Chapter 7
7
OWEN
Chubby cheeks and a gummy smile look back at me as I throw Poppy into the air, making her babble nonsense words and shriek with delight as the high motion makes her stomach drop, tickling her insides.
Landing with a splash in my arms, she kicks her little legs in the water again with excitement. “One more time,” I say.
Straightening my arms, I push her little body away from me. “Ready?” I throw her a giant smile, matching her giddy excitement.
We’ve been playing in the pool for the last hour and she’s like a jumping jellybean in the water. She loves it.
Marigold, Jade’s mother, sits under the parasol on one of the white patio chairs, placing a tray on the table with two glasses of freshly squeezed lemonade on it and a bowl of food and a drink for Poppy.
“You’re so good with her, Owen.” She gives Poppy a wave.
“She’s easily pleased, Marigold.” I repeat the same motion, and a high-pitched squeal leaves Poppy’s lungs as I throw her a little higher this time. Her smiles and laughter are contagious, causing me to laugh, too.
“Please call me Mari.” She looks at me with kind eyes. “And thank you for making lunch today and for looking after Poppy for me.”
“How are you feeling now?” Mari took a dizzy turn by the pool this morning, so I sent her to lie down and prepared lunch for us all while she rested.
“Better. I think it’s the heat. I’m not used to it.” She flicks her folded paper fan open and wafts her face with it.
I agree with her with a nod of my head. She’s a lovely woman and everything I wish my mother was—kind, caring, funny, compassionate, and supportive. She’s so proud of Jade, talking her up to me all day when we’ve been chatting. My mother would never dream of looking after her own grandchildren. Heck, she didn’t even bring us up, choosing to hire a governess for such unspeakable tasks instead.
That woman has the ability to love as much as a rock does.
I look up at the bright, sun-blessed sky and pull my sunglasses resting on my crown down to protect my eyes. “I think we should get you into the shade, Poppy.”
She now looks like Casper the Friendly Ghost, from the waterproof sunblock I smothered her in earlier, as instructed by Mari. I received a lengthy lecture, instructing me how to apply Poppy’s sun cream, warning me about a red-head’s skin being more susceptible to the sun’s harmful rays, followed by another lecture warning me on the dangers of the pool and how to keep Poppy safe, hence the pink inflatable armbands with printed strawberries and matching swim vest she’s wearing. I doubled up on the safety front. I want to prove to Jade and Mari that they can trust me with their precious cargo. Poppy is precious. All grabby hands and bumbling chatter. With the most beautiful copper curls, smiles, and blue eyes, just like her momma.
I haven’t heard her cry yet. She’s such a happy child, which is just as well as Mari hasn’t been well since her funny turn earlier. Her rosy-glow cheeks still haven’t returned.
“I’m so thankful you were here, Owen.” Mari takes a long sip of her lemonade.
“Happy to help, and it’s not as if I have anywhere else to be.”
With Poppy in my tight grip, I climb up the steps at the end of the pool to make my way over to Jade’s mom.
“You’ll be fine tomorrow, I’m sure. I think you’re right about the heat. Give it a few days, and we’ll all be acclimatized.” Thankfully, the clouds move in, momentarily hiding the sun.
Mari expertly wrangles Poppy into her highchair I brought over from their villa and scatters chopped up apple, strawberry, and banana onto the feeding tray in front of her. Immediately, Poppy grabs the fruit pieces, sucking them into her mouth, taking tiny bites with her only two front bottom teeth.
Mari and I situate ourselves around the table, sitting in comfortable silence.
Having never paid much attention to kids, or babies, before, I watch with fascination as Poppy tries to feed herself with the grace of an elephant doing ballet, while noisily bouncing her sippy cup full of water off the tray.
Poppy holds out a piece of squished banana for me to take. “You have it,” I tell her. “Poppy’s, not Owen’s.” I point to her and she takes that as permission to smoosh it into her mouth.
“Well, don’t you look beautiful now?” I chuckle as Poppy makes num num noises.
“She likes you,” Mari says with a smile.
I straighten out my wet shorts that are stuck to my legs. “ That’s because I fed her earlier, and made her tummy feel like she was on a roller coaster in the pool.”
“The perfect way to a girl’s heart, Owen; food and laughter.” A smirk plays along her lips. “But I didn’t mean Poppy. I meant Jade.”
My eyebrows shoot up in surprise.
“She spoke to me this morning before she shot off. She said she had a great night.” Mari smiles cheekily. “She looked happy. Glowing . Then she told me to find the panties she misplaced in the pool last night.”
Oh, my freaking God.
My face heats with embarrassment. “She’s adventurous,” is all I say, feeling slightly uncomfortable and not wanting to give anything away. She’s a daredevil and likes to live life on the edge doing insane flips and loops in that plane of hers.
“She said she went for a midnight dip.” She watches me squirm in my uncomfortable plastic seat. “By herself.”
“Right.” My throat dry, I audibly gulp and lean forward to take a mouthful of my juice.
“Did you not get a taxi home together?”
