Chapter 59
Fifty-Nine
M y guilt over kissing Bradley weighed on me, and was only alleviated when it was replaced by my guilt over telling Natalie I was leaving.
I waited until after dinner, when Ryan was engrossed writing the latest chapter of Geoffrey the Giraffe.
Then I sat her down at the kitchen table and told her everything.
I hadn’t planned what to say but in the end I knew I couldn’t keep anything from her, it wasn’t fair.
So I stammered and stumbled, my heart pounding in my chest as I told her about Alfie and my college offer.
She listened calmly as I spoke, sipping her chamomile tea, her dark eyes steady as ever. I expected her heart to break, but instead it burst with pride. I had expected her to be angry that I was leaving her but instead she broke into a smile, and as her arms wrapped around me I sobbed with relief.
“Don’t cry, Lo, we’re going to be fine. It’s you I’m worried about. You’ve got a hell of a decision to make.” She pulled back, her hands clasping in mine.
“I know.” I laughed bitterly. Almost a week had passed since Alfie had asked me to leave with him and I was still no closer to making my choice.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do. I wasn’t even sure I could bear to go.
I don’t want to leave you.” My voice cracked as I spoke and I bit down on my lip, trying hard not to break down in front of her.
“Oh love, there’s a difference between leaving and abandoning. Our dad abandoned us, but you aren’t abandoning me and Ryan. I left my family to come here and build a new life for myself. You need to do the same.” She squeezed my hands, emphasizing her words.
“But you need help with Ryan?—”
“I was raising him alone before I met you. Do you really think I can’t do it again?
I’m a mother, Lo. I don’t get the luxury of being scared or tired.
Having to wear that front every day builds a strength inside you you didn’t know you had.
” I thought of my own mum. Even when she was facing her own death, she still hadn’t let her fear show.
She had been strong, right up until the end.
Natalie smiled and I couldn’t help but return it.
“I’m going to be fine, love. I don’t need you to hold my hand, and you don’t need anyone holding yours either.
Not me, not Keira, not Alfie.” I stared at my sister, wondering how I’d ever thought she wouldn’t be able to cope without me.
She was a tower of strength. I was the one who wavered. I sighed, relief flooding through me.
“Don’t be too relieved. You haven’t told Ryan yet.”
Telling Ryan I was leaving was awful. There was no other way to describe it.
My tough, monster-fighting nephew with a skull and crossbones ‘tattoo’ drawn on his arm, cried like the little boy he was as Natalie broke the news.
It took all I had to hold it together but finally, after lots of cuddles and promises of ice-cream, he managed to calm down his sobs to gentle hiccups.
I held him in my lap, stroking his hair as I answered all of his questions and helped him straighten out this huge life change in his eight-year-old mind.
“Will you ever come back?” he asked in a small, broken voice that twisted my heart.
“Of course. This is still my home, but I’m a grown up and grown ups have to go on adventures so they can learn how to be better grown ups,” I said softly as I rocked him back and forth.
“Can I come on the adventure too?” His voice was full of hope. I gave him a small smile and wiped his tear-stained cheeks.
“Not this time,” I told him gently. “You’re still little so you need to have different adventures right now.
You need to have adventures at school or with your friends or up here, in your imagination.
” I tapped a finger to his head. “Maybe you could write about the adventures you have and send them to me while I’m away? So that I don’t miss out on anything.”
“Like sending you chapters of a book?”
“Yeah, like that.”
He thought about it, his little face screwing up in concentration. “Yeah okay, I can do that.” Just like that, the storm had passed and his world was the right way up again.
“I love you so, so much,” I told him, needing him to know how much I cared, but he just rolled his eyes at me and hopped out of my lap.
“I know that already, Auntie Lo.” He wandered off into the kitchen and came back a moment later with a bowl of ice-cream, his tears completely forgotten.
I lay back on the sofa and allowed the wave of impending relief to finally crash over me.
I had told them I was leaving and the world hadn’t broken.
They were going to be okay without me and I would be okay without them.
