Chapter 18.2
Matt observed her from lowered lashes. She looked exhausted. Utterly exhausted, and he knew she hadn’t slept last night. The pallor of her skin was strangely ashen. He never thought a skin tone like hers could lose its warm glow, but it had.
“Coffee?” He held the pot up and she shook her head. He turned to Dante, who sat on the other side of the table. “What about you? Would you like coffee?”
“Thanks, man,” Dante said, holding his mug out. Matt poured the coffee, noticing that like him, Dante’s gaze was never too long away from her empty features. Matt hid his worry behind a calm mask. It was as if the life had seeped right out of her. She kept glancing at her watch nervously, lips moving silently ever so often. It pained him to think of what she was going through, but it was best to just get through today. Once today was over, his poppet would be back to her smiling self.
“We should go,” she said abruptly.
Dante had raised the mug to his lips. He set the mug down and glanced at Matt.
Madi pushed her chair back, looking over at the flowers at Dante. “We should go now.”
“Okay,” Dante said.
“Of course, poppet,” Matt said.
She stood up and stalked over to the counter to get the flowers. “Right, then. Let’s go.”
Matt watched her agitated movements: her compressed lips; the flinching in her eyes. His poppet was in the grips of mental torture, her own private hell. Bollocks. Had she never truly come to terms with her parents’ deaths? Her behaviour the past few days indicated exactly that.
She held the flowers away from her face, as if she couldn’t bear inhaling the delicate fragrance, and walked out of the kitchen without a backward glance.
Dante looked over at him. “Today isn’t a good day for her.”
Matt nodded as they followed her out of the kitchen. She waited silently at the front door, never meeting their eyes. They left her home and headed for the Hither Green cemetery in Lewisham.
Matt could sense her despair the closer they got, and it was far more painful for him than he expected. When he parked, she exhaled loudly, flashed him a tight smile and said, “I’ll see you guys in a bit.”
He had planned on going with her, but that one sentence signified her desire to be alone.
“One hour, Madi,” Dante said softly as she opened the door, adjusted the flowers in her arms and nodded. She walked away.
Dante sighed loudly in the backseat and rubbed a hand over his face. Matt eyed him in the rear view mirror. Now they were alone, he could finally speak his mind.
“I know Madi views you as her closest friend,” he started coolly. “I respect that, Palmer. You two grew up together and you work together.” Matt’s grip on the steering wheel tightened. “But if you ever stand by and watch her get into the state she’s been in the past few days, if you ever encourage her to indulge in such behaviour…I will personally make it my business to make your life a living hell.”
Dante straightened up against the leather upholstery. “Who the hell do you think you’re talking to, Bradley? You don’t know shit about Madi, and you sure as hell don’t know shit about me. What? You think because you’re fucking her you know her? Man, fuck you. You don’t know shit. I’ve been by her side for decades.”
“Hmm.” Matt made a derisive sound at the back of his throat. “Yes, you have and, instead of being a true friend, you’ve done nothing more than enable her destructive behaviour the past few days. Do you even understand the definition of friendship?”
Dante’s face hardened as he glared at Matt’s eyes in the rear view mirror. Matt continued in a hard voice, “I’ll make it clear for you, Palmer. Madi is mine. I will do everything in my power to ensure she’s happy. If you get in my way, I will simply remove you from the equation. If you value your so-called friendship with her, I suggest you learn how to be a real friend. Otherwise, keep it strictly business between yourselves.”
“Do you think I’m afraid of you?” Dante scoffed. “What? You think because you’re some rich asshole that I’m gonna quiver at your threats?”
“You should,” Matt stated frigidly. “Trust me, Palmer. I am not a man you want to cross.”
Dante rolled his eyes and looked out the window. He remained silent, as did Matt. He’d said what he wanted to her friend. There was nothing more Matt needed to say.
