by Jody Klaire
“You live here permanently?” Rebecca moved around the incoming mop and washed the ingredients in the sink.
“Here and the city,” Berne said.
Rebecca looked at me.
“She meanb Marbsay.”
“Ah, so you still live there too? Do you do the same thing there?”
Berne picked up the used bucket and emptied it outside. Sounds of sloshing water gushing into a drain mixed with Rebecca’s chop chopping on the board.
“No, I go there to see Vivienne.”
My nose seemed to hurt more at the sound of her name. It was a dumb name, like Virginia, I mean . . . come on, who called their kid Virginia?
“I take it she’s not just an old chum?” Rebecca flashed me a wicked grin. I wanted to curl up into a ball and cry.
“Non,” Berne whispered.
“You been with her long?” Rebecca seemed to read the look on my face and frowned. I got up and wandered towards the bedrooms.
I didn’t want to know how long they had been together or how wonderful life was for them. Just hearing her say that she had even looked at someone else felt like my insides were being ripped out through my stomach. No, better to pretend that she wasn’t invading my thoughts with her gorgeous smile or her laugh, or . . .
Oh, get a grip. Focus, decor, rooms. Inspect the rooms like mother.
The bedrooms were everything that could be expected from a holiday rental, neat, airy, and without personality. My nose had calmed enough for me to regain some sense of smell and I breathed in slowly, trying to clear the foggy pain.
I sneezed, nearly knocking myself backwards.
Holiday places all had a summery, musty smell that seemed to linger. I stood, wondering what it was. I discounted frozen pea. The linen was fresh, the sheets no doubt were crisp, yet every place I’d been abroad smelled like . . . well . . . adventure.
“Rebecca is asking if you would like to have bacon in your omelette?”
Rebecca knew full well that I always had bacon in my omelette and was checking on me. So much for decor. I couldn’t give a crap where I was as anywhere Berne happened to be in was perfect. “You were set on the gendarmerie. Why did you really come back?”
Berne smiled. “Mon papa, he had a stroke. My brother was already doing so well in the force that it seemed only right that I come back to help.”
I stared at her with the news. I couldn’t imagine how much she’d been through. She adored her father, as had I.
“It is okay,” she said with her trademark effortless shrug. “He is a little slower, a little bossier, mais . . . he has good health.”
What must he think of me? I was sure that he must have known Berne and I were much more than friends. “Does he recognise me, I mean today?”
“Oui. You are hard to forget.”
I made the mistake of meeting her eyes. Love or lust or whatever went on between us was meant to fade over time, was meant to be smothered by my abandonment. Instead the space between us seemed to me as though it may shimmer and pulse with the force of my own feeling. Oh, I was in trouble, real trouble. Leaving was supposed to stop this, was supposed to drive these feelings away.
“Ladies.” Rebecca cleared her throat, frowning at me once more. “You ready to eat or what?”
“Yes.” I snapped my eyes away from Berne. “Yes . . . starving.”
The soft chuckle from Berne as I walked by told me that she understood exactly how I felt. Earlier, I wondered how we’d get through the project together without me losing myself but right now, I would be happy just to get through dinner.
Chapter Six
I WAS ARTFUL in avoiding any interrogation from Rebecca by feigning tiredness that night. I awoke to the sound of a cockerel crowing and fumbled around searching for my alarm and smacking it for snooze. Berne had been ever present in my dreams throughout the night leaving me wanting nothing more than to escape into my head a little longer.
We’d met when I had been sent by my father to study with her in Marseille. She was working on a major renovation in the city and I could learn from her, get great experience, and get first-hand knowledge of France and its language.
Well, they did say that the best way to learn French was to fall in love with a French person.
How lost I had felt in those first few days of talks and greetings. My father’s friend had taken me around and showed me little places he knew of. There had been no sign of this mysterious Berne Chamonix who I was meant to work alongside. Then came a hand-written note in her swirling letters, simply her address and she signed it “B” at the bottom—
Cock-er-doodle-doo!
