by Cathryn Hein
The gas fire was barely winning its battle against the cold when, after a long shower, she padded into the lounge in her pyjamas. She turned it up to flat out before sinking into her favourite armchair and flicking on the television, hoping to distract herself.
Eighty-seven pay TV and five free-to-air channels, and there was still nothing on. She stared at the fake logs and dancing flames of the gas fire and let tears flood her eyes. This time, her tears weren’t over her father, but for another man she didn’t understand. Another man who didn’t want her love.
They’d been trapped in the float together for fifteen long, embarrassing minutes. After his gentle rebuff, Sophie had found she couldn’t bear to look at Aaron. She’d turned her back and stood at the window looking out at Buck and actually wishing he would do something obliging for once and run off so she’d have to chase him.
It wasn’t until the rain had eased that Aaron spoke. He held his hat in his hands, rolling and unrolling the edges of the brim like an obsessed milliner.
‘You scared the crap out of me today,’ he’d said.
She’d turned to look at him. Holding hands with her had scared him?
‘I watched some of the others. None of them went as fast as you or took the hard options like you did. Why?’
‘I guess they just didn’t want to win as much as me.’
‘Is that the only reason?’ His eyes were fixed on hers.
She’d shrugged, not understanding what he was getting at. ‘I can’t think of any other.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes,’ she said slowly, staring at him and wondering if this was some weird joke. ‘I’m sure.’
‘Good.’
Apparently satisfied, he’d donned his hat and walked toward the door. He held it open for her but as she’d brushed past he’d put his mouth close to her ear and spoken again. ‘You holding my hand scared the crap out of me too.’
When she’d looked at him, he’d shaken his head as if he couldn’t believe what he’d just said and nudged her out the door.
She’d wandered around in a fog of lust the rest of the afternoon, trying her hardest to engineer another close encounter, but Aaron had kept his distance. Even after the presentation, when she’d sidled up to him and asked if he wanted to kiss the winner, his kiss was brief to the point of rudeness. And if that wasn’t bad enough, he’d then ruffled her hair like she was his ten-year-old sister.
Tess and the others had been right, though for the wrong reasons. She should have stayed well away from Aaron Laidlaw.
And now it was too late.
Ten
Aaron stilled and cocked his head. The distinctive knock-knock of the Range Rover filtered in through the door of Hakea Lodge’s feed room. He smiled and allowed himself a moment’s mild fantasy before shutting down his thoughts. Making it through the morning without touching Sophie would be hard enough.
But it was a day for optimism. The storm had blown through, leaving clear skies and a landscape scrubbed clean. Earlier, he’d sat on the verandah steps watching the sun rise and the horses snort and stamp as the first rays of light drifted across the yards.
He’d thought about Sophie, and dreamed of how it could have been between them – but never would be. At sixteen, he hadn’t understood that mothers were capable of selfish exploitation. Or that fathers could die of shame. They were lessons he’d learnt too late, just as he’d learnt too late that pity and compassion could turn into something else. Something they shouldn’t.
The combined thrill and terror of watching Sophie ride cross-country like some equestrian kamikaze still lingered, plucking at his conscience the way Tess’s words did. Little pecks of doubt, eating away at his perception of Sophie, making him question her fortitude and query his own judgement.
Yet the memory of her expression when she had looked up from Chuck’s sweating neck and saw him eclipsed everything. Mud-splattered, wearing that stupid egg on her head and that equally stupid body protector, she’d gazed at him with huge grey eyes full of tears and amazement, as if seeing him was the best thing that had ever happened to her.
No one had looked at him like that before. Ever.
He’d known straightaway he was in trouble. That something had shifted between them. If he’d had any doubts about his feelings, they’d been dashed the moment he’d seen that weedy wanker kiss her. Jealousy had clotted his bloodstream and he’d wanted to yell at her for making him feel things he didn’t want to feel. But he couldn’t. So he’d hurt her instead by saying he didn’t care, and realised too late when he saw her face that he’d hurt himself too.