“You think I don’t know it’s messed up?” Dante suddenly asked. “You think I haven’t tried to talk to her over the years? She won’t listen, not about this. It’s as if she’s stuck in this dark place…every fucking year I watch her fall apart. Then she goes back to normal, like she presses a reset button in her head and everything is fine. I don’t know why she does it. It got to the stage where I stopped asking and went along with it…because, sometimes, that’s what friendship is. If your friend is drowning in shit and refuses your help, you dive right in there with them so they know they’re not alone. You don’t know shit.” Dante turned back towards the window, his harsh breathing giving Matt a clear indication of how upset he was. “She told me once, I think she was ten, she said to me: ‘D, I’m broken inside and no one sees it.’ How the hell am I supposed to fix that? To fix her? Trust me, I’ve tried. I uprooted my whole damned life for her. I would do anything for her. But I can’t fix this. I don’t know if anyone can. You self-righteous bastard. You think what happened over this weekend was bad? You have no idea. This was nothing in comparison to how she used to be. You don’t know shit.”
Matt wasn’t going to back down, but the impassioned outburst from one of Madi’s oldest friends, her best friend, gave him food for thought.
“Help me understand,” Matt said quietly. “Help me understand so I can help her get better.”
Dante shook his head, peering gloomily out the window. “If I understood it, don’t you think I would have done something about it by now?” He twisted his head around so their glances met in the rear view mirror. “She’s afraid of something, something about that day, about today. She blames herself, and I honestly don’t know why. Survivor’s guilt, maybe. Whatever it is, it shuts her down. You happen to be in her life now to witness this. Next year you might not be, but I will. What you’ve seen the past few days, like I said, it’s nothing in comparison—”
The loud ringing coming from Madi’s bag broke Dante’s tirade. Matt saw his face fall for a second before it settled into a resigned mask. Dante reached forward to grab her bag and start rummaging through it before plucking out her mobile.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Matt said in surprise over the man’s bold behaviour. Matt felt further shock when he saw Dante key in the pass code. “How dare—”
“Hey, Aunt Cleo,” Dante said, holding a finger up to Matt in a shushing gesture.
“No, no, she’s doing okay. We’re at the cemetery now,” Dante said.
Matt arched an eyebrow at Dante’s words. His poppet was not doing okay.
“Yes, I’ll keep an eye on her.”
Matt’s eyes narrowed in annoyance. Bollocks to that. Matt would be taking care of her from now on.
“I know, Aunt Cleo. I’ll get her to call you later. Why don’t you go to bed? I know Madi won’t like thinking of you up at this time.”
Matt instinctively looked at his watch. Six forty-five am. There was a five hour difference between their time zones.
“I’ll tell her. Bye, Auntie.”
Dante ended the call with a tired sigh, then glanced at Matt who had twisted around in his seat to observe him.
“Madi’s Aunt,” he advised as he placed the phone back in her bag.
“Yes,” Matt said dryly. “I gathered that.”
“Look, I don’t want to get into anything with you. You’re Madi’s boyfriend for whatever reason, and I accept that. But you’ve got to accept that I’m not going anywhere, either.”
Matt pondered his words silently. It wouldn’t be easy but, if he wanted to, he could find a way to cut Dante out of Madi’s life. He was a Bradley, and nothing was outside his reach. But could he do that to her? She obviously valued her close friendship with Dante. Hell. The man had keys to her bloody house. Was Matt secretly that envious of their bond that he would willingly fracture their friendship? He had no answer to those questions. All he knew was she was hurting, and he felt as if there was nothing he could do to protect her from it.
Then the skies opened up, and in typical British form, a downpour began.
“Shit,” Dante muttered, peering out the window.
Matt was reaching for the umbrella that came with Rolls-Royces, grasping the door handle to open it and go to her.
“You can’t, Matt.” Dante said, using his given name for the first time. “She’ll freak if she doesn’t spend at least an hour at their graves. She never comes here except for today. The first time we came here, three years ago, she sat there crying for five hours straight, man. Five hours. So I made her promise, one hour, no more no less. You can’t go.”
“What the fuck am I supposed to do?” Matt finally voiced his anger. He’d never felt helpless before, and it enraged him. “Sit in the bloody car while she gets soaked? Strike up a conversation with you about the state of the fucking economy while the heavens open up?”
