STANDING OUTSIDE, HEARING JAKE AND IAN TALKING IN the kitchen, Jacy was restless and not a little resentful. The dust had settled, but the sheep were almost as loud as before, since they were just across the yard and down the slope in front of the house, at the springs.
Ignoring the quilt, which would have to be laundered again, Jacy turned her attention to Ian’s massive horse, its flesh glimmering with sweat, and felt a stab of pity for the creature. She brought an old bucket from the shed, which was practically falling down from neglect, and filled it from an outdoor faucet.
She was just setting the pail on the ground so the stallion could drink when Ian’s voice lashed her from behind like some invisible whip.
“Get away from that horse. Now.”
The words had a cold, brutal edge, and they sliced deeply into Jacy’s pride. She flushed, stunned and angered by this new emotional blow, and stepped aside. “I was only giving him water,” she said when she found her voice again.
Ian came toward her, grasped her hard by the shoulders, and half dragged, half thrust her away. “Damn it,” he hissed, through his teeth, “that’s a brumby, and he’s all but wild. Last week he kicked in a man’s ribs!”
Jacy gave the hem of her T-shirt a sharp tug and tossed her head once to let Ian know she wasn’t daunted by him or his damned wild stallion. Furthermore, she resented the implication that she was a witless greenhorn bungling into danger. She’d been around horses all her life.
“He seems tame enough to me,” she said, giving the animal a cool once-over before glaring directly into Ian’s narrowed eyes.
A tiny muscle in Ian’s jaw clamped visibly. Then, in a sudden, furious motion, he tore off his hat and threw it hard at the ground. Jacy jumped, startled, and the stallion danced and nickered nervously, pulling at the reins that tethered him to the hitching post.
Jacy had recovered by the time Ian bent, with a muttered curse, to pick up his hat. He slapped it once against his thigh, making the dust fly, then wrenched it onto his head again.
“No wonder that thing looks like it’s been stepped on by every elephant, giraffe, and pony in the circus,” she said with a sweetness calculated to irritate. “You ought to learn to manage your temper, Mr. Yarbro. For the sake of your wardrobe, if nothing else.”
With that Jacy turned and walked toward the house. She could feel Ian seething behind her, there in the dooryard, but she didn’t look back. As she passed Jake, who had made his way to the bottom step, she saw just the ghost of a grin touch her father’s mouth.
The sight cooled her temper a little, giving her new hope that Jake would soon be his old, mischievous self again. She was still profoundly shaken, though not because of any near-miss, real or imagined, with the brumby. Jacy’s nerves were bristling because Ian had touched her.
She heard her dad stump into the kitchen with his cane, but she didn’t look at him. “We’ll have something cool for lunch,” she said, wrenching open the refrigerator door to peer inside. The rush of chilly air was heavenly, for she was drenched with perspiration, being unaccustomed to the heat.
There were still some casseroles and salads in the fridge; word of Jake’s return from Adelaide had spread fast, and several of his friends had come by with food the first day he was home.
“Never mind lunch,” Jake said quietly. “It’s plain to see that the last thing you want right now is a meal, Jacy-girl, and I’ll feed myself when I get hungry.”
Jacy only nodded without meeting his eyes and hurried into the sanctuary of her room. There she stripped off her jeans and T-shirt and put on a cotton robe. After that she crossed the hall to the bathroom and took a cool shower, keeping it short because water was so very precious in the bush.
When she came out of her room some twenty minutes later her hair was still wet, though neatly combed, and she was wearing white shorts, a tank top, and sandals.
Jake was seated at the table by then, reading the weekly paper that was published up in Willoughby. He made a tsking sound at something he’d taken note of and shook his head.
“What’s so fascinating?” Jacy asked, opening the fridge again. Now that she’d had time to cool down, literally and figuratively, she was hungry. She chose a creamy fruit salad over a beef and noodle casserole because she didn’t want to use the propane stove while it was still so hot. There was no electricity at Corroboree Springs, and whatever wasn’t powered by gas ran off a generator.
“Another of Ian’s letters got into the paper, that’s all.”
Oh, sure, Jacy thought sourly. It had to be something about him. Weren’t there any other topics of conversation?
“Ian makes a habit of writing to the editor?” she asked airily, to prove she had her emotions under control. Which, of course, she didn’t.
Jake nodded, and again, in a sidelong glance, Jacy caught a glimpse of his old smile. “Ian thinks there’re too many foreigners coming to Australia these days. He doesn’t take to those people who run Merimbula—says they ought to go back to the States and leave us alone.”
