R Is for Rebel (4 page)

As promised, the sweet housekeeper from Moonhole had shown up with a tentative knock at seven in the morning, holding a small white bag from the “Mistah Eliot” for the “Lady Abigail.” An hour later, she still hadn't removed the late-model iPhone from its trim white box. Instead, she tossed it unopened (with a contrived lack of interest), into her rucksack, slung the whole pack over one shoulder, and joined Max, Bronte, and Wolf out on the porch of their villa. It was still early Sunday morning, the Caribbean sun bright and warm.

“All ready?” Max asked.

“I think I've got everything,” Abby answered.

They took a taxi to the small harbor town of Port Elizabeth, then a water taxi over to Mustique, where Abigail's mother (more commonly known as Sylvia, Dowager Duchess of Northrop) was staying at a
proper
villa that was, at least partially, closer to her idea of an acceptable place to stay. Abigail's newlywed brother, Devon, and his wife, Sarah James, were staying on in Bequia for their honeymoon, not returning to London for another two weeks, at the very least.

Ten o'clock Sunday morning, the dowager duchess, along with Abigail, Max, Bronte, and Wolf, were all wedged into the relative luxury of Sylvia's private jet. It was not
her
jet, per se, but the one-sixth time-share of a jet that she rarely made use of, except on occasions such as these that would require inconvenient plane changes on obscure third-world tarmacs. Abigail and her mother faced each other across the aisle in the first group of four seats and left Max, Bronte, and the baby to spread out in the four seats toward the rear of the very narrow fuselage.

After what she was now ruefully telling herself was the Seduction-That-Wasn't and a fitful few hours with her cheek burning a hole in the cool cotton pillowcase at her villa in Moonhole, Abigail fell easily asleep once the small plane reached cruising altitude. There wasn't much to distract her, since her mother had very little to say to Max and even less to say to Bronte. Somewhere along the line, those three had fallen out of the habit of normal communication, though Wolf was turning out to be a happy bridge of sorts.

Abigail, unlike her older brother, was beginning to see her mother as a separate adult, rather than the brisk, unloving matriarch of her childhood. She wasn't sure if they would ever share a genuine affinity for one another, but in the meantime, Abby was grateful for the thaw. Lately, when she visited London, she often stayed at her mother's (very large) townhouse in Mayfair, Northrop House. Abigail had assumed those visits would be few and uptight. As it turned out, her widowed mother was grateful for the company, and often made an effort to free up her schedule on the occasions that brought Abigail to town.

Their interests were diametrically opposed (Sylvia's grand passions included clothes, shoes, and interior decoration), but lately Abigail had the feeling that her mother was actually trying to cross the generational (or, more accurately, profound philosophical) divide that separated mother and daughter. Almost by accident, they had fallen into the habit of attending the BBC lunchtime concerts at Wigmore Hall on Mondays.

Music was a passion they shared. Her mother was rarely moved by much of anything at all, a fact that Abby found almost frightening, especially because she herself seemed to feel everything around her with an unavoidable poignancy. But music seemed to affect the duchess. During concerts, Abigail had taken to stealing the occasional surreptitious glance at her mother: only then could she see a glimpse of a real woman, a real person, free of agendas and social constraints. Sylvia's entire life had been a series of short- and long-term goals and, in due course, accomplishments. Lady Abigail, in one of her more deeply engrained—and perhaps self-defeating—acts of parental defiance, had always made a point of avoiding goals and accomplishments at every opportunity.

Abigail awoke somewhere above the Atlantic Ocean, her neck bent at an uncomfortable angle. Her mother was quietly working on a piece of Bargello needlepoint that Abigail thought looked familiar, from twenty years ago.

“How long have you been working on that, Mother?”

“I think I got the pattern when I was pregnant with you.”

“Why haven't you ever finished it?” Abigail asked with a small laugh.

“This way I always know I'll have something to do on lengthy plane trips. I don't really need another pillow, I just need something to occupy my time while I'm traveling.”

Abigail covered her mouth as she yawned and looked out the small oval window to the sparkling sea far below.

