425

Sleep was slow to take him that night.
************
Ben sat at a table on the patio soaking in the morning sunlight as the party enjoyed their breakfast. They were watching the traffic drive by and the busy movement of people passing by on the sidewalk. Truth be told the four blondes sitting at the table next to the railing were drawing their share of observers as well. Ben was sitting with Gabriella and her kids. He’d wolfed down his breakfast and was now just relaxing and letting the food settle.
Gabriella and Catherine were desperately curious about his meeting with Margaux but they didn’t want to push him and there hadn’t been an opportunity for him to speak privately anyway.
“BEN! It’s him!” Catherine hissed.
His eyes snapped open and he looked to where she was discretely pointing. He spotted the small man they had the altercation with in the Louvre. He was sitting in the back of a convertible with a tall woman with an enormous mane of blonde hair and huge sunglasses. Driving the convertible was the little man’s bodyguard. He stood to watch it move down the block. The last he saw it was turning into the next street.
Gabriella had memorized the plate and entered it into her phone’s email.
“Weren’t the police looking for him?” Catherine asked.
“Yes! I still have his address so I’m going to send a note off to Chief Inspector Boucher with the license plate. He can forward that along to the local police or whoever is looking for him. What was the man’s name again?”
The McGovern ladies conferred for a second. “He said his name was Rachid Shakir.”
Gabriella added that to the note then hit send.
“Is everyone done? Are we ready to go?” Ben asked and received nods.
The plan for the day was to drive to a mountain top walled village called St. Paul de Vence. Gabriella was driving so they all got into the fish tank, Ben squeezing himself into the rear most seat between the delighted duo of Miriam and Daniel. They giggled constantly as Ben teased Sophia, Rachel, and Megan from the back seat by tugging on their hair. Gabriella and Catherine finally had to tell everyone to behave and look out the window to enjoy the scenery. Ben made an unhappy face and the kids burst into giggles again.
“Ben!” Gabriella growled playfully.
The scenery was very interesting so soon the van was quiet. Ben noticed Rachel was rolling her neck stiffly. He reached over the seat and began massaging her shoulders.
“Oh god, yes! That feels so good!” Rachel groaned and all eyes went to her.
“What’s going on back there?” Catherine asked.
“Ben’s just massaging Rachel’s shoulders and neck,” Sophia said with an envious tone.
He worked his thumbs into her stiff trapezius muscles and felt them begin to loosen. Once she was relaxed he ran his thumbs down the sides of her neck and he felt something odd on the left side. There was a small ‘v’ shaped scar there. He gently ran his thumb over the spot and he felt her begin to squirm as tingles rushed through her body. He pulled his hands back in confusion.
He had a flash of memory. His lips kissing a neck, his tongue gently stroking the skin there and feeling the raised texture of a scar. A ‘v’ shape.
“Catherine?” he called out and she looked around the passenger seat to see him.
“Yes?”
He looked at her neck and it was smooth. No scar. “Nothing… nevermind.” He sat back, stunned. What the hell?
He spent the next little while in silence, looking at nothing as the dots connected in his mind. The behavior of the sisters the next morning. Catherine’s behavior and Gabriella’s. He felt his world start to slip out from under him. The trust he had in these women was seriously strained and he began to feel ill.
“Gabriella. I need to stop please. Right now,” he said, fighting to keep the bile down.
She swung the car into a fast food restaurant parking lot and people scrambled out of the van to let Ben get out. He made a bee line to the restaurant and rushed into the washroom.
Daniel followed him in to make sure he was ok. He heard Ben throwing up and went back out to tell Catherine. She looked worried. No one else was feeling ill and they had all eaten breakfast together. Minutes later Ben walked from the washroom. His face was wet from splashing his face in the sink. Catherine walked up to him but he passed her and went to the counter. He bought himself a couple of bottles of water. He drank one immediately then looked over at Catherine.
“I need to speak with you and Gabriella please.” He looked over at the empty booth in the corner and pointed to it.
Catherine blinked at his tone then went outside to get Gabriella to come inside.
Ben dropped himself in the booth with his back to the wall. He ran his hands through his hair and tried to calm his mind. Gabriella and Catherine came in and sat across from him. He glanced out the window and saw the others standing by the van watching them through the window.
“Ben, what’s wrong?” Gabriella asked, worried.
