Shadows of the Past

by Frances Housden

  Franc put his hand over the top of his glass to prevent Maria’s brother, Andrea, filling it up. He was feeling far too melancholy and no amount of wine was going to cheer him up.

  The weight of Maria’s arm sat across his knees. He liked the feel of it, the warmth, the subtle ebb and flow of her muscles as she shifted against him and quirked an eyebrow in his direction, as if she’d sensed the change in his mood.

  What he needed was some fresh air and Maria, but not necessarily in that order.

  He caught her hand in his and tugged gently on her fingers as if to say, “Get up.”

  “Want to go for that walk you promised me?”

  “Sure, give me two minutes and I’ll meet you on the patio.”

  Franc watched her leave the room and edged his way through the piles of wrapping paper the children were collecting as they helped make room for the toys they wanted to play with. Santa had been generous this year.

  His mood lifted an inch or too as he realized Santa had already sent him a present. He’d recognized it the moment Maria entered the restaurant. The memory had simply got sidetracked as ineligible alongside all the problems facing Maria that he’d discovered later.

  Franc counted the paving stones as he slowly walked to the end of the patio to wait…eight, nine, ten, almost there. His gaze traveled the green, vine-striped horizon where it met up with the sea and sky as he turned to face the house. There were grape leaves as far as the eye could see, a fitting setting for his goddess.

  The sound of footsteps drew his glance and he turned to watch his Christmas gift arrive.

  “Where are you taking me? I could use some adventure.”

  Maria blinked up at him as his arm curved around her shoulder. “I thought we’d take in the vines and the view in that order. But, first we have to that path to a bridge that crosses the stream at the bottom. Unless you’d prefer to get your feet wet?”

  “Maybe later.” He grinned, looking down at his soft brown leather loafers. They teamed up with the loose-weave cotton shirt he had on, casual but smart. As for the rest, his tan chinos were the same as those her brothers wore.

  They’d only gone a few steps away from the patio when Franc pulled Maria’s arm around behind his waist, leaving his on her shoulders. Side by side, they traveled in silence until Franc said, “Sorry if I came across as unsociable toward the end of the gift giving. I started thinking about my family, and before I knew it, I’d dropped out of my comfort zone.”

  So that was his reason for the change in atmosphere she’d sensed. “Do you miss them?”

  “If you’d asked me yesterday, I’d have said no way. But that was yesterday. I also felt a bit embarrassed about the gifts.”

  “Ah, but mothers always cater for the unexpected. You can eat your chocolates and wear your socks with a clear conscience.”

  He patted his stomach. “Do you think I can chance it?”

  “If you mean has she poisoned you, you’re safe. But if you’re asking about putting on weight…” She let the answer hang a minute while she remembered the feel of his hard body covering hers. Color swept her face, and she tried to hide it by looking around him as she gently pinched his waist. “No problem there. You can take it.”

  “Glad I have your approval,” he said, lifting her chin till he could look straight into her eyes.

  What she saw in them made her heart leap. Suddenly she didn’t want to wait another day to discover how making love with Franc felt. The thought of having him inside her brought on an ache that intensified her longing. He leaned over and brushed his lips across hers, gently, sweet as fresh-picked grapes with the warmth of the sun on them, warmth that infused the whole of her body. She’d never in a million years imagined this floaty feeling as if her feet didn’t touch the ground.

  They walked a few more yards before she dredged a few words out of the knot in her throat. “Actually, you did me a favor. That’s two I owe you now. Instead of mooning sentimentally about this being my last Christmas at Falcon’s Rise, I was more concerned you didn’t feel left out. Which meant I didn’t embarrass myself by coming over all weepy. I guess I did enough of that last night.”

  “And with good reason.” His voice dropped a couple of notches, vibrating through the wall of his chest into her side.

  The tips of his fingers drew lazy circles on her shoulder, keeping alive the buzz she’d experienced before. “You’ve been through a frightening experience. You know what they say about a trouble shared. I guess we halved it. You ought to feel easier now you’ve told me.”

  “Dumped on you, don’t you mean? I guess the tension has been slightly alleviated, but I always feel more relaxed at home. If only I could convince myself I haven’t got both of us worked up over a figment of my imagination.”

  They were less than three feet from the bridge when he stopped and held her by the shoulders. His hands were warm on the skin left bare by a sleeveless top the color of pale violets. She’d worn it because of a compliment he’d made about her eyes.

  His big hands made her feel small, fragile, but with Franc she didn’t mind. He probably didn’t suspect he had this talent for gentleness, but he’d proved it by not trampling all over her vulnerability.

  “I’d wish I could pretend the stalking was all in your mind, but from what you tell me, it’s happened too often to be dismissed lightly. When we get back to Auckland, I’m going to give you one of my cell phones. That way you can call me day or night. Anytime you feel you’re being watched.”

  Franc pushed her away slightly as he gauged her reception of his idea. “Got that? No matter the hour, you have to call me.”

  The area in her brain that wouldn’t quit, wouldn’t let her cower to Searle, wanted to respond with an irreverent salute, and an “Aye-aye, sir,” but she knew he was serious, deadly serious. The thought cast up an image to make her shudder.

