‘Meg!’ Maureen, her next-door neighbour, was wearing a pink swimming costume and a life vest. She’d been helping Meg supervise the splashing competition for the toddlers, and had taken a break for some much-needed morning coffee. Now she’d returned, holding Meg’s phone. ‘Your phone? Thought so. It’s ringing. Your turn for a break.’
It’d be Henry. Drat, she’d almost missed him.
She loved their calls. Somehow it still seemed important that she be a part of his life. It still seemed important that Henry be part of hers.
They video-called most days, talking of nothing and everything. School. What he’d found on the beach. What sort of fish the guys she took out on the charters had caught that day. Even trivial stuff like the new type of chocolate-chip cookie Matt’s cook had made.
‘What’s your cook’s name?’ Meg had asked and Henry had hesitated before answering.
‘Her name’s Esther but I’m not supposed to know,’ he’d told her. ‘Matt says don’t disturb the staff. It’s better that way.’
‘Really?’ That had been a gut clencher. If she were there...
She wasn’t there. She’d walked away from being part of Henry’s life, of Matt’s life.
Her life was here and life was okay. She shook herself free of seawater and took the phone from Maureen.
‘Henry?’
‘It’s Matt,’ the voice on the other end of the line said. ‘Happy Christmas.’
Matt. It was almost a month since she’d talked to him. It was almost—what?—ten minutes since she’d thought of him.
‘H-happy Christmas.’ He still had the power to take her breath away. ‘I... Thank you.’ And then her breath caught. This was Henry’s phone. ‘Is anything wrong?’
‘Nothing’s wrong,’ he said quickly. ‘Henry was about to phone when his new puppy escaped with the Christmas beanie Peggy’s knitted for him. It has a red pompom on top and if that’s not asking for trouble I don’t know what is. Peggy and Henry are currently chasing one cocker spaniel puppy across the lawn. Stretchie’s helping. I don’t like the beanie’s chances.’
‘Oh...’ she gasped and then choked on laughter. ‘A puppy. What a gorgeous idea. Was that your Christmas gift to him?’
‘It was,’ he told her. ‘Made more complicated by Henry’s insistence that Christmas gifts aren’t given until after Christmas pudding. It’s very hard to hide a puppy until after pudding.’
‘I bet it is. Well done, you. Did Esther help?’
‘Esther?’
‘Your cook,’ she told him. ‘Henry says she’s great.’
‘She did help,’ he said cautiously. ‘Henry told you about Esther?’
‘He did, and also about your edict about not getting to know the staff. What’s that about?’ She was standing knee deep in the shallows, surveying her Nippers, and she was feeling strange. Commenting on Matt’s lifestyle? She had no right, but strangely it felt appropriate.
‘If you get to know the staff it hurts when they leave,’ Matt said and that was enough to give her pause. To make her think.
‘Is that what you learned?’ she said. ‘When you were a kid?’
‘It doesn’t... We weren’t talking about me.’
‘I guess that’s not what you phoned to talk about,’ she agreed. ‘It doesn’t fit inside the Matt McLellan boundaries.’
‘Meg...’
‘Sorry.’ She sighed. ‘That was uncalled for. It’s not my business. You’d have thought I’d have learned by now. Are you having a good Christmas?’
‘We are.’
‘Who’s there?’
‘Peggy and Henry.’
‘Not Steven?’
‘He sent Henry a very expensive construction kit.’
‘Bully for Steven. He gets boundaries, too.’
‘Do you need to sound so cynical?’
She caught herself. ‘Sorry. I don’t mean to. It’s just a different way of life from the one I’m used to.’
‘So who did you share Christmas with?’ he said, and she heard a trace of cynicism in his voice. Like ‘pot calling the kettle black’ cynicism.
‘Lots of people,’ she said diffidently.
‘Really?’
And that had her arcing up. She knew criticism when she heard it.
‘Really,’ she snapped. ‘I’m not dependent on Matt McLellan for company. Maureen came over for Christmas morning eggnog. Then we had a massive barbecue on the beach. Maureen’s kids and grandkids. Two of the charter boat guys. Charlie’s ex-wife and her new husband—she’s done so much better than Charlie. Their kids. And food... The best seafood ever. You might have a professional cook, but we can catch crayfish half an hour from our front door. And pavlova. There are raspberries on Maureen’s bushes and one of her kids has a cow. Fresh cream. Beat that, Matt McLellan.’
‘I guess I can’t,’ he said weakly. ‘It sounds great.’
‘It was great.’
‘So you’re not lonely?’
‘How can I be lonely?’ She stood in the shallows and looked around her, at the community she loved, at the community she was part of.
‘Matt, this is a video call,’ she told him. ‘Can you turn your camera on?’
And she flicked the video icon on her phone and turned the camera to the scene around her.
Maureen was in the water covered with toddlers. A bunch of learner bodyboarders were in the shallows. Older Nippers were organised into swimming races around buoys set further out. Mums and dads talked or snoozed on the beach. Boof was digging a hole to China with a couple of other dogs helping.
