Be Mine: Valentine Novellas to Warm The Heart

by Nicole Flockton

  The result?

  Like using the best space in a garden to grow your client’s favourite plants. A bit of artifice; a bit of care and culture - and voila! A stunning result.

  Friday 14 February. Valentine’s Day. 12.07pm.

  The doorbell rings.

  I click-clack-click to the bathroom and take a last look in my small, head-high mirror, craning to see the rest of me. All in place. I hope. I clop and click to the front door. Hesitate, hand on doorknob. Remove hand from doorknob. Inhale.

  This Valentine’s Day Project could go either way. It could be wonderful. Or it could be an unmitigated, totally misjudged disaster.

  There was only one way to find out.

  I stretch out a hand and open the door.

  Step back.

  Harry is standing there, almost obscured behind a huge bunch of old-fashioned sweet-smelling red roses.

  His face appears over the top.

  His expression is everything I imagined, and more.

  He is pole-axed, slaughtered. Stunned. Wide-eyed, sheepish. Shocked and delighted. His eyes flash dark blue. He radiates admiration, lust, desire, covetousness. At least ten of the Seven Deadly Sins.

  I hold out my hand for him to take, but he captures it and raises it to his lips instead. His lips are warm. I feel like a queen.

  He says, ‘I’m breathless. I’m in love with every single version of you I’ve met, but this goddess? What did I do to deserve you?’

  He’s in love with me? How does he say that so easily?

  As I mentally stumble, he secures my hand under his arm and walks me slowly, given the height of my heels, to his car. As he drives, he can hardly stop looking at me.

  I smile, confident in my new elastic stay-on lipstick. Composed entirely of horrific nano-plastic particles no doubt, but utterly perfect for enjoying myself on Valentine’s Day.

  I give myself a tick: success! With more surprises to follow.

  During lunch, Harry plies me with scrumptious morsels of food and delicious wine. He can’t keep his eyes off me. He still looks stunned, and kind of amazed and grateful, and aroused.

  Harry says, ‘I love you in your overalls and work boots. So sassy and dynamic. I love you dressed up like a princess. You are totally stunning.’

  Those words again! Said with such ease, while I struggle. He gazes at me with all his powerful focus and my breath hitches. He says, his voice a deep gravelly murmur that teases my senses, ‘I thought you beautiful from the first time I saw you covered in twigs and spider webs, but it’s lucky for every man around that you don’t look like this all of the time!’ He touches my lips. ‘It’s you Lilac. Your grace. Your strength. You radiate love.’

  ‘I wanted to show you that I am not a total bogan. That I can look civilised when I try!’

  ‘Civilised?’ His grin turns wicked. ‘A complete understatement! Your ‘looking civilised’ could start wars.’

  ‘Oh please!’ But it is lovely to hear his exaggerated compliments. It is nice to feel beautiful, and made-up, with someone to appreciate my efforts.

  My hair has been subtly coloured and styled until it is gleaming in a long, smooth sheet, hanging just below my shoulders, with a couple of streaks of daring vivid red to brighten things up. My make-up is new generation, the colours and textures flexing with my expressions and enhancing my features in an age-appropriate way. My dress is simple but expensive, clinging to my shape in a way that shows off my strength and fitness. My shoes are high and fun. The whole make-over underscores what I am: a happy, healthy, strong woman, comfortable in her body and proud of her achievements. In my strong, early fifties and hiding nothing.

  ‘No Botox,’ I’d said to Tori. ‘It’s not for me, not now anyway, but a little makeup and a nice dress? Oh yeah!’

  ‘You don’t need any Botox anyway, my love,’ Tori had said. ‘You are glowing!’

  We drive back to Harry’s place, and I see that he has been developing a Valentine’s Day Project of his own.

  The place is full of sweet-smelling roses and lilies. The fridge is stocked with tasty snacks and there is chilled champagne and white wine and sumptuous reds to sample.

  I have a bigger bag than usual. I am a bit giggly and staggery from the wine at lunch and the force of Harry’s admiration.

