Something from Tiffany’s Read online

  Oh hell . . .

  She tried to picture the scene in her head. Two men shopping on Christmas Eve, both laden down with packages. One gets hit by a cab and the other tries to help out, and somehow the shopping bags get mixed up.

  Terri couldn’t believe it. Poor Ethan Greene. He must have almost died when he realised that his massively expensive diamond ring had gone astray, and, even worse, that he’d ended up with a simple charm bracelet.

  And poor Rachel too. Talk about adding insult to injury: Gary thought so little of her that he was willing to pass off the ring as his own and commit to marriage on a random whim!

  ‘I don’t understand. The ring isn’t yours, so how could you use it to propose to Rachel?’

  ‘What was I supposed to do, Terri? Believe me, I was as shocked as anyone when I saw what was in there, but I could hardly tell Rachel when she was mooning all over it, could I? Besides, it all worked out OK, didn’t it? Rachel’s happy, and yeah, OK, so it might not have been on the cards right now, but what can you do?’

  Terri was so disgusted she thought she might gag. To think that he could blithely go along with something so awful . . .

  ‘Gary,’ she began, deciding to throw the idea out there, as clearly he wasn’t clever enough to put two and two together. ‘Did you ever consider that maybe the reason this Ethan Greene guy has been hounding you as you say, is not because he fancies Rachel but because the ring is actually his?’

  He looked completely bewildered and she knew the idea had never even once crossed his mind. ‘Huh? But how could it be? It was my bag.’ But she could see his eyes grow wary, now the subject had been raised.

  ‘Yes, but perhaps he’d been carrying a Tiffany’s bag too, and the two of them got mixed up in all the drama?’

  Gary shrugged. ‘Nah, I don’t think so. Anyway, it’s not my fault if this guy can’t keep track of his own stuff.’ He was seriously slurring his words now, and Terri figured it was pointless trying to get him to see sense at this stage. She wondered if he would even remember this conversation tomorrow.

  Well, however dishonourable his intentions regarding Ethan Greene, Terri now needed to know his true intentions towards her best friend.

  ‘So this whole engagement only came about because the ring turned up out of the blue? You hadn’t planned it all along?’

  ‘Nah. I mean, I don’t mind going along with it, though. Rachel’s great, easy on the eye, good craic, dynamo in bed,’ he added and Terri seriously had to restrain herself from throttling him. Clearly he’d forgotten whom he was talking to at this point, and this must be how he talked about Rachel to his ‘boys’.

  Terri was so annoyed she couldn’t think straight. She wasn’t sure what to say next. Gary was an even bigger numbskull than she’d realised.

  At that moment he laid his head on the table and closed his eyes, muttering something that sounded like ‘I could get used to all this free stuff – beer, diamonds . . .’ and then he let out a huge snore.

  Terri waited for a moment, making sure he was out cold before she could even contemplate her next move. Her first instinct was to whack him over the head with something, she was so shocked by what she had just learned.

  While she’d suspected all along that something wasn’t right, she certainly hadn’t anticipated this. Should she tell Rachel? Break the news to her friend that her so-called fairy-tale engagement was a complete sham, and had only come about because Gary had come out the better end of a mistake? She had to, didn’t she? Although, thinking about it, no doubt Ethan Greene was doing exactly that himself right now.

  Trying to imagine that conversation, Terri’s heart went out to the poor guy. Why should he have to suffer the consequences of all this, when dumbass Gary was the one completely at fault?

  Terri looked again at the love of Rachel’s life, drunkenly snoring his head off. She hoped he had the mother of all hangovers tomorrow morning and would be wracked with shame and guilt over what he’d just told her. Or would he even remember?

  Terri shook her head. Poor Rachel, and her big dreams about tradition; with an oaf like Gary for a husband what kind of traditions would she have to look forward to now?

  Chapter 24

  Gary could hear someone calling his name. He was in a murky place; something cold and hard was pushed against his face and for the life of him he couldn’t figure out what it was.

