‘We are sorting the date out. Juan?’ Eduard’s tone changed to being tentative. ‘There is something I wish to discuss with you. We’re so grateful, but you don’t have to keep paying for my pills.’
‘Are the pills working?’ Juan asked, and grinned as Eduard gave a shy smile back. This was no crude conversation, there was nothing they did not discuss, and Juan, loaded with survivor guilt, refused to leave anything out of bounds.
‘Yes,’ Eduard said. ‘We have sex and it is getting better. She enjoys it, I think, and I love her pleasure.’
‘Then that money is there,’ Juan said. He knew the tablets were expensive and the young couple could not afford many, knew what must sometimes be on Eduard’s mind, so he said, ‘If I kill myself doing all this crazy stuff I have left money for you in my will. You will be pleasing your beautiful Felicia all your life, my friend.’
‘Thank you.’
‘No need,’ Juan said, and he meant it.
‘I tried what you said with my mouth,’ Eduard said, ‘and she was not faking!’
‘I’ll teach you more tricks another time,’ Juan said. No, it was no crude conversation—younger, far less experienced, Eduard had cried and cried to Juan about losing his ability to make love to Felicia, had doubted that he might ever please her again. But even as Juan smiled, it faltered. His tears were coming again, and he felt guilty because he was the one walking and yet he was the one crying. ‘Sorry, Eduard, you don’t need this today…’
‘Hey!’ Eduard said. ‘It’s me.’
‘I know.’ Juan looked at his friend and nodded, because they had agreed it went both ways. For it to work, Eduard had to be there for him too. How different Juan was from how he had once been—how much his priorities had changed since that day.
‘I was going to call you on Sunday,’ Eduard said. ‘I know it will be a difficult day.’
It would have been Juan’s first wedding anniversary.
‘It’s not just the wedding anniversary,’ Juan admitted. ‘I like someone, Eduard. For the first time in what feels like for ever there is someone that I cannot get out of my mind and yet I cannot get her into bed.’
‘You can.’
‘I leave a week on Tuesday.’
‘You have to leave?’
‘Yes,’ Juan said. ‘My visa expires and anyway I don’t want to get too involved.’ He trusted so few now, had sworn never to let go of his heart—to just love them and leave them. ‘She reminds me a bit of your Felicia, she is loyal, she is so serious…’ He smiled as he spoke. ‘She is so sensible and cautious but I am sure she is wild too…’
‘You’ve got it bad,’ Eduard said. ‘Have you told her about the accident?’
‘No.’
‘Will you?’
Juan shook his head. ‘No, I don’t want her sympathy.’ He shared it with no one apart from the people who already knew. ‘I don’t want to even try to explain what happened, what it was like.’ Juan thought for a long moment and Eduard patiently sat through his silence. ‘I don’t want to get involved or anything. Really, I just want it to be a week on Tuesday and to be gone…I think.’ Juan honestly didn’t know how he felt. ‘Perhaps it is just that she has said no. Perhaps that is the reason I can’t forget her. If I could sleep with her, maybe I’d get her out of my mind.’
‘Have you cooked for her?’ Eduard said, and Juan grinned. ‘Has she had the full Juan treatment?’
‘No.’
‘Go!’ Eduard said. ‘Sort it now.’
Juan laughed.
They chatted a little while longer then said goodbye and Juan found himself naked in the kitchen at three a.m. He lit the gas under the frying pan then he went and put a towel around his hips to save the precious bits from any oil splashes.
Hopefully he’d be needing them tomorrow night!
CATE WOKE TO the heat of summer and the scald of her own thoughts about Juan, insisting she should be proud of herself.
Imagine how much worse you’d be feeling if you’d slept with him, Cate tried to tell herself as she took her uniform off the line and quickly ironed it. Imagine how much worse you would be feeling if you’d gone and got involved with him, Cate told herself as she drove to work.
She had almost convinced herself she was proud for resisting, but it actually felt horrible, walking into the department and knowing she wouldn’t see Juan.
That she probably wasn’t ever going to see him again.
These last few weeks, when she should have been missing Paul, when she should have been trying to get over a two-year relationship, when she should have been sorting out what she wanted from her career, instead her thoughts and emotions had all been taken up with Juan.
Funny that a heart could be so raw and bruised by a man she barely knew when it was not damaged by the man she had spent two years with.
It surely just showed how right she had been to end things with Paul.
Cate looked at the roster, devoid of Juan’s name, and thought of the sky jump next Sunday.
Her last chance to see him.
A farewell shag before he flew? Oh, God, she was actually thinking about it, Cate realised. That was how much she regretted saying no last night!
‘How was Christine’s leaving do?’ Harry yawned. He had been working all night and was now about to go off duty until Monday.
‘Good,’ Cate said. ‘Who looked after the twins last night?’
‘Mum.’ Harry sighed.
‘Are you having any luck with getting a new nanny?’
‘I’ve got a couple of people to see next week,’ Harry said. ‘But most of the people on the agency books want to live in the city, not a good hour away from it, and I’ve got the consultant interviews too.’
‘Any luck?’
‘Nope.’ Harry shook his head. ‘Same problem I’m having with the nannies—all the good ones want the bright lights of the city. Honestly, Cate, I need to sort something out as soon as I can. I can’t keep just dropping everything and coming in because we don’t have enough staff…’ Harry shook his head. ‘At least I don’t have to think about it for a couple of days now. The department is Dr Vermont’s problem this weekend. I’m going to spend some quality time with the twins.’
‘You have a good one,’ Cate said.
It was, thankfully, a busy morning, so there wasn’t much time to dwell on Juan and the night that had never happened, but it was there in the back of her mind, just waiting for her thoughts to turn to it, and Cate was determined they would not.
She was heading off to lunch, having decided to spend the hour sorting out what would be her office come Monday. She did not want to sit in the staffroom and join in the post mortem about last night. There always was one after a department do. As the late staff trickled in, more and more would be revealed—who’d got off with who, who had said what, and people were already talking about Christine and the fool she’d made of herself last night.
Cate simply didn’t want to hear it. she was just about to hand the keys to Kelly when she saw a well-dressed woman, looking a little lost, and Cate asked if she could