Stone Castles (3 page)

‘Luke!'

He stopped scrutinising the boots long enough to look over. ‘Hmm?' And suddenly wondered at the weird pallor of his mate's skin. ‘What is it?'

‘There's more you should know.' Craig licked his lips and Luke was reminded of the last time he'd seen him use that exact gesture – right after he'd got the call to say his wife was in labour for the first time. He'd been here in the Ag store buying his goddamned header when Trace had called Craig to tell him her waters had broken. Luke had watched him turn a deathly shade of pale right before his eyes. And suddenly he wasn't sure he wanted to hear what his mate had to say. ‘I just need to warn you, okay. I really hope you don't mind, but Trace is planning to invite Pip to be Chloe's godmother.'

Luke blinked. Put the boots down. He could always come into town later. Much later. Maybe the year after next. ‘I should be going,' he said, sickened that the mention of someone he hadn't seen for nigh on ten years – someone he'd been done and dusted with for a decade and a half – still had such an impact on him.

‘What about that fuel filter you wanted? It won't take long –'

‘Nah, can't wait. Get that young bloke – Jacko? – who lives up the road to drop it off on his way home. I'll get those droppers I need while I'm here. Fix the fence while I'm waiting.' Fix anything that needs fixing and then find something else to do. Anything to keep busy, to avoid coming into town again in a hurry.

‘You'll still come to the christening, though? Still be godfather to Chloe?'

Oh yeah, that.

He sucked in air. Craig was his oldest friend. They'd started kindy together. Gone through school and a dozen footy and cricket teams together besides. He could hardly blame him for his wife's random acts of madness. ‘I said I would, didn't I?'

‘I'm really sorry, mate. If it's any consolation, Pip might still say no.'

‘Two chances of that,' Luke said, certain of the maliciousness of Murphy's Law. ‘Buckley's and none.'

Chapter Four

T
he town of Kadina emerged from the golden paddocks one slow kilometre at a time. The grain storage site on the right. More paddocks before the Ag store on the left. And then she was there. Finally. Relief battled with hunger, Pip's stomach rumbling loudly as she negotiated a roundabout. No wonder, given it was two o'clock and she hadn't eaten since breakfast on the plane, hours before they'd landed.

But there had been a cafe not far from here, she recalled, and indeed there still was, even if it had experienced a makeover or three since she'd been gone. She pulled up outside, stretching her travel weary limbs as she climbed out. A salad sandwich and a takeout coffee would go down a real treat. And then she'd be ready to go see Gran.

*

Luke pulled into a space outside the cafe, right next to a low slung red convertible that looked like it belonged anywhere else but here. His lip curled. Not a local then. Clearly someone from the city with lots of money and a lot less sense. There were plenty of them around these days, people looking for a sea change on the coast and finding it hereabouts. He couldn't blame them. He wouldn't trade where he lived for quids.

But it didn't make him like their poncy city cars any more.

He patted Turbo's head with the promise of chicken and chips on his return and was almost at the door when the plastic fly strips buckled and parted with someone attached to a takeaway coffee cup coming the other way. Someone who looked as preened and polished and high maintenance as the car out front. He snorted. Figured.

‘Sorry,' he said, stepping back out of the way to let her through. And then he saw her face and it hit him like a punch to his gut and he knew it for a fact, Murphy was indeed a bastard.

Pip sensed the man before she saw him clearly, her first glimpses coming through the gaps between the strips as she focused on not spilling the coffee that was filled to the brim in her hand, glimpses that built a picture of long legs encased in denim and finished in dusty boots, a look a million miles from Manhattan and one that could still stir her womanly senses. Nothing at all wrong with a man in jeans and Blundstones.

Or a policeman in uniform for that matter, she thought, remembering Adam.

Maybe coming home might have its compensations. She loved her life in Manhattan, but it had been a long while since she'd felt herself stirred by a pair of dusty boots. Why not enjoy the view while she was here?

And then he stood back and she heard him say sorry as scalding coffee sloshed over her fingers. Burning skin was the least of her worries though, as her brain hurtled her back a decade and a half to the last time she'd heard that voice utter that word.

No!

