Christmas at Waratah Bay (14 page)

“Yay, you’re up,” she said in satisfaction. “Bigfoot’s defrosted and stuffed, and you’re just in time for pudding stirring. Everyone has to stir for luck, and then, she goes into the boiler, and then it’s present time. You stir first.”

He stirred. She held the basin. She looked . . .

He felt . . .

Yeah, he didn’t know how he felt. Like the world had tilted and he was no longer sure what way was up? He watched as everyone else had a stir, as Katie helped the littlies, as Sarah held Harold’s hand and guided it because Harold was so damned weak, it was as much as he could do to hold the spoon . . .

Christmas was happening whether or not he willed it.

Pudding stirred, Sarah headed back to the kitchen. He followed but she waved him away.

“All under control,” she told him. “You get back in there with your family.”

“For today, they feel like
our
family.’

It was the right thing to say. She beamed and then she sniffed.

“Exactly,” she said. “Pretend or not, we’re having a family Christmas.”

*

It wasn’t exactly
what Miss xxxx’s blog called the perfect Christmas. Bigfoot was a bit charred. The gravy was a bit lumpy. The pile of veggies looked good enough, but they had come out of the freezer.

The potatoes were excellent, but that was because Doug and Max had built a fire pit outside, wrapped them in tinfoil and buried them in the cinders. They were awesome.

The pudding . . . yeah, okay, the pudding was less than perfect, too. She’d multiplied the recipe by three. She’d cooked the dratted thing for hours, but when she went to turn it out it was sloppy.

Max started to make suggestions, but Katie waved him aside.

“No probs. Turn it out on a tray, break it up and stick it in the freezer. Kids, you have half an hour to play with your presents before pud’. Harold, talk with your mates.”

They did. Harold’s two old friends chatted happily about Christmases past, the kids whooped it up on the veranda, and in half an hour Katie scooped the cold pudding into a pile, stirred in a tub of ice-cream, turned it back into the pudding bowl lined with cling wrap and then turned it out again.

“Hey, presto, Aussie pud’,” she declared as they gathered in admiration.

“Puddings are supposed to flame,” Harold said, frowning and then it was Max’s turn to step in. He could do this.

He heated brandy in a saucepan, lit it, then slowly poured it over the pudding. The surface ice-cream melted at a touch, the pudding sank a little, but the flame was spectacular and everyone was happy.

Pudding was eaten. The kids dispersed with Doug supervising. The old guys sat on the veranda and went to sleep and so did Katie.

Sarah donned her apron again and faced the mountain of dishes.

Max wielded a dishcloth like a hero.

“There’s no need,” Sarah told him. “I can do it. I want to do it.”

“I’ve done nothing.”

“Of course you have. We all have.”

Yeah, that was the thing he couldn’t get his head around. A family Christmas . . .

She washed. He wiped. Silence.

The silence didn’t mean lack of communication, though. There were signals zinging everywhere, he thought. Crazy undercurrents he couldn’t get his head around.

“You want a walk when we’ve finished these?” he asked, and she turned to him and looked—just looked—and that look contained about a thousand messages, none of which he could figure out.

“No, thanks,” she said at last. “Harold’s mates will be going home. I’ll go out and sit with him for a while.”

“He’ll be asleep.”

“I don’t mind,” she said simply. “I have so little time. I’ll sit with him while I can.”

“Will you have a swim before tea?”

“Tea?” she asked, incredulous. “More food?”

“I mean leftovers,” he said humbly. “Swim before a supper of leftovers. And I’ll organize it.”

“A swim might be good,” she conceded. “But it depends on Harold.”

“Of course it does.”

“Off you go then and check your cattle or stare at your bookwork, and do whatever you need to do in silence. Goodness, Max, you’ll be turning the radio on next. I thought you liked your peace.”

“It’s starting to lose its appeal.”

She was washing a pot; a big one. Now, she paused and turned, her hands still in the suds.

“No,” she said.

“No?”

“Don’t let me mess with your isolation,” she said. “Because I’m leaving. I’m heading back to isolation of my own.”

*

He checked the
cattle. He did a fast check back at the house, but no one needed him. Christmas was in wind down mode.

Harold’s mates had gone. Doug and Katie and the kids were obviously resting. Harold was fast asleep on the veranda and Sarah was snoozing beside him. All that turkey duty last night, he thought.

Gerome was on her knee. She was still wearing her crazy Christmas hat. She looked . . .

Like he shouldn’t look any more. He grabbed his swimmers and headed across the sandhills. The water wouldn’t be cold enough for what he needed, he thought, but it’d have to do.

He hit the waves running, and then tried to swim off sensations he didn’t know what to do with.

He swam back and forth across the bay, four or five times, long, strong strokes, pushing his body to the limit.

On the final stroke, he glanced toward the beach—and Sarah was there.

In bikini.

With Santa hat.

She dropped her towel and hat on the sand and headed into the water. She didn’t race in like him. She ventured in a toe at a time.

