Page 64 of The Island Villa

“I’m trying to understand.”

“It’s impossible to know what would have happened in that situation. None of us can see down the road we don’t travel.” Her mother put her spoon down. Gave up on eating. “Relationships are complicated, that’s why I’ve managed to make a career writing about them. If they were simple, predictable and always stayed the same, there would be only one story to tell and I wouldn’t have had the career I’ve had. The reason I can write book after book is because no two people are the same, and—this is the important thing—” her mother leaned forward “—no two relationships are the same, even when it’s between the same two people. No one stays the same throughout their life. We’re all shaped and molded by the events we experience. I’m not the same person I was when I was married to Andrew the first time around. He’s not the same person either.”

Cassie thought about Adeline and the way she lived her life. Safe. Protected. Her childhood experiences had shaped her into the person she was.

She felt a pang as she thought of her sister.

“So marrying my father wasn’t a mistake?” She needed to know that. She needed to believe it, because otherwise what did that say about her? That she was a mistake too.

“How could it have been a mistake? I had you. And you and your sister are the two most important things in my life. Now, let’s eat some breakfast or we risk offending Maria twice in twenty-four hours and we don’t want to do that.”

Cassie poured herself a glass of juice. She’d asked her questions and her mother had answered them. Or most of them. Her answers had made sense. Of course, people changed. Of course, it was theoretically possible that you could fall out of love with a partner, and then back in love with them again. Complicated, but possible.

Cassie should be feeling better about everything. She should be feeling reassured.

So why couldn’t she shake the feeling that there was something her mother wasn’t telling her?

15

Adeline

Adeline paced to the end of the jetty, past her mother’s boat, which bobbed quietly on the crystal clear water, its blue-green paint gleaming in the hot sunshine.

She took slow deep breaths. Calm, calm, calm.

The sun blazed and her linen shorts, which had seemed cool in the villa, stuck to her thighs. Her loose shirt felt like a fur coat.

She removed her hat and lifted the heavy weight of her hair off the back of her neck. Here, right by the edge of the ocean, a faint breeze cut through the almost oppressive heat.

Her father had gone back to the villa, apparently unable to face being apart from Catherine for more than an hour. He’d urged her to join them, but she’d told him she needed to check her emails and send in her copy for her Dr. Swift column. Which was all true.

She also needed time to get her thoughts straight.

The conversation hadn’t gone the way she’d hoped it would. Nothing she’d said had made her father question what he was doing. He believed that life was giving him a second chance and he was determined to grab it. The wedding would be going ahead.

He was making a mistake, that was obvious, and yet he seemed to think she was the one with the problem.

She relaxed her muscles and closed her eyes.

“I am not going to scream.”

“Scream if you need to. Don’t mind me.” A man emerged from the boat. His hair was dark and rumpled by the breeze and he was wiping his fingers on a rag smeared with oil. There was a smudge of oil on his cheek and on the shoulder of his T-shirt. He stood on the deck, his board shorts riding low, his legs planted apart as he steadied himself against the gentle rocking of the boat. He looked like someone who was entirely at home on the water.

Adeline was mortified that he’d witnessed what she’d thought was a private moment. “I didn’t realize anyone was on the boat.”

“You had things on your mind. Bad day?”

Her defenses snapped back into position. She wasn’t about to share her deepest emotions with a stranger.

“Everything is fine. It’s a good day.”

“You scream on your good days?” He stepped off the boat in a single athletic stride and she took an involuntary step backward.

She didn’t want company. She wished he’d just stay on the boat and get on with whatever he’d been doing, and let her get on with...

With what?

“I wasn’t screaming.”

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