Miami.

Just… Miami.

She let her eyes close for a few seconds as she remembered Eliot's invitation for her to join him in Florida.

“Did you see that nice Eliot after the wedding?”

Damn mothers. They always knew what you were thinking. Abigail almost gave in to a momentary desire to lie, just to protect her privacy, but that seemed petty somehow. And Eliot, well, her heart bounded forward a bit when she thought of Eliot and there was nothing petty about it. A lie would have been some small show of disrespect to him. “I did actually.”

“Actually?” Her mother's needle paused in midjab, halfway through the colorful canvas pattern.

“You know what I mean. Yes, Mother, I saw Eliot again later last night. He stopped to say good-bye.”

“Well, you'll see him again, I'm sure.”

“You're sure?” Abigail parried.

Her mother laughed with unfamiliar levity. “I'm surprised you didn't prevaricate when I asked.”

“I know you've thought the worst of me,
lo
these
many
years
,” Abigail said with a genuine smile and a theatrical tremor to her voice, “but it was never for lying… in fact, I recall a time when you wished I would lie, at least a little, when your friends would ask if I was seeing anyone and you would cringe in anticipatory dread.”

The duchess had returned her attention to her needlepoint and her lips were firmly shut.

Abigail forged ahead. Perhaps long plane rides were just the thing for hammering out age-old family squabbles. It was impossible for anyone to storm off and abandon the conversation (and live).

“Mother?”

“Yes, dear.” Eyes still bent on her work.

Abigail sighed and looked out the window. Did she care what her mother thought of Eliot? Of course, she was so used to her mother's disapproval that her approval in this case might prove more off-putting. “What do you think of Eliot?”

That stayed her hand for a moment. The Dowager Duchess of Northrop seemed to disappear for a few moments, and a mere mother took a long look at her youngest daughter—the daughter better known as her folly—and then the mother was gone. She chose her words with a touch of spite. “Since when do you care what I think?”

“Forget it—”

“No. That was wrong of me. I'm, well, I'm taken aback. Let me think.”

Abigail thought her mother might have just apologized, but that would have been, if not impossible, highly unlikely.

Sylvia continued thoughtfully, her hands resting delicately in her lap amid the folds of yarns and canvas. “You have hamstrung me, Abigail.”

“What do you mean?”

“If I say I like him, that will make him far less appealing to you, I fear. If I say I don't like him, that might endear him to you, but I would be a liar.” Her mother's smile was bittersweet.

“Let's forget about the perverse nature of how your opinion may or may not color my response, and just, you know, discuss him in the abstract. Do you find him charming, intelligent, garrulous, what?”

Sylvia's smile widened. “I find him to be simply divine, Abigail.” She glanced down the aisle to make sure Bronte, Max, and Wolf were all still asleep, then continued when she was assured of their privacy. “I know children are always horrified to hear their parents talk about their marital intimacy or whatever you all are calling it these days, but Eliot reminds me of your father in some ways—”

“Great…” Abigail crossed her arms and rolled her eyes.

“You don't have to turn everything into a sordid, postfeminist, Oedipal thesis topic, Abigail!” Sylvia kept the volume of her voice low, but the power behind her words hit Abigail like a quick slap of a riding crop.

“Go on, then.”

“Never mind. You just go on living under the happy misapprehension that I disapprove of your
lifestyle
.” The older woman gestured in a circular motion with her free hand, as if said lifestyle was of very little consequence.

“It's not a misapprehension, Mother.” Now it was Abigail's turn to tighten the timbre of her voice. “You basically ignored me for much of my childhood then treated me with cool disdain in early adulthood. And now that I'm no longer living with a woman”—her mother looked away, as she always did when mention of her relationship with Tully came up—“you've suddenly taken an interest.
Why?
I cannot have misapprehended my entire life.”

The silence spread, an uncomfortable, palpable void. Maybe long-avoided discussions between mothers and daughters in cramped planes were not such a good idea after all. Then her mother looked at her, really looked at her, and Abigail saw the depth of her pain and confusion.