Jacy couldn’t help the immediate association she made. Ian had certainly “taken to” one person on Merimbula—Elaine Bennett. He’d liked her well enough, in fact, to father her child.
She slammed the teakettle onto the burner with unnecessary force. “Ian’s a bigot,” she said irritably.
“Is he, now?” Jake asked in a distracted way that meant he was reading the paper again and not paying any attention at all to what she was saying. “I’ll have a bite to eat after all, if you wouldn’t mind dishing it up.”
They didn’t speak again until the plates were on the table and Jacy was sitting down across from him.
“I’d better drive into Yolanda for supplies,” she announced. “We’ve about finished off the stuff your neighbors brought by. Want to go along for the ride?”
Jake shook his head. “Believe I’ll rest instead,” he said. He ate hungrily, “You might get some meat pies while you’re there. Couldn’t get one to save my life while I was in hospital.”
Cheered by her father’s good appetite, Jacy ate her lunch and put the leftovers back into the old refrigerator, which chugged and rattled once in genial acknowledgment. Then, humming softly, she began washing the dishes.
“Jacy?”
The earnestness in her father’s voice made her turn from her task and look at him with concern.
“It means the world to me that you came back,” he said. “Thank you.”
Tears of love sprang to her eyes—she’d done more crying in recent days than she had since Paul’s death—but she knew it was good for her. “Nothing could have kept me away,” she replied.
Jake made an effort at a smile, scraped back his chair, and labored off into the other room. Moments later Jacy heard the familiar, comforting creak of the rocking chair.
Before setting out for Yolanda, Jacy applied sunscreen to her nose and cheeks and ferreted an old straw hat out of one of the closets. For good measure she put on a long-sleeved cotton shirt.
The dirt track leading into town was hardly better than the rough sheep trails crisscrossing her father’s property and Ian’s. The summer heat was enervating, and dust rolled in through the open windows, half choking Jacy.
A lot of good it had done her to take a shower and wash her hair, she thought ruefully when the town finally came into sight.
Yolanda was an odd assortment of shacks, houses, and shopfronts tumbled across the stark terrain in no particular order. There was one grocery shop, one patrol station, a school, a pub called the Dog and Goose, and a post office. The picture theater was closed down, probably for lack of funds, and the single church looked weathered and small against the vast landscape that sprawled beyond its rickety picket fence.
After one turn around the town for old times’ sake Jacy pulled up in front of the grocery, tossed her old straw hat onto the passenger seat, and went in.
The inside of the shop was like something from the fifties. The large white coolers roared with the effort of keeping milk and eggs and frozen dinners cold—Yolanda, unlike the outlying regions, had electricity—and the Coca-Cola sign over the counter would have brought a fortune at an antiques sale back in the States. The floors were bare wood, worn smooth by decades of passing feet, and the cash register was scrolled with brass.
Darlis Shifflet was sweeping the floor, her dishwater blond hair straggling from a loose bun at the back of her neck. She wore an old cobbler’s apron over her faded cotton dress and a large plastic pin with her first name printed on it.
She offered a tentative smile. “Jacy Tiernan?” she asked.
Jacy nodded and smiled back. “Hello, Darlis.” She didn’t ask the usual question because she could guess how Darlis was—still married to Redley Shifflet, no doubt, still getting beaten every Saturday night, and still making excuses for her husband. The sad thing was that Darlis’s predicament wasn’t all that uncommon, either in the U.S. or in Australia; she was trapped by her own lack of self-esteem.
Her husband, Redley, was what Jake called a no-gooder, and just the thought of him made Jacy fighting mad. To men like that, women and children were property, not human beings, and deserving of whatever punishment their lords and masters chose to mete out.
Still, if Darlis wouldn’t help herself, there was nothing anyone else could do. Jacy pushed the problem to the back of her mind and concentrated on her shopping list. She opened one of the coolers and took out milk, a non-dairy concoction for Jake’s coffee, some butter and eggs.
Darlis wheeled over one of the two carts in the store—a rusted one with a squeaky wheel. “How’s Jake doing?”
“Better,” Jacy said, though she wasn’t sure that was the whole truth. She glanced around, but apparently she was the only customer in the store just then.
“You tell him Darlis and Redley say g’day,” Darlis said.
Jacy ached for the woman. “I will,” she said gently, and she pushed the cart into the aisle where cereal and pasta were displayed.
