She groped for the right words; she couldn’t afford to alienate him now, not when her spur-of-the-moment plan was looking eminently doable. ‘Look, Brett, I’m aware some of the things that happen around town aren’t ... how can I put this? Well, they aren’t totally above board, if you know what I mean.’ Noting the way his gaze shifted once more around the reception area, checking they were alone, it was clear that he knew exactly what she meant. ‘I’m not saying you’re involved in anything shady, just giving you a heads up.’
Slade stood silent for a moment. ‘Right.’ His face showed no emotion but both hands had clenched. He obviously had something to hide. ‘Who were the opals stolen from?’
‘No name was mentioned.’
‘Okay.’ He nodded slowly, eyes narrowed in calculation.
Gemma continued on in a conspiratorial tone. ‘I was going to suggest that if you have any opals that might be, you know, mistaken for the stolen ones, you could leave them here,’ she pointed under the desk, ‘while you get the rest of your finds valued. Don’t worry. I’ll keep them safe.’
‘Say I did happen to have somethin’ like that, why would you be lookin’ out for my interests?’ Suspicion had replaced the calculating look.
Her forced smile was nearly killing her. ‘It’s the least I can do. If it wasn’t for you we wouldn’t have been freed so quickly from the cave-in.’
There was a long pause as he stared at her shrewdly, presumably mentally assessing his situation. At just that moment Nick’s previous appointment emerged from the room.
‘Quick!’ she said, holding out her hands for the backpack.
Slade passed it to her and she shoved it under her feet behind the desk. The other miner sent her a wave as he crossed the foyer and left through the front door. Without a word, Slade grabbed his plastic bag of rubble and disappeared through the opal dealer’s door.
More than a little relieved at the success of her plan, Gemma immediately stood and hefted the backpack onto the desk. The pulse in her throat was beating faster than a drum solo—the thrill of anticipation was unbearable.
Chapter 22
Trembling, heart pounding, Gemma unclipped the top of Slade’s backpack, poured the contents onto the desk and ...
Nothing.
No dismantled Gracie. No opalised fossil bones. Just a collection of opals partly cleaned to expose their colour; what Jamie referred to as ‘rubs’.
Disappointment tasted so bitter she could have retched.
Fury. Sadness. Defeat. So many emotions rolled over and through her that dizziness forced her to sit before she fell down. She hadn’t wanted to consider the prospect of being wrong about Slade having stolen the skeleton, had pinned all her hopes on that being the case, and now that she’d been proved wrong, she didn’t know what to do. Surrendering to tears, she lay with her head on her hands on the rock-strewn desk and sobbed.
By the time Slade exited the room she’d recovered herself somewhat, but a need for some sort of retribution burned inside. Slade may not have taken Gracie, but it was a dead certainty that the opals in front of her were stolen. No way was she going to allow the barefaced liar to get away with that.
The moment Slade’s eyes fell on the abandoned backpack and the rubs covering the desk, the smile he’d been wearing as he emerged through the doorway slid from his face.
‘Sorry I’m late.’ Sergeant Krazinski barged his way through the front door, thumbing through the pages of a notebook as he approached. ‘Had a bit of a situation. Now, about these stolen opals you—’
‘I think these might be what you’re after,’ Gemma interrupted before Pete could give her away. She indicated the rubs laid out on the desk in front of her. ‘This man brought them in.’
Slade aimed a murderous expression at her.
‘Are these yours?’ The sergeant turned to Slade for confirmation.
‘No!’ The denial was explosive.
Gemma feigned surprise. ‘Yes, they are. You asked me to look after the backpack for you.’
Fear flecked the miner’s eyes and nervous sweat had formed drops on his upper lip. ‘You don’t know what you’re talkin’ about. I ain’t never seen that backpack before.’
‘But—’ Gemma began.
‘But nothin’. It ain’t mine.’ Face mottled in frustration, he stood in front of them for several seconds before flinging a final scowl at her then storming out.
Gemma turned to Pete. ‘I’m not sure who these belong to, but you heard the man. They aren’t his.’
