A Woman Worth Waiting For

by Meredith Webber

  ‘I don’t know about this, Max. I know what happened between us before was a fleeting thing, hardly a relationship. But at the time…’

  She hesitated, feeling again a dull reminder of the ache she’d carried in her heart.

  ‘All I remember is the hurt—the feeling of betrayal. OK, so, for whatever reason, you couldn’t return, but I could have gone to you. There was no choice in it, just a letter saying goodbye. I guess, in your eyes, what you did was right for both of us, but I was too upset to realise that at the time, and then I made things worse. I hid my pain by launching into a relationship that was never going to work.’

  She steepled her fingers, pressing the palms of her hands together then releasing them. Studied the movement while she sought the words she needed.

  ‘My turn to hurt someone,’ she whispered, as memories of David’s devastation when she’d told him she couldn’t marry him came vividly back.

  She looked up at him.

  ‘That was worse, somehow, than being hurt myself. Especially as I knew from the beginning I was doing it in an effort to forget you. Hurting him—his name was David—made me cautious, so much so I’ve avoided relationships since then.’

  ‘Now I’ve come back and…?’

  There was a question mark at the end of the unfinished sentence and so much hesitation in his voice that she found a smile and offered it tentatively to him.

  ‘Thrown all my hard-won satisfaction with my single life into total chaos.’ She completed the sentence with mock severity, then moved closer and put her head against his chest. The cathartic effect of talking, on top of the shock of Max’s sudden reappearance in her life, had left her feeling infinitely weary. For now it was enough that the words had been said.

  And that Max was holding her.

  Or was it?

  ‘But there’s more than the past to consider, isn’t there, Max? You’re back, but for how long?’ she murmured into his shirt. ‘You’re on a six month contract in Queensland and here at Ellison for what, a few weeks? Then you’ll go away again.’

  His arms tightened around her so she felt his chest move with each breath he took and the thud of his heartbeats resonating against his rib cage.

  ‘I won’t go far,’ he said, and it seemed as if he was using his words with care. ‘Not so far I couldn’t be back here when you have time off—even, at times, commute from here to other hospitals. If you should want me around.’

  ‘Are you asking me that now?’ She raised her head so she could see his face, shadowed by the light behind him but not so dark she couldn’t see the anxiety in his eyes. ‘Whether I want you around?’

  ‘Not asking for an answer, Ginny. Not right now. In fact, right now I’d settle for a kiss.’

  Desire had replaced anxiety in his eyes, and an answering need rippled through her body. Not ready, yet, for him to see it, she dropped her head again, butting it against his breastbone.

  ‘Would we settle for a kiss?’ she asked.

  ‘If it’s more, do we need to fight it?’ he murmured, while his fingers tangled in her hair with such tenderness she wanted to weep.

  Then an echo of his words sounded in her head. She stepped away from him, probably too abruptly, and looked up at him.

  ‘They didn’t fight—none of the women. Or did they, but the police haven’t released that information? I can remember thinking how alive—normal—the last one looked, apart from the bruises on her neck. If someone was strangling me, I’d buck and shout and thrash around—scratch them, do whatever I could.’

  Max smiled at her.

  ‘Quick conversational shift?’ he said, but his words were filled with understanding though the tone was teasing.

  She found herself smiling back then stepping forward again—back into his arms.

  ‘Too quick, I guess, but it’s there all the time, isn’t it? You can’t not think about young women dying,’ she murmured. ‘Though as we can’t do anything about it right now, perhaps we could set it aside and talk about it tomorrow.’

  She put her hand around the back of his neck, easing his head down towards her.

  ‘Right now, if you think you could bear it, I might give you the kiss I didn’t give you last night.’

  Max didn’t even pretend to resist, although as his lips met hers an insistent voice in his head was asking stupid questions.

  Why kiss him now, when she’d been talking about the pain he’d caused? About the young women dying?

  Was it a test? Or more like medicine? To get the thought of the murdered young women out of her head? To find oblivion after the stresses of the evening?

  And why were her lips so much sweeter than any other lips he’d ever tasted?

