The Eden Inheritance (46 page)

At first, when she jumped down from her little air taxi on to the sunsoaked landing strip and saw the tall, dark-haired man dressed in white checking out a light aircraft where it was parked up on the grass, she did not recognise him. Then he looked up, saw her and waved, and her heart lurched. It was Jorge!

Instantly all the half-forgotten dreams were there, resurfacing as if it had been only yesterday that she had cherished them. Only now they were tempered with the realisation of just how silly her childish adulation had been, and the teenage Lilli was overwhelmed by embarrassment both for her five-year-old self and for the way she was feeling now, just seeing him again. She waved back and he crossed the grass towards her.

‘Lilli! It is Lilli, isn't it? I'd never have known you except that your father told me you were expected home today. You've grown up!'

His dark eyes were moving over her, appraising her, and not bothering to hide the fact that he liked what he saw.

‘I should hope I have grown up, since the last time I saw you I was only about five years old!' she said with a little laugh.

‘You were beautiful then,' he said, ‘but you are even more beautiful now.'

Lilli flushed with pleasure. She brushed her hair away from her face, tucking it behind her ear and holding it there. The sun glinted on the gold bangles which had once been her mother's and which she now wore whenever she was not in school uniform.

‘Is that your aeroplane?' she asked.

‘The Beech? Yes.'

‘Beech?'

‘Short for Beechcraft Baron. It's my newest baby. You like it?'

‘It looks wonderful.' And so it did, a sleek white bird gleaming against the deep blue sky and the emerald grass.

‘I am just leaving for Florida but I shall be coming back in a few days' time and when I do I will take you flying. ‘Would you like that?'

‘Oh yes!'

‘Good.' He caught her hand and raised it to his lips, kissing her fingers with an extravagant gesture that was pure South American, whilst his eyes, deep and full of meaning, sought hers. Then he released her hand, smiled at her, and turned, walking back across the grass to where his aeroplane was parked.

Lilli watched him go, thrilling with excitement. No one had ever talked to her like that before, no one had kissed her hand or looked at her with that searching meaningful gaze.

The deliciously tingly feeling of standing on the brink of something new and wonderful remained with her as the car whisked her back to the villa, making her homecoming even more special than usual and making up for the fact that she no longer had her father to herself.

The previous year Otto had married again and the intrusive presence of his new wife, Ingrid, whom, he told her, he had known many years ago in Germany, was the one small cloud that had hung over Lilli's pleasure in returning to Madrepora. She had tried hard to like Ingrid for her father's sake. He must have been lonely since her mother's death, she knew, and she tried to be glad that now, whilst she was away at school, he was no longer alone. But for all that she could not help resenting Ingrid, however unreasonably, for taking her mother's place. And when Lilli had noticed Ingrid wearing a brooch which had once belonged to Magdalene her resentment had deepened. From that day on Lilli had begun wearing Magdalene's bracelets, a small defiant gesture in an effort to reincarnate the spirit of the mother she could scarcely remember.

Now, however, Lilli was too happy to allow anything or anyone, to spoil her homecoming.

‘I saw Jorge at the airstrip,' she said that evening as they relaxed in the salon, cold drinks at their elbows, whilst the overhead fans cooled the room where the heat of the day still lingered.

The soft twilight masked the slight stiffening of Otto's jaw.

‘Ah – Jorge. Yes.'

‘I thought Fabio ran things here nowadays.'

‘Fabio is weak,' Otto said. ‘Besides, he has begun to drink too much – a family failing, I'm afraid. all the Sanchez family drink too much, but Fabio can't handle it.'

‘And Jorge, of course, can,' Ingrid said. Her tone was silky smooth as ever but Lilli could not mistake the underlying sarcasm and she experienced a flash of the old dislike.

‘It was very nice to see him again anyway. It reminded me of the old days when Mama was alive,' she said, glancing slyly at Ingrid and feeling a spark of satisfaction at the twin spots of colour that appeared in her cheeks.

‘Those days are over, Lilli,' Otto said sharply.

It was Lilli's turn to flush with guilt at her childish attempt to hurt Ingrid.