Pete nodded knowingly. ‘Well now, that might be the first time that low-life’s ever told the truth. I had a number of reports of robberies from mine sites this morning, which is why I was late getting here. Sorry about that, but it could be that we’ve found the culprit.’
‘Aren’t you going to arrest him?’ Gemma demanded.
‘Technically I can’t charge him with anything. It’s your word against his with regard to who owns the backpack. But I’ll find out which miners these’ve been stolen from and that’ll hopefully lead to a conviction.’ The sergeant headed for the door. ‘Thanks for your assistance.’
Gemma collapsed into the chair, a mixture of relief and painful reality turning her legs to jelly. She closed her eyes, rested her elbows on the desk and cradled her chin in her hands, trying desperately to sort out her feelings.
Yes, she’d gotten the better of Slade, but where was the self-satisfaction? She was no closer to finding out who stole the skeleton; in fact the mystery had only deepened. Grief tugged as heavy as an anchor at her heart as the understanding finally sank in that Gracie was now, in all probability, irrevocably lost to the world. Her sense of personal loss paled in comparison to the magnitude of that.
But it wasn’t the only reason for the sudden blinding tears.
What was Jamie going to do now? He had to be suffering; he’d planned his entire future around selling Gracie to buy back the old family home for Harry. With that no longer an option, he’d have no choice but to stay here in Rainbow Cliffs while her life was in the city.
She had her career to think of, even though the grant she’d been chasing would probably not eventuate. If by some miracle Gracie was found intact, Jamie would still have to dismantle her and sell her to an opal dealer to make enough money to move to Sydney. That would at least make it possible to continue their relationship, but how could she reconcile securing her own happiness at the expense of the fossil’s destruction when she’d spent her whole adult life preserving such treasures? She couldn’t live with that on her conscience.
So where did that leave them? Her and Jamie?
God knows she’d lived through turbulent times before, but the past week had to rank amongst the most emotionally tumultuous of her life. She wasn’t the same woman who’d arrived a handful of days ago. Jamie had opened her up to a whole new way of looking at the world. All her senses had been sharpened—the colours out here were brighter, the sounds more distinct, the smells more all-pervasive.
Who’d have believed that her first love would come to mean so much to her again? She pictured his face and an automatic smile lifted her lips. His tenderness, his gorgeous grin, his humour and his optimism, all those qualities that had first attracted her were still there. And making love with him after all these years had been a revelation; she’d allowed herself to feel pleasure for the first time in the longest time.
She paused and sat up straight in the chair. Was it possible that she was allowing that beautiful memory to cloud her mind? The love she’d had for Jamie back in their university days was young love, all hearts and flowers, naive and romantic, but she was no longer a girl still in her teens with a head full of dreams. She may never have fallen out of love with him, or he with her, but that was no guarantee of a happy-ever-after ending for them.
Their new partnership was still very much in its infancy, and those other less-appealing traits of Jamie’s—the self-righteousness, the stubbornness, the fact he was still a hopeless dreamer, the c
haracteristics she’d always had difficulty dealing with—remained.
Was their newly rekindled love strong enough to withstand a long-distance romance? If she really was finally ready to stand on her own two feet, was it a mistake to commit to this relationship so soon?
And then there was Drew.
Guilt stiffened her in her seat. Here she was, thinking only about herself when what she should be concerned about was how her son would react to another man in his mother’s life, even if that man happened to be his real father. It had never been in her life plan to be a single mother; she’d love someone to share the moments of pride and the pure joy of watching Drew grow into the happy, loving little boy he’d become since she’d left Roger. But it would be a huge call to disrupt the stability and security of the life they’d made for themselves, even presuming that Jamie wanted to fully embrace the role of father. He’d said he did, but Drew needed a full-time dad, not someone blowing in and out of his life when time permitted.
How the hell were they going to make that work?
A surge of homesickness hit her like a slap to the face and she dropped her head onto the hands she’d laid one on top of the other on the desk. Her son was what mattered. She had to get home to him.
