As Sharni pulled up in the wide, circular drive, she leaned over and squeezed Lou’s hand. ‘Want me to come in? Help you unpack?’
Lou shook her head, taking in the long verandas wrapping around the old homestead, which was shaded by fire-engine red flame trees coming into bloom. The yard was neat, the grass carefully mowed – no traces of stray machinery, car bodies or delinquent dogs. Beyond the house, well-kept fences led out to closest paddocks, and beyond them, a cluster of outbuildings: the converted stables, the guesthouse.
It was late in the day, and the valley that sprawled out to the west was showing off how Sunset Downs had got its name, a vibrant palette of pinks, purples and golds turning on a show. ‘Wow,’ she breathed. ‘The place looks incredible.’
‘Yep,’ Sharni agreed, her smile almost touching her ears. ‘Gage has done an amazing job, hasn’t he?’
Lou considered Sharni carefully. She knew all the reasons her friend had never wanted to leave this place. She understood the tug of its raw beauty, and how only the tug of Matt could have trumped it for Sharni. She also knew why Sharni hadn’t come back, after things had gone wrong with her marriage. No-one needed that particular small-town brand of what are you thinking? But seeing Sharni now, her red hair lit gold by the sunset, her grin transforming her into the loud, funny, wild girl Lou had known twenty years ago, it was hard to understand how her dearest friend had ever left.
Sharni prompted her again. ‘Want some help?’
‘Nah,’ Lou said, so tired from the events of the day she knew she just needed to get in, get this all over with and hit the sack. ‘I’m good.’ But she smiled gratefully at Sharni. As she did, she noticed something, a slight droop in Sharni’s huge smile. Her tummy clenched. ‘What is it?’
Sharni looked straight ahead, out the windscreen. ‘You know how you made me promise never to tell you anything?’ She pointed towards the homestead. ‘About him.’
Lou nodded, her tummy tightening further.
‘Well, I think there are a few things I ought to tell you.’ Sharni’s voice was very quiet and she continued to look in front of her.
Lou’s vision started to blur. He’s married. Oh my God, he’s married. That’s why the place was so neat. Lou’s eyes flicked over to the pretty baskets hanging on the posts of the homestead veranda, brimming over with flowers.
A woman’s touch. Holy crap.
Lou’s mind raced. She hadn’t told Sharni about the kiss at the reunion. If she’d told Sharni about the kiss, Sharni would never have let her come here. Now she was here, in his home, the scarlet woman. What had Gage been thinking, inviting her to stay?
‘He’s married?’ Lou hissed. ‘That falls into the category of things you definitely should have told me.’ She closed her eyes, considering whether she would have wanted to know, back in Sydney. ‘At least today you should have told me, once you knew I was coming here to bloody well stay.’ Lou was vaguely aware her voice was becoming hysterical.
Sharni finally turned to face Lou, her cheeks flushed. ‘No, don’t be bloody silly, of course he’s not married. Of course I would have told you if he was married.’ She closed her eyes briefly and Lou knew she was going through the same process Lou had the moment before. ‘At least today, I would have told you today. It’s not that, it’s –’
But they had both failed to notice the arrival of the devil himself, and they were interrupted by Sharni’s door being wrenched open. ‘Ladies,’ he said, gesturing for Sharni to step out.
Both women looked at him, mute and frozen. He appeared to have just come out of the shower – his long hair was wet and curled slightly at his neck. He was barefoot and naked from the waist up, towel hanging from his shoulders, wearing only a pair of jeans. His face was freshly shaved and had that just-scrubbed look, pink-cheeked and touchable. His semi-naked state afforded Lou an unimpeded view of broad brown chest, populated by the kind of muscles you only get from working hard on the land rather than at the gym. His biceps were so big and hard looking, Lou had a mad, girly moment of wanting to reach over and squeeze them. Then there was the scar, the remnant of a fencing accident when Gage had been fifteen, it had never ceased to fascinate Lou. The way it looped, snake like, around his broad brown forearm. Something about it always made Lou want to circle that forearm with her fingers, see if she could get them to meet over its muscular expanse. As she watched him, all the saliva dried up in her mouth and her tummy started tap-dancing with excitement.
Sharni saved her. ‘You get dressed up just for us?’
Gage grinned. ‘I was just down at the guesthouse, checking the shower worked okay.’ He aimed his smile at Lou. ‘It’s hot, you’ll like it.’
