Chapter 14

“Yes, you did – we all did, everyone who knew her loved her,” she agreed, almost absently, as she seemed to become lost in her own memories.

Seline blinked at him, suddenly, as she registered his words, and his meaning. “You did love her, Matt ... but you were not in love with her!”

He felt a jolt deep inside him, that the woman who had meant so much to him, was not the woman who had died. “But she was important to me,” he insisted stubbornly. “I feel it deep inside me – she was the cause of the happiest time of my life – I know it, Seline ... but you know more.”

She sighed again sadly. “There is not much to tell really,” she said slowly. “But I will tell you what I know – I will tell you what I can...”

She paused for a moment whilst she gathered her memories, and when she spoke her voice was thick with emotion. “I was already staying with Belle, when you came. Belle welcomed you into her home and family with open arms and you seemed to be in awe of her warmth, almost as though you had never had a kind word or a show of affection before.” she grinned at him. “You and I competed for her attention in the beginning – just like two spoilt children, but we soon became good friends, too.” her eyes misted over, and her voice slowed to a halt.

“I loved her,” Matt said. “But she was another man’s wife, mother to another man’s children ... I loved her, but I was not in love with her ... but I was in love with someone?”

Seline sighed. “We spent days – weeks in our own private heaven in Belle’s home ... then one day; we were sitting out on the veranda; it was a warm sunny afternoon ... when she came to visit ... the first time you saw her it was as if you were transfixed. Her golden hair streaming down her back. Her vibrant blue eyes. She was laughing as she always seemed to do. Her nature was as open and summery as her looks, and you fell hard and fast for her. She was so unlike anyone else you knew. The opposite of your own dark, brooding and serious countenance.”

“Who was she?” he whispered hoarsely.

Seline smiled a steely sort of smile and shook her head. “No, I will not hand it to you on a plate. You must remember for yourself for it to have any meaning.”

Matt growled and he clenched and unclenched his fists. “Seline,” he warned.

She patted his arm. “I am sorry Matt, but I have another to think of, one who swore me to silence for fear of retribution from your father – or the council. I was never released from that promise; but more than that I care too much for you, to just give you a cold impersonal name. I know ... I just know that if I do then it will cause you more harm than good.”

She was firm and resolute, and Matt realised that she would not give in. She thought that what she was doing was the right thing, and he could not change her mind.

He had seen how steadfast she could be, if she felt she was protecting another – even against his brother, when Jonathon had tried to bully her.

A deep part of Matt, sort of understood and agreed that this nameless faceless person deserved more than just a name pulled out of the air.

Seline watched his internal struggle and sensed the moment that he conceded. She draped her arm through his. “Come and join me for a glass of wine – or two, before you retire to your cabin for the night.”

He let her lead him from the building, and whilst she chattered away about nothing, he allowed his whirling thoughts to settle. Belle had been important to him ... but not in the way he had thought. She had been instrumental in his meeting with the sunshine girl – the girl that he had loved.

Not Iris, not Laurie, not their mother Belle ... not Seline either ... but someone else who had been close in their family circle? He felt that he should know, but it was as if his heart and mind shied away from it – refusing to let him see what was there.

What had become of her? Of their relationship? Had she rejected him? Just because he had loved her – it did not mean that she had returned his feelings.

He smiled bitterly. He had come to Seline for answers, but instead he had more questions than ever.

Before though he had always just hated his loss of memory – that black hole of nothingness. But now he felt that he wanted – needed to remember – that those memories had value and were precious to him, if he could just find them again.

As they neared the main house, lights began to pop on in several of the rooms, and he could hear the sounds of laughter and of chatter bordering on shouting.

He smiled again as he glanced at Seline.

“It really is a good thing that you have done here,” he said as he thought about the possible fates these girls could have endured, had Seline not stepped in and rescued them.

“It was necessary,” Seline shrugged. “And I would do it again a dozen times over, if I could.”

“In spite of the cost?” he asked softly, as he thought of her solitary life and how simply she lived now.

“I have help with funding,” she told him casually.

“I was not just thinking of finances, but to your own life too ... have you never felt the pull of love, of the need for someone to hold you – of a child or children of your own?”

“My heart was given over a long time ago to your brother, but at the time he was married with a young child, and so I knew that he would not be in my life; and even when his wife died, and the years passed by, I knew that he would not look at me in that way.”

“And yet you flirted with him openly?”

Seline laughed, but there was an edge to it too. “There was a certain amount of safety in knowing that he would never take me seriously; and a large amount of spite that he would not take me seriously.”

“Until recently.”

“Yes, I don’t know what happened, why he changed his mind, but I have hopes for a warmer future ... and more security for my girls.”

“I have hopes for you both on that score too,” Matt told her seriously. “But you will have to be patient with him – my brother has a lot of irons in the fire and he has been on hand to assist people for more years than I can remember – even though he believes that he can just walk away from it all – it will be difficult and complicated for him to let go completely.”

“He does seem overly eager to volunteer in the help front,” Seline nodded. “But then that is part of the reason that I love him.”

“Good, I am glad that you understand,” Matt smiled. “But in the meantime, I should like to add my name to your funders list.”

“Why?” she asked bluntly.

Matt sighed. “Sitting there with them – listening to their happy banter, I found myself thinking how different their lives could have been had you not stepped in.”

“And?”

“And I would not want that for any of them, for any future girls either,” he shrugged. “I think what you do here is important, and I want to help.”

“Well then I accept – with gratitude your offer of funding.”

She led him into the house but this time she went into her study, where she did the finances and ordering and so on.

“One thing though please, Seline,” Matt said as he sat down across from her. “I want my donations to be just between you and me ... no one – and I repeat no one else is to know about this.”

“But...” she began to protest.

“I mean it Seline; this is a very serious matter. It’s one I cannot afford for the council – nor anyone else to become aware of my involvement.”

She looked openly confused and Matt sighed as he sat back. “The council believes that they have me on a short leash – under their total control, if they even think that I go off and do things on my own initiative, well then they will become threatened by me.”

“You are talking about your inner strength.” she guessed. “The repressed power that we all see in you, but no one dares to acknowledge.”

“Perceptions and illusions!” he snapped, then he gave her a wry, apologetic sort of smile. “But you are not wrong either.”

He sighed again and she saw for the first time the tiredness of his spirit. Matt had been the council’s ‘grim reaper’ for too long now, and she could see suddenly how much it damaged his soul.

“And then there is the public perception of you too,” she continued thoughtfully. “You inspire fear and subservience wherever you go and so an act of kindness here would undermine that.”

“Yes, and that is something that the council would never allow, they would have me disposed of rather than have their chief henchman seen in a weak light – it would make them seem weak too.”

She nodded suddenly. “You have my word Matt, any donations you give to my home will be for my knowledge only ... no one will hear of it from me.”

“Good enough,” he nodded back with a small smile. “And thank you for understanding, Seline.”

“I do Matt, I really do. The council were indifferent to my girls in the beginning, and ignorant to my intervention ... but as soon as they became aware of my home and young women – then they saw it as an opportunity – as something belonging to them by right of power – for them to dictate and decide upon.”

Matt gave a soft understanding grunt, but he did not have the energy all of a sudden to get hot and bothered over those foolish old men who ‘thought’ they held power.

He suddenly had a need to be alone, to lose his conscious mind to those veiled dreams of someone who he now knew was real. He had a real need to get back to her and try to discover her in his dreams so that he could find clues of her in the real world; he knew just knew that if he could find her then he would know her immediately.