* * * *
Corrie lifted her chin and clenched her hands. She had no idea what she had previously been saying, but her thoughts were rampant...and all derogative! Obnoxious beast! She glared at him.
“Before you...” She hesitated, thinking twice about using the word rudely. “...interrupted,” she said, more hard-edged than if she had used entered.
She caught the movement of Vic’s hand coming up to cover his mouth, attempting to hide a smile.
The corner of Britt’s generous mouth quirked slightly. “You could hardly blame me for...interrupting.”
So her hesitation had conveyed her meaning to him, giving her a real buzz of satisfaction.
“After all, I had been privileged for some minutes to the way you were hedging around asking, or was it going to be telling Vic that you wanted access to my personal records. The answer is a definite no, Miss Nelson.”
“Without asking my reason?”
“The letter you received contained my answer. My denial should be no surprise.”
“But you haven’t given me a chance to explain.” Oh damn, she wasn’t pleading, was she? She had no intention of doing that and certainly not to him.
Flashing green eyes pinned her. “You really believe I should make intimate letters and documents available to complete strangers?”
“No, of course not,” she snapped. “You really are making me and my request into something...” Corrie cast around for the appropriate words. She had never felt this out of control, ever! “Something sleazy, Mr. Hendricks.” She immediately recoiled from her choice of words.
“And is it?”
“What? Ohhhh!” It was an exclamation of outrage. She was on her feet, her indignation lost on his wide-shouldered back as he turned to sit in an identical leather chair to the one Corrie had just vacated.
“Well, how do I know?” Now seated, he gave a slight, nonchalant shrug. “You could be with one of those popular girlie magazines.”
Corrie looked at this objectionable male, one arm draped casually over the back of the chair, the black linen shirt honing his tanned skin to a brazen sheen. But she wasn’t fooled for one moment. One hand was clenched tight, his knuckles white. He was like a golden mountain lion just waiting to pounce for the kill.
“You really are trying your best to provoke me, aren’t you?” she questioned icily.
“You think so? Then I had better leave before I’m held responsible for some unseemly behavior on your part.” He turned slightly. “Vic?”
“Don’t look at me. I thought you were doing beautifully all by yourself at insulting Corrie.”
“So you know why Miss Nelson is requesting to see my personal files?”
“Haven’t a clue.”
“Then I suggest you find out.” Obvious controlled anger made his voice cold and harsh, mirroring his turbulent sea-green eyes.
“Excuse me!” Corrie interrupted. She had no wish for Victor to be the recipient of Britt Hendricks’s unwarranted anger. “This really has gotten out of hand. I have a folder of identification, plus photocopied information that should allay any fears of us being employed by girlie magazines or tabloid newspapers.”
She would love to accuse him of being a big-headed egotist. Why would any journalist consider him worthy of their time...only that he was the most devastatingly handsome man she had ever seen. As she fumbled to lift the folder out of her bag, Russella was suddenly beside her. To Corrie’s astonishment, she realized she had forgotten all about Rusie.
“I wish Matt was here,” she murmured.
A lot of good that would do, Corrie thought. Britt and Matt were both arrogant. It seemed Victor was the only one with a streak of common decency between the three. She went to hand the folder to Britt, but having left the chair, he was now standing further away with his back to the window.
Well, she certainly wasn’t going to cross the room to hand it to him, even though his eyes held that challenge. Instead, she placed it on the desk in front of Victor.
Britt immediately picked up on the slight. He was now glaring at her. “Seems you’re the one elected to stand in judgment, Vic. Excuse me.” He strode from the room, meeting Matt coming in, closely followed by a Chinese man carrying a laden tray. They both found the rough edge of Britt’s tongue. “You’ve certainly taken your time,” he snapped, making Matt recoil from the unwarranted words, and the houseman retaliating with a string of loud, garbled Chinese.
