Chapter 36
Toni wasn’t sure she trusted her heart as she pulled into the car park at the squat, red-brick office building. Dawdling to the sign announcing which businesses were housed in the complex, there it was, right at the bottom, as though recently added: Kinetic S.r.l.
She’d been on the company’s website earlier that day and found a press release in English: the Italian tech company had recently won a tender to provide their optimisation services to the National Grid, with a new office set up in… Weymouth, in this shared office space by Radipole Lake.
Her jaw wobbling, she ran her fingers over the new sticker with the logo. How could he do all this and still think she needed time? He thought love wasn’t enough? He’d just proved himself wrong.
Maybe he couldn’t say the words, but this giant step in her direction – literally, if he was planning to man this office himself, or figuratively at least – was more than a confession of love and if he thought she needed to take things slow, he was wrong. She had to see him now.
Clutching the small bag she’d brought as a prop to help her make her point in a way he’d immediately understand, she headed inside, waiting as the building receptionist finished up a call. But the answer to her query wasn’t the one she’d hoped for.
‘There’s no one in at the moment,’ he said apologetically. ‘He’s a bit eccentric, the new guy in that office.’
Toni bit her lip over the thrill in her chest. Yes, he was a bit eccentric. ‘Let me guess, it’s full of plants?’
‘Bursting,’ the receptionist confirmed. ‘Smells like a roast dinner – with dessert mixed in as well. He left about half an hour ago – had some kind of surfboard on top of his car, I noticed. He’s got a little electric SUV – a cool ride. Brand new, I think.’
‘Did he say where he was going?’ Toni asked before the receptionist could wax lyrical about the car.
‘No, he just muttered something about the levante. I thought it might be some kind of restaurant.’
Toni paused, the word familiar at the edge of her mind. She thanked the receptionist and wandered back out to her car, her mind racing. She was far too impatient for a puzzle.
The surfboard was obviously a sailboard for windsurfing and the levante… Hurrying the last few steps to her car, she dived in and groped for her phone, opening a web browser. Yes, she’d been right. The ‘levante’ was the wind – the east wind, more specifically.
She chuckled to herself, picturing Gabri rushing out of the office early to catch the ideal winds.
At least she could be certain he wouldn’t fall into his previous trap of overwork and burnout.
She was suddenly desperate to be out there with him, clutching the boom as she skated over the water.
In her distraction, she’d forgotten she’d intended to join a windsurfing club.
Maybe she’d be able to teach Cillian one day – or Gabri would.
The future opened up ahead of her as tears pricked her eyes. She just had to find him first.
Thinking back to her lesson at Procchio, where he’d steadied her gently and taught her to feel the wind, she realised that levante wind could lead her right to him. One more search and she had her answer: an east wind was best at Overcombe. She’d find him at Overcombe beach.
Shoving her car into gear, she stomped on the accelerator and turned the car north-east.
The shingle crunching under her feet fifteen minutes later, Toni took a deep breath of salty air and gazed out to sea with a smile.
It wasn’t quite Elba – it was missing a few degrees of warmth on this cloudy August day – but she could still appreciate the rush of the wind over her skin and the views of the distant headlands, the holiday attitude she’d brought home with her, partly because of Gabri.
The isola would always be there to return to, but she hoped Gabri could be happy here – with her.
There were a few windsurfers out, enough that she struggled to work out which of the figures in dark wetsuits zipping over the surface of the water was Gabri. Then a wild idea assailed her and nothing else would do.
She made her way to the shop offering equipment hire over the road from the beach.
The waves were stronger than in the cove at Procchio and it took several attempts for her to get the board out to a place where she could safely get up. Her hands shook and for a moment, she wondered if this had been a stupid idea.
She’d only done this once and Gabri had been there to soothe her nerves and talk her through it.
But she’d been through challenge after challenge with no guidebook for years of her life and this was important, so she took a deep breath to still her clamouring heart, paused to feel the direction of the wind, checked she’d aligned the board in the right direction and then pushed up with all her determination.
It wasn’t pretty, but she clambered up onto her knees without tumbling off again.
Groping for the uphaul rope, she made it to a standing position, her foot shoved in the front strap, without losing her balance, and then she was in the wind – strong and capable and alive with speed and movement.
With a sizzle of adrenaline, she wondered how quickly she’d be able to afford her own foil.