  ‘Ah, Ma, give it a rest . . .’

  ‘Gary, wake up.’

  There, he heard it again. Why couldn’t he open his eyes? They seemed glued shut. He was slowly becoming conscious and the first thing he noticed was the shooting pain in his skull; it was as if his head was locked in a vice. Why did his head hurt so much? And again, where the hell was he?

  ‘Gary, come on – wake up!’ There was an insistent tapping on his shoulder and, blearily, he realised he knew that voice.

  Finally, he was able to open one eye, then the other one. There in front of him stood Rachel. His fiancée, he remembered. She didn’t look happy, though. He wondered why.

  ‘Gary.’ She shook his shoulder. ‘What are you doing here?’ It was more of a demand than a question.

  He had still not uttered a word but was trying to focus on his surroundings. There was a whiskey bottle in front of him, along with two shot glasses. He appeared to have his head resting on the dark wood of a table and was sitting on a chair. He noticed that not only did his head hurt, but so did every other part of his body. He could only imagine it had to do with the fact that he had slept practically upright all night.

  ‘Hey, babe,’ Gary mumbled as he started to slowly pick his head up from the table.

  Rachel’s nostrils flared and her eyes narrowed. He tried to think of a time when he had last seen her mad, and realised he couldn’t recall a single moment. Sure, there had been times when she had been stressed out about this and that with the bistro, but her anger had never been directed at him.

  ‘What the hell are you doing here?’ she asked again.

  Good question, he thought to himself, what was he doing? He tried to think back to the previous evening. He remembered getting a taxi back from Wicklow with Sean, and then arriving at the bistro looking for Rachel, but she wasn’t there. Terri had been, though, and she’d given him more drink. More importantly, Terri had been nice to him; she’d invited him in for a beer and, of course, what man would turn down free beer?

  It was strange because Terri never really talked to him, and he’d always thought she didn’t particularly like him, but last night . . . had she flirted with him? Gary tried desperately to think back. Yes, there could be something to that. She’d certainly been over-friendly anyway. He tried his best to remember the rest. But he was missing something; there was something important he couldn’t recall. They had started doing shots of whiskey; he remembered being surprised when she’d pulled the bottle out. They’d done a couple – no, it had been a lot more than a couple. Terri had kept refilling his glass.

  And she had kept asking questions.

  He hadn’t thought anything of it at the time. After all, it just sounded as if she was jealous of Rachel getting married, and he hadn’t realised this before, but maybe she’d fancied him too.

  Then Gary’s skin broke out in a cold sweat as the most important part suddenly came rushing back to him. He’d told Terri about buying the bracelet and ending up with the ring. He had told her the whole bloody story. And was he imagining it or did Terri have some kind of theory on exactly how that had happened, something to do with that guy Greene.

  Christ . . .

  He wondered if Terri had already told Rachel about the mistake. If she had, it would certainly explain why she seemed so mad at him now. And he hoped to God he hadn’t shot his mouth off about anything else.

  ‘Well? Do you plan on answering me?’

  Gary snapped back to the present, realising he still hadn’t said anything to Rachel. She was tapping her foot on the ground. He looked up, wondering if he had the presence of mind to
bluff his way out of all this.

  ‘Ah, well . . .’ He wasn’t sure what he was supposed to be explaining: why he was here, or why he’d proposed to her with a freebie engagement ring.

  ‘Why are you sleeping on one of my tables?’ Rachel entreated, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

  ‘What time is it?’ he asked groggily. It was starting to get bright outside. Had he been here all night?

  ‘It’s seven a.m. And you still haven’t answered my question.’

  ‘I came here last night, looking for you.’

  Something crossed Rachel’s face very briefly. Gary caught it and it piqued his interest. Was it guilt? If so, he wondered if he could maybe turn this around.

  ‘But you weren’t here so I decided to stay for a while, and I had a drink with Terri.’ He thought if he played up this aspect maybe it would distract her, make her a bit jealous even? ‘We had a couple of drinks and—’

  ‘Looks like it was a hell of a lot more than a couple of drinks,’ she said, incredulous.

