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‘I don’t know,’ he said harshly, raking his hand across the back of his neck. ‘I felt a tug down by the river. Maybe then—’
‘Shall we go back and look for it?’
‘Not if we want to catch the flight back to Lima. The time-slot’s non-negotiable.’
‘Oh, Xavier.’ Sophie reached out to him.
‘Don’t,’ he said, turning his head to hide his emotion.
‘But I want to help… I need to. I’m going to,’ Sophie said firmly, putting her arms around him and leaning her head against his strong back as she waited for a response.
‘I could have saved him—’
It was the faintest murmur she had to strain to hear.
‘If I’d been a doctor at the time of the car crash, I could have saved him.’
‘You don’t know that. You can go over it as many times as you like, but you must know you weren’t to blame.’
‘It was my car—’
‘And it was my father who dared Armando to take your keys,’ Sophie interrupted in a low, firm voice. How could she ever forget? Rumours at the time had been so cruel and ugly. People had said Xavier must have given the keys to Armando, but Sophie knew the truth—knew it, and had lived with it as long as Xavier. Her own father—the bully who had almost ruined her mother’s life, had tormented the wild young teenager until Armando had been persuaded to sneak away the keys to Xavier’s powerful new car—a car Armando had had no hope of controlling.
She could still remember every detail of that awful day even now, Sophie realised, holding Xavier a little tighter as she replayed it in her mind. Roaring past the tiny cottage they had rented each year, Armando had raised his hand in ironic salute to Sophie’s father, as Sophie had stood, uncomprehending, with her mother in the garden. She could still recall slapping her hand over her mouth in absolute horror as the scene had played out in slow motion with all the inevitability of a film you couldn’t stop rolling how ever much you wanted it to, and her mother’s instinctive cry as she had reached out her arms in a gesture of impotent appeal towards the recklessly speeding car.
It had all been hushed up, though no one could make the consequences disappear, Sophie realised. And after years of abuse her mother had finally had enough. When her father had confessed his part in it during a particularly morbid display of self-pity, her mother was even more horrified by his confession than she had been by his treatment of her. And so the tragedy in the Martinez Bordiu family marked the end of her parents’ marriage too.
Sophie’s thoughts jerked back to the present when she heard Xavier murmur as if to himself, ‘Armando could have been anything he wanted to be… He could have been a doctor too—’
‘Xavier.’ Sophie cut him off, instinct guiding her as she stroked and smoothed the harsh lines of his agonised face with tender fingers. ‘Don’t torture yourself like this. There’s nothing you can do that will change the past, but you are doing everything in your power to make a difference to the future. You are building such a monument to your brother’s memory. Armando will never be forgotten.’
‘I must leave,’ he said restlessly, ‘with, or without his wristband. There’s my training programme in Spain. It’s no use offering to sponsor young people if there’s no one to run the programme—’
Sophie allowed him to talk, only relieved he was looking forward, not back.
‘I’m not going to stop you catching that flight,’ she promised, moving away from the bed. ‘And you’ll find someone to take over from you here. I know you will.’
‘Who will take my place?’ he said, viewing her keenly.
‘I think you already know the answer to that.’
‘Henry?’ he said, his eyes clearing as he looked at her.
‘Why not Henry?’ Sophie said, smiling back. ‘He’s a wonderful teacher and doctor.’
‘And you, Sophie?’ Xavier demanded, a harsh note sounding in his voice. ‘What about you? What will you do now?’
Sophie’s life force seemed to drain from her as she stared uncomprehendingly into his eyes. Did he still think she had a choice? Did he imagine for one minute that she could have given herself to him so freely, so completely, if there was even the remotest chance they would not be together always—and on whatever terms he chose to name? Her gaze slipped automatically to his lips, but she wasn’t waiting for his kisses now; she was waiting for him to speak the words that would mean she could go on living…the words only he could say.
‘Has Henry changed so much you want him back?’
That was the last thing she had expected, Sophie realised, when she saw the fierce Latin pride take possession of his face. ‘Don’t,’ she protested softly. But Xavier’s eyes were like stone and his mouth a flat line reflecting feelings so intense she knew he was having difficulty containing them.
