Chapter 25 Cursum Perficio #2
I turned, rushing out of the room and back through the house until I was outside again. The heavy evening air felt too dense for my lungs. Gasping, I tugged at the collar of my blouse, undoing another button. Then came the soft press of a hand on my back and her honeyed voice in my ear.
“Take it easy, just breathe.” She rubbed the space between my shoulders.
I stood, and her hand fell away.
“What are you playing at, Francesca?”
She tilted her head, her lips pressed into a thin line.
“Why did you suggest that the Daltons pay for Jeremy and I…” I gasped for air again.
She stepped toward me, gripping my shoulders until I looked into her dark eyes. “Calm down, will you. Breathe.” She took slow breaths herself, drawing the air in and out, in and out. I copied her until my racing pulse calmed and my lungs remembered how to do it by themselves.
“There, that’s better.” Looking into my eyes, she tucked a strand of hair behind my ear and touched a cool palm to my cheek. “Walk with me,” she said.
Even after all this time, rage bubbled up inside me.
I didn’t want to walk with her; I wanted to slap her hand away and launch myself at her.
I wanted to scratch her insanely beautiful face and tear the luscious hair from her scalp.
But, as if enchanted by her siren song, I complied.
I hated my feet for going along with her, but our steps fell into sync until we reached Jane’s beloved rose garden.
I’d spent many afternoons out here pruning and preening these flowers.
Only the distant chirping of birds punctuated the silence between us, which felt as heavy as the air I’d been struggling to breathe.
I risked a glance at Francesca’s profile, the sharp angle of her jaw, the way her lip curved up in a half-smirk. She looked composed, amused even. It was infuriating. I wanted to see her fracture with the pain that had broken me.
She stopped and hovered her hand over a vibrant crimson bloom. I thought she was about to pluck it from its stem; instead she turned, her eyes meeting mine, and gestured towards a low stone bench.
“Sit with me.”
My brain was outraged that my body yielded to yet another of her commands without protest.
Francesca closed her eyes and tipped her face to the sky, where streaks of pink stretched across it like long, slender fingers.
It was my voice that cracked into the moment. “Why did you plant the seeds about a practice?”
She turned to look at me. “I’ve missed you,” she said.
“What?”
Her wry smile triggered an involuntary reaction that had me no longer wanting to scratch her face but kiss it. I shook my head to recalibrate.
“You have no idea how much I missed you, Catherine.”
I swallowed, my mouth suddenly dry again. “But you, you and Jeremy. You’re with…”
“It’s different.” Francesca waved a dismissive hand through the air. “You know it’s different. It’s always your face my mind drifts to when I need to escape.”
I stared at her for a long moment. My eyes on hers, dark with the depths I’d once lost myself in. It would be so easy to fall again. “I, er… I don’t understand. What are you saying?”
Francesca released a small sigh, as if exasperated by my unrelenting need for clarification. She reached up and swiped a gentle thumb across my cheekbone.
“I don’t want us to fight anymore, Catherine.” She leaned closer, her voice a silken whisper that seemed to wind its way around me. “You and me, we’re—”
Jeremy’s voice boomed from behind, shattering the moment. “There you both are.”
Francesca stiffened beside me, and her hand fell away from my face.
“Supper’s ready,” Jeremy said, drawing nearer.
“We’ll be there in a moment.” Francesca turned and forced a smile.
Jeremy’s shoulders rounded as he sloped back towards the house. Francesca squeezed a hand on my thigh.
“Look, trust me, okay? Whatever’s discussed at dinner, I need you to understand that I have your interests at heart too.”
I frowned. “Sorry, I don’t—”
“Shhh!” She silenced me by pressing her finger to my lips.
Holding it in place, she leaned in and softly kissed it.
Like a traitorous drum, my heart beat a frantic rhythm in my chest. I hated myself for wanting more, for surrendering so easily.
She hadn’t even apologised for what she’d done.
Yet here I was, entranced and exposed amidst the ruins of my crumbling walls.
Francesca’s eyes flicked toward the house. “There isn’t time now, but I’ll find you later, okay?”
I could only nod. She stood and pulled me to my feet.
A potent cocktail of confusion, desire and self-loathing swirled in my stomach as I took a seat between Dad and Jasper.