“What is it, Mother?” she asked with quiet sympathy.

Her mother's jaw flexed then relaxed; her mouth opened to speak, then closed. Abigail let her take her time.

“You're right, of course. I was never cut out to be a mother. I just wasn't made for it. My mother trained me, quite literally, to be the wife of an aristocrat, and that's what I was. I only—” She turned away from her daughter's hard gaze, then regrouped and looked at her again. “I only did what had been done for generations. After your sister Claire was born, I thought I might be maternal. I wanted to hold her, I craved the feel of her skin, the smell of her milky neck, the silk of her hair…” Her voice trailed off as if recounting a dream, then firmed. “But it just wasn't
done
. And I was so young. And my mother kept telling me that my husband must always be my priority; children had nannies and governesses and tutors, but a man only had one wife. I believed her, and was more than happy to oblige. I adored your father.
That
you never had cause to misapprehend, I hope?”

Abigail shook her head with a guilty acknowledgment. “No, that was never in doubt,” she said, then forced herself to stuff the immature barb that, in the midst of all that love for her husband, the woman might have spared a few drops of kindness for her desperate children.

“And then when you took up with Tully, I thought you were beyond me. I thought I didn't know you.” Abigail opened her mouth to protest, but her mother raised one hand to still her. “Let me clarify. I mean that I realized I never knew you to begin with, not that your choice to be with Tully made me think I no longer knew you. So then it became easier to reside in that little stereotype with which Max and Bronte and you are so happy to define me. Bigot or whatever. But it's not that. Would I choose Eliot over Tully for you?” Sylvia's laugh was low and jovial. “Yes! But not for those silly, narrow reasons you think: male, female, what have you—” Sylvia paused suddenly to contemplate how to go on, then said, “But because Eliot makes you soar. You laugh and sparkle and it's just, well, it's quite lovely to see. For the past ten years, I've watched you and Tully getting along together. Sweet. And I almost cried at the hypocrisy of the semantics. You were supposed to be
out
, but I had the terrible feeling that you were very much
in
.”

Abigail felt a sharp pain at the back of her throat and the pressure of unshed tears at the back of her eyeballs. Maybe having an honest discussion with her mother was a very bad idea indeed. Maybe it was easier to keep her in that little bigot box. Because the truth of everything she said was going to be much harder to process than years of closely held righteous indignation. Abigail's voice was nearly a whisper: “Why didn't you ever say that to me before now?”

“Would you have heard me?”

“Probably not.”

“It would have just sounded like I was picking on Tully, and you know I think she's quite charming. Besides, there wasn't Eliot before now. Who was I to tell you Tully wasn't right for you? You would have cried foul immediately. All that narrow-minded, old-fashioned dowager duchess nonsense. I couldn't bear it.” She smiled and Abigail saw the glimmer of kindness, that maybe they could be friends. Starting from now. She was just some woman who had loved her husband and was a terribly inattentive mother, but was observant, and patient. Abigail smiled back at her.

“So anyway,” her mother continued in a lighter tone, picking up her needlepoint again, “Eliot Cranbrook is divine. All that brawny American outside, and all that sophisticated, continental je ne sais quoi inside. But I'm just an old widow. What do I know?” She raised one eyebrow in silent challenge.

“Quite a lot, I think.”

“So do you have plans to see him again?”

“No. We just sort of left it up in the air.”

“How dreadful.”

Abigail burst out laughing, then her voice dripped with a spot-on impersonation of aristocratic sarcasm. “It is,
rawther
! No balls, or routs, or tea dances; no Almack's or carriage rides on Rotten Row; no ices at Gunter's! How will I
ever
be thrown into his path, Mother dear? Perhaps you and I will have to take a trip to the continent? A grand tour!”

“Oh! What a fabulous idea!”

“I was joking, Mother. I need to get a life, not go on a grand tour with a
dowager
.” Abby looked back out the small window at the cloud formations.