  Her amusement vanished as a somber shadow filled its place.

  “Okay, if that’s what you want, but I won’t feel comfortable waking you up unless it’s a matter of…” She let the rest hang fire. How could she do anything else when they were talking of her life, or maybe death?

  “Unless it’s too late, you mean. I expect more than that. If you’re in the street and feel he’s watching, step into a shop or café and give me a call. You don’t want to make it too obvious that you’re on to him. Then, if Randy is anywhere in sight, we’ll know you were correct in your assumption.”

  “Or that it’s all a horrible coincidence.” The corners of her mouth drooped. “Or maybe I’m being paranoid.”

  “With your history, you have a right. But for the rest of Christmas Day let’s try to put it behind us and go for the peace on Earth and all that. There’s little chance that anyone is watching you today.”

  What was it about him apart from a crooked smile that wiped years off his age and sent her heart fluttering, as if she’d swallowed a hundred soft-winged moths.

  “I guess I’ve been acting like a wimp.”

  “Would a wimp have crashed my party? No way. You are beautiful, so beautiful. I can see why someone would like to spend a lot of time looking at you. But, while they only look, there’s little anyone can do.”

  “You’re right. I do feel safe at Falcon’s Rise. Safer than in Auckland.” She wanted to say “safer because I’m with you,” but no matter what he said about calling him if she felt threatened, she knew his presence in her life was strictly temporary. He’d made that perfectly clear yesterday.

  Was it wrong to look for more? Expect more?

  No one could be more suitable than Franc. He was handsome, experienced, the only man to make her feel sex was the natural outcome of their relationship, not something to be feared. Why then, did her insights of the future resemble something from Picasso’s Blue Period?

  Franc pulled her arm through his as they resumed their walk. A few more steps would take them out of the garden and across the bridge to a north-facing slope ribbed with green-trellised vines. “
So, Maria, how does Rosa rate when it comes to cooking turkeys?”

  “She makes a pistachio nut stuffing that’s to die for.”

  Through the telephoto lens Maria appeared close enough to touch. He watched her laugh, eyes crinkling with pleasure as she looked up at the man, Jellic.

  Moving the camera slightly he cut the guy out of the picture.

  This new aspect was unforeseen; he’d thought she was afraid of men. It would make things more difficult, yet ultimately more interesting. He smiled at the thought of stealing Maria from under Jellic’s nose.

  The camera clicked, capturing an unguarded moment. As the next frame whirred into place, blood gorged his groin as he imagined the moment the exposed print slid from the chemicals, the pleasure of holding it up for his eyes to feast on. Yes, this enlargement could be nothing less than life size.

  The smile never left his face. It widened as his teeth clenched, knowing she might never look at him in just that way.

  Still, he was a man of infinite patience. He could wait.

  “Roses were the last thing I expected to find amongst the vines.” Franc stopped to pick a full-blown yellow bloom and handed the fragile flower to Maria.

  She held it to her nose and drew in its perfume, her nostrils gently flaring, and her eyes shut, hiding the ecstasy he knew she was feeling. Franc did a mental rundown on the hours until he could get her into his bed, cursing his suggestion that he take her into the city for a meal, when there was a restaurant less than five minutes from his door.

  “Its perfume is almost too perfect, my head is spinning. Oh, oh dear,” she said, dismayed as the rose fell apart and its petals tumbled from her hands. “Don’t you think it’s sad, how quickly the roses die in the heat?”

  “Tell the truth, it isn’t something I’ve put a lot of thought into, never having much to do with flowers.”

  “I remember Papa planting these roses when he put in the new vines. They used to be an indicator of any diseases that might attack the grapes, but these days they’re more decoration. He ripped out the Muller Thurgau that grew here, and replaced it with red wines. Sangiovese is the newest of the ones he has replaced it with. It’s over there.”

  Her serious expression amused him, as if she was conducting him round a famous art gallery and desperately trying to pronounce all the artists’ names correctly.

  “Say that again.”

  “Say what again?”

  He took a step closer, an invasion of her personal space, and watched her eyelids flicker, their dark lashes twin crescents of sable. Her tongue moed her lips as his nearness forced her to look up at him. She smelled of rose petals and sunshine. The thought of taking, owning, her and the glorious combination made him hard. “The name of that wine, I want to hear it again.”

  “S-s-sangio…”

  Before she could finish, his mouth slanted over hers and swallowed the rest of the word. Her eyelids snapped open then sank on a murmur of pleasure.

  It was everything he remembered and more. Better. Out here in the open air, just the two of them, as if they were alone in the world, and all their previous stresses counted as nothing.

  Slipping his arms round her waist, he began to move as they had when they’d danced, slowly turning to a tune only lovers could hear, on a bed of yellow rose petals.

  “Once more, hon, whisper the word for me.”

  “Sangioooooo…”

  They kissed again…and again, turning till his head spun with the hot scents of grass, and vines, and roses, the sun, and the sensuality, holding Maria in his arms and never quite letting her finish saying the word.

  “I guess we ought to look at the view. I expect they will ask how you liked it,” she mentioned as they reached the brow at long last.