‘They were good days though, weren't they?' she said defiantly.

‘They were a long time ago,' Otto replied firmly. ‘Now, tell me, what have they been teaching you at school this term?'

The conversation continued but the happy mood of the evening had been fractured and Lilli was not quite sure how or why it had happened.

Jorge returned to Madrepora a few days later. Lilli met him and her father coming out of the room Otto used as an office.

‘It's our little princess!' Jorge said, looking at her in a way which made her pulses quicken. ‘ You are a very lucky man, Otto, to have such a beautiful daughter.'

‘Yes, I know,' Otto said, but there was a tightness in his voice.

‘I have promised to take her flying,' Jorge said, his eyes meeting hers. ‘Shall we say tomorrow at four, Lilli?'

Otto's face darkened.

‘I'm not sure about that.'

‘Oh please, Daddy!' Lilli begged. ‘Jorge will take good care of me, won't you, Jorge?'

‘Of course.'

After a moment Otto relented.

‘Very well, Lilli, since your heart is set on it,' he said with a sigh. ‘Just as long as she is back before dark, Jorge.'

Jorge smiled and said nothing.

Lilli had expected a short pleasure trip, but to her amazement Jorge flew her to St Vincent, skimming over the sparkling blue water with a skill that excited her. Lilli had always loved flying, especially in the little air taxis, but sitting beside Jorge in the front of his Beechcraft Baron was a whole new experience. They were close enough for his arm to brush hers occasionally and the scent of his aftershave, fanned towards her by the air-conditioning, excited her.

‘I hope you are hungry,' he said when they landed on St Vincent. ‘I have booked a table at a restaurant. But not just yet. We have time to explore first.'

‘You mean – dinner?' Lilli asked with a tinge of alarm. ‘But I promised Daddy I'd be back …'

‘You'll be back – just a little later than you thought. Don't worry about it.'

Lilli did not argue. A sort of madness had taken hold of her. She knew her father would be furious but she no longer cared. Nothing mattered except being with Jorge.

A hire car was awaiting them at the airfield.

‘Have you ever been to St Vincent before?' Jorge asked, swinging the car on to the Leeward Highway which ran northwards up the west coast of the island so that the brown sandy bays were to one side of them and the hilly interior and tropical rain forest to the other.

Lilli shook her head.

‘Daddy has always been too busy to take me.'

‘Do you know why I like St Vincent?' Jorge asked. ‘ Because of the volcano. It's more than sixty years now since it erupted, but one day it will erupt again.' His black eyes were glittering.

‘You like danger, don't you?' Lilli asked.

‘To experience danger is to know you are alive,' Jorge replied. ‘Yes, I like that. And so do you, my little princess. I can sense it.'

Lilli said nothing. She had never thought of it like that but now that he said it she felt he had discovered something deep within her which no one else in her charmed, well-protected life had ever touched on.

A few miles north of Chateaubelair the road ended. Jorge stopped the car where they could look down over Petit Bordel Bay.

‘I will bring you here another day when we have more time,' he said ‘Then we will take a boat to the Falls of Baleimo. They plunge down from a volcanic hill. Fire and water, Lilli – that, too, is exciting.'

He reached for her hand, curling his fingers around it, and as he did so he also touched her soft inner thigh. Lilli gasped softly. It was as if the excitement of the flight and Jorge's nearness had already sensitised every bit of her and his touch was like a high-voltage electric current, sparking each tiny nerve ending to life. His eyes never leaving hers he moved his fingers in a gentle stroking motion and the thrills of awareness grew sharper. She had never known so much delight was possible from such a little touch, and she sat motionless, hardly daring to breathe.

He kissed her, then drew back, looking at her.

‘You are so beautiful, Lilli, and I have waited for you for so long.'

Happiness burst in her. It seemed that all her dreams were coming true.

Jorge had booked a table in a restaurant at the water's edge; while the sun sank in a ball of red fire into the deepening blue of the ocean they ate shellfish and chicken Caribbean style and drank champagne. To Lilli it was ambrosia. Jorge drank little – ‘I have to get you home safely,' he said. ‘And who needs wine? I am drunk on you, Lilli.'