All impolite, Corrie decided. And who could blame the houseman! She wished she’d been brave enough to shout impolite words at Britt Hendricks. Her fingernails bit into her tightly clenched hands as she watched the obnoxious man’s exit. She was mystified at the intensity of his cold anger. Anger that had erupted from what could easily have been explained, only for him rudely barging in, filling the whole room with his intimidating presence. Even if he did own the office, surely one owed their guests some mediocrity of good manners.
The man was incomprehensible!
She swung to face Victor, his one hand grasping the nape of his neck, his black eyes narrowed. She burst out, “I’m sorry! Sorry I came. Sorry I thought this meeting could be in the least way pleasant and productive. And most of all, I’m sorry I’ve been the cause of making Mr. Hendricks angry with you all.”
Matt was at Russella’s side, protectively taking her hand. “Did he say anything to you? Because if he did...” The words hung in the air with a definite threat, and when Russella said no, he turned to Victor. “What the hell happened here? I knew he was hardly at his best, but the last time I saw him looking like that—as though all the Valkyries had been let loose—was when he gave me that dressing down about racing Lady Flight. That I will never forget!”
“Pay heed, young Matt. That’s what happens to middle-aged bachelors living in an all-male household. We really do hate having our everyday expectations and plans sabotaged.”
“Well, I can assure you that is not going to happen to me.” He laced his fingers in Rusie’s and looked down into her beaming face. “Not a chance. Not now.”
Corrie looked on, horrified, as Rusie gazed up at Matt’s earnest, young face. Her cousin looked totally enthralled with the man, and he with her. Good grief! They really were in love...or thought they were. It wasn’t possible! And had she witnessed a solemn commitment, even a marriage proposal, albeit a suggested one? She thought she had.
What on earth was she going to say to Aunt Viviene and Uncle Russell? How could she explain that only one day after meeting, this was happening. It didn’t bear thinking about! She groped for her chair and slowly lowered into it.
What a day! And it wasn’t even halfway over.
She was conscious of the houseman still muttering in Chinese, his words now aimed at Victor, and Victor was answering calmly, “Yes, I know, angry and unreasonable. Please offer Miss Nelson a glass of juice, Wing Lee.” And still the houseman was muttering as he placed the cold glass and serviette into Corrie’s trembling fingers. “All right, Wing, I’ll tell him. Yes, Wing. He’s never like this. Yes, yes, I’ll tell him you’ll go home to Singapore. All right!” Victor lost his cool. He slapped his one hand down on the desk. “All right!”
“Okay,” Wing Lee replied in clear English before he very quickly left the room, closing the door with a thud.
“Everyone’s gone mad!” Victor declared, raking his right hand back through his thick, black hair.
Corrie rose to place the untouched juice on the desk and lift the folder before she spun to face her cousin. “We’re leaving, Russella.” She turned to Victor again. “I’ll obtain my information elsewhere—the historical society. I won’t bother you again. In fact, I hope to be away from this island by tomorrow. Early! You might like to share that information with Mr. Britt Hendricks.”
Corrie turned to the window. Alarmingly, the sense of his presence was still there, shadowing the brightness of the day. Her eyes misted, and she bit into her bottom lip. No, she would not give way to her disappointment, not here!
She felt empty, drained. She had never been subjected to such an awful scene before, much less been part of it. Not even in her job, with combatants throwing horrible accusations at each other. She had no doubt that in Britt Hendricks’s estimation she was entirely responsible for all this ill feeling.
She turned again to look at Victor. “It was a hare-brained scheme to start with. I had no right to expect it to succeed.” Corrie found she couldn’t look at Victor’s concerned face a moment longer. She lowered her head, the surface of the desk shimmering through unshed tears. “I have to go. I’m sorry.”
“Corrie.” Victor’s voice was gentle. “If this means so much to you, why not give me the opportunity of understanding. Let me have your folder, let me understand.” He began to slowly walk around the edge of the desk.
“The wrong person would be understanding, Victor. It is Mr. Hendricks who needs to understand, and for some reason he’s not interested enough to even let me explain my reason for being here. Thank you for your offer, but this whole unsavory episode only adds to my conviction. We should not be here. We should not have come.”