All I needed to do now was decide which direction I was going to go.
I heard the faint rumble of an engine outside and Ryan hopped up from his place in front of the TV to peer out the window, his ice-cream still in hand. Immediately, he began to hop up and down.
“Auntie Lo! The noble steed is here!”
And just like that, the memory of Bradley’s mouth on mine came flooding back to me.
Today wasn’t over.
It wasn’t over by a long shot.
I took a deep breath and stepped outside, ready to face Alfie, but instead I found Elliot.
“Where’s Alfie?” Just his name in my mouth felt as though I had a dagger made for the guilty seated in my stomach. It twisted and burned, reminding me of my treachery.
“He has business to attend to and sends his apologies that he couldn’t collect you himself.” Elliot held the passenger door open for me, knowing that I preferred it to sitting in the back. He offered me a small smile, which for Elliot was the equivalent of a bear hug and a high five.
“That’s okay, but maybe I should just stay here? I mean, if he’s going to be working all evening anyway he won’t even notice if I’m not there.”
“He’ll notice, Miss.” He meant well but all his words did was push the guilt dagger deeper into my gut. I nodded and got into the car. Elliot, ever the professional, maintained his steady silence, though I wasn’t stupid enough to believe he wouldn’t notice something was wrong.
The drive to The Carlton was over too fast. I fidgeted the whole way and barely managed a goodbye to Elliot as I stepped out of the Rolls. Alfie and I had come so far, the very dress I wore was a testament to that, and now I couldn’t fight the sinking feeling that I was about to destroy it all.
The suite was dark, ghostly. I wiped my sweaty palms on my dress, my beautiful red dress, that Alfie would no doubt tear into shreds when I told him what I’d done, or rather, what I’d allowed Bradley to do.
I didn’t know what he would do. Would he throw me out? Would he punish-fuck me until I cried? I just didn’t know, but I knew that whatever he did, I deserved it. If he had kissed Angie…just the thought had me gritting my teeth.
I fought the urge to turn and run back to the lift.
I forced myself up the stairs and to his office door, my heartbeat getting louder with every step down the darkened hallway.
Should I knock? I could picture him on the other side of that door, seated at his desk with that awful, blank look on his face.
My hands wouldn’t stop shaking and I clenched them into fists.
I was scared. Every fight that we’d ever had had been caused by Alfie’s issues, Alfie’s fuck-ups, and they’d been resolved with my patience and understanding.
But this fuck-up was all mine and Alfie didn’t do ‘patience and understanding.’
I took a breath and opened the door. The room was dimly lit and he sat at the large desk, the moonlight at his back, his face draped in the mask I’d seen him wear so often.
The scene before me was exactly as I’d pictured it, except that I hadn’t pictured the vases of pink bleeding hearts that littered every available surface.
I counted ten of them scattered around the room, huge bouquets of my flower sprinkled with delicate sprigs of baby’s breath.
The sight of them should please me but instead all they did was twist the dagger deeper in my gut.
“Come here.” His voice startled me out of my guilt-ridden thoughts.
I needed to tell him. I needed to say it from over here, at a safe distance.
Once I was over there, he would touch me and I would fall apart.
I opened my mouth to speak my sin but instead, the cord that attached me to Alfie constricted and I found my feet moving towards him.
He stalked me with his gaze and as soon as I was close, he reached for me, his hands bunching in the material of my dress and pulling me towards him.
He seemed to revel in the warmth of the cotton, the sight of his gift on my skin.
That hurt me too. Every instant with him only deepened my betrayal.
Why did I do it? Why didn’t I just push Bradley away?
I expected Alfie to kiss me, to sprawl me over his desk and seek solace in me the way he always did, but instead he leant into me, his forehead resting against my stomach, his hands fisting the folds of my dress. He just seemed so tired.
“Whatever it is you do that makes me feel better, please do it.” His words shattered me, snapped me right down the middle, and I knew in that moment I couldn’t tell him.
