by Margaret Way
“That’s okay. I’ll wait,” Tali answered cheerfully. “I don’t have a lot of friends, Livia,” she said. “My friend Danny comes closest. The other kids at school are just little kids, pretty dumb. But I’d like to be friends with you, Livia, Nona told me a long time ago Daddy was madly—”
“Daddy will be hoppin’ mad in a moment.” Jason chopped her off crisply. “This subject is best left alone, Tali. I’ll be having a word with Nona.”
“You know Nona, don’t you, Livia?” Tali pulled on Olivia’s hand. “She’s amazing. She’s supposed to be an old lady but she doesn’t have a line on her face.”
“Italians are a very handsome race,” Olivia said. “Your father inherited the golden skin.”
“Daddy’s very handsome.” Tali nodded proudly. “Danny’s big sister reckons Dad takes her breath away.” Tali shrieked with laughter. “I can speak Italian,” she announced, breaking into a fluent, melodious stream.
Before she realized it, Olivia had turned to smile at Jason. A moment of pure radiance and accord.
He sucked in his breath as a flood of unimaginable longing rushed through him. To gain time he looked down at Tali saying a few words to her in the same tongue. Only then did he manage to speak to Olivia, his tone perfectly steady. “As you can hear Tali’s bilingual. She’s begging you to come with us. That’s the thrust of it.”
“You can ride your lovely horse, Livia,” Tali decided, her face bright with happiness. “Dad and me—”
“Dad and I—” Jason corrected.
“Dad and I will take the ute. It’s not far. Let’s go. I’m hungry.”
Whatever Jason had said regarding the lack of communication between Megan and her child Olivia thought Tali had to be missing her mother greatly. Proof seemed to be in the way Tali was interacting with her. They had only just met yet the little girl was as comfortable and relaxed around her as if she had known Olivia all her life. Of course it was well known children did take great fancies to certain people. She had experienced it with her own pupils.
“This is our house!” Tali the very picture of animation came running out to welcome Olivia when she arrived. She took Olivia’s hand urging her up the short flight of steps to the shady porch with its white wicker furniture and hanging baskets of yellow alamanda. “Nona comes over once in a while,” she chatted excitedly. “She has her own room and her own bed. Sometimes she puts a big sign that says Do Not Disturb on the door. She likes to take a nap. She likes to do the washing too but Daddy says she doesn’t have to. Daddy did all the painting. Do you want to see?”
Olivia smiled at the child. Outwardly her manner was gentle and friendly but inside she was experiencing a near overwhelming sense of defeat. It was as though Jason and his little girl had outmanoeuvred her by getting her here.
They were inside the bungalow where Olivia noted at once Jason had knocked down a wall so the old kitchen, parlour had become one open-plan area. It was amazing what a difference it had made. The colours on the outside continued inside, yellow, white, turquoise and sage-green. It was very attractive. In fact a transformation from the house she remembered.
“So what are we going to have?” Jason asked with rueful charm, watching Tali take charge of their visitor, her small face lit up, her eyes sparkling.
“You really don’t have to bother with anything for me,” Olivia said. “A cup of coffee will do nicely if you’ve got it.”
One brow shot up. “Got it! What do you mean, got it? You haven’t forgotten my Italian blood, have you, Liv?”
“I promise you I haven’t, Jason,” she countered not altogether successful at masking the sarcasm. “It was just a throwaway line.”
“Make sandwiches, Daddy,” Tali suggested brightly. “Daddy always gives me sandwiches for school lunch and some fruit, Livia. I tell him I hate bananas but he says they’re good for me.”
“They’re good with peanut paste,” Olivia remarked.
Tali dimpled. “What in sandwiches?”
“Yes, sandwiches,” Olivia said. “There was a famous rock star who loved peanut butter and banana sandwiches.”
Tali nodded. “Okay, then, I’ll have banana and peanut paste sandwiches, Dad. Livia will have—” Tali rocked back on her heels staring up at Olivia. “Chicken and avocado. You’ll like that, Livia. Dad is always feeding me but my mum didn’t feed me. She used to forget. She hated cooking. She’s never coming home.”
