The Chocolatier's Secret (Magnolia Creek, Book 2) (18 page)

Chapter Twenty-Four

Andrew

‘I heard what happened at the shop.’ Gemma put a cup of tea in front of her husband.

So much for coming home to make amends with her. This was likely to result in either a full-blown row, or at the very least a tense conversation.

‘Who told you?’ Andrew asked.

‘Does it matter?’ Gemma sat opposite, her fingers wrapped around a mug of hot chocolate. ‘You can’t go on like this. Neither of you can.’

‘Louis shouldn’t have come to the shop.’

‘You won’t talk to him here.’

‘So this is my fault?’ Andrew swigged his tea, wincing at the heat of it.

‘I didn’t say that.’

He looked up at Gemma, into those brilliant blue eyes. She was as beautiful as the day he’d first seen her, as lovely as the day he’d asked her to be his wife, in sickness and in health; for richer, for poorer. What about when the shit hit the fan? Here she was, putting up with all of this, and she didn’t deserve to.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said, but even to him his words sounded weak. ‘I’m sorry for everything.’

‘You don’t need to apologise.’

He reached for her hand and pulled it from the hot chocolate, squeezed it firmly in his own. ‘I do need to apologise. In all of this I’ve only been able to see me, to see my father, to see what they did to me back then. I haven’t once asked about you. And I’m sorry.’

Tears sprang into her eyes, and she wiped a finger beneath one and then the other, sniffed lightly and looked upwards to stop any more tears falling out. He reached for her other hand, gave it a squeeze too.

‘I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel,’ he said. ‘I can’t see past what happened to be able to even think about what I’m going to do.’ He held her hands a little tighter. ‘I wrote to Julia, told her everything.’

‘Has she written back?’

‘Not yet. God knows what this will have done to her. I don’t even know if she’s on good terms with her mother, whether her mother is even alive.’ He laughed briefly. ‘Julia had a right temper on her sometimes. She threw a shoe at my head when I was late to meet her once. I think she’d been scared, waiting alone at the railway station, but I’d been held up at school and couldn’t get away.’ His eyebrows knitted to a frown. ‘If her mother’s alive now, then I’m pretty sure all hell will break loose over this.’

‘I thought you were going to hit Louis when he told you everything.’ Gemma gripped his hands tightly in return.

‘So did I, and it scared me. I never knew I was capable of being that angry.’

‘He’s running out of time, Andrew.’

Andrew looked at the kitchen table, the knots beneath the varnish, the weathered corners and the chips that had happened over the years without even noticing. ‘I know he is.’

‘Did you mean what you said?’

His silence confirmed the answer.

‘Andrew, you’d never forgive yourself if you let him wither away in front of you. Does seeing his pain every day really make up for the pain he caused you?’ She didn’t wait for an answer. ‘I’m worried, Andrew. I love both of you so much and I know you’re going through hell, but I know Louis, and I really think he was doing what he thought was best for you all those years ago.’

When a tear finally crept its way down Andrew’s cheek and he sniffed, Gemma was there by his side. He’d never cried in front of her before.

Gemma wrapped her arms around her husband as she stood behind him. ‘You’re not a malicious man. You’re kind, loving and you have a heart. Don’t let this take all of that away.’

He held her arms against his chest.

‘What are you going to do?’ she asked. ‘Are you going to try to find your daughter?’

‘That’s the other thing. Dad lied to me, but it kills me to know I’ve got the one thing you so desperately want. The child we
both
want.’

Gemma let go and came to sit on his lap. She rested her forehead against his. ‘I don’t think it’s ever going to happen for us.’

The tears came from both of them. Tears for the past, tears for the present and tears for what might have been.

‘We still have a chance,’ he told her. ‘We’ll try IVF.’ But he’d already seen the IVF leaflets tossed in the recycling with an empty box of muesli and knew she was giving up on their dream of a house full of kids.

‘Will you try to find her?’ Gemma asked, the topic of IVF shut down, at least for now.

‘I honestly don’t know.’

When they heard the back gate go, Gemma got up, dried her eyes.

‘Is it Dad?’

‘Yes. He must’ve been for a walk.’ Gemma blew her nose into a tissue. ‘He shouldn’t be going without one of us. He’s not strong enough.’

Andrew didn’t say anything until Gemma had stood there watching through the window for another couple of minutes. ‘Go to him,’ he told her. ‘Despite what he’s done, I still want him to be okay.’ He pushed the chair back and left the table.