“No,” I lie.
“Hmmm.” She taps her chin with her pointer finger. “You know, I’m pretty certain when Gregor came over this morning, he asked Jade if she got home safely.” She theatrically pauses. “With you.”
My lemonade goes down the wrong way, making me cough and splutter everywhere. Poppy blows a raspberry in response as I wipe down my torso, which is now covered.
“That’s what I thought,” Mari mutters under her breath.
I clench my hand, coughing into it while I grab the pack of disposable wet wipes off the table to clean myself up .
“My girls are special to me, Owen.” Through narrowed eyes, she stares me down.
Clearing my throat, I scrunch the now dirty wet wipes into a neat ball and place them in the middle of the table.
“My husband died last year and they’re all I have.” Sounding melancholy, Mari lets out a deep sigh.
Nodding in response, I understand everything she’s not saying. Don’t hurt her.
Mari leans over and casually wipes the creamy banana out of Poppy’s curls. “Tell me about yourself, Owen. What’s going on in your world and how long do you plan on sticking around?” She pulls a baby wipe from the packet to clean her hands. “I know you fled here to get away from a marriage you didn’t want.” Preparing myself, I blow out a breath and tell Mari everything I told Jade last night.
She’s watching me intently as I finish, then says the most unexpected thing that blows me sideways. “You’re a man of honor and integrity.”
I disagree; that couldn’t be further from the truth. If I were honorable, I would have married Evangeline. “That’s not what my family thinks.” Or me.
“Well, it’s true. Your feelings are valid, Owen. Above all else, you honored them and stayed true to yourself. Being honorable doesn’t mean pleasing your family or anyone else. It means being honest and true to yourself.”
“You mean selfish,” I scoff.
“No,” she says firmly, swiping her hands through the air in front of her as if casting my words aside. “You believed in the truth and stood by it, knowing neither of you would be happy if you had gotten married. That rotten feeling you had in your gut as you stood at the altar is very telling; it was your inner alarm system going off, warning you of what your future held if you went through with it. And you knew it was unfair to put her, and yourself, through a loveless marriage. You did the right thing for both of you, regardless of what your family believes.” She leans forward and grabs my hand, then pats it. “You have principles, and you broke the archaic family tradition of what they distinguish as marriage. Marrying her for stature and financial stability, and vice versa, was a recipe for disaster.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Oh, yes, I do,” she replies, staring me down. “My father’s views on who I married weren’t exactly liberal. He expected me to become a nurse and marry a doctor or a surgeon. He even signed me up for nursing college behind my back. The day I came home and told him I had signed up to join the Royal Air Force as a clerical assistant, he was horrified. And that got worse when he discovered the weeks of grueling basic training I had to go through. Crawling through muddy grounds and obstacle courses, cleaning the blocks, field exercises, camping, chemical and biological lessons, rifle work, prepping uniforms, and shining shoes.” She chuckles as if remembering. “After basic training, I started on the lowest pay grade, living in single living accommodation in a room no bigger than a sardine can. Oh, no, my father was not happy at all. It wasn’t very ladylike.” She nods. “His words, not mine. But it’s how I met Andrew.”
“Jade’s father?”
She smiles fondly. “He was the most handsome man I had ever met.” Her eyes go dreamy. “I remember the day I arrived at my first posting. I was like a lost sheep with no idea what the heck I was doing or if I’d made the right decision to join up. Nerves, like a washing machine in my stomach, posted hundreds of miles away from home. I was barely eighteen.” Her eyes crinkle around the sides as she reminisces. “I had never been out of the little village in Kent I’d lived in all my life, and I couldn’t even drive. But I knew what I wanted. Becoming a nurse and marrying a surgeon wasn’t it.”
“Was your father mad at you?”
Mari picks up a slice of apple that Poppy has thrown on the ground and places it on top of the pile of used wipes. “Hopping mad,” she answers. “He didn’t even turn up to watch my Passing Out Parade after basic training. But then, when my mother told him I was courting a fast jet pilot, well now, that got his attention.” She throws me a cheeky wink. “And it wasn’t really the done thing, an officer going with a non-commission service woman.”
“I bet it wasn’t.” Amused at Mari’s rebellious ways, I chuckle softly.
“And the rest is history. Andrew and I married, and he wanted to start a family straightaway, but I wanted us to enjoy each other first. Not long after we married, they deployed me for months, and I hated being apart from him.” Her memories appear to make her smile even wider. “It forced my hand, and I left the Air Force because it was becoming too difficult to match my postings with Andrew’s, and when I left, I fell pregnant with Jade. From then on, we let the Air Force dictate where we lived. We were happy and had everything we wanted in life, so our location didn’t matter. We had lots of friends and each other. When Jade was only a few months old, we relocated to Lincolnshire after Andrew’s squadron moved stations, and there we stayed and settled. It’s where I still live.”
“There’s an air base near Castleview Cove at Licharty,” I tell her. It’s only three miles away from Castleview. As a little boy, I always loved the sound of the fast jets roaring by from the end of the pier, watching them take off and coming in to land out on the peninsula.
