Jamaica

Santiago wakes me as the alarm goes off and I roll with a groan to peep at the bedside clock. I’ve been with him for a good while now, three whole days after our first night together.

I should be thoroughly ashamed of myself and indeed go for that therapy session but, meh, you can only regret what you never do really. That’s my motto.

The things you do and don’t feel too hot about later aren’t regrets, they’re life lessons. I bet some dried up grape of a shrink would totally have a field day with that way of thinking and tell me I’m justifying my actions or some shit.

They’d be right, but I don’t care.

Today, as with the last three, I’ve been aaaahming the hell out of life and telling myself that it doesn’t matter what other people think, as long as I’m happy.

And I am! I’ve stopped caring that I’m sleeping with my boss because, yeah, despite what Santiago said, I do see him that way. Hell yeah I do, I’m taking the money people! I’m not working these mad skills for free just because the man is my ex-lover - reinstated for the time being - and a friend - up in the air right now on that one. I hate waking up early.

In other words, yes, I have totally thrown caution and the past to the wind for the time being and I am sleeping with the guy.

It’s all gooood. I’m totally enjoying the sex, I have had a good long talk to myself and my vagina and I am staying objectively detached from feeling anything but lust.

I am.

And it’s gonna work this time, I swear it is. Maybe. Oh, who the hell knows, don’t you laugh at me. I have needs, people, and it feels really good to have those needs met, over and over again, without having to think or feel anything but the pleasure.

“Bella, we need to wake, my heart. Our plane leaves in an hour.”

I groan, mutter something he can do with his plane and roll out of bed, walking to the bathroom unashamedly naked. I hear him growl and stifle a chuckle as I yawn and stretch up on tip toe, stretching muscles that are sore in the best of ways.

“You’re sure you’re okay with this, Santiago? Don’t get your hopes up, it’s just an address,” I say for the fortieth time when he walks into the bathroom, watching me put my hair up before stepping in and turning on the water.

“I am aware, as I have told you already. I am not a child, Isabella, I can handle disappointment.”

I hear the words but the last three days have been a seesaw of emotion for me. I found an address and even an existing electric bill - don’t ask me how, I will never admit to breaking laws, I’m not stupid - but that didn’t pan out either because, according to school records, there is no Gabriella Luis in attendance at any of the schools.

I even searched under her new name, Gabriella Morada and came up empty. It took me an entire day to ascertain that she isn’t in a school in the area so I had to branch out and get creative.

Very creative.

I eventually hit upon a lead using hospitals - again, I do not admit to hacking into any official and confidential files using an IP that bounces to South America - and found a record for a Gabriella Luis who was treated for a fractured arm.

That was in Madrid itself and they were even nice enough to have an address on record. Score!

That’s where we’re going, later. First, I have to get to Italy because apparently Luc is having a fit because Mia still hasn’t gone into labor and I’m the baby whisperer.

I don’t know where the man comes up with that shit, I just don’t, but to Italy I will go. Not that I want to, I think morosely, scrubbing my junk squeaky clean.

I do not, I repeat, do not, want to be anywhere near Mia right now. It pains me to admit this, but I think part of the reason I left is because she’s pregnant and I am unholy jealous.

And not a little angry that she gets to have two whole babies and I got none. I’m a peach that way.

I step out of the shower once I’m rinsed and grab a towel, dry myself and head for the closet where I’m pretty sure I see more clothes than belong to me.

I won’t say a thing, just avoid them altogether even if they are suspiciously in my size. I pull on skinny jeans, a white tee and tennis shoes without socks.

Santiago waits patiently as I apply some make up and spritz on perfume before grabbing my bag and the little carry all I have packed for emergencies.

“Okay, I’m ready.”

He smiles and takes my hand, his finger fiddling with the engagement ring and I follow him out to the car for the drive to his private plane. We get there more than on time because I am a rock star who doesn’t take forever to get ready and it’s only once we’re seated and in the air that he turns to me with a frown.

“Tell me again how you found her and how you know she’s in Madrid.”

I sigh silently, refraining from an eye roll because the man is persistent and no matter what he says, he’s nervous. Men, Jesus they’re so freaking predictable.

“I searched hospitals one by one with her name, age and parents as the criteria. It got one hit for an incident just a few months ago when she was treated for a fracture in her right arm. I don’t know if this address is viable but it’s the last lead I could scare up. We have to go there and pray that they still live there or question the neighbors one by one.”

I’ve told him this many times now but he still doesn’t seem to believe that this is a viable lead. Or maybe he’s just afraid to believe it, I think, muttering a silent curse at my insensitivity.

The poor man is probably just scared that we’ll get there and it’s nothing. I get that, I do, but this is what we have unless I call Bill and let him go bananas breaking into people’s private information.

I don’t want to use him until I have no other options and, yeah, I know why. The sooner I find Gabby, the sooner I get to leaving and it’s horrible but true. I don’t want that time to come.

