A Heart Worth Mending

by Amanda Canham

  No. Bad Kelli.

  She flicked her eyes back up to his and realised he was still waiting for an answer to his question. She shook her head vigorously, twisting away from him to point at her bag.

  ‘Have my own,’ she got out, before reaching for her towel. She flapped it in the wind until it was fully extended, then laid it on the sand, purposefully ignoring Travis, though she could feel his eyes still trained on her.

  She moved her bag to the centre of the towel to keep it secure before shimmying out of her denim shorts and loose, cheesecloth shirt. Reaching into her bag, she pulled out her own tube of sunscreen and started rubbing it into her skin. Not wanting to make a display of the act, she tried to move quickly, but she could still feel the heat of his gaze on her as she ran her hands over her body: her neck, her shoulders, and the crevice between her breasts. Everywhere she touched his eyes followed, and her skin sizzled in his wake.

  She finished smoothing the liquid into her belly and reached around to cover her back. She heard a sharp intake of breath, and realised she’d inadvertently pushed her chest out. She hunched back, reaching over the top of her shoulders to get at her shoulder blades instead.

  ‘Need a hand?’ the words were husky, and closer than she was expecting.

  She glanced up as he moved towards her, electricity tingling in the air between them.

  ‘Not a good idea,’ she got out, throwing the tube of sunscreen into her bag.

  ‘Your call,’ he shrugged casually, the desire in his eyes belying the gesture, the strength of its heat anything but casual as they roved over her exposed skin. His gaze hovered just below her chin and a shiver passed over her as he closed the distance between them.

  ‘You missed a spot,’ he whispered, his fingers drifting up a hairs-breadth from her arm until he reached a spot just below her ear. His fingers brushed against her skin, setting off an explosion of sensation. Nerve endings tingled along her jaw, down her spine, everywhere, anywhere, as his fingers rubbed back and forth across her skin. She couldn’t think, she couldn’t breathe. All she could do was feel him touching her. And all she wanted was for him to keep touching her, to lower his palm to her chest, to slide it down over the nipples standing at attention, begging to be noticed. Her eyes snagged on his lips and she wanted to taste them, she wanted to feel the soft, puffy fullness against her own.

  ‘I need…’ She whispered and then stopped, unable to think, or to speak. She could do nothing but feel.

  ‘What do you need?’ he whispered back at her, his hand hovering, waiting for direction, his fingertip the only part of him touching her skin. ‘Tell me, Kelli,’ he continued, his fingertip wandering along the length of her collarbone, melting her insides. ‘Tell me what you need,’ he commanded and her eyes meet his. She could see liquid desire in them, the strength of which was only paralleled by her own desire for him.

  Him.

  The answer was on the tip of her tongue. It’s all she needed to say, and she knew he’d take her right here, right now, not caring they were on a public beach. Give her another minute, and she wasn’t sure she’d care, either.

  A childish squeal burst through her bubble, and the reality of where they were, of who they were, crashed down on her.

  ‘I need…to cool down,’ she gasped. She didn’t wait for a reply, but pulled away from him, turned around and ran down the beach towards the shoreline, and the squealing children. She gained speed as her feet slapped onto the hard, wet, wave-soaked sand. Water swept in, rushing over her feet, and she welcomed the refreshing coolness against her overheated skin.

  She slowed down the further she went in, basking in the cool as it crept up her body, until she’d finally reached a spot deep enough to dive into. She pushed herself down, deep, under the oncoming wave. She opened her eyes, staring into the mostly clear, yellow-green water around her; particles of sand floated past her face, churned up by the passing wave. Much like her insides churned now.

  She pushed deeper into the water until she could brush a hand against the sand at the bottom of the sea-bed, trailing her fingers through it until the pressure in her lungs got too much and she had to push back towards the surface. She parted the water in front of her with the semblance of a breast-stroke, swimming until she finally broke clear.

  She gasped in a lungful of the pure, slightly salty air. She pushed aside the hair matted to her head, fingering it behind her ears to keep it out of her face.

  What had she been thinking back there with Travis?

  Clearly, she hadn’t been thinking at all. All she’d wanted was to feel him, to touch him. Even now, her body melted at the thought.