As she was loading her purchases into the truck a small crowd gathered. Revelers came out of the Dog and Goose, cue sticks in hand, to ask after Jake’s well-being, and old Mrs. Dinter even left the post office to wave and offer her good wishes.
When Jacy arrived at Corroboree Springs the sun was finally relenting a little, and an almost indiscernible breeze was ruffling the leaves of the pepper trees Matty had planted fifty years before. She pulled around to the back of the house so she wouldn’t have to carry the groceries so far and was startled to find the yard full of old trucks and cars, along with the odd horse and one rusty motor scooter.
She smiled as she got out of the truck and walked around to the other side to reach for the first box of groceries. More of Jake’s “mates” had come to offer an official welcome home.
Jacy set the box on the kitchen table and went back for another, pleased by the sounds of laughter and talk from the front room and at the same time hoping Jake wouldn’t be too worn out by all the excitement. She was turning toward the house again, her arms full, when she collided with Ian.
He’d showered and changed clothes since she’d seen him before, and his dark hair was still damp. Without a word he took the box from her and carried it inside.
Jacy followed with the last of the grocery order and felt a wicked and very inappropriate thrill when she saw that Ian was still in the kitchen. He was leaning against the refrigerator, his arms folded, regarding Jacy with a slight frown.
His presence seemed to fill the whole room, not just the space he occupied physically, and his eyes were troubled.
“I’ve got some beer,” Jacy said awkwardly, unable to bear the silence any longer. If only they could pretend that nothing had happened between them and start over without all the emotional baggage. “I don’t think it’s very cold, but—”
In the living room someone made a raucous joke, and an explosion of laughter followed.
“Never mind the beer,” Ian said. “How long are you planning to stay at Corroboree Springs?”
She’d already told him the night before that she meant to stay awhile. Evidently he was hoping she’d changed her mind, or that he’d heard her wrong the first time.
So much for the idea of live and let live.
“I bought a one-way ticket,” she replied in a mild but defiant tone. “Why don’t you write a letter to the editor and complain about me? Maybe you can get me run out of the country on a rail.”
Ian glared at her, opened his mouth to say something, then snapped it closed again.
Jacy was ridiculously pleased to see that she’d stymied him, momentarily at least, but she was also deflated. It was painful feeling so unwelcome in the very place that always tugged at her heart when she was away.
On the theory of quitting while she was ahead Jacy turned her back on Ian and rummaged through the boxes and bags until she found the beer. Then she opened one for herself.
Only when she’d poured the brew into a glass and taken several sips did she bother to look and see that he was still in the kitchen, glowering at her as though he hoped the very heat of his gaze would incinerate her.
“Was there something else?” she asked with acid politeness.
Ian was leaning against the fridge. He narrowed his eyes as if he thought Jacy were an infuriating puzzle with no solution forthcoming. “Jake’s been getting along well enough without you these ten years,” he said at last. “You’re not needed here. You’ll only cause more trouble.”
Jacy’s fingers tightened around her glass, and she raised her chin a little. “You don’t get to tell me what to do, Ian,” she said, making an effort to keep her voice down so she wouldn’t spoil her father’s party. “Whether I go or stay is my decision, and Jake’s. So why don’t you just go off and tend to your own business, along with your sheep?”
Having blurted out this speech, Jacy found that her energy was depleted. She sagged back against the edge of the sink, needing its support, wondering why the simplest encounter with Ian Yarbro had to be an athletic experience.
Ian didn’t trouble himself to respond to her taunt—not verbally, at least. Instead of speaking he pushed away from the fridge, crossed the space between them in a few unhurried strides, and leaned in close, trapping Jacy against the sink. His hands were braced on either side of her, and the muscles in his arms seemed hard as concrete. His breath touched her face, smelling of mint, and the soap-and-fresh-air scent of his skin was better than any cologne could have been.
For the longest time they just stood there staring at each other. Finally, though, Ian broke the silence.
“It seems we always get off on the wrong foot, you and I,” he said in a voice just above a whisper. She felt the words, soft against her mouth, and they made her lips tingle. The sensation moved quickly through the rest of her system, pulsing in all the wrong places, as if her heartbeat had multiplied. “Why is that?”
You know damn well why, Jacy thought, but she couldn’t quite manage to speak out loud. She’d used up her nerve before. Now it seemed that all she could do was tremble.
