A WEEK later Adam was standing in the shallows as the sun poked golden fingers over the horizon, watching Jess leap to her feet on the board and ride a baby wave. Her tongue poked between her teeth in concentration. She was becoming quite competent at standing and had even extended the amount of time she managed to stay on the board.
She looked up at him, smiled and waved then shrieked as she lost her balance and plunged into the ocean. Adam laughed.
He loved these early mornings with Jess. Most of the women he’d seen in the past didn’t tend to be early risers and he’d lost count of the number of times he’d left a sleeping naked woman in his bed while he’d hit the waves.
Of course this had also given him a great opportunity to not be in the bed when they had woken, sending a potent message about the fleeting nature of their liaison to the few who’d thought they were different.
But with Jess it was almost as if he’d found a kindred spirit.
She paddled towards him and rose out of the ocean. Water streamed from her hair and sluiced down the very sensible one-piece that somehow seemed sexier than a micro, string bikini.
‘Okay, that’s it,’ Jess said, handing the board to him as she collapsed in the shallows next to his feet and flopped backwards. The water gently lapping at the beach cradled her weight. ‘I’m exhausted.’
Adam turned and pushed the board high on to the sand well away from the tide mark and sat in the shallows beside her. ‘You’re getting better,’ he murmured.
Jess snorted. ‘Liar.’
Adam chuckled. ‘You are. You’ve got a good technique going.’
Jess shut her eyes, tuning into the smell of salt and sand and the feel of the water washing in and out of her ears as it ebbed and flowed around her. It wasn’t the vast dryness of the outback but sitting next to the man she loved, it was pretty blissful.
‘I’ve got a good teacher,’ she murmured.
God knew, she was only doing this because of him. No way would she ever have got on a board if it hadn’t been at his urging. If it hadn’t seemed so important to him.
Adam looked down at her. Her blonde hair floated around her head in the current. Moisture beaded on her face, on her pink mouth. The water lapped at her sides, making an island out of her torso. The wet one-piece outlined the contours of her breasts and the hard points of her nipples to perfection.
Her legs, in slightly deeper water, were submerged and it wasn’t such a stretch to imagine that beneath the surface a tail swished lazily in the current.
She sure as hell looked like a mermaid.
His mermaid.
A feeling so foreign he didn’t even know what to call it filled him. Swept like the tide from his toes to his head. Its intensity was confusing and for a moment he didn’t even dare breathe.
Then it came to him.
Contentment.
It was a very odd revelation. He doubted he’d ever felt it with a woman, not even Caroline. He’d been too busy trying to make it all perfect, to constantly shore up the foundations so he could prove something to his father, to feel content.
The only thing in his life that roused similar sentiments was his job. And now that seemed kind of insignificant compared to this amazing surge of rightness.
Looking down at her, he knew he wanted to come back to this after his next mission overseas.
To her.
To her laughter and her smile.
To their conversations—on the beach and in bed.
To this feeling that all was right with the world. That she understood him. Accepted him for who he was. Didn’t want him to be someone else.
Like his old man.
Didn’t want anything from him.
He wanted to be able to look forward to coming back for a change. Coming back to something other than a crumbling house and the surf. To spend every day of the two months he was away anticipating his return.
Anticipating their reunion.
To know that while he was away, somebody, other than Ruby and his mother, was looking forward to him coming home.
Jess opened her eyes to find him looking down at her intently. She smiled at him. ‘What?’
Adam smiled back, his gaze drifting lower to her breasts.
Jess felt his gaze as potently as if he’d yanked her one-piece down and flicked his hot tongue over her nipples. They pebbled even tighter as the wet fabric abraded them painfully.
‘I’m cold,’ she said defensively.
Adam chuckled. ‘I can see that.’
Jess shut her eyes again. ‘If you’re going to look at me like that, you’d better be prepared to follow through,’ she murmured.
Adam’s breath hitched in his chest. He loved how she’d grown sexually confident. How she looked at him with sex in her eyes. How he caught her watching him sometimes and would know, without a doubt, she was mentally undressing him.
Jess shivered as she felt the soft weight of his hand on her belly. She smiled as it inched slowly north. His warm lips pressed a kiss on her shoulder and she sighed.