Oh no. Did he have to do that? Did he have to plant an image of his tanned, muscly nakedness into her head? And in the shower she would be using? She smiled weakly. ‘Thanks.’
‘No probs,’ Gage said, stalking around to the back of the car and banging on it until Sharni released the catch. He returned with Lou’s bag and poked his head in Sharni’s door. ‘Er, you two coming?’
‘Not me,’ Sharni said, looking at Lou with eloquent youcan-still-change-your-mind eyes.
But Lou was committed. She didn’t know what Sharni had been about to tell her, but she was sure it couldn’t be good. She leaned over and kissed her cheek and then dragged herself out of the car like she was made of lead. Then she stood next to Gage and waved as Sharni sped out of the driveway.
When the little blue car was a speck in the distance, Gage spoke, his voice low and sweet. ‘You look like you’ve been dropped off at Purgatory.’
Lou turned to him, forcing a smile as those smoky green eyes bored into her. ‘Sorry,’ she said, trying to inject some sincerity into her voice. ‘It’s just been a long day.’
‘Of course,’ he said, turning on his heel and heading towards the paddocks. ‘Follow me, I’ll take you down to the digs. You can get washed up before dinner.’
Lou did as she was bid, stepping across the grass carefully in her not-nearly-sensible-enough shoes and trying not to watch his arse, encased in habitually tight jeans.
Gage was right – the shower was hot, Lou thought as she stepped into it ten minutes later. And the little guesthouse was charming. It had been renovated lovingly to return it to its yesteryear elegance. It was only a single room with a bathroom, but it was large and comfortable, and had a small sitting area complete with its own fireplace. There was a fire crackling as the warm afternoon cooled to evening. A rocking chair and a fluffy rug for toe warming sat in front of the fire. A plain blue bedspread adorned the large but simple bed, along with a couple of throw pillows.
Lou stood under the steaming assault of the shower and thought about all that had happened in the last twenty-four hours. As hard as she tried to untangle it, she knew she’d had too little sleep, too much trauma and far too many tequilas the night before to make sense of it before she had a proper rest tonight. She only knew three things with any certainty right now: she was at Gage Westin’s place, showering in the same shower his naked body had been in very recently; her mother was dying, and there was a catalogue of other disasters she needed to deal with when she could bear to let her mind start to look at them; and last, there was something going on here, with Gage, that Sharni thought she had needed to know about.
She wondered if she could stay in the shower forever.
With a long sigh, she shut off the water and stepped out, wrapping herself in the fluffy towel that had been laid on the bed for her. Exhaustion seeped into her bones, making her head spin a little. She sat down quickly on the bed, dragging her bag towards her with her foot and carefully unzipping it to extract the cosy dressing gown she never travelled without. Snuggled in it, and staring at the fire in the corner, she could almost pretend she was in some high-end mountain lodge, some three-thousand-dollar-a-night escape for the rich and famous. She almost purred as she stretched out on the big, comfortable bed, pointing her toes towards the fire.
But then, as they often did in quiet moments, the thoughts overtook her. She stared at the flames and saw it all again, as though she was watching it for the first time. The thing that had happened that could never be undone. The familiar nausea toyed with her, and she closed her eyes against the predictable stab of pain that knifed under her ribs. It was worse here, in Stone Mountain. Whoever said you couldn’t outrun grief wasn’t entirely right. You could move away from its epicentre, if only to avoid torturing yourself with its sharper edges.
She lay back on the bed and scolded herself for coming back here at all. She needed to get out, as soon as possible. This place was dangerous to her peace of mind. It reminded her of that night, and her own guilt in it, and she couldn’t think about that too hard or too long without going under. Her eyes started to close as she focused on what she had to do: get her mum sorted.
And then she would get the hell out of this mausoleum.
A fire alarm sounded in Lou’s classroom as she watched Mr Fletcher explain quadratic equations. He might as well have been explaining how to grow feathers and fly like a bird. Everyone ignored the alarm, focusing instead on whatever idle pursuit they were using to make the seconds pass by more quickly: love notes, graffiti on the desktop, munching spitballs. It was five minutes until the end of school for the week, but that blessed moment might as well have been five years away. Every second was pure torture. Even to Lou, who got advanced maths more than most.
Suddenly, the room was filled with billowing smoke. Heat and flames danced across the desk, engulfing Mr Fletcher and half of the first row. Lou’s brain screamed at her to get the hell out, but her legs wouldn’t move. Terror had her in its thrall, and it wouldn’t let go. Kids screamed and ran and all the while the fire alarm rang on and on.