“How did Rachel get the scar on her neck?” he asked Catherine.
“What? Uh, she was in a small accident in school when she was in her teens. It’s been there for years. Why?” she asked, puzzled.
“You don’t have a scar that shape on the side of your throat,” he growled.
Comprehension flashed in Gabriella’s eyes and Ben saw it. “Ben, wait! There is a good explanation for what happened that night!” That lit the lights in Catherine’s eyes and she suddenly looked guilty.
“You are supposed to tell me the truth! That’s the foundation of our relationships! Honesty! Keeping me in the dark is the same thing as lying!” Ben exclaimed.
“Yes, Ben but you weren’t stable that night! You’d had a mental break,” Gabriella asserted quietly.
Ben rocked back. He wasn’t stable. Was that how they saw him?
Gabriella immediately saw Ben had taken her words harder than she’d intended but knew retracting them would be worse. “You had a couple of episodes of memory loss. You collapsed. We put you to bed and you were still a little shaky. Rachel was passing your room later and heard you scream. She went into your room to see if you were ok. She touched you and you pulled her onto the bed. You went back to sleep holding her but she couldn’t get loose. She waited for us to come upstairs to help her but she fell asleep too. When we came upstairs your door was open but we closed it instead of looking inside.”
Ben’s jaw was flexing as he stared at the table surface and digested her words. He couldn’t argue with them as he had no memory of the event but it sounded like his previous behavior.
“Why didn’t she tell me it was her?” he ground out.
Catherine leaned forward and spoke gently. “She said you’d already started when she woke up and it felt too good to stop. She wasn’t prepared for you to have sex with her but honestly both she and Sophia were praying you’d take them to bed. It wasn’t until afterwards when you called her Catherine that Rachel realized she might have created a problem for you. She immediately spoke with Megan then they came to speak with me and Sophia. I spoke with Gabriella and we were worried that the additional stress might be dangerous after your episode the night before. We’re sorry Ben! There was never any intent to hurt you! We love you!”
Ben sat quietly trying to get his equilibrium back. He looked out the window and saw Rachel was crying. He put his head in his hands and groaned as a spike of pain went through it.
When he looked up again his eyes were red and glassy. Gabriella and Catherine had tears pooling in their eyes too.
“I’m sorry I’m such a mess. I will check in with my shrink the moment I get home to deal with this. But I need you both to stop keeping things from me. That is far more destructive to my mental balance than the truth, however messy it may be. My trust in you must be absolute. I can’t function otherwise. My world falls apart. Can you promise me that?”
Gabriella and Catherine both nodded and they all slid out of the booth. He hugged them both tightly to his body. He felt them trembling but he was trembling too. They made their way back out to the van and Rachel looked at him with bleary eyes. He held his arms open and she ran into them, crushing her body against him as she cried.
“I- I’m s-s-so sorry!” she wailed against his chest. He made hushing sounds and kissed the top of her head and rubbed her back until she calmed down.
“I’m not mad at you. I was upset that the secret was kept from me and that hurt. A lot. I don’t like secrets. No more secrets. Okay?” he whispered to her. She nodded vigorously. He tilted her chin up and gave her a gentle kiss on the lips. He reached over and pulled Sophia close as she had tears in her eyes too. He addressed them both quietly. “No more mistaken identities if I find one of you in my bed. My eyesight in the dark isn’t that good. You announce who you are. Understood?”
Sophia caught the implication immediately and a smile blossomed on her face and she nodded.
“Clear it with your mother and Gabriella first,” he said looking them in the eyes and they nodded again, excitement coming back into their eyes. He turned to the group. “Let’s get back on our way. Sorry about the delay.”
Gabriella drove them the rest of the way up the mountain and they managed to get one of the coveted parking spots around the walled town. As they were walking towards the gates Daniel was giving them the history of the town from his guidebook.
The town still had a fair number of residents but it was also home to many unique shops offering everything from art to fashion to furniture to wine. There was also a number of excellent restaurants. They spent the rest of the morning mooching in the shops with Daniel and Ben exploring and taking pictures. Ben bought Daniel some glass art he fell in love with and had them ship it to his address.
They met up for lunch at a restaurant with tables in the square under some trees and took in the view of the valley below. The meal was exquisite and Ben’s spirits were gradually returning to his regular levels. The boy’s enthusiasm was a definite antidote for his blues.