A French Kiss in London (17 page)

Chapter Eighteen

Linda stood motionless in the semi-darkness, watching astonished as a vulgar-looking woman kissed her lover. She felt a terrible pain, almost physical, as though thousands of spears were brutally piercing her entire body. The first one went straight through her heart. For a split second, it seemed to stop beating. Never in her life had she experienced such an agonizing feeling. It was as though the entire world had ended and was now collapsing over her, crushing her mercilessly.

With a painful sob tightening her throat, she descended the stairs quietly before anyone could see her. She got out of the building and looked around, at a loss, feeling numb. Like in a trance, she walked to the place where she’d left her car.

She jerked violently when her cell phone started ringing inside her jacket’s pocket. She took it out and stared at the bright display. It was him. Gerard. He probably hadn’t even had time to wipe that whore’s lipstick from his mouth, before calling her. She bit her lower lip until she felt the metallic taste of her own blood, and a single tear rolled down her cheek. She hurled the still ringing phone with all her force. It smashed against a tree, shattering into dozens of small pieces. She stood for a few seconds, listening to her own ragged breathing in the abrupt silence. Then she got into her car, slamming the door. She revved the engine and floored the accelerator, launching at full speed onto the streets of London.

It was dark, and the tears that wouldn’t stop falling blurred her vision. She wondered for a mad moment if it would be better for her just to die. To simply drive straight into the first obstacle she’d encounter. In that instant, she felt that was indeed what she wanted to do.

But reason and pride took precedence in her mind and heart. To die for a man! How pathetic she was. Never! No one deserved this kind of honor, this sort of sacrifice. Especially that lying worm! How could she let her cat be orphaned, for a man?

Her Italian ego was the only weapon she had against the wound bleeding deep into her soul. Pride had helped her get over all the bad memories, over Tony, over everything that had hurt her. It was going to help her now. After all, she’d been the one to declare from the start that she didn’t need, nor want, a serious relationship. Why was she complaining? What could be more un-serious than the man to whom she had offered herself—body and soul—kissing another woman?

Well, it had looked like the woman was the one to do the kissing, but Linda’s reasoning—or the lack there of—rejected the continuation of this idea. No one could force a man of Gerard’s size and build. That woman hadn’t kissed him by physically constraining him, that was certain.

But why? Why? What could that slut have offered him that I haven’t? What has a common whore over me?
she thought, with the inbred superiority of high-class women.

The she remembered Tony’s words, that night of the exhibit. All of her old hang-ups, which she’d thought Gerard had wiped from her subconscious, surfaced once more. Maybe she really was a lousy lover, not good in bed, or outside of it.

She jerked the car to a stop on the side of a road she didn’t know. She lowered her head onto the steering wheel, her chest shaken by sobs. She wondered if this horrible pain would ever go away, or at least diminish. She wondered what he would feel if he’d see her in another man’s arms. Would it be worth it to repay him with the same coin?

No, it wouldn’t. That would mean lowering herself to his level, and she had too much self-respect. Or, she tried to. Besides, no man was going to make her feel what she felt with Gerard. Ever. She was sure of that.

Why, oh why, had she listened to Giovanni and started this relationship? Why had she given Gerard the vote of confidence? She bitterly cursed herself for that. She wanted to call her brother. She longed for comfort, just as a person covered by burns feels the desperate need for ice, for a soothing balm, for anything that could bring relief.

But she remembered her phone was now in pieces, somewhere near Gerard’s building. She swore aloud and rummaged in her bag for some tissues.

Her jaw dropped at the sight of the object she discovered in one of the inner pockets of her handbag. She bent and studied it in the dim light, then shook her head in dismay. After a moment, she let it fall back on the headrest. What difference did it make now? It didn’t matter anymore. Nothing did.

After driving aimlessly for hours, she headed home, feeling that she had a stone instead of a heart. But stones couldn’t feel pain, while her heart was in agony.

She saw Gerard from a distance as she drove toward her gate, and involuntarily bit her lip, which started bleeding again. She gritted her teeth, punching the steering wheel hard. Somewhere in her subconscious, she’d predicted she was going to find him here, but he was the last person she wanted to see.