Just as Lou gave up all hope, Gage sprinted into the room, his face smeared with soot. He was shirtless, which was strange for a school day, stranger even than him being at school on a Friday at all, but Lou wasn’t complaining. The state of affairs provided a commanding view of his suntanned, rippled seventeen-year-old chest. She tried not to swoon at the sight of those flat brown nipples and the way his long hair grazed his shoulders.
The fire, she needed to think about the fire.
Gage vaulted three desks to get to her. When he reached her, he flicked his hair out of his eyes, but when he looked at her again he somehow wasn’t seventeen any more – he was older, much older, and he flicked a stray strand of hair from her face as he picked her up under her waist and buttocks and carried her like a baby out of the classroom. Her body banged against his hard chest as he ran from the room.
She could smell smoke and skin and the sweet male tang of this man as the alarm rang and rang and rang. She didn’t care if she burned; she didn’t care if they made it; she just wanted him to hold her like this forever –
‘Gage said not to wake you.’
The voice was quiet and had an interesting timbre, deeper than most women’s. Lou could almost pretend it wasn’t real; that it was just part of some sweet dream. But then it spoke again.
‘He said you’d be tired; you’ve been through a lot today.’
Lou’s brain snarled at the voice through the fog of sleep: Why, then? Why are you waking me? Whoever you are.
‘But if you don’t wake up you’ll miss dinner.’
At the mention of food, Lou’s stomach growled.
‘See?’ The deep, soft voice had an edge Lou was sure she recognised. How did she know this girl?
There was only one thing for it, she was going to have to open her eyes, as much as the warm, drugged, deliciousness of the nap was pointing its finger at her and warning her that it was a very bad idea, that she should simply slide back and let its honeyed fingers do their restorative work. But goddamn if curiosity had not killed the cat many times over in Lou’s life. Too many for her to count.
Lou dragged her eyes open, but they took a while to adjust in the low light of the fire. She unfurled her body from the foetal position she’d been sleeping in, still wrapped in her dressing gown, and sat up, trying to find her focus in the unfamiliar room, climbing out from under the jet lag late-afternoon naps always seemed to induce in her. As she did, she blinked several times, trying to make sense of the apparition in front of her, outlined by a halo of flames from the fireplace. The girl looked to be in her late teens, but it was hard to tell because of the been-here-before quality of her face, which was scrunched in concentration, considering Lou. She had long, very dark hair, tanned skin and a haughty lift to her prominent chin. The aristocratic effect was heightened by her regal nose and forehead, and only softened by the most spectacular pair of eyes – long lashed and some dark colour that was impossible to discern in the firelight. The bits of her that Lou could see were dressed in a simple tank top and jeans, and adorned only by a leather strap wound several times around one wrist. A dark spot – the kind that used to be called a beauty spot – sat like a punctuation mark on one cheek and a slender hand flew to it self-consciously as Lou took her in.
‘Hi,’ Lou said, her brain struggling to work out who this creature might be. Not a wife, Sharni had said there was no such creature. Too young for a lover, surely, even for a prime specimen like Gage. A stablehand?
‘Hi,’ the girl said, unsmiling but not unfriendly, more like she just wasn’t someone who tried too hard to please. ‘You don’t look like Skye.’
Oh. Now how many times had Lou heard that in her life? What was it? The pale skin? The dark hair? Or the whole skinny, boobless thing? She sat up a little more, thinking she might need more authority to manage this straightforward beauty than her dressing gown and semi-reclined position afforded her.
‘She’s a lot taller,’ the girl finished shortly.
Lou laughed in spite of herself, fairly sure that was the least of the departments in which she fell down in comparison to luscious Skye.
‘True,’ she mused. ‘And she tells jokes better than me.’
The girl wrinkled her nose at Lou, her head on the side. The gesture made her look oddly both younger and older. ‘But you’re her daughter? Gage said.’
‘Yep,’ Lou confirmed, shrugging her shoulders to communicate her apologies that she was so disappointing. It was a practised gesture. ‘And you’re?’
‘Piper,’ the girl said. ‘Hasn’t he told you about me?’
‘Gage?’ It was hard for Lou to keep up with the after-effects of sleep and the slight pounding at the base of her skull, indicating that migraine was still flirting with her.
