White Lies

‘Thanks, Simon. I needed this,’ she said with heartfelt gratitude, and took several long sips through the straw. ‘It’s very good,’ she said, trying to take her mind off the hovering Pascal. ‘Lots of spices.’

‘I’m sorry it took so long,’ Simon said to them both. ‘One of us was up at the main bar getting more ice and I was trying to catch a dog running loose on the beach. I brought a refill for you both, in apology.’

‘I can certainly drink them both. I’m so hot. Wait a minute. I can finish this one now... There.’ She exchanged the empty glass for the full one, a little worried that her body was definitely not acclimatising to the sun. Suddenly she felt quite heady. ‘I’m sorry you’ve had to come all this way,’ she said with a warm smile.

The young man grinned at her, slid two tumblers of amber liquid from the tray and handed each one to Pascal. ‘No problem. Signature, please,’ he said, handing a receipt book to Mandy.

Pascal and Simon indulged in another round of friendly banter while she went over to a rock and settled herself down on it with her feet in the surf. The white, frothy juice slipped down her parched throat and eased her tension at once. Was there rum in it? It was difficult to tell, it tasted so spicy.

‘What’s in this?’ she asked suspiciously.

‘Papaya, mango, sour-sop, cinnamon, ginger, cumin,’ Pascal replied. She nodded. The warming spices. No wonder her body glowed. ‘What do you know about my father?’ he shot at her suddenly, catching her unawares. ‘Do you know he’s a lecher and a liar?’

She stared wide-eyed at his expressionless blue eyes and felt a deep sympathy. Hating your father might actually be even worse than growing up without one. At least if you were ignorant of your father’s character you could pretend that he was everything you would have wished for. She shivered as a tremor of dread iced her spine. Maybe she would do better to remain ignorant of her own parents.

‘I know nothing about him. Whatever the truth, I’m very sorry for you both because you hate him,’ she said earnestly, swishing her hot feet in the cooling water. Languidly she tipped back her head. She ought to find some shade soon. The sun’s glare was very fierce and it was making her a little dizzy, so she brought her head level again.

Pascal flicked away the sticky drops of water that had condensed around the bottom of his empty glass which he’d been resting against his chest. He placed the glass on a rocky ledge behind him and picked up his second drink.

‘If you like,’ he suggested, ‘I will give you a free ride on my boat to the airport when your two weeks are up. I must strongly advise you never to make any attempt to see my father, however tempting the idea might seem. You would almost certainly regret it.’

Mandy felt her heart beating faster. His threat had scared her. Giving him the benefit of the doubt, she decided that maybe he was being kind and trying to keep her from being hurt by discovering the secret of her family. She shook her head to clear it. ‘I need time to think,’ she said slowly.

It was difficult. Her brain seemed addled. For the life of her, she could think of no other logical reason why Pascal should warn her. Unless it was somehow to his advantage.

Advantage... That popped a memory into her head: the wording of the cryptic advertisement. ‘Please contact the office below where you will learn something to your advantage.’ She pursed her lips. His father had placed that advert and he’d virtually promised her something good. Her eyes shone. Something good! Not bad. Not frightening or disgusting!

Either he or Pascal was lying. But which of them?

‘Decided?’ he asked silkily.

‘No.’ She moistened her mouth with another long sip of juice, closed her heavy eyes and let the sun warm her lids. She was getting tired. The journey had sapped her strength and she wanted to lie down and rest, but she couldn’t let Pascal see that she felt weak to her very bones.

Her eyes seemed reluctant to open. Slowly her lashes lifted, fluttering with the effort. The sun and sea were so dazzling to her eyes that they were blurred. As though through a fog, a thought surfaced in her mind.

‘You were looking through his papers.’ She frowned, finding it difficult to formulate words, and wondered if she was suffering from jet lag. One of the people whom she delivered mail to had said that it only happened on west-east journeys, but he could have been wrong. ‘What did you dis-discover about me?’ she asked carefully.

‘Enough,’ he answered curtly, draining his glass. He shot her an assessing look. ‘Enough to damn you.’

She stiffened, her eyes rounding in distress. She couldn’t form the question in her mind. And maybe she would be wise never to ask, never to know. ‘You—you’re frightening me,’ she managed at last.

The fierce blue eyes burned with a cold, piercing fire. ‘So I should hope. The whole thing alarms me,’ he said softly.

‘No!’ she moaned. 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.