  Gary blinked. Now he wasn’t sure if she was angry about him drinking with Terri or sleeping at the bistro. He decided to wing it.

  ‘Come on, babe, you don’t need to be jealous or anything.’

  ‘Oh please. I’m not jealous of Terri, I’m just wondering how you ended up sleeping all night in my restaurant.’

  OK, she wasn’t jealous. Gary shifted gears. ‘Well, it’s not my fault. Terri got me drunk and then left me high and dry here, so blame her.’ If he shifted most of the blame onto Terri then Rachel could take her anger out on her.

  Instead, Rachel rolled her eyes and sighed. ‘Gary, come on. Last time I checked you were an adult. It’s hardly Terri’s fault that you got drunk. Didn’t you tell me yourself you were drinking all day yesterday? Besides, how could she have possibly moved you? And I can’t imagine she’d want to put you up upstairs either.’ She put her hands on her hips. ‘The problem is that I need to open up soon and I can’t have you in here looking and smelling like you do. It wouldn’t be good for business. So scoot.’

  Was she really kicking him out? Couldn’t she at least offer him some coffee to help him wake up first? Or maybe a bite to eat, while she was at it? What had got into her?

  He started to open his mouth to ask these questions, but Rachel held up her hand. ‘Gary, please, just get a move on. I don’t have time for any of this right now. It’s after seven and I have too much to do. Go out the back way.’

  So now she was making him exit through the back, like she was ashamed of him or something? What the hell?

  Shaking her head in irritation, Rachel started to clean up around him, taking away the shot glasses and placing the whiskey bottle back on the shelf. Gary sat there, confused and unsure of what to say. She had never acted this way around him before; usually she was all over him.

  He started to panic, wondering if Terri had in the meantime told her the truth about the engagement; but she wasn’t saying anything, expecting him to just guess why she was cheesed off, like women often did. He glanced at her left hand for the diamond but thankfully it was still there. He breathed an inward sigh of relief. OK, that wasn’t the problem. Nice one. At least he didn’t have to face all that now too.

  Rachel came back over and starting making shooing motions. ‘Come on, come on. What are you waiting for?’

  She herded him through the doors that led to the kitchen and then to the back service door. When he reached it, he turned around and tried to summon his most charming grin. ‘Don’t I get a goodbye kiss?’

  Rachel made a face. ‘Gary, you stink. Just go and maybe I’ll talk to you later.’ She pushed him out of the door and closed it behind him.

  Alone in the back alley, Gary sniffed inside his shirt. She was right: he did smell bad. He felt a growing sense of unease in the pit of his stomach. He seriously wished he could remember more about last night, what he’d said to Terri or more importantly what he didn’t say. He didn’t think he’d been drunk enough to blab everything, or shoot himself in the foot, not at this stage. Yet who could tell? One thing was for sure, he didn’t like this – having Rachel mad at him, that was. Usually, she was delighted to see him and so happy to be around him. Should he try to make it up to her? Buy her flowers or something?

  Walking around the front of the building, he peered in the windows to the inside of the bistro, where Rachel bustled among the tables, getting ready for business. He waited for her to look in his direction, but she didn’t. It was as if she was purposely ignoring him.

  He stepped out into the road, looking to hail a taxi home. He just hoped he could make it all the way there without puking.

  As a cab pulled up, he got in and tried to rid himself of the worry that was starting to creep up on him big time. It wasn’t so much that Rachel was mad at him; he’d had many women mad at him over the years.

  But if she was this annoyed at finding him passed out on the table, what would she be like if Terri told her about the ring?

  Chapter 25

  Rachel could practically feel Gary’s eyes on her from the other side of the window.

  She knew he was looking in, but she’d already decided that there was no way she was acknowledging him. She felt as if she were holding her breath, waiting for him to leave. She had never treated him that way before; she had never cajoled or been angry with him. It was a completely new feeling.