‘Jess.’
She opened her eyes to find him lying on his stomach beside her, the water lapping his elbows as he supported himself and looked down into her face. His shaggy hair blew lightly in the early morning breeze and his lapis lazuli eyes stared at her with breathtaking intensity.
He looked very, very serious.
Her smile faltered. ‘What?’
Adam’s heart was beating so hard against the sand he was afraid the tremors might set off an underwater earthquake far out to sea. ‘What would you say if I asked you to be waiting for me when I get back from my next mission?’
Jess saw the words come out of his mouth, she even heard each one with a startling clarity despite the noise of the ocean in her ears.
It did, however, take a long moment to compute their meaning.
An eerie silence descended around them as everything seemed to stop. Time and motion. Even the gentle rocking of the ocean. Her silly heart bounced around in her chest like an out-of-control firecracker but her ever-present practical side urged caution.
After all, it wasn’t a declaration of love. It wasn’t a marriage proposal. And he had been most specific when setting up the boundaries of their affair that he could only give her a few weeks.
She bent her knees and lifted herself up on her elbows, displacing his hand. The sand washed away beneath her soles and her elbows sank her down deeper. It brought their heads closer and she looked him square in the eye. ‘I’d ask why.’
‘Because I really like you and I’m going to miss you. And that’s not something I’ve said to any woman other than Caroline. Because I think we’ve got something good going on and it feels…right. To me. It feels easy. Because I want to know that while I’m slaving away in the developing world somewhere, you’re here thinking of me, waiting for me.’
Jess was stunned by his admission. By what he was offering. She smiled to hide the maelstrom of thoughts and feelings all competing for equal billing in her brain. ‘You think I’m easy?’
Adam gave a half-smile at her attempt at a joke. ‘I’m serious, Jess.’
She could see that. ‘I’m…confused,’ she said slowly. ‘I thought there was a clock ticking on this?’
He shrugged. ‘So did I. But…I don’t want this to end yet. I don’t think you do either.’
Well, that was the understatement of the year. She loved him.
But.
‘So…you want me to wait for you while you’re off overseas, sleeping with any nurse or pretty little intern who bats her eyelashes at you for two months, and then just pick up where we left off?’
Adam frowned. ‘No. Absolutely not. Even if there was time, even if I didn’t collapse into bed every night utterly exhausted from twelve-and fourteen-hour days, as I told you the other night, I’m not like that. That’s my father’s speciality.’
Jess bit down on her bottom lip. The possibilities glimmered like stars, twinkling tantalisingly close.
Maybe she could wait?
She wasn’t going anywhere just yet. She had a year in Emergency and a year in ICU before she planned on returning home.
She did have time.
Maybe this was the next step? These last weeks had been the first. Maybe this was the next?
Adam was a man who’d spent a lot of time avoiding commitments such as the one he was proposing now. Running from his father and therefore everything else that staying put offered. It made sense that he wasn’t going to rush headlong into something that smacked of permanency.
Maybe this was one step closer to him falling in love with her?
Maybe she could bend her perfect fairy-tale to suit a skittish prince? And if this was all he could offer her, maybe she could rewrite the fairy-tale altogether?
Maybe this princess couldn’t have it all?
Maybe that’s what happened after the happily-ever-after.
Compromise. Maybe she was all right with that.
She looked into his earnest face, making her decision without hesitation. ‘Good,’ she said. ‘Because I’m only interested if this is an exclusive arrangement.’
Adam nodded. ‘I give you my word.’
Jess sat up, suddenly overwhelmed by the situation. By her decision. She hugged her knees as she looked out to sea. The ocean stretched before her, rising and falling to an invisible rhythm. Her heart beat in unison with it.
Daring to hope.
She felt Adam turn and vault forward to join her in her inspection of the horizon.
After a minute she said, ‘Okay, then.’
Adam only just heard it. He turned his head and grinned at her, nudging his shoulder into hers. ‘Okay, then.’
Then he made a grab for her, wrestling her back as she shrieked and laughed. But when he kissed her there was relief and gratitude and a promise of all the good times to come.