I blinked open one eye, that wasn’t five minutes. No fair. I hit the button again. Berne swam before my eyes. She played the piano in the heat of the summer storms, the windows wide open, her slow, taunting melodies lured me in. That’s how I’d discovered her, running from the rain, from the lightning—
Cock-er-doodle-doo!
What? No, no, that wasn’t enough time. I slammed the button on the clock once more. That sound, an aching call. So smooth and haunting, calling me closer, closer . . . her skin glistened with the rain, her hair wild, she turned—
Cock-er-doodle-doo!
I was going to hurl the stupid thing across the room. I groaned and opened my eyes. The scent of fresh bread, warm summer smells filled my nostrils.
And, ow, ow, ow, did my nose feel like a foreign object. The cockerel alarm continued to taunt me with its cheery cries. Who was that happy about morning anyhow?
I glared at my clock. The alarm wasn’t even on. It was eight o’clock.
“I don’t work anymore,” I told it. “I’m a bum.”
The cry sounded again and I rubbed my eyes, wincing as the skin pulled making my nose ache. Had I set my phone alarm? Would I do that? The only time I bothered looking through the hundreds of odd apps littering the screen was for two things: the alarm, which I took an age to find, and a cute little lemming game that I was slightly addicted to. Had I bothered to go through all that and if so, why? What was so important that I needed to be up in the early hours?
Cock-er-doodle-doo!
“Will you give it a break?”
Where had I put my phone anyway? Was it in my trousers? Wait, had I been wearing trousers or shorts? I scrambled out of the sheets, getting my big toe stuck in the corner. I wrenched it free and stared at the clean floor. I swear I’d left them where I always did. Had I been drinking?
Cock-er-doodle-doo!
“Where are you?”
“You need something?”
I waved at Rebecca, distracted by my hunt. Were they under the bed? Maybe I’d kicked them under there. I looked at the wardrobe, then shook my head. Fat chance.
“Pip, you okay there?”
I dropped to my hands and knees and flung an arm underneath the iron-cast bed. Nope. I glanced up at Rebecca. “My alarm keeps going off. I can’t find my phone.”
Rebecca pointed to the nightstand. My phone happily sat there as though amused by my predicament.
“Right,” I muttered, heading to it and sweeping my hand across the screen. “I must have set it.”
Cock-er-doodle-doo!
What? The thing didn’t even sound like it was making a noise. I flicked the screen with irritation and took a picture of my toes.
Rebecca pulled the phone from my hand and led me over to the window. “You should be in a funny farm, you know that?”
A preening cockerel strutted across the yard, looking very pleased with himself. “Please don’t tell me he’s going to do that every morning?”
Rebecca nodded. “I’ll ask about ear plugs.” She smiled at me. “Your nose looks less purple.”
“It feels mashed up like one of those old boxers.”
“Well, sting like a butterfly and float like a bee.” Rebecca thumbed to the doorway. “You want breakfast before we head to work?”
Oh, yes. I wasn’t a bum was I? No, I was employed by my own fiancé, working on a
house he wanted for us with a woman who so far exceeded any description adequate enough.
I wanted to go back to bed until it all went away. Would anyone notice?
Rebecca grabbed hold of me as I was in mid-stride and pushed me toward the breakfast table. As always with her cooking, my stomach betrayed my attempt not to be moved. It sounded like a pack of dogs had decided to make a rap record.
“I got freshly made French bread,” she said. “And . . . chocolate spread.”
The rap turned to a chorus. “Why didn’t we get married again?”
Rebecca guffawed. There was no other way to describe it. Her unruly eyebrows shot up so high that she looked like a model with a facelift. “Did you seriously just say that?”
“I can joke.” I sat down at the table, a little wobbled by my words myself.
“Pip, you make it clear any way you can that you are little miss straight.” Rebecca flashed a cocky smile, wiggling her eyebrows. I fought the urge to throw my bread at her. She was crass. “Maybe you’re mellowing in the light of the French sun, huh?”