Olivia felt an almost physical stab of sorrow. She touched the little girl’s shoulder gently. “I’m very sorry, Tali. You must miss her?”
Tali’s mouth curved into a wide, wicked grin. “No way!” she exclaimed, putting a lot of feeling into the words. “She used to smack me, real hard. She called me a goddamn nuisance.”
“Okay, Tali.” Jason moved purposefully out of the kitchen. He gave his daughter an admonishing look. “That will do. Olivia doesn’t want to know.”
“I thought she did,” said Tali with an air of puzzlement. “Nona has been talking and talking. She said Livia was bound to find out everything. Nona says my mother stole Daddy off you.” Tali squeezed Olivia’s hand sympathetically.
To Olivia it was a direct hit to the heart, but her expression remained perfectly calm.
“So much for telling you to stop, Tali,” Jason said, directing a I-mean-business frown at his daughter.
“What should I say?” Tali asked reasonably.
“Weren’t you going to show me the house,” Olivia intervened, glancing down the corridor.
Immediately Tali adopted the role of hostess. “I’m dying to show you,” she said. “Come with me. Nona says Daddy is much too young to be on his own,” she confided as they moved away. “I can’t believe he didn’t marry you, Livia. You’re so beautiful. I’ve never seen anyone with your colour eyes. Are they silver?”
Oh Tali! Jason agonised left alone. At the same time he had to concede it could have been worse. Tali brought him undone every time. The trouble was he couldn’t stop her talking her head off. It was all Renata’s fault. She spent her time filling Tali’s ears with family history going way back—informing him with many pokes in the chest Tali deserved to know.
Not at six going on seven she didn’t. Who knows what Tali was saying to Olivia now. He could see the tender hearted reaction of the Olivia of old when Tali told her in no uncertain terms she didn’t miss her mother. The sad thing was she was telling the plain truth. Sadder yet Tali remembered.
Inside her bedroom Tali made a dive for the bed. “I just love what Daddy has done to my room!” she cried, brimming over with happiness.
“If I was six years old I’d want a bedroom just like this,” Olivia said looking around the room. It was delightful but not overly frilly. Tali wasn’t the frilly type. Jason had settled for the pale yellow trim, she noticed. She had to say it went well with the soft eggshell-blue of the walls.
“Nona made the curtains and the bedspread,” Tali announced proudly. “Nona told me she learned to sew when she was four and her mama used to prop her up so she wouldn’t fall asleep. Nona’s been sewing all her life. Daddy said she’s a real professional.”
“She always was very clever with her hands.” Olivia admired the curtains and the bedspread. The fabric was very attractive matching the colours of the room. There were four small botanicals prints of fruit and flowers on the wall; a bookcase filled with children’s books, a soft blue and white rug on the polished floor and a large white painted blanket box presumably to hold toys at the end of the bed.
Tali, lolling on the bed, clapped her hands. “Of course!” she cried as though she had suddenly made a discovery. “You know Nona don’t you? You would have known my grandma who died.”
“I knew all your family, Tali,” Olivia said quietly. “I’m very sorry you lost your grandmother. She had a lovely name, Antonella. She was a lovely lady.”
Tali nodded, looking at Olivia with big curious blue eyes. “Are you still sad, Livia? You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.�
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“About what, Tali?” Olivia asked, knowing full well what the child was referring to.
“About Daddy!” Instead of speaking the words Tali decided to sing them with a perfect closing cadence. No doubt Nona again. At one time there had been no end to the operatic arias Renata had sent floating sometimes howling around the district. The more violent the tragedy, the better.
“You’re smiling,” Tali said. “You have a lovely smile yet sometimes you look so sad.”
“I was thinking of your nona and the way she was always singing,” Olivia said.
“She still does,” Tali told her and grinned. “Nona said when she was young and beautiful she was almost as good as the great Renata Tebaldi, her namesake.”
“I don’t think Nona ever had a real chance,” Olivia said.
“Neither did you,” Tali decided in her own mind. “You didn’t tell me…are you still sad about Daddy?”
“No, Tali,” Olivia told the child firmly, shaking her head. “That was a long time ago. I’m fine.”
