Just Between Us (19 page)

Holly wasn’t so sure. Tara and Stella were different, Rose was so proud of them. Holly tried so hard to make her mother proud of her. She just hoped that one day she’d manage it and Rose would say so. Maybe the weekend of her father’s birthday would be the time.

Stella forced herself to stand beside the huge window and admire the view of Dublin’s docklands area from Nick’s sixth-floor apartment. A masterpiece of smoky glass and cutting edge architecture, the apartment complex was like a modern hotel, complete with twenty-four-hour concierge and security. The views were spectacular and the rooms were spacious. But what Stella really wanted was to prowl around and look at Nick’s things: his furniture, his books, his photos. On her first trip to his home, she longed to know more about him. She needed time to work out exactly what sort of person he was – and what it meant when a man offered to cook dinner on the fourth date.

Vicki said it meant Nick was crazy about Stella and was doing his best to impress her: ‘A man offers to cook dinner for you in his apartment and you’re trying to analyse it?’ Vicki said. ‘Are you mad? You’re nuts about him, so stop worrying and grab him with both hands.’

Stella was still anxious. ‘I can’t rush in too quickly,’ she confided. ‘What if I’m wrong, what if he’s not the lovely, kind man I think he is, but some sort of practised seducer who drums up an amazing meal, plies me with wine and then expects to get me into bed?’

‘Just say no,’ Vicki pointed out prosaically. ‘He can’t drag you into the bedroom.’

‘I didn’t say I thought he’d drag me in,’ Stella said, ‘it’s just…’ She couldn’t quite explain that she dearly wanted to be right in her assessment of Nick. But that she was scared
of being wrong. He was funny, kind, attractive, he made her feel wonderful inside and he was clearly crazy about her. After their first date, he’d sent her a bouquet of white flowers that was so big that she had to get Vicki to help take them downstairs to her car. On their second date, they’d gone to the theatre and followed it up with a late-night pizza where they’d held hands under the table and gone for long moments with no conversation, as they stared dreamily into each other’s eyes. For the third date, they’d gone to the cinema, held hands again and shared a bucket of popcorn. Stella could barely remember what the film had been about.

Nick phoned every day, apologising because he didn’t want to interrupt her work but adding that he wanted to hear her voice. She couldn’t stop thinking about him and genuinely saw a future for them. Was it too good to be true?

‘Fabulous view,’ she said, turning round to the kitchen where Nick was getting her a white wine spritzer.

‘It’s great, isn’t it?’ Nick said, preoccupied. He’d been like that since she arrived, nipping into the kitchen as soon as he’d opened the door and given Stella a cursory kiss on the cheek. It wasn’t like him to be so edgy, a fact that made the knot in Stella’s stomach clench even tighter.

She skirted the chocolatey brown divan and wandered idly over to a shelving unit which was crammed with books and papers, all jammed in higgledy-piggledy. His reading matter ranged from political biographies to thrillers, she noted, and there were sailing magazines squashed in too. The mantelpiece was bare but for several brown envelopes from bills and some loose change scattered carelessly. In one corner, moving cartons were still stacked high, proof that Nick hadn’t really settled in, despite living in the apartment for several months.

‘I know it’s a bit of a mess,’ he apologised, handing her a glass. ‘I haven’t had much time to do anything and I’m not good with decoration.’

‘It’s lovely, really,’ Stella said. She liked the rich creams and the dusky browns of the room, although the entire place was too unloved and unlived in for her taste. Glancing
around, she spotted a host of photo frames on a low table in the corner. She strained her eyes staring at them but they were too far away for her to see the pictures properly. In the dining part of the room, a very impressive glass and metal table was laid for two with a giant arum lily in a test tube sort of vase as the centrepiece. It was all very beautiful and looked like something from an interior design magazine.

‘Sit down, please,’ said Nick.

They perched on opposite ends of the divan and Stella felt another sliver of unease. Intuition told her that something wasn’t quite right.

‘I hope you like duck,’ said Nick.

Duck. Stella was surprised. She hadn’t pegged Nick as much of a man in the kitchen and had thought they’d probably end up eating something with pasta. That or steak. Men seemed to like cooking steak.

