Long-Lost Son Read online

  She did realise.

  She knew it shouldn’t have happened. She also knew she’d be feeling just as restless and confused and full of questions if she’d managed to stay safely in her own bed. Was he looking for Alice? It hadn’t felt that way just now. All those times over the past couple of days when she’d felt as if Alice’s ghost had been hovering between them…Alice’s ghost hadn’t been here tonight, not for a second.

  And what am I looking for?

  If she gave Luke her heart, and found he didn’t want it because when he came to his senses he realised that he’d done this for one great big wrong reason, what would she do?

  Learn to live with her heart shattered in pieces.

  The idea frightened her.

  ‘We kissed once before, do you remember?’ she heard herself asking him, and didn’t know why she’d said it.

  He shifted and laughed, kissed her shoulder. ‘As it was only last night, yes!’

  ‘No. I don’t mean last night. Hope you’d remember that! Before. Way before. Eight years ago.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Yeah, it was at a party and we’d had too much to drink. We’d both had a rotten week in A and E. Heroin addicts and yelling doctors, and patients we couldn’t save. So we all gathered at someone’s place to let off some steam.’

  ‘Not ringing any bells yet, Janey.’

  She pushed on, still not knowing why. ‘And I was crying on my friends’ shoulders, saying all sorts of extravagant things, and you were, oh, chatting up every woman in sight and showing off as usual—’

  ‘And this is your idea of the right conversation topic for an interlude like this.’

  ‘I want to say it, Luke.’

  ‘Apparently. Have I any power to stop you?’ He squeezed her, to soften the words.

  ‘And I kissed this bloke I didn’t even know.’ She knew she was testing Luke’s patience now, but for some reason this was important. ‘And he wanted to race off to his place, but I said, no, and then I just, basically, fell on you and locked lips.’

  ‘Sounds like a great kiss!’

  ‘To be honest, I can’t remember if it was.’

  ‘I don’t believe it really happened.’

  ‘It did. It probably only lasted a few seconds. I don’t think it was your first kiss of the evening, or your last. I’m not surprised you don’t remember.’

  ‘So why are we talking about it?’

  ‘I just wondered, that’s all.’

  ‘Wondered what?’

  ‘If any of it had stuck. I hadn’t thought about it myself for years, and then last night I did. But it didn’t trigger the same memory for you. And I just wondered.’

  ‘You’re spoiling something that doesn’t need to be spoiled, Janey. Spoiling something wonderful that I won’t forget. Can you stop?’

  He was right. She’d known it even while she’d been saying it, but it was hard to be wise when your whole life had just been shaken into pieces by one man’s touch.

  They caught the nine-thirty boat out to Charm Island the next morning. Liberally coated in sunscreen and wearing a broad-brimmed canvas hat, Rowdy hung on the rail for the whole journey, seeming captivated by the sight of the water. He’d probably never been out on the ocean before, and might not even remember having seen the sea.

  It was too soon to gauge what Cyclone Willie had done to the Barrier Reef itself, as they passed the halfway point of the one-hour trip. Skirting several kilometres to the south of Wallaby Island, which was much larger as well as closer to the mainland, they could see how much more extensive the damage must have been there. The island’s rugged skyline looked like a torn sheet of paper, with so much vegetation shredded and destroyed. Charm Island had fallen just beyond the outer edge of the worst damage.

  Some people were making dire predictions about the future of tourism and the Reef in this area. Others said that the marine life and the coral itself would fare well, and the focus of environmental concern needed to be the tracts of rainforest in the path of the cyclone after it had hit the coast.

  The resort at Charm Island’s southern end looked messy but its infrastructure was basically intact. As the boat approached the jetty, in the sheltered waters of a curving bay, Luke and Janey saw a row of roofless cabins fronting the water and a litter of trees and branches on the ground, but a second row of cabins further back towards the island’s forested slopes still had bright beach towels hanging on their wooden deck railings and groupings of outdoor chairs.