She jerked the car to a stop behind his Jeep, and Gerard ran toward her. She took a restorative breath, grabbed her handbag and stormed out of the car. He reached her in two strides. Putting his arms around her, he drew her close against him, holding her tightly.

“Where were you, Linda?” he asked frantically. “I was so worried! Where’s your phone? Why haven’t you answered me?”

“I smashed it,” she replied calmly, trying to ignore the warmth of his arms and the nearness of his body, which had become her temple in such a short time. Only the thought that those arms could have held another woman caused a sharp pain in her heart. She detached herself from his embrace. “I smashed it,” she repeated, in a glacial tone. “I didn’t want to be disturbed. I had…things to do.”

He froze and his hold on her slackened. He stepped back slowly, analyzing her from head to toe. She knew her hair was disheveled, her clothes wrinkled and her lower lip was swollen and bleeding. She probably looked well fucked, from his point of view. In a dark corner of her soul, she thrived on that thought, wanting badly to make him suffer the same agony that she was feeling.

A wave of confusion, maybe even madness, seemed to fall over him. He grabbed her shoulders and jerked her to him, glaring fiercely straight into her eyes. Then he spoke through his teeth, accentuating each word.

“I thought I was going crazy with worry and despair because of you! I was just going to the gallery, then to the police and the hospitals. Where have you been, Linda?”

“Take your fucking hands off me right now!” she shouted, yanking herself from his grip. “It’s not your bloody business where I’ve been! We have—or rather, we had,” she corrected, “a modern relationship, right? Do you think you’re the only one who has the right to fuck exotic dancers?”

He looked stunned, his astonished gaze fixed on her as though he tried to make some sense of her words. Eventually, he asked, in a tone straining with forced calmness, “Can you please translate for me what the hell you’re talking about?”

She watched him contemptuously, seeing the innocent expression on his face. She had an acute urge to slap him.

“I saw you, Gerard, so don’t bother playing dumb. I was just climbing the stairs to your flat, and I saw you kissing that second-rate whore on your doorstep. Do you pay her, or does she offer you her services for free? God, to think I’ve slept with you!” she exclaimed, plowing her fingers through her hair, overwhelmed by a hysterical humor. “I hope at least you use protection with her, Doc. Or should I take the HIV test? Considering the number of men who have probably tumbled her…”

He stared at her speechless, gradually grasping the situation. He pushed a hand through his hair, looking like he was trying to find a right way to deal with a rattlesnake.

“If you say you were there when Danielle kissed me—accent on
she kissed me
—have you also noticed I didn’t participate with anything to that gesture?”

“I didn’t see you protesting!”

“Because I didn’t have time! She took me by surprise! I’ve no idea what got into that woman, but it wasn’t me. I know her for months, and yes, it’s true she came on to me a few times, but I’ve always made it clear for her that I wasn’t interested!”

“Looks like you weren’t clear enough! I wonder what other things you did together,
against your will
. It’s remarkable what power of persuasion a pair of fake tits can have on a man,” she scorned, turning away from him. “Imagine, I thought you were too noble to fall for this kind of frivolous female traps. I came there to surprise you, because I couldn’t sleep without you anymore. My God, how could I have been such an idiot?” she screamed and landed a mighty punch on the side of his Jeep, putting all of her force behind the blow.

“How could you be with me and not realize I’d never cheat on you?” he roared, grabbing her shoulders again and turning her to face him. “How can you judge me only by a scene, which wasn’t what you’re imagining? Did you really not notice I didn’t have time to make one single gesture before that woman kissed me? How should I know what was in her head? She came to return the key to my flat, I gave her the gifts and she left. That was all. I told her I was in a hurry, and I truly was. I rushed downtown before the shops closed, to buy something for you,” he told her furiously.

Suddenly, his hands dropped down from her arms. He lowered his head, shaking it slowly from side to side, with his eyes closed. When he opened them again, they fixed on her. The emotion she saw in his gaze was so potent it made her heart tighten painfully.

He reached inside his jacket and retrieved a small, dark, velvet box. His voice sounded rusty when he said, “I was in a rush to get over here, because I can’t go on living without having you in my arms, and without having you by my side, night and day.”

She remained motionless, staring dumbfounded at the box in his hand. Gerard opened it hesitantly, revealing a delicate gold ring, with a diamond sparkling pale in the moonlight.

