They drove home from the release site in silence. Taj stole the occasional glance at Kim. Each time she was staring out the window. He hadn’t realised what a wrench it would be for her to let the dingoes go, and his mind was awash with unfamiliar feelings. Kim’s raw torrent of emotion had flooded his defences, exposing the jagged, long-submerged rocks of his own grief.
When they reached the house, Kim sat awhile, blinking back tears and staring into the middle distance. Taj handed her a dusty tissue he’d found in the centre console. She blew her nose, rubbed her blank eyes. He wanted to reassure her, tell her the dingoes would be safe, that she had nothing to fear. But that would be a lie. Risk was the price of freedom; he knew that better than anybody.
He glanced at the clock. ‘Are you okay to drive? Would you like me to pick Abbey and Jake up from school?’
Kim shook her head. She seemed entirely forlorn, like a lost child. Taj burned with words that wouldn’t come, hating that he’d added to her misery. He’d dreamed of doing the opposite, dreamed of lifting the sadness from her eyes. Whether on full show or lurking beneath the surface, it was always there. Taj recognised it all too well. He saw it in the mirror each morning.
How lovely she was, even now, with her blue eyes rimmed in red, and her lips ending in a tremulous downward curl. She blew her nose again. A slender nose, somewhat crooked at the tip. It spoiled the symmetry of her face, giving it an irresistible appeal.
Dusty came pelting over. Kim shoved open the door and got out without a backward glance. Taj watched her go; she was wrapped up in her anger and hurt, and he was powerless to help. Her anguished plea for the dingoes played over and over in his mind. ‘They might be shot, or poisoned. They might starve. What’s wrong with you? Don’t you even care?’
Of course he cared. The raising of each pup had been a labour of love. He’d fed them through the night, nursed them when they were sick, taught them to howl and even to hunt. He’d considered their welfare before his own, been both mother and father to them. Prepared them as well as he could for the threats they would face: snakes, snares, baits, men with guns. There was another threat too, one that he hadn’t shared with Kim. Taj had found fresh dingo scat by the creek. An exciting find, yet he hoped it belonged to a lone animal, Dusty’s father perhaps. If a wild pack had moved in to Journey’s End, well . . . dingoes were territorial, and the youngsters would come off worst in a fight. But now they were grown, he could not deny them their birthright. He hated that Kim thought him callous.
But worst of all was her furious, ‘Don’t touch me.’ He’d misread things badly. For the last few weeks the two of them had been working together nearly every day. Planting, clearing, weeding, planning. Arguing about which seedlings were big enough to plant out, and which ones needed re-potting. Laughing at the mischief that Dusty got up to. Marvelling at the sheer size of the task ahead. Two people born worlds apart, brought together by a magnificent shared vision. Striking sparks off one another.
A long-dormant feeling grew within him, unrecognised at first. A warm physical energy that lit up his body and radiated out. The attraction between them was tangible, and he’d been sure she felt it too. Kim had become his ally, his muse, his creative inspiration. Sometimes he imagined she was already his lover. He couldn’t take his eyes off her, any more than a man in the desert could take his eyes off a distant mirage, although he knew he’d never taste it.
What did Jean say to the children? If wishes were horses, beggars would ride. His confidence had been nothing but wishful thinking.
A honking horn startled Taj out of his thoughts.
‘Get out of the road, mate.’ Ben in his LandCruiser, yelling and waving. Jake glared at Taj through the back window. Why the hell was Ben picking up the kids?
The horn honked again and Taj moved his car a few metres before stopping. Ben shook his head and squeezed past.
Taj had never viewed Ben as a rival. He’d seen how Kim was with him – friendly yet aloof, as she was with everyone. Though Ben often visited, there was no connection, why should there be? Kim and Ben had nothing in common. He had no feeling for the forest, no interest in wildlife or wilderness. He was a businessman, with no poetry in his soul.
Taj watched him in the rear-view mirror, striding towards the house with Jake at his heels. Kim came round the corner, still visibly upset. Shit, he wished he could hear what they were saying. Then . . . Ben had Kim in his arms.
Taj’s fingers tightened on the steering wheel and his knuckles showed white. A shudder ran through him as he pulled away and he drove faster than necessary onto the road.
What a fool he’d been.
Of course Kim and Ben had something in common – it was staring him in the face. Something vast and all-pervasive, which he could never compete with. They were shaped by the same society, the same culture. They shared a set of assumed values that, as an outsider, he could only guess at. For that’s what he was, and would always be. An outsider. This remote place, with its wild mountains and easy-going people, had lulled him into a false sense of belonging. He was accepted here, but only up to a point. There was a line he could not cross.
For the rest of the drive, Taj struggled with a sudden and profound homesickness, a longing for the life he’d left behind in Afghanistan. But even as the memories struck home, one after the other, emptying him out, he knew he’d find no comfort there. That world was gone; utterly, tragically changed. There was no going back.
His throat was tight with disappointment, so tight he found it hard to breathe. He might not have Kim. He might not be the one to help her heal. But he knew one thing for certain. If Ben wanted to be that man, Taj would have his eye on him.