She stopped dead in her tracks as the last of the fly strips fell into place behind her, and then she saw his face and realised her brain hadn't lied. It was Luke all right, all six foot four of uncompromisingly gorgeous-looking male, and she realised a bitch of a day wasn't done with her yet.

‘You!' she said, her voice as flat as the paddocks that surrounded the town, and that told him everything he needed to know right there.

Luke wondered at the coffee he'd seen spill over her fingers, but she either didn't feel it or didn't care. She didn't even flinch. She just looked as shocked and unhappy as he was.

‘Nice to see you too, Pip,' he said automatically, and it might have been halfway to the truth too, if she'd been anyone else. In any other circumstances he might almost have enjoyed bumping into a woman who looked like her. Because whatever she'd been doing these last few years, it sat well on her. She was as slim as he remembered, her bare arms smooth and toned, the rest of her tucked neatly under a sleeveless shirt and slim fitting pants, and she'd grown her hair long again, just the way he'd always liked it. She'd had it coloured too, or frosted or highlighted or whatever it was that women did to their hair to make it catch the light and make it look even better than nature intended.

Damn.

‘I'm sorry, Luke,' she said. ‘That was rude. I just . . . got a shock to see you, that's all.'

Her accent sounded different to how he remembered. More American. Grating. ‘Yeah, I guess you'd hardly expect to see me in the town where I've lived my entire life.'

This time she did flinch, her blue eyes frosting over, as cold as he imagined a glacier would be, and he was almost sorry for sending her to that frosty place. Almost. Except this was Pip and she'd sliced him into pieces and thrown them away once before.

And he was never laying himself down on that particular altar again.

Someone tried to duck between them into the cafe, between her still coming out and him still going in, and both of them shifted and made way. And while he was tempted to cut and run, damn it all, he still wanted that chicken and chips, so he didn't. He stood his ground and when the plastic fly strips stilled again she was still right there, looking up at him.

He wished she wouldn't do that.

God, she had gorgeous eyes. She'd always had gorgeous eyes. So blue you could take a dip and drown in them on a summer's day.

Those eyes cast a longing look in the direction of the Audi and escape.

And suddenly, madly, contrary to everything he'd felt the moment he'd set eyes on her, he was glad she hadn't gone. Not before he'd said what he should say, regardless of what she'd once meant to him and what she'd done to him. Because that was history, and now should all be about Violet.

He licked his lips. ‘I'm sorry to hear about your gran.'

She blinked, and the ice melted and turned her eyes watery. ‘Thanks. I'm just going to sit with her now.'

‘Give her my regards.'

‘I will,' she said, even though they both knew it was pointless, that Violet Cooper hadn't recognised anyone or anybody for years and wouldn't remember who he was, even if she was still capable of hearing.

The logical thing to do next would be to say goodbye and walk right on by. That was what a normal person would do. A normal person who'd run into someone they'd known long ago but really didn't give a shit about now.

He wanted to be that normal person, not this lunatic whose blood was spinning furiously around his veins and whose stubborn feet remained bolted to the floor.

Turbo barked from inside the car, impatient for lunch. Luke's dog had got him out of plenty of scrapes in his time, but he'd never been more grateful than in this moment. ‘Well, I better get going. Feed the dog. You know how it is,' he said, and immediately wanted to sink through the verandah with the lameness of his words. But at least they'd done what he'd needed them to do and broken whatever spell had rendered them both immobile.

‘Me too,' she said quickly. ‘See you 'round.'

‘Sure,' he said, thinking, not if I see you first.

Inside the fly strips the air was cool and Elvis was crooning something from a speaker in the corner near the ceiling and the woman who'd gone in before him was just being handed her milkshake and passing over a note to a woman he didn't recognise.

‘Be with you in a moment, lovey,' said the woman, as she turned to the cash register to fetch her customer's change.

He looked over his shoulder, telling himself he'd better check to see the dog wasn't getting up to any mischief, but it was the red car next to his that drew his eyes. The red car with the driver who looked like she'd just stepped out of a fashion magazine.

Pip in a convertible. She sure had changed. She'd always hated flashy cars. Well, she had once upon a long time ago.