“I’m glad you find my plight amusing.” I was really glad that she was. That she didn’t hate me for, one, not telling her and two, being so duplicitous about my past.
“You deserve to get teased,” she said. “But it’s only because I know it’s all in the past and you adore your hunk-in-boots.”
“Hunk-in-boots?” I spread the chocolate over my bread, took a bite, and licked the corners of my mouth, delicious fatty goodness. “Where do you get these sayings?”
“Stop avoiding the question.”
I crunched through the bread and the smooth sugary bliss oozed into my mouth, the chocolaty delight smothering my lips. Oh yes, I loved food. “I’m not,” I mumbled around my groaning. “You didn’t ask anything.”
Thankfully Doug waltzed through the doorway at that point. He was an annoyingly cheery morning person, one who spoke loudly and made a racket. If he was up, everybody else had to be.
As he slumped down on the seat next to me and planted a kiss on my lips, I found myself really looking at him. He was broad shouldered and toned, more from time spent in the gym than any actual activity. His wide chin sported reddish-brown stubble and his hair was neat, cropped, respectable. Every inch of him was the product of his upbringing. Born with a silver spoon in his mouth, he embodied everything an upper-class man should be.
He was always respectable, always polite, always well-mannered. He did what was expected of him and demanded that those around him did the same. His grey-blue eyes, so piercingly clear, made him difficult to resist. And after eight years, he felt like an appendage. I was scatty, disorganised and, as he called it, untamed. It made me wonder just what he saw in me.
I would say he needed committing but there you go.
“I was thinking that you could start working with Monsieur Chamonix after the locals I hired have removed all that’s left in there.” He smiled, a patient smile. “I did tell them I wanted it done by the time we arrived but you know foreigners—”
“Which is exactly what we are, Dougie,” Rebecca said, smattering her bread in yummy chocolate. She loved it as much as I did. Sometimes we’d appreciate its wonder in silence together. There was nothing like chocolate. The one thing that united women across the world in all generations.
Doug crossed his legs and popped the end of my roll into his mouth as I watched on forlorn. “I can’t help that they can’t even speak English now, can I?”
Rebecca looked at me and passed me the end of her roll. “We are in France.”
“Who doesn’t speak English these days?” He laughed as though that settled the matter and squeezed my knee. “Your mother will be popping in on the weekend. Maybe time for a little shopping?”
I shoved the roll in my mouth.
Rebecca blinked a couple of times. “Her mother?”
“Of course, who else would help her pick out a dress?” He seemed delighted at this turn of conversation. “What better way to break in the house, hmm?” His mobile beeped and he held up a finger as though checking for wind direction. “Right, yes . . . no, no, no . . . no you need to change that.” He put his hand over the mouthpiece. “I have to take this. Dinner?”
I nodded, chewing on my roll. He planted a kiss on my cheek, tutted at the chocolate on my lips, and strolled out of the door.
“Your mother.”
Swallowing was far harder now. “My mother.”
“A dress.” Rebecca reached across the table and patted my hand.
“A dress.”
I stared down at my hands. “He doesn’t mean a nice summer gown for a ball, does he?”
She shook her head.
I shook mine.
We stared down at the tub of chocolate.
“You want a spoon?” Rebecca asked.
I nodded.
She fetched two and handed me one. “You think he really wants us to fix up the house?”
I plunged my spoon into the tub, hung it upside down, and clamped the chocolate against my tongue. “Think he’d notice if we ran?”
“Me, not so much,” Rebecca said around her own mouthful. “You, well . . . I’m not sure if he’d stick a collar on you.”
“You think he would?” There was something in my voice that did not sound anything like joy or excitement. “He is going to make me join a country club or something, isn’t he?”
“Not if you don’t say ‘I do.’”
How could I not say those words? I’d promised to. It wasn’t polite to break promises. “What do I do?”
“In your situation, if I wasn’t running under cover of darkness, I would do what any self-respecting gay woman would.”
The mark of how very straight I was. I didn’t even know there were standards. “And what is that?”