‘That sounds very adventurous,’ she said politely.

‘Er, yes,’ he said, fiddling with his tie.

He was nervous, she realised. What was going on? There was something not quite right about tonight. This was either an ‘I’m sorry but it’s over’ dinner or he was planning
something.
But then, why invite her over to say goodbye, why not do it over the phone?

‘I’ll just check the oven,’ Nick leapt to his feet.

Definitely a goodbye dinner, Stella decided. Oh well, she hated being right all the time. It
had
been too good to be true. That explained why Nick was dressed up in collar and tie; formality helped when it came to tough talk. What the hell, she wasn’t going to be the perfect guest any more. She got up to examine his photos. All of them were of his two daughters, some from when the girls were children. Jenna made an adorable toddler, with white blonde hair curled around chubby cheeks and an engagingly naughty grin on her face as she was pictured covered in what looked like chocolate spread, with a pot overturned beside her and everything, even her knees, smeared with the stuff.

There were no photos of the girls’ mother. Excised from
Nick’s life, Stella decided, much the same way she was going to be excised. She felt grief bubble up inside her. She’d been stupid to imagine that they could have a future. Recently-divorced men were looking for freedom from responsibility, not shackling themselves to divorced mothers-of-one as soon as the ink was dry on the divorce lawyer’s cheque. She’d been his rebound relationship, nothing more, and now he was trying to extract himself from it.

Perhaps he was heading back to his ex. Perhaps the story about his and Wendy’s parting hadn’t been strictly the truth. Even Vicki, in the midst of telling Stella to ‘go for it’, had been sceptical about that part.

‘He’s said it was an amicable divorce?’ Vicki said. ‘That’s the bit I find hard to believe. That’s a contradiction in terms; there is no such thing. Ask Alison in family law if you don’t believe me. When you get to know him better, find out if it really was amicable.’

Maybe Wendy had divorced him, and now he was hoping it was all on again, thought Stella miserably.

‘Er…Stella, could you look at this for me.’ Nick interrupted her thoughts. He sounded very anxious.

Stella walked into the pristine kitchen, thinking that Nick must have been slaving away to cook duck and then clear up so efficiently before she got there. But there was no smell of food cooking, which was odd.

‘What’s the problem?’

Nick pointed to the oven, a gleaming silver and grey double oven affair that Stella would have loved in her kitchen but could never have afforded.

‘It’s been on for an hour and it’s still not hot.’ Nick ran an agitated hand through his hair. ‘I’m really sorry, Stella, I wanted this to be perfect.’

She bent down and opened one side of the oven. Lukewarm air rushed out. She touched the two foil-wrapped packages inside. Barely warm. The packages looked very professional; too professional almost. She checked the dials and realised that the timer button was lit.

‘Did you time it?’ she asked.

Incomprehension crossed Nick’s face. ‘No,’ he shrugged, ‘I just turned it on like they told me…Hell,’ Nick pulled off his tie and unbuttoned the top of his shirt. ‘I wanted to impress you so you wouldn’t think I was one of these useless men who can’t boil an egg. I wanted you to think I was a New Man. I ordered the entire dinner from this catering company. They bring it over nearly ready and all you have to do is re-heat it. Except the oven…’

‘…was on timer and obviously the timer overrode whatever you did with it,’ finished Stella, beaming at him. ‘You wanted to impress me,’ she said, clicking the oven off. She stood up and put her arms round his neck, leaning close to him. ‘I knew something was wrong,’ she added. ‘You were so edgy, I thought you were going to tell me it was all over.’

‘And when there was no smell of cooking,’ Nick continued, ‘I realised it wasn’t heating up…What did you say?’ He looked at her, startled. ‘You thought I was going to tell you it was over? Oh Stella,’ he groaned, lowering his mouth to hers.

Relief flooded out of Stella as they kissed deeply, and desire flooded in. ‘As if I could tell you it’s over when I can’t concentrate on anything but you,’ Nick murmured, his lips trailing from her mouth to her cheekbones, his hands cradling her close to him.

Stella leaned her head back as Nick’s mouth slid down to nuzzle her neck. ‘Vicki said I should stop analysing things and just enjoy it.’

