When Danger Follows

by Maggi Andersen

  They rode out before noon. Caitlin found she was becoming acclimatized to the heat. They rode for almost an hour before Harry dismounted to rest his horse. He held Caitlin’s reins for her to do the same. “About three kilometers from here are some Aboriginal cave paintings,” he said. “People come from all over the world to see them.”

  She was far more confident in the saddle. In fact, she was ready to surprise Jake with what she could do. She was just waiting for the opportunity.

  “Can we make it to the caves and back before dark?” She had no wish to add to the unsettled atmosphere at Tall Trees.

  “With time to spare. I’ve brought torches and water. Look, even a couple of sandwiches. Hungry?”

  Eyeing the squashed bundle of plastic wrap, she said, “Who made them? Columbine?”

  “Funny girl. I did. Ham-and-tomato or cheese-and-tomato.”

  “I guess beggars can’t be choosers.” Caitlin took the cheese-and-tomato and began to unwrap it.

  Harry laughed. “That’s very ungracious of you, Caitlin. Water?” He handed her a bottle. “Eat up, the land levels out ahead and I want to see how well you can gallop.”

  She sat down on a rock to eat and then jumped up again as a fat lizard came to claim it. “I sometimes feel like I’ve come to another planet,” she said crossly, backing away as the lizard stared up at her and made a loud, hissing sound.

  “A goanna.” Harry said, dismissing it.

  It looked menacing to her. A hawk floated in the sky above them and the goanna suddenly came to life, crawling away out of sight. Relieved, Caitlin moved away, but she was aware she was not top of the food chain here and it put her constantly on the alert.

  They mounted their horses again and she showed off how much she’d improved. Far less like a sack of potatoes thumping about in the saddle, but still lacking the grace and ease of the men. Harry passed her easily and headed towards a rocky outcrop in the distance.

  “Wait,” she called. “Columbine doesn’t have legs like Thunderbolt.”

  He returned and circled her. “Talking about legs,” he said teasingly.

  “Down boy,” she replied, grinning. They’d arrived at the outcrop and she saw the mouth of the caves that probably ran deep into the earth.

  They tied up the horses in some shade from a pile of rocks. “I’m not about to wander miles underground, Harry.”

  “We don’t have to go very far,” he replied, as she followed him inside.

  They moved deeper into the cave, away from the entrance, the light from their torches bouncing off the rock walls.

  “Ow!” Caitlin yelled, freaking out as something slithered past her.

  “What is it now?” Harry asked in a wry tone, his voice echoing around her.

  “Something ran over my foot,” she said indignantly.

  “Probably just a snake.”

  “A snake!” she flinched, her sweaty fingers almost dropping the torch.

  Harry’s torch raked the ground at her feet. After a brief look, its glow returned to the cave wall. “A small carpet python. It’s gone now.”

  “Harry,” she said firmly. “I don’t intend to die of snake bite here in this cave.”

  “Shush, Woman,” he said. “Look.”

  Caitlin aimed her torch where Harry was pointing his, then held her breath. The wall was covered with animals and strange images painted in clay and earth colors. They almost came to life in the light of their torches. “Amazing.” she said. “How old would these be?”

  “Hundreds of years, I reckon.”

  She let out her breath. “Some look like creatures from outer space.”

  “They symbolize the Aboriginal Dreamtime.”

  “The Dreamtime?”

  “The Aboriginal take on the afterlife.”

  It was deathly quiet in the cave. The cool darkness wrapped itself around Caitlin and she shivered.

  She felt his hand warm on her shoulder. “You’re shaking. Are you okay?”

  They made her think of death. Of Blaine, Mary and Max. And her own mortality. “I’ve never seen anything like this, that’s all,” she whispered.

  “The place is getting to you. Come outside.”

  In the dazzling sunlight spots danced before her eyes. She almost welcomed the heat. it warmed her and made her feel alive. “Harry, what if that had been a poisonous snake in there and it bit me. What would you have done?”