“It’s not my place to apologize for Britt’s unreasonable, and I might add out of character, behavior. I don’t know what got into the man. His manners are usually impeccable.”
“Providing his ordered life isn’t inconvenienced in any way,” Corrie said, her own manners being stretched to the utmost with all these unnecessary words. What she had intended to explain and request was not to the liking of that dreadful man’s closed mind. Corrie shook her head slowly with resignation, and her voice softened. “And it was such a harmless cause.”
Clutching the folder close, she turned to seek Russella. Only to find her and Matt in deep, subdued conversation in the most secluded corner of the room, Matt holding both her hands against his chest.
“We must go, Rusie,” she requested.
Without further words she walked from the office, through reception, and down the steps to the driveway. Her back turned on Arafura Enterprises with the resolution she would never, ever, have anything more to do with the company. And certainly not with its odious owner!
Tomorrow she and Rusie would fly to Cairns en route to Sydney from the local airport on neighboring Tern Island. The money saved by cutting short their stay here on Endeavour Island would off-set the cost of the unexpected airfare to Cairns. She would also have to cancel their overland return trip via Weipa. But she imagined that could be done when they reached Cairns.
She had to leave this place!
She refused to even contemplate what she had witnessed between Russella and Matt. After all, it was just one of those improbable, ridiculous holiday flings, and she was not going to succumb to Rusie’s pleadings. Not this time.
Her arm was grabbed, and she was wrenched around to face the object of her last thoughts. “Corrie! Matthew offered you a lift back to the motel, but you rudely never answered.”
“I didn’t hear him.”
“I don’t wonder why with the way you stormed out of there, leaving us all open-mouthed, especially Victor.”
“I didn’t storm, and I thanked Victor. There was no point in staying longer. I intend to contact the travel agent as soon as we get back to the motel.” Finished with explanations, she began to turn away, but Russella stopped her by almost shouting her name.
“Corrie! What are you talking about? Travel agent?”
“We’re leaving tomorrow. We’ll fly back to Cairns then continue on home. We shouldn’t have come.”
“Well, I’m not going. I’m staying here with Matthew.”
Corrie looked at her willful cousin’s bottom lip pouting and trembling. She wasn’t going to back down. “You’re being silly, melodramatic, and ridiculous! And you’re not staying anywhere within cooee of that trio, or anything to do with Arafura Enterprises.”
“And you’re completely irrational and selfish! And I’m not going anywhere near a travel agent. Our booking is for a week, and a week it’s going to be! And even then I might not leave. So there! And don’t look so shocked, it’s mostly your fault. Why did you have to provoke Mr. Hendricks? Matthew says he’s never like that, he’s always so polite. You should have come right out with the reason why we came to this island, instead of acting like some...some double-O-seven agent. Well, I don’t care if you never speak to me again for what I’ve just done. I’ve told Matthew exactly the reason for our visit.” By this time Russella’s eyes were shimmering bright with tears, then she flung herself at her cousin, holding onto her desperately. “Oh, Corrie, it was all so silly.”
Corrie, standing stiffly straight, found herself accusing Rusie, quite without reason, “You didn’t support me.” Her voice was muffled with restrained tears.
“You were a stranger. I couldn’t believe your behavior, practically shouting at the man we had come to ask a favor of. It wasn’t my calm, serene Corrie. Even when I came to speak to you, you looked at me like my being here was a nuisance. Please, let Matthew drive you back to the motel.”
Corrie shook her head. She needed time to herself. Frankly, she needed to come to terms with the unrecognizable woman she had become in Britt Hendricks’s presence. And with the accusations Rusie had just leveled at her.
To most people the altercation would have been no more than a commonplace exchange of heated words, but to her it had been thoroughly abhorrent, degrading! A shiver of recall swept her. Even though she had no need to respond quite so vehemently, she still saw the whole horrid incident as Britt Hendricks’s making.
