by Jennie Jones
‘Thank you, Charlotte. I appreciate your thinking I’m trustworthy enough to have that information.’
‘You’re welcome, Nick.’ Charlotte backed away, swinging the tray in her hand. ‘Anything else you need to know about Lily, you just ask.’
Nick returned her smile but his was cautious. Charlotte’s was an outright grin.
‘I’ll let her know her lift’s here.’ She turned for the kitchen and Nick sauntered to the big panoramic windows of the hotel and stood looking at Main Street, waiting for Lily.
So what would he do? If Lily asked anything of him.
Chapter 6
Since Andy had ridden the newly-fixed bicycle home, Lily found herself alone with Nick in the king of all vehicles.
‘We’ve only got a short drive, Lily, and I’d like to tell you something before we get to your house.’
Lily’s nerve-ends prickled. They’d kind of only just got to know each other. What could he possibly want to tell her?
‘I was talking to Andy today while he was over at my place.’
Andy, not Andrew. He knew the difference. That her son would always be Andy, regardless of his insisting he be called Andrew at this time in his life.
‘And I offered him a job.’
Lily’s real-time senses returned and she shot a look at Nick.
‘Only casual. On a Sunday. He can help me out and learn quite a bit as we go.’ He glanced Lily’s way, probably expecting a response but not getting one because Lily was newly surprised.
‘I wanted you to know because I made the mistake of offering the job to him before speaking to you. I apologise for that.’
No man had ever apologised to Lily before. Unless they’d bumped into her in a supermarket aisle or a cinema queue or the like. She moistened her dry mouth by swallowing.
‘Sundays,’ Nick said. ‘Is this going to be okay with you? Because if it’s not, I’ll find some way to tell Andy myself.’
So it didn’t make Lily look like the baddy if she refused to let her son have a job. ‘Um—’ She swallowed again. ‘That’s generous of you. I don’t mind him working. But are you sure?’
He nodded. ‘I’m not used to teaching boys, but I had a lot of young men under my command while I was in the Navy. I promise he’ll be safe.’
‘Of course,’ Lily murmured, not the slightest bit worried that either of her children wouldn’t be safe with Nick, but instead, thinking ahead. If Andy had a job he might not feel so isolated. Most of his friends had weekend or late-night jobs but to get one of those Andy had to travel to Cooma, an hour away. ‘I tend to forget he’s maturing,’ she said to Nick, thinking aloud. ‘He needs to spend time learning about grown-up life now. It’s just that it’s tricky for us, being so far from the bigger towns.’
Nick shifted gear as he slowed the ute to turn the corner onto the dirt track that led to Lily’s house.
Lily’s focus got caught on his hands. Strong, tough hands weathered to nutmeg brown by the outdoors, with scratches and faded scars scattered across his knuckles and a longer, thicker scar starting at the base of his thumb and curling into the palm of his hand. Lily wanted to ask how he’d got that one.
‘There’s something else,’ he said. ‘Janie-Louise.’
Lily lifted her eyebrows. ‘Are you giving her a job too?’
He laughed, his smile wide enough to make Lily smile too.
‘No,’ he said. ‘I doubt there’s anything in my workshop that interests her, but when I dropped her home the other day she was telling me about the ereader she’s saving up for.’
‘She’s got a budgie cage to buy first.’
Nick looked her way. ‘Did she get the baby budgie?’
Lily nodded. How come this man, practically a stranger up until yesterday, knew so much about her children?
She wriggled in her seat, settled the seatbelt more comfortably, holding onto it so it didn’t rub her neck.
‘You okay?’
‘Fine,’ Lily said, and stopped wriggling.
He pulled the ute to the side of the dirt track and put the handbrake on. ‘Is the seatbelt rubbing?’ He reached across and before Lily had time to wonder at the tantalising aroma of Nick Barton’s shower-fresh skin beneath his thick woollen jumper, he was as close to her as he had been this time last year. When he’d almost kissed her…and the same sensory awareness surrounded her now. Tanned skin and iron strength.
