Page 81 of Suddenly Beck

‘Wait, you’re leaving?’ I say in disappointment.

‘I have to.’ She smiles despondently. ‘Avery’s flying back from a meeting in Paris tonight, and I have to be home before he gets back.’

‘Why?’ I frown.

‘I just.’ She shakes her head, leaving the sentence hanging and rises from the table. ‘It was lovely to meet you all.’ She smiles at Mel and Beck, and also Joss, who’d joined us.

‘I hope you come back soon,’ Mel tells her softly. ‘Nat just lights up when you’re here.’

‘I will,’ Pia promises.

‘I’ll walk you out,’ I tell her as everyone waves, and we make our way to the door. Once we’re outside, I see a sleek black Mercedes waiting in the carpark. ‘I wish you didn’t have to go,’ I tell her unhappily.

‘I know,’ she murmurs as she turns to face me. ‘But I will come back now I know where you are.’

‘Will you stay?’

‘I don’t know.’ She bites her bottom lip nervously. ‘A day is one thing; I won’t be missed, but overnight is too difficult to explain.’

I study her face silently. It’s been one of the best days I can remember in a long time. All the times we’ve seen each other over the past few years have been awkward and distant. I took that to mean we’d just grown apart and weren’t the same people anymore. But now, looking back on those times with a fresh perspective, it wasn’t because we’d grown apart or stopped loving each other, it was because I was desperately unhappy in my life, and I realise with a heavy feeling, so is she. Pia hasn’t changed, not deep down. Today proved that she’s still the girl I remember, but when she’s with Avery, he dims that light inside her, and she becomes a different person, just like I did when I was around our father. There’s something about Avery that I’ve never trusted, and now, I find my dislike of him growing intensely. Red flags start going up, and I kick myself for not asking questions sooner.

‘Pia?’ I ask. ‘Is everything alright with… Avery.’ I force myself to use his name and not simply refer to him as’that arsehole.’

‘Yes,’ she replies. ‘Of course.’

‘Pia.’ I bite the bullet and just ask. ‘Why did you marry him? You don’t love him, you never did, and I’m sorry but you don’t seem happy.’

‘Nat, don’t.’ She shakes her head. ‘There are things... things you don’t know, things I’ve tried to protect you from.’

‘You don’t need to protect me.’ I frown.

She glances back to the car. ‘I really have to go,’ she says worriedly. ‘Just... just promise me one thing, okay?’

‘What?’

‘Don’t come back,’ she whispers cupping my face gently in her tiny hands. ‘Stay here and be happy.’

‘Pia,’ I say again, worry churning in my gut as the Mercedes horn beeps.

‘I really have to go.’ She hugs me fiercely and kisses my cheek. ‘I love you, Nat.’

‘Love you too,’ I murmur, watching her scurry across the car park and climb into the back seat of the waiting car.

Turning back toward the restaurant, I see Reed tucking his phone back in his pocket. His eyes lock on mine and I wonder how much of that he heard.

Chapter Twenty-One

Nat

A very merry un-birthday to me…

July passes into August in a hot sweltering blur of tourists and blazing sunshine, and my life couldn’t be better. Although, I’m still worried about Pia, we call or text each other every couple of days now. She doesn’t talk about herself much, which is telling, but she inhales every little snippet of gossip about the bay and its residents. She’s very invested in Molly and Bernard’s rebellion, who seem to come up with daily ways to wind up their children and seem to be having a whale of a time doing it.

I’d worried for a while after Pia came to see me that our father would find out where I was and show up demanding I return to London, and for the next several days, I found myself nervously looking over my shoulder, but as the weeks passed, I convinced myself that he’d finally let me go. After what I did the day I left, I’d hoped he’d washed his hands of me. Slowly, I was beginning to believe that I was finally free.

Beck and I spend every day and night together now. We haven’t talked about it, but I’ve started leaving spare clothes and a toothbrush at his place. I still have a room at the B&B, but I’m never there. We surf together every morning, and I head back to his place every evening after the restaurant closes, and it’s as pretty close to perfect as I could’ve imagined.

I haven’t told him about Grace yet, or the circumstances leading up to me leaving London. There never seems to be a good time, and the more time that passes, the less important it seems. It’s my past, and I don’t want it to define my future.