Chapter Twenty-Nine
Emerald was having a surprisingly interesting time working at her cousin Suzie’s gallery, apart from missing her old friends at Hot Air Aviation, and of course Marco. Suzie was happy to let her stay in her spare room and had immediately offered her a job at the gallery, persuading her to frame some of her paintings and sell them.
Suzie hadn’t asked any awkward questions, much to Emerald’s relief, as she couldn’t bear to relate what a gullible fool she’d been. She also couldn’t utter Marco’s name without her voice cracking. She wanted to hate him for what he’d done, but found it infuriatingly hard to work up the requisite anger.
Suzie had also given Emerald access to her airy loft where she was successfully venting her rage in the medium of oil paints, creating vivid and turbulent seascapes in the dead of night when she couldn’t sleep.
It was impossible for Emerald to banish the images of Marco from her mind: the gentle smile that she’d thought was reserved just for her, and his spontaneous laugh when they had chased each other on the beach, Emerald amazed to discover that he wasn’t perennially grumpy. But she refused to paint his likeness anymore. At such times pain ate away at her heart, and her wild brushstrokes of the African savannah seemed to dull it somehow. Even though she knew he’d used her for his own means, she still ached to hear his voice and she would often close her eyes in the dark, imagining his voice in her ear as he whispered her name.
She brought her mind back to the present and opened the cabinet on the counter to tidy up the jewellery display. Sparkling diamonds nestled next to pearls in exotically designed brooches, along with Ceylon Emeralds and cabochons. The astronomical price tags were an indicator of the type of clientele Suzie had garnered, although the complicated locking system in the gallery was a bit of a giveaway.
Her cousin was discussing one of Emerald’s African scenes with a client who was just out of earshot and she marvelled at her selling persuasion. She was shocked at the high price Suzie had suggested for her paintings, and even more surprised at how quickly they were selling, considering she’d only wanted to top up her wage from the gallery work.
It was the difference between sinking and swimming, so even though her heart was starved of love, at least her body had sustenance. The large African scenes were the best sellers, but she had also sold two pictures of Edinburgh Castle and one of the Highland Guard playing the bagpipes, although she had felt as if she was losing a piece of her soul when she’d bubble-wrapped it for the customer, never to see it again.
Working in the gallery was not the same as her old job though. She missed flying and she craved Finbar’s daily bitchiness and humour and the camaraderie that was Hot Air Aviation.
So Emerald couldn’t help herself but wonder if her daydreaming had taken on a surreal edge when she heard an all too familiar call her name, with an inflection that could only be Italian. Her eyes widened in panic when she heard her name called again.
‘Emerald?’
Marco?
The air whooshed out from her lungs on his name, stunned as she was to see him. ‘Mr Cavarelli?’
She was gratified to see his brow furrow at her use of his title. She would never again call him Marco. He didn’t deserve it. She hated the way that her breath hitched, though, when she spoke his name.
‘Emerald, how have you been?’
‘Unemployed.’
He shook his head slightly, as if accepting that she wasn’t going to make it easy for him.
‘We need to talk, I think.’
‘I don’t think we do.’ Her heart rate quickened and her skin prickled with heat and she resented that he could do that to her body, when he had been so obviously absent from touching it. She also hated him for looking so casually gorgeous and unflappable, while she was flustered and fractious from sleepless nights. She wanted to yell at him and throw things to make him see what he had done to her, while he just stood there, the epitome of reasonableness and composure.
‘Do you know how hard it has been to find you?’
‘Is the answer very ?’ She needed to be cooler than cool, even though her legs were trembling behind the counter.
Marco walked towards her, then stopped and just stared at her, as if drinking her in. He breathed in, paused and then spoke. ‘I didn’t come here to fight. It was all a misunderstanding — I didn’t dismiss you.’
‘No, what you did was worse. You betrayed me — and duped me into betraying my colleagues.’
‘If we are being pedantic, I already knew everything about my staff, you just confirmed it.’ Then he flinched at his words as if realising too late that he wasn’t helping his cause.
Emerald’s eyes widened. ‘Don’t you dare turn this around on me. Just leave, please.’
‘Please, Emerald, talk to me.’
