Long Game

by Catherine Evans

  He cleared his throat. ‘Go get the others. I’ll be okay with Tris.’ He turned and headed to their table, sucking in a deep breath. He didn’t want her sympathy. He didn’t want to tell her how stupid he’d been. He’d have to. On the way home. If he managed to survive the night.

  Before he reached her brothers, Tris lifted and tapped his empty glass. ‘Your shout.’

  Quin went to the bar and returned with beers for the guys, and a soda water for himself. The girls were swarming around the twins, so he had space beside Tris to put the glasses down and slide them across the tabletop. Damo and Gar were holding court, which left him blissfully free of attention.

  ‘What’s that?’ Tris jabbed a finger at the clear glass in front of Quin. ‘Can’t keep up?’

  Quin forced a grin, hoping it was believable, and placed his hand against his chest. ‘Pure city slicker now. No stamina to keep up with the hard country living.’ He’d had two beers and that was his limit. Now.

  Tris snorted and rolled his eyes as he sipped his schooner. ‘Weak.’

  Quin forced a laugh. Wasn’t that the truth.

  Life in Grong Grong seemed so much simpler. At eighteen, he and Tris had had their share of big nights. One night had seen them sprawled in his mother’s garden. After drinking with Tris, they were both too drunk to make it any further. He’d tripped and settled into the soft earth of his mother’s bulb bed. Thankfully it wasn’t spring and he hadn’t massacred any plants. Tris had at least made it to the front porch. The cold, the dirt, his parents’ reaction, and the hangover were kept in the never-to-be-repeated part of his brain.

  Aside from his parents knowing, there were no repercussions from that night. No potential ruin of his career. Having a few drinks with mates had seemed harmless. He knew better … now.

  ‘Do you and Cress have a system like me and Damo?’ Gar asked.

  Quin must have missed a whole snatch of conversation because the twins were staring at him, and there were just the Kennedys at the table now. ‘A system?’

  ‘Signals.’ Damo seemed to think Quin knew what he was talking about when he hadn’t been paying attention at all.

  Quin shook his head.

  ‘Ours is simple. Shut bedroom door means no entry. Clothes outside the door, means no knocking and no entry. And if the front and lounge room lights are out, then you go spend the night somewhere else.’

  ‘Somewhere else?’ Quin still hadn’t caught up.

  ‘At Tris’s or Ollie’s or Dad’s or another chick’s. Anywhere but our place where the action is happening.’ Gar sounded like he’d won the lottery or something as he ended that sentence. Quin thought he might have sounded like that, years ago, before he became jaded and now irrational.

  ‘I slept in the shed one night.’ Damo sounded as if he was inordinately pleased about that.

  Tris was laughing so hard the table was shaking. In contrast, Damo and Gar were serious, as if they wanted his opinion. Valued his opinion even.

  ‘What do you do with Cress?’ Gar leaned his chin on his upturned hand, leaned on his elbow and waited for Quin to find words.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Tris, not holding back the smirk, ‘what do you do with her?’

  Use her to protect me.

  There weren’t the words. Not for Tris, or the twins. ‘Nothing,’ he muttered as he shook his head.

  ‘You could use our system. It’s pretty easy and Cress knows it.’

  Quin gulped his soda water. ‘I wouldn’t bring someone home while Cress was in the house.’ Was this a trick question? Were they trying to see how he was treating their sister?

  Now he was being overly sensitive. They’d never gang up on him. Gar and Damo were just being … Gar and Damo. He was in a worse mess than he realised. Obviously, avoidance wasn’t helping him.

  ‘Why the heck not?’ Damo asked.

  ‘Because it’d be rude.’ Surely there were more answers than that but they weren’t coming to him when he needed them.

  ‘It’d be like sharing the house with one of us, wouldn’t it?’ Gar’s question floored him.

  It was nothing like sharing with any of them. Nothing.

  Before he could answer, lithe arms slid their way around his neck and his stomach tied itself into a freezing knot that paralysed him. His nostrils were assaulted by flowers; half-dead flowers that smelled like they’d been locked in the heat for days. Overpowering. A breath against his ear. Soft flesh encasing his neck. Skitters ran over his entire torso, and they weren’t good skitters. They were the kind that monsters induced. He grabbed hold onto the edge of the table, hoping Tris noticed his white knuckles. Or maybe he hoped he didn’t.

