Читать книгу Australian Affairs: Wed: Second Chance with Her Soldier / The Firefighter to Heal Her Heart / Wedding at Sunday Creek - Barbara Hannay - Страница 15

CHAPTER SIX

ELLIE STOOD AT one end of the long front veranda, elbows resting on the railings, staring out at the waterlogged paddocks. The rain had actually stopped for now, but the sky was still heavy with thick, grey clouds, so no doubt the downpour would start again soon.

She wasn’t crying. She’d dried her tears almost as soon as she left the lounge room and she was determined that no more would fall. She was angry, not sad. Angry with herself, with her stupid behaviour.

She’d been determined to handle Joe’s return calmly and maturely, and when he’d been forced to stay here she’d promised herself she would face that with dignity as well. Instead she’d been as tense and sharp-tongued as a cornered taipan.

She was so disappointed with herself, so annoyed. Why couldn’t her behaviour ever live up to her good intentions?

You make it so damn obvious that you can’t stand the sight of me.

Did Joe really think that? How could he?

It seemed impossible to Ellie. The sad truth was—the sight of Joe stirred her in ways she didn’t want to be stirred. She found herself thinking too often about the way they used to make love.

Really, despite their troubles, there’d been so many happy times, some of them incredibly spontaneous and exciting.

Even now, irrationally, she found herself remembering one of the happiest nights of her life—a night that had originally started out very badly.

It had happened one Easter. She and Joe were driving down the highway on their way to visit her mum, but they’d been so busy before they left that they hadn’t booked ahead, and all the motels down the highway were full.

‘Perhaps we should just keep driving,’ Joe had said grimly when they reached yet another town with no spare rooms.

‘Driving all night?’ she’d asked. ‘Isn’t that dangerous, Joe? We’re both pretty tired.’

He’d reluctantly agreed. ‘We’ll have to find a picnic ground then and sleep in the car.’

It wasn’t a cheering prospect, but Ellie knew they didn’t have much choice. While Joe went off to find hamburgers for their dinner, she tried to set the car up as best she could, hoping they’d be comfortable.

She’d shifted their luggage and adjusted their seats to lie back and she’d just finished making pillows out of bundles of their clothing when Joe returned. He was empty-handed and Ellie, who’d been ravenous, felt her spirits sink even lower.

‘Don’t tell me this town’s also sold out of hamburgers?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said simply.

Her stomach rumbled hungrily. ‘Are all the shops closed?’

‘Don’t know that either. It doesn’t matter.’ Joe’s sudden cheeky smile was unforgettably gorgeous. He held up a fancy gold ring, dangling keys. ‘I’ve booked us into the honeymoon suite in the best hotel in town.’

Ellie gasped. ‘You’re joking.’

Still smiling broadly, Joe shook his head. ‘Ridgy-didge.’

‘Can...can we afford a honeymoon suite?’

He shrugged, then slipped his arm around her shoulders, pressed a warm kiss to her ear. ‘We deserve a bit of comfort. We never had a proper honeymoon.’

It was the best of nights. Amazing, and so worth the extravagance.

All thoughts of tiredness vanished when they walked into their suite and saw the champagne in an ice bucket, a huge vase of long-stemmed white roses and chocolate hearts wrapped in gold foil on their pillows.

Like excited kids, they bounced on the enormous king-sized bed and then jumped into the spa bath until their room service dinner arrived. And they felt like film stars as they ate gourmet cuisine dressed in luxurious white fluffy bathrobes.

And, just for one night, they’d put their worries aside and they’d made love like honeymooners.

I shouldn’t be thinking about that now...

Ellie was devastated to realise that she was still as physically attracted to her ex as she’d been on that night. The realisation made her panic.

What a mess.

With a despairing sigh, she sagged against a veranda post. How had she and Joe sunk to this? She’d thought about their problems so many times, but she’d never pinpointed a particular event that had killed their marriage. It had been much the same as today. Ongoing bickering and building resentments had worn them down and eroded their love.

Death by a thousand cuts.

