Free Life's a Beach and Then... (The Liberty Sands Trilogy Book 1) by Julia Roberts Page B

girl.
    Holly scribbled a few lines in her notebook for the blog she
would be writing later. The resort had definitely passed the ‘happy parents’
test.

 
    Chapter 19
     
     
    Holly ordered room service that evening. She was impressed to
find that you could order anything off the Waves restaurant menu. The items
marked with a yellow tick were part of the all-inclusive package she was on and
there was plenty to choose from, particularly for vegetarians, she thought
wryly.
    After replacing the telephone handset she only had time for
a quick shower before there was a knock at her door.
    Impressive, thought Holly, back home it takes longer than
that for a pizza delivery, courtesy of a dodgy old moped.
    She had decided to eat on her balcony, the perfect place for
a bit of people-watching as she was only fifty yards from Roberto’s Italian
restaurant, and she could also enjoy the soft breeze from the Indian ocean and
the fragrant perfume of the frangipani carried on the balmy evening air.
    As she tasted her first forkful of food she was surprised to
see Umberto and Mathilda at the entrance to Roberto’s waiting to be seated,
without Giulietta. They were shown to a table next to the entrance which would
give them a perfect view of their room, the last one of the block closest to
the restaurant. Holly leaned over her balcony and could just see the baby’s
buggy fully reclined with netting over it to protect Giulietta from the night
time bugs. Her parents would be able to hear her if she cried but Holly still
felt uncomfortable that they had left her outside their room alone. That
picture of Madeleine McCann and her huge haunting eyes flashed into her mind.
It would be a very safe bet that her parents never got through a single day of
their lives when they didn’t feel regret.
    Holly had never left Harry unattended for a moment, even to
pop into a shop to buy a loaf of bread or a postage stamp. She would either
struggle in with the buggy, often disappointed that no one volunteered to help,
or she would unclip Harry from his harness and carry him into the shop, leaving
the buggy outside on the pavement. Although she was short of money a buggy was
replaceable if it got stolen, not so her precious child.
    Maybe it was different for her because she had no one else
in her life. No husband, no father and a mother who had disowned her because of
one mistake.
    She remembered her mother’s words as if they had been spoken
yesterday: ‘Have a termination Holly or you will regret it for the rest of your
life.’
    She had been shocked by her mother’s vehemence. Theirs had
never been an easy relationship, with constant accusations that she was a
‘daddy’s girl’, but that was a savage thing to say to a frightened nineteen-year-old
whose boyfriend had seemingly disappeared off the face of the earth. Holly
admitted that there was a good deal of truth in her accusation. She had adored
her dad, but it was her mother’s fault really. It was difficult to love someone
who was so volatile particularly when she had been drinking. That was when she
would become abusive towards Holly.
    ‘You ruined my life,’ she screamed at the terrified,
cowering child on more than one occasion, along with, ‘I should have got rid of
you.’ Holly swore that one time her mother had said in a drunken rage, ‘I
should have got rid of you too.’ When she questioned her mother about it she
was adamant that Holly had misheard, although she had sobered up pretty quickly
that time.
    Laughter below her balcony dragged Holly back to the
present. A group of a dozen or so young people in very high spirits were
heading for Roberto’s. Holly wanted to tell them to shush, as they might wake
the baby, but she was too late as Giulietta let out a wail. Within a few
seconds Umberto was next to his daughter’s pram, lifting her out to comfort
her. Then he released the brake on the pushchair and wheeled it the few yards
to their table in the restaurant. That was the end