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Confusion and pain fell from her eyes like tears, each one landing hard and fast on his heart.
‘Yes, you do. You do know. You find people in your life to weave impossible relationships around, because that’s easier for you than to face up to the reality that not everything can be a fairy tale, not everyone can be as perfect as you really want them to be. Not
your father, not your brother and damn sure not me.’ And even as he said the words, he half believed them, half hoped that he was speaking the truth, because the pain he was causing her, causing himself would be somehow less, and damn him if that didn’t make him a bastard. ‘And what is the reason for that, Maria? You once told me you wanted to know who Maria Montcour was, but, in truth, whether you’re a wife, or a mother, a sister or a daughter, you don’t seem to know who you are. And without that, we will all be playing roles in your fantasies. Ones we never have any hope of living up to. You demand love from us, but how could we if you don’t even know yourself?’
Maria let his accusation lie within her. She almost felt herself shrugging into it as if rearranging a piece of clothing over her skin. The horrifying realisation that he might be right robbing her momentarily of thought. Suddenly it was as if something within her snapped into place. As if he had thrown a mirror up to a person she vaguely knew but hardly recognised. Because he was right. It was easier to play a role within these desperately fantasised relationships. Because any rejection she experienced wasn’t a denial of her, it was the role that she had assigned herself, one she could discard and move on from.
Had she really done that? All these years...she recognised the truth of it in what her feelings had once been for Theo. But no matter what Matthieu said, she knew that she did love him. She could see him almost mentally scrabbling around for anything that would push her away, that would defend himself against his own feelings for her. And if he was going to tear strips from her heart to reveal some inner truth, then she would do the same for him. If this was the last time she would ever be able to meet him with honesty then she would.
‘Oh, how righteous you are, accusing me of not knowing myself, of hiding in roles, but what about you, Matthieu? What are you hiding from each time you leave my bed?’
‘I have to. I have nightmares, and they are...’
‘Just dreams, Matthieu.’
‘No, they’re not. They are real, they are memories for me! Each night I see my father, my mother and my house all burn. Sometimes you are there. You and our child. And I can’t—’
She could see the pain rippling across his shoulders and down his spine. Even in the warm night air, he looked frozen, cold to the touch even as his words were heated and blistered with pain. Her heart broke at the sight of it. Hating that he had hidden this from her.
‘Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you talk it through with me? We could have faced it together, but instead you bottled it up and kept it to yourself.’
‘I’m not like you. You have your brother, you have family. I am alone in this, and have been for more years than I have not been. Of course I didn’t tell you. I don’t tell anyone anything.’
‘But I’m not just anyone,’ she couldn’t help but cry. ‘I’m your wife. A role more real than any other. And as much as you might fight it, try to deny it and palm it off as fantasy, I love you. I do. It’s overwhelming, incredible and wondrous and you won’t let me share that with you, which is unspeakably sad.’ The words were a call to action in her heart, rippling out through her body. She hoped above all that even now, even as she knew she must walk away, he would change his mind. Change his heart.
‘But you won’t let that happen for yourself,’ she pressed on. ‘Instead you hide your pain, hoarding it as if it’s precious, as if it’s the only thing your parents left you with. Ignoring the fact that they gave you the building blocks to become the amazing man you could be, if you just let yourself.’ She could see the way he flinched at her words as they struck home, as they knocked aside the lies he had built around his heart to protect himself. ‘When I first told you about our child, you asked me what it is that I wanted. Now I’m asking you. What is it you want?’
‘I don’t know!’ The shout left his mouth and crashed against her in the most painful way. Because she wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt, desperately wanted to help him find his way to the truth. But she couldn’t.
‘That’s not good enough.’
‘It was at the beginning. I told you that I would be there for the child. I told you that you could have whatever material thing you could ever want or need. And I told you that I could not give you more than that. You’re changing the terms of our agreement.’
‘Yes,’ she said defiantly. ‘I am changing the terms. Because you’ve shown me that you are capable of more than you pretended to be. And you made me want that person, you made me want more.’
Matthieu couldn’t even deny it. Because he had changed. From the first moment that he saw her by the lake in Iondorra, he had known it would happen. It had started long before the nightmares that plunged him back into memories that he had long ago buried, never wanting to feel the pain, the devastation, the loss—the loss he feared he would experience if she or their child ever... He couldn’t even bring himself to think it. She had made him want more, want to be more. But it was too much. And the beast within him ached, snarling, biting, growling and gnashing its teeth.
‘And until you are ready to be the man I know you can be, I don’t want to see you. I don’t want you near me. You will have access to our child any time you like. I would not deny our child or you that right. But know this. When it comes to our child, there is no force majeure. You will be there at every birthday, every Christmas, every celebration whether it be a music exam, a school exam, or a driving test.’
Maria was painting a picture of the future he would deny himself. The future he was almost forcing through his hands like sand and it was eviscerating him.
‘No force majeure and no three strikes. Miss one, and you are out of their life for ever. Do you understand? Because what I have learned from my childhood and my time with you is that I will not inflict any kind of physical or emotional absence upon my child.’
My child. She was removing him from her life just as he had wanted before he had returned to the house, and after she had given him the present. At first it had been because he thought they would be better off without him. Now? He simply couldn’t imagine how he could live with them. Them and the constant fear that he could lose them at any moment. So yes, he needed her to go.
‘My child will grow up knowing they are loved, they are supported by their family. That no matter what, they come first. And they will know that because I will lead by example. So no matter how much I love you—and I do, Matthieu, so, so much—I am putting myself and my child first. But, Matthieu, for you? You have to face this. You cannot live in the shadow of the reputation you have lived down to as beast. You cannot let it rule your life.’
She walked past him, then, head held high, so beautiful it made his heart ache. But he knew it was for the best that Maria Rohan de Luen, the woman he loved too much to bear, left his life.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
YOU CANNOT LET it rule your life.
Maria’s parting words had echoed within the walls of his estate, had roamed around his mind for hours and even days after she had left.
His phone calls and emails had gone unanswered. He had not been back to the office since that night. Because in truth, her words had come to consume him. In the years following the fire he had thought, in his own way, that he had dealt with the events of that night. But now Maria had shone a light on his darkest, deepest hurts and the door that she had unlocked now swung open, fully flooding him with everything.
At first he had been cowed by the loss, a loss as fresh as it had been all those years ago. But once the first flush of memories from that night passed through him, other memories emerged. A holiday they had spent in Antigua, the way his mother always dressed in bright colours, pinks, turquoises, purples and bright oranges. The way his father would gently tease his mother for her choice in unusual earrings. And it hurt. The realisation that he had pushed down all the things that had made the two of them unique, loving, sometimes even like bickering schoolchildren. And it made him want m
