Before she realised what was happening, Dan was kissing her. His hands had found their natural place on the bare skin of her back, moving, caressing her where the string of her bikini formed a line. His kiss was passionate, insistent and his warm lips lingered on her mouth, longer than a peck, but not long enough to deepen it, which was still the right amount for Lizzie to feel knocked off her feet.
When he slowly pulled back, his eyes were dark and serious, his breathing heavy on her cheek.
‘What was that for?’ she gasped.
‘I thought that might snap you out of it.’ He pulled her into his arms and wrapped his big body around her. It had been so long since she’d leaned on someone, had someone to lean on, that she almost surrendered. The temptation to lose herself in him at that moment, to forget about her failures, to just be honest about what she felt for him, was powerful and potent. Dan’s fingers teased through her hair, so soothing she wanted to sink into him and never let go.
‘You. Are. Driving. Me. Bat-shit. Crazy. You know that?’ he whispered.
‘I don’t understand why I’m driving you crazy.’ She snuggled into his chest, her breasts crushed up against him, her arms around his waist, holding on with everything she had.
‘Elizabeth, I want you to listen to me.’ His voice was rough and deep. ‘I know you love Middle Point and the people in it. I’ve seen it with my own eyes and I get it.’ His tone wavered between irritated and sympathetic and Lizzie wondered which one he’d finally go with.
‘But you’re not on guardian angel duty here 24/7, okay?’
Guardian angel? Is that who he thought she was trying to be? Someone who thought she could run around and make people’s lives better, make them better? Hadn’t the events of that day, what had just happened with Harri, proved that she could never be? When she stiffened, he didn’t let her go, but held on tighter, his hands moving sensual circles on her bare back, still gritty with sand.
‘You’re wrong, Dan, I—’
‘Elizabeth,’ he said, and just held her. ‘Things will happen to people that you can’t do anything about. They will have their hearts broken. They will run away to Melbourne and Sydney. They will trip on a hose, or get cheated on or…’
Lizzie heard the catch in his voice, the hesitation, and held her breath.
‘Or even get in a car wreck. And there’s nothing, absolutely nothing you can do about it. That’s life in the world on an ordinary day. Welcome to it.’
‘It’s too hard,’ she said softly into his chest, feeling fragile and overwhelmed. ‘It’s too hard when things happen to the people you love.’
He understood it. Better than she knew. He felt it, right there, at that moment. He got it.
When he felt her strength start to drain away, her body almost limp in his arms, he shared his own with her, held her up, pressed his lips to the silky hair on top of her head, hoping his wildly beating heart would help hers regain its rhythm.
‘You take on their pain too, don’t you? And then it feels like it hurts you more because there’s nothing you can do to help them.’
He felt her nod, and he pulled back from her slightly. He had to see her eyes. Had to judge what was in them.
‘I’ve been thinking about what you told me, months ago, down on the beach that night. You said that shit happens because it happens. That life’s too short to drive yourself crazy asking why.’
She let out a deep breath, shuddered with it. ‘I’m clearly full of crap, aren’t I?’
‘No, you’re not. It helped me, you know that?’
‘It did?’
‘And what I’m wondering is, why the hell haven’t you listened to your own advice and stopped beating yourself up about things you can’t change?’
Lizzie was still. The colour had drained from her face. Her eyes were pale and wet.
And then a realisation hit him, one that should have been obvious to him all along. He looked deep into her eyes, wondering if he could see right inside her. Was it there, in that sadness, in those tears?
Shivers goosed up his spine. ‘What happened to you, Elizabeth?’
There was nothing from her but a sigh. No words, no confirmation, but no denial either.
They stood for a long beat, entwined, Dan not wanting to let go of the woman whose heart seemed to be breaking. ‘Will you tell me?’
She shook her head against his chest, sniffed.
Dan didn’t push. He knew pushing hadn’t helped him. As he held her, feeling the turmoil so close to the surface, he remembered what he’d said to Joe at Christmas. She needs someone to look out for her. When Joe had replied, ‘That’s you, is it?’ Dan hadn’t known the answer back then.
He did now.
CHAPTER
26
Lizzie dug deep down for the resolve to let go of Dan. She couldn’t think. She needed to get away from him, keep under control the urge to give in. But the warmth and safety, the strength of his arms, was almost too good. When she began to wriggle her way out of his embrace, he didn’t fight it. She managed to step back from him, from the heat of his gaze that had seen straight through her and shattered her.
‘I need to go.’
‘Wait.’
‘I need to ring Harri’s sons in Adelaide, let them know what’s happened.’
‘Okay.’ Dan’s words were understanding but there was a tension in his jaw, a seriousness in his eyes that she couldn’t decipher.
Lizzie glanced down at her bikini and her wetsuit, the arms of which were flapping around her hips. ‘And I need to have a shower.’ She tried not to notice the way he looked at her body. Not now, she begged him silently, please don’t.