I couldn’t. It would break him. My mum’s necklace burned on my sternum, weighing heavy and reminding me of her admonishments about lying.
But lying with good reason…that couldn’t be entirely wrong, could it?
I pushed my fingers into his hair, gently stroking, trying to ease whatever it was that troubled him. I didn’t know what it was that I did that made him feel better. I’d only ever done what came naturally to me, so that was all I did now.
Long minutes passed as I held him, and eventually his shoulders dropped, his grip on my dress eased up, and he sighed, one long expelling breath.
He leant backwards, pulling me with him until I straddled him.
The position surprised me. Alfie never allowed me on top.
His hands found my waist and he contented himself with gazing up at me.
It was something he did often and I’d never gotten used to it.
I didn’t have the confidence to relax as someone scoured every minute detail of my face.
Tonight, I was scared he would see what I was hiding.
I was scared he would see Bradley’s stain on my lips.
His fingertips idled under my dress, stroking the skin of my thigh.
“Let your hair down,” he said, his voice a deep husk. I pulled out the clip that held part of my hair off my face and tossed it onto his desk. His hand found my hair, twisting it through his fingers before winding it around his fist. He brought it to his nose and inhaled.
“Bad day?” I asked. He released my hair and resumed winding it through his fingers, meditating on it as he did so, the moonlight catching the red in my locks.
“Just the same day. Over and over.” His stupid phone chose that moment to pierce the air with its tinny shriek.
He tensed and reached for it robotically, but without thinking I scooped it up, rejected the call, and switched it off altogether.
I tossed it onto his desk and turned back to find him staring at me.
“Have you eaten yet?”
“No.” He shook his head, his hand releasing my hair in favour of the tie at my waist, his other hand still buried under my dress, his thumb tracing warm, heated circles on my skin.
“I’ll order something.” I tried to rise, wanting to get away before I let him see too much, but his grip on my thigh tightened, forcing me to stay where I was.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, studying me. I tensed. I should have known he’d read me. Genius Alfie Tell could always read me.
“Nothing,” I answered quickly. What was I doing? I didn’t lie and sneak around like this.
“You’re lying.” He gripped my chin, forcing me to look at him. I tried to do what he did, to slip a mask into place and hide my secret away from his prying eyes.
“I just…I told Natalie I was leaving today. I haven’t decided where I’m leaving to yet, but she knows.” It was a shitty cop-out, but it wasn’t entirely a lie.
He eyed me for another moment before giving me a satisfied nod. “Good,” he said, seeming pleased.
“ Good? ” He was pleased that I was upset?
“Yes. You needed to tell her and now you have.”
“You could at least ask me if I’m okay,” I snapped and he tilted his head at me, clearly not understanding what my problem was.
“Why wouldn’t you be okay?”
“Because I’m leaving my family behind! Didn’t you care when you left your family for the first time?”
Alfie sighed and ran his hands through his hair.
“Lola, I was six years old when I was sent to boarding school, so whether I cared or not, I don’t have much memory of it.
” He raised a hand and cupped my face, gently stroking my cheek.
“It’s unfortunate you’re upset about your sister but it was unavoidable, so what do you want me to do about it? ”
What did I want him to do about it? Nothing. I just wanted him to feel as guilty as me.
“Nothing. It’s not your fault, I’m sorry for riding you about it,” I murmured. He pulled me to him, his lips meeting mine for the first time in a soft kiss that was unusually chaste for Alfie Tell. The man had been breaking my heart all day.
“Go and order dinner, O’Connell.” He spanked me playfully and lifted me off his lap.
“Sure,” I said, trying not to wince as he switched his phone back on. I considered myself dismissed and started to leave when he stopped me again, his fingers catching mine.
“Lola, you’ll come right back.” His words were half-order, half-plea, and they twisted the guilt dagger painfully. I could barely stand to look at him, to see the budding trust, the glimmer of hope starting to shine in his cold grey eyes. I gave him a smile that I hoped was sweet.
“Where else would I go?” I said and walked away.