A New York kid? She was obviously not an Aussie, born and bred at the beach or spending hot summers in and out of farm dams.

She was a different species to him.

He should keep stroking. Instead, he trod water and watched.

She splashed cool water on her face, and then did it again, like she was tasting it.

She knelt, tentatively, in knee deep water and seemed to savor the small waves washing over her, but after five minutes, she was still only wet to the waist. Enough of watching. Max caught a breaker in, body surfing to within ten yards of her, and then as his wave petered out, stroking the rest of the way. He hit the sandy bottom before he reached her.

He surfaced and she was watching him, with a certain degree of caution.

“Hey,” he said, idly. He felt good. He felt really good, actually. The sun was losing its sting. There was no wind to speak of and they had the idyllic bay all to themselves. Christmas was done and dusted. Life could settle.

Soon everyone would be gone, he thought, and then he thought—did he want everyone to be gone? It was a jarring thought, like something inside him had cracked.

“How’s Harold?” he asked, because he couldn’t think of anything else to say. He was feeling way off balance.

Her face tightened a little. “So weak,” she told him, splashing a little more water on her face. Rivulets were running down her throat, onto her breasts. A man had to force himself to keep his eyes upward . . . “He’s awake now, just looking out over the sunset. He asked me . . . he asked me to leave him for a bit. He wanted to be alone, just with his dogs, just with his thoughts.”

He could understand that. It was what he’d always wanted. But then . . . Harold had never wanted isolation—he’d had it thrust upon him.

“He’s had a big Christmas.”

“He’s had a wonderful Christmas.” Her face softened again and he saw the glint of unshed tears. “I can’t thank you enough. That I could bring him here . . . that you shared your Christmas with us . . . You’re a very nice man, Max Ramsey.”

“I am, aren’t I,” he agreed, complacently, though he wasn’t exactly sure that the description fitted. This had been Christmas under duress. But still . . .

Still he’d made Harold happy, and Katie and her brood and Harold’s mates were happy. And, Sarah seemed content.

It felt okay.

No, dammit, it felt good.

He so wanted to touch her.

“Not swimming?” he asked, fighting to find distraction and she shook her head and more of those droplets coursed down. Distracting a man like he couldn’t believe.

“I can’t,” she said.

“You can’t?” To not swim . . . the concept was as alien as spaceships. “But you spent time here as a kid.”

“Only in winter.”

“But . . . ”

“And I wasn’t . . . ” She paused, seeming almost to bite her tongue. “Well, that was a long time ago, but I used to look at the sea and wish. You looked fabulous out there. Like a seal. No, something even sleeker, a gorgeous, tanned dolphin . . . A merman?”

“I’ll blush in a minute.”

“I’d like to see that.”

“Would you like to learn to swim?”

“I don’t have time. I’m going . . . ”

“Back to New York soon. I know, but I’m not talking soon. I’m talking now. This minute. I know, we won’t get you to Olympic level by dusk, but we might get you able to float.”

“Max . . . ”

“I didn’t give you a Christmas gift,” he said. “This could be it.”

“I didn’t give you one either.”

“But I got a particularly fine bundle of socks from Katie.”

“And Harold gave me a brooch.” It was almost a whisper. “It was his mother’s. He kept it for me. It should be . . . ” And once again, she blinked back tears.

“Hey.” He put his hand on her shoulder and gripped. Preconceptions were nowhere, he thought. The way he felt about this woman now—a one eighty degree turn didn’t begin to describe it. He’d thought he’d loathe her. Now . . . he still didn’t know what drove her, what her story was, but doubts had long been buried. Underneath the glossy exterior was pure gold. “Hey, Sarah, swim? Yes?”

And, she blinked and looked up at him and managed a smile. “You really think I could?”

“The sandbank’s stopping the bigger waves. The little ones build again on this side, but before that there’s this lovely flat pool, perfect for learning to float. This can be my Christmas gift to you—you can go home to New York knowing that you’ve floated over Australian waves. If you trust me to hold you . . . I won’t let you down, Sarah.”

“I know you won’t,” she said, and blinked again. “I don’t think you ever could.”

*

She trusted him.

Max had taught every one of his siblings to swim. Each time, the biggest hurdle had been trust. “Lie face down and put your face in the water. Lie with my hands under you and when I feel the water take your weight, I’ll take my hands away.”

His brothers and sisters had mostly trusted him but it had still been a long process, dipping face in, panicking, spluttering to the surface, not waiting to feel the power of the water holding.

Sarah listened to his instructions, looked nervously around her at the vast stretch of shallow water—“just doing a last minute check for sharks,” she told him, and he knew she was only half joking. Australia was known for dangerous.

Then she looked up at him, meeting his gaze square on, as if assuring herself that there were no sharks there either.

Enough. She sank to her knees in the shallows. He put his hands on the flat of her stomach and underneath her breasts.

She took a deep breath, put her face in the water and lay prone.