The Marriage Gamble

by Meredith Webber

  Which was OK for him, but what about her? Could she have that kind of relationship with him? Could she find joy in something that held, from the beginning, no promise of a future? And if she could, at what cost would it be to her emotional well-being when they parted? Would she be able to pretend she didn’t care when her mother said, ‘I saw Ted at the shops today’? Would she be able to not ask, ‘How’s Mike?’

  She’d phone him in the morning. Stop the nonsense before it went any further. Better now than later.

  Still muttering clichés, Jacinta drifted off to sleep, awakening not to the same determination but to a skittery excitement that she’d be seeing him that evening.

  ‘You’re hopeless,’ she told herself as she showered and shampooed her hair—twice.

  ‘Weak,’ she scolded as she pulled clean underwear, trousers and a cotton knit sweater from her wardrobe and tucked them into a plastic bag with toiletries and make-up.

  ‘And you’ll regret it!’ she warned, as she all but danced down the stairs.

  ‘I’m on late tonight and might go somewhere with Mike when I finish,’ she told her mother, who was sitting over coffee in the kitchen. Then, deciding some things were best not talked about, she dropped a kiss on her mother’s head and added, ‘I’m off. I’ve heaps to do. I’ll eat at work.’

  Her mother eyed the plastic bag but didn’t comment, merely saying, ‘We’ll see you when we see you, then.’ She turned back to the paper.

  But Jacinta knew her lips were smiling, and a new worry loomed. She should tell her mother right now there was nothing in this fling with Mike, so she didn’t start thinking in terms of wedding plans and grandchildren.

  But such a confession would reveal too much—draw judgement on Jacinta’s own behaviour, though doubtless it would remain unspoken. Her mother had always let her make her own mistakes.

  By the time Jacinta finished work, the tumult in her mind had added to the physical tiredness a long day always caused, so she felt, and no doubt looked, like a piece of chewed string.

  She eyed the plastic bag, trying to summon up the energy to walk through to the washroom, have a quick wash and change her clothes. The idea had all the appeal of pulling out her toenails.

  A light tap on the door made her straighten in her chair. Please, let it be Carmel saying goodnight, not another patient.

  ‘Come in,’ she said, and heard the lack of welcome in the words, so when the door opened and Mike poked his head around it, she didn’t quite know how to react.

  ‘Poor mouse,’ he said. ‘You look exhausted. Are you finished? Can I take you away from all this?’

  ‘Are you sure you want to?’ she asked, as his gentle solicitude weakened whatever feeble defences she might have retained. ‘Look at me. I did intend washing and changing, but somehow the effort’s got beyond me. Did Carmel tell you about the baby we had?’

  Mike beamed at her.

  ‘Trent Clinics’ first on-the-spot delivery. You all did very well. Carmel says they wanted to call the little girl Jacinta after you.’

  ‘Poor child. She’ll have people asking how to spell it all her life.’

  ‘So, shall I carry you out to the car?’

  Jacinta looked at him then—really looked at him—and caught what could almost be uncertainty in the lines on his face.

  And because uncertainty seemed such a strange thing to associate with Mike Trent, she smiled and stood up and said, ‘Oh, I think I’ll manage the distance. But first I’ll have a wash, even if I don’t change.’

  She’d barely finished speaking when doubts assailed her.

  ‘But perhaps I should change. Where are we going?’

  ‘No, you don’t need to change, and it’s a surprise. Just relax and go with the flow.’

  ‘But my car…’

  He reached out and put his finger against her lips, touching her for the first time and firing her nerves once again to tingling anticipation.

  ‘We can leave it there. Now I know where you live, I can pick you up in the morning and drop you at work.’ Mike paused, studying her, then added, ‘No, I was going to do that anyway so your car wasn’t sitting here over the weekend. What we’ll do…’

  It was her turn to touch his lips.

  ‘Let’s forget the car thing. I often catch the train so there’s no need for you to pick me up tomorrow. Mum and I will come in together and she can take my car home.’

