Heart of the Valley

by Cathryn Hein

  ‘So why make the bet?’

  ‘For the same reason I’ve made every other stupid bet with Andrew. To get his attention.’

  ‘Why?’ Brooke’s eyes widened as understanding dawned. ‘Oh, shit.’

  ‘Yeah. Oh, shit indeed.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Brooke, trying to digest the news. ‘Okay. You’re in love with Andrew?’

  ‘Yes. Unfortunately he’s in love with you. At least with Lachie here I had a chance. Now …’ Chloe raised her scissors and dropped them again in despair. ‘Andrew will think he can win you back.’

  ‘But I don’t want him. I never wanted him. He knows that.’

  Besides, Chloe was wrong. Andrew, while friendly, hadn’t made a single move since Lachie left. If anything, he’d been distant. It was as though the moment in the stable, when she’d refused his offer to help keep vigil over Poddy, had finally proved to Andrew where her heart lay. And with understanding came change and healing. Now, unlike Brooke with Lachie, he’d moved on.

  She frowned, mind switching back to Chloe’s revelation. ‘So if you’re in love with Andrew, what about all those other guys?’

  Chloe made a wry face. ‘I thought if I pretended I was over him, I could make myself believe it. Like a self-fulfilling prophecy. And maybe I needed to prove to myself how desirable I am.’ She touched her chest for emphasis. ‘That I’m someone special too. Trouble is, it’s become second nature. And don’t worry, I’m very aware of what people say about me.’ She shook her head, disgusted, although whether in Andrew, Brooke or herself, Brooke couldn’t tell. ‘It’s stupid, I know, but I felt better about myself if I knew that guys were interested in me – even if it was never Andrew. I think deep down I understood we’d only ever be friends, but I couldn’t help hoping. I didn’t want to stop believing that it might happen. But then he went and fell in love with you.’ Suddenly her face crumpled, bright-blue eyes pooling.

  ‘Oh, Chloe, why didn’t you tell me?’

  ‘I was desperate to, but I was afraid it’d make things weird between us. That it’d spoil our closeness. And to be honest I was a bit jealous. I knew it wasn’t your fault but it still hurt.’

  Hearing the pain in Chloe’s voice, Brooke studied her friend, acutely aware of how much had changed between them over the course of this year. All those secret desires slowly eroding their once happy triumvirate. Desires Brooke had never even knew existed, but should have sensed.

  ‘I’m so sorry, Chloe. I wish you’d said. I wish Andrew had said. But most of all I wish we could have fixed this years ago.’

  ‘Me, too.’ Chloe smiled a little. ‘Might have saved me a lot of bad sex.’

  ‘So we’re okay? You and me?’

  ‘Don’t be a doofus, of course we are.’

  Relief bursting across her face, Brooke flicked the cape to free herself, launched from her chair and wrapped her arms tight around Chloe. They embraced for a long moment before releasing each other, smiling despite their tears.

  Brooke sat back while Chloe inspected her face in the mirror and ran the corner of a towel under her eyes to tidy the mascara smudges. Makeup fixed, Chloe picked up her scissors and squatted back on her stool, before scooting behind Brooke to resume cutting.

  ‘So what are you going to do about Lachie?’

  ‘Nothing. As I said to Mum, there’s no point. He’s there and I’m here. May as well be the other side of the world.’

  ‘I really wish he’d stayed. Andrew knew right from the start Lachie was exactly your type. I knew it’d be easy to get him to agree to the bet – he wanted Lachie out of play.’ She made a face. ‘He’s so transparent sometimes. Stuffed if I know how you never suspected.’

  ‘I did. Sort of. I just didn’t want to admit it. I was too scared it’d ruin our friendship.’

  ‘Nearly did anyway.’

  ‘Yes.’ Suddenly Brooke smiled and clapped her hands to ease the tension. ‘Right. So what are we going to do about you and Andrew?’

  Chloe shrugged. ‘Nothing. What’s there to do? He’s not interested. Whatever happens, one thing’s for sure. I’m not making any more stupid bets. I’m worth more than that.’ She caught Brooke’s eye. ‘Lachie did me a big favour knocking me back. It made me really think about my life, what I was doing to myself. I turn twenty-five in a few weeks. What sort of twenty-five-year-old shaves her head to get some bloke’s attention?’ Her mouth set in a determined line. ‘We’re not kids any more, Brooke. We’re adults, and it’s about time we all grew up. It’s fine for Andrew. He’s so rich he could buy someone’s heart if he wanted to.’

