Chapter Five

Chloe receives a package

 

 

 

Tristan had dropped me home and gone off to work and I watched him drive away smiling. I still loved him. It was hard to think back about what we had shared and not love him, not want him. I shook my head as I opened the front door thinking to myself that I would call Oliver and tell him about the jeweler, because Oliver should have been the one with me there, not Tristan, but I suspected Tristan had to do it.

There was a flat, padded-bag package on the doormat with the other mail that had been put through the mail slot when I was out. I opened it as it was addressed to me. It was a little flat purple-blue box and a note. I opened the box already knowing it was the bracelet Oliver and I had given back to Marti when I was there trying to surreptitiously heal her daughter. I took the bracelet out of the box and held it as I read the note.

You brought us luck with your generous gesture. Rachel is completely well as if her kidneys are new. We got your address from the auction house copy of the receipt that they provided to your boyfriend for insurance purposes. I would like you to have the bracelet. Marti

I smiled at this. I’d wondered if the healing had worked for the last couple of weeks. In that time I had helped someone with arthritis, an older man who was in obvious pain in a shop in town. I’d started to work with Bartholomew too. He’d shown me the symbols, which if I incorporated them into stained glass window designs, would relax the person looking at it. That was my first task, but I knew I would work with him on other designs soon.

I called Oliver and his phone went to message so he must have been working and unable to answer. I took the bracelet up to my room with the note and left them on my desk.

I decided to get some work done and booted my computer. I walked over to my window to look out at the expanse of garden and the woods beyond. It was unthinkable that I should leave this house, ever actually, and I sighed thinking that eventually I would have to. You couldn’t have Tristan semi-funding where you lived forever. I had the stupidest thought then, and it was how it would have been okay if I was getting engaged to Tristan, and we would live here together. I felt shocked at myself. Was I always going to crave Tristan as well as Oliver? I needed to pull myself together.

I was lucky because right then my cell phone rang and it was Oliver. I breathed a sigh of relief when I found I was elated by his calling me. I told him about the return of the bracelet and he was so pleased that Rachel had been cured. He asked me about the ring, and when it would be ready, and I reluctantly told him Tristan was picking it up at the end of the week. Oliver sighed, but didn’t comment, and we arranged to see each other that evening. He would come around after work and pick me up.

I applied myself to work for the rest of the afternoon and early evening determined to make a success of the new designs incorporating Bartholomew’s symbols. Half an hour before Oliver was going to arrive I had a shower and put on a dress. It had been some time since I had worn this dress and it reminded me of other times, times with Tristan, and I frowned thinking I must be having some kind of delayed reaction to his finding Dale, and my getting engaged to Oliver.

Oliver arrived.

“Chloe you look gorgeous. I haven’t seen you in that dress for ages. I should be taking you somewhere special not just to my place”. He smiled as he held me at arm’s length and looked at me.

“I’m just thankful to be with you Oliver no matter where we are going. I feel a little on edge for some reason, and I just need some quiet time with you”, I told him, and hoped that it was true.

When we got to Oliver’s place he went to have a shower and left me looking at a website he had built for a new client. I was supposed to check the user friendliness of it, and so I did until I became interested in what they were selling. They had taken photographs of beautiful scenery around the area, processed them at poster size, framed them, and that was what they were selling. Some had special effects on them such as sepia or raindrops. You might think this was a simple and possibly not very lucrative business, but the pictures were stunning. Someone had framed and composed the shots with huge skill. I was looking at a photograph of a stream when Oliver came into the room and cuddled me. He bent close to my ear and whispered, “I love you so much”.

I turned my head to kiss him and put my hand up into his hair, which was still wet. His kiss was gentle and loving. “What are you looking at Chloe? That’s pretty isn’t it?” He had noticed the picture I had on the screen. I smiled at him.

“It is. They have taken a simple idea and made some stunning pictures. Look at the frames too. Some seem old and some look specially carved to suit the photographs”.

Oliver pulled up another chair and sat beside me.

“You know Chloe, you did this too, remember, you took photos of Tristan’s horses and got one framed for his birthday present. It’s hardly a new concept”.

I grinned at him and leaned in to kiss him again. He is just so sweet.

“I know Oliver but what I see here are such beautifully framed, composed photographs. Everything about them is beautiful. They are compelling. The light, the mix of texture it’s all gorgeous”.

He smiled at me. “You know this stuff. I’m a simple computer junkie”.

I shook my head. “No Oliver and you know that’s not true”.

We put our arms around each other and kissed.

He had to know it wasn’t true and I put all my love for him into that kiss.

He kissed me breathless and unzipped my dress.

It fell off one shoulder and Oliver kissed along my skin murmuring how much he loved me. I reached inside his unbuttoned shirt to trail my fingertips along his chest muscles. For a computer junkie Oliver was built. When his lips found mine again, he had pushed down my dress to stroke along my backbone, and unhook my bra. I felt the intense pleasure that always came with the knowledge that Oliver was going to make love to me and everything else went out of my mind.