Rebecca grinned. “Play with power tools.”
“Can I play with a hammer and saw instead?” Me and anything pneumatic was a bad idea.
“If you’re picturing cutting up frilly wedding dresses then that’s just fine.”
We both shuddered at the W word. It was good to know that she felt as jarred by Doug’s sudden announcement that nuptials were looming. What I couldn’t shake was if I really was terrified at the prospect of marrying him or whether I was confused by Berne being near. That’s all it was, yes, the shock was making me jittery.
Just shock.
Not Berne.
Nope.
Balls.
I needed more chocolate.
Chapter Seven
WE GOT TO the site only to find that the local men that Doug hired had all but stripped the place already. I had been expecting a slow, leisurely pace that with a little dragging out, could give Rebecca and I time to come to terms with all the grown-up stuff. At this rate, I’d be married and pregnant by the end of the month.
In a word, merde.
“Berne, Pip, you want to come over here a minute.” Rebecca had her work clothes on, complete with a checked shirt and white vest.
I hadn’t missed Berne smile at the fashion statement. Berne had her work jeans on, which wrapped snug against her powerful legs. Still, they weren’t so powerful that you could mistake she was a slender, gorgeous walking work of—
“Pip, quit drooling and focus.”
I heard my own gasp and my neck itched with the ensuing blush. “I hate you.”
Berne laughed as we huddled around Rebecca’s little gas stove.
“And you, Bebe.”
Rebecca frowned. “Did you just call her baby?”
Berne laughed again as I felt myself blush, again.
“Non. It is my nickname. Here, in France, you take the first part of your name and répété?” She smiled. “It can be your prénom or your . . .” She made the delightful humming sound when thinking. I leaned on my fist, enjoying it. Goodness she enchanted me.
“Surname?” Rebecca asked, prodding me.
Right, focus. Yes, where were we?
“Oui. Par example, m
y brother is Erique and so it would not work . . .”
I wondered how Erique was. I’d only met him once. He was as charming as she was.
“ . . . Alors they call him Cha-cha.”
“That sounds kinda camp,” Rebecca said.
I poked her in the back. She shrugged.
“There is nothing camp about Erique Chamonix, believe me,” I said. “He has enough charisma to make even you take notice.”
Berne smiled at my defence of her brother or maybe it was Rebecca’s look of mild disgust.
“Well, funny things do happen to go on in this country. Your sexuality seems void here, right?” Rebecca folded her ink-covered arms across her bust. I decided to ignore one tattoo that I hadn’t noticed of a rather . . . well . . . curvaceous woman. She was an anchor away from joining the Navy.
“So, why are we huddled, Ree-Ree?” I said, sticking my tongue out for good measure.
“I have a plan.” Her eyes lit up as she formulated my name into the mould. Hear it came. I folded my arms, waiting for it. Yup, cue adolescent mirth.
“PeePee!” She gripped her stomach as she howled like the adolescent teenage boy she was inside.
I knew her far too well. “It’s Pep-pee actually.”
Berne nodded in firm agreement.
“Like the cartoon skunk?” Off she howled again.
I sighed at Berne. “You can’t take her anywhere,” I said in French. “If there’s anything remotely gross or any innuendo, she is your girl.”
At the sound of my rusty French, Berne beamed. “Very good,” she whispered back. “You still remember much.”
“I had a good teacher.”
The twinkle in her eyes pretty much rooted me to the spot. I was aware that the builders were casting glances at us. Quite possibly, leaning towards her as I was, may suggest to some that I was about to throw myself into her arms. They were strong arms. I had no doubt she’d be able to catch me. In fact once, she’d carried me down a set of stairs. And was it me or was I close enough to just reach out and—
“So, plan, focus on the plan, ladies.” Rebecca recovered from her hysterics and cleared her throat.
“You speak French too?” Berne was very impressed. In fact, I could almost see her deciding that she liked Rebecca. A twinkle filled her eyes in such a way that I had only seen when she looked at her family or her beloved best friend, Babs.