Chapter 9 #3
He drops his head into his hands and stares down at the floor, his body rigid with shock.
‘All these secrets and lies. It’s utterly disgusting.’
‘I know. That’s how I felt when I found out too.’
He looks up at me again and I suck in a sharp breath at the loathing I see in his face. ‘I’m talking about you deliberately keeping this from me for all this time.’ He rounds on me, his eyes flashing with anger, and I take a step backwards in shock.
‘How dare you decide whether I got to know this stuff or not? To make that choice for me? You put your and your father’s pride before our relationship!’ he shouts at me.
‘That’s not why I did—’
‘It wasn’t your decision to make, April. You should have trusted me. Trusted in us.’
He’s pointing an angry finger at me now, his eyes wild.
My body floods with adrenaline. My pulse is racing in response to his anger, but I know I need to keep calm. It’s the only way to get through this.
‘You took away the opportunity for me to deal with what my father had done while he was alive,’ he says. His shock now seems to have turned into full-on fury, and it’s all focussed on the one person he has left to blame. Me.
‘I can’t even talk to him about it now. It’s too late.
How am I supposed to come to terms with that?
To try and forgive him? Clearly you thought I was too weak to handle it.
’ He points his finger at me again. ‘That’s what hurts the most. You had no faith in me.
You took my agency away. And I can’t forgive you for that. ’
Before I can respond to this, he brushes past me and swings open the door to his bedroom, turning back to look at me with such coldness in his eyes I actually shiver.
‘I want you off my island. I’ll arrange for the transfer yacht to pick you up in one hour.’
I can’t believe this is happening. But then, also, I can. This is exactly what I was afraid of.
It’s all such a mess. A horrible, painful, tangled mess. Just as I knew it would be.
Not that it stopped me from coming here. Apparently, the potential of that wasn’t enough to make me ignore the lure of spending time with him.
‘What about the sale of your father’s company?
’ I ask in panic, trying to delay being thrown off his island and out of his life for as long as I can, though I feel like the most shallow, unfeeling parasite in the world, using our former deal as an excuse.
But I need something practical to focus on right now or I think I’m going to completely lose my mind.
The look of disgust he gives me shakes me to my core. Because I think I know deep down that I deserve it.
‘That’s your greatest concern right now – that you’ll lose this deal?
’ He shakes his head, distaste clear on his face.
‘I can’t believe I thought you were capable of being anything but a cold-hearted business bitch, just out for what she can get,’ he snarls at me.
‘You can have the fucking company. I don’t want anything of his any more anyway.
You and your father are welcome to it. I’ll have my lawyers draw up the sale documents as soon as possible.
Let your jackals pick over the flesh of his dead body.
’ There’s no expression in his face now.
He’s completely blanked himself of all emotion.
I take a step towards him and reach out a hand, wanting to touch him, comfort him, though I know there’s no way he’ll let me do that.
‘Jamie, will you be okay?’
Anger flashes in his eyes. ‘What the hell do you care? You only came here to get your hands on my company.’
‘Maybe to begin with,’ I argue weakly. ‘But I feel like things changed between us recently.’
He waves away my words with a gesture of disgust and looks at me with utter revulsion in his eyes.
‘You mean absolutely nothing to me. This was all just an attempt to force you to finally be honest with me. So I can move on with my life and never have to see or think about you again. Because that’s exactly what I want.’ He leans in closer and whispers, ‘I never want to see you again.’
And I know for sure, right then, that he means it.
That this is the end.
In a numb state of shock, I wait at the small harbour for the transfer yacht to pick me up. I’d barely brought anything with me, so it didn’t take me long to pack.
It’s been painfully easy to leave.
Everything seems so quiet and still, as if I’m waiting at the end of the world for the sky to come crashing in. It’s just me left here now, alone with my racing thoughts.
After delivering his final dénouement, Jamie simply walked away from me, his broad back tense with anger, and all I could do was stare after him, wondering how the hell I’d allowed myself to get into this mess.
I know how, though. I’d wanted it. Encouraged it, even. Because I’d craved spending more time with Jamie. I’d enjoyed being here with him.
I felt as though I’d come home.
I shake my head, fighting back the tears that threaten to spill from my eyes.
What the hell had I been thinking – that I could seriously pretend I was someone else while I was with him and that would protect me from my feelings? That here on his island everything was different? That I was different? That he was?
I think what hurts the most is that for those handful of glorious days I’d felt like the woman I used to be: playful and full of positivity and fun. Someone who didn’t take herself too seriously, who enjoyed life and wasn’t weighed down by her cynicism.
A woman who could imagine allowing herself to love someone and to accept and believe that they could love her back.
But it had all been an illusion.
A trick.
So now she’s vanished again, leaving behind the same hollow shell I’ve had to live in for the last ten years.
And all I can do is sit on this cold, hard harbour wall and grieve for her.