‘So tell me, what made you change your mind about doing the story?’ he asked later. They’d been talking nonstop for the best part of two hours.
‘I’m not doing a story,’ she said stubbornly. ‘I’m looking into the evidence.’
‘Yeah, yeah, we both know you’re doing a story. Might not be today, but you will.’
Pip rolled her eyes but answered his question. ‘I can’t stand injustice. I went to visit Bert and I caught a glimpse of what his life had been like all this time. It was terrible. He was a war hero—he’d been a POW and he came home broken. He gave up six years of his life for this country and they turned on him. After everything, they ridiculed and tormented him for seventy years.’ She shook her head.
‘You remind me of my mother,’ he said after a while.
This change in direction made her look up. ‘How so?’
‘She was always fighting for the underdog too.’
‘Was? Does that mean she’s passed?’
‘Yeah. A couple of years ago now.’
‘What was she like?’ Something about the way his face softened when he’d mentioned his mum made her curious.
‘She was a pocket-sized rocket—much like you,’ he said with a smile that seemed slightly bemused. ‘But with the fire of the Irish,’ he added, and his smile turned indulgent.
‘Your mother was Irish?’ she asked, surprised.
His grin told her he enjoyed revealing that little titbit. ‘Yep. She stood five foot tall if she were an inch and had long, flaming red hair.’
‘So you’re half Irish,’ she mused.
‘To be sure, to be sure,’ he said in a fair imitation of an Irish accent.
‘So what’s the other half?’ she said, reaching for her glass and taking a sip.
‘My dad was from Papunya up north, about two hundred and forty kilometres north-west of Alice Springs.’
‘How did they meet?’ She sensed the beginning of a good story.
‘Mum was a backpacker who worked her way up to Papunya. She was a teaching student back in Ireland and she volunteered at the mission near where my dad lived. The story goes she broke down one afternoon on the way back from picking up supplies, and this tall, dark, handsome ringer from a cattle station up the road came past and offered her a ride.’
‘So, you didn’t take after your dad then,’ she said, raising an eyebrow.
‘Fine, just for that, I won’t finish the story,’ he said, crossing his hands over his stomach where he sat on the floor of the lounge room, his long legs stretched out in front of him, but a ghost of a smile hovered at the corners of his mouth.
‘Okay, I’m sorry, that was uncalled for. I’ll refrain from any further comment.’
He sent her a righteous look but continued. ‘Mum, being a sensible woman, declined to get in the car with a stranger and kept walking. My dad, having been brought up never to leave a lady stranded, continued to drive by her side the entire ten kilometres back to the mission.’
‘Wow. Let me guess, after that, she realised what a great guy he was and they fell instantly in love and lived happily ever after?’
‘Ah, no. Not exactly. She was so annoyed with him for not taking her word that she could look after herself that she told him she never wanted to see him again.’
‘What!’ Pip was dismayed by the news.
‘However, my dad being my dad,’ he added with a grin, ‘he didn’t give up, and continued to woo her for the next two weeks until she finally gave in and went on a date with him.’
‘And then they lived happily ever after,’ Pip said.
‘’Fraid not,’ Chris said, shaking his head.
This was turning into the worst story ever. ‘Why not?’
‘Well, my mother had already accepted another job over in Western Australia before the car incident, so she decided there wasn’t any future in a second date. She only gave in to shut him up—her words, by the way,’ he added. ‘So, she left to go to her new job, and three weeks later my dad turned up with a bunch of flowers and asked her on another date.’
‘No. Way.’
‘Way,’ Chris nodded.
‘So then they lived happily ever after?’ she asked hesitantly.
‘What is it with you and happily ever after?’
‘Well, it’s the story of how your parents met—I’m just assuming it’s going to be a happy one.’
‘I suppose it was. I wouldn’t call it a fairytale or anything. There were some pretty hard times. His family wouldn’t even meet Mum when he told them he was getting married, and Mum’s family disowned her because she married a blackfella, so she couldn’t go back to Ireland.’
Pip gave a small grimace of sympathy.
‘But I guess there were still some happy times.’
‘Is your dad still alive?’ she asked when he stopped talking.
‘Yeah.’
His short answer, so different to when he spoke about his mother, was telling.
‘You don’t get along with your dad?’
‘Nah, not really.’
‘That’s a shame. He must miss your mum.’