But why? How? How could she be so tense and angry with a man she still fancied? It wasn’t as if she actively disliked Joe.

She supposed they should have seen a marriage guidance counsellor years ago.

Joe had been too proud, of course, and Ellie had been too scared—scared that she’d be psychoanalysed and found lacking in some vital way. But if she’d been braver, would it have helped?

She probably would have had to tell the counsellor about her father’s death and how unhappy she’d been after that. Worse, she would have had to talk about her stepfather and how she’d run away from him.

Ellie didn’t actually believe there was a connection between Harold Fowler and her marriage breakdown, but heaven knew what a counsellor might have made of it. Even now, she still shuddered when she thought about Harold.

And here was the thing: it was the sight of Harold that Ellie couldn’t stand. Not Joe.

Never Joe.

Her mum had married Harold Fowler eighteen months after her father died, after they’d sold the farm and moved into town. Harold owned the town’s main hardware store—he was loud and showy and popular, a big fish in a small country pond. And a couple of years later he was elected mayor. Ellie’s mum was thrilled. She loved being the mayor’s wife and feeling like a celebrity.

Harold, however, had given Ellie the creeps. Right from the start, just the way he looked at her had made her squirm and feel uncomfortable, and that was before he touched her.

She’d been fifteen when he first patted her on the bum. Over the following months, it had happened a few more times, which was bad enough, but then he came into the bathroom one night when she was in the shower.

He was full of apologies, of course, and he backed out quickly, claiming that he’d knocked and no one had answered. But Ellie had seen the horrible glint in his eyes and she was quite sure he hadn’t knocked. Her mother hadn’t been home that night, which had made the event extra-scary.

And Harold certainly hadn’t knocked the second time he barged in. Again, it had happened on a night when Ellie’s mum was away at her bridge club. Ellie was seventeen, and she’d just stepped out of the bath and was reaching for her towel when, without warning, Harold had simply opened her bathroom door.

‘Oh, my darling girl,’ he said with the most ghastly slimy smile.

Whipping the towel about her, Ellie managed to get rid of him with a few scathing, shrilly screamed words, but she’d been sickened, horrified.

Desperate.

And the worst of it was she couldn’t get her mother to understand.

‘Harold’s lived alone for years,’ her mum had said, excusing him. ‘He’s not used to sharing a house with others. And he hasn’t done or said anything improper, Ellie. You’re just at that age where you’re sensitive about your body. It’s easy to misread these things.’

Her mother had believed what she wanted to, what she needed to.

Ellie, however, had left home for good as soon as she finished school, despite her mother’s protests and tears, giving up all thought of university. University students had long, long holidays and she would have been expected to spend too much of that time at home.

She had realised it was futile to press her mother about Harold’s creepiness—mainly because she knew how desperate her mother was to believe he was perfect. Harold was such a hotshot in their regional town. He was the mayor, for heaven’s sake, and Ellie was afraid that, if she pushed her case, she might cause the whole thing to blow up somehow and become a horrible public scandal.

So she’d headed north to Queensland, where she’d scored a job as a jillaroo on a cattle property. Over the next few years, she’d worked on several properties—a mustering season here, a calving season there. Gradually she’d acquired more and more skills.

On one property she’d joined a droving team and she’d helped to move a big mob of cattle hundreds of kilometres. She was given her own horses to ride every day. And, finally, she was living the country life she’d dreamed of, the life she’d anticipated when she was almost thirteen. Before her father died.

Whenever she phoned home or returned home for the shortest possible visits, she was barely civil to Harold. He got the message. Fortunately, he’d never stepped out of line again, but Ellie would never trust him again either.

Trust...

Thinking about all of this now, Ellie was struck by a thought so suffocating she could scarcely breathe.

Oh, my God. Is that my problem? Trust issues?

That was it, wasn’t it?

She clung to the railing, struggling for air. Her problems with Joe had nothing to do with whether or not she was attracted to him. The day they met remained the stand-alone most significant moment of her life.

She’d taken one look at Joe Madden, with his sexy blue eyes, his ruggedly cute looks, his wide-shouldered lean perfection and nicest possible smile, and she’d fallen like a stone.

