Short and Sweet (20 page)

And she missed him.

So did Ellie. But for once, Mel kept her dog under control.

During the next two weeks they could not avoid meeting occasionally at the local store, which sold all the basic necessities and none of the frills of life. The first time James looked across at her he hesitated, as if he wanted to speak to her. She turned away, seeing in the security mirror on the wall how he scowled. But at least he left her alone.

At home, Mel distracted herself by working furiously on her canvases, not stopping until she couldn’t see straight at night. They weren’t the peaceful rural scenes she had first planned, but a big stormy landscape, a lush rainforest oozing with water, and a scorching panorama of coloured desert that socked you right in the eye.

Day by day she peeped through her window and watched angrily as her neighbour and two helpers surveyed his whole block, setting out stakes here and there. Tears filled her eyes on the day a portable office was set up on the far side of his old beach shack.

The following day, just before noon, someone knocked on the door. When Mel opened it without thinking, she found James standing there, with a bloodstained towel wrapped around his hand.

‘I’m sorry to disturb you, I know you don’t want to see me, but I’ve had an accident and—’ Blood dripped from the towel.

She gestured him inside. ‘Let me see.’

‘If you’ll just ring for a taxi, I’ll go to the doctor’s and get it stitched up. I haven’t had a phone put in yet and the battery’s flat on my mobile.’ Both batteries. He’d been thinking of her, damn her! She was getting between him and his work. Not just her hair, but her firm suntanned legs and slumberous green eyes. He drew in a deep breath and concentrated on his hand.

‘Let me look at the injury first.’ She could see him starting to refuse and added, ‘I’m a trained nurse.’

‘You are?’

‘I’m not working as a nurse at the moment,’ she said curtly.

As they stood by the sink, rinsing off the blood, she was conscious of him as a man first and an injury second – a very attractive man, even if he was a louse. She was also suddenly conscious that she hadn’t brushed her hair that morning and was wearing a very old paint-spattered sweatshirt and rather tight shorts with frayed edges.

The cut was deep and jagged. She cleaned it carefully. ‘Yes, you do need stitches. I’ll drive you down to the doctor’s.’

‘I can get a taxi. You won’t want an untouchable like me in your car.’

‘Don’t be stupid.’

They drove there in complete silence, both breathing deeply and carefully, sitting as far apart as possible. Which wasn’t very far in such a small car.

Two hours later, she drove him back, by which time his hand was neatly bandaged and he was looking white and weary. The doctor, assuming that Mel was James’s girlfriend, had given strict instructions that James was not to drive or do anything with the hand for a couple of weeks.

‘Do you – er – have enough food in the house?’ she asked as they bumped along the track to his front door.

‘No. I’ll get something sent in.’

‘Ben at the store doesn’t deliver and there’s nowhere else close enough. I’ll make you up a couple of casseroles and get you some shopping in tomorrow.’

He was still stiff. ‘I can’t impose on you like that.’

‘You don’t have much choice.’

‘Well – thank you, then. Mel . . .’

‘Have to go. I’ve got a big commission to finish.’

Ten days later, ten very long days fraught with encounters, she drove him to have the stitches removed. He thanked her and sent her some flowers. If he’d brought them in person, she’d have made up the quarrel on the spot, but he didn’t. He sent one of his assistants and that annoyed the hell out of her.

When he was no longer dependent upon her, she found she missed him.

‘Why did he have to be a land developer?’ she asked the moon as she lay awake at night.

It just winked at her and continued to smile knowingly.

‘Stop grinning!’ she yelled. ‘I can forget him. I can!’

She couldn’t, but at least he didn’t know that.

A few mornings later, Ellie went missing. Mel searched -frantically, but couldn’t find her.

Hearing her calling, James came out of his shack. ‘Something wrong?’

‘Have you seen Ellie?’

‘No, not since yesterday. Let me help you search.’

They checked all Ellie’s old haunts, but there was no sign of her. Then, as they were walking back along a track through the bush, James suddenly stopped. ‘Is that something over there?’

It was. Ellie. Lying unconscious with a bloodied head.

Mel’s eyes were so flooded with tears she couldn’t see straight. Ellie had been her best friend for ten years.