  “You should know about that.” He searched around the ground and selected a small, reasonably straight branch, then pulled off his belt. “Give me your leg.”

  “What!”

  “Your leg,” he grinned. “It’s safe with me.”

  Caitlin put her leg up on the rock beside him. He carefully rolled up the bottom of her jeans to the knee. “You’d find two puncture wounds where it bit you,” he said, touching her calf gently. He placed the branch against her leg, and then deftly wound the belt around it firmly, winding upwards. “You have to immobilize the limb. It stops the poison from spreading. I sucked the poison out once when a young cowhand got himself bit, but that’s not advised any more, they need the venom for snake identification.”

  “What about an antivenin?”

  “The Doc down in the town keeps some handy, but if you’re bitten by a Brown or a Taipan you don’t have much time.”

  “Can I have my leg back before you cut off the circulation?”

  “You’re no fun. Come on, time to head back. You do want to get back before dark?”

  “Yes, please!”

  “We’ll have to ride flat out.”

  * * * *

  It had been blissfully peaceful since Vanessa went home. Caitlin and Jake had begun playing board games with the children after dinner. Snakes and Ladders was a big hit. There was much shouting and arguing as William slid down the snakes and Elizabeth climbed the ladders.

  Caitlin had to calm them down to get them into bed.

  One night, Jake put on one of Elizabeth’s favorite Jessica Simpson CD, Sweet Kisses, and he gave in to his daughter’s pleas to dance with her. Caitlin clapped to the beat as he swept the little girl up and they danced around the floor. When he put her down, Elizabeth said, “Now it’s Caitlin’s turn, Daddy.”

  Caitlin shook her head. But when Jake held out his arms, she walked into them. She could barely breathe as their bodies came together. He was rhythmic and graceful, and his body felt far too good under her hands. She looked up into his face, and his blue gaze sought hers and held it. Did something unspoken pass between them or did she just want to think it had?

  “I think that’s enough,” she said laughing and drawing away. “Now it’s William’s turn. She sat and watched the three of them dance around the floor.

  After they’d put the children to bed and were gathering up their toys, Jake said, “You know that pile of wood and bricks out in the yard?”

  She nodded. Covered in creeper, they had obviously been there a long time.

  “I planned to build the kids a playroom on the cool side of the house. I think I’ll make a start on it tomorrow.”

  “Perhaps I can help load the bricks into the barrow?”

  “A brickie’s laborer?” Jake laughed. “Every building site should have one like you.”

  She grinned at him. “You think I can’t do heavy lifting?”

  “You’ll get blisters.” He grinned back. “You’ll quit when you break a nail.”

  “Oh!” She punched him on the arm. “Just because I don’t have muscles on my muscles, like you.”

  “I’m not complaining about the way you’re put together.”

  There was a loaded pause.

  “I’ll be up and ready when you are.”

  “You think?” He laughed.

  The next day she rose to the sound of hammering. She looked out and saw Jake working, stripped to the waist. For a moment, she drank in the grace and beauty of the man. The rippling muscles on his chest and back, shiny with sweat. His trim waist and long, lean legs in his cut off
jeans. His dark head as he leaned forward with the hammer, pounding away with rhythmic strokes. There was something primeval about it, which made her draw breath. But he wasn’t building it for her. He had some of the framework already in place. She hurriedly pulled on a t-shirt and shorts and went out to him. “Before breakfast?”

  He turned and grinned at her. “Told you I’d be up before you.”

  Caitlin decided to set her alarm clock for the next morning. Before daybreak.

  “Would you like a tea break?”

  “Now you’re talking.”

  “I’ll be right back.”

  That night, Caitlin ached in different places from her riding lessons. She wanted to tell Jake about her new riding and shooting skills, but she savored it up, putting it away for the right moment. Just now, she was intent on proving to him she could be that strong Outback woman. He was right about her hands though. She looked down at the blisters forming on her palms and her broken nails. It had been a perfect day. The children, released from their lessons early, had frolicked like young calves around them as they worked steadily until the light faded.

