Life shifted. The sea gates, locked for so long, creaked slowly open, and Jack was there, waiting for her to swim free with him.
‘You’d want me?’ he asked.
‘More than anything in the world.’
‘You’d leave here?’
‘There are rehab. places for kids everywhere, and if there aren’t I can set them up. Someone else can take over my place here. Some other doctor who needs healing.’
‘You no longer need healing?’
‘I think,’ she said unsteadily, ‘that all I have is a void in my heart that needs filling. And I might...I just might be looking at a guy who could fill it.’
He smiled. He smiled and he smiled, and then he dropped to the sand.
On bended knee.
‘I’m not sure if this is the time or the place,’ he said. ‘You need rose petals and champagne.’
‘I don’t need anything but you.’
She was smiling down at him. Smiling as much as he was. She was dizzy with smiling. Dizzy with...love?
This was all about Jack and the rest of her life.
‘Then will you marry me?’ Jack asked, and the world stilled.
She thought... Marriage. Jack. The feeling flooding through her... Who could describe it? Euphoria was too small a word.
‘Is it too soon?’ he said, mistaking her silence for hesitation. ‘Kate, I can wait. I’ll wait as long as I must. I’ll do whatever I must to win you. To love you. But if you’ll marry me I swear I’ll not confine you. I swear I’ll keep you free. All I’ll do is love you, for as long as we both shall live.’
Silence. He needed her to answer, she thought desperately. She needed to get her voice in order, her thoughts in order. Somehow she made a massive effort.
‘Jack, I’ve never had a family,’ she said, softly and lovingly. ‘Not really. I’m not sure how to start, but if you wouldn’t mind taking on a raw beginner... You and me and Harry, and Maisie and whoever else comes along. Family. I’ll do my best. I’ll love you with all my heart and if that’s not enough I’ll love you some more. So, yes, Jack Kincaid, I’ll marry you.’
She dropped to her knees to join him on the sand. He cupped her face in his hands, and looked at her, caressing her with his eyes.
‘I will love you for ever,’ he told her. ‘I should have loved you and married you years ago but I’ll make up for it. I have no idea how to be a husband, how to be a father, but I’ll learn. The only requirement I know is love, and I have that in spades.’
‘You, too?’ She could barely speak. ‘The way I feel...’
But she couldn’t go on. He’d tilted her chin to kiss her. His mouth met hers. She felt his warmth, his strength and his love. His kiss was tender, loving, perfect, and it was the sealing of vows that were as yet unsaid but were already stronger than chains.
She kissed him back. His hand tugged her close and she surrendered to the kiss. She surrendered to this man but it was okay, it was fine, because he was surrendering, too.
She kissed him back. She loved him and held him and the kiss could have lasted forever, but finally, eventually, they became aware of laughter and applause around them.
They broke apart and patients, parents and staff were clustered around, smiling and smiling, ready to share in their joy.
Everyone but Helen.
Out on the sandbank Helen cut a lone figure, dripping wet, gesticulating hysterically as Maisie swam serenely back to shore.
Kate choked on laughter. She stood with Jack’s arm around her while Maisie bounded up the beach to drop the ball at her feet.
‘Oh, Maisie,’ she faltered. ‘How could you do that to Helen? Not when she’s come all this way to warn me.’
‘It’ll be fine,’ Jack said grandly, hugging her closer with one arm and waving to the beach in general with the other. ‘Helen is family, and forgiveness come with the territory. I’m thinking family might take some getting used to, but we’re about to start.’ And he kissed her again. ‘We might rescue Helen first, but we’re about to start right now.’
* * *
Six months later... A coastal town south of Sydney. Sunday morning. They were down at the dolphin enclosure, watching Harry swim.
This was a different place from the dolphin sanctuary that had played such a huge part in their lives. This was simply an enclosure where injured dolphins were rehabilitated. Dolphins needing long-term care were sent somewhere like Dolphin Bay, but these were short-termers. They were wild dolphins, recovering from shark bites or encounters with fishing nets.
Jack and Kate had wed back at Dolphin Bay. It had seemed the only place. Helen had grumbled about needing to bring all her kids to the other side of the country but once her kids saw Dolphin Bay all grumbles were put aside.
The ceremony had been magic, on the beach at sunset. Kate had worn a simple dress, soft silk, floaty, beautiful. She’d worn frangipani in her hair, and nothing on her feet.