But what was he supposed to do? A relationship between them was impossible. He could fantasise about her all he liked but that’s where it had to end. Love required openness and honesty, yet he could offer neither. The truth was too destructive.
Although that didn’t stop him dreaming.
‘Hi.’ Sophie stood leaning against the doorframe with her arms crossed, silhouetted against the light.
‘Hey, Soph.’
She came into the room and sat on an unopened sack of oats. Aaron went back to measuring out feeds, but could sense her scrutiny. From his stable, Rowdy let out yet another whinny. He’d been at it non-stop since six-thirty. Aaron suspected he was calling out for Sophie, and knew exactly how the horse felt.
‘Rowdy’s living up to his name,’ she said.
He glanced at her. She was staring at his arms. He shot a look at them, self-conscious. The sleeves of his flannelette shirt were rolled up almost to the shoulders. Oaten dust had turned his blond hairs white, but otherwise they looked like they always did – a bit more muscular than average from working with horses, but overall the arms of a normal male. Maybe she preferred men with darker hair.
‘I think he missed you over the weekend,’ Aaron said, wishing she’d stop staring. It was making him paranoid.
‘Mmm.’
He stopped measuring feeds and eyed her. ‘Are you all right?’
She blinked. ‘Fine, fine. Sorry, I was miles away.’
‘Still daydreaming about your big win?’
She shook her head. ‘No. Just daydreaming.’
He went back to work, digging oats out of a hessian sack with a large galvanised iron dipper and dropping them into the buckets he’d lined up across the room. The feed room was dusty and smelt of chaff and the unmistakable odour of mice.
‘There’s a thumping great snake in here somewhere,’ he said.
‘Carpet python?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Vanaheim’s got one too. They’re the best rat-catchers.’ She smiled. ‘Are you trying to scare me?’
He was. He wanted her to stop eyeing him that way. It didn’t help that she looked morning gorgeous. Ruddy-cheeked from the cold, scrubbed and fresh, with her hair pulled back and the pearly skin of her neck teasing him with its smoothness. Even her mouth was conspiring against him with its inviting soft smile.
He was definitely trying to scare her. He wanted her away from him before he did something stupid. Like kiss her.
‘I thought girls were supposed to be scared of snakes.’
She shrugged. ‘It’s a carpet python. It’s harmless. Who are we taking out this morning?’
‘Costa Motza and Pollyanna to start with.’
She stood up. ‘I’ll go fetch my horse then. It’s about time I showed you how it was done.’
‘How what was done?’
‘Slow training.’
His jaw dropped open. ‘You’re joking, aren’t you?’
‘No,’ she said, but her mouth twitched.
It took him a few seconds to realise she was pulling his leg. He blamed it on the way her lips quirked as she tried not to laugh, but she could have been poking her tongue out and he still wouldn’t have twigged. He was too busy thinking about things he shouldn’t.
‘Are you sure you wouldn’t prefer to ride a real racehorse, like Pollyanna?’
She crossed her arms. ‘Costa
Motza is a real racehorse.’
‘You keep telling yourself that, Soph.’
‘He is.’
‘Yeah, yeah.’
She glared at him, then picked up a handful of oats and threw it at him. at him. ‘Is.’
A single grain caught in his collar and slipped down into his shirt. He dropped the dipper and pulled his shirttails out of his jeans, shaking the fabric until the oat fell out. ‘You don’t want to start something you can’t finish, Sophie.’
She threw some more at him.
‘I’m not warning you again.’
‘Take it back,’ she said.
‘Take what back?’
‘What you said about Costa Motza.’
It was bad form for a trainer to criticise one of his charges, but she looked so deliciously outraged he couldn’t help but tease, just to see how far she’d go.
‘I told you before, Costa Motza’s not a racehorse’s backside.’
Another handful of oats landed against his chest.