She’d miss Jamie. Miss the sound of his voice, miss the musky, manly smell of him, miss the feel of him lying next to her in bed. Mostly, she’d miss his kisses. But—she sat up and swiped away the tears of self-pity falling in heavy drops down her cheeks—no matter how much it hurt to say goodbye, she had to get home to her little man.
She’d survived heartache before. She could do it again.
* * *
‘Where ... where am I?’ The words sounded more like a croak than anything else.
Jamie raised his gaze to the ceiling and briefly closed his eyes in a silent prayer of thanks.
‘Harry, I could kill you. You scared the living daylights out of us.’ Lou jumped to her feet, her eyes glittering with unshed tears under the harsh lighting of the hospital room.
‘What happened?’ Harry struggled to lever himself up from the pillow.
‘Don’t!’ Jamie and Lou both yelled at once.
He peered around, stunned, at the tubes and machines hooked up to his body. ‘Fair go, you two. Ganging up on a fella is a bit much, don’t you reckon?’
Lou soothed the iron-grey hair back from Harry’s forehead to plant a kiss there. ‘What I reckon is, you deserve a bloody good talking to, mister. Didn’t you have any indication you were about to have a stroke? And if you did, then why didn’t you mention it to either of us?’ She gestured with a fierce finger-point between herself and Jamie.
‘A stroke? Geez, I wondered what was wrong with me. I didn’t want you to worry.’ Harry grimaced, as though the effort to explain had been too much. He lay back, eyes closed.
Lou took his hand in hers. ‘We’ll discuss this later. All I can say is that you’re lucky it was minor.’
A fresh-faced young nurse appeared from nowhere and bustled around him, checking his pulse and temperature. ‘All good,’ she assured them all with a smile. ‘I’ll let the doctor know you’re awake.’
Jamie stood looking down at his dad, struggling with what to say first. He wanted to berate his father for not letting him know about the symptoms. Wanted to be angry with him for daring to keep things from the ones who cared about him most. Wanted to cry out his relief that Harry, his only family, was going to be all right.
He grasped a hand and squeezed it. ‘I love you, Dad.’
Fingers squeezed lightly back. ‘Love you too, son.’
Then Harry smiled at Lou, a smile that clearly came from the heart. ‘I also love this beautiful lady.’ He touched her cheek and she leaned affectionately into his palm. ‘She’s made my life worth living.’ The look they exchanged spoke volumes.
‘I love you, Harry.’ She said it with such simple heartfelt longing there could be no doubting her.
‘You always came first with me, Jamie. Ever since you mother died, God rest her soul.’ His father closed his eyes momentarily as if drawing on some inner reserve. ‘But you’re a grown man now, a man I’m proud to call my son.’
The words of praise spread an all-encompassing warmth through Jamie’s body.
Harry took a deep breath. ‘You don’t need me like you once did.’ Jamie shook his head in denial but his father continued on. ‘You’ve never come out and said it, but you’ve given enough hints about wanting us to move back to the coast. Fact is, I don’t want to leave Rainbow Cliffs. I’m happy there.’ He looked lovingly at Lou. ‘It’s home.’
‘Your father and I are moving in together, Jamie.’ Holding Harry’s hand, Lou glanced between them. ‘We only decided the morning of the cave-in. We meant to tell you, but so much was happening. Then after the stroke I didn’t see the point in saying anything until I knew your dad was going to be all ri—’
‘I don’t want you to move in with me, Lou.’ Harry’s voice was croaky but definite.
‘You what?’ She arched an eyebrow at him.
Harry smiled. ‘Not unless you marry me.’
Lou laughed her best hearty laugh. ‘You drive a hard bargain, mister.’
‘Well?’ Harry persisted. ‘Will you make an honest man of me?’
She crinkled her eyes up thoughtfully for several seconds. ‘I ... will.’
Jamie swallowed hard. He should’ve realised long before now that this was where things were heading. If only he hadn’t been so caught up in chasing his own dream, a dream that would never happen now. His effort to recapture the past, to bring the fading memories of his mother back to the forefront of their minds, was beyond his reach.