“Linda, I came here tonight to ask you to marry me. To spend your life with me. To let me show you I love you more with every moment. I came here to tell you that you’re everything that motivates me and gives me purpose in this world.”

Still she couldn’t speak. Her gaze was fixed on the diamond’s mesmerizing reflections. Her soul and mind were spinning in chaos and everything was confusing, especially this unexpected turn of events.

After a while, she lifted her eyes to him and exclaimed incredulously, “You…You can’t be serious! We’ve known each other less than a month and you’re telling me you want to marry me? After I saw you kissing another woman? You…Just can’t be serious. This is crazy!” she stammered, trying to control the maddening racing of her heart.

“Not to me, it isn’t. I didn’t need a month, but only a moment to know I fell in love with you. That I want to spend the rest of my life with you,” he said simply. “But you…You’ve never believed in me, in us. You never wanted this relationship. You were always distant and apprehensive. What hurts me the most though is that, after all the moments we shared together, you could doubt me, even for a moment. No matter what you saw, you should have at least given me the benefit of the doubt. You should’ve felt in your heart I could never be interested in another woman. You’re the most important thing I’ve ever had in my life.”

She read an infinite sadness and disappointment in his voice. She noticed, alarmed, that his eyes were shining with tears. She’d never seen such hopelessness into the green depths of those eyes.

Before she can say another word, Gerard let the ring box slide from his fingers. It fell to the pavement with a sad sound. He spoke in the same tone.

“I’m sorry, Linda. I didn’t want you to feel constrained by me. I just asked you to marry me, and…your reaction says everything. I won’t bother you again. You can believe what you want about Danielle and me. It doesn’t matter anymore.”

He turned his back on her with an air of finality. With the posture of a man who carries the entire world’s heaviness on his shoulders, he climbed into his car and drove away.

She stood in the middle of the road, next to her own crookedly parked car, following his headlights, as they disappeared into the night.

She fell to her knees and picked up the tiny box, then gently brushed her fingers over the delicate diamond. Even its glow seemed to reflect a sad solitude, sending rays that pierced her soul. She cried alone in darkness, cupping the small box tightly to her chest, consumed by regrets and doubts, and most of all by the black abyss of loss, which seemed to absorb her completely.

Chapter Nineteen

She spent the night crying, hugging one of Gerard’s shirts that had remained into her closet. She attempted in vain to absorb love and warmth from his scent, impregnated in the white cotton. Pirata cuddled against her, crestfallen because of his mistress’s deep unhappiness. He seemed to feel the despair in which she wallowed. She stroked him softly, gazing into his blue eyes, which reflected intelligence and understanding.

Pirata had always managed to alleviate her soul, but in these horrible moments it felt her wounds would never heal. Dozens of times she reached for the phone on her nightstand, determined to call Gerard. Yet something inexplicable stopped her every time. She tried telling herself it was the image of him kissing that woman, but she wasn’t sure. She wasn’t sure of anything. Only when daylight began dissolving the darkness did she fall into a superficial sleep, where the reality’s nightmares followed her ruthlessly.

She woke up a few hours later, with a terrible headache. Her eyes were so swollen and gritty from crying that she could barely open them. She felt unusually weak. Her stomach seemed to have shrunken overnight, reminding her she hadn’t eaten in over twelve hours.

She got up and, swaying, headed to the bathroom, where she took an almost cold shower, in an attempt to force her body and mind to function.

Afterward, she wrapped herself in a robe and descended the stairs. In the kitchen, she fed her cat, then managed with great difficulties to swallow a croissant and some milk. She forced down each bite, repeating to herself that she wasn’t going to destroy her health over a man, no matter what.

She wandered around the house like a ghost, moving from room to room. Everything reminded her of him, of his smile, of his touch. The need to hold him provoked an almost physical pain inside her, but Linda clenched her teeth, fighting to chase away any thoughts of him.

Although it was probably too early for shops to be open, she dragged on a pair of faded jeans and a T-shirt. She hid her eyes behind an enormous pair of sunglasses and went out to buy a new cell phone.

She drove with the motions of a sleepwalker to a mall and bought the first phone she saw, without understanding a single thing of what the clerk was saying. The woman was so chatty that Linda wanted to strangle her.