Ian bent his head and brushed Jacy’s mouth with his own. Then his strong hands closed on her waist, and he kissed her in earnest, tracing the seam between her lips with his tongue, coaxing them to part for him.
This is insane! Jacy thought wildly. The man broke your heart! Somehow, though, she didn’t try to push him away. Indeed, she returned Ian’s kiss in the old way, and in that moment she lost touch with reality. They might have been kids again, making love in the sweet soft grass that grew around Corroboree Springs.
He raised his hands slowly to her breasts, brushed her nipples with the callused pads of his thumbs. Even through the fabric of her blouse and the thin lace of her bra she felt the peaks harden and reach for him.
And all the while the kiss went on, fiery, eternal, forbidden.
Jacy’s mind was bedazzled; her most primitive instincts had taken over; her body wanted Ian’s conquering and was preparing itself for it.
Ian took a breath, turned his head, and took Jacy’s mouth again with a fevered desperation to match her own. He released her throbbing breasts to cup her bottom in both hands and press her hard against him.
She moaned, so ferocious was her need. She’d thought she’d mastered it during the years away, but now she knew the dangerous desire had been there all along, just beneath the surface of consciousness, waiting.
It was the worst, and the best, moment for Jake to come in.
He cleared his throat, and they bolted apart, both embarrassed and disoriented. Jacy’s heart pounded against her breastbone like a bird beating its wings in a frantic effort to fly away, and she knew her face was crimson.
“Sorry,” Jake lied good-naturedly, going to the bag that contained the beer and extracting a bottle.
Only then did Jacy realize that his party had broken up. Behind the house car doors were slamming and engines were starting. Thank heaven the celebrants had left via the front door, she thought.
She felt ruffled and hot, like a teenager caught rolling about with a boyfriend in the backseat of an old Chevy. She moved away from Ian without looking at him, but she could still feel him pressed against her. In fact, she feared she would bear the imprint of him on her skin for the rest of her life.
Ian gave a ragged sigh—no doubt he was relieved that fate had rescued him from the clutches of the dreaded foreigner—then murmured something to Jake and left.
Jacy burst into tears and fled into her bedroom as if she were eighteen again and the cracks and fissures Ian had put in her heart were brand-new.
* * *
Inside his late-model truck Ian knotted one hand into a fist and slammed it against the steering wheel. What the hell had he been thinking of, closing in on Jacy like that, kissing her, practically making love to her in her father’s kitchen? Losing her had nearly killed him once before. Hadn’t he learned from that?
The plain fact was that Jacy Tiernan wasn’t cut out to live in Australia. She was pampered and rich, like her mother before her, and when things got hard, as they always did in the bush, she would get on an airplane and wing it back to America and the soft city life that awaited her there.
It had been all for the best, ten years before, when Jacy had returned his ring and gone home to the States, even though the pain had fractured something inside him. It was her coming back that was bad luck, that was a fact, and if he was smart, he’d stay the hell away from her.
His own place came into view, a large block homestead with a wraparound veranda and shutters on all the windows, and the familiar sight quieted his spirit a little and gave him comfort. Beyond were the various sheds and the farmyards, the paddocks, the horses he bred and trained to work on stations all over Australia.
He parked the truck in back and grinned to see his son, nine-year-old Chris, leading his piebald pony out of the main shed. The boy looked just like his mother, with his glossy chestnut hair and round hazel eyes, but Ian loved him with all of his heart.
“Did you see Jake?” Chris asked, swinging deftly up into the saddle. He’d been riding since before he could walk; Ian had made certain of that.
Ian nodded and reached out to stroke the horse’s muscled neck with one hand. “Jake’s on the mend, all right, though he looks a bit puny. Don’t go far, now—Mrs. Wigget’ll have dinner ready soon, and you’ve got your lessons to do.”
Chris beamed. “I don’t have any lessons,” he said. “Mr. Ryerson’s gone off on another of his walkabouts.”
Ryerson was the teacher at Yolanda’s one-room school-house, and he was about as dependable as a street rat. He disappeared regularly, leaving his handful of students to fend for themselves, and yet the town had felt fortunate to have him. Not many teachers wanted to work in such an isolated place, and they’d taken special care to hire a man for the job. The idealistic young women who had preceded Ryerson had all either gotten themselves married to some bushman in the middle of the term and resigned or been overwhelmed by the isolation and the spareness of the accommodations and gone scurrying back home to Adelaide or Melbourne or Sydney, where life was tame and safe.