But I couldn’t trust Joe.

When it came to coping with the ups and downs of a long-term marriage, she hadn’t been strong enough to deal with her disappointments. She’d lost faith in herself, lost faith in the power of love.

Ellie thought again about her father climbing a windmill and dying before he could keep his promise to her. She thought about her creepy stepfather, who’d broken her trust in a completely different way. By the time she’d married Joe...

I never really expected to be happy. Not for ever. I couldn’t trust our marriage to work. It was almost as if I expected something to go wrong.

It was such a shock to realise this now.

Too late.

Way too late.

She’d never even told Joe about her stepfather. She’d left it as a creepy, shuddery, embarrassing part of her past that she’d worked hard to bury.

But that hadn’t affected how she’d truly felt about him.

She’d loved Joe.

Despite the mixed-up and messy emotional tornado that had accompanied her fertility issues and ultimately destroyed their marriage, she’d truly loved him—even when he’d proposed their divorce and he’d told her he was leaving for the Army.

And now?

Now, she was terribly afraid that she’d never really stopped loving him. But how crazy was that when their divorce was a fait accompli?

No wonder she was tense.

Ellie thumped the railing with a frustrated fist. At the same moment, from down the veranda she heard the squeaky hinge of the French windows that led from the lounge room. Then footsteps. She stiffened, turned to see Joe. He was alone.

She drew a deep breath and braced herself. Don’t screw this up again. Behave.

‘Are you OK?’ Joe asked quietly.

‘Yes, thanks.’

He came closer and stood beside her at the railing, looking out at the soggy paddocks. ‘I’m sorry, Ellie. I’m sorry for getting stuck into you. My timing’s been lousy, coming back here at Christmas.’

She shook her head. ‘I’m making too big a deal about the whole Christmas thing.’

‘But that’s fair enough. It’s the first Christmas Jacko’s been old enough to understand.’

She sighed, felt emotionally drained. Exhausted. ‘Where’s Jacko now?’

‘In the lounge room. Still hiding the bear, I hope. Persistent little guy, isn’t he?’ Joe slid her a tentative sideways smile.

She sent a shy smile back.

Oh, if only they could continue to smile—or, at the very least, to be civilised. Joe was right. For Jacko’s sake, they had to try. For the next couple of days—actually, for the next couple of decades till Jacko was an adult, they had to keep up a semblance of friendship.

Friendship, when once they’d been lovers, husband and wife.

‘I got my knickers in a twist when you suggested I wasn’t sensitive about Jacko,’ Ellie admitted. ‘It felt unfair. He’s always been my first concern.’

‘You’ve done an amazing job with the boy. He’s a great little guy. A credit to you.’

The praise surprised her. Warmed her.

‘I don’t know how you’ve done it out here on your own,’ Joe added.

‘The nanny’s been great. But I’ll admit it hasn’t always been easy.’ She stole another quick glance at him, saw his deep brow, his wide cheekbones, his slightly crooked nose and strong shadowed jaw. She felt her breathing catch. ‘I guess this can’t be easy for you now. Coming back from the war and everything.’

When he didn’t answer, she tried again, ‘Was it bad over there?’

A telltale muscle jerked. ‘Sometimes.’

Ellie knew he’d lost soldier mates, knew he must have seen things that haunted him. But Special Forces guys hardly ever talked about where they’d been or what they’d done—certainly not with ex-wives.

‘I was one of the lucky ones,’ he said. ‘I got out of it unscathed.’

Unscathed emotionally? Ellie knew that the Army had changed its tactics, sending soldiers like Joe on shorter but more frequent tours of duty in an effort to minimise post-traumatic stress, but she was quite sure that no soldier returned from any war without some kind of damage.

I haven’t helped. This hasn’t been a very good homecoming for him.

Quickly, bravely, she said, ‘For the record, Joe, it isn’t true.’

He turned, looking at her intently. ‘What do you mean?’ His blue eyes seemed to penetrate all the way to her soul.