  On shore, a signpost and map board indicated various activities. The animal park and wind-surfing were listed as closed, and they could see the torn netting and broken supports of what must have been an impressive aviary, but various other sport and water activities and two of the three nature trails that led into the rugged interior of the island were open.

  ‘Play on the beach?’ Luke suggested, and that seemed fine with Rowdy.

  They spent two hours on the sand, digging holes and making castles in between taking refreshing dips in water that had settled back to its brilliant tropical colour instead of its recent stormy brown. Then they explored the resort buildings and at the gift shop Janey bought Rowdy a stained-glass kit which he could make up into a circular picture of tropical coral and fish.

  He looked pleased about it and wanted to carry it himself, but she told him, ‘We’d better keep it in the day pack. Wouldn’t be good if you dropped it or forgot it somewhere.’ He gave a silent nod.

  In the end they’d decided not to bring a picnic, because the mere mention of one had thrown Mrs Grubb into such a flap—she’d apparently pictured goat cheese tartlets and smoked salmon croquettes, even though they’d insisted salad sandwiches would be fine. She had enough in the catering department to worry about at the moment, so they’d told her, ‘We’ll buy lunch there.’

  There was a buffet on offer in the resort’s biggest restaurant. Rowdy piled his plate high, trying everything from crab claws to sliced roast beef to peppers stuffed with spicy rice.

  Luke ruffled his hair. ‘You are a brilliant eater, kid!’ He didn’t let the physical contact linger. He had to hold himself back sometimes, Janey could see. Had to force himself to show less than he felt. They hadn’t even begun to talk about how or when to tell Rowdy that this man was his dad.

  And they hadn’t talked about last night, which repeated itself over and over in her mind. It ambushed her whenever she looked at him and so did the knowledge that it might never be repeated.

  After the big meal, Rowdy looked a little sleepy, so they found a shady place beside the kids’ playground. The shade sail above the play equipment had survived the cyclone—probably by being taken down and stored away. It stretched above them, a cool jade green, offering relief from the midday heat of the sun. Rowdy played on the equipment for a while, then came and lay down on his towel at Janey’s suggestion and slept.

  ‘He seems good today,’ Luke murmured, watching him.

  ‘Maybe it’s easier for him, in some ways, when Max and CJ aren’t around, even though they’re building a nice friendship, the three of them. But when it’s just us, he doesn’t have to keep such a close watch on himself, doesn’t have to keep reminding himself not to talk. There’s not the same exuberance.’ Janey rolled onto her stomach and propped herself on her elbows, so she could look at Luke as she talked to him.

  Luke wished she hadn’t.

  Or he wished that Georgie had a different preference in swimsuit styles.

  This was Alice’s sister, and it disturbed him, this new awareness of her and need for her as a woman. It irritated him, disturbed him, confused him, made him restless and unsure. He knew he shouldn’t have given in to it last night, but even in hindsight couldn’t pinpoint the moment where he should have or could have turned away.

  The whole thing played in his head like a loop of videotape, only that wasn’t quite right, because there was so much more to it than mere sight and sound. The feel of her skin. The taste of her. The trust in the whole lengt
h of her body when she pressed against him.

  And there’d been no games.

  However right or wrong or just plain crazy it had been for them to pull each other’s clothes off and explode in each other’s arms, there had been no games. She’d kissed him because she felt the same need that he did. She’d given in to their blazing desire because, as had happened to him, it had taken control of her whole being and she hadn’t been able to think straight.

  Then they’d both come back to earth and had that weird, awkward and unsettling conversation about having kissed before. Why had she asked him about that? He had no idea.

  But at no point had she pretended to feel more than she did, in order to see how much passion or vulnerability he might betray.

  Alice had been the Stafford sister who’d played games.

  These comparisons—they unnerved him. The idea that he’d kissed Janey eight years ago unnerved him, too. It must have been very dark, very late, and she’d said they’d both had too much to drink. Was it possible he hadn’t even realised who she was? He tried to think. What might she have been wearing? No, it wasn’t going to come back to him. It had totally gone.

  ‘How long since you spoke to your parents?’ he asked quickly, to distract himself.