‘She’s still breathing,’ he said softly, bending down. ‘Looks like a dead branch fell on her.’ He led the way back, carrying the dog carefully. ‘We’ll take my car.’

Mel sat on the back seat and let him pass her the dog. Within minutes they were at the vet’s, by which time Ellie was stirring and trying to raise her head and Mel was in tears again, tears of relief.

When they got back home, leaving Ellie in overnight for observation, Mel turned to James. ‘Thank you very much!’ She smiled as she added, ‘I guess land developers aren’t such villains after all.’

He got out of the car, strode round to her side, pulled her out and smothered her with kisses, which somehow she couldn’t resist.

When they drew apart, he said fiercely, ‘If you’ll only let me explain, you’ll see that I shan’t be spoiling anything – on the contrary! What I’m building is an ecotourism mini-resort where we preserve the bush and teach people to care about it.’

‘Oh.’ She sagged against him, feeling an utter fool – but a deliriously happy one.

‘We won’t discuss the details of that just now. I have something else in mind for tonight, and for a lot more nights to come.’ He tucked her arm under his and led her inside his shack, locking the door carefully behind them. ‘I’m thinking of getting into this interesting development deal – stepfather to a big furry mutt. Now what are you crying for?’

She sniffed. ‘Because I’m so happy.’ She grabbed his hair and pulled his face towards hers. ‘And if you won’t stop talking and kiss me again, I’ll have to kiss you.’

His voice was muffled. ‘I surrender. Totally. Take me – I’m yours.’

Later that year, Mel won a big prize for one of her paintings. Full of passion, said one critic. Naked emotion, wrote another.

‘It’s because of you,’ she told James, ‘filling my nights—’

‘And an occasional day,’ he interrupted, smiling sweetly and taking the brush from her hand.

‘—with love and sex,’ she sighed, as she drew him into the bedroom, ‘wonderful, heavenly sex and . . .’

Outside the door, Ellie sighed and went to sleep. It was time for her dinner, but she knew better than to interrupt when they started playing this silly human game.

One White Rose

Anna’s Notes

This is one of my favourite stories, and it’s another one that turned into a book.

Actually, it became one of my favourite modern novels
(Kirsty’s Vineyard)
. It’s another fairy tale come true. Who wouldn’t want to inherit a vineyard?

Of course, in the novel, the heroine changed her name to Kirsty, and a whole set of new characters joined the cast, but still, this story is where it all started.

J
ulia gaped at the solicitor. ‘But I don’t know any Australians. Who is this Charles Finlay-Jamieson? Why would he leave me a bequest?’

‘I believe you knew him simply as Mr James.’

‘Oh.’ For a few months Mr James had come to the library twice a week, regular as clockwork. Old, gentle, courteous. She had helped him to find books and lingered to chat, because he was clearly lonely. Then he’d stopped coming, and she’d assumed that he’d either died or moved away. Sometimes you didn’t know and never found out, which was sad.

‘Did you know Mr Finlay-Jamieson well?’

‘No. We used to chat sometimes at the library. What has he left me – some books? We shared a very similar taste in novels.’ Romances, the soppier the better.

The solicitor cleared his throat. ‘No. Not books. Actually, he’s left you his whole estate.’

She felt as if the room were spinning round her and clutched the arm of her chair. It was a moment before she could concentrate on what the solicitor was saying.

Later, she told her family the news. Her brother Robert spoke first, as usual. ‘I can’t believe it.’

She smiled faintly. It made a change to surprise Robert. Usually he knew everything and didn’t hesitate to tell you so.

‘Mr Finlay-Jamieson left me his house,’ she repeated, ‘on condition that I look after his books, and lay a white rose on his wife’s grave every year on their anniversary.’

‘Well, you’ve fallen lucky. When are we moving in?’

‘It’s not that easy. The house is in Australia and there’s an income to go with it. I have to live there for five years before I can sell anything or return to England.’

‘That’s ridiculous!’ her sister Sue said.

‘The old fellow’s wits must have been addled,’ Robert stated. ‘You can’t possibly go. We’ll contest the conditions of the will.’

For once, she managed to stand up to them. ‘I shan’t contest the will. It’s what Mr Finlay-Jamieson wanted.’