She turned her phone to show her feet in the water and she kicked, a splash that was pretty much defiance.
‘These are my people,’ she said. ‘I’m having fun.’
‘I didn’t ask that, though,’ Matt said slowly. ‘Meg, I asked if you’re lonely.’
Oh, help. Heaven preserve her from a perceptive male.
‘I’m less lonely than I would be at McLellan Place,’ she told him. ‘Being a part-time wife.’
‘Meg, I love you.’
There went her breath again. How was she expected to breathe when he said things like that?
I love you.
Why was he saying it now?
‘How can you say that when you have all those boundaries?’ she managed. ‘You can’t just love at weekends. It doesn’t work like that.’
Silence.
He’d turned his camera on as well, and she could see him. It was almost like talking face-to-face. Matt was dressed for Christmas in winter, in a crimson sweater and classy trousers. His dark hair was neat, beautifully groomed.
She was dressed for messy Christmas in summer. Bikini. Salt water. Not a lot else.
She swiped a dripping curl from her forehead.
Matt looked... Matt looked.
Focus on boundaries, she told herself. She needed to think of them. She couldn’t live with them, no matter how sexy this guy looked. No matter how much her heart lurched every time she saw him.
‘Some boundaries are necessary,’ Matt said at last. ‘Meg, you know I’m happy to share. I wouldn’t have boundaries with you.’
‘But you’d keep those gates locked. You’d advise me not to get to know your cook.’
‘It works.’
‘Not for me it doesn’t.’ She turned her camera back to the splashy toddlers. ‘This is fun. Where’s the fun for you, Matt McLellan?’
‘I want you.’ It was a guttural response, almost primeval in its intensity. It made her take a step back. It almost made her click Disconnect.
Why? Because it evoked an answer in her that was stronger than any echo.
I want you.
She looked at her screen, into his dark, troubled eyes, and she thought it was just as well she was on the other side of the world. I
f he were here, if he were to take her into his arms...
He wouldn’t. Or maybe he would, but only if it fitted into the time slots he had available.
‘I know you do,’ she managed at last. Maureen was looking up from where she was crouched in the shallows with their splashing toddlers. Seeing her distress? She needed to finish this conversation and get back to what really mattered. Rowan Bay Boxing Day. Community. Life.
‘It’s the best compliment I’ve ever been paid,’ she whispered. ‘You loving me. But it won’t work. Not while you don’t know your cook’s name.’
‘I do know her name.’
‘You know what I mean.’
‘Meg...’
‘Give my love to Henry,’ she said sadly. ‘And to Peggy. Tell Henry I’ll head inside and ring him at about seven tonight, your time. I need to see his puppy. Will you be staying with him for much longer?’
‘Until New Year. Meg, what do you expect me to do? I can’t—’
‘I don’t expect you to do anything,’ she told him. ‘I understand. There’s nothing either of us can do. I love you, Matt, but there’s the problem. You have your boundaries you can’t cross, and I can’t cross them, either.’
* * *
He stared at the blank screen. Then he swore and shoved the phone onto the table so hard it slid across the shining surface and landed on the floor beyond.
Then he thought, uh-oh, that was Henry’s phone.
Thankfully, it wasn’t broken.
If it’d been his, would he have cared?
Of course he would. His phone was his link to his world. Those days at sea when he’d been out of contact had been a disaster. At least one multimillion-dollar contract had fallen over because of it.
But he’d been with Meg.
He stared down at the blank screen of Henry’s phone and the thing almost mocked him. Two minutes ago it had been filled with life, with laughter. With Meg.
If he’d used his own high-tech phone he could have recorded. He could be playing it back right now.
He could be showing himself pictures of a woman who was nothing to do with him, of a life he wasn’t part of.
He stood, silent, letting his thoughts go where they willed.
Outside Henry and Peggy were engaged in a silly game with Stretchie and the yet-unnamed puppy. They were rolling on the grass.
It was December. The grass was wet. They’d be soaked.
Peggy wouldn’t care. All she wanted was for her grandson to be happy. He watched her giggling with Henry, and he thought, She’s shed ten years.
She’d abandoned her island. She’d abandoned her life to keep her grandson happy.
He’d asked Meg to do the same and she’d refused.
The screen was still blank. He closed his eyes and it was filled again, with Meg, with a beach crowded with kids, dogs, laughter. Life.
Meg.
Their conversation was being replayed. A repetitive loop.
And suddenly the loop seemed to tighten, focusing on two statements.
I asked if you’re lonely.
I’m less lonely than I would be at McLellan Place. Being a part-time wife.
That was an admission, he thought. She was lonely.
So what? It didn’t mean she was missing him.
But if it did? How could he persuade her...?
He couldn’t. She’d made her decision. She couldn’t fit into his lifestyle.
The thought of her was still with him, the sight of her splashing in the shallows.
Meg.
He wanted her.
The feeling was suddenly a hunger so vast he had to open his eyes and steady himself. His foundations seemed to be disappearing, leaving him foundering.
And it wasn’t just Meg.
