Less Money, More Love

Chapter 3: Clovelly

Once the plane landed, Rachel was faced with lots of decisions attacking her for response and resolution all at once. A mix of anxiety and excitement stirred inside her. She was without a plan, but she knew that she needed one. She had left the country. The first matter before her was where she should go next.

By the time she collected her bags from baggage claim and exchanged her dollars for pounds, she considered starting over in London, which presented many opportunities if she decided she wanted to stay there. But she didn't.

Her father had businesses and offices all over the world. Once he learned that she was not in L.A. after all, he would just strategically start contacting his different international offices from Berlin to Bagdad and Beijing. Nothing was beyond his control.

He would coolly go about checking with his international security personnel. Then he would actively engage them in searching for his daughter, the crazy runaway bride. If he was still as angry as he was when she talked with him on the phone, then she definitely did not have any plans for returning to deal with a tighter reign of his control over her life.

Finding her would not be too difficult for her father. Her phone calls and her credit card use could be tracked and she could be located. She was not a child, however, but an adult woman. Her father could not force her to do anything no matter how rich, strong, and politically powerful he was.

Everything so far had been done on calculated whims. England was the same way. She hired a taxi and was on her way to a small seaside village where her late mother had lived briefly. She told her about her life growing up in different countries then traveling on her own in her early twenties, a much happier time for her or so it seemed.

She loved hearing those stories of her late mother's life abroad, the daughter of a diplomat, before she met and married her father. Her stories revealed a side of her late mother that she had not often seen as a part of their family life. She was a buffer in the small family dynamic of three; her main goal was to secure a stable future and endless opportunities for her daughter, the apple of her eye.

Rachel told the taxi driver to take her to Clovelly. Just as she was sitting back, about to enjoy the ride and forget about her problems, her phone started to ring.

“Great," she said with sarcasm. It was Kurt. “Yes....?"

“I thought you had more brains and critical thinking skills, being college educated and all that. I guess I thought that common sense was also part of the package. I was wrong."

Kurt's tone was sharp and disdainful. No wonder he and her father got along so famously. They both had managed to master the art of how to talk down to a person. No response was possible that would rescue them from being berated by either man; they felt like they were walking on eggshells just about to break at any time and for any reason, whether within or beyond their immediate control.

Before she could respond to his first comments, he cut her off and supplied another put down.

“Are you aware that this is an international call? That we had 842 guests here to celebrate our happy union and we had to turn them away because of your capricious act? You are quite a handful, girl."

“I'm a handful?" she replied angrily. “You don't know me. You don't know the first thing about me. I'm just a messy part of the deal. I'm someone you have to put up with but not placate, right, Kurt?"

“Well, you left a lot of people behind. We had to tell them something, so your father and I decided to say that you were..."

“That I was what? Spill it."

“That you were out of medication. There were several doctors in attendance and they helped the guests at the reception to accept and accommodate the regrettable situation with as much ease as possible. They considered that the sheer number of guests might have been too much excitement for you. We were able to spin it to our advantage."

“So now you have an ace. It wasn't enough to take my inheritance away for not marrying you? It wasn't enough that you lost points with my father. And it wasn't enough that I fled our wedding, leaving you at the altar? You needed ultimate control, a wild card, where you can have me institutionalized at your will and get my father to sign off on it. Nice, Kurt. Nice."

There was nothing to go back to and no way of returning without a serious loss. A loss of wealth, independence, and support had all been yielded to a total stranger over a business agreement that her father, her only blood relative, had agreed to without hesitation.

“If I know my father well, he provided an escape clause for you of some sort?"

“It's about more than just the money, Rachel."

“Yeah, I know. Don't even try to pretend like you care about me in any way. It 's all about image. The image of a happy, united front with a multi-billion dollar, multinational deal as the backstory. You are a supreme a**. Go slither back under the rock where you came from, Kurt."

With that she ended the call, not waiting for another lie from her past and putative groom.

On the way from London to Clovelly, Kurt called her 57 times and left 19 voice mail messages. Upon her arrival, she looked at the sea and looked at her phone. Bringing her closer to other hateful and angry individuals in her life was not what she wanted right now. That was not her idea of marrying well; escaping exchanging vows and undoing a marriage of convenience became her roundabout way of achieving that success on her own terms.

She refused to be considered as the family problem to be managed and kept under control. In Clovelly, she could learn more about what her late mother liked about this village now clearly full of tourists' delights. She could learn how to live like average, everyday people, a good although novel experience for her.

The first priorities were finding a job and a place to stay. She had converted enough American dollars to British pounds at the airport to last for awhile. She had to be careful to use cash instead of her credit card from here on out so she could bury her tracks.

After her long, international journey, she was tired and hungry. She looked into spending the night at a bed and breakfast that was within her current means and her last luxury. After using her phone to read more about the village, and ignore the unfortunate yet very real possibility more communication from the two men in her life at this point, she turned off her phone and threw it in the sea.

“Good riddance. Can you track me now?"