  Max ignored all but the final question, shutting off the thinking part of his mind and concentrating solely on sensations. Ginny’s softness. The way she fitted against his body. The faint scent of rose petals he detected in her hair.

  Or was it apples?

  Something fresh.

  He drew her closer, felt her lips part beneath his and a little sigh escape as their tongues touched in the prelude to a special kind of dance.

  Ginny drew away first, her cheeks flushed, her breath coming in gasps, but her eyes uncertain.

  ‘I don’t know about this,’ she said, words and tone echoing the doubt in her eyes. ‘When I kiss you I feel as I did six years ago—totally out of control as far as my emotions are concerned. Shouldn’t age have brought maturity?’

  He smiled at her, but answered honestly.

  ‘It hadn’t brought enough for me to resist you back then—not for long, anyway. And if you want to know where I stand, everything I felt for you six years ago is alive and well—intensified if anything. But as for exploring these emotions—taking things further—that’s up to you, Ginny.’

  She grinned at him, the uncertainty vanishing as the smile flashed across her face.

  ‘So it’s up to me? Isn’t that a cop-out, Dr McMurray? You’re the psychologist. Can’t you give me reasons why a relationship, preferably with you, would cure all my hang-ups about relationships? Can’t you convince me you’re my saviour?’

  He wanted to smile back, but he knew her valiant words were hiding acres of doubt.

  ‘Kiss me again, and see if you can convince yourself,’ he suggested.

  She barely moved—nothing more than a slight tilting forward of the upper part of her body—yet he knew she’d nearly done it.

  Then she straightened up, half smiled at him and said, ‘Maybe tomorrow. I think we’ve covered more than enough ground for one day.’

  His arms ached to hold her—other bits of his body ached to do more than hold her—but he knew it was goodbye.

  He put his fingers to his lips then transferred the kiss, oh, so lightly to her hair.

  ‘Sleep well, little Ginny,’ he said, turning the phrase she’d hated into a caress.

  ‘Get out of here!’ she said, trying to sound annoyed but smiling all the same.

  His departure didn’t stop her thinking and she lay awake for a long time, considering Max’s reappearance in her life and what it might mean. Then, because these thoughts led to imponderables, she thought about the murdered women instead, puzzling over why they hadn’t fought their attacker.

  ‘Why didn’t they struggle? Drugs? Is that why he feeds them, so he can drug them?”

  She asked Max the question early next morning. She’d been standing at the window, wondering if he was up, when she’d heard him calling a soft goodbye to Sarah.

  Wanting an excuse to see him, Ginny had wandered out onto the veranda to tell Sarah she’d be home all morning and to phone if she had any questions. Max had suggested coffee, and here she was, perched on a stool in his flat, talking about the musings of the night to stop herself thinking how handsome—and desirable—the freshly showered and shaven, early-morning Max McMurray was.

  ‘After last night’s kiss—the one you gave me, remember—I was kind of hoping this visit might be for som
ething less technical,’ he said. ‘Toast?’

  Realising she was still in the short nightshirt she wore to bed, Ginny hesitated then, because it was so good to be with Max again, she nodded.

  ‘I haven’t read the results of the forensic tests, so I don’t know about drugs,’ he said, finally answering the question she’d come in to ask.

  ‘I suppose drugs were unlikely. People who have easiest access to drugs, medical or pharmacy people, would know you’d find traces of them when blood and organs are tested after an autopsy. In fact, most people would know it, given the amount of forensic stuff shown on television.’

  Max slipped a slice of bread into the toaster. ‘Have you been awake all night, thinking about murder? Doesn’t say much for my kisses!’

  Ginny smiled at him, but didn’t admit she’d deliberately started thinking about the murders to take her mind off him, and kisses, and what might be developing between them.

  ‘I tried to think what I’d have done—and, believe me, if I wasn’t drugged I’d have struggled, no matter how safe I might have felt with the man. Maybe he’s using an unusual drug—something no one thought of testing for.’