‘There is nothing to say.’
Marco took a step forward, his hands held out, imploring. ‘I think there is. And if I have to do all the talking, then so be it. Just hear me out.’
‘I’ve done enough listening . What I didn’t do was enough thinking, to realize how false your words were — along with your shallow emotions.’
Marco recoiled at her words. ‘I never lied to you, Emerald, please believe me and—’
Emerald cut him off. ‘This is not the place to be having this discussion, Mr Cavarelli.’
‘Will you stop with the Mr Cavarelli, for God’s sake—’
Emerald turned towards her cousin whose eyes were on stalks as she looked at Emerald and then Marco, and back again to Emerald. ‘ Mr Cavarelli is just leaving.’
‘Oh, stop being childish, for heaven’s sake,’ Marco butted in. ‘This is the real world. Hot Air is just a two-bit airline that needed shaking up. We need to move on from it and discuss our relationship.’ He compressed his lips, realising once again that he was handling the situation badly. He should have prepared better for it.
‘How dare you be so casual with people’s lives — with my life. How dare you think it’s fine to call in and speak to me as if what happened between us was a simple business trade-off! If you don’t leave now, I will not be responsible for my actions.’ Her eyes darted around the counter and she picked up a heavy bronze statue.
Suzie was by her side in seconds. ‘No, please don’t throw that one.’ She prized it out of Emerald’s fingers and picked up a china figurine. ‘This one’s much less valuable — I think it might even be a fake Davenport.’ She pushed the figurine into Emerald’s hand.
‘If it helps, throw the bronze. I’ll pick up the bill,’ Marco said, eyeing the statue warily.
‘You can’t buy your way out of everything.’ Emerald slammed the figurine back on the counter, her breath heaving in her chest. ‘You make me so angry.’
‘You don’t say?’ Marco’s eyebrows rose slightly. ‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry that I’ve upset you. Please meet me when you’ve finished work. I really want to put this right.’
‘Why would I want to meet you, Mr Cavarelli, when I’ve spent every waking moment trying to erase you from my mind?’
Marco wiped a hand over his face and huffed out an exasperated breath. He stared at Emerald, who stared back, unblinking.
‘Okay, you win,’ he said eventually, as he shook his head and placed a business card on the table. ‘Just in case you have mislaid my number.’ His smile was strained and Emerald noted the lines around his eyes. Good , she thought. He deserves to suffer .
Marco’s hand hovered over the card. He looked into Emerald’s eyes, and for a moment their eyes locked and it was just the two of them, their eyes full of pain and longing.
But Emerald could not forgive so easily. She pulled her gaze away, focusing on the wall behind him. ‘Goodbye,’ she said.
Marco gave her a last pleading look but when she didn’t respond, turned his back on her and walked out of the gallery.
‘Good. Very good. I’m glad he’s gone. Very glad,’ Emerald reiterated to no one in particular. Her fingers itched to pick up the figurine and hurl it anyway, but instead she simply watched the love of her life disappear down the street, the fight draining out of her.
He had come looking for her — that meant something, surely? But she was so angry with him still and couldn’t stand to talk to him. She wanted to forgive him — but could never forgive him.
‘So, that was the man who screwed you over so badly?’ Suzie asked.
‘Yes,’ Emerald answered limply, spent of energy. She should have realized Suzie would guess her troubles were because of a man.
‘Looks to me like a guy worth fighting for.’
‘He’s not.’
‘Your call.’ She shrugged and picked up the business card, reading the front of it. ‘Isles of Scilly, eh?’
Emerald grabbed the card from Suzie’s hand and studied it. ‘He bought the hotel, then. He’s a fast mover.’ She took a deep breath. Crying was not an option. ‘And I don’t care.’ For a moment, she wanted to clamp the card close to her chest, but she instead traced a finger over the embossed writing before ripping it into shreds, watching as the pieces drifted towards the bin.
