Tahitian Wedding

‘Where is Marie Rose?’ she demanded. ‘She promised to come and meet me.’

‘Unfortunately she was not able to do it,’ replied Alain. ‘She asked me to come in her place.’

‘What’s wrong?’ asked Claire in alarm. ‘She’s not ill, is she?’

Alain dismissed that with a shrug.

‘Marie Rose? No! But for your father, it’s a different matter. His heart has been giving him trouble for the last two years, although perhaps you didn’t know or care about that.’

‘I knew,’ replied Claire shortly. ‘And I cared.’

‘But not enough to come home and visit him?’ challenged Alain.

Claire bit her lip, but remained silent. Alain’s barbed comments filled her with guilt. Knowing Alain, that was probably just what he intended. After all, he had never hidden his opinion that Claire was heartless and totally indifferent to other people’s feelings. In fact, her father’s illness troubled Claire deeply, but pride would not allow her to tell Alain the truth—that she had repeatedly tried and failed to persuade Roland Beaumont to visit a Sydney heart specialist at her expense. As for visiting her family, her conscience was quite clear on that score. Fear of meeting Alain had always kept her away from Tahiti, but she had paid several times for her parents and sister to join her in Sydney. Yet why should she have to justify herself to Alain by explaining all this?

‘Well,’ said Alain with a lift of his eyebrow, ‘there will be plenty of time to catch up on the rest of the news in my car. For now, I think we should go and collect your luggage. After that, I will take you to meet Marie Rose and your parents, just as she asked.’

Claire stared at him in perplexity.

‘But why should Marie Rose ask you to do all that?’ she demanded. ‘You hardly knew her.’

‘Six years ago, no,’ agreed Alain. ‘But a lot can happen in six years. Didn’t Marie Rose tell you that her fiancé Paul Halévy is my cousin and the manager of my new hotel on Moorea?’

Claire took a step back.

‘No, she didn’t!’ she replied in a startled voice.

Alain smiled sardonically.

‘Then, in that case, she probably did not tell you either that I am to be best man at her wedding. Am I right?’

This time Claire stared at him in horror.

‘Best man?’ she croaked. ‘That’s impossible! Ridiculous!’

‘Believe me,’ Alain assured her, ‘the thought of being constantly thrown into your company for the next week is just as unwelcome to me as it must be to you. But for the sake of Marie Rose and Paul, we must both put a good face on it. Now come and we’ll collect your luggage. You must be tired after your long trip.’

Claire’s thoughts whirled as Alain whisked her through the building. For one insane moment she was tempted to flee back to the plane she had just left, but Alain was handling her arrival as efficiently as he had once organised her departure. With the ease of a man accustomed to prompt service, he soon had her outside the airport and comfortably settled in the luxurious front seat of his gleaming Citroen car.

‘You travel light,’ he observed. ‘Only one small suitcase on wheels. As if you were always ready for a fast getaway.’

Claire shrugged.

‘That’s truer than you know,’ she agreed. ‘I’ve been on the move so much in the last six years that I’ve reduced it to a fine art. I never own more than I can carry.’

‘That must be difficult,’ observed Alain.

‘Not really. It’s very simple. All you have to do is decide never to get attached to things.’

‘Or people?’ Alain challenged.

‘Or people!’ retorted Claire with a defiant toss of her head.

Settling back into her seat, she folded her arms and stared resentfully ahead of her into the darkness. He was determined to goad her, she thought fiercely, but she wasn’t going to be drawn. Alain Charpentier had made a blistering attack on her morals and her character once in her life, but she certainly wasn’t going to give him a second opportunity.

‘You’ve done very well since you left Tahiti,’ he said in milder voice. ‘You should be very proud of yourself.’

‘Thank you,’ replied Claire coolly.

‘Of course it’s not the sort of lifestyle that would suit everybody,’ continued Alain. ‘I’ve always admired your poise in front of the cameras and your ability to adapt to new countries, but I should imagine that sort of jet-setting must be very exhausting. It’s a good thing you’ve never wanted a settled home or any serious attachments, isn’t it?’

‘Yes, isn’t it?’ retorted Claire with an edge to her voice.

She stared out the window again and an ache like a physical pain filled her entire body. Her throat tightened as she remembered how often she had cried herself to sleep in her first bewildering months in Sydney. How many times had she felt a sharp, nostalgic longing for Tahiti, simply because of some trivial reminder that had sent her thoughts winging back to her home? The scent of warm croissants outside a bakery, the sight of scarlet bougainvillaea spilling over a balcony, the feathery crown of a coconut palm waving against a blue sky had all been enough to reduce her to tears. But worst of all had been the pain of missing her family. Her easygoing father Roland, with his rumbling laugh and his home handyman projects that never quite worked, her mother Eve, who sometimes surfaced from her painting long enough to cook wonderful French meals, not to mention her numerous aunts and uncles and cousins. And, of course, warm-hearted Marie Rose, whose only fault was her well-meaning desire to get Claire married off as soon as possible. How dared Alain assume that Claire’s home meant nothing to her or that she didn’t want deep attachments to anyone? Unconsciously she leaned forward urgently, as if she could make the car go faster.

