All her instincts were telling her to run from the truth, to leave the island and let her past remain a secret known only to Pascal, his father, and... her relative. The person who had paid to have her brought out to St Lucia.
‘You can’t stay. Your life would be a living hell,’ persisted Pascal remorselessly.
She gave a shuddering sob, seeing ahead of her her slow coming to terms with being quite alone in the world, never to find her family.
She gulped, emotion and weariness making it hard for her to get her words out coherently. ‘Tell your father I w-wish him well and I’m...sorry to let him down. I hope he feels better soon,’ she added, trying to hold her fuzzy mind together. ‘Poor, poor man.’
Something dark and anguished flickered in Pascal’s eyes and then his lids dropped to conceal whatever secrets lay there. ‘Poor man, hell! Last time I saw him he was screaming abuse at the stretcher-bearers,’ he said quietly. His mouth twisted at the memory and when he saw her sympathetic expression he lowered his lids again to conceal anything that might betray his true thoughts. ‘I gather from your sweet, parting sorrow that you’ve decided to call it a day.’
‘I think so,’ she said slowly.
He swung her limp body around to face him and Mandy’s dulled brain registered the shaking in his hands that betrayed an extreme tension. ‘Stop thinking. Just make sure you go. I don’t want to see you hurt,’ he said softly. ‘And if you stay you will be, I swear. Do the sensible thing. Get a suntan, eat, drink and be merry for the next two weeks, then leave St Lucia and don’t ever come back.’
She tried to focus on what was going on all around them and to see herself enjoying a holiday at Anse La Verdure. Carefully, elaborately, she built up the picture.
People were having fun. Scuba-divers were out on the coral reefs, people were snorkelling a few yards from where they sat. ‘It looks nice,’ she mumbled.
‘It’s wonderful. See the catamarans cruising by?’ he said persuasively. ‘Holiday-makers come from the north of the island to gape at the Pitons, which you have on your own doorstep. Look at the elegance of the yachts mooring in the bay. This is such a perfect place to anchor and the water is so clear that people sail from other islands to dive and swim, to eat in the beach bar or the restaurant complex above the beach. And you have it on a plate. Free.’
She passed a sweaty hand over her hot forehead. All along the beach the sunbathers slept, tanned and caught up with their holiday reading. Even to her confused mind she could see that it was a beautiful hide-away and totally peaceful in the absence of any traffic. The dominant sound was that of birds, singing in the forest that began where the sand stopped.
Mandy closed her eyes, imagining herself on the homeward journey. She would be alone, still with a huge question in her life unanswered. But this time it would be worse than before. There would be a bigger question mark hanging over her—not just the identity of her parents but what they had done. And how that affected her.
And then she knew that she had to discover everything there was to know about her background; every nightmare had to be exposed. Because, if she didn’t, she’d have those nightmares anyway—every single horror that could be imagined. If she was ever to know herself, she needed to know the truth.
White-faced, she began to gather all her courage, all the strength and dogged determination that had stood her in such good stead over the difficult years in the past. Without a doubt, she’d need every ounce.
CHAPTER THREE
SLOWLY Mandy opened her eyes and a wave of nausea hit her. Grimly she fought it down, realising to her dismay that her stomach had been so churned up with the unfolding nightmare that she was feeling quite ill, just when she needed to be strong enough to take whatever came her way.
Pressing a hand to her middle, she tried her best to calm herself with some long, deep breaths. But they made her dizzy and nauseous again and she slanted an alarmed glance at the watchful Pascal. ‘I don’t feel too good,’ she said miserably. ‘I need to lie down.’
Her free hand drifted vaguely over her forehead and found beads of perspiration there. It was the heat. She needed fluids. Her drink was still in her right hand and she gulped it down fast, draining the glass. Then she stood up to go and sat down almost immediately. Something hot and fiery was coursing through her stomach and her legs had melted along with every muscle in her body.
It was more than sunstroke or the spices in the drink. Closer to flu, she thought woozily. Or some virulent stomach bug—already! She let out a little moan to bewail her bad luck.
‘We’ll get you to your villa,’ came Pascal’s voice, a million miles away. It seemed almost concerned. But she must have been mistaken, because she thought he said, ‘And I’ll give you ten thousand dollars to get out of my hair and off the island now.’
‘Ten thousand?’ she repeated uncertainly.
‘You’re not asking for more, are you?’
The world went fuzzy. She looked down to quell the nausea, and the waves lapping her feet became a blur. When she laboriously lifted her head to judge his meaning, she found that his strong, dark face was hazy too, and her mind wasn’t connecting properly with her body. Or her mouth.
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