‘Isn’t.’
‘No more oats, Sophie. This is your last chance.’
As she dug into the sack, he pounced. He pulled her against his chest, pinning her arms to her sides with one arm. With his free hand, he scooped a handful of oats from the sack.
She tilted her head back to look at him. ‘Don’t you dare.’
He grinned. He would dare. He’d dare a lot. Holding her firmly, he squirreled his hand down the back of her jumper. Her skin felt warm and smooth and as he tunnelled further into that snug burrow her breath shortened into sexy little pants. Slowly, his gaze locked on hers, he released the oats. Her eyes widened as the scratchy little seeds tumbled down her back. She wriggled, her mouth parting in a shocked ‘O’. A whimper escaped her lips as she writhed against him. The sound turned his heartbeat arrhythmic and sent his groin hard.
He let her go.
She arched her back and dug one hand down the neck of her jumper and the other up the bottom. He glanced at her chest, at the breasts pushing toward him, and swallowed. Unbidden, an image of her naked and sprawled over the bags of oats, waiting for him, panting those little breaths as her nipples hardened with desire, invaded his mind.
His hands twitched as he fantasised about what he’d do to her, the pleasure she’d feel, the sensations he’d arouse. He’d take it slow, very slow, making the moment unforgettable. He’d scatter kisses on her stomach and ease his way up her chest, blessing each of her perfect rib bones with his mouth. And as he touched her, she’d make that same whimper before gasping his name as his hot mouth closed over the nub of her breast.
With a grimace, she tossed the few grains she’d managed to retrieve at him. ‘That’s not fair!’
He dusted off his hand, driving the fantasy from his head while hoping like hell she wouldn’t notice his hard-on. ‘You started it.’
‘I didn’t put any down your back, though.’ She squirmed and he knew the itch must be near unbearable. Oats were terrible, but by wriggling, she was only making it worse.
He regarded her, trying not to laugh as she started picking at the seat of her pants, jigging comically as she tried to shake out the oats.
‘Itchy?’
Her bottom lip stuck out, sulky and adorable. He wanted to suck on it.
‘They’re in my underpants.’
He drew air between his teeth, feigning sympathy. ‘That’s gotta hurt.’
‘There’s probably mouse wee on those oats.’
‘A little bit of mouse wee never hurt anyone.’
‘Says who?’
Suddenly, the yearning to touch, to feel, overwhelmed him. He reached out and ran his thumb over that deliciously pouty lip, his bursting heart free and in control. ‘Says me.’
The atmosphere changed, as though all the dust motes were rubbing against one another, electrifying the air with their friction. Sophie stopped wriggling and gazed at him, and then her lips parted and her pink tongue darted out to wet their soft surface. He couldn’t stop looking at them, hungering to know what they tasted like. Sweet, he decided. They’d taste sweet, like her.
She touched his face with warm fingertips and slipped her hand around his neck to draw him close, so close he could feel her breath on his skin. He breathed it in. It smelt of toothpaste. He closed his eyes and nuzzled at her cheek, inhaling the aroma of her skin as if it were the last oxygen on earth.
She pressed her mouth against his ear and he felt her smile against his cheek. Electricity jolted down his spine.
‘Kiss me.’ Her voice sounded husky, full of need, like him.
She pressed against him, and he groaned at the pressure on his erection. He cupped her face, studying those wonderful grey eyes, searching for reservations. There were none. Only pure desire for him.
‘Sophie.’ It was all he could say. Just her name. Just her beautiful, perfect name.
Very slowly, he kissed her smooth forehead, then her fluttering, delicate eyelids. He kissed the infinitely soft skin beneath her eyes and felt the tickle of her lashes against his nose. He heard her shallow, excited breaths. He felt anticipation engulf her body as he moved inexorably down the contours of her face until his mouth rested at the very edge of her quivering, parted lips.
And in that long ecstatic moment, he felt every tiny thing about her and knew he was lost forever.