‘Andrew,’ Gemma stopped him. ‘Please think about the operation again, for all our sakes? You might not like him much at the moment, but he’s your dad and we know this is his best chance to be with us for the foreseeable future. He’s got another dialysis session in the morning. It’d be good to know I won’t be driving him to those appointments for much longer.’

When Andrew dropped down onto the bed upstairs and turned on his side, he wondered how he could go back to thinking of his father in the same way, the way he had before all this had been thrown into the mix.

*

Gemma must have taken his socks and jeans off for him and tucked him beneath the covers, because when Andrew woke the next morning, groggy from a sleep filled with dreams he’d rather not be having, he was only in a T-shirt and boxer shorts. He dragged himself to the shower, went downstairs for breakfast and left the house, all without waking his wife, all without seeing his father.

At the shop, Andrew adjusted the thermostat in the kitchen. The days and nights were cooling down now, and the ideal temperature was a prerequisite for perfect chocolates. He systematically made his way through his to-do list and lost himself in the job he loved. Two hours later, after he’d turned the sign on the door from Closed to Open, he carried the blackboard outside, and using coloured chalk he drew a picture of a cup with steaming liquid, purple chalk creating curls of steam, and wrote Couverture Hot Chocolate along with the price for the winter warmer, which should start gaining in popularity now the days were cooler.

He turned to walk inside but looked twice when he saw the young woman across the street. It was Molly. And she was staring at him, or the shop, he wasn’t sure, but he raised a hand to wave to her. He was quite taken aback as she waved across to him and smiled. She was a beautiful young woman, and he was sure it wouldn’t be long before she captured some man’s attention.

Andrew went back inside the shop and continued with the order for the Easter Egg Hunt. This time, he used a little melted chocolate to fix together two halves of chocolate eggs he’d made earlier. It was an intricate job, required a delicate touch and a firm press to keep the halves together long enough so they’d set and not fall apart. But by lunchtime he’d made another hundred.

‘Those can all be wrapped, Emilio.’ He patted Emilio’s shoulder and indicated the first few batches that were set by now. He liked Emilio, who had more expertise than he’d given him credit for when he first employed him. He had vision too, and Andrew liked that in his team. Emilio had come up with a good range for Halloween already even though they were way off the season, but it’d given him a chance to buy in some special moulds in readiness.

When Andrew replenished the white chocolate discs on the shelf towards the front of the shop, he looked up and saw Molly, again. But this time she wasn’t alone. She was talking to Louis. They were sitting, side by side, outside the vet’s surgery, and she was chatting away, her face tilted to the gunmetal clouds lurking in the skies above, announcing autumn was well underway.

He disappeared out back again, anxious not to be spotted, and there he pulled another batch of mint milk chocolate hearts from the fridge where they’d been finished off. The fridge was set to a special temperature – for cocoa crystals to form the correct pattern, the temperature was vital to avoid fat blooming, which resulted in the fat in the chocolate rising to the surface and ruining both the appearance and the taste. And once he’d done that he figured the coast was clear, so he pulled out a sandwich from the mini fridge in the office, along with a bottle of water, and went down to the lake.

At the lake, Andrew sat on the low wall surrounding the water and shivered, realising it wouldn’t be much longer before he needed to remember a jacket when he was out and about. A light breeze flapped the paper wrapping his sandwich, and he watched as Rebecca Martin arranged chairs on the veranda at the front of Magnolia House, most likely in preparation for a wedding. She draped a white cloth over a chair and then pulled it into a bunch and wrapped a thick, pink strip of satin around the backrest and tied it in a bow. She did the same with each chair, and Andrew thought back to his own wedding with Gemma. They’d married in an old house in a Melbourne suburb beneath a gazebo in the gardens with all their friends and family there to share the day of hope and happiness with them. Gemma’s father passed away a few months before, and so Louis had given her away. He’d looked so proud walking her down the aisle, handing Gemma’s hand to his son, her long fingers outstretched, ready to become his wife and join his family and take on anything that came their way.

Giggling behind him alerted Andrew’s attention, and when he turned, there was Molly again. This time she was with Ben, the youngest member of the Harrison clan.

Andrew smiled. Young love … there was nothing like it.

He picked up the sandwich wrapping he’d stuffed beneath his thigh so it didn’t blow away and off he went, back to work.