‘Remind me to send Vicki some flowers,’ Nick joked. ‘Why did you even think I could want to dump you?’

Well, it’s all moving so fast.’ Stella’s firm gaze met Nick’s. ‘That scares me, Nick, and that would scare most men too.’

‘I know it’s moving quickly but that shouldn’t frighten either of us.’ He tucked a strand of Stella’s silky dark hair behind her ear. ‘I’d never hurt you, Stella. I just want to be with you, I want to talk to you every moment of the day, I want you with me all the time. I can’t believe how strongly
I feel after such a short length of time but we can’t let that stop us. Why do we have to be cautious? Why can’t we just enjoy this and how we feel about each other?’

‘I have to be cautious, Nick,’ Stella said honestly. ‘Because I have to think of Amelia. I don’t want her to be injured, and the next step is you becoming a part of her life too, so I have to know that you mean this and that I’m not some rebound fling you’re having. Sorry,’ she added, seeing a bruised look come into his muddy green eyes. ‘But Amelia is everything to me and I have to protect her. And, let’s face it, you have your daughters to think about too. Between us, we’ve enough baggage to start our own suitcase company.’

A smile lifted the corners of his mouth.

‘I know what you mean, Stella, but it’s probably easier for me in that Jenna and Sara are older than Amelia.’

‘Yes,’ said Stella slowly, although she wasn’t quite so sure about his reasoning when it came to his daughters.

‘Just do me one favour,’ Nick said. He took her hands in his. ‘Don’t hold back, don’t try not to get involved, please. I’ve never felt this way about anyone, Stella, this is special. And no, that’s not some line I read out of a book on seducing women.’

It was Stella’s turn to grin.

‘I mean it,’ he said. ‘I’m falling in love with you, what’s wrong with that?’

‘Nothing.’

For a moment, they gazed at each other, drinking each other in.

‘I think…’ Stella paused. ‘I think I’m falling in love with you too.’

This time, she moved towards him and pulled his head down to hers. Suddenly, the temperature was raised and Stella clung tightly to Nick, her body pushing against his hardness, her lips bruised against his. She knew where she wanted this to end: in his bedroom, where their passion could explode and all the pent-up longing would be exorcised. Her fingers unbuttoned his shirt rapidly, exploring his
chest, fingertips brushing sensitively over his skin. She could hear Nick’s breathing deepen as he buried his face in her neck, his lips licking and nuzzling as his head moved down to the soft curve of her breast. Stella arched her back, pushing her body closer to his mouth, willing him to reach down inside her silky cardigan and touch her aching breasts.

It was Nick who pulled away first. ‘I thought we were going to take this slowly,’ he said shakily. ‘Because if we don’t stop now, I won’t be able to stop at all.’

Stella grinned cheekily and buttoned up his shirt. ‘You’re right. It’s hot in here. If we took the duck out of the oven, it might heat up by just being close to us?’

Nick laughed and planted a chaste kiss on her forehead. ‘I can rustle up a pretty decent Chinese meal, you know,’ he said. He opened a drawer and extracted a laminated take-away menu.

‘Cheat.’ Stella took off her high heels and opened the fridge. There was cheese, salad stuff, water and lots of orange juice in there. ‘We can’t waste that duck. Seeing as it’s cooked already, how about we have it cold with salad?’

‘Brilliant idea.’

‘And for future reference, and if we’re going to get really comfortable with each other, you’ll have to realise that I don’t need cordon bleu meals every night. I like to watch TV with a takeaway on my lap and my feet on the coffee table.’

‘Sounds good to me,’ said Nick happily.

On the weekend of Hugh’s sixty-third birthday, the Miller women came home to celebrate with a big family lunch on Sunday. Stella and Amelia drove from Dublin on Friday night. Tara, Finn and Holly were to come on Saturday, although Holly wasn’t staying in Meadow Lodge that night. She was to be dropped off at her friend Donna’s house, because Donna had been begging her to stay over for months, but she’d be there for lunch on Sunday.

On Saturday morning, Hugh and Amelia set off on an expedition to investigate the birth of several puppies to Alastair Devon’s collie bitch. All of which left Rose and Stella with glorious time on their hands, time they’d decided to spend with a morning shopping.