Though that'd been then.

‘Can I help you?'

He turned back. Help him? He wished somebody could. Because suddenly he'd forgotten what he'd come in for. He studied the blackboard menu but the words might as well have been written in Sanskrit for all the sense they made. He blinked and now all he could see were the words of a song. A sad song. And then he realised it
was
a song. The song coming from the corner near the ceiling.

‘Hello?' The woman was still staring at him and waiting, one hand perched on her hip and the expression on her face saying she thought he was being a time waster or just stupid or both. ‘No rush,' she said, ‘Anytime this century'd be good.'

He shook his head. Suddenly he didn't feel hungry anymore. All he wanted was to be away from that song.

‘Sorry,' he said and turned for the door. As Elvis sang that someone was always on his mind one last time, he made it through the fly strips in time to see the red car disappearing into the distance, and he cursed Murphy all over again that he'd picked today of all days to come into town.

He climbed back into the driver's seat. ‘Okay, fella, let's go home.'

Turbo whimpered and pawed at his leg, and it took Luke a moment to work out why and remember. He sighed as he started the engine, curling his fingers around his dog's ears with the other hand. ‘I'm sorry, mate,' he said, jamming the ute into reverse, ‘but it's not like there's anything actually wrong with ham sandwiches.'

Chapter Five

C
rap!

Pip drove away with her heart still thudding in her chest and her palms slippery on the steering wheel. She rubbed them one at a time on her pants as she accelerated away. Of all the dumb luck, she had to pick that particular cafe on this particular day.

Crap! Crap! Crap!

Luke Trenorden was not who she needed to see today. Or any day for that matter. But definitely not today.

Especially not when he looked so good. He'd looked good back then, sure. Lean and long-limbed and drop-dead gorgeous. But the eight years since she'd last seen him at Fi and Richard's wedding should have made him look older than he did, surely. They should have turned him into more of an old married man, with hair greying at the temples from too many kids driving him nuts.

If there was any justice in this world, that's what should have happened.

Instead the years only seemed to have enhanced what had already been there – the residual softness in his face turned to lines that added ruggedness and character. The cast of his shoulders broader, stronger. And every change, every discernible difference she'd noted with her searching eyes while her feet had been rooted to the spot outside the cafe, turning boy into a man.

And not even the start of a beer belly under that work shirt. And she should know. She'd damn well searched for one.

Damn!
She swung the car through one last roundabout and pulled her thoughts back into line at the same time. She would not think about Luke a moment longer. He was history. He was her past. And dammit to hell and back, he was married.

And since she was committed heart and soul to a career in New York City, he was irrelevant to boot.

But couldn't he have tried to look a bit less like he'd just walked out of an R.M. Williams catalogue?

He could have at least made an effort.

Her mental rant took her past the turn-off, and she had to wend her way back through long forgotten streets until finally she was there, parked outside the Kadina Nursing Home.

She sighed a grateful sigh of relief which lasted all of a second before she felt a sudden surge of fear at what she might find inside.

Gran.

Her gran.

Dying.

This day had been coming ever since she had been admitted into the facility. Pip had known then that no matter what happened inside, whether Gran shifted from low care to high care or to the secure dementia unit, there was only one way out, and that one day the call would come – to come home quickly, or that it was over.

She'd known, and yet . . .

Oh god.

She took a moment to steel herself, resting her head on the steering wheel, before grabbing her coffee and sandwich and heading for the door.

Inside the air was cool and controlled, the scent in the ward a combination of cleaning solution and air fresheners. About as good as it could be, she figured, under the circumstances. Pip wrote her name in the visitor's book by the door and let herself into the secure area. She'd barely reached the nurses' station when she was spotted. ‘Pip! You made it, you're here!' And then Molly Kernahan's sturdy arms tugged her into a tight embrace. ‘You, girl, are a sight for sore eyes.'

It was a struggle to hold onto her coffee and sandwich, but Pip felt the beginnings of a watery smile against Molly's ample welcoming girth. Molly Kernahan had been a fixture at the nursing home since Gran had been admitted. It was Molly who had emailed her to say, ‘Come now, if you can.' And now, after thirty plus hours of luxurious but ultimately soulless travel, a hug from someone she knew had been here forever was enough to bring her undone.