Stupid! What happened to not feeling anything, I ask myself, watching Santiago pour us both juice from the jug at his elbow.

“So, if this address is not good…”

“Then I’ll need to question the neighbors. It’s normal procedure for this kind of case so it’s no big deal. If they have no forwarding address, then I call Bill and he’ll use his super spy skills to hack into government databases to find them using their IDs or tax history. That’s the ultimate step and one that is guaranteed to bring up results. The only reason I haven’t let him yet is because he’ll want more answers and you don’t want him to know it all. He’s a last resort,” I say, lying a little and feeling like hell.

He nods, sitting back with a sigh before eyeing me frankly.

“This time with you has been wonderful, Bella.”

Oh great, not the freaking let’s be friends after its done lecture, I pray, taking a sip of juice to keep my hands busy.

“It has. You were right, Santiago; sex with no strings can be fun.”

No it isn’t! My inner sap wails the words and starts sobbing from the corner I shoved her in, her time out totally necessary if I want sex without complications.

Shut up, bitch, didn’t I tell you to keep your filthy mouth shut? The last time I let you lead proceedings we cried for a month.

Santiago doesn’t smile or respond the way I thought he would and I feel like an asshole when he looks away, his jaw clenching.

“What we have had for these three days, Isabella, has been a revelation to me, querida. Sex with no strings? No, I cannot agree with you about that because it has been the very best time I have had in years. I did not think about anything but being with you and it is more than I have ever let myself have. I may not be a loving man, Bella, but I care for you deeply. When we are together, it is me making love to you, not my body seeking release.”

“Santiago, I-”

“But perhaps you cannot see it this way because I have hurt you too badly for you to feel anything for me,” he says, sounding so sad I feel my heart lurch painfully.

“That’s not true. I don’t hate you at all, Santiago. When I met you again it wasn’t easy. I carried a lot of grief and anger with me, but I’ve had time to think while we’ve been working on this case and I, I don’t hate you. You’re not a bad person and you don’t deserve the blame for something that was my fault,” I say hoarsely, my throat working because it isn’t easy to say the words out loud.

What happened with Brian was my fault. I was stubborn and blind, willfully blind because I didn’t want to do this all alone and it was easy to have him with me.

The fact that having him meant losing in the end just makes it all the worse. If I’d listened to my own inner voice and heard when she screamed at me that he was becoming unhinged, I’d never have been in that car in the first place.

“No, Bella.” He breathes raggedly, coming to kneel beside me when I sniff and swallow loudly. “It was not your doing. If I had been less of a bastard, I would have been there with you or we would have been at the villa where you were safe.”

I wanted to believe that for a long, long time but it’s not the truth. Here, there, I’d still have ignored the signs and stuck with Brian because he was my friend and I loved him.

“Or I would have not listened to you the way I ignored everyone else in my life and I’d still have been in that car when he lost it,” I say, biting my lip and looking into his eyes. “It doesn’t even matter anymore, Santiago. No one is to blame or if I want to place blame, the only guy to pin it on is already dead. It’s wasted emotion on a situation that I can’t change. I won’t blame you, not because of Brian’s actions, and I can’t stay mad forever. I want a life and happiness, not anger and grief,” I say softly, stroking his jaw. “You and me, we were never meant to be anything more than a casual holiday fling that I took too seriously. It’s taken me a long time to look past the hurt to see that you didn’t lie to me, I lied to myself.”

Cold comfort that if I have to think back on the path our ‘relationship’ took. Me and him, three weeks. Honesty on his part. Me, being a boob who just couldn’t get the message.

Yeah, what a freaking pill, I think, shaking off the sadness to give him a smile.

“You were a total dick but you were an honest dick who didn’t lie. You gave me a low blow with the whole paternity thing but besides that, I can’t fault you for much. It was all me.”

“Bella-”

“Don’t. Don’t try to be kind here, Santiago, please. I’m still the same girl with the same hopes and dreams even if I managed to step into the easy sex category for a while. You don’t want to love me and I can’t be with you without it. Let’s just leave things the way they are. We’ll go to see Mia and then get back to Madrid and I’ll find your niece.”

He wants to say something, I see it when he opens his mouth and then snaps it shut but whatever he sees on my face must be too close for comfort because he sits back in his seat and nods.

“Yes, we do this first and then…I would like to discuss the baby. If you do not mind,” he says painfully.

I kinda do, I don’t really want to relive everything about that time but I get that he needs and possibly has a right to answers about exactly what happened.

So I nod, not saying anything because the lump in my throat won’t let me.

“We can talk. We’ll also need to discuss the annulment and-”

“That cannot happen, Bella. We have been intimate,” he says, smiling wickedly when I blush because that word does not do it justice.

Intimacy is way too tame a word to describe exactly what we’ve been doing together. But I do freeze, the blush melting away as my face pales with realization.

“But, but no one needs to know that-”

“And it would be dishonest of me to use annulment. No, Bella, I am sorry but if we are to part ways it would be a divorce,” he says his tone hard and final.