‘We should be there just as the sun rises,’ she said. ‘I do hope we can reach Point Cupid before it comes up! I always used to love watching it from that bare hillside overlooking the bay.’

‘Did you?’ asked Alain. ‘Well, I’ll be glad to stop and let you see it, but I should warn you that the hillside is no longer bare. I’ve built a hotel there.’

‘You’ve what?’ cried Claire in horror. ‘Oh, how could you, Alain? How could you possibly ruin that beautiful headland by building some ghastly eyesore of a hotel there? Don’t you have any sensitivity at all?’

To her astonishment the car suddenly veered sharply off the road and came to halt. The glow from one of the sulphur-yellow street-lights filled the vehicle’s interior, turning Alain’s face to a bronze mask as he turned off the ignition. Then he seized her wrist, and glared down at her.

‘No,’ he said through his teeth. ‘I am like you in that respect, Claire. I have no sensitivity whatsoever and you would do well to remember it. And like you, I care only about one thing—the satisfaction of my own desires. All the same, I flatter myself that I do have good taste. So why don’t you wait until you’ve seen the hotel before you condemn it as being ghastly? It seems to me that you’re entirely too willing to make judgements about situations without being in full possession of the facts!’

‘Really?’ retorted Claire. ‘I always thought that was your speciality!’

‘You go too far!’ grated Alain.

His glittering blue eyes narrowed as he stared down at her and she caught her breath in a swift, convulsive gulp. The movement made her breasts strain against the low-cut neckline of her dress and she was conscious of the swift, instinctive flare of desire in Alain’s glance. Against her will Claire felt an answering surge of excitement as his eyes rose to scan her face. The silence lengthened and Claire was conscious of an unwelcome throbbing that pulsed through her entire body. Alain’s grip on her wrist seemed to scorch through her like a bracelet of fire. Then with a low, shuddering sigh he released her. Turning back to the steering-wheel, he switched on the ignition, rammed the car into gear and pulled out on to the road with a protesting squeal of rubber.

‘We’ll be at Point Cupid in another twenty minutes,’ he said with biting sarcasm. ‘So you’ll soon have the chance to see for yourself whether I’ve ruined the place or not.’

The streets of Papeete flashed past, ghostlike in the gloom. Down by the harbour, Claire caught a glimpse of the lights of moored ships and heard the distant laughter of all-night revellers on the docks, then Alain took a turning which led out towards the east of the island. Ten minutes later as the car was speeding up a winding road through lush tropical forest, a sudden burst of orange radiance filled the landscape around them.

‘Oh, do stop,’ begged Claire.

With a brooding glance at her, Alain sent the car hurtling round one final bend and brought the Citroën to a halt in a parking area overlooking the magnificent bay of Point Cupid. Scrambling eagerly out, Claire darted across to the viewing platform and stood gazing out over the ocean. As the sun rose like a blood-red orange from the sea, its rays lit up the dark blue of the outer ocean, the lacy necklace of foam that marked the hidden coral reef and the much lighter blue waters of the lagoon. Down below them a tangle of luxuriant tropical vegetation rioted exuberantly over the hillside. The flaming orange canopies of African tulip trees were noisy with the cries of mynah birds and, further down, coconut palms, hibiscus and banana trees jostled in colourful profusion. Claire gazed and gazed, avidly noting the far-off buildings of Papeete and the yachts at anchor in the harbour.

‘You haven’t told me what you think of my eyesore of a hotel yet,’ reminded a sardonic voice beside her.

‘W—what?’ stammered Claire. ‘Where is it?’

‘You’re practically on top of it,’ said Alain.

Gripping her shoulders, he turned her forty-five degrees further east and pointed downwards. Claire gasped. Tucked into the hillside, so cunningly that it was scarcely visible, was a set of buildings that looked more like a living staircase than a luxury hotel. Built in a series of tiers that followed the shape of the hillside, it was surrounded by coconut palms and banana trees that sheltered it from the wind and the gaze of curious sightseers. In addition, each unit had its own large balcony with planter boxes filled with tropical creepers. Bougainvillaeas in every imaginable shade of scarlet, orange and white cascaded over the walls and the air was heavy with the scent of tropical flowers. On the highest level of the cliff-top, the whole structure was dominated by a longhouse in the traditional Polynesian style, with the graceful swooping lines of a ship’s hull. And in the gap between the screen of trees Claire caught a glimpse of the sapphire-blue water of a large swimming-pool.

‘It’s beautiful,’ she acknowledged reluctantly.