  Without thinking, Jacinta had offered him a cue—a chance to say he’d pick them both up—but he didn’t take it. And though a wedge of sadness forced its sharp point into Jacinta’s heart, it didn’t stop her body responding to the kiss he dropped on her lips. Neither did it stop her kissing him back, when he took her in his arms and drew her closer.

  CHAPTER TEN

  MIKE drove along the freeway, glad the traffic had thinned and he didn’t need to give one hundred per cent of his attention to the road. He knew the way to his destination well enough to give at least forty per cent to his passenger, who’d slid into the leather seat beside him, murmured something about comfort, then promptly fallen asleep.

  He glanced Jacinta’s way and realised he needed more than forty per cent of his attention to work out what was happening between them. Was he heading for a mid-life crisis that he’d suddenly become besotted by this woman? To the extent that his work was suffering? That he’d phoned Jaclyn within twenty-four hours of meeting Jacinta and told her—gently, he hoped—he wouldn’t be seeing her any more?

  That he wanted, more than anything, to introduce Jacinta to his father?

  Yet all the while he knew a relationship between them wouldn’t work. If his insistence that their affair was only temporary didn’t kill whatever it was they had going, then selling the Abbott Road building surely would.

  He had to tell her, and the best time to do it would be tonight. But could he do it?

  Jacinta slept without moving until he pulled the car off the road and rolled it forward to where it offered the best view out over the city. The moonlight shining through the windscreen gleamed on her hair, and made her small face look pale.

  There was an innocence about her as she slept, which was so at odds with the passion of her kisses that his body tightened with desire for the other surprises she might offer.

  As if sensing his watchfulness, she stirred and opened her eyes, seeing him first then, as she straightened, the glittering lights of the city below them.

  ‘It’s like a scattering of jewels flung across a dark bedspread,’ she murmured, peering out towards the lights. ‘Are we on Mount Merion? I’ve been here by day for picnics, but never at night.’

  Mike felt a jolt of pleasure at her transparent delight, and wondered if she could read it in his foolish smile.

  ‘I have a picnic basket, rugs and cushions. Will you join me, my lady, on the grass?’

  ‘Oh, Mike, this is wonderful! I never dreamt…’

  She leaned across and kissed him on the cheek—a kiss of thanks, but so infinitely sweet he wondered if he’d ever felt so happy.

  Of course he must have done, he told himself as he gathered gear from the boot of the car. Think of the pleasure you’ve had from the success of the business.

  But he pressed his fingers to his cheek, touching the skin she’d kissed, and wondered if pleasure and happiness were the same thing. If they were, perhaps satisfaction was a better word to describe the emotion his business brought him. And even that had waned considerably lately.

  ‘Can I carry something? You don’t have to do the lot.’

  Jacinta stood on the other side of the boot and reached in for a blanket. It was such a homely kind of gesture somehow. He could picture her doing it in years to come, pulling out a child’s stroller, some toys and then the hamper.

  It had to be a mid-life crisis.

  He shook his head and found she’d gone, no doubt to spread the blanket. He grabbed the hamper, promising himself he’d think about the crisis tomorrow.

  ‘There’s wine—I
brought both red and white—and finger food, which I hope is easier to eat than knife-and-fork stuff.’

  He was almost stuttering again in his efforts to sound normal, so he took a deep breath, told himself to calm down and set the basket on the blanket. Went back for cushions and returned to find Jacinta had set out plates and napkins, glasses and a bottle of mineral water. She’d even opened the wine.

  ‘Sit,’ she said to him, ‘and tell me about this place. I can’t see any picnic tables. Is it a public park?’

  So he told her how he’d bought the ten-hectare block many years ago, intending one day to build a weekender on it, but somehow work had taken over his life and he’d not got around to it.

  ‘But it’s such a beautiful place. By day, you’d see right out to the ocean.’

  She leaned across to offer him a tiny pastry, holding it to his lips so he could take a bite.

  Then he fed her in turn and slowly but surely the meal became a prelude to seduction. A kind of foreplay so exciting he could barely breathe by the time they’d finished strawberries dipped in chocolate, and she invited him to lick the remnants off her lips.

