Chương 8
The corridor outside felt too bright.
Maya leaned against the wall.
Victoria stood beside her.
Neither spoke.
A crew member appeared at the far end carrying folded towels, saw them, and immediately found the towels fascinating.
Maya wiped her face.
“I’m sorry.”
Victoria frowned.
“For what?”
“Your dinner.”
Victoria stared at her.
Then she laughed.
It was the first uncomplicated sound Maya had heard from her.
“My dinner.”
Maya smiled.
“I’m technically still working.”
“No, you’re not.”
“Daniel said he wasn’t firing me.”
“I’m firing you.”
Maya’s smile disappeared.
Victoria added, “With full pay.”
Maya stared.
“For the rest of the charter. You’re a guest.”
“I don’t want—”
“I know. Consider it a labor-law panic response.”
Maya laughed despite herself.
Victoria’s expression softened.
“I’m not trying to buy you.”
“Good.”
“I’m also not asking you to forgive him.”
“Good.”
Victoria looked toward the salon.
“I don’t know if I do.”
Maya studied her.
“You married him.”
“Yes.”
“You knew what he was like.”
Victoria looked at her.
The question had come out harsher than Maya intended.
Victoria did not take offense.
“I knew what he was like now.”
“And that’s different?”
“I thought so.”
Maya looked down the corridor.
“Maybe it is.”
Victoria crossed her arms.
“When I met Daniel, he’d already had the accident.”
Maya glanced at her.
She knew about the accident in the vague way anyone who searched Daniel Whitmore online knew about it. A helicopter crash in British Columbia eleven years earlier. Two dead. Daniel survived with a spinal injury.
Victoria said, “He was impossible.”
“I can imagine.”
“No, you can’t.”
A small smile.
“He fired three physical therapists. Threw a bowl of oatmeal at a wall. Refused to let anyone move a chair in his house because he said he didn’t want the place redesigned around his disability.”
Maya listened.
“I was working for the foundation. I wasn’t his nurse or girlfriend or anything remotely romantic. I was the person stupid enough to tell him the accessibility committee couldn’t meet in a building with stairs to the conference room.”
Maya smiled.
“What did he say?”
“He said they could use Zoom.”
“That sounds like him.”
“He was worse.”
Victoria leaned against the opposite wall.
“He changed. Slowly. Not beautifully. There was no inspirational montage. He just got tired of being angry.”
Maya looked back toward the salon.
“And you fell in love with him.”
“Eventually.”
“Do you still?”
Victoria was silent long enough that Maya regretted asking.
Then she said, “That’s the irritating part.”
Maya nodded.
Love rarely arrived at convenient moments.
Her mother had taught her that too.
The next morning, the Belladonna entered Newport Harbor beneath a pale sky.
Maya had slept less than two hours.
She stood on the aft deck in borrowed sweatpants because Victoria had insisted she not put the service uniform back on.
The humiliation of accepting the clothes bothered her.
So did the comfort.
Crew moved around her preparing for arrival. Lines were coiled. Stainless steel was wiped. Coffee appeared from somewhere and Maya drank it too quickly, burning her tongue.
Daniel did not come outside.
Victoria did.
She wore dark sunglasses and carried two coffees.
“I brought you one.”
“I have one.”
Victoria looked at Maya’s cup.
“That looks terrible.”
“It is.”
“Mine is better.”
Maya took it.
“Thanks.”
They stood beside the rail.
Newport grew larger ahead of them.
Victoria said, “The board meeting is at ten.”
Maya looked at her.
“You’re still doing it?”
“Yes.”
“What are you going to tell them?”
“The truth.”
“Whose version?”
Victoria glanced at her.
“Good question.”
Maya sipped the coffee.
It was better.
“I don’t want to be used against him.”
“I know.”
“I mean it.”
“I know.”
“If you and Daniel have marriage problems—”
“We do.”
“—I’m not ammunition.”
Victoria nodded.
“You’re not.”
Maya watched a gull glide behind the yacht.
“And my mother isn’t either.”
“No.”
A minute passed.
Victoria said, “Would you come?”
“To the board meeting?”
“Yes.”
“No.”
Victoria accepted it immediately.
Maya appreciated that.
“Okay.”
Daniel appeared at the aft door.
He wore a dark sweater instead of the tuxedo.
Without the formal clothes, he seemed smaller.
Not weak.
Simply human-sized.
He rolled onto the deck.
Victoria’s posture changed.
Maya felt it before she saw it.
Daniel stopped several feet away.
“Maya.”
“Daniel.”
“I owe you an apology.”
She waited.
He looked uncomfortable.
Good.
“I had no right to strike the tray.”
“No.”
“I had no right to interrogate you as your employer.”
“No.”
“I frightened you.”
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry.”
Maya watched him.
There was no speech after it.
No explanation.
That helped.
“Thank you.”
He nodded.
“I’ve also instructed Owen to document the incident.”
Maya frowned.
“Why?”
“Because you were an employee when it happened.”
Victoria looked surprised.
Daniel continued.
“You’ll receive full charter pay and gratuity. If you want to file a complaint with the management company, I won’t contest your account.”
Maya studied him.
“Did Victoria make you do that?”
“No.”
Victoria said, “I suggested worse.”
Daniel looked at her.
“I’m sure.”
Maya almost smiled.
Daniel turned back to her.
“There’s one other thing.”
Of course there was.
He held out a small archival envelope.
Maya did not take it.
“What?”
“Original photographs of your mother.”
“How many?”
“Seven.”
“Why do you have them?”
“My father’s things.”
Maya took the envelope.
“Copies?”
“Originals.”
“You don’t want them?”
Daniel looked toward the harbor.
“They aren’t mine.”
Maya opened the envelope.
Elena at the kitchen table beside Charles.
Elena laughing at something outside the frame.
Elena pushing Charles through a garden.
Elena asleep in a chair with a paperback open on her chest.
Maya stopped.
Her mother looked so young.
Alive in the careless way people look when they do not yet know which parts of their lives will become evidence.
“Thank you.”
Daniel nodded.
Maya looked at the last photograph.
Charles and Elena sat beside a birthday cake.
Daniel stood behind them.
May you like
His hand rested on his father’s shoulder.
Charles looked irritated.