  No! She had to stop this nonsense. She sucked in a final, deep breath, and dropped back under the water, determined to drown out the uncontrollable desire raging through her.

  But she couldn’t seem to clear her mind of him. Even here, down beneath the ocean’s turbulent waves, she was still seeing him through yellow-green water. Was she so desperately horny she was hallucinating now?

  The ghostly image of him moved closer, lighting on her, brightening in recognition.

  Gawd! Now she was even imagining expressions and emotions on him. Maybe she did need to see—

  Travis stopped in front of her, smiling and pointing to the surface, almost as though he was real. But he wasn’t. He was a figment of her imagination. To prove it, she reached out and poked his chest. Expecting her fingers to slide right through the image she was beyond shocked when she encountered solid flesh.

  But that would mean…Kelli’s mouth dropped open in shock that Travis had followed her, had found her so quickly. Water flowed in, choking her. She tried to regurgitate it, to spit it back out but she couldn’t below the water like this.

  An image flashed through her mind, Jimmy floating face down in the gorge. Was this how he’d felt? Had he fought, struggled to push the water out but…just…couldn’t…get…it…

  Blind panic set in. Kelli struck out wildly around her, desperately searching for the surface. A hand wrapped around her elbow, propelling her up further and further, guiding her until she burst through.

  She gasped, and spluttered and chortled, trying to rid herself of the water. She tasted salt and warm wetness and could feel it sliding down her throat, in her ears, out her nose. A hard thump pounded on her back as Travis tried to help and finally the last of it dribbled out.

  She was alive. Thank goodness she was alive!

  She’d only swallowed a mouthful of water. She’d probably never really been at risk of dying, but for a minute, she’d thought she would end up like Jimmy.

  And she didn’t want that.

  Oh, she’d never actually wanted to die, but neither had she wanted to live this past month. She hadn’t thought she deserved to.

  But she did!

  She. Wanted. To. Live.

  ‘Thanks,’ she muttered, keeping her back to him, unable to face him while she worked through her thoughts.

  ‘Sorry,’ Travis said from behind her. He didn’t pressure her to turn and face him; he didn’t try to touch her. He simply stood there, a solid, steadfast presence, exactly what she needed. She gulped, almost choking again at the realisation.

  Just breathe, she told herself, focusing on the flow of breath, in through the nose and out through the mouth. When she felt she had control of herself, she turned around, slowly raising her eyes to his. ‘Thanks,’ she said again, a wealth of meaning behind the word this time.

  ‘I don’t know why you’re thanking me,’ he said, a bashful smile teasing around the edges of his lips. ‘It was my fault. I didn’t mean to scare you.’

  ‘You didn’t,’ she started to say, the denial automatically flowing from her lips until she swallowed her pride and admitted the truth. ‘Okay, you did. This was all your fault,’ she smiled to take the sting out of the words. ‘You scared the living daylights out of me.’

  ‘Ah, then my work here is done,’ he grinned at her broadly, and flexed his arms like a weightlifting
champion.

  She watched him for a minute, the smile playing about her lips, and then she lowered her eyes, slowly, dramatically shaking her head. ‘So, so, lame,’ she said inflecting heavy disappointment into her voice.

  A sharp cold splash of water hit her across the chest.

  ‘Ahhh!’ she screamed, her eyes flashing open, her hands automatically diving below the water to swiftly rise and skim across the surface, returning the favour.

  ‘You don’t want to do that,’ Travis warned between spurts of laughter.

  ‘Oh, really?’ Kelli asked, ignoring the warning as she flexed her hands. ‘I think I do,’ she said an instant before she sent the water flying towards him. He jumped backwards, ducking to avoid the worst of the spray, and then his hands were flying across the surface of the water, returning the volley. She shrieked, and lunged away, but was caught by the tail end of it. She tried to fight back but he was bigger, stronger, and his waves had much more force than hers.

  ‘Peace, peace,’ she finally called out, holding her hands up in front of her, though it was an effort to stay upright. Her belly hurt from laughing so much.

  ‘So you surrender?’ he demanded, mock-serious, his hands hovering above the surface of the water.