A fortnight later Jess sat in her scrubs in the middle of a press conference where Lai Ling was the undisputed star. The media had gone crazy when they’d seen the spectacular results of her surgery.
She was grinning madly, her new face a testament to Adam’s skills and the commitment of Operation New Faces, Eastern Beaches and several charities. Her facial sutures had been removed for a while now and her slight scars glistened with a special ointment to keep them supple and reduce their pinkness.
Eventually they’d turn white and be barely noticeable.
The whole team was there, sitting in the same positions as last time. Jess sat next to a beaming Lai Ling, holding her hand again under the table. The interpreter sat on the other side.
Adam sat opposite her, looking every inch the debonair surgeon in his scrubs and cap, and winked when the non-stop flashing of cameras caused her to squint. Her heart filled with the joy of them despite the blight of his imminent departure the next day.
But she was trying not to think about that. They had this press conference to get through and then tonight he was taking her to his parents’ house. His mother wanted to see him before he went and had invited him to tea.
Jess had just about melted into a puddle when he had asked her to accompany him. She knew it was a big step for Adam—huge—and it had come with dire warnings about his father’s insufferable arrogance but she had leapt at the chance.
Gregory Carmichael did not scare her.
And then after dinner they had a whole night in each other’s arms. Jess smiled to herself—she doubted either of them would be getting much sleep.
‘Dr Carmichael?’ A journalist at the back made himself heard above the din. ‘I understand you’ve been with Operation New Faces for about six years now. It strikes me as a rather high-stress job and one that takes you away from loved ones for long stretches of time. How much longer do you think you can keep that up for?’
Adam grinned at the camera. ‘As long as there are people who need me, as long as Operation New Faces is around, I’ll be doing it,’ he confirmed with a broad grin at the camera.
Jess felt her smile fade a little as her heart slowed right down in her chest.
As long as there are people who need me? That seemed like a very long time.
‘You must have a very understanding girlfriend,’ the journalist joked.
Adam slid a glance towards Jess. ‘I do.’
Jess rekindled the smile as the cameras clicked away. But her future suddenly lost a bit of its glow.
Was she willing to wait for him for ever?
Put her life on hold for ever?
The sky was a brilliant shade of crimson as Adam drove along the clifftop road to Whale Beach. They’d put the top down on the retro sports car he’d owned since he’d been an intern and the wind ruffled his hair as an amazing slice of coastal scenery whizzed by.
He was too keyed up to enjoy it, however.
The fingers of one hand were wound tightly around the steering-wheel as his tension grew, dreading the enforced company of his father. Worrying about how the chief would be with Jess. And hoping he could keep his temper in check for the sake of Jess and his mother, who couldn’t bear any confrontation between father and son.
He glanced briefly at Jess. Why had he invited her?
Had he learnt nothing from his experience with Caroline? Did he truly want to expose her to his father’s arrogance?
But a part of him couldn’t bear to tackle tonight without her. He’d been surprised to realise he wanted her by his side.
Because this was their last night together.
And. She was important.
She was looking out her side of the car, her hand loosely tucked into his. Strands of blonde hair had worked free of her ponytail and whipped across her face and she seemed lost in thought as her teeth worried her bottom lip. She’d been a little quiet since the press conference and she seemed tense now too. He gave her hand a squeeze as much for his own assurance as hers.
‘I’ll be with you the whole time,’ he said. ‘You have my permission to tell him to push off if he gets too overbearing. In fact, it might be fun if you did.’
She gave him a small smile. ‘I’ll be fine.’ And she returned to the view out her side of the car.
He felt his unease ratchet up another notch. He hoped it was just the spectre of him leaving tomorrow. It had hung over both their heads, casting a further pall on an evening that was already fraught enough.
Unfortunately it was a looming reality. The elephant in the room that they’d avoided the last few days.
But this was his life.
His reality.
And despite two months stretching ahead without her, Adam was looking forward to getting amongst it again. These last weeks had been a nice break from his hectic schedule but he could feel the little thrill in his chest at the thought of getting back to work.
Sure, he was going to miss her but he also knew that missions were intense and exceedingly demanding of his time and focus. There wouldn’t be a whole lot of time to dwell on what he was missing.