Unfortunately, Francesca and Jeremy sat opposite me, affording me a full-frontal view of their saccharine display.
Francesca turned on a show for her audience, the sound of her hollow laughter tinkling in the air as she leaned in to Jeremy.
She picked a piece of lint off his shirtsleeve, then laid her slender, manicured hand in its place.
The intimate moment, played out with such practiced ease, felt like a slap across the face.
I poured a glass of water from a crystal carafe and gulped it down; the cool liquid did little to quell the heat rising in my cheeks.
Jane’s staff bustled around with quiet efficiency, setting down hot, crusty rolls and small plates adorned with tiny works of culinary art. The clatter of cutlery filled the air.
“So, Catherine,” Jasper boomed. “Jeremy tells me he’s relayed the good news.”
“Sorry?”
“We’re going to be your first investors — Dalton and Truscote!”
In the Francesca haze, I’d all but forgotten Jeremy’s revelation. Now my back was against the wall. Jasper eyed me, awaiting a response.
“Oh, right. Yes, of course. I’m a little overwhelmed, to be honest. It’s…it’s…”
Dad jumped in where I floundered. “It’s very generous of you. Thank you sincerely from both of us. For this and for all the opportunities you’ve given Catherine.”
My heart sank. There was no backing out of it now. “Thank you,” I echoed.
Jasper shook his head. “No, not at all. It’s our pleasure to see our young people thriving and having such a clear path ahead of them.” With great bombast, Jasper raised his glass. “To Dalton a gesture probably intended to put me at ease, but it put me more on edge, like I was the butt of a joke I didn’t understand.
I concentrated on the food on my plate as the conversation turned to Francesca and Jeremy’s travel adventures.
Jane and Jasper’s faces glowed with adoration as Francesca held court and recounted the highlights of their trip.
From Paris to the sun-drenched Riviera, where they’d sipped rosé on the beaches of Nice and Cannes.
And from the electric buzz of Barcelona to Rome, where they’d hired mopeds and eaten in trattorias straight out of a Fellini film.
Jeremy nodded enthusiastically and threaded his fingers with Francesca’s as she spoke.
“It all nearly ended in disaster though,” he said.
Jane leaned in. “Oh, do tell.”
“I left Francesca to catch her breath on the Spanish Steps while I nipped off to get a gelato. By the time I returned, the damned thing was dripping through my fingers, but being the generous chap I am, of course I offered her a lick—”
Francesca rolled her eyes dramatically. “He dribbled it all over my silk scarf.”
Jane gasped.
“I swear, if looks could kill, it would’ve been the end of me,” said Jeremy.
“I hope you got Francesca’s scarf dry cleaned,” said Jane.
“No, I went one better.” Jeremy beamed at Francesca, and she conceded with a smile. “I bought her a Valentino to replace it.”
“Good boy!” Jane clapped her hands.
Jasper chuckled. “Goodness me, wrapped around her little finger, aren’t you, son?”
“Quite right,” said Jane.
My mood darkened with the sky. As if sensing my struggle, Dad nudged my leg under the table. I looked at him. He raised his eyebrows and mouthed, “Are you okay?”
I gave him a brief nod before returning my focus to the pattern on the plates; it was far more interesting than the insipid travel tales I was being forced to endure.
Truth was, I wished it had been me. Perhaps if I could’ve afforded to traipse around Europe for two years and buy Francesca designer silk scarves on a whim, then she’d be looking at me the way she was looking at Jeremy.
But then, less than an hour ago in the rose garden, she had been looking at me like that; when she kissed the finger she placed on my lips, and when she asked me to trust her.
How could I trust her when I knew at least one version of her was lying right now?
The conversation moved on to “unforgettable” Berlin. At this point, even Dad seemed a little mesmerised by Francesca’s storytelling. Traitor.
“We arrived just months after the wall came down. It was wild. There was this sense of…” She drew a long breath as if more air would help her articulate her point. “…something huge unfolding around us. You could feel the energy of the city being reborn.”
Nods and murmurs passed around the table.
“I literally saw Vrubel claim his grey canvas on the East Side Gallery.” She fixed her dark eyes on me and said, “My God, help me to survive this deadly love.”