  ‘He couldn’t buy mine.’

  ‘No. But he’s tried enough times. He’s still trying to with all that Kingston Downs business.’

  Brooke shot upright so fast Chloe’s scissors flew out of her hand and clattered to the floor. She whipped around and, gripping the chair’s arms, jutted her face at Chloe. ‘What Kingston Downs business?’

  ‘He’s been trying to buy the property for months, Brooke.’ Chloe’s expression turned sullen, the bitterness she’d kept so well hidden slithering to the surface. ‘I imagine it’s meant to be his big present to you. The one offer you could never refuse.’

  ‘It was Andrew?’

  Chloe nodded.

  ‘Oh God.’ Backing away, Brooke put a shaky hand to her mouth as wave of nausea threatened to engulf her. ‘But …’ Brooke shook her head, trying to understand. ‘Why would he do that to me?’

  ‘Because he loves you. Why else?’

  ‘But he doesn’t! I’ve been worrying myself sick over this. If it weren’t for Mum promising the family would never sell I’d still be panicking over it. Oh God, I need some water.’ Tearing at the velcro tape securing her cape, Brooke tossed it aside and ran to the wash station. She turned the cold-water tap on flat out, using the shower-head extension to rinse the acid taste from her mouth. Even with her nausea under control, her trembles refused to subside. Andrew buying Kingston Downs? It defied belief.

  She slumped into the basin’s reclining chair and rubbed her hands over her wet face. Andrew. How could he? He was supposed to be her friend. As was Chloe.

  Slowly, she dropped her hands and focused her cold gaze on Chloe. ‘You knew and you never said anything.’

  Her friend’s gaze dropped. ‘Only because Andrew let it slip. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, but he made me swear not to.’

  ‘So why tell me now?’

  Chloe walked to the chair and knelt by its side, her palm covering the back of Brooke’s hand. ‘Because I’m so over this; the secrecy, the lies, the heartache. Andrew needs to hear it from you, that even Kingston Downs won’t change your mind. Otherwise he’ll still hold out hope, and I just can’t handle it any more.’ Chloe wiped her cheek as a tear spilled down it slowly. ‘And no, I’m not a complete idiot. I know Andrew might never be interested in me, but I need a chance to find out.’ Voice choking, she held up her forefinger. ‘One chance, Brooke. It’s not too much to ask, is it?’

  ‘No,’ replied Brooke, sympathy softening her anger towards Chloe.

  ‘So you’ll talk to him?’

  Oh yeah, Brooke would talk to Andrew all right. She needed to get to the bottom of this. He was over her, no matter what Chloe believed, so why try to buy Kingston Downs? It didn’t make sense.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Thanks. It means a lot.’ Chloe grinned through her tears. ‘Who am I kidding? It means everything.’ She kissed Brooke on the cheek. ‘Come on, let’s finish this trim. We need to keep you looking awesome in case Lachie comes back.’

  ‘He won’t,’ said Brooke, lowering herself into the squishy cutting chair.

  Chloe leaned down and wrapped her arms around Brooke’s neck, looking at her in the mirror, expression alive with hope. ‘But we can dream, you and I.’

  Brooke smiled and clutched reassuringly at Chloe’s arm. ‘Sure we can.’

  Jaw set, Brooke left the salon and drove the twenty-five kilometres to Willowgrove with her hands t
ight around the wheel and her mouth as thin as a knife slash. The anger towards Andrew she’d suppressed in Chloe’s presence festered like an ugly boil. What sort of game was Andrew playing? He knew how stressed over Mark’s threats she’d been, yet he’d been one of the causes. And what the hell did he want with Kingston Downs anyway?

  She flicked the indicator and drove towards the main house, a sprawling white building surrounded by an English garden that wound around the house in a series of landscaped ‘rooms’. As teenagers, she, Chloe and Andrew had spend countless summer hours exploring the garden’s hidden nooks, delighting in the cool shadowed groves and the swathes of colourful flowers and plants, lazing on wood and stone benches, wading in the garden’s decorative pools. Sharing the secret, intense language of adolescence.