  ‘Are you sure?’ he asked, knowing she’d know exactly what he meant.

  ‘I’m sure,’ she murmured, and lay back against the cushions, slowly slipping undone the buttons on her sensible shirt so he could see tantalising glimpses of the lacy bra and creamy breasts beneath it.

  ‘You’re beautiful, Jacinta Ford, do you know that?’ he whispered, brushing the dark hair back from her face so the moonlight could shine on her features. ‘For all you put yourself down with talk of small brown mice, you’ve an inner beauty that comes through like a special radiance.’

  ‘You’re not so bad yourself,’ she said softly, fending off embarrassment by turning the compliment back on him. Her dainty fingers traced his cheek, his nose. ‘Great bones—but I told you that before.’

  He chuckled, surprised to find there was so much pleasure in prolonging even more the delights that lay ahead.

  ‘The skull?’

  Her smile widened and her fingers moved to his lips, tracing their outline, her forefinger probing towards his teeth.

  He bit the invader, but gently, then kissed her wrist and set it down on the blanket above her head, joining it with its mate then holding them gently so she need have no fear, while his free hand pushed aside the open shirt and his fingers slid beneath the lace.

  Jacinta felt her breath catch, and though she strained against his hold she didn’t try to break it. Instinct told her she was safe with this man, whose intention, she knew for certain, was to give as well as to receive pleasure.

  ‘Moonlight on Jacinta,’ he murmured, finding and releasing the catch at the front of her bra then pushing it back so she lay near naked from the waist up, and open to his scrutiny. ‘So beautiful!’

  His hand brushed across her breasts, then held one, as if to test its weight. His little finger curled upward to tease at her nipple and the whisper of sound that erupted from her lips was a plea, not a protest.

  Mike responded with his lips, feasting first on one, and then the other rosy, peaking breast, until Jacinta broke his grasp and put her arms around him, holding him close yet uncertain how best to ease the longing he was creating.

  She slid her fingers beneath his shirt, heard a button pop and in the end demanded parity.

  ‘Let’s both get naked and we’ll start again,’ she suggested, and smiled to see the startled look in Mike’s eyes. ‘That is where we’re heading, isn’t it?’ she added, snuggling up to him so her naked breasts rubbed against his shirt.

  ‘As soon as possible,’ he managed to reply, and the hoarseness of his voice suggested he’d been holding himself on a tight rein, determined to put her pleasure before his own.

  But still he teased her, and she teased him in turn until, when neither of them was willing to wait a moment longer, he entered her, sweetly and gently, holding her as if she were the most precious thing in the world, murmuring words of pleasure, asking, encouraging, until they found each other’s rhythm and joined in celebration of the mutual delights of love.

  Later, sated, he held her still, tucked against his body so he was a source of both warmth and protection. His finger traced her contours, face, breasts and belly, while his lips smiled down at her and his eyes, even in the moonlight, held a wonder she suspected was reflected in her own.

  There were no words, no more chat, just contentment so deep Jacinta wondered how she’d lived without it. It was only when the night breeze sprang up and she shivered that he moved, handing her her clothes, helping her with buttons while she offered help to him. Silence lay between them, as comfortable and easy, as natural as the moonlight that wrapped them in its glow.

  They packed up and drove back to the city, Jacinta’s hand pressed against Mike’s leg, a sense of destiny—of belonging to this man—so deep within her she was certain everything would work out in the end.

  ‘Until tomorrow, mouse,’ he whispered, kissing her one final time in the front doorway of her home. ‘And over the weekend, we’ll talk about the future, because leaving you like this is agony. I want you tucked up beside me as I sleep, not two streets away!’

  ‘Me, too,’ Jacinta agreed sleepily.

  She waited by the door until his taillights disappeared from sight, then made her way inside, walking slowly up the stairs to her bedroom while her mind replayed the special highlights of a very special evening.