  ‘Wednesday.’

  ‘Have you mentioned me?’

  ‘Not yet. We should have talked about this before, I suppose.’

  ‘There’s too much to talk about, all of it sensitive. It’s fine. I think it was the right decision not to tell them yet.’

  ‘I’m making all my decisions on the run, it feels. And I haven’t told them that he’s not speaking. They’re…pretty fragile right now, especially my mother. My aunt is staying with them, helping them through, which is what gives me the freedom to take things slowly with Rowdy.’

  ‘So what do they think? Why do they think you’re in Crocodile Creek?’

  ‘I told them I took the bus to the coast so we could fly out from a bigger airport.’ She gave a self-mocking shudder. ‘Which is not so far from the truth, because I am not a big fan of outback mail-hop flights!’

  He laughed and asked, ‘Have you travelled much?’

  ‘Been out of Australia twice. Once to New Zealand, once to Bali. I’m not exactly an intrepid world explorer.’

  ‘Some people would consider practising medicine in a place like Darwin to be intrepid enough.’

  ‘There are some challenges,’ she agreed.

  They talked like this until Rowdy woke up. Lazy and easy, punctuated with gulps of iced water from the day pack they’d brought, no mention of last night. He could see that she was thinking about it sometimes, though, the way he was. Just the way she moved a shoulder, or looked away. A self-consciousness in her smile, and a sudden bloom of colour in her cheeks.

  He wanted to tell her, It’s OK. We’re OK.

  But he didn’t know if it was true. Maybe something delicate and precious had been ruined.

  Rowdy was thirsty after he’d stretched and blinked and rubbed his eyes. He took a long drink from his water bottle, and then Luke suggested, ‘How about one of those nature trails? I’d be interested to see more of the island, the damage and what’s still intact. It’s only three o’clock.’

  ‘Do we want to take the boat that leaves at five?’ Janey asked.

  ‘There are only two more after that, on the hour at six and seven, and those both seem a bit late.’

  ‘Suit you, Rowdy? A bit of an explore, and then the five o’clock boat?’

  He nodded and scrambled to his feet, while Luke and Janey put T-shirts and shorts back on over their swimsuits. He was a pretty impressive hiker, it turned out. By the time they passed the helipad and then the extensively damaged aviary and animal enclosures he was a good fifty metres ahead of them. He covered the ground like an eager puppy, running until he was almost out of sight, then he stopped to examine something that had caught his interest, and circled back to hold out a shiny dead beetle for their inspection.

  The beetle was iridescent and beautiful, all greeny gold like shot silk, and Janey exclaimed over it with sincere interest, earning his rare grin. ‘Want to keep it and bring it home to show Max and CJ?’

  He nodded, and she wrapped it in a clean tissue and put it in the side pocket of their day pack.

  ‘No sign of any animals or birds in these enclosures,’ Janey said when he’d run off ahead again.

  ‘They must have lost a few, especially the birds.’ Luke peered into the damaged aviary. ‘But I heard one of the staff in the gift shop say that they’ve got temporary accommodation set up somewhere for the survivors. Their animal collection can’t have been that extensive, just a few cute marsupials for the overseas tourists. I think the birds were the main focus.’

  Beyond the aviary, the island quickly lost its resort flavour and became a wilderness of hoop pine, eucalyptus trees and lush pockets of thick rainforest. Their hiking trail meandered in the cool shade, skirting the surprisingly steep heights of the interior. They passed a couple of families on their way back to the resort, but otherwise the trail remained quiet and peaceful.

  ‘I don’t like it when we lose sight of him,’ Janey said.

  ‘I’m sure he feels very safe here. He’s used to country much wilder than this.’

  ‘That doesn’t mean he is safe.’

  ‘Janey, I understand why you’re nervous—’

  ‘I know. I’m being over-protective. But he’s still only five. He’s been through so much.’

  This time Luke didn’t argue, just put his arm around her shoulder and squeezed her, kissed the top of her head. She smelt the hot cotton of his shirt and just wanted to lay her head against him and surrender all control.