  She slid to a stop outside the end bay of the four-car garage, spraying up white gravel. Slamming the door, she took a moment to calm herself and think where Andrew could be. Even with the lowering sun, the temperature remained warm, the sky a summery peach and gold. She stalked around the edge of the house towards the pool and entertainment area, where, when he wasn’t in the stables, Andrew tended to live in the summer months. Where the three of them had partied and laughed and loved as only long-time friends can do. Without troubles. Happy. Or so she’d thought.

  ‘Brooke!’ Andrew waved before kicking off the pool wall and sleeking through the water in clean fluid strokes. He emerged at the edge near her feet, dark-gold skin sparkling with water drops, teeth perfect and white as he grinned. The muscles across his shoulders flexed as he planted his hands on the pool edge and raised his body out of the water, eyes wide with happiness at seeing her.

  Another woman might have been mesmerised by the sight of his lithe body, his laughing, handsome face, but Brooke remained, as always, unmoved.

  ‘You look knackered,’ he said, dripping beside her, oblivious to her crossed arms and furious expression.

  ‘Why?’ she asked.

  He blinked, confused, before his eyes registered her stance. Expression sobering, he headed towards the pool room, with its long bar and lounge area complete with a large, flat-screen television tuned to MTV, and game consoles of every make. ‘Why what? Do you want a beer? I have Peronis, your favourite.’

  ‘You know damn well what. Kingston Downs, Andrew. My home. Have you any idea the stress you’ve caused me?’ She placed her hand over her heart. ‘How scared I’ve been?’

  He looked away from her, as though it pained him to meet her gaze, and quickly ducked his head to stare inside the fridge, fingers tense around the door edge. ‘I didn’t mean for that to happen.’ For a long while he said nothing, then he pulled out two beers, shut the door and leaned against it. ‘Chloe told you everything, I suppose.’

  ‘You mean there’s more than you trying to steal my home from me?’

  ‘I wasn’t trying to steal anything, Brooke.’

  ‘So what were you trying to do then?’ She crossed her arms and shifted her weight onto one hip. ‘Explain it to me.’

  He walked behind the bar, found a bottle opener and flicked the caps off both beers before heading towards her, one held out. When she refused, he shrugged and took a slug from his bottle, watching her. No laughter danced in his dark eyes now. This was serious.

  ‘You think I was trying to buy your love.’

  ‘Oh, come on, Andrew. You might do some dumb things sometimes, but you’re forgetting I’ve known you long enough to know you’re not that stupid. So why?’

  ‘Because of what happened, that’s why.’ Anguish twisted his face. ‘Whose fault do you think the crash was, Brooke? I knew you were exhausted. I knew I should have followed you. But I was angry and hurt and too busy licking my wounds to do the right thing. And look what happened. I’ve told you before I’d do anything to make up for what you went through. Kingston Downs mightn’t have brought Oddy back or cured Poddy, but it would’ve been something.’

  ‘It was an accident. No one’s fault.’

  ‘I shouldn’t have forced you to kiss me.’

  ‘And I shouldn’t have made the bet in the first place! For God’s sake, Andrew, it was an accident. I never blamed you. The only person I ever blamed was myself, and thanks to my counsellor I don’t even do that any more.’ She grimaced. ‘Well, not much.’

  Confusion knitted his brow. ‘You mean you never blamed me?’

  ‘No!’

  He placed the two beers on the floor and, without hesitating, wrapped his arms around her. Brooke stiffened, but Andrew made no move except to press his face into her shoulder. ‘I’m sorry you were frightened about losing Kingston Downs.’

  ‘You should have told me what you were doing. I was so stressed. And if you’d bought the place, I could have ended up hating you.’

  He pulled away. ‘That was a chance I had to take if I was going to make things right.’

  ‘They were never wrong. Except for,’ she flapped a hand, ‘you know.’

  ‘That’s all over now. As you said, I might be dumb sometimes but I’m not completely stupid.’

  ‘Except when it comes to Chloe.’

  He threw her a ‘huh?’ look. ‘What’s Chloe got to do with anything?’

  She let out a breath. Time for more truths. ‘She’s crazy about you.’

  Laughter bubbled from his mouth. At ease now, he bent to retrieve the beers, shoving one into Brooke’s hand. ‘You can’t be serious.’

