From Pasta to Pigfoot (46 page)

It was late in the afternoon when the insistent chimes of the front doorbell broke her concentration. For a few moments she didn't move, and then remembered that she was alone in the house and no one else was going to answer the door.

Tutting in irritation, she raced downstairs, not bothering to check through the peephole before opening the door. She stood speechless with shock as she looked up to see Rocky standing on the doorstep.

For what seemed like hours, neither of them spoke.

‘Hello Faye,' Rocky said finally, his long-lashed, caramel-coloured eyes fixed on hers.

‘Hello Rocky,' she echoed faintly, still unable to believe her eyes. She realised that she was blocking the doorway and moved back hastily to let him in.

He shrugged off the heavy jacket he'd been wearing and hung it on the coat rack near the door, then turned back to Faye who was still standing and staring stupidly at him.

‘What are you doing here?' She blurted the words out, too surprised to care if she sounded unwelcoming.

Rocky looked at her steadily for a few moments and then pulled his wallet out from his back pocket. ‘I came to bring you this,' he said, taking out a small piece of paper, which he unfolded and then handed over to her.

Faye looked with surprise at the picture Uncle Fred had taken of her on the day of Frieda Ansah's engagement ceremony. Dressed in her borrowed
boubou
, she was laughing, her face radiating happiness. Her head was thrown back, exposing her long slim neck, while her almond-shaped eyes gazed straight into the camera, their expression sultry and inviting.

‘Where did you get this?' she asked in bemusement. ‘Uncle Fred took this picture ages ago.'

Rocky sighed and ran his hands through his cropped wavy hair in the gesture that was at once so familiar and so painful.

‘Faye, can I sit down, please?' he asked suddenly. She looked at him closely. He looked thinner than she remembered and tiny lines around his eyes betrayed his exhaustion.

She ushered him into the living room. ‘Are you all right?' she asked anxiously. ‘Can I get you something to drink?'

He waved away her concern, patted the seat next to him in invitation and turned to look at her as she reluctantly sat down.

‘Faye,' he started – and stopped – almost immediately, shaking his head in frustration. ‘Look, there's so much I want to tell you but first, and most importantly, I want to say I'm sorry.'

She stared at him, but before she could say a word, he
reached across and gently placed a forefinger against her lips.

‘No, please, let me finish,' he said. ‘I'm sorry for being such a stubborn fool and for not giving you the chance to tell me what really happened. I'm sorry for putting my own fears ahead of everything else and, most of all, I'm sorry for all the pain I've caused you by being such a total idiot.'

Faye surreptitiously pinched her arm to check she wasn't dreaming and welcomed the pain that confirmed that this was no illusion.

Rocky reached for the picture she was still holding and tapped it slowly with his finger. ‘You know, Faye, for a long time I thought that if I worked hard enough and long enough, I'd be able to get you out of my head. For a while I even thought it was working, until the day I was downloading the pictures in my camera and saw this one.'

Casting her mind back, Faye remembered how Uncle Fred had borrowed Rocky's camera to take the pictures. Silently blessing the older man for his foresight, she tried to take in what Rocky was saying.

‘The picture brought it all back and I realised that I was kidding myself if I thought that I was over you,' he said softly. ‘Faye, I'm sorry. Really, truly, sorry. Can you forgive me?'

He looked deeply into her eyes and held his hand out to her. Trembling with emotion, her eyes filled with tears and she reached for his hand briefly before releasing it and flinging herself into his strong arms. He held on to her tightly and continued to murmur apologies under his breath.

Breathing in his familiar scent, she kept her head pressed against his strong chest until she felt his fingers gently lifting up her chin. Looking down into her eyes,
Rocky leaned forward and kissed her, tenderly at first, and then with barely suppressed passion. She wrapped her arms around his neck, her mouth hot against his searching lips, feeling a heady sensation flooding through her as she pressed herself up hard against him, clearly feeling the evidence of his passion.

With a groan, she dragged herself from the couch, pulling him up with her. He looked at her, his breathing ragged, and she nodded in unmistakable invitation before turning and leading him up the stairs to her room.

The long shadows of evening had crept across the bedroom as they lay quietly in Faye's large bed. Resting her head on his chest, Faye caressed his muscled shoulders, marvelling at the strength they had just displayed. Kissing his chest softly, she asked the question that she needed the answer to, now more than ever.

‘Rocky, please tell me what happened with Celine,' she asked quietly. His hand had been stroking her hair and it suddenly stilled. He dropped a kiss on her head and sighed deeply before speaking.

‘We met when I was in the States,' he said softly. ‘She was on the MBA programme with me and we were in the same project group. She was very bright and incredibly attractive, and we soon started talking about more than our coursework.' His laugh was quiet and mirthless, and the sound rumbled in his chest against Faye's ear.

‘After a few months, she'd more or less moved in with me and things started getting pretty serious, at least they did for me – I even mentioned her to my family. Anyway, a few hours after we finished our final exams, I came back to
our apartment to drop off some books.' He paused briefly before continuing, his voice devoid of any emotion. ‘She was in bed with one of our classmates – a rich American guy whose father owned a steel mill somewhere in Pittsburgh.'