He adjusted the height of the seatbelt housing at the side of her head, lowering the housing until the belt sat more comfortably against her and didn’t touch her neck.
‘I’m not used to having a lady in the truck,’ he said. ‘Mostly just guys. Is that better?’
‘Yes. Thanks.’ Lily glanced at the moveable seatbelt housing. She’d never had a car that did that.
She focussed on the view out of the windscreen as he pulled from the verge. Lady? She’d never had a man under 60 call her a lady.
‘As I was saying — about Janie-Louise and her ereader.’
‘She hasn’t got one yet,’ Lily reminded him.
‘But I have.’ He performed another gear shift with that strong, tanned and scarred hand before resting it on his thigh as he steered one-handed. ‘I won one.’
‘That’s nice.’
He looked her way again. ‘I don’t want it. I don’t use it.’ He took his focus to the track. ‘So would it be all right with you if I gave it to Janie-Louise? Since she wants one and I have one I don’t use.’
Lily paused, catching her bottom lip with her teeth as she reflected. This five-minute journey had changed so much in her world. Two semi-strangers chatting about her two kids and their needs and wants. Was it producing a tentative friendship?
She felt some of it was Nick not only easing their new association along, since he kept insisting on giving her a lift, but also Nick querying something. Trying out and testing the friendship maybe? Or looking for answers to something. What, Lily didn’t know.
‘Well…’ She drew the word out.
‘It’s nothing more than a gesture. But if you don’t want me giving your daughter a second-hand ereader, that’s fine. I won’t do it.’
She’d already given Janie-Louise the money to pay Ethan for the second-hand bird cage, telling her daughter that she’d be doing additional chores, but delighted by the look of joy on Janie-Louise’s face.
Second-hand. The words bounced in Lily’s head. Was she beginning to stigmatise the very concept she cherished simply because someone was suddenly offering so much?
‘You don’t read?’ she asked.
‘Not on an ereader. I use my laptop if I need to download ebooks.’
So why would Lily not allow Nick to give her daughter his second-hand goods? ‘You won it?’ she asked, wondering if it was possible for him to have purchased one since he’d learned that Janie-Louise wanted one, and if he would have done that out of pity.
‘Still got the receipt stapled to the warranty. I won it through an internet site about four months ago. They were selling online raffle tickets for a cause I support.’
Lily relaxed. ‘Looks like I owe you a second thank you.’ Or was it a third?
‘So it’s okay if I give it to you to give to her?’ He gave a backward nod to the back seat. ‘I’ve got it with me.’
Lily realised they were driving through the opened gate at the bottom of the back paddock and any moment they’d be home. ‘Well, let’s just see, shall we?’ Lily did the mental maths. They’d been counting the money in the Janie-Louise Piggy Bank Fund yesterday. If Lily added 80 dollars to the pocket money she gave her daughter each week… Could she afford that much? She could if she didn’t buy the electric sander she’d been hoping for — elbow-grease was still free, and Lily was strong. After all, she didn’t need to finish off the bigger pieces of furniture in the living-room workshop, did she? She likely wouldn’t get the shop in order to sell them for another two years. Maybe three years. ‘But please come in,’ she said to Nick. ‘Janie-Louise needs to
thank you for fixing her bike anyway.’
Nick pulled up outside the back door and turned in his seat. ‘I won’t, if you don’t mind. I’ve got a gym session with Dan planned, over at my place.’ He stretched over to the back seat, giving Lily a brief but satisfactory glimpse of the waistband of the cargo-pants sitting on his hip, and the flesh of his… What were those muscles that dipped from a man’s waist to his hips? Maybe she’d flip through a few pages of some of the kissing books later and find out.
Lily undid her seatbelt and opened her door, her face heating up. Abductors. Or was it obliques? Whichever, Nick’s were in perfect condition. Start knitting, Lily.
‘Lily.’
She looked up.
Nick pushed a small parcel at her. ‘Please take it.’
The ereader. She took it reluctantly.
‘There’s something else.’
Good heavens — like what?