Melanie’s Coffee House was a hotbed of activity on Saturdays. At lunchtime, it got particularly busy with shoppers unable to resist the lure of Melanie’s home-made, organic quiches and pizzas, which revitalised even the most shattered customers. Melanie had cannily dumped the hard chairs favoured by the coffee shop’s original owners and replaced them with comfortable ones made even more accommodating with fat gingham cushions that matched the sky-blue gingham tablecloths. Coffee at Melanie’s was a byword in Kinvarra for putting your feet up after a hard morning. Consequently, by half twelve, the place was usually jam-packed with women proudly wielding bags as proof of their successful morning, and a few weary husbands hoping they’d be allowed to go home soon because they’d cry if they
had to lurk embarrassedly outside another changing room.

Rose and Stella had staked their claim early and were sitting at one of the coveted upstairs gallery tables with a view of the bustling main street.

In front of each of them sat a slice of succulent quiche – smoked salmon and feta cheese for Rose and tomato and basil for Stella. Despite the delicious smell wafting up from the pottery plates, neither of them was eating very much.

‘It’s just a couple of dates,’ Stella was saying, vainly trying to fork up some lettuce, ‘nothing more. Nick’s a nice man and I really like him, but that’s all.’

Rose cast a mother’s all-seeing eye over her eldest daughter and said nothing. Ever since Stella and Amelia had arrived at Kinvarra for the weekend, Rose had noticed a change in her daughter. Stella’s face shone with an inner glow and her eyes were positively luminous, She was dressed differently, too, having abandoned her normal black-trousers-with-shirt weekend wear for a pair of jeans and a tangerine fleecy top that made her look years younger. And nobody could fail to notice the way Stella, when she thought nobody was looking, would smile for no apparent reason.

‘I understand,’ Rose agreed gravely, somehow keeping the delight out of her voice. ‘He’s divorced, you’re divorced and let’s face it, second marriages have a greater chance of ending in divorce.’

Stricken, Stella stared down at her lunch. ‘I know all that, of course,’ she began. ‘It’s ridiculous, we shouldn’t even see each other again…’

She looked up from her plate to find her mother’s eyes twinkling.

‘Stella, I’m your mother,’ Rose said, somewhat unnecessarily. ‘Do you really think I can’t see that you’re wildly in love?’

Flushing, Stella abandoned any pretence of eating. It amazed her how her appetite had vanished in the past two weeks. ‘How can it be love when we’ve only just met? I don’t believe in love at first sight.’

‘Love at second sight, then?’

This was the question that still haunted Stella. Nobody had been more surprised than she at the speed with which she had fallen for Nick. After six dates, she found herself sitting in her office daydreaming about him living with her and Amelia: cosily happy in Delgany Avenue, sharing family dinners, going for long walks at the weekends, the three of them cuddled up on the couch on Saturday evenings watching television and eating popcorn. Real family life, in other words. But was she living in cloud cuckoo land?

For that reason, she still hadn’t introduce him to Amelia, even though she longed to do so. Despite her promise to Nick not to be scared of the intensity of their relationship, she was still anxious.

Rose, who’d been intently watching the play of emotions on Stella’s lovely face, gave up on her lunch too. ‘You’ve got to stop being so cautious, Stella,’ she said. ‘Take a chance on happiness. There are no prizes for never taking risks. Except loneliness.’

‘What about Amelia?’ protested Stella. ‘I have to think about her. I can’t afford to risk hurting her by making a mistake with Nick.’

‘And what about you?’ Rose reached across the table and caught her daughter’s hand tightly. ‘You know that I love Amelia with all my heart, but I love you too. I don’t want to watch you give up a chance of happiness because it might not work out. What’s the worst-case scenario here? Nick comes into your lives and after six months, he goes out again. That happens in life. It’s already happened to Amelia,’ she added gently.

‘I know. That’s what kills me,’ Stella’s expression was sad. ‘I’ve already lost Amelia one father, I can’t bring another person into her life for them to go away again.’

‘Children are tougher than you think,’ Rose said firmly. ‘You and Glenn handled your break-up very well and there’s never been any bitterness between you over Amelia.’