‘Then answer my question,’ he said tersely.
‘Of course I don’t want him back! How could you even think such a thing? And he’s with Anna now,’ she said, her voice rising in protest.
‘He is?’ Xavier said, rubbing the back of his neck.
Exasperation took the place of her anger. Didn’t men notice anything? ‘I wouldn’t want Henry back, improvement or no improvement—Anna or no Anna. I want you, Xavier,’ Sophie said bluntly. ‘And if you don’t know that yet—’
It was as if all Xavier’s tension drained away, and in the next moment something else, something equally fierce, took its place. And he cut her off in the most effective way, his lips demanding, his tongue clashing against hers in a primitive dance. ‘Why do you want me?’ he murmured, pulling away to brush her mouth with the lightest, most tantalising touch.
‘Goodness knows,’ Sophie teased, unable to keep the smile off her lips. ‘Because you drive me crazy maybe.’
His lips kicked up in a wry answering smile. ‘Good. I’m glad that’s settled.’ Xavier held her back and stared straight into her eyes. ‘Now I’m in a hurry, Sophie, and you have a decision to make—are you coming with me or staying behind?’
‘Can I get dressed first?’
He pretended to think about it. ‘Only so I can have the pleasure of undressing you again when you beg me to.’
‘Well, that’s never going to happen on the aircraft,’ Sophie said confidently.
‘Really?’
‘Yes, really.’
He shrugged acceptingly. ‘Before we leave there’s something for you in the bottom of that pot of cream.’
Sophie paused with her jumper halfway over her head. His casual tone gave her no clues. ‘Oh?’
‘Aren’t you even going to look at it?’ Xavier demanded, holding the pot out to her.
‘Is this one of your jokes?’ she said suspiciously.
‘A joke? No. But there’s only one way to find out.’ Dipping his hand into the pot, he pulled out something that fitted comfortably into his palm.
So comfortably, to Sophie’s frustration, she couldn’t see what it was. ‘What is it?’ she demanded, peering over his shoulder.
‘Don’t you know?’ he said and, when she went to prise his fingers apart, he closed his other hand over hers. ‘Shut your eyes and I’ll give it to you,’ he promised.
She did as he said and he pressed a small hide drawstring bag into her hands. She found it contained something warm and hard. As she hurried to release the stone from the protection of its bag and tip it out on to her palm, Sophie gasped as she saw what she was holding.
‘Well?’ Xavier murmured. ‘Do you know what it is?’
Sophie studied the rough green stone, hardly able to believe her eyes. ‘It looks like an uncut emerald.’
‘Correct. I didn’t want to accept it at first, but the villagers insist it is a gift of pride—of honour.’
‘For you?’
‘For us. Sophie, what’s wrong?’ Xavier murmured, cupping her face gently between his hands and tilting it up so that he could look into her eyes.
‘I was thinking about my contract…about how much work there’s
still to do here. About the people and how they need us—’
He dropped a kiss on to her lips, cutting her off. ‘And I have made a promise to those people you mentioned to go back to Spain and be ready to receive their young people for training. Won’t you help me with that, Sophie? I need you there. The people in these villages have come to love you, to trust you; they will be more likely to send their young men and women to Spain if they know you’re part of the training programme.’
‘I want to. I want nothing more, but are there enough people on the ground here?’
‘More coming every day thanks to all the coverage we’re getting from the media…thanks to interviews like the one you gave in Lima.’
‘And my contract—’
‘Is with me,’ he insisted wryly, running the tip of his fingers down the mud-streaked shirt she had put back on, allowing it to lodge provocatively on a button. ‘And anyway, I think it’s time I saw you in a dress, don’t you?’ he said, moving the finger slowly upwards to trace the line of her jaw. ‘A very, very pretty dress.’
‘Still a sexist,’ Sophie accused softly. ‘And I thought I cured you of that.’
‘Oh, forgive me,’ Xavier said in a voice full of irony. ‘I didn’t realise you don’t like shopping.’
‘Shopping!’