A few spots of rain told him he’d timed it perfectly.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Molly

Molly and Ben stood outside the cottage. The clouds had started to release their first drops of rain, and Molly had surreptitiously watched Andrew Bennett walk away. The rain had started to fall more heavily, and they’d run to the shelter of the tiny veranda.

‘You came here to do something, and if you’re not careful you’ll run out of time,’ said Ben. ‘It’s a massive thing, but when you don’t exactly live nearby, you have to factor that in. Otherwise you’ll tell the guy who you are, and he won’t have five minutes to get his head around it before you leap on a plane and disappear.’

Resting on his forearms against the wooden posts on the veranda, Ben looked out over the lake. Molly faced the opposite way, next to him, He was right, of course.

‘I asked Dad about the family,’ said Ben, continuing when Molly looked at him hopefully. ‘He seems to think they’re really nice, respectable people. And you liked the old man … what was his name?’

‘I thought small towns were supposed to be close-knit, where everyone knows everyone else.’ Molly grinned.

‘Hey, I have an excuse. I’ve been away, remember, and my shifts since I got back have been a little erratic.’

‘Okay, you’re forgiven. His name’s Louis, and yes, he seems very nice.’

‘Despite the confrontation in the chocolate workshop?’

She sighed. ‘As far as Louis knows, I’m just another tourist.’

‘I hope the shock doesn’t kill him.’

‘Ben! Don’t say that! Don’t even joke.’

‘Sorry.’ He turned to face the little cottage, his back to the lake, and for a minute neither of them spoke.

Molly softened. She wanted to chat to him, she enjoyed it. It was easy. ‘I’ve been posting Aussie pictures like crazy in the Facebook group. Everyone is so happy I’m here, finally seeing a bit of the world. Zara has been going to Stansted Airport – her nearest – to do the same as I did, spend a bit of time getting used to the sights and sounds. She wants to make it to Crete with some girlfriends.’

‘She seems pretty wild.’ Ben laughed. ‘Did you see those photos of her and her mates on their last holiday to Devon?’

‘Let’s hope if she makes it to Crete she posts plenty of photos of scenery,’ said Molly, ‘and not body parts.’

The rain came down harder, and Molly was aware of Ben’s body, the warmth from him standing next to her as the air around them cooled. It’d been an unexpected pleasure to have company these last few days when she was in a strange country about to do the impossible and turn up on her birth father’s doorstep. Without Ben by her side, a sounding board in moments where she doubted herself, she was starting to realise how much more difficult this would have been. Discussing normal things like their Facebook group enabled her mind to quieten and prepare for what came next.

Ben checked his watch.

‘Do you have to go?’

‘Work calls, I’m afraid.’

‘You’re gonna get soaked.’ Molly looked up at the heavens, black clouds overtaking the grey.

‘I saw an umbrella in your kitchen.’ He raised an eyebrow, and smiling, Molly went to fetch it for him.

‘I’ll need that back,’ she said.

‘Oh no, you don’t. Get your cardigan, your handbag … whatever. You’re walking me to Main Street where I’ve parked near the gift shop, and then you’re going into the chocolaterie.’

Molly’s smile faded.

‘Come on.’ He stepped off the veranda, put up the umbrella and wasn’t about to take no for an answer.

Molly hesitated one second longer, but then grabbed her keys and a cardigan and dived under cover of the umbrella with Ben.

‘I’ll hold you up until you get there,’ he told her, ‘but then it’s time you met the man you came all the way across the other side of the world to see.’

*

Molly left Ben outside Magnolia Gifts. He hugged her and climbed into his car and he drove away.

That was fifty minutes ago.

Molly wished she’d gone with him. She’d rather be at a maternity emergency helping out than feeling as useless as she did right now, lurking in Main Street.

She drew in her breath when the little bell above the chocolaterie tinkled and out came Bella.

‘Molly, hi! Lovely to see you again. How’s the holiday?’

Molly looked up from beneath her umbrella as Bella put hers up against the downpour.

‘Great, thanks.’ But when Bella looked about to engage in more conversation, Molly ducked into the chocolaterie and slotted her dripping umbrella into the stand by the front door.

He wasn’t there. There was a girl with long blonde hair behind the counter arranging truffles in an empty section in the glass-topped display cabinet. There was another man browsing the selection of Easter eggs that coloured the shop with their gold, pink, purple and silver wrappings.