Harry and Maisie had been joint ring-bearers. Harry had carried the ring while Maisie had stood by his side, solemn and true, as if she’d understood the significance of the occasion. The fact that seagulls had intruded right after the ring ceremony and had needed to be chased was immaterial. Kate had been wed. A dog’s duty was done.
Helen and Doug had beamed. The staff of Dolphin Bay had beamed as well. A new doctor had arrived the week before. Isabelle was a burnt-out surgeon. She’d arrived tentative, not sure if this could work, but after a week there was already colour in her cheeks, smiles, dolphin magic.
As for Simon, he was now nothing but a shadow from a forgotten past, safely back in prison for the foreseeable future.
Susie’s father had done wonders, even finding outstanding charges that had nothing to do with Kate. ‘And we’ll have a watertight intervention order to protect you when he finally gets out,’ Susie’s dad had told them. ‘Forget him.’
So they had. They’d moved on to happiness.
The staff of Dolphin Bay had given them a beach umbrella dotted with dolphins as a wedding gift. They were sitting under it now, while Harry lapped the pool. These dolphins in their new home weren’t tame, but they seemed to lap with him.
‘It’s magic,’ Kate whispered. ‘We’re so lucky.’
‘Lucky indeed.’ Jack held his wife’s hand and thought of the last few months. The house they’d found, a beautiful cottage just back from the beach. His job, satisfying in a way he’d never dreamed. The new rehab centre Kate was setting up. Harry’s school, where he was blossoming.
And this place...this dolphin sanctuary... They had such plans.
Because he’d spent his life so focussed on his career, Jack was financially secure. His money and Kate’s skills had secured them seats on the board and already they had plans in place for expansion. Kate had visions of a bigger pool attached to a smaller hospital pool. She dreamed of an educational centre where kids could learn about the needs of wild dolphins.
She had hopes that one day kids might also come here to heal, just as they did at Dolphin Bay.
This was okay, Jack thought. Actually, this was more than okay. This was pretty much perfect.
‘I don’t want anything more in life than what I have right now,’ he said, and he kissed his wife on the nose. And then, because who could resist, he kissed her on the lips.
She pushed him away, but just a little so she could still watch Harry. She was standing lifeguard, as all parents did. To Harry, the word ‘Kate’ was synonymous with ‘Mum’. He loved Kate and she loved him right back. His parents would always be a part of his life, a loving memory, the foundations of his future, but he had his Jack and his Kate and he was as happy as a kid could be.
Actually, he had an extra lifeguard as well. Maisie was standing guard on the sidelines. She wasn’t allowed in the dolphin pool but everyone knew that o
ne hint of trouble she’d be in there. Harry was hers.
‘So you don’t want anything else?’ Kate asked, as they watched, and Jack thought about it.
‘A beer,’ he conceded. ‘In a while. But that’s pretty much it.’
‘That’s a shame,’ she told him. ‘Because I have something for you.’
‘What?’
And in answer she took his hand. She was wearing a bikini. Her stomach was smooth and flat, yet when she held his hand over it and pressed down he felt...he felt...
‘You really want nothing else?’ she asked.
He closed his eyes, and when he opened them he’d come to a decision.
‘Harry,’ he called. ‘Time to come out.’
‘Aw...’
‘No arguments,’ he called. ‘Out, now.’
So Harry reluctantly emerged. Maisie met him, boy and dog hugged—they’d been separated for a whole fifteen minutes!—and then he turned to Jack.
‘Why did I have to get out?’ he demanded.
‘Because lifesaving duties have been suspended,’ Jack told him. ‘Harry, could you pour yourself a drink and go sit in the shade with Maisie?’
‘Why?’
‘Because there’s something I need to do,’ he told him. ‘Our Kate has just given me a gift, something so priceless I can scarcely take it in. I love you, mate, but right now I need to devote all my time to telling Kate I love her. So you concentrate on your soda and your dog while I take our Kate into my arms and tell her I love her for ever.’
‘Can I help?’ Harry asked.
‘Join the queue,’ Jack said. ‘But don’t rush. Loving Kate’s important, and we have all the time in the world.’
* * * * *
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ISBN-13: 9781460339466
A SECRET SHARED…
Copyright © 2014 by Marion Lennox
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