  After a glass of chilled Pinot Gris, more conversation, more laughs and a great deal more compliments from Harry, I implement Phase Two of my Valentine’s Day Project. I slip off to one of the large, gleaming bathrooms. Before I return, I check the location of what must be Harry’s bedroom.

  Harry had become loquacious with the lunchtime wine, chatty and witty.

  When he sees me now, his mouth falls open, and he can only emit a strangled sound.

  Ah lingerie. No ‘French maid’ or ‘nurse’ for me. I didn’t want anything too ‘caring.’ I wanted tough and strong.

  I tilt back my sheriff hat and adjust my tool belt, suggestively rattling my handcuffs. Harry still has his mouth open, frozen in shocked amazement. The hungry, sheepish, grateful, lustful look in his eyes I think I will remember forever.

  His eyes finally unfreeze, and I watch them travel from my face to my cleavage popping out of the top of my sheriff outfit, and dwell on my giant plastic silver star, positioned proudly on my right nipple. His eyes burn down my waist, clinched in with my shiny, black, plastic tool belt, to where the skirt of my uniform barely skims the top of my fish-net covered thighs.

  Harry swallows.

  I point my plastic gun at him.

  ‘You are under arrest,’ I announce.

  He comes willingly.

  Much, much later, Harry trawls a slow and languid finger down my side, tickling and teasing from shoulder to hip.

  ‘Lilac,’ he says, and there is a break in his voice. ‘Lilac Loveday. You are so strong and self-contained. Charming, beautiful and natural. Lilac...I’ve fallen completely in love with you. Right from the first twig I pulled from your hair.’

  This last sentence allows me to giggle a little in the intensity of the moment.

  His muscular shoulders and arms are hard and shapely beneath my exploring fingers. I love his musky smell. I can’t get enough of this man. My heart is full to breaking. And yet...my mouth closes on the words.

  ‘You are so amazing,’ I say instead, hoping, telling myself that those words are adequate. Instead of giving him what he wants, what this incredible, hurting man needs and deserves, I kiss him with all the passion burning in my veins and all the love bursting in my heart.

  But my weasely words are not nearly enough.

  I detest cowardice.

  Particularly when it’s mine.

  18

  When Lily rings two weeks later, I realise I have forgotten to worry about her finding a partner for an entire fortnight.

  ‘Lily, Darling! So good to hear your voice. I miss you already!’

  ‘I miss you too mum.’

  ‘Lily, there is something I have to tell you.’

  ‘Yes?’ She sounds a little worried.

  Still I hesitate. Take a breath. I can do this. ‘Lily, my darling daughter,’ I say. ‘I love you, Lily.’

  A pause. Then her voice rushes over me like a river in the sun. ‘I love you too, Mum!’

  We chat for a while.

  I tell her about my various projects (but not the Valentine Day one). ‘As well as the Hospital garden and my usual clients, I’ve been doing a weekly horticulture session with the students of the primary school. They are thrilled with the castle that Harry is building them, and they are helping me design the gardens. They love the whole thing! I have never had such enthusiastic clients. Such fun! So cute!’

  A quick pause. Then she says, ‘Mum. I’ve got some news.’

  My heart pounds and all those mother thoughts flash through my mind: Lily is sick, she is hurt, she is in trouble...‘Yes?’

  Pause. ‘I’ve met a Man. I really like him.’

  I wait for her to keep talking. My throat is choking up.


  ‘It’s early days yet, but we are loving each other’s company. He is intelligent, sporty, funny. He might even be The One.’

  Same here, my darling, I think. Same here. I am filled with a rush of gratitude that perhaps life will be generous to Lily and Sam. That happiness could be waiting for them too.

  I haven’t been this happy since before Aiden died. Or perhaps ever. Not this kind of happy. Harry has unblocked something vital inside me, something emotional and burning with life.

  A huge bunch of scented red roses is perfuming my house. ‘You are amazing and I love you,’ says Harry’s card. Red rose petals from Valentine’s Day are drying sweetly in a pretty china bowl.

  That night I ring Sam in Sydney and tell him I love him.

