Danielle Steel - Bittersweet

“You're scared. That's all it is. You panicked,” she said, beginning to sound desperate.

“I'm panicking now,” he said honestly, looking at her. He didn't want the responsibility of her. He couldn't do it. He knew it. Sean was right. He was senile. “India, you have four kids. You have a house in Westport.”

“What's that got to do with it? I'll put them up for adoption.” She was half kidding, but her eyes filled with tears instantly. She could see he meant it. She was fighting for her life and he didn't want to hear it. “I love you.”

“You don't even know me. All I am is a voice on the phone. A dream. An illusion.”

“I know you,” she said desperately. “And you know me. This isn't fair.” She started to cry openly and he took her in his arms and held her. He felt like a murderer, but he knew he had to escape her. For his own survival.

“It's better now. It would be worse later,” he said sensibly. “We'll just get attached to each other, and then what? I can't do this. Serena won't let me.”

“She's gone, Paul.” She said it gently, through her tears, even then not wanting to hurt him, while he hurt her. “She wouldn't want you to be unhappy.”

“Yes she would. She would never want me to be with another woman.”

“She was smarter than that. And she loved you. I can't believe you're doing this.” It had been a week. Seven days, and she had given herself to him completely, and now he was telling her it was over. A week ago, two days ago, he had told her how much he loved her. He wanted her to move to the city. He liked her children. He hated the commute, but who didn't? “Can't you give this a chance?”

“No, I can't. I won't. For your sake as well as mine. I'm going back to the boat. My son is right, I'm too old for this. You need someone younger. I can't take on four kids. I can't. When he was that age, Sean almost drove me crazy. I'd forgotten it, now I remember. And that was twenty years ago. I was thirty-seven. Now I'm a hundred. No, India,” he said sternly, looking at her as she cried, but he was doing it for Serena. He owed it to her, he had let her die alone on an airplane. That never should have happened. He should have gone with her. “You've got to go now.” He stood up and pulled India to her feet as she stood in front of him and sobbed. She had never expected this of him, and she hadn't been prepared for it. She had never suspected this would happen. He loved her. She knew it.

“What about Antigua?” she asked through her tears, as though it still mattered. But it was something to hang on to. And then he took that from her too. He wanted it all back now. His heart, his life, their future.

“Forget it,” he said coldly. “Go somewhere else. With a nice guy. I'm not that person. The best of me died with Serena.”

“No, it didn't. I love the best and the worst of you,” she said, and meant it, but he didn't want to hear that either. He wanted nothing more from her. It was over. And then she looked up at him with eyes that tore his heart out.

“What'll I tell the children?”

“Tell them what a bastard I am. They'll believe you.”

“No, they won't. And I don't either. You're just scared. You're scared of being happy.” It was truer than she knew, and truer than he wanted her to see now.

“Go home, India,” he said, and opened the door for her. “Go back to your kids. They need you.”

“So do you,” she said, believing it, and knowing him better than he did. “More than they do.” She stood in the doorway, looking at him for a long time then, sobbing pitifully, and her last words to him were “I love you.”

And as she walked away, he closed the door quietly behind her, and walked into his bedroom. He lay on the bed he had lain on with her, and sobbed as he thought of her. He wanted he back, he wanted her to be part of him, but he knew he couldn't. It was too late for him.

He was gone. Serena had taken him with her. And he owed her this now. He knew it. For not dying with her. For letting her down. He had betrayed her, and he couldn't do it again. He had no right to what India wanted to give him.

And as he lay on his bed and cried, India drove back to Westport, blinded by tears, hysterical. She couldn't believe what had happened. She couldn't believe what he had done to her. It was worse than anything Doug had done. But the difference was she loved him, and she knew he loved her. As she drove home, she was so distraught, so racked with pain, that she never saw the car next to her move out of its lane and cut in front of her. She didn't even have time to think before it hit her. She bounced off the divider, and back again into another lane, as the car spun wildly around her and she hit her head on the steering wheel, and the car stopped finally. There was a salty taste in her mouth and there was blood everywhere, as someone opened the door, and she looked at them, and fainted.

Chapter 23

IT WAS after midnight when India called Gail. She had fourteen stitches in her head, a broken arm, a concussion, and whiplash. And her car was totaled. But she was alive, and it could have been worse. She had hit two other cars, but fortunately no one else was injured. She was at the hospital in Westport. India cried when she explained her injuries to Gail. She had thought of calling Paul first, but even in her confused state, she decided not to. She didn't want him to feel sorry for her, or guilty. It was her own fault. There was no point blaming him now.

She was sobbing incoherently when she called Gail and asked if she could come and get her. Gail sounded panicked, and arrived half an hour later, in Nikes, with a coat over her nightgown. She had left Jeff with the children.

“My God, India, what happened?”

“Nothing. I'm okay.” But she was still sobbing, and badly shaken.

“You look like shit,” Gail said bluntly, and she saw then that India was going to have a black eye to go with the rest. It was the first accident she'd ever had, and it was a doozy. “Were you drinking?” She whispered so no one could hear her. The police had already come and gone, but there were nurses all around them in the trauma unit.

“No. I wasn't,” India answered, trying to stand up, but she threw up two minutes later. The hospital had said she could go home, but Gail thought she should stay there. “I can't. I have to go home to the kids. They'll worry about me.”

“They're going to worry more if they see you,” Gail said honestly. But India insisted. She just wanted to go home, and die quietly, in her own bed, with her head under the covers.

They left the hospital ten minutes later, with India wearing a blanket over her blood-soaked clothes, and holding a metal bowl in case she threw up, which she did four times on the way home, as she continued to cry softly.

“Did something happen? Did you have a fight with Doug or something?” Gail could see in her eyes that something terrible had happened.

“No, I'm fine,” India kept repeating. “I'm fine. I'm sorry.”

“Don't be sorry, for God's sake.” Gail was worried sick about her. She half carried her up the stairs, put her to bed, and stayed nearby so she could hear her. She tried to give her a cup of tea, but India didn't want it. She just lay there crying until she finally fell asleep at six o'clock in the morning. And when they got up, Gail explained to the children that their mother had had a little accident, but she was fine. She had bumped her head, and had a headache.

“Where's the car?” Sam asked, looking puzzled, and surprised to see Gail making them breakfast in her nightgown instead of their mother. The sitter had left before that.

“The car is gone,” Gail explained as she made pancakes for them. She had been up all night, watching India, and she looked it. “Forever,” she added, and Jason whistled.