“I’ll bet it was.”
“More like a nightmare.” He looked towards the window, watching the snow whirl past. “Raf came with us – I can’t even remember why – but somehow, it was the four of us, driving up here on a night not unlike this,” he said with a shake of his head. “The roads were icy.”
The only sign that Isabella sensed what was coming was the way she bit down on her lower lip. Holding back a gasp?
“I know how to handle these roads,” he muttered. “I took it slow, checked the tyres, did everything right.”
She nodded slowly. “But?”
“There was a bike. The driver had been drinking, and was speeding. He came around a bend and lost control. I swerved to avoid him, but the car drifted onto ice and spun out. We hit a tree.” He groaned, dropping his head, the simple words hiding a cacophony of painful memories all crowding through him. “In all my life I will never forget that moment. Time seemed to slow down, everything was happening so fast yet I was minutely aware of every single detail. I didn’t realise, but Carmen had undone her seatbelt so she could adjust something for Avery. She was thrown from the window.”
“Oh, Gabe.” Isabella clasped a hand to her lips, tears moistening her eyes. But he couldn’t look at her for long; there was too much pain. Too much blame. Not from Isabella, and yet how could there not be? He’d destroyed Carmen’s life – and Avery’s too.
“There was so much blood,” he said quietly, shaking his head in an attempt to grab onto a different thread of conversation. “I didn’t know what to do, where to go. I wasn’t hurt, but my seatbelt had locked and it took me a long time to work it free – probably only minutes, but the longest of my life. Avery was screaming, high-pitched and frantic. I managed to escape the car and get around to her – I checked her first. She didn’t look hurt. Raf was unconscious but breathing, his leg bent at a strange angle. My God, Isabella, I will never forget a single moment from that night.”
“And Carmen?” She whispered.
“I held her hand and told her everything would be fine. I told her she’d be fine, that I’d stay with her until help arrived,” he shook his head in frustration. “It was a lie. She died in my arms, on a mountainside not far from here.”
The silence that fell between them was coated with grief. The air throbbed with sadness.
“The day you arrived was the anniversary of her death. Seven years.” He said the last two words like little bullets, puncturing the air.
“And you’ve spent seven years hating yourself for the accident,” she said eventually, sipping her wine before placing the glass down at her side.
He rejected her characterisation. He hadn’t been hating himself. Not consciously. He’d simply lived as he’d needed.
“It was an accident,” she said gently.
“I killed her.”
“She died, but you didn’t kill her.”
“If I hadn’t invited her here. If I hadn’t insisted on Christmas at Il Nido. If we’d left any other time. If I’d seen the ice and avoided it.”
“If, if, if,” she said with a terse shake of her head. “How many people run down that path, only to realise they can’t change the past? You didn’t do anything wrong. You were trying to surprise your girlfriend and her baby – that’s lovely. You tried to avoid a motorcyclist. The ice, the crash, these things were bad luck, out of your hands completely.”
“No, cara. You want me to feel better, and so you say this, but the fact is, were it not for me, Carmen would still be alive. Avery would still have a mother.”
Isabella’s eyes fluttered shut a moment. “What happened to the little girl?”
“Her ribs were broken, but nothing more serious.”
“And where is she now?”
“With her father.”
“Do you ever –,”
“Speak to her?” He supplied. “No. She hates me.”
“I’m sure that’s not true.”
“If she doesn’t, she will when she’s older and learns the truth.” He expelled an angry breath. “All I could do was lend…”
She waited but he clammed up.
“Go on,” she prompted quietly.
Another rough breath exploded from his lungs. “I sought to alleviate any financial worries. It was the only thing I could do.”
“So you support them?”
“I’ve established a trust fund for her. Anything she needs in life will be taken care of. Her father does not need to work – he is both parents to Avery now, mother and father.”
Tears sparkled like diamonds on Isabella’s lashes. “You can’t keep beating yourself up for this.”
Gabe punctured her with the strength and steel of his gaze. “No?”
“No.” Her response was emphatic and then she pushed down from the bench, crossing the kitchen and standing in front of him. “No.” Louder this time, almost angry. “What good comes from the way you’ve ostracised yourself from life?”
He didn’t respond.
“Do you think Carmen would want this to be how you remember her?”
“I killed her,” he said quietly. “I don’t want to forget. And I don’t want to forgive myself. I don’t deserve that.”
“So this is your self-imposed punishment? Living here, far away from friends and family, alone and furious with yourself, hateful of the world?”
He lifted a shoulder, as if to say ‘why not?’.
“She lost her life.”
“And you’re forfeiting yours.” The words were tinged with bitterness. He met her gaze then, his gut rolling at her obvious sympathy. But her next action caught him off guard. Slowly, she lifted onto the tips of her toes, watching him the whole time, her eyes impossible to read.
“You’re wrong, Gabe, but that’s not your fault.” She pressed a hand to his chest, moving incrementally closer. “The fact you’re living like this is proof of one thing only.”
He braced for her condemnation, because surely she meant his guilt?
“You have a huge heart, and it’s filled completely with goodness. Only someone good could be feel this bad.”
The words