Once she’d found her feet and made her way a little farther from the beach, she scanned the surf for a familiar figure, doing her best to ignore the shot of worry that her logic had been flawed and he wasn’t even here.
But then she caught a flash of a familiar moustache on a dark-haired man currently turning his board into a lively wave. He hopped neatly over it, getting a little air, fine-tuning his stance to maintain balance.
A grin pulling on her lips, she lifted a hand in a wild wave, growing wilder the longer it took for him to notice her.
‘Gabri!’ The wind stole the word from her mouth and still, he didn’t see her.
Painstakingly adjusting the angle of the foil, she attempted to head in his direction – and suddenly found herself hurtling much faster than she’d intended. When she was making straight for him at a speed she wasn’t comfortable with, he finally saw her.
‘Ehi, Toooonnii!’
She didn’t quite run into him, but he had to pull up quickly and then his foil was tipping into the water. In a panic, she hopped off her board after him, but he came up immediately, spluttering something about Jesus and the saints, shaking his hair out of his eyes, droplets in his moustache.
‘Cristo, it’s cold! Why is it so cold?’
‘Welcome to the English Channel,’ she said, not quite managing to stifle a smile.
‘No wonder we call it the “sleeve” in Italian. You need long sleeves to swim here!’
‘I think it’s pretty mild today. I used to swim in winter occasionally. Maybe we could get into that this year,’ she said, thoughtfully tapping her chin.
‘You’re either very strong or out of your head.’ He paused, as though only just now appreciating that she was here in the water with him – making plans for the winter using the word ‘we’. ‘I know how strong you are.’
‘And I am a little out of my head,’ she said softly.
‘Really?’ His voice barely carried over the wind.
‘It seems like you are too.’
‘Oh, I am.’ His smile grew slowly, his blue eyes as wide as the horizon as he stared at her. ‘I’m quite lost.’
‘I’ve just found you,’ she pointed out.
‘So you have.’ He was closer now, one arm draped over his board. ‘I didn’t expect to see you.’
‘Gabri, you left a trail of clues for me to follow. Of course I’d find you.’
‘It wasn’t a trail of clues. I was trying to give you space.’
‘And time. I know. That’s what you told Ginny and Andreas.’
‘You’re quite a close-knit bunch at Great Heart and I Do,’ he commented.
‘Oh, Ginny can’t keep a secret at the best of times,’ Toni replied drily, although she wholeheartedly agreed with him. ‘You gave me a rosemary bush and a thistle instead of talking to me,’ she accused.
His eyes widened. ‘I didn’t think you—’
‘You’re the one who said we should keep talking to each other.’
He considered his answer for a long moment, then licked his lips before replying, ‘Last time we talked, we didn’t get very far.’
‘I thought that too,’ she agreed softly. ‘But the rosemary bush… Were you trying to make me cry?’
‘Noooo,’ he said, his expression pained. ‘I mean, unless the crying was constructive. The thistle was for you – for us – but the rosemary bush is something else. It’s for him – your husband. I wanted to pay my respects.’
Her blood rushed in her ears as she met his solemn gaze. ‘Why?’ she prompted.
‘Why?’ he repeated, his voice high. A wave hit and his board drew further away. But he lifted his chin, shouting his answer over the wind. ‘Because he loved you.’
Toni sucked in a sharp breath.
He kept speaking. ‘He loved you first,’ he added gently. ‘That’s why I want to pay my respects. If you like, I’ll plant it in your garden.’
She needed to throw her arms around him, hold on to him while the poignancy of his words made their changes in her heart. The reasons she’d fallen in love with him crystallised in her mind and her feelings made perfect sense, for once.
He shivered violently. ‘Perhaps the English Channel isn’t the place for this discussion.’
‘You’re right. We wouldn’t want you to get hypothermia before we’ve got to the good part.’
He eyed her, but after what he’d put her through, she didn’t mind making him wonder for a moment.
After fighting the waves back to the beach, he helped her haul her board up onto the shingle, then reached out a hand, staring as though he were still having trouble believing she was standing in front of him, unsure whether he could touch her or not.
‘Why are you here in Weymouth?’ she managed to ask.
‘Practical, level-headed Toni,’ he began, her name spoken in the same tone as amore, the endearment that had sometimes fallen from his lips on Elba. ‘I’m here for you.’