‘I understand you’ve been asked to sort out the new library books for Mrs Tam, and that you’ve got a job tidying Morelly’s back storeroom.’
How did he know so much? Was he going to gift her a brand new vacuum cleaner he’d won in another raffle?
He smiled at her, his features softening, his gaze sparkling in amusement. ‘It’s okay,’ he said. ‘I don’t have any more surprises for you. It looks like I’ve given you enough for one day.’
Lily nodded as her mesmerised brain attempted to process the information it had gathered over the last five minutes.
‘It’s just that they’ve both asked me to help,’ he said. ‘With the lifting.’
‘Oh — the lifting!’ So he was the one they’d roped in for all the heavy lifting.
‘I thought I’d mention it,’ he said. ‘In case you hadn’t realised it would be me helping you.’
Lily sucked in her yoga-strengthened abdomen and held onto her breath a moment as she recovered from the understanding that had just hit her.
She looked at Nick from beneath her lashes, an apologetic smile creeping onto her face. The poor man. Did he realise what was going on?
‘Just let me know when you want to get to either job,’ he was saying. ‘I’m happy to leave whatever I’m doing in the workshop to meet your schedule. Just say the word. I’ll work around you. Anything you want.’
Lily’s bottom lip was getting tortured by her teeth. Is this what life would be like if she ever married again? Making decisions and plans with another person. Organising and compromising on times and places and input.
‘Lily? Are you all right?’
Lily blinked at him. With the conversation she’d had with Charlotte, the slipped reference of a secret from Dan and the sudden concern from the townspeople about her needing a man for the heavy lifting in her life, Lily had no option but to consider the possibility she and Nick were being pushed together towards the ultimate ending. A wedding.
Chapter 7
Nick drew a measured breath as he drove out of his driveway onto All Seasons Road. Having fixed Lily’s car but not having told her was anathema to his usual mode of operation. But enjoying her company had won over honesty. A small fib, he told himself. He’d give her the car back soon. Maybe tomorrow. Or perhaps he could say he was waiting on parts and run her in and out of town tomorrow, Friday and over the weekend too. Although if he did that he’d give her reason to be concerned about payment of the parts.
Today was her day off so he hadn’t needed to pick her up early, but he was on his way to collect her now. They had the heavy lifting and the inventory to do at the library.
A flash of red and a ray of sunshine reflecting on the silver spokes of a bicycle as he turned a bend immediately brought him out of his reverie. He hit the brake and yelled out the open window, ‘Janie-Louise!’
She looked up, swerved the red bike’s front wheel and nearly fell off before she put both feet onto the road.
Nick pulled up to the verge and jumped out of the ute. ‘What the hell are you doing?’
‘I’ve been to the stables. I’m on my way home.’
‘You can’t ride and read at the same time.’ He pointed at the ereader in her hand, wanting to snatch it from her because of the jolt of fear she’d given him.
‘It’s such a quiet road. And I wasn’t cycling fast.’
‘You were swerving into the middle of the road — just as I drove round the bend.’
Her face flushed almost the same colour as her bike.
‘Where’d you get that?’ he asked, pointing at the ereader.
‘Mum topped up my piggy-bank fund and we bought it online on Monday night. Arrived yesterday — really quick, huh? I’ve got three books on it already!’
Nick contemplated this. Lily hadn’t said anything about buying an ereader to him when he’d offered his for Janie-Louise. Neither had she accepted the — gift. Damn, was that how she saw it? A hand-out or something? He couldn’t blame her if that’s what she’d thought. He’d offered it just having told her he was giving her son a job, after fixing her daughter’s bike and giving her a quick update on how it was going with him fixing her car. Pride would have ensured Lily bought her daughter the ereader, but how much had it cost her, financially, to do so? If she went on like this, she’d never get her impossible dream.
‘Well,’ he said to Janie-Louise, coming back to the problem at hand. ‘If I catch you cycling and reading again, I’ll have to take the ereader off you and let your mum know.’
She groaned. ‘You’re doing the grown-up thing.’