‘Yeah,’ the girl said, pausing like she was in no hurry. ‘Dad.’
Lou tried hard not to keep sneaking surreptitious looks at Gage and his daughter as they ate the meal. Gage Westin. The baddest, wildest, most delicious boy she ever knew. In what universe was it possible that he could be someone’s dad? She focused on the food.
‘Delicious,’ she purred, her tummy finally satisfied after the hardships of the last twenty-four hours. She pushed her glasses up her nose, wishing she’d had her shit together enough to put her contacts in. It was difficult enough to be near this dynasty of beauty.
‘I grew the vegies,’ Piper said, in what Lou was coming to realise was her customarily brief manner. ‘So I cooked them – that’s our deal. You cook what you grow. I did them the French way. Lots of butter.’ She smiled, suddenly and blindingly, and Lou was rocked to her core, the way she had been every time the girl had opened up to reveal a quick and heart-jolting flash of Gage. ‘Dad did the lamb on the barbie.’
It was odd, the way Piper used ‘Gage’ and ‘Dad’ interchangeably. The ‘Gage’ sounded a little strained, like she was still trying it on for size.
‘Delicious,’ Lou repeated, licking her lips where a smear of butter had landed. She decided not to mention the whole vegetarian thing. Especially when the lamb tasted so bloody good.
Gage smiled at her, his eyes following the progress of her tongue on her lips, then he turned the smile on his daughter. ‘Piper’s a great cook,’ he said, the pride sitting comfortably even in the short sentence. ‘And an even better gardener.’
‘Not as good as Grandpa,’ Piper said. ‘He’s got the green thumb.’
Bo? Lou tried to imagine Big Bad Bo Westin as anyone’s grandpa, let alone a gardener. It was tough. But it was fascinating listening to the conversation across the table as they ate. Neither Gage nor his daughter were the chatty type, but they talked when they had something to say – in the same short, matter-of-fact way. In the silences between, there was no sense of awkwardness or unease. They ate and smiled, and the space between them was so warm a creeping loneliness stole across Lou.
‘So,’ Piper said, cutting bread and passing the plate around the table, ‘you’re a lawyer.’
Lou put her fork down. That’s right, she was a lawyer. She’d almost forgotten that after recent events. She once read that going home turns you into your ten-year-old self, and she guessed it was true. In Stone Mountain she just felt like Skye Samuels’ dorky daughter. It was easy to forget all the life experience and learning she’d accumulated since.
‘Yep,’ Lou agreed, meeting Piper’s direct gaze. ‘For a firm in Sydney. Forster and Klein. I handle …’ She was about to rattle off her usual bio – company law, mergers, acquisitions – but then she remembered how much Stone Mountain people hated city people talking big. And, for some reason, she really wanted this beautiful, direct, strange creature to like her. And not just because she was Gage’s daughter. ‘I kind of … make deals.’
‘Huh.’ Piper took a large bite of bread and chewed slowly. Lou could almost see the girl’s mental wheels turning. She also saw Gage appraising his daughter, a look of indulgent bemusement on his face as he finished off what ten minutes before had seemed an improbably huge amount of lamb and vegetables. There was something mesmerising about watching him fork food into the mouth that had so completely unravelled her the night before. ‘Maybe she can help us out,’ Piper said to her father. ‘With the gas guys.’
Lou’s ears pricked up. Coal seam gas was interesting, and lucrative, offering a whole new lease of life to lots of struggling Australian farm communities. Many of them were suspicious of it, but from what Lou had read, it was possible for gas and farming to co-exist without too many hassles.
But Gage’s face shut down. ‘I can handle that fine all on my own,’ he said, his forehead creasing into deep lines.
Lou waited, watching Piper. The girl put her knife and fork down as she sized up her father. Gage’s chin was set and he bit into the last piece of lamb like he was tearing the flesh from the animal itself. Piper watched him for a moment, and Lou felt like the girl was trying to decide whether to press the point. Then she breathed out and picked up her fork again, turning to Lou. ‘You don’t talk much,’ she said, serving herself more lamb and vegetables from the centre platter. ‘Least not as much as Skye.’
The square table they were eating at was rough hewn but beautiful, and Lou couldn’t resist running her fingers across the warm wood while she pondered a response. ‘There wasn’t much room,’ she said, trying to smile like she meant it, ‘when I was growing up.’ Then she thought some more, because Piper looked like she expected it. ‘And I didn’t really mind.’ It was true, she hadn’t, not when she was younger. ‘I liked listening to her.’