  “I love the smell of the bush, lemony and minty and something oddly medicinal,” she said having a drink on the verandah with Jake after dinner.

  “It’s the gum trees. Eucalyptus. The aborigines use all kinds of plants for medicinal purposes. You should ask Jamie, the young Aboriginal lad down at the compound. He’s a great tracker, too.”

  “Tracker?”

  “Yeah. If someone gets lost I guarantee he’ll find them.”

  “That’s comforting.”

  “Maybe not in time to save them though. You can die pretty quick out here.”

  She walked to the edge of the verandah and stared off into the darkness. A giant bird went flying by flapping huge wings.

  “An owl,” Jake said. He’d come to stand beside her.

  She turned around and leaned against a verandah post, gazing up into his face. She desperately wanted to reach out to him, but so much stood in the way of it. It was impossible. “Let’s go in. I challenge you to a game of poker.”

  “Aren’t you sick of me always winning?”

  She followed him. “That’s because you cheat.”

  He turned around, his eyes wide. “I do what?”

  She laughed. “Where do you think your son gets it from?”

  He seized her shoulders and gave her a gentle shake. “Take that back.”

  “Uh oh.”

  “Take it back or I’ll…”

  His eyes were on her mouth. “You’ll do what?” she asked softly.

  He released her and turned back to the door. “I don’t need to cheat. You’re easy meat.”

  “Coward,” she said too softly for him to hear above the bang of the fly-screen door.

  * * * *

  With the room now built and furnished with the children’s toy boxes, Jake planned to take the children to Darwin for the weekend. Caitlin was packing Elizabeth’s clothes into an overnight bag when he came into the bedroom.

  “I wonder if you’d like to come with us this time.”

  She placed a folded t-shirt into the bag and turned, heart suddenly thudding. “I’d love to.”

  “You’re not spending the weekend with Harry?”

  She flattened the shirt, smoothing out non-existent wrinkles. “No. I’ll come to Darwin. Thanks, Jake.”

  “Have you ever flown in a small plane?”

  She shook her head. “I’ll be fine.”

  He cocked his head to one side. “You can finally find a swimming costume that fits.”

  She felt heat on her cheeks and looked away. “Um. Yes.”

  “Or you can keep wearing that green one,” he said laughter in his voice. “It’s not going to bother me.”

  The tone of his voice was different, lower, inviting a response she didn’t feel able to counter. She took a steadying breath. Was he flirting? If he started that, all her defenses would instantly combust.

  “Caitlin,” William stood at the door. “Can I take my toy train set?”

  “Not this time, Will.” Jake patted William’s head. “We’ll be too heavy and the plane won’t be able to take off.”

  She went to her room to throw a few things in a bag. Looking over her tired, limited wardrobe, she felt a stab of excitement. She planned to buy something more glamorous than the shorts and jeans she seemed to live in.

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  * * *

  Chapter Thirteen

  The small plane made her feel as if she had her own wings. They flew over spectacular, rugged country. She looked down on a range with oddly shaped orange and black stripes across beehive-like mounds.

  “You’re looking down on the Bungle Bungles,” Jake said. “Over twenty million years old.”

  “What an extraordinary sight.”

  The range had steep cliffs rising above woodland and grass plain. As they flew on, Caitlin saw an amazing, hidden world of giant gorges and pools, decked out in greenery.

  “It makes me feel very small and insignificant,” Caitlin said.

  Jake looked at her. “It strikes most of us like that.”

  “What’s that?” she asked, looking down at her first glimpse of civilization. A town nestled beside a huge body of water.

  “That’s Lake Kununurra. ‘Meeting of the waters’—the Aboriginal meaning for Kununurra, that’s the town you see down there,” Jake said, pointing. “We’ll take Caitlin there one day, eh, kids?”

  “We’ll go fishing in a boat, spearing Baramuri,” William said, making stabbing gestures.

  “Barramundi,” Jake corrected.

  “You can see the giant pelicans, they’re funny,” William went on, unfazed.