Sorrow threatened to swallow him but he couldn’t allow it to show. It would hurt these two people he loved. Then something shifted in his chest. Harry was planning a new life with Lou. His dad had moved on. Maybe it was about time for him to let go of the tragedy of the past and do the same. It’s what his mum would have wanted.
‘Well it’s about time,’ Jamie said, wrapping Lou’s cuddly form in his arms. ‘Welcome to the family.’
Her hazel eyes twinkled up at him. ‘Thank you, love. I know I can’t take your mother’s place but I love your dad and I care for you like you’re my own.’
Stretching up, she laid her cheek against his. Her skin was soft and she smelled of lavender and he had no qualms about the way his father’s future was headed.
‘Seems to me I’ve been given a second chance at life, son, and I’m gonna make the most of it. I loved your mother. A part of me always will.’ His father glanced apologetically at Lou then back at him. ‘And I know you loved her too—naming that fossil after her, all the work you’ve put into restoring her, is proof of that. Your mum would’ve been thrilled.’
Harry’s voice almost broke but he coughed and went on in a rush. ‘And I know you’ll have a good reason for wanting to sell Gracie off for the worth of the opal but I gotta tell you, I’m not interested in being the richest man in the cemetery. I know you. You’re a man of integrity. You wouldn’t be able to live with yourself if you destroyed her.’
Jamie blanched inwardly. In the overwhelming anxiety for Harry’s welfare somehow the dilemma of Gracie had been relegated to the back of his mind. In a flash, despair returned.
‘We’ll never know, Harry. She’s gone. I think Roger Devane stole her.’
His father stared at him for a disquieting moment then hung his head. ‘He couldn’t have.’
‘Why are you defending the man?’ He glared at his dad.
‘I’m not.’ Harry took a rallying breath. ‘I took her.’
‘You what?’
‘What?’ Jamie and Lou burst out simultaneously.
He cast them a regretful sideways glance. ‘I kept hoping you’d come to your senses and not sell her off but, in case you didn’t, I couldn’t have you making a deal you’d regret for the rest of your life, so I ... ’ The words appeared to be causing him great discomfort. ‘I moved her.
Just ’til I could talk to you.’
‘Where is she?’ Jamie demanded.
‘One of the unused mine tunnels. That glass case is heavier than I thought.’
Lou glared at him accusingly. ‘Someone with high blood pressure should have had enough sense not to raise it further by over-exerting himself. Good grief, Harry. What were you thinking?’
‘Sorry, love.’ Head hung low, he looked suitably chastened.
Jamie continued to stare at his father in disbelief. He wanted to be outraged, furious with his father’s actions, but suddenly there was no anger in him. Instead, a knot of excitement tightened his stomach.
He punched one hand into the air. ‘Yes!’ Gracie was safe!
He paced the area immediately beside the bed, mind swamped by a flood of new thoughts. Everything had changed. His long-standing guilt over Harry having to sell the old home to save Jamie from himself was relieved. He couldn’t stop smiling. All the feelings of self-recrimination over Gracie’s seemingly inevitable destruction could now be laid to rest.
And he could grant Gem her dream.
At the thought of her, a terrible longing washed over him. He hadn’t spoken to her since leaving the Cliffs two days ago; Lou was keeping her abreast of Harry’s situation nightly via the motel’s phone. He couldn’t bring himself to talk to her.
The moment of doubt he’d had over her involvement in Gracie’s disappearance still stabbed at his conscience. She’d heard the uncertainty in his voice when he’d questioned her and, from the wounded look on her face, he’d known immediately the terrible mistake he’d made. He felt ashamed, but there’d been no time to sort things out. Would she be able to forgive him?
The compassion she’d shown over Harry’s stroke was real, but that was just part of her nature, to be concerned, to want to be of help. She’d have done as much for a hurt kitten.
What if she wouldn’t forgive him? If he’d gone too far? What if he could never hold her, never make love with her again? She’d accused him of always running away from intimacy, of being afraid to commit in the past. Was it true?
Falling In Love Again Page 25
