Something From Tiffany’s (16 page)

She nodded. ‘Of course. I don’t think she had a very good time in New York, though, but I suppose that could change.’

Ethan grimaced. He’d half-hoped that Vanessa’s distant behaviour had been nothing more than a figment of his imagination, but it seemed not. ‘It was a bit topsy-turvy, our trip, wasn’t it?’

‘Yes.’ Daisy paused and looked at him. ‘Dad, did
you
have a good time? I mean, if you drew a picture of your favourite memory, what would it be?’

‘Well . . .’ Ethan was stumped. For a moment he honestly couldn’t think. Then he chuckled. ‘I suppose it would have to be the one of me force-feeding you M&Ms on our last night. Here, give me a piece of paper and one of those crayons!’

Daisy giggled with delight. Then, when Ethan was done with his own rendition of their chocolate feast, she raced into the kitchen to place it prominently on the fridge door along with the rest of her drawings, where Ethan had every intention of letting them stay until the edges were yellowed and cracked.

Chapter 13

‘I’m telling you, I don’t know how it happened,’ Gary said, crouching down as he tightened the last bolt on a new fuel line he was installing on his motorbike.

He was glad to be back home, a wrench in his hand and a beer on the concrete garage floor. It had been a long flight across the Atlantic with his sore ribs, but at least not as long as the bloody hospital stay. He shrugged and looked at his best mate, Sean. ‘Sometimes, when you realise the cards you’re dealt, you’ve just got to bluff and keep your poker face on.’

‘Well, you could have knocked me under a bus when you told me you were getting hitched, but with the way things panned out I suppose you couldn’t do much about it,’ Sean guffawed. ‘Anyway, you could do worse than Rachel, you know. You’ll never go hungry
and
you get to have those curves in your bed every night.’ He grinned and raised his beer can to his mouth. ‘Guess one of us had to take the plunge soon enough. Hate to admit it, you bastard, but you’re looking at a win-win.’

Gary and Sean had been close buddies for over thirty years. They’d grown up together in the same area of Dublin and had always shared a fascination for things that went fast, from home-made go-carts to BMX bicycles, then eventually street bikes. Somewhere along the line between those came fast girls and then fast women. While Rachel didn’t exactly fit the ‘fast’ category, she’d certainly been lusty and spontaneous enough to catch Gary’s eye and, more importantly, meet the approval of his mates.

He stood up, wiped his hands on a greasy rag and tossed it onto the workbench. ‘Throw me another one of those,’ he said to Sean, who reached into a half-empty twelve pack of Heineken and obliged. ‘Well,’ he said, as it opened with a loud hiss, ‘in fairness, marriage is never a win-win, but if I have to take the plunge I suppose the odds are in my favour this time.’

‘Yeah, well, just as long as it doesn’t change you,’ Sean said dismissively, waving the can in his hand. ‘Although at least Rachel never tries to come between you and your mates. Hell, she even keeps the brew flowing every weekend after the rides. How many birds would give us the thumbs-up on that?’

‘Cheers,’ Gary said, not entirely comfortable with this line of conversation – about marriage and being changed and all that. He’d just wanted to hear Sean’s take on what he should do about the ring if it all went south with Rachel. ‘One more thing: you can’t breathe a word of this. As far as the rest of the lads are concerned, I bought the ring and I proposed. I got it under control. OK?’

‘Say no more. You have my word,’ Sean said solemnly.

Gary laughed. ‘I’d better! All right, throw us over your bike now. Mine’s good to go.’ It was almost an unspoken pact between them to meet at Sean’s house on Sundays after their Saturday rides, to keep their bikes in tip-top shape. Because of his injuries, Gary wasn’t up to riding just yet, but today was a good excuse to catch up with his friend.

‘And speaking of coming up trumps, I suppose you’ll have a big payout coming soon – from the cab crowd, I mean,’ Sean said.

Gary frowned. He hadn’t thought of that. Sean saw the hesitation in his face and laughed. ‘You do know you can take that crowd to the cleaners, don’t you? I tell you, Gary, you’d be stupid not to. They’ll expect that kind of thing. Sure, aren’t the Yanks themselves always suing one another left, right and centre?’