And then two months would be up before he knew it and he’d be back and she’d be waiting for him.
The best of both worlds.
And as tense as they may both be at this moment, he knew in a couple of hours, when they were alone, he’d give her a night together that would get them both through the ensuing months.
‘Darling, come in.’ Sylvia Carmichael greeted her son, kissing him on the cheek. ‘I was glued to the TV this morning during your press conference. You did a marvellous job and that young woman…oh, my, she just looks amazing, doesn’t she?’
Adam smiled. ‘Thanks, Mum.’
‘And this must be Jess.’ She smiled at Jess. ‘I’ve heard so much about you from Ruby.’
Jess shook her hand, trying not to let the innocent comment hurt. Of course Ruby would have spoken about her. Why on earth would Adam talk about her? Until last week they had just been an extended fling.
She concentrated instead on the pride in Sylvia’s voice.
Adam shut the ornately carved front door behind them and his mother winced as the wind caught it and slammed it harder than he’d intended.
‘Mum? Have you got a migraine?’
Sylvia smiled. ‘Just a little one. I’m sure it’ll be gone in a jiffy.’
His mother had been plagued with migraines since as far back as Adam could remember. Often quite severe. He noticed the strained look around her eyes. ‘You should have cancelled, Mum.’
‘Nonsense.’
‘Have you taken something for it?’ he asked.
Sylvia waved her hand. ‘Your father says they make me muzzy-headed.’
Adam’s mouth flattened into a thin line. ‘Go and sit down,’ he ordered. ‘I’ll get you your medication.’
‘Don’t be silly, darling, I’m fine.’
Jess could feel the rage vibrating from Adam in waves and noticed his mother’s marked pallor. ‘Mrs Carmichael, why don’t you show me the way to the lounge room?’ Jess suggested.
‘Of course, my dear,’ she said. ‘Where are my manners? And please call me Sylvia.’
Adam stalked into the lounge room a minute later with a glass of water and two tablets. ‘Here,’ he said, kneeling beside his mother.
The great Gregory entered as his wife popped the pills into her mouth. ‘You still got one of those damn nuisance headaches?’ he said gruffly.
Adam stood. ‘Yes, how inconvenient for you.’
‘Adam.’ His mother’s hand slipped into his and the strain in her voice was unbearable.
‘Saw the press conference,’ Gregory said. ‘The girl looks amazing. Good repair job.’
Adam was stunned for a moment to hear such praise come from the big chief’s mouth.
Unfortunately he was about thirty years too late.
‘Darling, this is Jess Donaldson,’ Sylvia said rising to her feet.
Jess shook Gregory’s hand, shocked at how much he looked like Adam. It was positively eerie. Like looking into the future and seeing Adam as a sixty-year-old. A very handsome, very distinguished sixty-year-old.
No wonder Caroline had been a little freaked out!
But there was a haughtiness about Adam’s father that hadn’t been replicated in his down-to-earth son. A way of looking down his nose that was disconcerting. She felt as if she was being judged and with a quick purse of the lips found wanting.
‘Pleased to meet you,’ she murmured politely.
Gregory nodded as if it was perfectly obvious she should be pleased. ‘Drinks, Sylvia,’ he said, turning to his wife as he sat in a large white leather lounge chair that faced a wall of glass overlooking the darkening ocean. ‘I’ll have my usual.’
Adam noticed Jess’s surprise and he glared at his father. ‘I’ll get them,’ he said, turning to his mother. ‘You should go and lie down for a while.’
Even though the prospect of being left alone with his father was grim indeed.
His mother patted his hand. ‘And miss the fun?’ She crossed to her husband and kissed him on the cheek. ‘How was work, darling?’
Jess listened to an angry diatribe about incompetent theatre nurses that lasted ten minutes while Adam fixed the drinks. She was pretty damn steamed herself by the time Adam passed her a glass of white wine.
Didn’t he know what she did?
Adam slipped his arm around her waist and pulled her snugly into his side. ‘I told you he was a bastard,’ he murmured in her ear.
Jess couldn’t help herself, she smiled. In fact, she had to bite her lip to stop herself from laughing.
‘Think about later. About when we get home. That’s what I’m doing.’