‘Is she still . . .' she started with a sniffle against her shoulder. ‘Is Gran . . . ?' But the words stuck in the back of her throat. She couldn't bear it if Gran had slipped away already, when she'd come so far and been so close.

Molly took her shoulders and held her at arm's length, her round face breaking into a broad smile as she slipped her hands down into Pip's, but still she didn't miss the moisture filming the other woman's eyes. ‘She's made of stern stuff, that one. Nothing surer. Come on, I'll take you to her.'

She swept her down a corridor done out in fresh pastel shades some time since she'd last been here, every now and then negotiating her around another shuffling old dear on a walking frame, and always with a pat to their shoulder and a gentle word.

Molly Kernahan was a treasure, Pip thought. Every nursing home should have a dozen of her at least.

And then they entered a room with windows overlooking a garden filled with flowering bushes and plants. It was a gorgeous light-filled room dotted with small pieces of furniture she remembered from the old farm house, small side tables covered with crocheted doilies Gran had made long ago, when her eyes were clear and her fingers still nimble, and a mahogany dressing table with her silver-backed mirror and brush still lying on top, ready for Gran to climb out of bed in the morning and use.

Only she wouldn't, because there – barely a bump in the bed – her gran lay dying.

‘Look who's here!' Molly announced as she plumped pillows and adjusted the head of Violet's bed to raise her up a little. ‘It's your Pip come to visit. All the way from New York City. Isn't that nice?'

Gran blinked watery eyes and smiled a gummy smile that lasted barely a fraction of a second before her face slackened again.

Molly stroked her hair. ‘Ah, your gran is such a love. Always a smile. Even at a time like this.' She turned away, but not before Pip saw the moisture sheening her eyes. ‘Here, Pip love, come say hello. I'll fetch you a chair.'

Pip deposited both coffee cup and sandwich on a table and came closer. Gran was like a bird, shrunken and tiny, her limbs no more than skin over bone and corded sinew. Her hair was totally white and cut short around her gaunt face, her once familiar long hair and bun sacrificed for comfort and the staff's convenience.

‘Gran,' she whispered, swallowing down a catch in her throat as she kissed the old woman's forehead. ‘It's me, Pip.'

There was that sideways stretch of her lips again. The hint of a smile that Pip knew didn't mean ‘I remember', but was just a recognition that someone was there, talking to her. It was something. It was enough.

She sat down in the chair Molly had brought and gently placed a tiny claw of a hand into her own, stroking the old woman's palm with her thumb. ‘I missed lunch, Gran, I'm sorry. I got held up.'

Molly rested a hand on her shoulder. ‘She's not eating anything now, lovey,' she shared quietly. ‘Not even the custard and sweets that she used to love even up until a few days ago. She doesn't need it anymore, do you Violet?'

Tears pricked at her eyes as Pip stared hard at her gran – precious Gran who had once been as strong as an ox and milked the cows every day and tended a garden that stretched all around the farmhouse and beyond. Gran, who was all the family she had left in the world. She suddenly wondered why the hell she'd stayed away so long. And for what? It was all so difficult to remember.

‘I should have done more,' she said.

Molly clucked her tongue as she opened a window to let in the fragrance of the rose garden on the warm breeze. ‘Don't go going down that path, Priscilla Martin, or you'll never find a way back. You've done more than some families do, and you've had far better reason to do nothing at all, given how far away you live.' She gestured towards the floral arrangement on Violet's desk. ‘You've sent new nighties and dressing gowns and bedsocks the moment we suggested she needed new ones, and you've sent flowers every single week your gran has been here. She's loved them all, though she hasn't a clue who sent them – even when we tell her every time. And the rest of the residents have loved them too, when the new bunch comes in and the old one goes out in the lounge for another week. Don't you dare tell me you should have done more.'

Pip still sniffed.