Gary thought about it. Sean was right. The cab company were probably waiting for a summons to come through the post, and here he was sitting around like an eejit and doing nothing about it.

‘You know, you could be on to something there.’

Sean shrugged. ‘You’d be mad to let it go. From what you told me, it’s all cut and dried.’

That was true, Gary agreed. There he was in the middle of Manhattan, minding his own business, when this gobshite comes out of nowhere and mows him down. Of course he should get recompense for that. And for all the money he’d had to pay out for the hospital bills too, although to be fair, his health insurance had covered a lot of that. But thinking about it now, wouldn’t the cab companies have insurance for that kind of thing? So, really, Gary would be very stupid not to at least enquire about it.

‘You’re right.’ He’d phone a solicitor first thing in the new year. In these troubled economic times nobody could afford to let opportunities like that go astray. And wasn’t he entitled to it, after all? As it was he was still suffering, and if it wasn’t for the fact that the boys were willing to wait for him, he’d be missing the New Year’s bike ride. In fairness, he’d been forced to postpone one building job because of the hospital stay, and who knew how many others his injuries would put a stop to?

Not to mention that a few quid would come in handy right now. Actually, it might very well be the answer to one or two of his more pressing problems. Sean didn’t know the half of it.

‘Listen, thanks a mill again for holding off on the big ride until I’m up for it,’ he said to Sean. ‘These bloody ribs will take a while.’

‘No problem. Sure, we’ll do it as a team, same as always,’ Sean assured him. ‘The rest of the lads are fine about it. They’re all on for the party too.’

‘The party . . . yeah,’ Gary replied, grabbing a fresh cloth while Sean applied the engine cleaner. On the way back from New York, Rachel had come up with the bright idea of throwing a big do to celebrate their engagement.

‘We could do it at the bistro on New Year’s Eve – when everything’s already set up for a party,’ she’d gushed, her mind already racing with the possibilities, and Gary could do nothing else but agree.

‘One thing I am learning about all this engagement stuff,’ he grinned, ‘is that there’s lots of booze and partying leading up to the main event. Can’t baulk at that, I suppose.’

‘Too right,’ Sean agreed, taking one last swig and tossing his empty can across the garage and into the recycle bin. ‘I’ll make sure you have the stag night to end all stag nights too. Rachel didn’t waste any time pulling this one together, did she? A New Year’s Eve engagement party.’ He pulled his towel back and gave it a stinging flick that landed on Gary’s arm. ‘Very fancy.’

‘Dickhead – you’ll regret that when I’m back in fighting form,’ Gary said, grabbing another beer from the box and tossing it to Sean.

‘Sure, are you ever any other way?’ his mate replied with a wink.

‘Wait a second,’ Brian said, pausing to take a sip from his wine glass and then setting it on the bar. He looked at Ethan in disbelief. ‘You bought a two-carat rock for Vanessa?’

Ethan looked at his friend, wondering why he sounded so surprised. ‘Yes, it’s been on the cards for a while. I thought you knew that.’

‘Well, yes, I knew you two were close but I didn’t think it was that serious, actually . . . But, more to the point, then you went and
lost
the bloody thing?’

‘In a word, yes,’ Ethan replied. ‘And thank you for summing it up in a way that makes me sound like an absolute pillock. I know I can always count on you for that,’ he added, raising his own glass for a toast, which Brian gladly accommodated.

The two men had met years before at the university in which they both taught, and well before Brian had become the successful novelist that Ethan hoped to one day be too.

‘Glad I can bring some consistency to your life,’ Brian replied, finishing off the last of his Montrachet with one swig. He motioned to the barman. ‘Another, please.’

Ethan shook his head. ‘I thought we agreed to meet for
a
glass, not three.’

‘No such thing as one glass – what’s the point?’ Brian retorted. ‘Besides, you haven’t me told me how Vanessa reacted when you told her what happened.’

‘I didn’t tell her what happened. How could I?’ Ethan looked away and finished his own glass. Without thinking he raised his hand to his mouth to chew on his nail.

‘So you haven’t proposed yet?’ asked Brian.

‘No. As I said, how could I? What woman wants a proposal that ends in the man telling her he’s lost the ring?’