  Breath was hard to come by.

  Quin swallowed, as he tried to slow his heart rate and master his distress.

  He looked up to find Gar and Damo’s eyebrows on the way to their hairline, and eyes almost out on stalks. They weren’t afraid, they were practically salivating. Quin wished he could throw the bag of bones, draped across him, in their direction.

  ‘I heard you were back in town, Quin Fitzpatrick.’ Sultry voice, but the scent of tobacco made him think there was more of a smoker’s cough than a sexy sound causing that. The voice wasn’t familiar. He shot a look to Tris and hoped it told Tris enough for him to step in and help out.

  Tris saved him. ‘Chantelle, I don’t think Quin recognises your moves.’

  Quin dug in his memories for a Chantelle. It’d been a long time since he’d thought about the people in town, or classmates, he had nothing in common with.

  Then she moved from her draped pose into his line of sight, allowing him to take a sharp breath. Blonde, buxom, bold. Her eyes had to have violet contacts in them because irises of that colour were unnatural. Her lipstick was so bright, it clashed with her eyes. Not a woman to trust.

  He turned to Tris and widened his eyes, hoping Tris would help with memory joggers.

  Surely he’d remember most of the girls he’d known in high school? Although this girl was making a mockery of his memory. Maybe she looked different back then? A decade could change someone a lot.

  Tris’s lips twisted into a grin. ‘Looks like he has no clue who you are, Chantelle.’

  Before he could say anything to this Chantelle, her gaze moved beyond him and her lip curled. The superficially beautiful face became something else entirely. Those violet eyes squinted and looked feral. The plump red lips thinned as they curled and her nose wrinkled. It wasn’t a good look for her.

  ‘Dad.’ Gar’s yelp had Quin spinning around.

  For a second he couldn’t work out why Mr Kennedy’s presence would have caused the reaction in Chantelle, and then he saw the movement behind. Cress’s arm, then leg, then body burst through the crowd. Quin smiled as his stomach eased.

  He turned back to the table just as Chantelle slid her hand over his, red talons tapping on his fingers. ‘You and I have some unfinished business, Quin Fitzpatrick.’ Her voice was like a snarl in his ear, although he figured she probably thought it was sexy and breathy and irresistible.

  ‘I don’t have a clue who you are,’ Quin said as he pulled his hand from beneath hers and made room for Cress, Ollie and their dad. His move was deliberately away from the woman. ‘Glad you made it.’ He grinned at the newcomers and his chest eased when Cress sat closest to him. His armour was in place.

  Cress looked between him and Chantelle and then back to him. It was a slow and deliberate look, as if she was trying to work something out. ‘Chantelle,’ she said, ‘how have you been?’

  ‘Fine. You?’

  Cress grinned. ‘Absolutely loving Sydney. Quin’s taken me to so many of the touristy sites in our spare time.’ She slid her arm through his and he clung.

  Chantelle made a sound in the back of her throat and turned away. She’d taken five steps before Quin worked out who she was.

  ‘That’s Chantelle you used to play footy with?’ Quin knew his voice was the wrong pitch, making the wrong sounds.

  Cress nodded
then shrugged. ‘She didn’t play footy much in high school.’

  Unable to recognise the young Chantelle in this version, Quin kept staring at Cress until Damo jabbed at him.

  ‘You’re in luck.’

  ‘Huh?’ It was all the sound Quin could make.

  ‘She has unfinished business with you.’ Damo sniggered.

  Quin must have stared blankly at Damo because Gar jumped in to explain. ‘She’s been with everyone in town.’ When Ollie cleared his throat, Gar amended his words. ‘Except us. We’re like her brothers. Of course.’ There was such a false note to that. Quin wasn’t sure if they were trying to hide it from their father or sister, but he’d bet they’d both know it for false too.

  ‘What did you leave unfinished with her, Quin?’ Damo couldn’t seem to get his mind out of the gutter.

  ‘Puberty?’ Quin paused and ran his fingers through his hair.

  ‘What?’ Damo wasn’t letting this go easily.