Her heart began to gallop. She couldn’t back down now that she’d begun. ‘What you said before—that I can’t bear the sight of you—it’s not true.’ So not true.

‘That’s the way it comes across.’

‘I know. I’m sorry. Really sorry.’

She could feel the sudden stillness in him, almost as if she’d shot him. He was staring at her, his eyes burning. With doubt?

Ellie’s eyes were stinging. She didn’t want to cry, but she could no longer see the paddocks. Her heart was racing.

She almost told Joe that she actually fancied the sight of him. Very much. Too much. That was her problem. That was why she was tense.

But it was too late for personal confessions. Way too late. Years and years too late.

Instead she said, ‘I know I’ve been stupidly tense about everything, but it’s certainly not because I can’t stand the sight of you.’ Quite the opposite.

She blinked hard, wishing her tears could air-dry.

Joe’s knuckles were white as he gripped the veranda railing and she wondered what he was thinking. Feeling. Was he going over her words?

It’s certainly not because I can’t stand the sight of you.

Could he read between the lines? Could he guess she was still attracted? Was he angry?

It felt like an age before he spoke.

Eventually, he let go of the railing. Stepped away and drew a deep breath, unconsciously drawing her attention to his height and the breadth of his shoulders. Then he rested his hands lightly on his hips, as if he was deliberately relaxing.

‘OK, here’s a suggestion,’ he said quietly. ‘It’s Christmas Eve tomorrow. Why don’t we declare a truce?’

‘A truce? For Christmas?’

‘Why not? Even in World War One there were Germans and our blokes who stopped fighting in the trenches for Christmas. So, what do you reckon?’

Ellie almost smiled. She really liked the idea of a Christmas truce. She’d always liked to have a goal. And a short-term goal was even better. Doable.

‘I reckon we should give it a shot,’ she said. If soldiers could halt a world war for a little peace and goodwill at Christmas, she and Joe should at least make an effort.

He was watching her with a cautious smile. ‘Can we shake on it?’

‘Sure.’

His handclasp was warm and strong and, for Ellie, just touching him sparked all sorts of flashpoints. But now she had to find a way to stay calm. Unexcited. Neutral.

Her goal was peace and goodwill. For Christmas.

Their smiles were uncertain but hopeful.

But then, in almost the same breath, they both remembered.

‘Jacko,’ they exclaimed together and together they hurried down the veranda to the lounge room.

There was no sign of their son, just his teddy bear lying abandoned on the floor near the empty cartons.

Ellie hurried across the room and down the hallway to the kitchen. ‘Jacko?’ she called, but he wasn’t there either.

Joe was close behind her. ‘He can’t have gone far.’

‘No.’ She went back along the hallway to the bedrooms, calling, ‘Jacko, where are you?’ Any minute she would hear his giggle.

But he wasn’t in his room. Or in her bedroom. Or in the study, or Nina’s room. The bathroom was empty. A wild, hot fluttering unfurled in Ellie’s chest. It was only a small house. There wasn’t anywhere else to look.

She rushed back to the lounge room as Joe came through the front door.

‘I’ve checked the veranda,’ he said.

‘He’s not here.’ Ellie’s voice squeaked.

‘He must be here. Don’t panic, Ellie.’

She almost fell back into her old pattern, hurling defensive accusations. How could you have left him?

But she was silenced by the quiet command in Joe’s voice, and by the knowledge that she’d been the one who stormed out.

‘What was Jacko doing before you came outside to talk to me?’ she asked with a calmness that surprised her.

‘He was playing hide and seek with the bear. Here.’ Joe swished aside the long curtain beside the door.

Ellie gasped.

Jacko was sitting against the wall, perfectly still and quiet, peeping out from beneath his blond fringe, hugging his grubby knees.

‘Boo!’ he said with a proud grin. ‘I hided, Mummy.’

They fell on him together, crouching to hug him, laughing shakily. United by their mutual relief.

It wasn’t a bad way to start a truce.

* * *

Dinner that night was leftover Spanish chicken. For Joe and Ellie the atmosphere was, thankfully, more relaxed than the night before, and afterwards, while Ellie read Jacko bedtime stories, Joe did kitchen duty, rinsing the plates, stacking the dishwasher and wiping the bench tops.