  There is a small, shocked pause, and then he says, ‘I love you too, Mum.’ My eyes fill and my lips quiver in a huge wavering smile.

  There is a stunning, generous, solid, delightful man I need to talk to now.

  But this one I will tell in person.

  19

  It turns out I know one of the construction sparkies through a friend of a friend – it is Ballarat after all. I even ask Lily for help, though no doubt I’ll be answering a lot of questions from her in future. Naturally, Lily knows some of the tradies involved in Harry’s construction company. They all help to set the scene and ensure the site is clear of other people.

  It is dim twilight. The last luminous scraps of red and gold are fleeing the sky into deep indigo on the horizon. The construction offices are deserted, except for a lonely light flickering in the main construction site office, which is a temporary caravan-style building located to one side of the major construction project.

  I click open the locks on the wire fencing gate with the key given me by the sparky. I hold my breath, but no-one emerges from the site office.

  I creep up to the office and place the three bricks, in order, on top of each other, with their individual messages. The solid beginnings of a new structure: brick laid on brick. Harry’s language. I creep back and fetch the potted gardenias, the sweet scent strong in the night air, and place them around the bricks. Every structure needs a garden.

  My knuckles twang as I knock on the site office door. I quickly vanish, and watch from the shadows between the site office and the demountable building next to it.

  A groan, a stretching sound. A yawn. The door opens, light spilling over the yard and my carefully placed bricks. Harry emerges, rubbing his face and eyes.

  Harry is staring at the bricks. His eyes widen as he reads the message, one word per brick, the three bricks placed heavily on top of each other.

  I choose that moment to step out, and enjoy Harry’s utterly flabbergasted expression. Harry’s mouth opens and closes. He clears his throat noisily in the stillness. His eyes narrow and darken, shining in the reflected light from the office. His mouth quirks up on the left.

  I grin. ‘You said you find my work boots sassy.’

  ‘Ah, I...usually you are wearing pants as well?’

  I laugh and sashay towards him, grinning wickedly. I’m wearing the work boots, a hard hat, a bright orange reflector safety vest which reaches the bones of my hips, and very little else apart from a few strategic scraps of lace.

  He steps towards me as though magnetised, stretches out his arms. He points at the pile of bricks.

  I reach him, grab the front of his shirt and pull him in roughly towards me, knocking my hard hat askew in the process. Harry grins. I kiss him, softly, and then press my lips hard and urgently on his.

  He kisses me back, firm lips, flicking tongue, until I must pull away if I am to fully complete my mission.

  ‘Harry,’ I say. I’m not smiling now. I’m looking deep, deep into his eyes. His arms tighten around me, but I keep sufficient space so I can watch his mood. His eyes are black and fierce, and somehow entirely soft and doting at the same time.

  ‘Harry MacAulay ...’ I swallow. I look at the bricks. I look at his lovely, crumpled, dear face, and it gives me the courage I need.

  ‘Harry MacAulay. I love you, too.’

  The kiss that follows is the best kiss of my life. The kiss, and a whole lot more, continues on into the site office, shedding safety vests and shirts, pants and work boots as we go.

  The three bricks sit there in the glow of far-away street lights for the sparkies and tradies to tease Harry about come the dawn.

  I - Love -You.

  Find more about and contact Maryanne Ross on

  https://www.facebook.com/MaryanneRossAuthor/

  Twitter twitter.com/big_galaxy2

  About Maryanne Ross

  Maryanne Ross works as a speechwriter and Communications Manager for a major Aboriginal organisation and previously did media and communications for National Parks. She loves writing fiction and is excited to be part of the 2020 Be Mine Valentine novella set.

  Maryanne’s stories have won the 2016 Thunderbolt Prize for Crime Writing, the 2017 Scarlet Stiletto ‘Kerry Greenwood’ award and placed in the 2017 Southern Cross Literary Competition. Her stories appear in 2019 RWA Little Gems, 2017 Award Winning Australian Writing and Scarlet Stiletto: Ninth Cut. Hundreds of her media articles have been published in Victorian print, radio, TV and social media and syndicated internationally.