‘That’s because Glenn’s so laid-back he’s nearly horizontal. You can’t fight with him, it rolls off him,’ Stella said. It
was true: Glenn’s attitude to life in general had hugely helped their access arrangements. ‘Shit happens’ was his mantra. It used to drive Stella mad when she was married to him but came in useful when they were splitting up, when his philosophy made the issue of who’d care for Amelia very simple. From the ‘shit happens’ perspective, there was no point arguing over anything. Amelia would live with her mother, and Glenn would go with the flow.

‘I sometimes think that I failed Amelia,’ Stella insisted. ‘You wouldn’t have left Dad for anything because of us. I know,’ she added hastily, ‘that’s a crazy thing to even talk about because you adore each other, but you would never have contemplated divorce no matter what. You would have stayed together for me and Tara and Holly. I couldn’t do that for Amelia so I’ve failed her.’

Her mother’s expression was unreadable and for an instant, Stella feared she’d offended her.

‘Mum, I was just using you and Dad as an example, naturally I didn’t mean…’ she began.

Rose brushed the apology away. ‘Don’t be silly, darling,’ she said lightly, ‘I was just thinking, that’s all. You haven’t failed in the slightest. You did the right thing and Amelia is a wonderful, loving, funny little girl. I’m sure that having a largely absent father has had some effect on her, we can’t deny that, but would it be better if you and Glenn were married and hated each other with a vengeance?’

‘You’re right, I suppose.’ A picture of Nick telling her about the pain of his divorce came into Stella’s mind. Nick still insisted that his split from Wendy had been amicable, but he’d admitted that the divorce had been his idea and that it had taken a long time, and many arguments, for Wendy to agree with him. His moving back to Ireland, which he’d refused to do during their marriage, had infuriated her. ‘At least Glenn and I still get on and we never fought, even when we were married.’ Nick said the rows between him and Wendy when they’d been married had been pyrotechnic, particularly in the last year of their marriage. Stella actually
couldn’t imagine Nick having a raging argument with anyone. He was calmly measured about everything.

‘So,’ Rose began, ‘when are you going to introduce Amelia to Nick?’

Stella laughed. ‘I can see why Dad calls you the scourge of the committee ladies. You get straight to the point.’

‘It’s the only way to do things,’ Rose said proudly. ‘Hold on for a moment, we’re obviously not going to eat any more of this. Will I get us coffee?’

‘I’d love some.’

Rose got to her feet gracefully and went to the counter for coffee, her slim figure and elegant bearing that of a woman half her age. And it wasn’t only her figure that was young: her mind was as open to new ideas as a twenty-something.

Watching her, Stella thought once again what a remarkable woman her mother was. Rose possessed the uncanny ability to look right into people’s hearts and divine what was bothering them. She never judged or moralised. And her advice was always kind, genuine and sensible.

Rose came back with two coffees.

‘Right. List the pros and cons of introducing Amelia to Nick.’

Stella stirred one spoon of sugar into her coffee.

‘Well, we can imagine the pros. The cons are, they might not get on, Amelia might hate him and the idea of him. She’s never had to share me, you know.’

Rose considered this. ‘True, but you won’t know until you try. There’s no point trying to second-guess a seven-year-old. What else?’

‘He’s not divorced that long,’ Stella added. ‘He’s over it, but he’s,’ she hesitated while trying to find the right word, ‘bruised. The split was very difficult even though they both agreed it was the right thing to do. And he hated leaving his daughters, I think that was the hardest part.’

‘Could you love a man who didn’t regret hurting his children?’ asked Rose sensibly.

‘No, you’re right. He adores them. He came back to Ireland because he couldn’t bear to be away from them, which didn’t, I gather, please his ex-wife.’ Stella couldn’t understand why Wendy was so apparently het up over Nick’s decision to move back to Ireland. He was closer to their daughters, and surely the girls’ welfare was paramount.

‘I’m sure it didn’t,’ Rose said briskly. ‘Darling, just one word of advice: do be careful about demonising this woman. It’s a bit like agreeing with a friend about how horrible her husband is when they’ve had a row, and then having her resent you for what you said when they inevitably make it up. Don’t forget that she and Nick were married for twenty years and eventually, one hopes, they’ll learn to be friends. You don’t want to be nasty about her only to have him resent that later.’