‘I am.’ Nick felt he had some right to. Jamie-Louise and her carefree spirit lit something inside him. A gut reflex of fellowship. She was a smaller beam of her mother — all fire and fun. Had Lily had this yearning for danger inside her too, as a child? The ‘village to raise a child’ philosophy burst into his mind as he looked at Janie-Louise. A miniature Lily. He’d been in Swallow’s Fall long enough to know it was about time he became part of the town, which was why he’d stepped up to help in whatever way he could — but he’d have to curb his new-found enthusiasm. He’d never taken anything from anyone; he didn’t know what it would feel like to be beholden or in need.
‘Are you going to tell Mum?’ Janie-Louise asked, mouth turned down in anticipation of his answer.
Nick gave her a reflective look as he gathered his composure, not used to losing it so quickly, if at all. Young girls. What did he know about them and their make-up? ‘Maybe we can keep it between us. This once.’ He had a notion Lily would spit chips if she found out, and Lily didn’t need further worries.
Janie-Louise sighed. ‘Thanks. I don’t know how many lifelines I have. I’ve probably already used half, and if Mum found out I wouldn’t need the rest. I’d be grounded till I was ancient. Till I turned 30!’
Nick hid a relieved smile he didn’t want the kid to see and kept his brow furrowed in a concerned adult manner.
Janie-Louise put the ereader into the front basket on her bike, back-kicked the pedal and rested her right foot on it, ready to take off. ‘When you haven’t got a dad around your mum has to be tougher than other mums. Apparently,’ she added, sounding sardonic about the notion. ‘I can’t imagine how difficult it is though. I do heaps of babysitting and it’s easy. We just play.’
Nick understood where Janie-Louise’s judgement came from, given her 12-year old place in the world, but he felt compelled to stand up for Lily. ‘Your mum works, remember. She doesn’t have a lot of time for play.’ As he said it he saw Lily in his mind’s eye, rocking around the house to her favourite songs, making her kids laugh.
He focussed more purposefully on Janie-Louise and willed the family scene in his mind to fade and logic to return. Janie-Louise was a child on the cusp on young adulthood, so close to being a young woman branching out on her own it wasn’t funny — not to a guy who was old enough to be her father. Nick hadn’t had cause to worry about this stuff before now, but Lily was dealing with her growing kids on her own, and was probably juggling worries about Andy and his needs too. While fo
rgetting about her own.
‘I’m going to have four kids when I grow up,’ Janie-Louise said in an offhand manner, ‘and I don’t care if they have a dad or not. Do you have any kids?’
‘No.’ Would he have accepted the divorce if he and his ex-wife had had kids? Unlikely. Duty and honour and all that. He looked away from Janie-Louise and nodded at a tarnished, half-metre-long metal candlestick balanced in the basket of her bike. ‘What’s that for?’ he asked as a way of changing the subject and getting his mind off the notion that did, occasionally, haunt him. That he’d never have children. Would never know the depths of parental duty some lucky bastards found, filling their pockets with reasons to protect and care. Neither would he know what it felt like to be faced with any dilemma one of his kids found themselves in and wonder how the hell to make it better for them or help them through it, or if necessary, turn them around from a bad deal to a better deal. Didn’t mean he couldn’t do it for others’ children. So long as it didn’t look like interference.
‘It’s for Mum,’ Janie-Louise said with a smile that said she’d already moved on from being ticked off to being…a 12-year-old carefree kid again. ‘Sammy found it. Mum’ll transform it for her and make it shine.’
‘How?’ It looked years unused.
‘That’s what she does. She’s going to open the shop on the corner of Main Street as a shabby-chic, antique type place. We’re going to be business people. You should see how much stuff she’s got stacked in the living room at home. She already sells some of it.’
Lily’s impossible dream. How much had buying the ereader put her back?
Nick stepped from Janie-Louise as a sudden urge to hug the kid close gripped him. Stay safe, for God’s sake, he wanted to say. ‘I’m just on my way to pick up your mum actually. We’re sorting out the new books at the library.’