  The alarm broke into Jacinta’s deep and dreamless sleep, and though she longed to lie in bed a little longer and relive the memories of the previous night, her mother’s voice reminded her they had a train to catch.

  And she had a bag to pack, though she’d forgotten to ask Mike if they were going to the mountains or the beach.

  ‘Though I doubt it will matter,’ she muttered to herself as again she threw clean underwear into an overnight case. ‘The way things are we probably won’t get out of bed.’

  The thought sent the tingles up her spine and heat into her lower abdomen, so she had to hug herself to still the excited stuttering of her heart.

  Somehow she got through breakfast, parried her mother’s questions about the previous evening and arrived safely at work. Now, surely her mind would settle into work mode and take her body with it. A bit of ‘sensible’ was what she needed here.

  As the only doctor on duty, she was busy, which was good, though her eyes kept straying to the clock. Saturdays were often chaotic, so chances were she wouldn’t finish work until late. Knowing that, Jacinta had arranged to phone Mike before her last patient.

  But as twelve o’clock approached, the plan fell to pieces. Norrie Clarke, an elderly woman who often came with Mrs Nevin, arrived, crying about her friend, almost hysterical, demanding someone help her.

  Julie, the receptionist on duty, tried to calm the woman, but Norrie would have none of it. She needed the doctor to come now, she said.

  Jacinta finished with her patient, then took Norrie into the consulting room, but couldn’t get much sense from her.

  ‘Look,’ she said at last, ‘I’ve one more patient to see, then I’ll come with you.’

  She’d phone Mike once she’d sorted Norrie out. ‘But in the meantime, you’ll have to stop wailing and sit quietly. Would you like Julie to get you a cup of tea?’

  Norrie’s noise lessened, though not by much, and Jacinta took her back to the waiting room and waved the final patient in.

  ‘Have you had a tetanus shot recently?’ she asked the man, as she cleaned and bandaged a bad wound on his forefinger.

  ‘Had one last week,’ he said, holding up his other hand to show a grubby-looking bandage on it. ‘I keep doing it. Shoving rubbish down in the paper-bin, although I know the night staff don’t keep the paper and glass separate the way they should.’

  He went on to explain his job as a cleaner in one of the pubs nearby.

  ‘Next to that old building where the bag ladies hang out,’ he added, a
s if to make the pub’s position clearer.

  ‘You mean Norrie—the woman who was out there. Is she one of the women?’

  The young man nodded.

  ‘Her and the old bat with the gammy leg. She whacks at me with her umbrella if I leave the rubbish bins over on what she considers “her” side of the back yard.’

  He chuckled as if his battles with Mrs Nevin weren’t all bad, then thanked Jacinta for her time and departed.

  ‘Come on, Norrie, let’s go.’

  Jacinta grabbed her keys as she’d told Julie not to wait but to be sure to lock up as she left. She followed Norrie up the stairs and out past a couple of men in suits who were standing near the window of the adult bookshop with what looked like placards in their hands.

  ‘This way,’ Norrie told her. ‘It’s up this way.’

  She led Jacinta up the mall, past the pub where the young man worked and into the entrance of the decrepit building she now remembered seeing, but hadn’t previously taken much notice of.

  ‘I can’t get in,’ Norrie complained loudly.

  ‘You’re not supposed to be able to get in,’ Jacinta told her. ‘Someone owns it, and they want to keep you out. It mightn’t be safe to be in there.’

  ‘But Bessie’s in there, I know she is, and she must be hurt because she hasn’t been out.’

  ‘Is Bessie Mrs Nevin?’ Jacinta asked, and Norrie nodded her ragged head.

  Jacinta tried the door which, of course, was locked.

  ‘Have you been around the back?’ she asked Norrie, though she was by no means sure she wanted to get into the building. ‘Can you get in that way?’

  ‘Bessie says not to go that way. The publican don’t like it.’

  Or he might see them and report them to the police, Jacinta thought.

  ‘Let’s try,’ she suggested, when lack of progress had prompted Norrie to start wailing again. ‘We’ll go down the side street. It’s closer than going back through the clinic.’