He had purposely provoked her! From the moment he first spoke and then held her with his alarmingly sea-green eyes, he seemed to have found his mission in life—making her feel totally uncomfortable.
“Please, Rusie, I’d rather walk.”
Corrie lifted her gaze over her cousin’s jet-black hair to find Matthew coming halfway down the drive, his gaze protectively on Russella. And beyond him Victor was visible, standing on the tiled patio entrance.
“I’ll go right this moment to explain to Matthew and apologize.” Corrie determinedly stepped free of her cousin’s embrace and went to face the concerned, young man. “Matthew, I’ve just explained to Russella that I would rather walk back to the motel. And I do apologize for not answering you earlier, but as you’re aware, I was rather upset. Still, come tomorrow it will all seem like a bad dream as we are flying back to Cairns. Then we’ll be well and truly out of Mr. Hendricks’s hair for always. The odious creature!” She bit into her lip, but the words had already escaped.
“Hang on! Did you say you’re flying back to Cairns tomorrow?”
Corrie looked at Matt’s stricken face as he quickly glanced at Russella before looking back to her.
“You can’t!” he exclaimed. “Not tomorrow. We have so much to plan. Rusie said you were staying a week, and so did you. Now, all because of Britt’s imbecilic behavior, the great moron...” He suddenly stopped his tirade, and his hands came to grip Corrie’s wrists. “Don’t do this, Corrie. Don’t leave tomorrow. Don’t you understand? I’m in love with Rusie.”
Corrie stared at him in shock.
“I can see by your face that you don’t believe me, but it’s true. It happened just like that. Wham! Bam! Over in a flash! I know if you insist, and set your mind to it, you could make Rusie leave with you. It’s obvious that she idolizes you, Corrie. So I’m pleading with you, give us this week. Please?”
Corrie didn’t ask the next logical question. What happens when the week comes to an end? She felt she would be incapable of getting the words together that would need to follow. Too much had happened, and now this incredible declaration?
She felt like a fragile seashell, ready to be crushed if one more person presented her with even the mildest sign of confrontation. She just knew she would fall apart, embarrassingly, most un-serenely, even disintegrate, before their very eyes.
The shaking of her head matched that of her hands. “I can’t talk now. I just can’t. I
can’t even think straight. Just leave me be, please? I’ll walk. I’ll be all right. Go to Rusie, she’s so upset.”
Chapter 4
Corrie’s driven feet carried her in the opposite direction from where Russella stood, dejected and crying. She traveled down a long flight of wide, cement steps and across the road, then stepped onto the strip of cream-colored sand scoured by small, surging, foam-topped waves. So unlike the huge, dark blue rollers that swept up the beaches she was used to. Those waves weren’t influenced by the controlling coral reefs as they were here.
Her eyes were drawn to the south. Home! And yet, even after all that had transpired, and the short time she’d had to breathe and absorb the tropic-laden air, there was something unaccountable that made her reluctant to say goodbye to this island. A strange recognition. She turned to walk in the direction of the local hospital on Somerset Point.
Slipping her flat, leather shoes from her feet, she let the cooling water swirl around them, and the therapy began to work. Her trembling hands stilled.
The more she walked, the more Matt’s distressed, pleading words kept nagging at her to consider and do as he requested. But if she stayed, it would be for her own selfish reasons. She would be giving in to the pull this island had on her senses, and she couldn’t do that. Wouldn’t do that! Rusie, the silly darling, must see that Corrie’s decision to leave so soon was best for both of them.
A tumble of rocks strewn across the beach to the waterline barred her way. She looked up from the sand to find she had walked quite a distance.
A lone tree stood on the land side of the rocks; its thick trunk gnarled and scarred, telling of its age. Its tortured, leaning shape a testament to the strong winds that used Kennedy Channel as their playground.
The shade was welcome and Corrie, having reached it now, registered just how foolish she had been, walking bare-headed under the tropic sun. With the strong breeze to fan her face and lift her hair from her shoulders, along with her feet plunged into the cool waters, it had been a misleading situation.
Pearls of the Past Page 4