Chapter Three #2
As Marcus finished his spiel and went to lead them to the next painting, she caught up with the woman. ‘You’ll be better off getting the audio guide,’ she murmured in her ear. ‘He has no idea what he’s talking about.’
The woman smiled back at her. ‘Oh, hello,’ she said. ‘Yes, I know. I can smell the bullshit from here. But I’ve paid, so I might as well stay to the end.’
She winked, to show she had the measure of the situation. She was clearly less vulnerable than she seemed.
Olivia moved away, her heart pounding, searching for her love in the crowds, and as soon as she found him she slipped her arm into his and felt safe. Christopher was her now; her present and her future. She should leave the past behind.
‘Oh, there you are,’ he said happily. ‘I was wondering where you’d got to.’
Later, in the gift shop, while Christopher went to the café, Olivia picked out a sheaf of postcards to put up in the kitchen. She was just leaving the till when she felt a hand on her shoulder. She whirled round.
‘Marcus!’
‘I thought it was you,’ he said, and then his face took on an expression of deep hurt. ‘Where were you?’ He shook his head in disbelief, his eyes full of anguish. ‘I waited and waited, thinking you would turn up any minute. But you never did.’
Olivia tried to make sense of what he was saying.
‘What do you mean?’
‘The train to Nice. Where were you?’ he said again.
‘Where were you?’ she said finally. ‘I was there at half past five. Platform six. Gare de Lyon.’
He stared at her. ‘Gare de Lyon?’ He frowned. ‘But we were supposed to be getting the night train. From Gare d’Austerlitz.’
Her mouth went dry. ‘You said Gare de Lyon. I’m positive. Why else would I go there?’
He shook his head. ‘Gare d’Austerlitz,’ he repeated. ‘Oh, Olivia. I can’t believe it. For all these years, I thought you’d run out on me. I was devastated. I got on that train with a broken heart.’
She stared at him. Had it really been a misunderstanding all along? Had she lived more than fifteen years of her life with her heart broken into pieces because of a simple mix-up? The possibility changed everything. He moved in a little closer and she felt herself tense.
Should she believe him?
‘It’s so good to see you,’ he murmured. ‘I never forgot you. I thought about you every day.’
She tightened her grip on the little paper bag holding her postcards.
She wasn’t going to admit to anything, least of all her feelings.
She didn’t trust him. Not one bit. She was not the sort of person who got a train station wrong.
And he was more than capable of spinning her a line to prove his innocence.
No, she thought. He had slithered away with more than five hundred pounds of her hard-earned cash. A fortune to her at the time.
‘It’s good to see you too,’ she managed eventually, playing for time while she gathered her thoughts.
‘What are you doing in Venice?’ he asked.
‘Oh, just a work trip,’ she ad-libbed. She wasn’t going to mention it was her honeymoon. Thank goodness she’d pulled on her gloves, ready for the chill November air, so he wouldn’t see her rings.
‘Are you on your own?’
‘In theory.’ She flashed him a teasing smile, hating herself for it, but it was the only way to stay ahead of the game, to lull him into a false sense of security, to let him think he still had power.
‘Well, if you have time for a drink while you’re here . . .’ He pulled a card out of his breast pocket. ‘We could talk over old times. They were good, weren’t they?’
Moonlit cobbled streets. The silver Seine, Notre-Dame towering over them. A bridge at midnight; lost in each other as he whispered promises and painted her a picture so dazzling . . .
She stared at the card. Marcus Tremlett, Art Consultant and Guide, it read, accompanied by a cell phone number.
She smiled. ‘You finally succumbed to a mobile.’
He shrugged. ‘Needs must. All my bookings are done online. All my payments. It’s all automatic. No delays in paying me these days.’ He gave a rueful grin.
How did he have the gall? She told herself this was not the place to make a scene.
He gave her a quizzical look, as if everything she was thinking was written on her face. Perhaps it was, for she wasn’t good at hiding her feelings.
‘I must go. My party is waiting.’ He leaned in to press his cheek against hers in a farewell.
Once, it would have made her giddy, the touch of his skin, but now she gritted her teeth.
She caught a drift of his cologne – égo?ste by Chanel.
How appropriate. It had made her stomach turn over whenever she smelled it on another man for years afterwards.
‘I’ve got the afternoon off tomorrow. I usually go to the café in Campo Santo Stefano . . .’
He held her gaze. She gave the slightest nod, then stared after him as he swaggered away. She was delighted to see the hair was thinning at the back of his head. Did he know? He wouldn’t be happy if he did.
On the other side of the postcard stand, Rebecca watched Marcus go.
She’d heard every word from her vantage point.
Surely Olivia wasn’t falling for his oily charm?
It was obvious they had history, and Rebecca knew his type.
She’d clocked him from the moment she’d latched on to the tour, insinuating herself amidst the other women.
If he’d asked for her booking details, she’d have slipped away to the cloakroom; years of dodging ticket inspectors on the train came in handy.
She’d grown up surrounded by men like him.
Lotharios and narcissists, silver-tongued and morally bankrupt, out for themselves but unwilling to do an honest day’s work.
She could spot them at fifty paces. They were always putty in her hands, because even if they were attached they couldn’t say no to an attractive woman, unable to resist flattery.
It was always their weak spot, and she found it easy to work them to her advantage.
She felt a surge of protectiveness towards Olivia. Although she barely knew her, she could sense that she was a touch gullible – exactly the kind of woman a man like Marcus preyed on. He would reel her in like a fish, and because she was trusting, she might fall for it without meaning to.
Rebecca couldn’t bear the thought of it. Olivia belonged with Christopher, who Rebecca had observed on the plane was kind and chivalrous and absolutely adored his wife.
She sighed as she picked out some postcards to put up in the room she was renting in a shared house in Tooting.
She looked down at them. It would be the easiest thing in the world to slip them into her handbag, but suddenly that didn’t sit right with her, so she went to the till and paid. Just like a normal person.
In the museum café, Olivia slid into the seat in front of Christopher. He looked up from his Baedeker and seemed genuinely thrilled to see her, as if she’d been away from him for weeks not minutes.
He grinned. ‘All shopped out?’
‘Just a few postcards.’ She waggled the bag at him.
‘Very restrained. Coffee? I’ll have another with you.’
‘Actually, shall we push on and find somewhere lovely for lunch?’
‘Sure.’
He didn’t question her or think it odd. But she was desperate to get away. She wanted to put as much distance between her and Marcus as she could, and quickly.
‘Are you all right, Livingston?’ It was Christopher’s pet name for her, lengthened from Liv – which some people called her – because he hated shortened nicknames.
He never answered if anyone called him Chris.
And Jonathan Livingston Seagull was his favourite book.
Sometimes he called her Seagull instead.
‘It was getting hot in there, that’s all. I felt a bit claustrophobic. Let’s just go.’
He needed no second telling as she bolted for the exit and out through the garden.
She tried to put the encounter out of her mind as they crossed the Grand Canal in a traghetto and headed to the Piazza San Marco.
But it was almost impossible. The people, the pigeons, the impossible beauty of the buildings looming white against the brilliant blue sky: she felt overwhelmed as all those old feelings, of betrayal and abandonment, came silting up.
Those very feelings had stopped her trusting anyone else for years afterwards.
She would go on a date, or two, and as soon as someone showed interest, or she felt a glimmer of attraction, she backed away like a nervous horse.
She couldn’t bear the thought of going through that humiliation again.
Thank goodness for Christopher, who had persevered and refused to take no for an answer; who had known the moment he saw her and had swapped the place cards. She was determined to put Marcus out of her mind. He didn’t matter any more. He couldn’t hurt her.