“At this rate,” Ian told his son, “you’ll end up too ignorant to look after yourself. I’ll have to support you until you’re a hundred and three.”
Chris laughed, and the sound reminded Ian of the chimes that hung on the front veranda and sang softly whenever a breeze came up. God in heaven, he loved that boy, loved him so much that it scared him. “You won’t have to support me,” he assured his father, grinning. “I’m going to be your partner when I grow up. And when you’re old I’ll take care of you.”
The words made Ian’s throat tighten and his eyes sting. With the drought, and Merimbula trying to squeeze him out, and the economy the way it was, he sometimes wondered if he’d have a property to turn over to his son when the time came. His grandfather had settled this land, and Ian would have sworn there were grains of it in his blood. He didn’t want to be the one who lost it.
“Thanks, mate,” he teased. “It’ll be nice to give all the work over to you one day and just sit there on the veranda and rock and watch the ‘roos go hopping by.”
He slapped Chris’s blue-jeaned leg. “Go on, get out of here,” he said. “But mind what I said, and have yourself washed up and at the table in half an hour.”
Chris gave him a cocky salute, reined the game little pony away, and headed off toward his favorite haunt, an old mining camp a few kilometers from the house. He knew to stay away from the mine shaft itself, and Blue, Ian’s best sheepdog, trotted along behind. The mutt was tame as a canary most of the time, but at the first sign that Chris was in danger he’d turn vicious.
Ian watched them go and then went into the house to change out of his good clothes.
His room was large, taking up almost a third of the homestead. The roof slanted over his bed, and there were shelves everywhere, stuffed with books. He’d read most of them more than once, being largely self-educated, and many were dog-eared and falling apart.
A few pictures hung on the wall, one of his mother as a young bride, and one of Chris, taken when a roving photographer had come through Yolanda the spring before.
Ian had always liked his room, especially when it rained. He’d never thought of moving into the master bedroom after his father died. Just then, though, as the light was beginning to change, it seemed a lonely place, too big and too plain and too empty.
He swore softly as he changed into battered jeans and a work shirt. He was getting sentimental, probably because he’d kissed Jacy in her father’s kitchen and because he still ached, inside and out, with the wanting of her.
He was determined to think with his head this time, instead of his pecker, but he knew only too well what would happen to that noble resolution if he found himself kissing Jacy again, touching her breasts, pressing her close against him….
Ian cursed once more and slammed the door of his room when he went out.
Jacy was like a person in a daze. She kept reliving Ian’s kiss, the feel of his hands on her, the weight and heat of his body crushed against hers. While Jake took another of his naps she put away the groceries, tidied up the living room, and washed the cups and glasses the guests had used. She would think about dinner later.
Slipping out of the house, she headed for the place she’d longed for so many times back in the States, when she’d been troubled, confused, grief-stricken.
Jacy went to Corroboree Springs, the large, fresh pool that had given the property its name. Long ago, perhaps as far back as the Dream Time, the aborigines had used the site for ceremonial gatherings and celebrations. The name Corroboree had stuck.
Eucalyptus trees grew on three sides of the springs, sheltering the banks from the wind and, at that time of day at least, from the sun. The sheep had trampled the grass around the pool, but there was a high, flat rock at the water’s edge, and Jacy sat upon it, stretching out her legs, closing her eyes, and tilting back her head.
The place was curative, it seemed to her. She had often gone there when visiting Jake as a young girl—to dream, to think, to read poetry and romance novels. After she’d found out about Ian and Elaine she’d come there to lay sprawled on the sun-warmed rock, to cry and wish she were dead.
She felt like crying now, as a matter of fact, and laughing at the same time. It was official, she decided. She was losing her mind.
When she returned to the house twilight had gathered and the night music was beginning. A lamp burned in the window—because electrical power was supplied by a generator, they were careful to conserve—as if Jake had feared she would lose her way.
She went inside and found him in the kitchen, making scrambled eggs and heating “bully beef,” a canned meat concoction, for the meal he generally referred to as “tea.” He actually smiled full out when she went in to set the table.
“A man who cooks,” she said. “I could learn to like this.”
“You didn’t think I was going to let you do all the work, did you?” he teased, and Jacy was moved because he sounded more like the Jake she’d always known and loved.
“I was beginning to wonder,” she retorted with a grin.
He laughed, the sound more precious than stardust to Jacy, and gestured with the spatula in his hand. “Sit down, sheila, and mind your manners.” Jake went back to his stirring, leaning on the cane at the same time, and when he looked at Jacy again his expression had turned serious.