By the time he came back from checking the station’s working dogs and making sure the chicken coop was locked safely from dingoes, Ellie was at the kitchen table, looking businesslike with notepaper and pen, and surrounded by recipe books.

‘I need to plan our Christmas dinner menu,’ she said, flipping pages filled with lavish and brightly coloured Christmas fare.

‘I don’t suppose I can help?’

She looked up at him, her smile doubtful but curious. ‘How are your cooking skills these days?’

‘About the same as they were last time I cooked for you.’

‘Steak and eggs.’ Her nose wrinkled. ‘I was hoping for something a little more celebratory for Christmas.’

‘Well, if you insist on being fussy...’ He pretended to be offended, but he was smiling as he switched on the kettle. ‘I’m making tea. Want some?’

‘Thanks.’

At least the truce seemed to be working. So far.

While Joe hunted for mugs and tea bags, Ellie returned to her recipe books, frowning and looking pensive as she turned endless pages. As far as Joe could tell, she didn’t seem to be having much luck. Every so often she made notes and chewed on her pen and then, a few pages later, she scratched the notes out again.

‘Our Christmas dinner doesn’t have to be lavish,’ he suggested as he set a mug of tea with milk and one sugar in front of her. ‘I’m fine with low-key.’

‘I’m afraid it’ll have to be low-key. We don’t have much choice.’

With an annoyed frown, Ellie pushed the books away, picked up the tea mug and sipped. ‘Nice tea, thanks.’ She let out a heavy sigh. ‘The problem is, I didn’t order a lot of things in for Christmas. Jacko and I were supposed to be spending the day with Chip and Sara Anderson on Lucky Downs. All they wanted me to bring was homemade shortbread and wine and cheese. But now, with the creeks up, we won’t be able to get there.’

She waved her hand at the array of books. ‘Some people spend weeks planning their Christmas menus and here am I, just starting. Yikes, it’s Christmas Eve tomorrow.’

Joe helped himself to a chair and picked up the nearest book: Elegant and Easy Christmas.

‘Those recipes are gorgeous,’ Ellie said. ‘But they all need fancy ingredients that I don’t have.’

He flicked through pages filled with tempting pictures—a crab cocktail starter, turkey breast stuffed with pears and chestnut and rosemary, a herb-crusted standing rib roast, pumpkin and caramel tiramisu.

‘I see what you mean,’ he said. ‘These are certainly fancy. Would it help if we make a list of the things you have in store?’

‘Well, yes, I guess that’s sensible.’ Ellie rolled her eyes. ‘I’ve a pretty good range of meat, but my problem is the trimmings. I don’t have the sauces and spices and fancy herbs and that sort of thing. So I’m afraid we’re stuck with ordinary, boring stuff. For Christmas!’

‘Hmm.’

She looked up, eyeing Joe suspiciously. ‘You’re frowning and muttering. What does that mean?’

‘It means I’m thinking.’ Truth was—an exciting idea had flashed into his head. Crazy. Probably impossible.

But it was worth a try.

‘Excuse me,’ he said, jumping to his feet. ‘I need to make a phone call.’

‘There’s a phone here.’ Ellie nodded to the wall phone.

‘It’s OK. I’ve bought a sat phone, and I have the numbers stored.’

She looked understandably puzzled.

Adorably puzzled, Joe thought as he left the room.

By the light of the single bulb on the veranda, he found the number he wanted. Steve Hansen was an ex-Army mate and, to Joe’s relief, Steve answered the call quickly.

‘Steve, Joe Madden here. How are you?’

‘I’m fine, Joe, heard you were back. How are you, mate? More importantly, where are you? Any chance of having a Christmas drink with us?’

‘That’s why I’m ringing,’ Joe said. ‘I’ve a huge favour to ask.’

‘Well, ask away, mate. We both know how much I owe you. If it wasn’t for you, I would have flown home from Afghanistan in a wooden box. So, what is it?’