  Max nodded but said nothing, and Ginny sipped her coffee while her mind ran graphic pictures of what might have happened.

  ‘Does your silence mean I’m on the wrong track—that the women did struggle but the knowledge hasn’t been publicly released?’

  He retrieved the toast, spread butter on it, then said, ‘I’ve honey or Vegemite—not much of a choice, I’ll admit.’

  ‘Honey, please.’

  She wasn’t going to prompt him again. Though if he didn’t want to talk about the murders, all he had to do was say so!

  ‘They didn’t struggle—none of them,’ he confirmed quietly, putting a plate with the toast on it down in front of her. ‘It’s not something the police have publicised so I’d appreciate it if it didn’t go any further. Drugs are a possibility. Something fast-acting but equally swift in dissipating from the body so little trace is left.’

  ‘Were there signs they’d been restrained in any way?’

  ‘None! No rope marks or any other kind of marks around the wrists. No contusions on the body, on the back or buttocks, which you’d expect if a person was pushed to the ground, held there forcibly and strangled.’

  ‘If they were on a bed—perhaps a water-bed—there wouldn’t be any abrasions,’ Ginny pointed out.

  Max grinned at her.

  ‘After a couple of murders in the area, would you, on a first date, go anywhere near a relative stranger’s bedroom? Without being forced in any way?’

  She sipped her coffee, ate another quarter-slice of toast, considered where they’d got to in the conversation then frowned.

  ‘Maybe it wasn’t a first date,’ she said. ‘Maybe he’d been courting each girl for a while.’

  ‘That would work for the first woman. But then he had only three weeks and, according to family and friends, the second victim had no one new and exciting in her life during that time. Between her and Isobel there were only two weeks—’

  He broke off to look questioningly at Ginny.

  ‘You worked with her. Were you asked about her relationship with other members of the staff? Did the police question you about possible close associates?’

  Ginny thought back.

  ‘They asked a heap of questions, but mostly to do with her last hours at work—patients she treated, stuff like that. I guess I was asked about her friends and associates but, apart from Paul, I can’t remember her spending much of her free time with anyone. Not that I would have. We generally went to the canteen at different times, so I wouldn’t know who ate with her—if anyone. Probably Paul, that’s what I’d have guessed.’

  She paused, trying to put herself into the mind of a man who would kill women. Impossible! But what about the women? Was it likely all four had gone happily off with a total stranger, however well dressed he’d been?

  ‘I wonder if it goes further back. If he’d met them some time ago? Someone like a travelling salesman who was only in town once a month.’

  She shivered.

  ‘No, I hate that idea. It presupposes the whole series was planned and takes away the stress-trigger idea, which, while not an excuse, at least makes a kind of sick sense.’

  Another pause, while she looked at Max.

  ‘You’re not saying much. Simply letting me prattle on and on. What are you thinking?’

  He smiled and she wished she had more clothes on as he was sure to see the goose-bumps the smile had caused.

  ‘I was thinking how delicious it is to have you sitting in my kitchen—prattling on or not!’

  ‘Delicious? Funny word, Max!’ Ginny spoke lightly to hide the inner reaction to the words. Far worse than goose-bumps!

  ‘Delicious? Delightful? Fantastic! Unbelievable! Choose a word. Delicious must have come from the bit of my mind that was working on a suitable excuse to lick the taste of honey off your lips.’

  Heat filled Ginny, racing through her blood, flaming into her cheeks and throbbing in her abdomen. It made her tremble with a need she hadn’t known existed.

  ‘I don’t know anything about you,’ she whispered. ‘Who you are now—where you’ve been. Whether you’re married.’

  ‘Love with a proper stranger? It’s the title of an old movie my mother loved, and to some extent it describes us.’

  ‘It can’t be love, can it?’ Ginny protested. ‘I know, six years ago, I insisted it was, but does love come so suddenly, like a bolt from the blue? I can accept attraction—can’t deny that—but love…?’

  ‘Is it so sudden?’ Max argued. ‘I doubt there’ve been many days in the past six years when I haven’t wondered where you were and what you were doing.’