She chuckles fondly. “I know. It was a posting we always dreamed of. Your town and beaches are beautiful, but Andrew’s squadron was stationed in Lincolnshire.”
I nod in agreement. Our beaches are award-winning. It’s no wonder thousands of tourists travel from miles around to visit, even if it is just for the day.
Curious, I ask, “They don’t fly fast jets there any more, do they? Why not?”
“Something about a reshuffle. They always do that, then they realized they made a mistake and had to rethink the plan.” Mari reels off her intel. “There was a rumor that the base was closing down completely.”
“I heard that too. I also heard it’s going up for sale.”
“What the hell would you do with a military base with hundreds of homes and an airfield? You’d have to be mad to buy something like that,” she ponders.
I take a deep breath and ask Mari, “Do you regret any of the decisions you made?”
She replies in a heartbeat, “Not a single one. Everything I did, I did for me to begin with, then meeting Andrew and having him by my side throughout my career was the icing on the cupcake I wanted to share with him every day. We were very happy.”
“Wow,” I say, impressed at how badass Mari is. “You stuck to your guns.”
“I did because I knew what my father wanted for me was not what I wanted. I went out and found my dream. Made my own memories and created a legacy that will live on for years to come.”
“In Jade?” I ask, checking if that’s what she’s referring to.
“Yes. She’s special. Have you watched her flying? Her interviews? Being on camera? She shines.” She flicks her paper fan out to cool herself down as the sun has cracked out from behind the clouds again.
“No,” I answer honestly, with the sudden urge to look her up on the internet. I’ll most definitely be doing that later.
“She’s a star. My girl will go down in history. But had I followed my father’s plans for me, there would have been no Andrew and me, and ultimately no Jade.” She looks off across the pool in deep thought. “She inherited Andrew’s family’s talent for flying. Andrew and I, we made someone very special indeed.” She whispers her last thoughts.
Yeah, they did.
“Don’t play the game, Owen. Change it.” Mari finally shares her last words of wisdom.
Lost in my own thoughts, I realize I am getting my fresh start. To finally do whatever the hell I want. I don’t want to work in finance, because that’s what my father wanted me to do, or printing, attending boring machinery expos, balancing books or researching yet another complicated hedge fund or entering into a marriage to expand the business. Mari and Jade are both right. This is my opportunity to change course and take my shot; to break free and create my destiny.
As much as that scares me, it’s what I want.
The tumbling sensation that feels much like excitement bubbling in my stomach tells me it’s my time to take control of my life and to break free from my parents’ clutches. Internally, I make a vow to myself to discover what makes me want to hop out of bed in the morning, find a new career path and return to Castleview Cove self-sufficient. Or maybe never return at all. Maybe a new life awaits me elsewhere.
It’s farewell to Owen Brodie, heir to Castleview Printing Press, and hello to Owen Brodie, the man who sought his own destiny without knowing what that was. Sidenote: with a little help from his grandfather, who left him millions in trust .
I push my shoulders back, determination now running through my veins.
I can do this, and I will… whatever the hell this is.
Splitting the silence, Poppy bangs her sippy cup off the plastic food tray repeatedly, chanting mom, mom, mom, in time with her hammering. As she whacks it harder this time, the lid pops off with the pressure, then she pours the rest of the water over the top of her hair, leaving it there as if she’s wearing her cup as a hat.
Both Mari and I burst out laughing, then Mari says, “And of course, we wouldn’t have this little one either had Andrew and I never met, would we?” Mari stands too quickly, making her wobble on her feet and grab on to the table to steady herself.
I’m at my full height within seconds, hands on her elbows to support her. “Hey, I got you. Are you okay?” Concern drips from my lips. “We should text Jade.”
“No, don’t,” Mari snaps, then hangs her head. “I’m sorry, Owen. I didn’t mean to sound so stern.” She shakes her head. “Please don’t contact Jade. She’s busy and I don’t like her worrying about me. I think I need to lie down again.” Her pleading eyes speak volumes. “I felt better after I rested earlier. That’s all I need.” I notice her skin is paler now as she wipes her perspiration-covered brow.
I try to bury the niggle in my gut that there is a bigger underlying health issue causing Mari’s lightheadedness.
Reluctantly, I agree to not call Jade. I pull a wet and fruit salad-covered Poppy out of her highchair and order Mari to hook her arm into mine, carefully ushering her to their villa.
“Poppy needs her swimming diaper changed into a dry diaper, then she needs her nap.” Mari sounds concerned .
“I can help with all of that.”
Mari and I shuffle slowly to the forecourt and follow the path to the front of her villa.
Her eyebrows shoot skyward. “Have you ever changed a diaper before?”
“Never.”
“I’ll talk you through it.”
“Good plan.”
“She’s wrigglier than a worm, though.”
“I’ll be fine. It’s just a diaper.”
I help manage a three hundred-strong team of employees and run a production line in my father’s absence. I mean, what could go wrong?