“You don't get to call me
dowager
, only I get to call me
dowager
.” Her mother pointed her needle in Abigail's direction to drive home the small but salient point. “But, oh darling, let's go to Paris, at least for a long weekend. I'm sure there are lots of
activists
there for you to mingle with. They're known for their revolutions, after all. And we could visit Sarah's grandmother, and eat at La Tour d'Argent, and shop—”

Abigail rolled her eyes in mock horror.

“Very well,” her mother continued, a touch of exasperation coloring her voice. “I shall shop in the mornings while you look into do-gooder type things that engage you, then we can hear music in the evenings. And perhaps Eliot will happen by.”

Abigail smiled despite herself. She very much liked the idea of Eliot happening by.

***

Eliot found Miami in January an enervating, infernal haze. After five days of bucolic serenity on the islands, floating in the orbit of the ethereal Abigail Heyworth, everything in South Beach seemed too bright and too loud. He usually spent his time in Miami enjoying the larger-than-life music, food, cars, and women. He usually loved the Cuban restaurants in the smaller neighborhoods; he usually loved the cool drama of the Delano or the Setai; he usually loved the packed-at-three-in-the-morning bars and clubs.

But this visit was just annoying. He was not accustomed to this feeling of missing something. Okay, missing someone. He wanted Abigail Heyworth in his pocket.

He was only in town for two days, and he felt like there were a million other places he needed to be; he hadn't been at his head office in Geneva in almost a week and he knew the pile was mounting there. He had agreed to come to Miami since he was already going to be in the Caribbean for Sarah and Devon's wedding, otherwise he would have relegated the meetings to his North American team. He was working on a deal in Milan that would solidify Danieli-Fauchard's ownership of the top five luxury fabric mills in the world. He would much rather be working on that.

He would much rather be curled up on a beach or a couch with Abigail.

He tried to shake off that last thought.

It was Monday morning and he'd only left her Saturday night… very late… technically Sunday morning. But still, it was way too soon to be wondering where she was and what she was doing. He was regressing. He pulled his cell phone out of his side pocket and checked his emails and texts. He had held off texting or calling her; for all he knew, she had thrown the cell phone into the ocean. On the other hand, he had shown his cards—she must know he was crazy about her—so what was the point in holding back now? He tapped a few keys and pulled up her number, then texted a quick note:

thinking of you

Nothing wrong with that
, he thought to himself, trying to assuage his feelings of immaturity and, he hated to admit, longing. He was longing to be with her. The pathetic part was that he wasn't even able to relegate the longing to a purely sexual ache. He was actually longing just for Abigail… he wanted to sit across the dinner table, ride across a field, watch a movie, take a drive… with Abigail. If it were possible to punch himself in the stomach or slap himself across his own face, he might have done it. He needed to snap out of it.

Eliot was alone in an elevator, riding up to the twenty-seventh floor of a glass box high-rise in Miami Beach. He normally avoided photo shoots, but since he was already in town, he had decided to check in on the most exorbitantly paid model who was the face of Danieli-Fauchard's top female fragrance line. He had accepted long ago that a recognizable face sold more products than high-quality fabrics or excellent craftsmanship ever would, but it still rankled.

The amount of money the company paid these models was nothing more than a necessary evil, as far as he was concerned. After the elevator doors opened, he turned down the corridor to the right, following the booming sound of techno-hip-hop blaring from the well-known photographer's studio. Benjamin Willard was one of the most respected photographers of the past forty years, his black-and-white portraits held in the permanent collections of the Whitney, LACMA, MoMA, and the Pompidou in Paris. Eliot stood unnoticed for a few minutes as Willard barked random phrases at the impossibly beautiful Russian model.

Despite what Eliot considered a healthy disdain for some of the spoiled, neurotic models he had dealt with, he had to admit Dina Vorobyova was beyond reproach. Given the importance of her role in launching the fragrance that was the first ever to have the eponymous Fauchard name, Eliot had been closely involved in the year-long search that had to be based on far more than a pretty face. The idea was that she would be a part of the brand for years to come: she needed bones, staying power, an absence of frivolity when it came to her work habits and her personal life.