The attorneys had been real, however, sliding papers at her one after the next in the Costa Coffee near Clapham Junction. She'd signed the last five years of her life away with every pen stroke. At his command. With his blessing.
Cayo Vila, who never gave in, who had never heard the word no, had let her go, at last.
Just as she'd told him to do, she'd reminded herself. Just as she'd asked.
And then she'd gone back home, carefully taken the tin that held Dominic's ashes, taped it shut and wrapped it up, and packed it away in her checked bag.
The trip had been brutal. When she'd finally staggered into her hotel on the southern part of Bora Bora's main island, far away from Cayo's private island, it had been impossible not to notice the differences. She'd told herself she didn't care. That she'd come for a specific reason and to perform a specific task, and when had she become such a princess that she found her rather smallish room that faced a bit of garden depressing? It was still a garden in Bora Bora.
She'd been furious with herself-and with Cayo-for spoiling her so thoroughly. She'd become used to all of the luxury he surrounded himself with, apparently. It had only served to make her that much more appalled at herself and all the many ways she'd let herself down.
It had taken her a week to get up her nerve-and, if she was honest, to recover a little bit from those two intense weeks she'd spent with Cayo. But finally she'd been ready. One evening, at sunset, she'd taken one of the kayaks out and brought Dominic's ashes with her. As the sky exploded in oranges and pinks, she'd tipped his ashes out into the beautiful, peaceful lagoon.
And while she'd kept her promise to the first man she'd ever loved, and always would, she'd talked to him.
"I wish I could have saved you," she'd whispered to the water, the sky, the sea beyond. "I wish I'd tried harder."
She'd remembered her brother's delighted laughter that she'd never heard enough of. She'd thought of his wickedly amused gray eyes, so much brighter and more alive than hers-and then, sometimes, so much duller. She thought of his too-lean form, his shaggy dark hair, his poet's hands, and the tattoo on his shoulder of two hummingbirds that was, he'd once said with his cheeky grin, meant to represent the two of them. Free and in flight, forever.
"I wish I knew what happened to that picture of us as babies," she'd said, smiling at the memory of the old photograph. "I still don't know which one of us was which."
She'd mourned. She'd thought of their mother, so terrified of being on her own that any man had done, no matter how vicious. She'd thought of all those years when it had been Dominic and Dru against the world, and how much she'd miss that for the rest of her life. He'd taken something from her she could never get back, and as she floated out there with jagged Mount Otemanu before her and the world she knew so far away, she'd let herself weep for the family she'd lost, her potential children who would never know their uncle, the whole rest of her life stretching out before her with nothing of her twin in it except what she carried with her. In her.
Which wasn't enough, she'd thought then, bitterly. It would never be enough.
"You took part of me with you, Dominic," she'd told him as the inky darkness fell. "And I'll never forget you. I promise."
And when all his ashes were gone she'd made her way back to her hotel, where, finally, she'd curled up on the bed, pulled the duvet over her head, and fallen apart.
She'd stayed there for days. She'd cried until she'd felt blinded by her own tears, until she'd made herself retch from the force of her sobs. She'd let it all out, at last, the terrible storm she'd been carrying with her all this time. The grief of so many years, the pain and the fury and all the lies she'd told herself about her motivations. How much she'd loved Dominic and yes, to her shame, how much she'd sometimes hated him, too. His excuses and his promises, his grand plans that never amounted to anything and his pretty, pretty lies that she'd so desperately wanted to believe. She'd wept for everything she'd lost, and how alone she was, and how little she knew what to do with herself now that she had nothing left to survive, no purpose to fulfill, no great sacrifice remaining to build her life around.
But one day she sat up, and opened all the windows. She let the breeze in, sweet with flowers and the sea. She breathed in, deeply. She had her tea out on the hotel's pretty beach, and felt born again. Made new. As if she really had put Dominic to rest.
Which meant it was time to face the truth about her feelings for Cayo.
"Am I so scary?" he'd asked so long ago that night in Cadiz. The restaurant had been noisy and crowded, and his arm had brushed against hers as they sat so close together at the tiny table. His unforgettable eyes had still been so sad, but there was a curve to that cruel mouth of his, and Dru had felt giddy, somehow. As if they were both lit up with the magic of this night when everything, she'd been sure, was changing.
"I think you take pride in being as scary as possible," she'd replied, smiling. "You have a reputation to uphold, after all."
"I am certain that somewhere beneath it all, I am nothing but clay, waiting to be molded by whoever happens along," he'd said, that near-smile deepening at the absurdity of a man like him being swayed by anything at all save his own inclination.
"Metal that might, under certain circumstances, be welded, perhaps," she'd said, laughing. "Never clay."
"I bow to your superior knowledge," he'd said, swirling his sherry in his glass, his gaze oddly intent on hers. She'd felt herself flush with heat, and had felt out of control. Reckless. Yet it had felt right, even so. More right than she could remember anything else feeling, maybe ever. He'd leaned close, then murmured close to her ear. "What would I do without you?"
She knew what he'd do without her, Dru thought now, staring up at the perfect sky and the glorious lagoon, neither of which seemed to be as bright as they'd been before. Without Cayo. He was probably doing it right now-carrying on being Cayo Vila, scary by design, taking whatever he wanted and expanding his holdings on a whim.
But she was distorted by his absence. Disfigured. And it didn't seem to get any better, no matter how many days passed.
She sat in her cramped seat on an Air Vila flight from Los Angeles to London, staring at the picture of him on the back of the in-flight magazine, and she thought her heart might tear itself apart in her chest.
I can't do this, she thought then, scraping away the tears before they fell on her snoring seatmate. She couldn't live out whatever life it was she thought she ought to live, knowing that he was out there, knowing that she would only ever see him in these painful, faraway glimpses. On the telly, perhaps. In the magazines. But never again right in front of her. Never again close enough to touch, to taste, to tease.
She'd been in love with him for so long. She was still in love with him, however hard she wished it away. It hadn't changed. She was starting to believe it never would. She felt minimized. Diminished, somehow, without him. As if she'd depended on him just as much as he'd depended on her all this time.
Back in her bedsit in London, she tried to tell herself that her whole life was ahead of her. That she need only pick a path to follow and the world was hers. She woke the morning after her return and scanned the papers, looking for clues to her next chapter-but it all seemed cold and empty. Pointless.
She was haunted by Cayo even now, in a tiny flat he'd never visited, on a bright morning that shouldn't have had anything at all to do with him. Her eyes drifted shut as she stood at her small refrigerator, and she saw him. Dark amber eyes. That fierce, ruthless face, with that blade of a nose and his cruel, impossible mouth. She felt him. She couldn't breathe without imagining his hands on her skin, his smile, the sound of his voice as he said her name. And that same old fire still burned within her, stubborn and hot, even now.