They flew back through the velvet blackness of the night and the stars were reflected in the dark water beneath them. It was only when they landed on the tiny airstrip that Lilli felt a qualm of apprehension. Her father was going to be furious!

Otto
was
furious.

‘Where have you been, Lilli?' he demanded. ‘I thought I told you to be back before dark!'

‘We've been to St Vincent. And how can you tell me I should be back by dark? I'm not a child any more.'

‘No, but you are still far too young to be God-knows-where with Jorge. He is not a suitable companion for you.'

‘I'm sorry, Daddy,' she said, anxious not to spoil things with arguments and recriminations. ‘Don't be angry, please. I'm back now, aren't I?'

He shook his head sadly, thinking that Lilli was far too much like her mother for her own good Magdalene had always been able to wind him around her little finger too.

‘All right, we'll forget it now. But I don't want you seeing him again,' he said. ‘In any case, he is going to Florida again tomorrow and I doubt if he will be back before you return to school.'

Lilli was dumbfounded. Jorge had said nothing about going back to Florida. All the magic had gone out of the day and Lilli felt her heart would break.

‘Lilli, your cousin has telephoned,' Sister Concepta said. ‘He is coming to take you out for tea tomorrow.'

Lilli stared at the nun in bewilderment. She did not have a cousin, much less one who was likely to turn up at her school and take her out for tea. There must be some mistake.

‘My cousin?' she said blankly.

‘Your cousin, Jorge Sanchez. What is the matter with you, child? Why are you looking like that? Don't you want to go?'

Sister Concepta was the one looking bewildered now. The girls were generally only too delighted when a relative came to release them temporarily from the rigours of the convent school.

‘Oh –
Jorge
!' Lilli exclaimed, amazed and delighted. ‘ Oh yes, Sister. Yes, of course I want to go!' she said swiftly and not even the knowledge of how angry her father would be if he should ever find out about this could spoil the magic of the moment.

He came next day to collect her, driving into the white-walled courtyard of the convent in a scarlet Porsche. Lillie saw him arrive from the window of the dormitory from which she had been watching with barely concealed impatience.

‘He's here!' she cried, jumping up from the window seat and tidying her hair back into the band which restrained it.

‘That's your
cousin?
' Angel Gomez, currently her best friend, rushed over to peer through the window at the tall, slightly raddled man all in white who was climbing out of the Porsche.

Lilli smiled with pride and excitement. She had been aching to confide in Angel but some instinct had prevented her. Angel might be her best friend but she was also a gossip, and Lilli had been very afraid that if she told Angel the truth it would be common knowledge in the convent before she could so much as draw breath and the outing would be put in jeopardy. Now, however, she could no longer contain herself.

‘He's not my cousin,' she said smugly.

‘I should think not!' Angel snorted. ‘He's old! Your uncle, more like.'

Lilli shot her a look of hatred. Angel could be so obtuse sometimes! Why couldn't the see that age had nothing whatever to do with it?

‘You're just jealous because I'm going out and you're not – and your father's car is just a boring old Mercedes.'

She grabbed her purse and ran downstairs, almost falling over in her eagerness before she remembered herself and slowed to the sort of pace more suited to the sophisticated young lady Jorge thought she had become.

Jorge was in Sister Concepta's office and if he had not impressed Angel he had clearly won over the nun. Her small round face was pink with pleasure and the incessant fluttering of her hands betrayed her nervousness.

‘Ah – Lilli – your cousin is here,' she twittered unnecessarily when Lilli tapped at the half-open door, and Jorge gave Lilli a conspiratorial wink.

‘Now be careful, Lilli, that your behaviour does nothing to bring disgrace on the school.'

‘Yes, Sister.'

‘And make sure you are back in time for the six o'clock Vespers.'

‘You need not worry, I shall look after her, Sister,' Jorge assured her.

Sister Concepta's cheeks grew even more pink.

‘Oh, I'm sure you will, Señor. I didn't mean to imply … but rules are rules. We have to have them for the girls' own good.'

‘Very sensible,' Jorge said solemnly.

As she climbed into the Porsche beside him Lilli could restrain her giggles no longer.