  What’s happening?

  They were so comfortable together, even with all those unanswered questions about last night. She hadn’t known it was possible to feel so trusting and so on edge at the same time. He let her go without holding the moment of contact, but the pull between them lingered in the air like a delectable scent, and she knew she wanted much more.

  She wanted them to make love again. He did, too, she was sure. The awareness and the complexity made her dizzy. Giddy with wanting. Woozy from the vertigo brought on but so many unanswered questions.

  The rational part of her mind couldn’t trust that what she felt was anything more than the relief of having his rock-like support and knowing he felt the same as she did about Rowdy.

  Yes, the rational part, but, oh, the intuition…!

  The thing was, she’d never trusted intuition. That particular rug could get pulled from under your feet so fast that your self-esteem ended up flat on the floor. She wouldn’t give in to it again. Not with so much still unresolved. Not when this was Alice’s ex.

  Setting her jaw, she eased away from him on the path. It was wide enough. They didn’t need to walk this close together. Behind them, she heard thudding footsteps and two boys darted through the space she’d just opened up between herself and Luke. They ran and laughed, jostling each other, fighting a bit. They looked like brothers, one around eleven and the other a couple of years younger.

  The younger one’s laughter turned to a whine as he struggled to keep up. ‘Wait, Sam! I said it wasn’t a race.’ His big brother elbowed him, playful but too rough, pushing him against the bushes at the side of the path. ‘I’ll tell Mum you’re being mean,’ he whined again.

  ‘Oh, come on, Josh, don’t be a baby…’

  They disappeared around a bend in the trail. It must have been less than a minute later that Janey and Luke heard a boy’s voice again, but this time it sounded very different.

  Urgent.

  Angry.

  And several years younger.

  ‘Back away! Leave it alone or it’ll go for you! It’s hurt. Stay quiet and steady and back away! Back away!’

  ‘That’s not those two kids who just went past,’ Luke said slowly. ‘Whose is that voice?’

  He moved at once into a loping run and Janey
followed just behind him. He wore rubber-soled athletic shoes while she had on flat sandals, which she cursed as she struggled to keep up and got dirt scuffed in through the open toes. They rounded the bend almost sprinting and there was Rowdy.

  Yelling.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  ‘IT’LL kick! Back away!’ Rowdy yelled.

  Fifty metres ahead stood the two brothers and in front of them, right on the trail, was a cassowary nearly two metres tall. It was a beautiful creature, a powerfully built, flightless bird with coarse, heavy feathers in a gorgeous, shimmering arrangement of purple and dark blue, offset by a drape of orange-red around the neck like a scarf, and a dark, keel-shaped crest on the top of its head.

  ‘It’s hurt!’ Rowdy yelled. His face was red and screwed up tight in his frustration. He bent low and loped forward as he spoke, as if believing that he needed to be closer to get his urgent message across. He was trying to yell and keep his voice to a whisper at the same time, trying to make himself as unobtrusive as possible, so that he didn’t aggravate the cassowary even more. ‘Can’t you see? It’ll go for you!’

  It did.

  The boys had ignored all Rowdy’s frantic warnings. Was the older one trying to protect his younger brother? Did they both think that it was safe to taunt the creature? Or were they simply too frozen in fear to make any response at all? Janey and Luke had no time to tell, and they were still too far away to help. Luke bent down, grabbed a stick and ran, but it was no use.

  When a cassowary felt threatened, it attacked.

  The bird darted forward heavily, limping from its wound and yet still powerful on its strong legs. It kicked at the older boy.

  Once.

  Twice.

  And again.

  Fast, frightening, incredibly vicious thrusts.

  The boy was on the ground, screaming. Even from this distance Janey could see the blood. Arterial blood. There was no mistaking that dark spurting from high on his inner thigh. Luke had charged at the bird, yelling at the top of his lungs and waving the stick, and whether it was the noise or his size or the fact that the beautiful creature had given itself a fresh burst of pain with those kicks from its wounded leg, it was enough.