Mathilda spun toward the sound of her mother’s voice. Dressed in a filmy beach coverup printed with parrots, with large black sunglasses on top of her head, Charlotte Spencer-Sutton glided through the sliding doors that opened onto the cottage’s backyard.
“Mom? Why are you...Daddy?”
Mark Wheeler followed close behind his wife. His skin was already gold from the sun. Without the smears of zinc oxide on his face, he would have looked like a silver fox swimwear model. “Hi sweetheart. You look…” He paused, taking in the full disaster of her appearance, then shifted gears. “It’s wonderful to see you.”
He gingerly leaned in to peck her on the cheek.
“Hey Matty.” Her little brother Jamie appeared behind her dad. Little as in “younger” … not in size. Every time she saw him, he’d shot up another couple of inches. They’d never had much in common, since he’d been baseball-mad since the age of eight. Also, he was six years younger than she was, an awkward age difference that always put them in different phases of life. She wasn’t sure what phase he was in now; her attempts to communicate always seemed to hit a wall.
“Hi Jamie. Wow.” She surveyed her family. “You’re in Hawaii. All of you. In resort-wear.”
Her brother was wearing crisp linen shorts and a pink unbuttoned shirt over his still-pale torso.
“This stuff came with the place.” Her brother glanced at Duncan, who gave him a princely nod. Maybe her brother had a new role model in the glamorous Duncan.
“Well, welcome to Hawaii.” She eyed her family members with suspicion. Sure, they looked like innocent vacationers. But they hadn’t shown up here just for the pool time. “Please don’t tell me all you’re here for a hypothetical wedding.”
Her parents exchanged one of those glances that meant they were carrying on an entire conversation no one else could hear.
“The stars are aligning,” said her father. “We’ve never been to visit, and it seemed like the perfect time. But your future is up to you. All we want is for you to be happy with your choice, whatever it is. Why don’t you go clean up? You’ll feel so much better.”
“Okay, Daddy.”
Her dad was such a clean freak. Mathilda always felt messy in his presence. Around her mother, with all her grace and charm, she felt awkward. All those childhood feelings flooded back as she trudged toward the room Duncan pointed her toward. Messy and awkward. Too outspoken. Too many opinions. Not social enough. Too wrapped up in her own imagination. Unable to fake interest if she found something boring. Prone to fits of anxiety that could paralyze her.
In the shower, as the hot water cascaded over her head, she let her tumultuous thoughts take over. I’m not like that anymore! I have a life that suits me. No one in the jungle thinks I’m too messy or awkward. No one cares about those things. Rory doesn’t think those things about me. He appreciates me how I am. Will Duncan?
She’d seen Duncan’s expression when he caught sight of her muddy boots and ripped shirt. He was probably calculating how much time a marchioness makeover would take.
Feeling deeply discouraged, she rubbed shampoo into her hair, and sighed. Okay, showers were nice. She’d missed hot showers. Civilization wasn’t all bad.
Eyes closed, she tilted her head back to rinse out her hair, and let her imagination transport her wherever it wanted. She remembered the time she’d been banished to her room because she’d crawled through the rosebushes on her hands and knees, and sometimes her belly, in pursuit of a grasshopper.
“I just wanted to see where it was going!” she’d wailed in her defense. No one had considered that an adequate excuse for ruining the Ralph Lauren dress her mother had put her in that morning.
Closed up in her room, she’d curled up on her window seat and scowled at the green expanse of lawn surrounding the house. A bird had perched on the windowsill and cocked its little head at her. One bright eye considered her. She held her breath, delighted by its quick movements. Time seemed to stop while she and the bird looked at each other. Its feathers were brown, or maybe gray, or both, and the more she looked at them, the more variations in color she saw.
Then he flew away, whisking himself off somewhere else, somewhere she couldn’t go. She wanted to open the window and fly after him.
Which was exactly what she’d done, in a way. She’d chased freedom. She’d chased it all the way to Hawaii. But it wasn’t the magic of Hawaii that had transformed her life. It was not having to watch every single thing she said and did through the lens of her perfect parents.
Mathilda rinsed the shampoo out of her hair and watched it swirl down the drain, mixed with the last trace of the jungle—mud and stray bits of fern and even an ironwood needle that had somehow gotten stuck in her hair.
This isn’t just about you, she reminded herself. This was about the good she could do with those funds. And the bad shit that would happen if the marriage didn’t go through. She couldn’t have all that on her conscience.
There had to be some kind of loophole, a graceful way out of this conundrum.
She stepped out of the shower and toweled off.
A new stack of clothes already sat on the toilet seat; her mother had set them there with a cheery, “sunset cocktails by the pool when you’re done.”
Of course the clothes were expensive; they must have come from the hotel boutique. But clean underwear was clean underwear, and the pretty sundress the color of banana ice cream fit just fine. They’d even brought her shoes, if you could call delicate flat-soled sandals that. Two steps across a black sand beach and they’d probably fall apart.
Once she was dressed, she made a face at her pile of dirty clothes. She wondered if she should just throw them away. Duncan, her family, and the entire hotel staff would probably appreciate that.
Gingerly, she picked up her ragged cotton pants and carried them to the waste basket. Odd—there was something hard in the pocket. She didn’t recall picking up any coral or lava along their trek through the valleys. Why would she?
She drew out the object and caught her breath as sparkles of light danced around the bathroom. It was the crystal in the photos Rory had shown her. He must have slipped it in her pocket at some point during their journey from the jungle to the super-yacht.