  ‘Deadly.’

  His grin dropped. ‘But —’

  ‘Trying to cure herself,’ interrupted Brooke, knowing exactly what he was thinking. ‘And show you just how desirable she is.’

  He shook his head, overcome with the same sense of disbelief Brooke had experienced. ‘I suppose you knew?’

  ‘I had no idea. She only admitted it this afternoon.’ Brooke drank from her bottle. ‘But I realise now there were signs. I just didn’t read them. Like with you. And there I was thinking we knew everything about one another, when the reality was we knew so little. So much for friendship.’

  ‘You’re missing the point. It was for the sake of our friendship I never admitted how I felt. Do you think we’d have stayed friends all this time if I had?’

  Brooke stared at the television, mind only half registering the video that was playing. Andrew’s words held truth. This mess had occurred precisely because of their friendship. Because they all cared so much for what they shared.

  ‘You’re right,’ she said. ‘We would have fallen out long ago. But now we all know the truth, and that means things aren’t ever going to be the same again. And we’re going to have to deal with it. You and Chloe especially.’

  He stared into the neck of his beer. ‘I don’t know if I can.’

  ‘Take a gamble, Chiang-man.’ She smiled and patted his shoulder. ‘You never know, you might come out the winner this time.’

  Twenty-One

  Lachie rose, dressed and, as had become his habit these last seven weeks, headed immediately for his father’s room. He paused outside the door, bracing himself. The cancer, so widespread and unstoppable, had reduced Harry Cambridge to a series of angles. Triangular cheekbones, sharp-edged shoulders, elbows and fingers bent like set squares, and eyes which, when they weren’t closed with fatigue, narrowed in on Lachie like lasers.

  ‘Hey, Dad,’ he said as he knocked and entered. Though he kept his expression impassive, the sight of his father never ceased to send a cold rush through his gut. ‘Where’s Mum?’

  His father lifted a hand and pointed a bony finger in the direction of the bathroom.

  Lachie listened for a moment, satisfied when he heard the faint tinkling of the shower. Good. He wanted a moment alone with his dad, time to say the words he’d been aching to say for weeks but which he’d kept inside him, intimidated by those laser looks. Unsure what reception he’d receive. Fearful of contempt and rejection.

  Steeling himself, he pulled up a chair close to his father’s head and sat on its edge, leaning forward so Harry
wouldn’t miss a word. The palliative care nurse said it wouldn’t be long now and he believed her far more than the GP who’d written his dad off a month ago. The Home Hospice mentor had made similar noises, preparing them for the inevitable. The one small mercy was that Harry would die at home, with his family around and Delamere’s air in his lungs.

  And, if Lachie’s prayers came true, peace with his son in his heart.

  Harry hitched those pain-filled eyes to Lachie’s face and for a moment, Lachie thought he wouldn’t be able to do it, but his resolve held and the words, long overdue, emerged.

  ‘I’m sorry, Dad. For everything. For running out when I was a kid, to doing the same again last year. For never giving you the respect you deserved. For not being the son you wanted.

  ‘I should have …’ Lachie swallowed and breathed deeply. ‘I never meant what I said. I was never ashamed of you. I just wasn’t mature or smart enough to understand.’

  Harry’s hand rose from the blanket, clawlike fingers searching. Lachie leaned closer, uncertain, afraid. ‘What is it? What do you need?’

  ‘Hand,’ Harry whispered dryly.

  Lachie leaned back slightly. Hand? His dad turned his palm over and held it open. Lachie stared at it as something deep and painful cleaved his chest. A flood threatened, but he held it in check with a vice-like clench of his jaw. Not now. Not at this moment. Later, when he could walk away and give vent to his pain and grief and let his emotions dissolve in private.

  Hesitantly, he placed his palm against his dad’s and gripped it.

  Harry’s watery eyes fixed on him. ‘Proud you’re my son.’

  Lachie’s throat swelled. He bent his head. After all he’d done he didn’t deserve his father’s grace.

  ‘Lachie.’

  He looked up and, for the first time, he saw in his father’s ravaged expression the approbation he’d sought since boyhood.

  ‘Love you.’

  ‘I love you too, Dad.’

  His father’s eyes closed, his grip slackening as weakness claimed him. Lachie kept hold of his hand, imprinting the feeling to memory.