* * *
Emerald was surprised and, frankly, quite put out when six weeks passed and Marco hadn’t been in touch. She’d thought he might bombard her with messages now he knew where she was, or laughably, thought he might send tokens of love — the occasional bunch of roses wouldn’t have gone amiss. She’d even taken to opening the post, fingers trembling when anything that looked like a card arrived. It was usually an invitation to a gallery opening and she now steeled herself to be disappointed. Maybe trying to brain him with a bronze statue was enough to turn him off the idea of sharing his life with her, she thought. She smiled for a brief moment, although her heart was breaking.
She tried to put him out of her mind and even managed it occasionally, although the nights were bad, when her memories assailed her. She did very little apart from go to work at Suzie’s gallery and come home again, wondering how long it would take before she felt a stirring of happiness, or a semblance of peace. She hoped what she was feeling was a form of grief and it would be just a matter of time before she could live and breathe without the shadow of Marco darkening her every move.
Another month passed and, with a view to moving forward — or so she told herself — she finally arranged to meet Finbar in Covent Garden, a mixture of happiness and trepidation making her stomach roil. She wanted to hear all of the gossip but dreaded hearing that Marco, too might have moved forward — specifically, with another woman. If anyone knew anything about him it would be Finbar, who no doubt had his every move recorded. She hoped that he wouldn’t include juicy details of bronzed Amazonian women, or any women at all, although the odds were slight that Marco would not have found someone else: someone better and more suited to his lifestyle.
But Finbar was mostly full of the news of his promotion to Cabin Services Manager of the newly formed airline Midnight Skies — the new title that he claimed as his own brilliance, of course, and was excited to relate the story of how the two aircraft had arrived on a foggy Scilly Isles day and were the only ones that had managed to land.
Moreover, Finbar seemed to have been turned by Mr Cavarelli too, and was positively gushing about his unbounded business acumen. ‘He got a fabulous deal with a travel agent and we are now specialising in stargazing packages. He’s put a domed roof on the hotel, and although it’s not even finished, people are booking it for next year. It’s attracting the sort of rich people who love the outdoors, but would rather see it from the confines of a sumptuous hotel, and of course they can show off their knowledge to their partners without the inconvenience of actually going outside.’
A pensive look came over Finbar’s face as he glanced upwards, as if he could see the heavenly skies as he spoke. ‘You should see it, Emerald. You wouldn’t believe how gorgeous the stars are on a clear night out there.’
Emerald didn’t need to imagine it. She would never forget the evening of the high tide when she was in the Scilly Isles, looking out at the turbulent sea with the navy sky dotted with crystal stars above it. Marco was by her side then, warm and responsive. She wondered if Marco occasionally remembered their magical night together. It would stay etched on her mind forever. She thought she’d found her soulmate that evening, only for it all to come crashing down like the waves outside the window.
She put such intimate thoughts out of her mind as Finbar continued. ‘I just can’t understand why he didn’t use my suggestions though — what an opportunity he missed there.’
‘Which were?’ Emerald prepared herself.
‘Well, we had a promo flight and invited loads of journalists and influencers, with fabulous food and champagne. I suggested bow ties that squirted water, magicians, a clown or two, jugglers — you know as in-flight entertainment in the aisles and a brilliant play on the name — Scilly Isles. Dismissed the lot of it, miserable git.’ Finbar sighed. ‘I would have loved it.’
Emerald could picture Finbar in his element with a red and yellow bow tie that squirted out water as he juggled brightly coloured balls in the aisles. She smiled at the thought. ‘It would have been brilliant,’ she said, knowing that Marco would have hated it.
‘Hmm, I guess. Oh, Emms, we miss you so much — why don’t you come back? Mr Cav. — Mr Cavarelli to you, hasn’t been seen for a month or so — you wouldn’t even have to bump into him.’
Emerald experienced another kick to her heart on hearing that Marco had finally taken a back seat. He always said he would. It was the acquisition and the fight he loved the most, and turning it around until it was profitable. And now she was sure he had hot-footed it back to his home town, so he could whizz around the mountain roads he loved so much in his rich man’s car impressing some gorgeous blonde in the passenger seat. She wanted to weep.
Suddenly the light had gone from the day. ‘He didn’t exactly try very hard to win me back, did he?’ Marco had hardly ever been absent from Hot Air Aviation, always interfering and fussing, and now he had gone for good. She tried to feel relieved that she could put an end to that part of her life, but her smile drooped.
