He’d asked her to come early so they could cover these bases before Mia arrived, but he knew it was going to be a tricky conversation. He took a breath, looked up. ‘No.’
Madelon frowned. ‘Have you told her anything?’
‘She knows Pa drank. She knows he was violent.’ He shrugged and swept the sliced shallots into a bowl. ‘That’s all I’ve told her.’
‘What about Eline?’
‘Garlic, please...’ Madelon handed him two peeled cloves and he thwacked them hard with the hilt of his knife. ‘She knows about Eline, knows who Eline is, but I haven’t gone into the details.’ He caught Madelon’s recriminatory look. ‘We were in...’ He rolled his eyes. ‘It was an intimate moment, okay? I didn’t want to be talking about my ex-wife at that particular juncture.’
‘Hmm.’ Madelon spliced a carrot and started carving it into matchsticks. ‘So, even outside the interview, we can’t talk about the family, or anything personal...?’
Madelon was mindful because she had to be, but her natural disposition was to be open and honest. Of course, since her career had always taken precedence over personal relationships, as far as he knew she’d had no experience of being in a situation like his. He rattled his knife over the smashed garlic, micro-dicing it the way Bram had taught him. ‘Ideally, no.’
The weight of Madelon’s stare was deadening his limbs. He set the knife down, wiped his hands on a cloth and met her gaze. ‘What...?’
She sighed, reaching for the spring onions. ‘I don’t know... I just keep thinking about all the people who knew us before. Any of them could come out of the woodwork at any time...’
‘They won’t. Not without a reason. Right now you’re just a girl they used to know—someone who’s making a successful career. They’ll be saying, Hey, I remember that girl from school... Or, I worked at the same coffee shop as Madelon Mulder! That’s as far as it’ll go. But if someone connects us, finds out that Madelon Mulder and the MolTec boss are siblings, that’s when someone’ll start joining the dots, asking questions: Wasn’t he married to that supermodel? Wasn’t there another brother? The alkies and junkies Bram used to run with would sell him out in a heartbeat for the price of one lousy fix!’
His heart was pumping, heat rising. He gripped the cloth tightly, pushing at the narrow walls of his anger, trying to subdue his hammering heart. ‘The press loves you now, Maddie, but they love a dirty story even more. Can you imagine—paparazzi camping out on Texel waiting for Bram to go shopping? Christ! You’d think they’d find something better to do.’ He snapped the cloth hard against the table edge and felt a momentary relief. ‘I don’t care what they say about me, and you’d ride it out because talent always trumps scandal, but Bram wouldn’t cope.’
Madelon sighed heavily. ‘You’re right but...don’t you get tired of it all?’
For some reason he was folding and unfolding the cloth. ‘Of course I do, but it’s just the way it’s got to be, until Bram’s...’
‘Better?’ She looked up. ‘What if he never gets better, Theo? Are we to spend our whole lives on lockdown?’
There was no recrimination. It was only a question, a point she was raising, but still his stomach churned. He couldn’t go there, couldn’t allow himself to believe that Bram wasn’t going to make it.
‘Eight months clean, Maddie; that’s more than he’s ever managed before.’
She put her knife down and stepped towards him. ‘I want Bram to make it, I really do, but I have two brothers...’ She touched his arm, squeezing gently. ‘And you’ve sacrificed so much. You can’t go on like this. You’re in love. You’ve got a chance of happiness, but you’ll lose Mia if you keep her at arm’s length. Why won’t you trust her?’
Words he didn’t want to hear; a question he couldn’t bring himself to answer. He wanted to trust Mia, but he’d lost his first love because of his devotion to Bram, and he wasn’t ready to risk it happening again. He’d never told Madelon about Eline’s cruel jibes; how much she’d stung him. It had seemed like an unnecessary detail—Madelon had found Eline’s affair heart-breaking enough—and it was pointless talking about it now. All he knew was that for the moment he couldn’t face telling Mia about Bram.
‘I’m dealing with it, okay?’ He swallowed hard. ‘We can’t widen the circle...not yet. Not when Bram’s almost—’
The doorbell rang, cutting him off.
Madelon shrugged, eyes heavy. ‘Okay...but, for the record, I think you’re making a terrible mistake.’
‘Mia!’
Her heart leapt as he gathered her into his arms, hugging her warm and tight. Everything felt better when his arms were around her. She nestled against him, breathing in his clean skin smell. It was hard not to slide her fingers under the hem of his tee shirt.
He released her slightly, smoothing a strand of hair away from her face. ‘You’re a sight for sore eyes.’
‘So are you.’ She slipped her arms around his neck, happy to be in the moment, not worrying about Eline or the secrets he might or might not be keeping. She just wanted to lose herself in his warm, green gaze.
He pulled her in again, lips against her ear. ‘I missed you so much.’
Something in his voice, a depth of emotion that made her heart quicken. Perhaps she wasn’t the only one on the brink of...
He released her for a second time, took hold of her hand. ‘Let’s go inside so we can say hello properly.’
‘Wait! I’ve got you something.’ She’d been so preoccupied with the Eline de Vries situation that she’d almost forgotten to bring him his present. She pulled her hand out of his and picked up the gift-wrapped pot plant she’d stowed near the door. She held it out, bobbing a curtsey. ‘Ta dah!’
Recognition flared in