  “I don’t like Darwin,” Elizabeth said, her expression bleak. “We always stay indoors with Nanna.”

  “Not this time, Elizabeth,” Caitlin said. “We’ll go shopping for pretty, new clothes and go swimming and get ice creams. Maybe even go to the movies. Would you like that?”

  “And new pink sneakers like the ones on TV?”

  Caitlin looked down at the shadow the plane made—like a soaring bird—as it flew across the town to the airport. Darwin was larger than she expected.

  “We had a disastrous storm here years ago,” said Jake. “Cyclone Tracy. It flattened the place in 1974. Sadly, there’s little of the original Darwin left. The Colonial architecture had its own kind of charm.”

  When Caitlin stepped onto the tarmac, the humid air covered her like a wet blanket. “It seems even hotter here than Tall Trees.”

  Jake glanced out to the horizon where huge clouds were gathering. “It’s building up to the wet season.”

  The hotel looked out over a turquoise sea. Palm trees trembled in a slight sea breeze that didn’t help at all with the heat, but when they walked into the hotel, an icy blast of air conditioning felt like a bath of chilled Champagne. They checked in and were relieved of their bags by a porter. As they walked over the cool terrazzo floors to the lifts, the heat outside was quickly forgotten.

  Jake had booked a three-bedroom suite with a terrace that looked over the leafy town.

  Caitlin leaned over the balcony rail, admiring the colorful purple and red flowering trees. She had unpacked their bags and was planning the day. First, shopping for swimming costumes for her and Elizabeth, then back for a dip in the huge, guitar-shaped pool below.

  Jake came to stand beside her. “Where are the shops?” she asked him.

  He laughed.

  “And why is that funny?”

  “I’ve never known a woman not to ask that question after spending time at Tall Trees,” he said.

  She speculated on how many women he’d known, then grew annoyed with herself. He leaned in her direction, his arm touching hers as he pointed. “See that building over there?” She pulled her gaze from his smooth, brown arm to look out over the roofs to a concrete structure that seemed to cover a whole block.

  “Yes.�
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  “That’s the shops. There’s a movie complex in there, too.”

  “Great. I’ll take the children.”

  “Okay. I have some work to do.” He drew a wad of notes from his wallet. “Here’s some money to buy those things we discussed. I’ll see you back here at the hotel for lunch.”

  * * * *

  The complex had two floors of shops that seemed to go for miles. Caitlin bought the children an ice cream and they wandered through, stopping at a toyshop where she bought them each a puzzle. They entered a swimwear shop and Elizabeth pounced on a yellow costume with a frilly trim around the bottom.

  “That will suit you,” Caitlin said as she searched along the racks.

  “What about this one for you, Caitlin?” Elizabeth held up a hot-pink bikini. She pointed to the navy one-piece Caitlin held in her hand. “That one’s too boring.”

  Caitlin was after something serviceable, suitable for her position, but she took the bikini from Elizabeth. She had never seen anything like it in Ireland, and it was her size. “I’ll try these on,” she said to the sales girl. She checked that William was occupied, sitting in the corner of the shop with a toy car, then slipped into a cubicle while Elizabeth tried on hers. The bikini was briefer than anything she’d worn before, but it came with a matching wrap. She changed and came out, holding up the navy one-piece and the bikini. “I’ll take both of these and the yellow.” She took out her purse.

  “You have lovely children,” the salesgirl said as she wrapped their purchases.

  “Not mine, but thanks.” Caitlin handed over the money Jake had given her and glanced down at them. Elizabeth was holding her hand and William was placing his toy car carefully in her bag. She felt a stab of inexplicable pride.

  “Time for lunch,” she said. “We’ll come back later and buy you some clothes, William.”

  “I don’t need any,” he said crossly.

  Back at the hotel, a note from Jake was propped on the kitchen bench, inviting her to join the family for lunch. She almost declined, wondering if Vanessa would be there. Caitlin devised a plan of escape, knowing she wouldn’t want her there. She made the children wash their faces and hands, then ran a brush quickly through their hair and tidied hers.