Rowdy whinnied.
His eyes flicked open. The odour of grain and chaff penetrated his nostrils, waking his love-sodden brain. He jerked his mouth away and stared at Sophie’s bliss-filled face, then dropped his hands and took a hasty step backwards, his chest heaving. What the hell had he been thinking? This was Sophie, for Christ’s sake. The Sophie whose mother he’d as good as killed. The little Sophie who’d screamed at her mother’s funeral as though it was her being buried. The same Sophie he’d vowed to protect and then never had.
The Sophie to whom his guilty heart owed everything except this.
‘I’m sorry.’ He grabbed at his hair with his hands, horrified at how close he’d come to wounding her in a way that would never heal. ‘I shouldn’t have done that.’
She crossed her arms and cocked her head at him. ‘Done what? Put oats down my back or nearly kiss me?’
‘Both.’
Her head dropped for a moment. ‘Thanks. Nice to know you find me so attractive.’
He opened his mouth to tell her he thought she was beautiful and then realised it would only make things worse. She raised her head, grey eyes limpid, and they stared at each other through the dusty air of the feed room. Two people starving but only one knowing the food they wanted was poisonous.
Sophie was the first to move. She reached for his hand and took it in both of hers. ‘It’s not scary,’ she said, but he knew she was wrong. What was happening between them wasn’t just frightening, it was impossible – but he couldn’t tell her that without admitting what he’d done. And he could never do that. Not now.
For the second time in two days, he pulled his hand from hers and endured her face crumpling with hurt. He looked away, hating himself.
‘You can use the bathroom to shake out your clothes while I go get the horses ready.’
She touched his sleeve. ‘Aaron.’
‘Don’t, Soph. It’s no good.’ With his hands deep in his pockets, he left her alone in the feed room.
Eleven
The week progressed with painful slowness. Sophie’s red-rimmed eyes seemed to worsen with every day and Aaron felt guilt tear at his heart every time he looked at her. He knew he didn’t look much better. Sleep refused to give him respite from the long nights of worry.
He knew he was driving Sophie insane, but he couldn’t stop himself from calling her every evening, needing to hear her voice, sad but unmistakably alive. And every morning, as he waited for her to pull into the yard, anxiety yanked and pulled at his insides and ugly words circled his head, reminding him who would be to blame if she didn’t come.
The memory of Fiona Dixon haunted him. The way her f
ace had morphed from horror to a strange serenity with every word he’d flung. She’d been so calm, taking him in her arms and comforting him the way his mother never had, stroking his head and promising him it would be all right, giving him hope when all the time she knew she had none.
Suicides lied. He wouldn’t be misled again.
On Thursday night, he’d rung Sophie only to have her snap at him that, no, she wasn’t all right. Her rotten father hadn’t called, Tess had left the hayshed paddock gate open again and Buck had dumped her twice that afternoon. He’d panicked, racing around to Vanaheim and banging on her door like a lunatic. He gave Sophie credit for being more polite than if he’d been in her shoes, but her intention was clear.
Piss off and leave me alone. You’ve hurt me enough.
The situation couldn’t last. They were both going crazy.
‘Are you going to tell me what the hell’s going on with you, or do I have to guess?’ asked Sophie on Friday morning, to Aaron’s relief. Since she’d booted him off Vanaheim the previous night, he’d been mulling over how to bring it up. They were sitting on the verandah step – him at one end, Sophie at the other, and at least a metre of empty space between them – drinking tea and soaking up rays of autumn sunshine.
He took a sip of tea to collect himself, wondering where he should begin.
Sophie filled in the silence for him. ‘Why do you call me every night?’
That question was easy to answer. ‘To see if you’re okay.’
‘Why wouldn’t I be okay?’
That one was harder. ‘I don’t know.’
She sighed. ‘You ring me every night to see if I’m okay and yet you won’t come within breathing distance of me. I’m starting to think I smell or something.’