“Tell me about your mother,” he said. “Is she well?”
Whenever Jacy returned to Corroboree Springs Jake invariably presented that same question. It was as awkward for him to ask, she knew, as it was for her to answer.
“She’s well,” Jacy said, seated obediently at the table, tracing a flower pattern on the worn-out oilcloth cover with the tip of one finger. “Busy with her clubs and classes and charity projects.”
“That doctor bloke she married—he treats her the way he should?”
Jacy nodded. Although she knew Jake and Regina’s decision to divorce had been a mutual one, she had guessed that their relationship was passionate while it lasted. “Michael is very kind,” she said. But he isn’t my father. He isn’t you, Jake Tiernan, and I could never love him as much, or in the same way.
Jake brought the eggs and bully beef to the table in their enamel pans and sank gratefully into his chair. He looked strained and pale; the visit from his friends and the effort of cooking the meal had drained him, but Jacy would not have deprived him of either experience.
“What about that young man—Paul?” he asked out of the blue. “The one who died a few years ago. Did you love him?”
Jacy’s fork hung suspended in midair. She had stopped making references to Paul in her letters to Jake long ago, because even writing about him had been too painful. “I loved him,” she confirmed hoarsely. “But not in the way you’re thinking. We were friends, that’s all. Mates.”
“Sometimes that’s a lot,” Jake answered, searching her face with his pale blue eyes. How she missed the sparkle and mischief that used to dance in those eyes. “You look all right on the outside, sheila,” he went on gently, “but inside you’re all bruised and broken. Do you think I don’t see that? Or is it that I’m too fragile, in your opinion, to listen to your troubles?” He paused. “I’m still your old dad, Jacy-girl, and I love you.”
Jacy set down her fork and swallowed the sob that had risen to her throat. “There’s so much—”
“What?” Jake urged. “I know all about the trouble with Ian, of course, though from the way the pair of you were trying to swallow each other this afternoon, I daresay there’s still hope in that direction. But there’s more, isn’t there? More even than your friend dying the way he did.”
Jacy looked away, then made herself meet her father’s eyes. “I’ve failed at so many things,” she confessed. “I’ve never seen anything through to the finish—I always run away when it gets too hard. I don’t want to be that kind of person, but I am.”
“People change,” Jake commented between bites of scrambled egg. “And you’re young. If you don’t like the way you are, then work on yourself.”
“It isn’t quite that simple,” Jacy protested.
“Isn’t it?” Jake countered. He took a drink from his coffee mug, then went on. “They’ll be wanting a teacher in Yolanda now that the last one’s gone wandering. Maybe you could help them out.”
Jacy was instantly intrigued; she’d loved teaching once. After a moment, though, she shook her head. “You need looking after. That’s why I’m here, after all.”
Jake pretended to glower at her, and his accent thickened. “Who says I want you under me feet all the time? A man needs a moment to himself now and then, you know.”
Jacy smiled. “You’re not fooling me, old man. All men like to be waited on, hand and foot, whether they’re sick or well, and you’re no exception. You’re trying to be noble and save me from myself.” Her smile faded. “And how I wish you could.”
They finished their meal in companionable silence, and then Jacy washed the dishes while her dad listened to the news on the portable radio. When he’d found out what was going on in the world he turned it off and raised himself from his chair with a difficulty that made Jacy ache. This was a man who had climbed into the tops of trees to save kittens, who had won prizes for shearing the most sheep in a day and broken wild horses to ride.
He cleared his throat. “You ought to be more patient with Ian, you know,” he said. “He isn’t a bad sort, and he was young when that other went on.”
Jacy didn’t answer because she couldn’t say what she knew her dad wanted to hear.
Jake lingered a few moments, then said good night and shuffled off to get ready for bed.
Jacy was exhausted—she hadn’t slept well since before she’d left New York. The endless flight certainly hadn’t been restful, and after she’d reached Adelaide and the hospital she hadn’t wanted to leave Jake’s side. She’d gone to her hotel only to shower and change clothes, and most nights she’d slept in a chair in her father’s room, fearing he would slip away, as Paul had.
For all of that, as Jacy went into her room, undressed, and stretched out on her bed with a book, she dreaded turning out the light and closing her eyes. When she did she would remember Ian’s kiss and relive it, and all the painful desires, all the things that could never be, would rise up around her like ghosts.