Molly’s heart was in her mouth. She concentrated, imagining Ben’s voice right there, telling her to breathe. But her heart pounded, her chest tightened. She grabbed her umbrella and ran out the shop. The scene with her birth mother at the forefront of her mind, she couldn’t go through with it. She couldn’t do it this time.

‘Hey!’ a female voice shouted. ‘Look out!’

Molly stood back. She’d nearly taken the woman out with the spike of her umbrella. The damn thing was stuck and she couldn’t put it up.

‘It’s Gemma,’ the woman said. ‘Are you okay?’

Molly stared back at the beautiful blonde woman about to go into the shop. She turned away and tried again, in vain, to force the umbrella up so it could do its job. She was getting drenched, her dark hair curling at the bottom and sticking to her face.

‘I asked whether you’re okay?’ said Gemma. ‘You don’t seem it.’

And then there was a voice behind the woman, a voice she recognised from someone she hadn’t seen. She’d been too busy trying to sort the umbrella out. ‘I’m not up to this, Gemma.’

Molly turned round and saw Louis standing there.

‘Lovely to see you,’ he said. Or at least that’s what she thought he said. ‘You’re getting soaked through.’ He beckoned her to the shelter, but as the rain came down harder and harder, she didn’t move.

‘Come inside,’ Gemma begged. ‘Both of you.’ She looked sternly from one to the other, and Molly found herself moving forwards. Her feet were sodden, her flip-flops squelched as she walked. Her jeans were stuck to her legs, her top hung heavy and drips ran into her eyes.

‘You should throw that useless thing away.’ Gemma took Molly’s umbrella and tutted at the bent canopy. She dropped it in the umbrella stand. ‘Let me go out back and get some towels, for the both of you.’

Molly looked at Louis and Louis looked at her, and the twinkle in his eyes was what set her off. Molly’s laughter echoed all around the shop.

‘She’s treating us like we’re naughty kids up at that school of hers,’ Louis guffawed, a big sound from a frail old man.

Molly’s face turned serious as Gemma returned with towels. ‘Andrew is out back, Louis. Go and talk to him and I’ll be there in a minute.’

Louis didn’t move.

‘Go, Louis.’

‘Does he know I’m here?’

Ben’s voice was there again, inside her head, telling her to get on and do it. But before she or Louis could move from the spot where they stood dripping onto the dark wooden floor of the chocolaterie, there he was. Andrew Bennett. Dressed in an apron, he was standing watching all three of them from behind the counter.

Molly had seen him before, of course, in the pub, at the workshop, on the street when she’d watched from a distance. But being close again now and knowing why she was here made her notice him in full light. The planes of his face – were they the same as hers? Dark hair like hers maybe, once upon a time, but now salt and pepper with flecks of grey among the dark, especially where it had been allowed to grow longer on top. The crease between his eyebrows told of frowning too many times. Molly was guilty of doing the same thing, especially when she was concentrating or annoyed. The only difference was her skin was too young to have a permanent mark etched already. She relaxed her expression to avoid the same happening to her.

‘What’s all this?’ He walked towards them. His apron was filthy with smears of dark chocolate and a lighter variety, and for some peculiar reason Molly found herself wondering why, on all these cooking shows on TV, pastry chefs and those who worked with chocolate were always in crisp, white chef clothing. Was it all a gimmick? A game of make-believe?

‘You two need to talk,’ said Gemma, looking first at Louis, then at Andrew.

Before Andrew could open his mouth, Molly found herself saying, ‘We do.’

All three turned to her.

‘I’m Molly.’

Gemma, Andrew and Louis looked at her as though she were barmy.

‘Molly Ramsey,’ she added, but they had no idea, did they?

‘Am I missing something?’ Gemma turned to Andrew and then back to Molly.

Andrew looked confused, as did Louis, but as Molly locked eyes with Andrew one more time, looking into piercing blue eyes, at the softly curved top lip she knew hers was a mirror image of, Andrew Bennett saw what she did and when he opened his mouth, no words came out.

Andrew and Molly stared at one another. Gemma asked what was going on. Louis stayed silent.

‘Do you two know each other?’ Gemma looked worried, and Molly hated how she was about to blow this woman’s world apart. She was nice, the sort of woman she wished was her birth mum rather than the woman who’d told her to go away.

Next to them Louis’ breathing became heavier.

‘It’s you.’ Andrew looked at Molly.

‘It’s me,’ she said.