  ‘Never!’ she exclaimed a moment before the water hit her. ‘Okay, okay,’ she finally conceded, water dripping down into her eyes. ‘I surrender,’ she said, wiping the moisture from her face.

  ‘Good,’ he smiled, satisfied, but there was a hint of something deeper, as though she’d surrendered to more than this game. And for once the thought of having something deeper with this man didn’t scare the bejeezus out of her.

  Kelli dropped down into the ocean, keeping her head above water, luxuriating in the feeling of weightlessness as her body followed the ebb and flow of the ocean. Travis followed her lead, dropping down beside her, his head appearing almost disembodied as it floated above the water.

  ‘Do you get down here much?’ Travis asked, his face close to hers.

  ‘Not as much as I’d like. I used to, when I was working down here, but,’ she shrugged, flicking her glance back to his, ‘I get home too late, leave too early. I don’t have time during the week.’

  ‘Did you grow up down here?’

  ‘What is this? Twenty questions or something?’ Kelli laughed lightly.

  ‘No. Just…I think it’s called “getting to know someone”,’ he answered with a wink.

  ‘True,’ she acknowledged with a rueful grin, looking down into the ocean before she drowned in his eyes. ‘But then again, if you’d been listening last night, you would know I grew up on Tamborine Mountain, up around there somewhere,’ she pointed to the mountain on the horizon behind the beach. ‘The parentals still live up there,’ she added. ‘We…Well, just me now. I go up for lunch every Sunday.’

  ‘It’s a nice place.’

  ‘Yes, it is. Quiet, but nice. I moved down to the Coast during my first year of uni.’

  ‘Straight in with Jimmy?’

  ‘Yes and no. We lived together on and off over the years. Whenever he wasn’t too irritating,’ she added with a laugh. It felt good to laugh, to be able to say his name without feeling the instant pinprick of tears in her eyes. ‘What about you? Do you come down to the coast much?’

  ‘A little. Pierce lives down here, but I don’t visit as much as I could. We used to come down more when I had Sean,’ he paused for a moment, a melancholic frown resting between his brows. ‘We used to go out west, too. I’ve got a few horses that are agisted out at Canungra. Sean loved riding.’

  ‘Does he still?’

  ‘I’m not sure. I don’t think he gets much of a chance these days.’

  ‘What about you? Do you get out there much?’ she asked, her eyes trained on him. He trailed a hand through the water, his fingers making spirals and splashes.

  ‘No.’

  ‘So you’ve got…How many horses?’

  ‘Three,’ he answered, looking up from the water.

  ‘And they’re just wasting away, neglected on the agistment property?’

  ‘No, of course not. I pay good money to make sure the owner looks after them, takes them riding.’

  ‘What a waste,’ she accused him, looking out, up towards the mountain and the direction of his horses.

  He didn’t answer the accusation, and the water his hand was twirling stilled. She glanced back at him, expecting a fight, or some kind of defence but he was grinning at her.

  ‘What?’ She had to fight the urge to grin back at him. He didn’t deserve it, not when he’d practically abandoned his horses.

  ‘You’re a horse-lover,’ he informed her, and if possible, his grin widened even more.

  ‘I’m not.’

  ‘I know the difference between a horse-lover and the other kind,’ he said with a laugh. ‘My sister is one of the other kind. So was my wife. Do you know how painful it is to try and ride with someone who hates it? Who’s scared of the tiniest little nicker.’

  ‘Who would be scared of a nicker?’ Kelli asked, flabbergasted. ‘The horse is just trying to talk.’

  ‘Exactly! But there’s no talking to the others about it. Now, are you going to admit you’re a horse person?’

  ‘I wouldn’t say I’m a “horse person”. I haven’t been around horses in years.’

  ‘But you were at some stage?’ It was more a statement than a question though, if the confidence in his eyes was anything to go by.

  ‘Okay, fine,’ she finally gave in. ‘Yes, I used to ride when I was younger. My grandparents had a horse. She was pretty old by the time I was able to ride her. And she died when I was just a kid. I haven’t really had an opportunity since.’

