The Guilt Trip(22)

“You know him well, yet you don’t know how to contact him?” asks Rachel, unable to help herself.

Jack comes toward her and picks up her hands, which have been hanging limply by her side. “I shouldn’t have told you,” he says, looking at her intently. “It wasn’t fair to land this on you so close to the wedding. But you pushed me.”

“No, I didn’t,” says Rachel. “Paige did.”

“Well, whoever it was, I shouldn’t have aired my grievances. But hey, it’s out there and now you understand why I don’t want to be within three feet of the woman.”

Except you just were, Rachel wants to shout. Right here in this room.

She goes to the door and stares out across the mezzanine that overlooks the living room below. Opposite, toward the stairs, is Paige and Noah’s room, but as much as she looks, desperate for there to be another door, to give Ali a reason to be up here, there’s nothing.

Maybe it had been a trick of the light. Perhaps the sun had bounced off the polished concrete walls in such a way that it had created the illusion of someone rushing from one side of the mezzanine to the other. Perhaps Ali is still in her room … or out on a walk … not even wearing orange.

“I’d better go and help the others,” she calls out, sticking her head around their bedroom door.

It’s then that she sees it; the tiniest dot sparkling in the sun, on the floor, right outside the bathroom. She goes to it and picks it up, examining the perfectly cut diamond. It’s only on closer inspection that she sees a tiny hole in the top, as if, until recently, it was a sewn-on embellishment.

She doesn’t own anything quite so blingy, so pops it in her pocket and heads back to the kitchen, the whole time telling herself, convincing herself, that she couldn’t have seen what she thought she’d seen. It was a moment in time—it could have been anything.

Rachel has almost talked herself into believing it by the time she reaches the kitchen.

“Jeez, that dress is gorgeous!” Will whistles through his teeth as he picks Ali up and kisses her. “Is it new?”

Rachel doesn’t want to look, but her brain already knows what’s there and is battling to backtrack against itself; as if trying to convince her that what she knows is there, isn’t, and what she knows she saw, she didn’t.

“It’s a caftan,” says Ali, her eyes like saucers as she looks at Will. “And yes, I bought it in Selfridges last week.”

“Not many people can get away with that color,” says Paige, leaving the words hanging there, so nobody’s quite sure whether it’s an insult or a backhanded compliment.

“Thanks,” gushes Ali, opting to go with the latter.

“Most women end up looking like an escaped convict,” Paige goes on, hammering the point home even further.

“It’s always been my favorite color,” Ali enthuses. “I would have worn an orange wedding dress if I could.”

And just like that, Rachel knows that she can no longer pretend to see what she wants to see. She’d wanted to allow her eyes to trick her into believing that Ali’s dress, or caftan, is a shade of pink, or even red. She would let her eyes convince her it was green if it meant that it didn’t match the flash of orange that she saw leaving her and Jack’s room just now. But more than that, she wishes that the diamantés hanging off it weren’t the very same as the one that’s in her pocket.





5



“Ah, here he is!” says Will, as Jack walks out onto the terrace where they’re all sitting around a table laden with Mediterranean fare. Sliced salami, serrano ham, French cheese and olives are laid on platters. The only Portuguese produce is the sardine paste that Will has lined up in the tiny foil pots it comes in, alongside great hunks of freshly baked bread.

“Good morning,” coos Ali. “Or should I say, good afternoon.”

Jack ruffles his still-wet hair. “Just in time for a hair-of-the-dog,” he says, looking past her to Will.

“No alcohol until after we’ve been in the water,” says Will, smiling and holding up a can of Diet Coke.

Jack groans like a child who’s been told he can’t have an ice cream until after dinner.

“How you feeling?” asks Noah, pouring a puddle of olive oil onto his plate. “You were putting in some serious dance moves last night.”

Rachel smiles as she pictures Jack twirling her around, the pair of them lost in the moment. But then she remembers what she’s just seen and is hit by a sudden image of his head between Ali’s legs.

The very thought of it makes her take a sudden intake of breath and she gasps, and everyone’s heads turn toward her.

“You okay?” asks Ali.

Rachel can’t look at her for fear of seeing her lying on their bed, with her eyes closed and her hands on the back of Jack’s head.

“Fine,” she says tightly, picking up her glass of water.

“Well, this looks amazing,” says Jack, blithely unaware of the all-too-vivid images flashing in front of Rachel’s eyes.

“Don’t eat too much,” says Will.

“Blimey, you sound like Mum when we were kids. ‘Wait for your food to go down before you get back in that water,’” Jack mimics in a high-pitched voice.