Once she got back into her car, she realized that, by breaking her old phone, she’d lost all the phone numbers stored on the device’s memory card. If she weren’t in such a turmoil, she would have thought about it long before.

“God damn it!” she screamed and smashed the tender, swollen knuckles of her right fist against the dashboard. “How much more can I take of this?” she demanded of herself, of God, of anyone who was responsible for the mess her life had turned into.

She released all the cuss words she could think of, then thumped her head hard on the headrest. She felt defeated, exhausted. She, who usually had nerves of steel, had become an emotional wreck because of a man!

She closed her eyes and took a deep, restorative breath, gathering each drop of inner strength she possessed, in an attempt to collect herself. She had to start thinking rationally again. The first step was to see if she could recover her memory card. If miracles existed, it could still be lying somewhere in front of Gerard’s flat building, next to the tree against which she’d hurled her phone.

The thought of going there caused her stomach to knot, but she had no alternative. All her phone numbers and important contacts were on that minuscule card. She would need days to gather only part of them. Perhaps being so tiny, the card had passed unnoticed. It seemed highly improbable, but she had to try.

On the way to Gerard’s residence, she had to drive by the clinic. As she approached Hope, her heart started to race uncontrollably. Like in a trance, she slowed down, then parked somewhere behind a van, close to the clinic’s entrance. She consulted her watch, knowing it was time for Gerard to come to work. She waited for a few minutes, gazing at the cafeteria where they’d eaten ice cream the day they’d met. That memory brought on a fresh wave of grief and sorrow. But it couldn’t even compare to the emotion she felt when she saw his car appearing at the curve.

The Jeep stopped right in front of the clinic. After a few moments, Gerard emerged, holding a stack of files. Linda stopped breathing for a moment. Her heart hammered madly at his sight. He was dressed as usual in jeans and a black shirt. Even from this distance, she noticed the purple, dark half-moons under his gorgeous eyes, which now looked tired, with no trace of the vitality that gave them their special glow.

He was unshaven and his movements reflected those of a man twice his age. Nevertheless, she thought he looked magnificent. An adolescent-like emotion of a scary intensity flashed through her. A tear rolled slowly down her cheek from behind her opaque lenses. She didn’t want to be noticed, so she breathed easily when he entered the building, without looking to the right, nor to the left. He seemed to move like an automaton. He appeared broken, as if his existence was as miserable and unhappy as hers was.

Linda clamped her teeth over her lower lip, which now wore a visible mark. But she didn’t feel the pain anymore. Although she was vaguely conscious of her physical discomfort—result of a sleepless night spent curled up in bed, crying—she was much more aware of her psychological meltdown. She felt her spirit shattered, destroyed, torn. She simply was incomplete.

She didn’t know when she’d lowered her head onto the steering wheel. When she opened her eyes, her vision was blurry and the lenses of her sunglasses were wet with tears. She took them off and wiped them with the hem of her T-shirt, before putting them back on.

Remembering her plan, she started the engine and sped toward Gerard’s flat. Once she got there, she parked on a side street and headed to the place where she’d destroyed her phone. She quickly located the tree against which the poor object had smashed.

She squatted and stared around, groping among patches of grass and dirt. To her amazement, she found the phone’s components, one by one: a fragment of the display, most of the back carcass and some other pieces she couldn’t identify. Probably none of the street cleaning-crews had yet reached this area.

In the grass, at the base of the tree, she caught a metallic glint. Bending, she discovered the card, which had flown off in the moment of the impact. She gave a short sigh of satisfaction and reached for it, praying that it still functioned. She blew the dust off it and stood, feeling a bit dizzy.
That’s what sleepless nights, lack of food and crying jags do to a person
, she thought miserably as she stuffed the card into her jeans’ pocket.

When she turned to go, she came to an abrupt halt. Facing her was none other than the woman who had become her rival in the past twenty-four hours.

Danielle, wearing a semi-transparent, minuscule dress and four-inch heels, was watching her with an amused expression over her carefully painted face.

It was the first time Linda was seeing her from up-close. She had a mane of blonde, bleached hair, dark eyes and full lips painted cherry-red. Her obscenely large breasts were barely contained under the thin material of her cheap dress.

“Looking for something, doll?” the woman drawled, indolently.