He stared back out of the window. It was almost dark and starting to rain, just drizzle but enough for sensible people to run for cover. Henry and Peggy hadn’t noticed. They were entranced, having fun, not caring about minor details such as wet clothes.
Peggy... Seventy-six years old.
The only thing she’d care about was if she lost Henry, he thought. She’d do anything to prevent that, and he’d help her. Once the adoption went through they’d be safe together.
So he was fighting for Henry and Peggy.
What about Meg?
He thought back to what she’d said. You have your boundaries.
Who didn’t? He had to have boundaries to survive.
Peggy didn’t have boundaries.
And neither did Meg, he conceded. She’d opened her home, opened her heart to Peggy and Henry. He had no doubt that if Steven hadn’t intervened that was where Peggy and Henry would be. Sharing Christmas at Rowan Bay.
That was where he wanted to be.
Not possible.
Why not?
For a million reasons, he thought.
Name them.
Right. First, Steven would never agree. Steven had met the idea of adoption with initial consent, but Matt knew that a part of his reaction to his small son was his need for public approval. The story of Amanda’s death and Steven’s surprise parentage had filtered through the circles they moved in. Denying responsibility didn’t fit Steven’s self-image. Nor would sending Henry to Australia. If it was hinted at, the adoption would be off.
It couldn’t be done.
So... Taking Peggy and Henry to Rowan Bay was problematic.
But him?
Taking himself to Rowan Bay?
What would he do with himself? His business was here. His life was here.
And then he thought, Is business what I do or what I am?
It was Meg’s question, an accusation, echoing back to haunt him.
He looked again at Peggy and Henry. They were self-contained, gloriously happy with their dogs and their new life. They’d been delighted to see him when he’d arrived last night, they’d been even more delighted when he’d said he was staying for a week, but they didn’t need him. Neither of them had invited him outside with them. They’d be expecting him to return to his office, as he normally did when he was here.
They wouldn’t expect him to roll on wet grass.
Even if he did...it wasn’t who he was.
Who was he?
What was important to him?
It wasn’t a question he’d ever asked himself.
So ask it now.
This place was important to him, he conceded, this sheltered headland, this untouched beach. He’d fight for it.
This house? He looked around at the glamorous interior and conceded...not so much.
Peggy and Henry?
He glanced again at the pair outside and thought, yes, they’d become part of who he was. He’d fight for them, with every means at his disposal.
And his business? The massive financial world he lived in? He’d been bred to it. Its care had been ingrained from such an early age that he’d never questioned it.
Why?
Was it what he was?
The McLellan’s foundation did so much good. It employed so many. The thought of it crumbling was unthinkable.
It didn’t impress Meg.
And there she was again, front and centre. Meg.
He couldn’t go to her. She wouldn’t stay with him.
And then he paused as he heard the thought bubble.
She wouldn’t stay with him.
But he hadn’t asked her to stay with him. He’d asked her to fit in around the edges of what he was.
Of what he did.
Maybe Meg could be a part of who he was?
He closed his eyes again, letting his thoughts drift, to Meg as he’d just seen her, to a laughing, beautiful woman who’d taken the life she’d been given and accepted it with love and courage.
She
’d been falling in love with him. She’d said it, but she couldn’t love within his boundaries.
His world was shifting. Boundaries. Where were they and what was he protecting?
Himself?
A sudden flash of insight had him remembering Nanny Elspeth and the gardener who’d been sacked when he was small. He remembered the grief, the emptiness.
‘That’s what you’re afraid of.’ He said it out loud.
But then he glanced outside again, at Peggy, who’d taken herself off to her island in her own emptiness.
And Henry...
My friend Robbie at school says this place is like an island.
His world felt as if it were shifting.
Boundaries...
The French doors were suddenly flung open and a soaking Peggy and Henry and two sodden dogs burst into the room. Water scattered all over the parquet floor.
His parents would have had kittens.
But they’re boundaries, he told himself as Henry launched himself at him, bursting with excitement.
‘I’m going to call her Puddles because she loves splashing,’ he said excitedly. ‘She likes getting her nose wet. I bet she loves the beach.’
He thought suddenly of the turtles, of the nesting sites. That was how they were protected, with boundaries.
Or you figured another way.
‘We’ll need to train her to protect the turtle nesting sites,’ he found himself saying. ‘And not to chase the birds. We’ll need to watch her until she’s trained.’ And then he thought, We?
He couldn’t train a dog at weekends.
How many boundaries needed to disappear?
‘I’m good at watching,’ Henry said happily. ‘She’s a smart dog.’ And suddenly he wrapped his skinny, soggy arms around Matt’s body and Matt found he was lifting one small boy into his arms and holding. Hugging. Feeling Henry’s small body cradle to his, his face nestle into his neck.
Feeling boundaries start to crack.
And then it was done. Henry struggled to get down and whooped off toward the kitchen to tell Esther the news about Puddles’s new name. Esther. Not ‘the cook’.
Another boundary.
Cinderella and the Billionaire Page 16