  ‘Maybe we could go riding one day?’ Travis suggested. He was twirling the water again, his eyes glued to the ever increasing circles as though they were the most fascinating thing in the world. ‘It would be good to go out there with someone, give a couple of the horses a decent ride.’

  Nervous tension wound through her. Was he asking her on a date? But he hadn’t specified an actual day. Maybe he just wanted a friend to hang out with, to give him a hand. ‘Yeah, one day. That would be fun,’ she answered, the coils of tension tightening in her veins.

  ‘It would be,’ he agreed, his eyes flying to hers, a bright, blinding grin lighting his face. Kelli found herself mesmerised by the sight of him. She couldn’t look away. After a few moments his grin started to dim and she realised she’d just been standing there, staring at him for who knew how long.

  Flames of embarrassment engulfed her, and she tore her gaze away, desperate to look anywhere but at him.

  ‘We should probably get back. Ana might think we’ve drowned.’ She pulled away from the intimacy of the moment, striking out to swim closer to shore.

  ‘You know she won’t even notice we’ve been gone all that long, right? I dare say she’s still asleep. That girl would sleep forever if she was given the chance,’ Travis informed her, though he followed her back to shore.

  ‘Probably has something to do with all her night-shifts,’ Kelli answered, finding her feet as they reached the shallows. She stood up, the water dripping down her body. She leant forward to wring out the worst of the water from her hair.

  ‘You do know how to torture a man, don’t you,’ Travis grumbled good-naturedly beside her, his eyes soaking in the sight.

  ‘You do a pretty good job yourself,’ Kelli gave his body a quick sweep before turning back to the sand dunes, searching for Ana. She jumped, just a little, when Travis’ hand touched her back lightly, his head bent close to her ear.

  ‘Looks like a few more people have made it out of their cave,’ he said, pointing up the beach a little further. There, Kelli saw Ana sitting next to a man and another woman. It took her a moment before she recognised Pierce, Travis’ step-brother, whom she’d met the night before.

  ‘How much do you want to bet she’s the woman he went home with last night.’

  Kelli looked
at him, horrified. ‘I would never take a bet like that.’

  ‘Maybe not yet, but once you know Pierce better, you’ll understand. Girls fall in love with him like that,’ he clicked his fingers next to her face.

  ‘And does he fall in love with them?’ Kelli asked, as they walked along the beach towards their companions.

  ‘He likes to think he does.’

  ‘But he doesn’t?’ she persisted, glancing up at him.

  ‘If he does, he falls out of love very quickly. Fair warning, just in case you were having any ideas about him,’ he added, smiling lightly, although she detected a hint of tension behind the smile.

  ‘He’s not my type,’ Kelli told him, keeping her eyes focused on the sand at their feet, but she felt the tension ease out of him at her words.

  ‘Hey guys, was the water nice?’ Pierce called out as they reached their towels.

  ‘It was beautiful,’ Kelli scooped up her towel and wrapped it around her.

  ‘Just what I needed,’ Travis added, wiping droplets of water off his chest with his own towel.

  ‘I’ll bet,’ Pierce winked at them both, and Kelli felt colour flush up her face. She dropped her towel on the ground, stretching it out beside Ana, the furthest she could from Pierce and his innuendo, and lay down, letting the warmth of the sun dry her.

  ‘Your phone rang a while back,’ Ana told Travis as he dropped his towel on the ground next to Kelli.

  ‘Was it -’

  ‘Sean? Yes.’

  ‘How long ago?’ Travis reached for his phone.

  ‘Not long after you went in, so, maybe twenty minutes—’ Ana started to answer, but Travis didn’t wait for her to finish before ringing his son back.

  ‘Hey mate, how’d you go?’ Kelli heard him ask when the phone was finally answered.

  Travis wandered down the beach, out of earshot, and Kelli turned her head towards the others, focusing on the people she was with. Well, she tried to focus on the anecdotes Pierce was regaling the other women with, but she was too aware of Travis so near, yet so far. She kept shooting glances towards him. He’d hunkered down in the sand a couple of metres away, his shoulders hunched, his head bowed as he spoke to his son. Within minutes he’d hung up and was stalking back towards them.