  “My sister, Jo, has a friend with a winery at Pigeon Hill, I think it’s quite near, though I’ve never visited it.”

  “I know her. Maggie Kovacs she used to be. I believe she married a cop, but he gave up his career and works with her now. Pigeon Hill has a few more hectares in vines than us, but when Gina and my brothers combine their properties, I guess they’ll give them a run for their money.”

  She flashed a rueful smile his way. “That makes me sound very competitive. I’m not really, I’d just like to see my family do well.”

  “I don’t see much wrong with that. Ambition is what lifts you out of the crowd. Without it, my friend Brent and I might be slogging away in dead-end jobs letting other people take credit for our work…our ideas. When I met Stanhope at my sister’s wedding, he was impressed by my ideas and gave me this chance. Of course, I couldn’t leave Brent behind. We were in the same year at Unitech and have worked together ever since.”

  “And you don’t compete with each other?”

  “Only over women.” One glance at Maria told him he might have made a hash of his chances by being too clever. “But that was a while ago. Now we’re just two old working hacks who know better than to compete over anything.”

  As he leaned closer, she looked away. Snubbed him. “I always won, but never so well until I met you.”

  Hands shaping her spine, he felt her shiver as she melted against him. He fought an urge to pull her down to the ground to take her right there on the top of the hill with the smell of the grapevines all about them. Goddess country.

  Desire almost won, would have won, if he hadn’t seen the flash of sunlight on glass. Seen someone watch

  Maybe someone innocent.

  Maybe not.

  He moved so her back was toward the slope where the flash of light had come from. “C’mon, let’s go back to the house and offer your mother a hand.”

  “I always thought you were brave, now I’m sure of it.” She winked at him but he couldn’t return the gesture. “Okay,” she finished. “Next stop the lion’s den.”

  Chapter 7

  Before most members of the household were moving next morning, Franc rolled out of bed with the intention of taking a walk and doing a little on-the-spot investigating. The more he thought about the flash that had made him shepherd Maria back indoors—as he saw it, to safety—the more he needed to be sure he hadn’t imagined the diamond-bright light in the midst of the vines.

  He wanted confirmation. It made no difference that Maria had confided in him, given him chapter and verse on her reasons for pointing the finger at Searle; witnessing one tiny particle of evidence had opened his eyes to a startling revelation about himself. Hell, if he’d had a daughter who’d been abducted at one time, he’d never let her out of the house without him glued to her side. His stomach churned the way it had for the most of yesterday.

  After a whole night of tangling the sheets into one big knot, he’d realized Maria had known the truth of the matter when she’d set out to confront Searle. You couldn’t spend the rest of your natural life in fear.

  Thanks to his occupation, Franc had an eye for detail; he could look at the big picture without losing sight of the components that made up the whole.

  Measuring the angle with his eyes, he stared at the spot on the opposite slope. The place where he’d almost laid Maria down and made her his own. The thought of someone spying on them, tainting their moments of intimacy with lewd thoughts, made his skin crawl.

  He gauged the distance and took three more paces. If he’d got it correct, the flash had come from right about here.

  He studied the ground, looking for clues to something out of the ordinary. Without rushing it, he walked across the curve of the slope, eyes to the ground between the trellises, searching the loose dirt around the roots of the vines and the mown strip of grass bordering them for a sign of someone’s presence.

  And found it.

  He hunkered down. Shoe prints dug more than a quarter of an inch into the soft soil as if someone had stayed in one position for a while. Cross trainers by the look of the pattern on the sole, a full print and one half-size from the toes back, as if the wearer had crouched down and balanced most of his weight on the back of one heel. />
  He studied the spot intently, knowing a sensible solution would be to take a photo. Too bad he didn’t have a camera handy. He lined up his feet with the prints and looked through a small gap that had been cut in the vines. The guy couldn’t have got better cover if he’d buil himself a duck shooter’s hide. From up here he would have had a perfect view of the comings and goings of the Costello household.

  What kind of way was this, for anyone without malice, to celebrate Christmas?

  Franc pushed to his feet, stood staring for almost two minutes and let his conclusions take shape. Determination changed the thrust of his jaw. He didn’t want to see a guy who was innocent take the rap for what was going down around Maria.

  If Jo was correct in her assumptions, that’s what had happened to his father and the whole of the Jellic family had paid for the injustice.

  The way the Costellos had paid. Because, as he’d discovered before he left Maria to seek out his lonely bed, her abductor had never been caught. Damned if this guy would get off so easy.

  He looked to the horizon. Time to get back to the house. Thunderheads had begun to breach the dark gray rugged peaks of the Barrier Islands and looked ready to charge down on Kawau a few miles’ distance across the water. As he headed down the slope, a band of sunlight sliced through the full bellies of the clouds and lit up Little Barrier’s crenellated slopes and towering peaks. The impression endured for less than the blink of an eye before the rain front rolled over it.

  Funny what a difference a little bit of light made. Yesterday it had taken his life in a different direction. His back teeth ached as he saw his dreams begin to recede, but he was damned if he would let Maria go until he knew she was safe from the Peeping Tom on the hill.