  ‘I haven’t seen her since before she hit puberty.’

  Except for Cress, they all snorted, and as elbows dug into each other, their laughter became more real. Cress’s dad was the one who took control of the situation just before Quin thought he’d yell at them all.

  ‘Beers all around?’ Mr Kennedy asked.

  ‘Water, thanks,’ Cress answered over her brothers cheering.

  Quin snapped his gaze at Cress and then back to Mr Kennedy. ‘For me too, please.’

  ‘You okay?’ Cress asked when the others’ attention was on the bar. He gave a nod, not quite trusting his words. Her arm had slipped away from his at some stage, but her fingers rested lightly against his thigh. Safety. Comfort.

  As the night went on, he relaxed a little more. But as more girls came up and decorated the Kennedy boys, he found he couldn’t laugh, or breathe easily, even with Cress’s protective shield.

  She knew he was in trouble but she didn’t push. A couple of times she’d flinched as if to move and he’d grasped her, harder than he wanted to, and she’d stayed. Mostly her hand rubbed along his thigh in confident, calming strokes. He had to talk to her. Explain. He owed her that.

  He’d been hoping it could wait until they were driving to Sydney but he had to get out of the place. His chest was tight, his heart rate elevated, his stomach knotted firmly, and if he left this any longer he’d have a full-blown panic attack.

  ‘Want to head outside?’ He had his mouth against her ear when he asked, and she jumped. Then she glanced across at him and nodded. ‘We’re heading for fresh air.’ He made the announcement to the table, hoping no one would want to join them but he needed to explain why he was running away with Watercress.

  She grasped his hand and led the way through the crowded pub, nodding, smiling and murmuring to people, but never stopping. More importantly, she didn’t let go of his hand. When they burst out into the fresh, warm, night air, he gulped it in.

  They walked down the street a bit and then across the road onto the grassy stretch but she didn’t stop, she kept walking further and further away from the pub until there was only the faint sound of music.

  When she came to a halt, under a few trees, she let go of his hand and faced him. ‘Are you okay?’

  His head shook as he caught her hand in his, both of his. One hand held hers and the other twisted and stroked her fingers. She didn’t pull away. She didn’t ask anything else. She let him stand there, gathering his thoughts.

  He wanted to gather her against him and hold her tight, like a pillow against his chest, but what he was going to say wasn’t something where she’d want to be that close to him.

  ‘At the end of the season, I did something really stupid.’ He held her fingers and didn’t know how to go on.

  ‘Hmmm.’ Her whisper was soft and held the exact amount of care and concern so that it acted like a balm.

  ‘We went out, a bunch of us, commiserating. We got drunk.’ He shook his head, squeezed her fingers. ‘Really drunk.’

  He half-turned away, staring into the darkness as memory washed him. He clung to the connection he had with her, hoping she’d keep him from becoming lost in his memories.

  ‘The guys must have left but I don’t really remember. It’s no excuse. I should have known better than to drink so much.’ He gulped, her fingers curled around his. It helped him continue. ‘I ended up with a bunch of blokes I didn’t know and women were dripping off us. Then I saw this one woman taking photos, of us.’ His whole body shook. He couldn’t control his shaking. His stomach curled, twisted, threatened to leap from him. ‘Of me.’

  Watercress burrowed against him. His stomach felt her warmth and eased a tad. He crushed her against him and held on. ‘She had photos and video. Stuff that could have been used to … to …’

  ‘To hurt you.’ Her offering of words was too kind.

  If he had any strength he’d push her away and tell her she shouldn’t be so understanding. He’d had it drummed into him for at least the eight years he’d been in Sydney that he had to protect himself by maintaining control, having a whiter than snow approach to life. He should have known better.

  ‘How did you manage it?’

  ‘Badly.’ Watercress stiffened and he let her go. ‘Violently.’ The last word was a rough whisper he wished lost in the dark.

  Hands caught his arms. Strong, powerful hands that gripped him and shook him so hard he snapped out of whatever horror his mind had fallen into. ‘No, you didn’t.’ The words were fired at him. Snapping.