‘You were dealt a rough hand,' Molly continued, her voice softer as she put an arm around her shoulders. ‘Nobody but you left to care, and you played it the best way you could. Never feel bad about living your own life. Not when your gran's was already gone for all intents and purposes.' And with a final squeeze of her shoulder, she checked if she needed anything else to eat or drink, and left her in peace, closing the door after her to shut out the sounds of the trolleys clattering down the hallways.

Pip sat there a while, her sandwich and coffee forgotten while she held her gran's frail hand in hers, and told her all about life in New York City, of the tall buildings and yellow cabs and wall-to-wall people, and how it was so different to be home, but good to be home too. She told her of her apartment in an old brownstone building near Central Park that she shared with her friend, Carmen, and then she started on her job before she ran out of things to say. So she picked up the book she'd spied on her gran's bedside table, a familiar book that had graced her gran's bedside table as far back as she could remember.
Not Only in Stone
had been her gran's favourite.

And she opened the book at the bookmark and began to read Phyllis Somerville's fictionalised but so true-to-life story of the Cornish families who had settled the Yorke Peninsula – as Violet's own family had done – when it was copper, not wheat, that had made the region's fortune. She read the pages she'd first read as a teenager because she'd been told she should. She read them now and this time their stories seemed more than words. Now, it seemed, she was reading what could have been her own family's life. Their struggles. Their victories. Their losses.

She read as her gran lay still on the bed, her breathing intermittent, her blue eyes filmed with grey, and her mouth twitching every now and then as if she remembered, while the fragrant scent of roses carried on the breeze that stirred the curtains and perfumed the air . . .

She was in a plane and being pulled over by the police again, and this time he was prodding her, except he didn't look like Adam, he looked like Luke. And that wasn't right because it sounded like a woman . . .

‘Pip?' Another shake. ‘Pip?'

Pip came groggily to through a thick fog of confusion to find two women, Molly and another she didn't recognise, but who smiled down at her and clearly knew who she was.

‘You should go home, lovey. You're dog tired.'

She blinked and put a hand to her spinning head. The book had fallen onto the coverlet and her neck ached from lolling at an angle. She looked at her gran, eyes shut and seemingly motionless, until her tiny bird shape fluttered and the covers shifted as she took one more breath. ‘Gran.'

‘She's resting. Like you should be. Where are you staying?'

She rubbed her aching neck and glanced at her watch. Barely five o'clock. Too early to sleep just yet. ‘Out at Tracey and Craig's place.' There was no need to bother with surnames. Everyone knew Craig from the Ag store, and by extension, his wife Tracey.

Molly frowned. ‘Are you sure you're okay to drive out there?'

‘I'll be fine,' she said, and reached for her coffee. Bleh. It was stone cold.

I'll bring you a hot drink,' Molly said, ‘and you say your goodbyes for now and then go and get some rest,' Molly commanded gently. ‘That's an order.'

‘But Gran? What if . . .'

‘Nobody knows, lovey. Death has its own timetable, but your gran's surprised us enough times already to suspect she'll still be here waiting for you tomorrow. And if she's not –' she shrugged as she smiled sadly ‘– then she'll be in a better place. Just make sure you tell her you love her before you go. That's all you can do.' She bustled towards the door. ‘Now I'll get you that coffee. How do you like it?'

Pip told her and then said, ‘Oh, and Molly?'

The older woman paused.

‘Do you think Gran could have some music playing? You know, something to keep her company when she's alone.'

Molly smiled. ‘I think that's a very good idea. What does she like listening to? Classical music? A bit of Slim Dusty?'

‘Hymns,' Pip said with a frown, suddenly thinking it odd – their family had never bothered much going to church. ‘She always loved listening to
Songs of Praise
.'

Molly smiled. ‘I've got just the thing. Don't know why we didn't think of it before.'

She was back in less than five minutes with a CD player, a selection of discs and a hot coffee for Pip. Pip set up the player, popped in a disc and sipped her coffee while she listened to the York Minster choir sing ‘Amazing Grace'. Then she said goodbye to her gran, and even though she was asleep she told her she loved her, and gently squeezed her claw-like hand and kissed her brow again, and managed to hold herself together while she exited the building.

But once in the car, it was a full five minutes before the tears slowed and she could see clearly enough to drive.