‘I have to confess that I’m a bit puzzled by his inaction to get you back . . . He acted as if he’d move heaven and earth and then pfft.’ Finbar snapped his fingers. ‘You didn’t actually throw that priceless bronze at him, did you?’
She laughed. ‘No. Trust you to remember that bit. I wish I had flattened him with it, to be honest, at least I’d know why he’s not been in touch again. Probably wouldn’t have even dented the bronze with his thick head.’
‘But anyway, I thought you’d be pleased to hear that he’d gone? You said you hated him.’ Finbar’s eyebrows lifted, his two silver-stud piercings moving in unison on his left eyebrow. Finbar knew how to play the game and he was completely playing her now.
‘I am — I did hate him, but I can’t seem to forget him. It’s so annoying!’ She glanced at Finbar and did a double take. ‘I hope you don’t try to get away with wearing that hardware on your face at work, especially now there’s no one to stop you,’ she added, hoping to change the conversation.
He smiled ruefully. ‘It’s no fun now, trying to be a nonconformist when I’m practically the manager — the naughtiness has gone out of it. It’d be like trying to wind myself up. You should ask for your job back, you know, I’m sure Mr Cav. would consider it. I could even re-appoint you — probably.’
Emerald shook her head. ‘I couldn’t work anywhere near him now.’
‘Because you’re still in love with him.’ It was a declaration, not a question.
‘I’m trying hard not to be.’ She rested her chin on her hand, her thoughts far away on the Isles of Scilly. ‘Marco’s moved on. He’s finished what he came to do and will be back to annoying the natives in Florence — might already have founded another small empire and . . .’ Her voice cracked. ‘Broken another heart.’
Finbar offered her his hand and she took it, holding on tight. She looked him in the eye for a moment before continuing. ‘It was an easy conquest, wasn’t it? I don’t suppose he had a clue that I had no idea what I was supposed to do when it came to love. Think Marco might be my last attempt at it, too. I’m obviously no good at it.’
‘Don’t say that. I’ll always love you.’
She tutted but gave a small smile. ‘Fat lot of good that will do me. But let’s not focus on my disastrous love life. I have some good news. I’ve been selling my art at Suzie’s gallery. Actually selling paintings, not just putting price tags on for people to laugh at the absurdity of it. It could even become my new career.’
Finbar’s forehead creased. ‘What paintings? Hang on, those scary pictures on your walls are your own?’
‘Yep.’ Emerald looked abashed. ‘Sorry.’
‘And you never said.’ His eyebrows lifted and his kohl-rimmed eyes widened. ‘Wow.’ A pause. ‘And they’re selling? Bloody hell — selling ?’ he asked, shaking his head as if he’d just witnessed a miracle.
Emerald smiled at his obvious shock. ‘In fact, I’ve been invited to attend a gallery open evening in Mayfair — so that has to be a good sign, right? I will schmooze with dealers and convince them to come and visit Suzie’s gallery. And they might just notice my paintings hanging there.’
Finbar patted her hand. ‘I’m sure it’s your ticket to fame and fortune. Just don’t forget your old mates when you’re hobnobbing with your betters.’
‘Finbar, I have about three friends in the whole world and you’re the best of the lot, so I’m hardly likely to forget you, am I?’
Finbar brightened. ‘And you never know, you might meet your Prince Charming at the exhibition.’
She smiled bleakly. ‘I don’t think Prince Charming exists — and if he did he’d probably be gay knowing my luck.’
‘You’re right, of course, so make sure you give me a call, if he appears,’ Finbar said. ‘I’m far better at this lurve thing than you. Now come on, cheer up, it’s all coming good.’
Emerald gave him another wan smile.
‘Good girl. Now, let’s celebrate your talent for wielding a paintbrush so splendidly. An ice cream I think.’
‘Let’s not forget my total inability to cope with the opposite sex — surely that’s worth celebrating, too?’
Finbar nodded. ‘The I Scream Parlour is the place to be, and the ice creams are on me.’
‘With sprinkles on?’ Emerald asked.
‘Definitely. Chocolate flake and sauce too, don’t you think?’