‘But you can’t go and live in Australia!’

‘Um, the estate’s worth well over a million pounds.’ It was the only argument likely to convince Robert.

There was silence around her, then her brother began making plans to accompany her. And, through the long months of getting permission to live there, nothing she said would deter him from it.

She was always glad that Robert broke his leg just before they left. Always. She was nervous about travelling so far on her own, but Mr Finlay-Jamieson must have had some reason for leaving her everything and making those conditions. She couldn’t let him down.

And she’d certainly remember about the rose. He’d spoken very lovingly about his wife.

Western Australia was very hot in February, which was the height of summer in Australia. People at the airport were complaining, but after the English winter she had left behind, Julia welcomed the warmth of the sun on her face. Exhausted by the twenty-hour flight, she went straight to the hotel and fell into bed, forgetting to ring her family as promised.

When the phone woke her up, she felt groggy. ‘Why didn’t you ring us when you arrived, Julia?’

‘Robert?’

‘That was very selfish of you. We were worried sick.’

She slammed the phone down on him, then stared at it in dismay. He would be furious. Well, she was furious, too. That anger gave her the courage to call reception. ‘Please hold all calls. I need some sleep.’

It was late afternoon, Perth time, when she awoke. She rang for room service. With the tray came an angry note dictated over the phone by her brother Robert. She screwed it up and threw it across the dingy room. She did the same with a later note demanding that she call her sister Sue.

Family! It was ungrateful, she knew, but she was thirty, had been a deputy librarian for the past five years, and wasn’t too stupid to manage on her own. She pulled a wry face. No. Not stupid, but cowardly sometimes. She did so hate arguments and fuss.

A smile crept across her face. At this distance she had a way to deal with her family. If she changed hotels, if they couldn’t phone her . . . One hand crept up to her mouth. Dare she? Yes. She’d do it. Turn over a new leaf here in Australia. Be her own woman.

As soon as she’d finished breakfast, she packed her things and checked out. The taxi driver took her to a better hotel, where she booked a luxury room with a view of the river. Robert would have had an apoplexy at the thought of her wasting so much money, but just for once she wanted to live elegantly, in the way she’d read of in books.

Her family didn’t know about her secret vice, but she adored reading romances. She loved the tall dark heroes and the courageous heroines who deserved to be loved, as they always were in the end. She even quite enjoyed the sexy bits. It was as near as she had ever come to the great mystery of life.

Her one love had been a man as gentle as herself who had died in a car accident. Poor Donald. He’d never have made a hero, but she thought they might have been happy together, in a quiet sort of way.

The next day she went out. There was a terrifyingly large amount of money sitting in her new Australian bank account, and the solicitor had advised her to get a car. ‘You do drive, don’t you, Miss Mincham?’

‘Oh, yes.’ She had an elderly car in England, as gentle and hesitant as herself.

‘Well, you won’t be able to manage without one over there. The property is in the country and there’s no public transport at all.’

‘Oh.’

In between sightseeing, she took a couple of driving lessons to get used to the local traffic rules, then she bought a car. A Mercedes coupé. She hadn’t been able to resist it. The heroes in her novels drove cars like this. Just for once she would indulge herself, she thought, as she sat behind the wheel and started the engine.

The car was beautiful to drive, comfortable, with excellent brakes. It gave her a feeling of confidence, enough confidence to ring up her family.

‘Where the hell have you been, Julia?’ roared Robert.

She’d guess he was fretting about his broken leg. Well, too bad. He shouldn’t take out his frustration on her. ‘I moved to a nicer hotel.’

‘We’ve been worried sick about you. Give me your number this minute!’

‘There’s no point. I’m going to my new home tomorrow.’

‘Then give me the address there. You forgot to do that before you left England. Typical of you! I don’t know how you’re ever going to manage on your own.’

His voice sounded so scornful. Had he always spoken to her like that? She frowned at the phone. Had she let him? ‘I’ll write to you when I get there. Bye, Robert.’

For the second time in her life she put the phone down on him and told reception to hold all calls.

It took only three hours to reach her new home. The country roads were empty by English standards and driving the new car was a pleasure. Julia found herself humming along with the radio.