Linda had an urge to claw out her black-lined eyes, but she gazed at her contemptuously, up and down. In an infinitely superior tone, which only high-class people can assume, she asked, “Have we met?”

“I don’t think you had the pleasure, but I know who you are,” Danielle said in the twisted, Cockney accent of a low-class country-girl. “Gerard has almost made an exhibit with your newspaper pictures. He’s sweet up to the pathetic point. I’ve never thought him to be so boring. From what I’ve heard, you know who I am, as well.”

“You must be mistaken, uh,
Miss
,” Linda replied icily, straining the last word in scorn. “I don’t know who you are, nor do I want to.”

Danielle propped a fist on her well-rounded hip.

“Your boyfriend almost killed me last night. I had the night off. While I was sleeping, I woke up with the sound of his fists banging against my door. He woke up all the neighbors. It was quite a show. As he was heroically abstaining from wringing my neck, he was yelling that, because of me, he’d lost what he loved the most. I guess he was referring to you.”

Linda watched her silently, without even blinking.

Danielle didn’t seem to wait for a reply. She went on, unfazed, “It never happened to me before for a man to be offended by me kissing him. It appears your boyfriend is an exception, from several points of view. I don’t need to explain why I felt the need to kiss him. It’s obvious, for any woman who takes one good look at him. Anyways, against my better judgment, and for his benefit only, I’ll tell you the truth as it is.”

She shifted her weight onto the other long, tanned leg, and then continued.

“He didn’t contribute with anything to the kiss you saw. Hell, on the contrary. If he had time, I’m sure he would’ve protested. I just couldn’t help myself. I believe you can understand that. In any case, I want you to know that between him and me there was nothing more than a simple friendship. He wanted it like that. Now that’s over too,” she concluded with an almost sad smile, showing Linda her arms, where twin bruises were beginning to darken. “I want to say you’re to blame for these. But I know I’ve brought this on myself.”

The woman paused, probably waiting for a reply from Linda, but the latter remained stubbornly silent.

Danielle sighed deeply.

“In the end, I’ll tell you that if you let a man like Gerard walk, you’re a bloody idiot. The man loves you more than anything. Only a blind person could fail to see it. You should take off those freaking sunshades and take a good look at what you’ve thrown away.”

With that, Danielle turned her back and left, swaying her generous hips.

Linda stayed where she was, looking after the woman, dumbstruck.

* * * *

Gerard buried his face in his palms and propped his elbows onto his old, scarred desk. He’d tried hard to concentrate on the stack of papers spread all around him, but in the end he gave up. From the small radio-speaker, Laura Pausini’s crystalline voice was sending painful and unsuspectingly deep echoes into his heart, with each note of the song
Strani Amori.

Strange love.
Gerard had guessed the meaning of those two words in Italian. That melodious language reminded him of her. Everything reminded him of Linda, starting with the hollow he felt in his soul, ever since he’d left her standing in the middle of the dark driveway. Did she miss him, just a little? Did she really think he’d cheated on her with Danielle? He recalled the way he’d acted toward Danielle the past night, and felt a trace of remorse. Perhaps she hadn’t deserved such a rough treatment, but he had simply lost control, as swiftly as he’d lost the only woman he’d ever truly loved.

In such a short time, that woman had become the center of his universe. He relived each moment spent with her, beginning with the instant he’d first seen her, looking so distant and cool. He reminisced every small progress and the necessary efforts to remove her shield of indifference. Every time they had made love…

Had everything been in vain? When he’d ran like a teenager to buy the ring, he was so sure that Linda loved him, that she would say
I do
, that she wanted to become his wife. Yet now, he wasn’t sure of anything. He was only conscious of an utter desolation, a state of uselessness and misery, which had descended over him.

He raised his head slowly, looking around his office, aware stronger than ever of all the pressure and responsibility weighing on him. He’d spent all morning with the clinic’s manager, as well as with a couple of his most trustworthy workmates. He’d told them Jean-Paul’s story and they had put together a plan of action.

Suddenly, he was seized by an impulse to get away from all this, to walk away, maybe to run away—even if that made him a coward in his opinion. But it was a choice between taking a break far from everything, or losing his physical or mental health—entirely or partially, he didn’t know and didn’t want to find out.

He stood up, abruptly. Without a backward glance, he got out of his office, slamming the door behind him.