Brian was silent for a moment before he spoke again. ‘I just can’t believe it.’ He shook his head.

‘I know I wouldn’t have let that bag out of my sight for a second, let alone drop it on the street to help some stranger. You’re way too nice for your own good sometimes, my man.’

‘Well, that’s the thing,’ Ethan replied, explaining that the bag had actually been in Daisy’s care. ‘She’s blaming herself, of course. But I’ve tried to reassure her that it wasn’t her fault. It’s not as though the bags got mixed up intentionally.’

Brian looked sideways at him. ‘I take it she knew about the planned big Christmas proposal, then. How’d she handle it?’

‘Brilliantly, really. She didn’t know when it was happening until I picked up the ring in New York, but she was fine, really enthusiastic.’

‘That’s great, Ethan. I’m glad Daisy’s OK with it. That kind of thing could have been a big stumbling block, especially when she’s so attached to you.’

And why wouldn’t she be? It had been just the two of them for so long, Ethan thought.

‘Is she still just as gung-ho on the health stuff?’

He smiled sadly. ‘Afraid so. The other day she brought home this leaflet she’d picked up from somewhere about superfoods.’ It broke Ethan’s heart to see that most of the items listed were being lauded for their cancer-fighting abilities. ‘And she’s doing her utmost to try to make me take up jogging as a new year’s resolution,’ he told Brian. ‘Says it’ll help keep my stress levels down.’

Which was another reason Ethan was still at pains to reassure his daughter that the mix-up with the bags wasn’t her fault and that he’d be able to get the ring back with minimum hassle.

The problem was that he didn’t know if that were true.

‘She’s a great kid. And you’re a great father, Ethan, better than I could ever hope to be. Not that
that’s
on the cards,’ he added sardonically. ‘Or if it is, I know nothing about it, nor do I want to.’

‘Thank you.’ Ethan smiled, thinking that with Brian’s reputation it was very likely that he might indeed have offspring somewhere that he didn’t know about. Although Ethan didn’t know if what his friend had said about him being a good father was true. He’d muddled his way along so far, but there was so much he didn’t know about bringing up a little girl in today’s world. Which was why he was so happy to have found Vanessa. There was no replacing Daisy’s real mum, of course, but it was plain to see that his beloved daughter needed a strong female influence in her life.

‘So what’s your plan for getting this ring back, then?’ Brian asked. ‘I take it you’re still going ahead with the big proposal.’

Ethan looked at him. ‘Well, of course. Why wouldn’t I be? Anyway, seems like I might need to take a trip to Dublin soon.’ He explained how the numerous messages he’d left for the other party were so far unreturned.

Brian looked incredulous. ‘And how exactly do you plan to get this mysterious trip past your lovely bride-to-be without telling her what’s going on? Hell, Ethan –’ he paused, shaking his head ‘– call me old-fashioned, but if you’re going to marry the woman shouldn’t you be able to actually
talk
to her?’

Ethan pushed aside his empty glass, and set his elbows on the bar. ‘That’s funny coming from someone who hasn’t stayed with one woman longer than six months.’

‘Point taken.’ Brian grinned, unable to deny he was a renowned Lothario, his esteemed profession helping a lot in this regard.

‘Anyway, as it turns out, things aren’t that simple. The woman who has the ring . . . I met her in New York . . . Gary Knowles’s girlfriend,’ he continued, stumbling over the words a little. ‘We had coffee, and exchanged phone numbers. So I suppose I’ll just have to try to—’

‘Hold on!
Woman?
What woman? You didn’t mention a woman. I thought some bloke had the ring.’

‘He did. At least I think he did, but he didn’t . . .
doesn’t
realise it.’ Ethan glanced across and felt the weight of his friend’s perplexed look, something he’d last seen when Brian’s car had a flat and he’d admitted he didn’t know how to change a tyre.

A couple of very long minutes passed during which Ethan noticed the music coming from the jukebox and the growing hum of people in the bar. It was Happy Hour and people were filing in. He felt diminished, as if all the great plans he’d had in mind had suddenly been bundled in the palm of his hand and inadvertently dropped and stepped upon.