‘You’re right, Mum,’ Stella said automatically. The truth was, she was astonished by how much she disliked the sound of Wendy Cavaletto. In a very un-Stella-like way, she relished hearing about Wendy’s outbursts of temper. Of course, it was easier to be the replacement for a bitch than an angel.

She stared out of the window and Rose sipped her coffee, looking around the gallery area in order to leave Stella to her thoughts. In one corner sat Mrs Freidland, and her daughter, both tight-lipped as though holding off on an argument because they were in public.

One of the women who worked in Rose’s dentist’s office was at another table, sitting with her husband and two teenagers. The woman smiled in recognition and Rose smiled back. She remembered hearing that one of the teenagers had been hospitalised with anorexia not so long ago. Both girls were slender; it was impossible to know which had been ill. The whole family looked light-hearted, as if they hadn’t a care in the world. A brave smile was a remarkably good camouflage, she reflected.

‘I know I’m panicking,’ Stella said. ‘I just worry about things, that’s all. We’ve talked about Amelia not liking Nick. What if Nick’s daughters don’t like me?’

‘Everyone loves you,’ Rose reassured her briskly. ‘Stella, I can’t think of a single person who doesn’t. It might take time, yes, but you’ll win them over. If you and Nick have a future together, you can overcome all these things.’

‘You really think so?’ asked Stella suddenly, sounding like she used to as a girl when she needed reassurance.

‘Absolutely.’

Stella smiled. Her mother was right. Somehow, and she really didn’t know how she’d done it, she’d kept a certain distance between her and Nick, just in case. That distance had been her insurance but now it was time to tear up the policy. Live dangerously. Take risks. Nick had asked her if she wanted to go away for a weekend. Anywhere she wanted.

‘I was thinking maybe a city break in Europe, would you like that?’ he’d asked, his eyes telling her that he knew it was a big step.

She’d said she’d think about it. Sensible Stella, knowing that a weekend away would be a big step towards another destination: the bedroom. The electricity between them was incredible and so far, it had taken all of Stella’s self-restraint not to throw her inhibition to the wind and clamber into bed with Nick.

Suddenly, she wanted to phone him and say yes, a weekend away would be fabulous and how about Paris? She’d only been there once, years ago. And why didn’t he come to her house next weekend and meet Amelia? There could be no more creeping around. Nick was going to be a part of both their lives. Once she’d made the decision, excitement and a sense of the rightness of her choice, flooded through her.

‘Thanks, Mum.’ She gave her mother a smile that was full of sweetness. ‘You’re right.’

At that moment, doubts assailed Rose. Her radar, once so reliable for other people’s problems, wasn’t as good as it had been. What if she’d given Stella the wrong advice? What if this Nick
was
on the rebound and needed the consolation of gentle, loving Stella to get his confidence back? What
would Stella do then, having given him her heart and let him into both her and Amelia’s lives? What if the children all hated each other? What if…

‘You’re going to love him, Mum,’ Stella said. ‘He’s very special. He’s funny, clever, kind, everything.’

Rose suppressed her fears. ‘Is this the man who was just a friend a few minutes ago, the man you’d gone out with on a few friendly dates?’

‘That’s the one.’ Stella grinned.

‘When do we get to meet him?’

‘Soon.’

‘You could bring him to our ruby anniversary party in April,’ Rose suggested wickedly, ‘and see if your Aunt Adele approves.’

Stella laughed. ‘And put him right off me? I’d love to bring him – thank you – but he’ll need to be briefed before meeting Adele. But tell me, you’re going to organise the party? Tara, Holly and I are supposed to do that for your anniversary and surprise you. We’ve been talking about it for ages.’

‘Your father hates surprises. He’s very keen on a big party and has decided that we should arrange it ourselves, so don’t feel guilty. He says it’s old-fashioned to wait patiently for someone else to do it, and there’s nothing he dislikes more than being called old-fashioned. Besides, you three and I would go for a small family gathering, while your father fancies a big mad party where he gets to invite everyone he’s ever met.’