  She felt a little out of kilter today and she tried to convince herself it was only because she’d walked in to find her fiancé passed out after a drunken night.

  But regardless of how much she tried to convince herself of that, a little voice in the back of her mind was telling her something else. She felt differently towards Gary today, and the scary thing was that she figured it might be related to last night’s dinner with Ethan.

  He was so different to Gary, so warm and easy to talk to. Last night, they’d stayed on for a very long time after dinner and had talked for ages over coffee. She still couldn’t believe she’d opened up to him like that about her desire to have a real family and to create real traditions. She was sure he’d thought she was some kind of loon, but no, he actually seemed to understand perfectly what she meant. After all, he was hoping for the very same thing with his soon-to-be fiancée.

  Despite herself, Rachel couldn’t help wondering what the woman was like. She would no doubt be intelligent, stylish and definitely very beautiful, considering that Ethan was himself an incredibly handsome man. He was also gentle and courteous with impeccable manners, insisting after their meal that he saw Rachel safely off in the taxi.

  Taking a wet rag she wiped down the area of the table where Gary had been drooling all night. Talk about a stark contrast . . .

  She went through to the kitchen to start on making bread and pastries for their breakfast offerings, which of course immediately reminded her of the subject matter of Ethan’s book. Damn it, no matter what she did this morning, her thoughts kept drifting back to him. What was wrong with her?

  For some reason she felt uneasy. Not because of the dinner with Ethan – far from it. Actually that was the first time in a long time that a man had sat down and showed a real interest in her and her life. Ethan had asked questions and listened patiently to the answers. He wanted to know everything about her life and business – even her dreams – and for once she had no problem sharing.

  It wasn’t as if she didn’t share things with Gary; it was just different. Their relationship was one of extremes and excitement. He made her laugh, even when he was being ridiculous, and normally she loved the fact that she never really knew what he was going to say or do. But she thought again about what Ethan had said last night about sharing her hopes and dreams with Gary, and she realised that she had never actually done that. Of course, this was mostly because her fiancé was a man’s man and had no real interest in all that kind of malarkey. And for the most part Rachel liked that.

  Still, as she thought now about some of the sacrifices she’d made, her mind
suddenly seemed to focus clearly on the little oddities that she’d brushed off: Gary’s reluctance to eat in some of her favourite restaurants because they were ‘too fancy, and they never give you a decent feed’; the fact that he rarely complimented her on her appearance; the way that he often didn’t notice the things she did for him; how it had taken so long for him to introduce her to his mother . . .

  Rachel felt almost surprised by the realisation. Was Gary inconsiderate?

  Her head said no, but deep down her heart seemed to argue the opposite. Yet, if he was, it certainly wasn’t intentional; his behaviour could really be described more as clueless than anything else.

  She sighed, deciding to turn some of this sudden reflection back on herself. Maybe the problem wasn’t Gary at all, but her. Was she really so shallow that the first time another man paid her some attention, she immediately began picking faults in her partner?

  No, that wasn’t the case at all, she told herself. Anyway, and notwithstanding the fact that he was already attached, Ethan wasn’t even her type.

  In fact he went completely against the norm in terms of her history with men. She usually went for the strong, masculine and largely unpredictable kind, not the staid, straightforward, open type that Ethan seemed to be. The type that Terri kept insisting no longer existed.

  Thinking about last night, she felt slightly guilty that after saying goodbye to Ethan and getting a cab home, she hadn’t thought once about Gary until she’d actually crawled into bed. It was only then that she realised she hadn’t heard from him all evening.

  Rachel scowled. Little did she know then that her beloved was here, dead drunk and fast asleep in her restaurant. What had he been doing here and why didn’t he call? Of course, she remembered ashamedly, she hadn’t called him either, and in fact had neglected to tell him that she was out for dinner with another man. Hell, she was hardly one to talk about inconsiderate behaviour, was she?

  At that moment, she heard movement and the jangling of keys from outside, signalling Terri’s arrival downstairs from her flat.