  ‘Yet you didn’t exactly come rushing back,’ Ginny teased, then regretted the remark as something very like sadness clouded Max’s beautiful eyes, dimming their usual radiance.

  But all he said was, ‘No, I didn’t, did I?’

  ‘And now you are here, it’s to do a job, not to lick honey off my lips, Max.’

  She sighed.

  ‘We keep coming back to it, don’t we? And it’s far more important than whether what we’re feeling is love or attraction. Everyone involved in the case should be giving one hundred per cent of his or her attention to finding the killer.’

  ‘Not kissing the nextdoor neighbour?’ Max said softly.

  He leaned forward and ran his tongue across her lips. Ginny caught back a tiny moan, but not fast enough for him to miss it, so the touch became a kiss which, though brief, carried sufficient electricity to leave her weak and shaken.

  ‘I’ve got to go,’ he murmured. ‘But we’ll talk more later. I’m supposed to be thinking things through from the victim’s side but, not being a woman, I can’t help but miss the nuances.’

  He touched her lightly on the head.

  ‘Talking to you about it is a big help.’ He hesitated, then added, ‘When it’s not an even greater distraction!’

  ‘I’ll be off,’ she told him. ‘Right now. See you later.’ She slid off the stool and headed for the door, then looked at her empty hands. ‘Damn! I forgot my keys. Now I’ll have to get Security to let me in. I did it so often when I first moved in, they must have thought I was a complete nitwit.’

  ‘Perhaps my key will fit. Let me try it first.’

  Max led the way out of his flat, with Ginny trailing protestingly behind.

  ‘Of course it won’t fit,’ she said. ‘What kind of security is that, having all the keys the same?’

  ‘You never know unless you try—and that goes for a lot of things in life!’ he told her, opening the door to her flat with a quite unnecessary flourish.

  ‘I can’t believe it!’

  Ginny was still protesting.

  ‘It means I’ll have to see Security after all. The locks will have to be changed again.’

  She glanced along the veranda.

 
; ‘I wonder if they’re all the same—the locks keyed alike for all flats—or if you’ve got some kind of master by mistake.’

  ‘Well, I, for one, don’t intend to find out. Though later, when the others are present, we probably should try them.’

  ‘We could try Sarah’s door,’ Ginny suggested. ‘She certainly wouldn’t mind, and I’d be here to watch that you didn’t go in and steal her valuables.’

  ‘Anyone who leaves valuables in a hospital flat needs their head read,’ Max said, then he added sternly, ‘Not that it makes any difference to trying the door. We can’t do it until Sarah’s here.’

  Ginny accepted the moral correctness of his attitude, but until they knew if all the flats were keyed alike, she wouldn’t know what to tell Security.

  She was still mulling over this, though not tremendously concerned as her co-inhabitants were hardly likely to be trying their keys in each other’s doors, when Max said something.

  Glancing up at him, she tried to replay the words she’d heard, but her subconscious must also have been switched off.

  ‘Well?’ he said.

  ‘Will I tell Security?’ she guessed, and saw laughter light his eyes.

  ‘Yes to that. I guess they should be told,’ he said, ‘but “Will you have lunch with me?” was the question.’

  ‘Lunch?’

  She repeated the word while she scanned through her mental reactions to the invitation.

  Lunch was fairly harmless. Nothing much could come of a simple lunch. Though eating toast had seemed innocent enough but led to kisses.

  ‘In the canteen?’ she asked him.

  He sighed.

  ‘I did think perhaps somewhere more…personal?’

  ‘But the canteen’s easy, the lunches are better there than the dinners, and we could ask Sarah to join us and tell her about the keys.’

  Max sighed again.

  ‘OK! If that’s what it takes to get you to say yes, we’ll make it the canteen and include Sarah in the treat.’

  He bent his head and dropped a quick kiss on her lips.

  ‘Very domestic scene, this. You in your jimjams and me leaving for work! Now you have to say, “Have a good day, honey” and I kiss you again and whisper a few sweet nothings in your ear, then we both wave to each other—’