Oh shit! Hell no. I don’t believe in divorce, not after Aunt Sue told Mrs. Freeman that her daughter is going to hell for breaking vows with God.

“But, it was just,” I whine, counting in my head, “nine times.”

He grins, his brow arching and I blush again because, okay, some of those times I am conveniently forgetting don’t just fade away. I don’t count them all because oral isn’t full sex. Is it?

“Bella, be reasonable we are married for all intents and purposes.”

“But…but it’s not a real marriage.”

“No? We exchanged vows, have slept together too many times to consider this marriage unconsummated and to be fair to myself, I do not see you as some pawn I used to get what I want. I truly do care for you. Enough to know that scrubbing this marriage from my mind is not something I want to do.”

Oh God!

“Are you saying you’re definitely doing divorce?” I ask, flabbergasted by the ramifications.

I’m definitely going to hell, if Aunt Sue is right and I don’t wanna! I have a cloud picked out in heaven and everything. If Aunt Sue is right and my parents can’t be judged for being idiots - I don’t one hundred percent agree here because I don’t think George Bush is going to heaven and that man is a dummy -  then my cloud is the one furthest away from them because I know I can’t kill anyone in heaven - can I? - and somehow I just know I’d be demoted. Waaaay demoted. Because I’d kill them.

I’m only human, people.

Santiago shrugs as if he’s not too concerned and I start to sweat, deciding that continuing this line of conversation is not in my best interest.

“Bella, this isn’t for your concern now, sweetheart. Let’s just go talk to Mia, get her to go into labor and then get Gabriella. When it is all done then we can talk and decide what we want to do.”

What I want to do? What we want to do?

What needs to happen is for this all to be done so I can go back to Italy, finish out that Halifax case and then get my ass back to the states where I have an ocean between me and Santiago Alvarez. That’s what needs to fucking happen!

I don’t have it in me to be cool and collected with him if he’s taking down the emotionless veil that surrounds our sex. Without it I’m right back where I started, only this time I get to have the past and the present all coalescing into one moment when I get to feel even shittier about myself.

“Okay.”

He nods, taking paperwork out of his briefcase and I sit silently, pretending interest in a magazine while thoughts flash through my brain in disjointed pieces.

Me and Santiago the first day we met, seeing him in magazines, just like the one I’m reading, dating other women, the accident, Brian’s funeral…

It’s all there, just waiting for me but for the first time since it happened I have real trouble pushing it all back into the box. It’ll be there later, I tell myself.

I don’t need to think or deal with it now. It’s best to just keep my eye on the ball and do what I’m getting paid to do; find Gabby. When that’s done, I’m going to power through the Halifax case, take a break and then rethink my options once I’m back home.

Maybe I’ll go to New York, pay Emma a visit even if she has trouble with seeing me in person.

I could stay with Aunt Sue, just rest for the first time in years - without Santiago to ruin my holiday - and think about what I want. For a fact, I’m going to get shitfaced as soon as I’m alone and no one can see that I’m a drunk crier.

After that, maybe me and Fran can do something together, she’s always good for a laugh. Maybe she can set me up with that pipsqueak accountant she thought would be perfect for Mia.

There are so many options for me out there on any given day and I need to remember that I am not alone. I may be foolish enough to want one of those options to be Santiago but I’m not brainless enough to entertain the thought. Not for long.

No, the two of us…don’t fit. He’s sophistication and cool affairs, I’m a t-shirt wearing, beer loving, all American girl who doesn’t care about wine years or ham whether it be Parma or just plain cold slices from the supermarket.

I should have known months ago that we’re two pieces of entirely different puzzles. We don’t fit and even if we managed to mash the pieces together, we don’t look right together.

Snorting at my maudlin thoughts I ignore his glance and concentrate on the latest hair removal technology, thanking my mother for the one good thing she gave me, a practically hair free body.

The money women pay to get tortured…

“You are too quiet. What are you thinking?” Santiago asks just after the stewardess puts on the seatbelt sign.

I clip in, adjusting the belt before looking back at him.

“Nothing. Just wondering how to whisper two babies through their mother’s vagina.”

He chuckles and the atmosphere is lightened enough that I feel comfortable again.

“This cannot be easy for you, Bella. I wish it wasn’t so hard, or that I didn’t have to take you there at all.”

Not see Mia? Look, I may not feel all that into it but I’ll have to deal because she’s my friend, I love her and I love her family, including two babies I’ve never met.

Not go to her side and help her in some way? I’d rather be strung up and beaten than ever betray one of my friends that way just because I’m a baby.

“It is what it is, Santiago. Mia’s my friend, part of my family and I won’t ever let her suffer because of my feelings. I’ll get over the hurt, I won’t ever meet someone like her or have such a good friendship.”

He nods, his eyes speculative but I ignore him and breathe easier when we eventually start our descent and touch down.

Time to talk two stubborn Italian babies out of the womb.