  Maryanne is currently writing novels featuring historical romance and gothic crime (not in the same book - yet).

  Healing Hearts

  Alli Stewart

  Setting:

  Australia - uses Australian English spelling.

  Heat rating - one chilli

  About Healing Hearts

  It had only taken a moment… a flash of lights, a scream of metal and Chris Kingsley’s life had turned on its head.

  In the months since Meg Taylor’s best friend, Sarah, had died in a car accident, Meg and Sarah’s widowed husband, Chris had been there for each other.

  Now Meg’s fiance has returned from London for their long-planned wedding and Meg and Chris’s comfortable routine is about to end.

  It is time for both of them to let go of the past and start living again.

  What will it take for these two broken hearts to realise that they belong together?

  Maybe a nudge from St. Valentine, may be the answer.

  1

  From today everything changes.

  Meg's heart skipped a beat as she raised the tarnished brass knocker on the green front door. Almost before it fell back into place, the thunder of feet in the passage foreshadowed a rapturous welcome of large dog and small boy the moment door opened.

  "Auntie Meg, Auntie Meg. Look at what I made at kinder!" Ben thrust a bright painting at her while Rufus rushed around in ever decreasing circles, his plumy tail beating against her legs as she navigated her way into the house.

  Meg took Ben's painting of a rainbow, with what looked like boats on a sea, and praised it fulsomely.

  "It's for you," Ben said.

  "And it will go on my fridge," Meg said, knowing Ben would deem that the highest honour to be bestowed on his work of art. The boy grinned.

  "Ben, give Aunty Meg a chance to catch her breath. And Rufus! Out."

  Chris stood at the end of the long corridor of the renovated Victorian home, drying his hands on a tea towel. A lock of dark brown hair fell across his face and he unconsciously pushed it back, an easy smile curling the corners of his mouth.

  Meg's nose twitched in appreciation as the smell of something freshly baked drifted down the passage. "Something smells good," she said.

  Chris swept a hand at the kitchen bench with the aplomb of a master chef.

  "My first attempt at making chocolate chip muffins. I think they've turned out okay," he said.

  Meg smiled. The muffins looked good but Chris had a smudge of flour on his cheek and it looked as if he had used every bowl in the kitchen cupboard. She reached across the bench to steal one of the warm muffins and he flicked her wrist with the tea towel.

  "You'll probably burn your to
ngue and I refuse to be held liable for damages."

  "Typical lawyer," she responded.

  "Here!" Chris tossed her the tea towel. "Make yourself useful and then you can have a muffin."

  Obediently, she picked up a saucepan from the draining board.

  Chris plunged his hands into the sudsy water and glanced sideways at her. "Today's the day. How do you feel?"

  "A little nervous," Meg admitted. "I can't believe it is less than six weeks to the wedding. He's been away so long."

  Too long, but why should that matter? After all she and Robert had been engaged for nearly three years, but in the last twelve months they had seen each other only on his flying business trips from London.

  Chris dumped a handful of cutlery into the draining basket. "Ben and I are looking forward to the wedding, aren't we buddy?"

  Ben looked up from the kitchen table where he had been drawing. "Yes, and I promise I will be the very best page boy ever."

  Meg smiled at him. "I'm sure you will."

  Ben held up his drawing. "See? That's you and Robert."

  He pointed at the two stick figures that stood hand in hand. One of the figures had a long veil and Meg's curling brown hair. The other looked like Blofeld from the James Bond movies; bald and sinister.

  Ben frowned at her from underneath his blunt-cut fringe. "When you marry Robert, will that mean you won't come and visit us anymore?

  She opened her mouth to issue a vehement denial, then stopped herself.

  "We've talked about this, Ben. Meg and Robert are moving to London," Chris answered for her. "We'll just have to learn to manage without her, won't we?"

  A pain, acute and physical, tightened around Meg's chest. She would miss these Saturdays spent with Ben and Chris. They had become so much part of her life. Her counsellor had told her that it was a part of the healing process for all three of them, but it had come to mean so much more than that. For Meg, Chris and Ben, Saturdays had become sacrosanct. With Robert's return, it would all end.