‘Me too,’ Piper agreed, her face lighting up, and Lou’s heart clenched in her chest. Another fan. ‘A bit like the way I like listening to the guys on the radio,’ Piper went on. ‘Although, like them, she does talk some dreadful shit.’ She paused, her head on the side, considering. ‘Sometimes.’
‘Piper,’ Gage admonished, assembling his features into a parody of parental disapproval that didn’t fool Lou a bit.
‘What?’ Piper blinked at him. It was clear that plain talking was not normally discouraged, and Lou smothered a smile.
Gage laid his cutlery across his empty plate and sighed. ‘That’s Lou’s ma you’re talking about.’
‘Oh.’ Piper blinked. Then she studied Lou some more. ‘Did I offend you?’
‘No,’ Lou said quickly, beguiled by the girl’s open gaze. ‘I think she talks shit too.’ She hurried on lest she sounded mean: ‘Sometimes.’
‘But you still love her,’ Piper stated in a definite kind of way, watching Lou’s face surreptitiously as she feigned interest in a piece of lamb. Lou made a noise she hoped sounded like agreement as she shovelled some buttery vegetables into her mouth.
‘Even though you never visit.’
Gage pushed back from the table and started stacking plates. ‘Time to clear up, Pip,’ he said firmly.
‘Sorry,’ Gage said gruffly as he handed Lou a sopping plate shortly after.
She was holding the tea towel like it was the last line of defence between her and the mad pull of him, washing dishes, barefoot and bejeaned. What would it feel like to stand behind him, wrap her arms around his waist and press her face against his back?
‘She only had me,’ he continued. He looked at her, his green eyes shuttered, his frown lines deepening as he tried to find the right words. ‘And I don’t …’
‘Go in for social niceties?’ Lou tried to help as she carefully dried both sides of the rose-adorned plate.
‘I guess,’ Gage said, handing her another. He paused. ‘I was young, and I guess you know I never really gave a shit about …’ he waved a hand, ‘… what people thought.’ He shook his head. ‘She had no ma. And neither did I. So she’s like two generations’ worth of motherless. Poor thing.’
Lou paused this time, stacking the dishes on the drying shelf Gage had indicated. ‘How old were you?’
‘She’s seventeen,’ Gage said shortly. ‘I met Shirralee a couple of years after you … left.’ He dropped a plate down hard on the others in the sink and swore loudly, pulling a bloody hand out of the sink. He stared at it, dripping into the suds, like he couldn’t remember what to do.
‘Shit.’ Lou hurriedly wrapped the tea towel around his hand. She tied a hard knot and gestured for him to sit at the kitchen table. ‘You got a first aid kit?’
Gage pointed at a cupboard above the fridge. Lou reached up and grabbed the kit, setting it on the table next to where he sat and pulling out bandages and sticking plaster. Then she unfurled the tea towel from his hand and examined the bloody red slash. She wiped it gently, following up with cotton wool and antiseptic before applying a suitable plaster. A bandage seemed like overkill.
Neither of them spoke as she tended to him.
She tried really hard not to enjoy sitting so close to him, wiping and ministering to his hand, feeling the warmth of his body and the deep steady breaths he took. And she tried even harder not to breathe in the smoky, fresh-grass smell of him as she did it all, or to enjoy the feeling of his big, warm hand in hers. His dark green eyes watched her work.
‘She was only here for a season,’ he said finally, as Lou finished up. ‘Shirralee, Piper’s mum.’ He shrugged. ‘She stayed while she was pregnant, and then …’ He shrugged again, his big shoulders lifting eloquently. ‘And then she was gone.’
Lou swallowed hard. The answer to the next question seemed to matter so much. ‘Were you sad?’ She sought out those eloquent green eyes, which she knew from experience could speak to you even when he wasn’t saying much.
‘I was sad for Piper,’ he said, standing up and stretching. ‘I know what it’s like to grow up without a ma.’
Lou nodded, then stood and packed the kit away, not sure what to say. When she turned back, she had it. ‘You’ve done a great job,’ she said. ‘She’s lovely.’
Gage’s face creased into a smile. ‘You gotta grow up pretty quickly,’ he said. ‘Grow up, or get it wrong.’
Lou joined him at the sink again. She stood in front of him and put a hand on his rock-hard arm, giving it a little squeeze. ‘You got it right,’ she said.
His big hand closed over hers.