“That’s good,” said Tali, springing off the bed. “I don’t want you to be sad.”
When they returned to the kitchen, the wonderful aroma of coffee spiked the air. Olivia realized she was looking forward to a cup. Three plates of sandwiches had been set on the circular pine table with a big bowl of citrus fruit in the middle, a tall glass of flavoured milk for Tali.
“Any more amazing disclosures?” Jason asked with a lopsided smile.
Tali winked at Olivia. “Not telling.”
“Really?” Jason cocked a brow. “Yeah, well, we’ll see. Eat up, girls. I have to get back to work.”
Olivia looked her concern. “What happens to Tali, now it’s the school holidays?”
“She comes with me sometimes.” Jason met Olivia’s eyes sardonically. “But mostly she goes to Nona who has a really, really bad habit of filling Tali’s ears with inappropriate gossip. It’s difficult when she’s not at school.”
“I hate school,” Tali said. “The kid beside me is always whingin’ and whingin’ feeling sorry for herself and lookin’ at my book. I’m smart, I’m inclined to be bossy, but I have a bright personality. That’s what it said on my report. I’m going over to my friend Danny’s place this afternoon,” she told Olivia happily. “We’re going to watch a video. It’s one I’ve already seen but I want to watch it again.” Tali broke off briefly to bite into her peanut paste and mashed banana sandwich coming up with a verdict. “This is just the sort of sandwich I like. I might keep one and share it with Danny.”
They had scarcely finished the light snack when a red hatchback pulled up at the front gate. “That’s Michelle,” Tali said, running to the door. “She’ll come in, so you’ll be able to meet her, Livia. She likes to see Daddy. Danny is in the back. They’re both coming. Michelle is really nice, so’s Danny’s mum. I’ve stayed over a few times. She kisses me good night just like she does Danny. I guess she feels sorry for me.”
There was nothing else for it but to meet Michelle and Tali’s little pal, Danny. Things could very quickly get out of hand with children around Olivia thought wryly. Already she felt protective of Jason’s little daughter which surely created a problem. Tali’s well being would affect her decision. If she let it.
Danny was a wiry little boy with a shock of brown hair and big brown eyes. His sister Michelle looked no more than sixteen, cheerleader cute, with the same brown hair and brown eyes, white teeth, big smile, voice trilling as she greeted Jason. She was wearing a very skimpy pink sundress that showed off her pert little breasts and golden tanned limbs to perfection. It would have been obvious to the visually challenged that Michelle had a serious fixation on Jason who would arouse lust in any female Olivia thought with the inevitable tinge of bitterness.
Introductions were made. Michelle looked at her as though she’d come straight from another planet. Danny gulped a hello before swerving right back out the door again. Olivia remembered the family. She vaguely remembered Michelle looking much like Danny did now.
“Danny’s shy,” Tali told Olivia sounding ten times her age. “Actually I don’t really feel like leaving you—”
“Go off and enjoy yourself,” Olivia said with smiling firmness.
“Can I see you again?” Tali looked up anxiously.
“Of course you can.”
That earned Olivia a big hug.
Jason walked out with the small party to see them to the car while Michelle trotted alongside, no doubt drowning in his blue eyes.
Hot was the word for Jason Corey even with a six-year-old daughter in tow.
“Hell!” he breathed, when he returned to the living room.
“Dear oh dear! Have you discovered Michelle has a crush on you?”
He looked straight at her, his tan making his blue eyes look even bluer than they already were. “No need to make it sound like it’s my fault. She’s a kid. A schoolgirl.”
“I seem to remember you kissing me plenty when I was a schoolgirl. That’s before you smashed up my life. I used to be wild about you.”
“That’s interesting. Used to be?” There was a sensual line to his mouth
“Until you got caught out.”
“My experience of hell,” he said bleakly.
“Hell, was it?” Olivia picked up her white panama and shoved it on her head. “Serves you right!” She walked past him, every nerve-ending in her body jangling. “Thank you for the coffee and the sandwiches. I must go.”
“I have an afternoon of hard work in front of me as well,” he said, following her out onto the porch. “I’ve worked my butt off these past two years, Olivia.”