“I don’t give a fuck what you do,” Dante replied in a voice as frustrated as Matt’s. “But you’re not going out there and intruding on her time with them. Right now, the rain is the last thing on her mind. We have to wait.”
Matt muttered a foul expletive and glared out the windscreen at the downpour. He checked his watch. She’d been gone seventeen minutes. Goddamn it. This was going to be the longest wait of his life.
>>>
It didn’t stop raining the whole hour they sat in the car. Matt could see her figure walking over in their direction. He was out of the car, Dante following seconds behind, and hurrying over to her. He didn’t bother with the umbrella, it would serve no purpose.
“Poppet,” he murmured as she looked up at him. She was drenched. Soaked to the bone, the legs of her jeans mud-stained with grass sticking in places. The light cardigan she wore over her t-shirt was plastered to her upper body. Her hair was so wet, the curls seemed flat against her head. But what shook him to the core was that empty look in her brown eyes. Her beautiful, expressive eyes reflected nothing, not one single emotion.
“It’s raining,” she said softly.
“I know. Let’s get you in the car,” Matt replied.
Dante slipped his arm through hers as Matt grabbed her hand, and the three of them hurried to the car. Well, they hurried her along to the car. When they stood next to the car, Dante opened the back door, Matt thought to jump in himself and get out of the rain, but he ushered Madi in gently. She smiled at him before laying down and closing her eyes.
Dante shut the door and they both got in the front. Matt started the engine, wanting to get the hell away from the cemetery as fast as he could.
“I’m taking her back to my place,” Matt said sharply. “Where do you want me to drop you off?”
Dante glanced at the backseat. “Madi.”
“Yes,” she murmured.
“Matt wants to take you back to his. Are you okay with that? We’ll go home if you want, sweet cheeks. I’ll stay with you if you want.”
“I want to sleep, Dante. For a little bit. Just let me sleep.”
Dante turned frontward, a conflicted look on his face that Matt didn’t like. Dante was barking mad if he thought Matt was leaving her today. He was taking her back to his place where he could look after her properly.
“She’s coming back to mine,” Matt stated resolutely.
Dante nodded and inside the car fell silent until they got back to Greenwich.
“She’ll be fine tomorrow, Friday at the latest,” Dante said in a hushed tone. “Once she sleeps through today, she’ll be back to usual herself. She’ll reset and this, all of this, won’t matter to her. Until next year.”
“That’s—” Matt peered through the heavy rain beating over the windscreen before stealing a quick look at her in the backseat. “That’s insane and, frankly, alarming—”
“It is what it is, man. Look, if you can’t deal, just drop us off at Madi’s—”
“Shall I drop you off at your flat?” Matt interrupted curtly. So they had a little heart-to-heart earlier on, it didn’t mean he liked the man. Far from it.
Dante looked a bit surprised. “Uh, yeah man, it’s on—”
“I know where it is,” Matt replied evenly. “I had a background check done on you, too.”
“Son of a bitch,” Dante murmured under his breath.
Matt smiled tightly. “Yes, I am. Please try not to forget that.”
In record time, considering the downpour, Matt pulled up in front the building where Dante lived. Dante unbuckled his seatbelt and twisted in his seat, reaching back to run his finger down Madi’s nose lightly. Matt frowned. He’d seen her friends Bret and Marie-Sol doing that yesterday.
“Madi,” Dante called softly, running his finger down her nose again. She opened her eyes slowly and blinked at him. “I’m going now. Matt’s taking you back to his place. And Aunt Cleo called before. Call her when you get the chance.”
She nodded before closing her eyes.
Dante spun around to scowl at Matt. “Let her sleep and she’ll be fine.”
Matt jerked his head towards the door and Dante’s scowl deepened. He got out of the car and ran towards the doors of the building. The second Dante had slammed the car door shut, Matt was driving away.
