Seeing Red

Nice part-2

Arthur and Charles left for Var once he was awake, I was nervous about lunch with Charlotte. She was really sweet but she was his ex-wife, the mother to Mia. What if she despised me?

She had told me the name of the restaurant they were eating at, after help from the locals and a few wrong turns I was finally here.

The place was situated right along the beach, people were carrying their food from the restaurant to the beach, I found the concept really fascinating.

"Tara!" I heard Mia's squeals.

"Hi!" I walked to where they were sitting.

"I missed you so much!" She hugged me.

"In the entirety of 4 hours that you were away." Charlotte laughed.

"Thanks for inviting me!" I beamed taking a seat opposite to her.

"The pleasure's all mine, should we order now?" She asked me.

I nodded, we ordered a good mix of food and were served with beverages to cool ourselves down almost instantly.

"So Tara, tell me about yourself! There's so little I know about you!"

"Well, I'm Tara Fae. My parents are two successful entrepreneurs and my sister Harriet Fae is a chef! She's working at the Alain-"

"Ducasse? I've had the experience to dine there! Their menu is wonderful, compliments to the chefs!" She smiled. "That's about your family, what about you?"

"Well, in the 24 years of my existence all I've done is fail!" I laughed, "Started a clothing line, pockets went dry, abandoned the business and started one one on refurbishing and reselling preowned books, it didn't run profitably and then my last job was at an HR firm, I couldn't lie well enough."

She went quiet, she hadn't said a word. I could see Charlotte struggle to find the right words, she finally managed to say that she had seen pictures from the ball. Charles and I looked lovely together and it seemed dreamy.

"Thank you!" I smiled.

"So, tell me about how the two of you met!"

"It's... A long story..."

"And we have all the time in the world!"

I told her about how my parents threatened to cut me off after losing my job and so I moved to Monaco to live with Harriet. She too was tired of seeing the awful state I was in and we tried looking for jobs but it didn't work, until she met Pascale.

"So Mia would be there, at the salon causing chaos."

"I ran around with scissors in my hand only twice mama! Don't believe her!" Mia defend herself.

"Twice!? Mia!" Charlotte looked at her in shock.

"Yup, for that reason she needed a babysitter. I started babysitting her, blissfully unaware that she was your and Charles' daughter!"

"Oh wow!" She laughed.

"Let's just say the first week was difficult, she refused to believe in the concept of friendship."

"There was only boss and slave." Mia added eating her fries.

"Who's teaching you all of this?" Charlotte looked at her.

"She gave in, we became friends and then I was invited for her birthday. That's where we met the first time." I smiled.

"That's adorable! But Mia, we need to talk about a lot." Charlotte glared at her daughter.