“I bet Harry paid you plenty!”
“Bit of a bitch, aren’t you?” Blue flames danced in his eyes.
“I never used to be,” she said strongly. “I never knew you were going to be on Havilah, Jason. Harry kept me totally in the dark. I happen to find that a betrayal.”
“Do you?” His gaze swept her contemptuously. “Then think of the strain on Harry having to live a lie. He loved you so much he didn’t want to upset you. You never came home. Do you know how much he longed for you to come home? He had to visit you.”
“He didn’t have to hire you!” she burst out furiously. “You have to take responsibility for your actions, Jason.”
“I thought I was doing just that. It’s not easy rearing a child without its mother. Every child needs its mother for goodness’ sake!”
“If Megan was such a poor mother she needed help. Perhaps counselling.”
“I don’t believe all the counselling in the world would have changed her. She wasn’t cut out to be a mother, Olivia.”
“You should have realized that a bit earlier,” she countered.
“You don’t forgive easily, do you?” he said, when the pause stretched too long. “Okay I understand that. Have you made any decision yet? I need to know, I’ll have to make plans.”
“Harry’s wishes are easily challenged, Jason.” Flags of colour were flying in her cheeks. Where he was, heat gathered. Sexual tension.
“Tell me something I don’t know.” He shrugged. “I’m not good at conflict, Liv. I never have been. You want me out, I’ll go.”
“I do want you out, Jason.” Her words were so sharp they could have cut flesh. But then she was under the challenge of his presence. “I don’t want to see you or hear your voice. Only your absence will heal my heart.”
“You don’t think I’ve suffered enough?”
His blue eyes were a glory. She feared to look into them, instead she breathed in the garden’s perfume. It soothed her. “I know I’m being cruel but I can’t help it. It was no quarrel we had, Jason, something we could patch up. It was life shattering.”
“As though that hasn’t sunk in in a thousand ways! Look at me, Olivia, before you start throwing your daggers. I hurt us all. I know that. I hurt you. I hurt Megan who’s run so far away. I hurt myself perhaps most of all. You can’t ignore that. Would you reall
y throw your life away to spite me?” he demanded. “What are you frightened of, Olivia? That all the old feelings will rise up again? You didn’t fight me when I kissed you the other day. The old flame reignited. It will never die. It’s like a brand. Does it shame you that you still have feelings for me?”
Her whole body tensed as she let her old grieves and antagonisms unwind. “You lost your right to question me, Jason. When you fell into Megan Duffy’s arms you ceased to think of me. You left me bitter and bereft. Don’t ever imagine I’ll allow you the opportunity to destroy me again.”
Jason’s response couldn’t have been more emphatic. His own overpowering emotions cut in. He could still feel the anguish of yesterday, the sense of entrapment. He had lived with Megan as his wife for four long unhappy years. Four years that weighted heavily on him. Four years of eternity. “Drown in your misery, Liv,” he said harshly. “I no longer care. All I care about is Tali. She loves it here, I’ve made a home for her. She has her nona close by, and she’s beginning to make friends.”
Olivia, her eyes blinded by tears, started to walk down the steps, her heart beating so quickly it was an actual pain behind her ribs. She fought for control, grateful for the sun glasses she’d shoved onto her nose. The fact she still loved him was a secret only she had to know. She turned back momentarily, her light eyes a crystal flash. “I have a sense of commitment to all children, Jason. That was one reason I became a teacher and I’m a good one. You dishonoured me years ago. You disgraced yourself. I know you’ve suffered, but so have I. My feelings for you demand you go out of my life. It’s not a perfect world.”
“What a bloody awful thing to say!” He caught hold of the timber railing staring down at her. A veritable storm of emotion had come out of the thin air.
Olivia continued, her voice tight. “My feelings for you however, don’t extend to your little daughter. For her sake, you can stay, Jason Corey!”
Up on the porch Jason made a huge effort to control his temper. He wanted to take the steps at one leap, grab hold of her and shake her until her teeth rattled. He craved her so much it frightened him. “Olivia, you’re a saint,” he called in a hard, mocking voice. “I bet you think that decision alone will get you into heaven.”