In the time it took for him to arrive at his place, his concern, his worry, had morphed into downright fear. Stuart, his brother-in-law, was a surgeon. Should he call him? There was no way he could take her to the hospital. The media would be on the story in hours. If they found out about this, the ramifications could be terrible. The impact on her dance company, on her character, catastrophic. It would have to be a private medical facility but, even then, it might still get out. Matt parked his car outside his home and took a minute to breathe.
‘Just love her, faults and all.’ Those had been Nathan’s words, but could Matt do that? The past few days had been an eye-opener, and he wished his eyes had remained closed.
“Matt?” she murmured, sitting up and running a hand over her face.
“We’re here, poppet,” he replied, unbuckling his seatbelt and turning around to regard her with a tight smile on his lips. “Let’s get you inside.”
The rain hadn’t stopped falling. Matt grabbed her bag and helped her out of the car into his house. It was slightly past nine in the morning, although Matt felt as if he’d lived an entire week in the past few hours.
“I need a shower,” she said softly when he pushed open his bedroom door and she glanced at the pristine white sheets, then at her clothes.
“Of course,” Matt murmured.
Madi eased her trainers off outside the door and tiptoed over the large space towards the ensuite. Matt tossed her bag aside and followed her.
She stood still for a moment, as if dazed and unsure of what to do. The expression on her face was the saddest one he’d ever witnessed. Matt went over and started undressing her.
“It’s my fault you know,” she said sharply. “They’re dead because of me.”
Matt paused in his attempt to get the dirty, wet jeans down her legs. He looked up at her. Dante had said she blamed herself. But why?
“Are they?” Matt queried softly. “Why is that, poppet?”
“Promise not to tell anyone?” she asked him, finally letting her gaze fall to his kneeling form. Matt kept his face neutral and nodded slowly. The emptiness in her eyes, God. Was he witnessing her mental breakdown? She seemed so detached, so—
“My teddy Bobo fell, he fell and I wanted him, but I was in my car seat and couldn’t get him. I was small as a child, you know. Daddy wouldn’t give me a booster seat yet, said it wasn’t safe, and I needed to be a certain height,” she explained with a faraway look in her eyes. “I wanted Bobo, screamed for him. I remember kicking the back of Daddy’s seat. M-mommy told me to calm down, to behave.” She started rubbing her pinkie finger. “It’s funny. That memory is so clear in my head. I wished it wasn’t. I wished I had behaved. Maybe then it wouldn’t have happened. I was screaming at them, then we were spinning, over and over. It felt like it would never stop. But it did. And there was so much blood, so much…Mommy said my name, I can still hear her in my head. She was calling me, and I couldn’t get out of the car seat. The seat belt, I couldn’t—”
Matt stood up slowly and cupped her face. “It wasn’t your fault, Madison. That truck driver swerved into the lane you were in and hit your car head-on. It wasn’t your fault.”
He held her empty gaze and, little by little, emotion started seeping back in. Her eyes filled with tears as she shook her head.
“It wasn’t your fault,” Matt repeated, as she flung her arms around his neck and buried her face in his chest, sobbing. Matt had seen women cry. He’d caused quite a few of them to shed tears by his indifference, but Madi’s outpouring of grief broke his heart. It was as if she was sobbing out the pieces of her soul.
He held her tight in his arms while he uttered over and over that it wasn’t her fault. She was cold and Matt, fully dressed, took her over to the shower enclosure and turned the water on. He finished undressing her, then himself, and washed the dirt off her skin. He wished he could wash away her pain that easily. He shampooed her hair, scrubbed every inch of her and, through it all, not once did his blood stir at the sight of her nudity. He wanted her hurt gone.
When they were clean, Matt got her out the shower and efficiently dried them both. He wrapped her in a robe and towel-dried her hair. He even went as far as applying generous amounts of her leave-in conditioner to ensure her curls didn’t tangle.
With a towel around her head and the white bathrobe swamping her, Matt took her to his bed and watched her fall into a deep sleep. Slumber eluded him though as doubts plagued his mind. For the first time, he wondered whether his desire for her, the love he had for her, was enough. For the first time since being in a relationship with her, he wondered if she truly was the one.