‘I guess so. He started drinking after a while—after his accident. He came off a horse chasing a cow when I was about eight and couldn’t find work again after that. He took up drinking to cope with the frustration. He felt like a failure to Mum, I suppose. She worked two jobs for years to support us and each day he seemed to withdraw inside himself a little further until he’d all but disappeared.’
Pip could picture the memories all too easily—a sad, redheaded young woman with a small child, an angry husband and dreams of a happy life together unravelling at the seams. ‘Do you have any siblings?’ Pip asked, feeling sad for the man before her.
‘No. Just me.’
‘What made you join the police force?’
‘Mum and I moved to Melbourne when I was in high school. She wanted me to have a better chance at finding a good job. The bush didn’t have many options where I came from. We had a careers day at school one time, and I walked past the police recruitment table and this old copper stopped me and asked me what I wanted to do with my life. I didn’t have a clue. Mum was rabbiting on about university, but I knew I didn’t want that. He sat me down and pointed out all these different areas police worked in, and I remember seeing “Detective” and all of a sudden, that’s what I wanted to do. I don’t know why—I don’t know what suddenly changed that day, but I focused on that goal and I joined the police force as soon as I was able and kept working until I made detective.’
‘And how did you end up out here?’
‘I took a transfer to get out of the city. I was working in Melbourne, but I wanted to get back out in the country. What about you?’ he asked, then took a long sip of his drink. ‘How did you come to be a journalist?’
Pip settled her back against the base of the lounge, having joined him on the floor. It had been a long time since she’d felt comfortable enough to unwind with someone other than Lexi. It was nice. ‘I’ve always been curious,’ she said with a smile as he made a sarcastic noise in the back of his throat. ‘My mum says I was one of those kids who always needed to know everything. I used to wear her out asking a million questions once I started talking. I guess it started there,’ she said, reaching for more pizza. ‘But I really loved writing. English was my favourite subject at school, pretty much the only thing I could do well. I sucked at maths and I was like an uncoordinated clown when it came to PE, but English—I was in my element.’
‘I hated English,’ he said, giving a small shudder at the memory.
‘Maybe you just needed a great teacher,’ she suggested. She would always be grateful to her year ten English teacher, Miss Grace. She had been the one to nurture Pip’s writing talent, and encouraged her to think about her future. Everyone needed at least one Miss Grace in their high-school life. Or maybe a Miss Adams, she thought, thinking about Rebecca and making a note to touch base again.
‘I don’t think it would have made any difference—I wasn’t much of an academic back then.’
‘I can just imagine. You would have been one of those kids up the back of the class,’ she said with a stern frown.
‘And you would have been one of the goody-two-shoes up the front,’ he grinned back, completely unrepentant. ‘My first crush was on a girl who sat up the front of the class,’ he mused after a while.
‘Ah,’ Pip nodded sagely. ‘The old bad boy–good girl thing.’
‘Yeah. But it didn’t work out.’
‘She preferred good boys?’
‘She preferred girls,’ he said.
‘Oh. Well, you really didn’t have much of a chance there, did you.’
‘Not really. No.’
‘I hope your people-reading skills have improved nowadays,’ she said, collapsing back against the chair and groaning as she put a hand on her belly. She’d eaten too much.
‘People-reading skills aren’t a problem,’ he said confidently. ‘It’s more the average woman-reading skills that even being a detective doesn’t seem to be any help with,’ he admitted.
Pip rolled her head sideways to face him and grinned. She hadn’t realised his head was so close to hers and found herself looking into his dark eyes, which held hers gently.
She leaned closer, and he met her halfway, his lips firm but warm and gentle as she kissed him and felt a surge of need race through her.
‘Ow,’ she pulled back as something dug into her hip and she pulled out the hard drive she’d forgotten about and dropped it on the coffee table. ‘Sorry,’ she muttered awkwardly.
‘That’s nothing, you should have seen what my mother used to find in my pockets when I was a kid,’ he said, his eyes lowered in a sexy, brooding kind of way that did strange things to her breathing as he tugged her back to kiss her again.
A small moan escaped from her and he shifted slightly, bringing his hands up to cup her face and pull her closer.
God, she hadn’t felt this desperate since … her mind went blank. She couldn’t think of a single other time with a man she could compare this to. Brushing that thought aside, she concentrated instead on allowing the sensations his hands and mouth were creating to take her away and forget everything for just this one night.