  He focused his gaze on Cress and realised she wasn’t repulsed. Nor was she questioning him. She was flat-out denying his words. Her gaze shone in the moonlight and it was like blue steel.

  ‘You would never have hurt her.’ Again. Steel.

  ‘I smashed her phone.’ He tried to turn away but hands held him firm. ‘Cress, I ground her phone beneath my heel. I tore her SIM card out. I took it all with me. I didn’t think. Fury vibrated through me and I couldn’t think. Everything was red.’

  ‘How much money did you throw on the table as you left?’

  ‘Everything I had in my wallet. Maybe a few hundred bucks, maybe more. I just don’t know. I don’t know.’ His body shook still. His heart was icy. His throat burned. And he couldn’t move.

  It seemed forever before the vices eased on his forearms. Warmth against his torso slowly sunk into his mind, easing the icy fear the memories had brought back. He became conscious of eucalyptus, dust, summer and Watercress.

  She was tucked beneath his chin, hanging on to him as if her grasp was all that was keeping him on earth. It was overly melodramatic to think that. His world had become like that. One stupid night and he’d become a melodrama. Almost a disaster. He rested his chin on the top of her head, closed his eyes and drew in a breath.

  Hang on.

  ‘I hadn’t told you that. No one knows.’ A fist seemed to close on his heart. ‘How did you know I left money?’

  ‘I know you.’ She tipped her head back and looked at him. ‘You wouldn’t have broken something and not fixed it or paid for it.’ Then she tipped her head to the side. ‘She knew who you were. She could have chased you up any time.’

  Quin frowned.

  ‘You must have left enough money to cover her loss.’

  Quin’s eyebrows lifted.

  ‘She’d have found you if you owed her anything.’ She paused. ‘The group who were there would never have let you leave if you owed them anything.’

  He stared and let Cress’s logic soak into his brain. He’d holidayed overseas, driving across the United States to hide while trying to work it all out … and his fears were unfounded?

  No.

  He wasn’t that irrational.

  Was he?

  The guys he’d been with …

  Damn.

  They’d set him up. They must have. They’d been mates of teammates, an ex-teammate who’d been sacked. Payback? Quin shook his head. He didn’t think that was possible. But there wasn’t another explanation, was
there?

  ‘I think I was set up, Watercress.’

  She curled into him tighter. ‘It happens. Jealousy. Fear. Anger. It happens.’

  He heard the words and nodded.

  They stood hugging each other tightly.

  ‘Thanks for telling me, Quin. I was worried.’ His Watercress was cute when she worried.

  ‘You must think I’m the biggest drama queen.’ Cress snorted, and there was definitely amusement in that snort. ‘I couldn’t get it out of my head, couldn’t get it straight in my head, and how do I tell that to a teammate? At best, no one would trust me, and the worst, I’d have lost my career.’

  ‘Excuse me, Drama Queen,’ Cress stepped back and grinned. ‘A mate would have known that you wouldn’t have deliberately hurt anyone.’ The last bit was said in all seriousness, even if she was still grinning.

  ‘How could anyone be sure of that?’

  ‘I am.’ The way she said that left him no room to argue. She was certain. Solid. The words held such force and strength.

  He didn’t have this. Family fighting in his corner. Cress had learned from her brothers. He was honoured to have it extended to include him, but it didn’t ease his inner turmoil around Cress. Sometimes he was comfortable in his big-brother-protector role, and other times he wanted to shred that along with her clothes.

  No. He wasn’t thinking about her naked now. Not when it was dark, they were alone, and she’d just revealed her complete belief in him.

  She grabbed him by the jaw, fingers digging into the soft flesh around his bone so she held him in a pistol grip he couldn’t easily break from. ‘The next time you get yourself lost in your head, Quinlan Fitzpatrick, if you don’t talk to me, I’m going to be very mad at you.’

  His lips twitched. She was a ferocious wild cat sometimes. He tried to nod, hoping the sincerity would come through his gaze, since he could hardly move his head. She was right there, in his face, and his mouth moved to capture hers before he could think through his action.

  He didn’t need to think. When her lips met his, they softened and took every sensible thought from his mind. His hands wrapped around her hips, pulling her close, as her hand slid from his jaw into his hair and the other curled around the back of his neck.