Jess felt heat bloom not only in her face but in other parts of her body.
One last night with Adam for two whole months.
The chief addressed Jess. ‘Tess, is it?’
Adam’s jaw clenched. ‘Jess,’ he corrected, his voice clipped.
‘Jess. You’re family are farmers, yes?’
Jess couldn’t believe anyone could put emphasis on a word that denigrated it so completely. She suddenly felt like a country bumpkin.
She straightened a little. ‘We have a hundred thousand acres about seven hours directly west of Sydney.’
Gregory whistled. ‘What do you grow?’
‘Cattle. Mainly.’
There followed a conversation involving the scandalous price of beef, poor farming management practices and a very ill-informed monologue on the drought.
Jess, aware of Adam growing tenser by the moment as he politely argued each point with his father, was grateful when Sylvia announced dinner was ready.
She hoped it wasn’t beef.
The meal, a melt-in-your-mouth, savoury soufflé, was divine and almost made up for Adam’s father’s continuing prattle.
When they were all done Sylvia stood and started to clear the dishes. ‘Off you all go through to the formal lounge and I’ll bring in the coffee.’
Jess stood too, picking up her plate and Adam’s.
‘Don’t be silly, Jess. I’ll do this. Off you go.’
Jess smiled at her. ‘My gran would tan my hide if I didn’t help after you’ve gone to all the trouble to cook such a beautiful meal’ she said, gathering dishes. ‘And with a migraine too.’
Adam heard the note of reproval aimed at his father and smiled.
‘You’re close to your grandmother?’ Sylvia asked.
‘Oh, yes,’ Jess confirmed. ‘I grew up in my grandparents’ house. We all lived together.’
‘How charming,’ Gregory murmured.
The inflection on charming was slight but there nonetheless. Enough so Jess wasn’t left in any doubt Adam’s father thought she and her family were yokel hayseeds.
‘Hey!’ Adam growled. ‘Back off.’
Her mother gasped. ‘Adam!’
‘It’s okay.’ Jess turned to assure him, placing a hand on his wrist, biting back the retort that had come instantly to her tongue. Instead she smiled at his father. ‘Yes. We have a very charmed life.’
And they did. Jess considered herself blessed to have had the experience of growing up in an extended family like people used to do. She felt it gave her an unusual perspective.
And no one was going to make her feel ashamed of it.
‘This way, dear,’ Sylvia said.
Adam started to follow them but his mother shooed him away. ‘Stay and talk to your father,’ she said.
Adam wanted to do that about as much as he wanted to jump off the cliff the house was perched on. But her eyes implored him and he could hear the plea in his mother’s voice. She hated confrontation and so wanted Adam and his father to get along.
A little late for that.
Jess followed Sylvia into the kitchen and set the dishes in the sink.
‘You mustn’t mind him, dear. He’s does tend to speak without thinking. It’s the curse of a brilliant mind.’
Jess gave a forced smiled. Adam was right. His mother was clearly besotted with his father. Totally blind to his faults—his arrogance, his condescension, his ego.
So love truly was blind.
They made small talk as they prepared the coffees, Sylvia talking mostly about her husband’s accomplishments and Jess answering questions about the press conference.
Sylvia loaded the coffee mugs and after-dinner mints onto a tray and Jess carried it back to the lounge room.
‘There you are, darling,’ Sylvia said, passing Gregory his cup. ‘Are you comfy? Would you like your footstool?’
Jess watched her fuss, risking a glance at Adam. His gaze met hers and she could see the frustration stirring the golden flecks in his eyes.
Jess turned away to inspect the wall of framed photos nearby. No surprises that they were all of the great Gregory. Not one of Adam or Ruby, or even husband and wife. She raised an eyebrow at some of the famous faces on display.
‘Aren’t they fantastic?’ Sylvia said, sidling up to Jess. ‘Gregory’s celebrity clients just adore him. They’re always so pleased with their results.’
Jess nodded, offering no comment. She came to stand in front of a black and white print of Adam’s father standing in front of the Sphinx.
‘Oh, this is my favourite,’ Sylvia murmured. ‘It’s been a lifelong ambition of mine to go to Egypt. Gregory’s been several times for work things. When he retires he’s going to take me. He’s going to take me to all these places he’s been,’ she said, indicating the wall.