Her arms tightened around him in sympathy and he sounded almost pensive as he continued. ‘The funny thing was she didn't turn a hair.
He
was terrified and couldn't get out of the room fast enough. She just looked at me and shrugged. I can still hear her now, “Rocky, honey, you've got to understand. I'm smart and I'm a high achiever and I've got to be with another high achiever – that's the only way to get on in this world.”'

Faye sat up abruptly, appalled at what she had just heard. ‘But how could she say that, Rocky!' she exclaimed. ‘You'd just finished an MBA, for God's sake.
Of course
you were going places!'

He shrugged, gently pulling her head back down against his chest. ‘In her book, having someone with an MBA
and
access to millions of dollars was a much better bet than having some foreigner with an MBA and no job.' He laughed properly for the first time since his arrival.

‘Anyway, I guess that's what made me so determined not to let another woman get to me. Until I met you, that is,' he added, kissing her hair.

‘Er, hello! What about Clarissa, then?' Faye asked pointedly. He laughed again and pulled her closer still.

‘Believe me, Clarissa was a non-starter,' he chuckled. ‘She was good fun and easy to be with, but there was no way it was going any further and I didn't want to lead her on. In fact, she did me a favour by playing up to Stuart.
She knew Celine had left me paranoid about infidelity and Clarissa's attempts to flirt with Stuart gave me all the excuse I needed to end the relationship.'

He sat up slightly, peering at her in the semi-darkness. ‘I'm just sorry that my paranoia also made me jump to the wrong conclusion about you and Sonny,' he said soberly. ‘I should have known better.'

He moved to kiss her and she pulled away from him, pretending to sit up.

‘I really think I should get up now. As your hostess, I don't want to abuse the situation,' she said with a teasing smile.

‘Abuse me all you want,' he murmured, pulling her back to him and nibbling gently on the soft lobe of her ear. After several minutes, she sat up again.

‘Rocky, you're definitely thinner than before,' she said in earnest. ‘You looked really tired when you got here. You must be hungry – let me make you something to eat.'

‘Okay, what do have in mind?'

She thought back to what she remembered of meals in Rocky's house. ‘I could make
jollof
rice, if you like? Or I could cook some spinach stew with pigfoot – I've watched Martha make it and I'm sure I can get the ingredients together in no time.'

Rocky pulled her back into his arms and kissed her. Shaking his head, he smiled gently and said before kissing her again, ‘I
hate
pigfoot. What about some pasta?'

Acknowledgements

While it is said that everyone has a book in them, it takes more than just the author to bring it out.

A huge thank you to the Jacaranda Books family for being the most positive and supportive publishers any writer could ask for. Jazzmine, thanks for loving the story from the start – you'll never know how happy your email made me! Rukhsana, thanks for believing in the characters so much, you wanted to punch them. Valerie, you have my deepest and most sincere gratitude for being such an insightful, brilliant, tough and encouraging Editor. You can bet that ‘Show, don't tell!' will be engraved on my tombstone.

Thank you so much, Kate Forrester, for the brilliant cover design and your sensitive interpretation of the key points of the storyline.

My thanks to Melissa Mensah Abanulo for reading the manuscript and for loving it enough for me to risk letting it see the light of day.

My special thanks to Marcelle Akita for her inspired matchmaking – I will be eternally grateful.

I would also like to express my heartfelt gratitude and appreciation to everyone who took the time to review this book and offered their feedback.

To all my wingwomen and indefatigable cheerleaders, you know who you are and thank you for being there whenever. Chux, thanks for being the best friend anybody
could have – we've come a long way since my first published book review in
The Voice
!

Finally, thanks to each and every one of you in my big, lovely, loving, scattered and supportive family. To my beautiful daughters, Seena and Khaya, you haven't quite yet mastered the art of not interrupting when I'm ‘in the zone', but I love you anyway. Nana, thanks for giving me the motivation to go home, for a great day in Cape Coast and for the time to learn enough to tell Faye's story.

And finally, finally, my love and thanks to the beautiful country of Ghana, land of my birth and my spiritual home for ever. I hope I've done you justice and if I haven't, any inaccuracies are mine alone.

About the Author

Frances Mensah Williams was born in Ghana and grew up in the UK. After graduating from the University of Reading, she pursued a career in Human Resources Management, Training and Consultancy, which spanned the UK and Africa. She is now the Chief Executive of Interims for Development Ltd. and the Managing Editor of
ReConnectAfrica.com
, a careers and business website and online publication for African professionals in the Diaspora.

Frances is the author of the non-fiction titles
Everyday Heroes – Learning from the Careers of Successful Black Professionals
and
I Want to Work in Africa: How to Move Your Career to the World's Most Exciting Continent
. She is the recipient of several awards and in 2011 was nominated as one of the Top 20 Inspirational Females from the African Diaspora in Europe.

Frances has travelled extensively, having also lived in
the USA, Austria and France. She now resides in London with her family.
From Pasta to Pigfoot
is her first fiction novel.

To find out more about Frances Mensah Williams and for regular updates, visit her website and Facebook page:
www.francesmensahwilliams.com

www.Facebook.com/FrancesMensahWilliams