Jess noticed pictures from London and Italy and America.
‘Adam’s offered to go with me, of course, but I couldn’t be away from Gregory for so long, he depends on me to be there for him. I’m happy to wait.’
Jess felt a heavy sick feeling start in the pit of her stomach. Sylvia sacrificing what she wanted to please her man.
It was eerily familiar.
She walked on to the nearby sideboard where there was one framed picture of Ruby and Adam together with their mother. Jess was struck by the similarities between Ruby and Sylvia—there was no mistaking they were mother and daughter—and she smiled at how happy they all looked.
A smaller frame, out of the way, hidden almost behind some ugly modern art sculpture, caught her eye. She picked it up.
‘Oh, that one.’ Sylvia laughed dismissively. ‘It’s just an old one of me.’
Jess stared at it. A young Sylvia in her nurse’s uniform, complete with starched white veil, looked back at her. Her cheeks glowed and her eyes, so like Ruby’s, sparkled with promise. ‘Did you like being a nurse?’ Jess asked.
Adam’s mother took the frame and looked down at it. ‘Oh, yes.’ She smiled. ‘I loved it. I was going to specialise in renal. Dialysis was in its infancy here in Australia and it was so fascinating.’
Jess watched as Sylvia absently ran a thumb over the glass. Her face looked wistful. ‘My older brother died from kidney disease in his teens.’ She shrugged. ‘I wanted to make a difference.’
Jess couldn’t take her eyes off the image. Adam’s mother holding her past in her hands. Did she regret it?
‘Do you regret it?’ she asked tentatively.
Sylvia held onto the frame for a few more seconds and then placed it gently back on the sideboard, pushing it back behind the sculpture.
‘Of course not,’ she said with a bright smile. ‘Sure, I loved it but I’d fallen head over heels for Gregory and I couldn’t believe he wanted me too. There were so many girls who were after him.’
She glanced over at the object of her affections and sighed. ‘He didn’t want his wife to work. He needed me to keep everything running and on an even keel so he could build his career. And then Adam came along.’
Jess nodded even as her head spun and she leaned against the sideboard for support.
Sylvia had spent her whole life waiting for Gregory.
Because he’d wanted her over all the others.
And when he retired, her life, what she wanted, was going to begin.
Wasn’t that exactly what she’d agreed to do for Adam?
Wait.
The chief was talking and Adam was sitting opposite him when the women rejoined them. He wondered when it would be polite to leave. Jess was quiet as she sipped her coffee and he placed his hand over hers. ‘Are you okay?’
Jess was decidedly not okay. She felt like she was going to throw up any moment. But she forced a small smile to her lips.
‘Just a bit tired,’ she murmured.
It was all the excuse he needed. Adam put down his mug. ‘It’s time to go.’
Five minutes later, after a teary goodbye from his mother and a stiff if you change your mind about private practice from the chief, he’d popped the top up on his car and they were backing out of the driveway.
They drove in silence for five minutes before he said, ‘I’m sorry. I told you it would be awful.’
Jess nodded. It had been nowhere near as awful as the slow dawning she’d experienced talking to Sylvia.
The realisation that she was on the precipice of becoming Adam’s mother.
That she too, would give up everything—bend her fairy-tale—because he’d chosen her.
Over all the others.
A pain built in her chest. It pressed against her rib cage with terrifying intensity. Her heart pounded, her ears filling with the deafening thud. She sucked in a breath as she rubbed at the spot where the pain seemed to deepen with each second.
She felt as if she was suffocating in the enclosed confines of the car.
Was she having a heart attack?
Adam glanced at her as he drove. She was sitting rigidly in her seat, staring at the windscreen as if she was seeing a ghost, while she rubbed her chest. ‘Are you okay?’
Jess dragged her eyes away from the road ahead and looked at him. He was so beautiful. And she loved him. So deeply it was frightening.
She shook her head. ‘Stop the car.’
Adam frowned. ‘What?’
‘I have to…I need to get out. I can’t…’ She rubbed at her chest harder. ‘I can’t breathe.’