‘And I seem to have a throbbing headache.’ She squeezed her eyes shut to block out the sight of Dan, so gorgeous, so caring, so supportive of her. She’d let him get too close and now she felt shivery with nerves and afraid and all she wanted was to run from him, get home and hide in her bedroom with the covers pulled up way over her head.
‘Elizabeth. Stop it.’ He reached out and wrapped his fingers around her wrist.
‘Stop pushing me away.’ Dan took a step closer. ‘You don’t have to do this on your own. I’m not going anywhere.’
Lizzie jumped back, turned on her heel. Her head was a jumbled mess of everything she’d said and thought and felt during the past half hour. She needed to get away, needed to think and unscramble what she was feeling.
‘Dan, I can’t do this right now. I need to think about Harri. Can you let Julia and Ry know what’s happened?’
She was almost too scared to look at him, fearful of what the expression on his face would do to her insides. When she finally did, he pulled her close and kissed her. His soft lips on hers, one comforting hand on her arm, the other on her cheek, said so much more than words could. She understood the message. He was saying, I’m here. You can count on me.
She slipped out of his embrace, too scared to stop walking away from the ten kinds of handsome – and ten kinds of good – Dan McSwaine.
Lizzie waited very impatiently for Joe to call with news of Harri. She filled the time with phone calls to Harri’s two sons. Son number one had dropped everything and was on his way to hospital. Son number two had been tied up in court, so she’d left a message with his assistant. While she waited for news, Lizzie decided to make sure things were in order in Harri’s place, given Harri would be away for at least a couple of weeks.
Lizzie had been inside her neighbour’s house hundreds of times but she realised, as she pushed open the front door, that being there alone was very different. The place was eerie without Harri in it. The carpet runner in the hallway dulled her footsteps as she made her way to the open kitchen and living area at the back. The radio on the kitchen bench was still announcing the news of the day and Lizzie turned it off. She opened the fridge and poured away half a litre of milk that would expire by the time Harri was home again. A supermarket packet of defrosting chicken would also have to go, as well as a selection of salad v
egetables. Lizzie added them all to the half-filled rubbish bag and then put the whole lot in the outside bin. It could be weeks, Lizzie knew, before Harri would be back. She would not only need time in hospital to recover from her surgery, but time in rehab as well.
Lizzie took a long look around the tidy, old-lady house and wondered if this would be her life in forty years time. Would she still be living in Middle Point? Perhaps relishing her role as honorary Aunt to Julia and Ry’s future children? Maybe Harri would hand down to her the mantle of wise old sage of the town. She could then dispense wisdom and local folklore from the pub, grow her hair long and grey, even start wearing it in a signature bun on top of her head just as Harri had for decades.
Had all the other options passed Lizzie by? Was this all she was due? Was this all she could expect? And what about the whole husband and kids package? Lizzie had learned not to wish for what seemed impossible. She definitely wasn’t hanging out for the tradition of it. It wasn’t the convention of it that she wanted, not the white dress or the ring or the ceremony. It was the love and friendship and wild sex part of it. The in-jokes and the shared stories, the history and the comfort of being loved and loving someone. She wanted what she’d seen Julia fight so hard for. And seeing Julia get it had made Lizzie think more about what she might be missing out on.
Lizzie dragged out a chair from Harri’s kitchen table and fell into it, all those sentiments overwhelming her. What if she ended up alone? She could do that, she’d already done it. No one to answer to. That is, if Joe ever moved out. She could be a free agent, eat cheese on toast for dinner if she wanted to. Stay up late. Get grumpy. Wear her PJs all day. Give up on shaving her legs. She would be able to come and go as she pleased.
Except she never went anywhere.
And now, it all seemed so…ordinary. For so many years, she’d wished for ordinary. And it had been enough. But now it just seemed like the ambition of someone who was scared to think about what she really wanted, someone who was too scared to wish for more.
Someone who’d spent her whole life settling for less.
Dan’s words were like a recurring dream in her head. What happened to you, Lizzie? Why, of all people, was it Dan who could see her for who she really was? That she was someone too scared to face the truth of what had happened to her and what it had done to her.
How the hell could he know?
She covered her face with her hands, trying to block out the light and everything else. When Julia had come back to Middle Point, filled with the burning desire to get the hell out of there as fast as she could, Lizzie had reminded her that it was the one place she could really be herself. ‘You don’t have to pretend to be something you’re not when you’re here,’ she’d told her self-righteously.
The lie of that speared Lizzie right through her heart. She hadn’t known it at the time, but she’d lied to her best friend. She’d lied to everyone. Most of all, she’d somehow managed to lie to herself and have herself believe the lie. For fifteen years, she been pretending to be someone she wasn’t. And it seemed it was finally catching up with her.
When her mobile rang, vibrating in the pocket of her jeans, she fished it out with a frustrated sigh. The caller ID announced it was Stinkface and she pushed the phone to her ear.
‘Joe? What’s happening? Where are you? How’s Harri? Is she okay?’ Lizzie’s words came out in a tumble.
‘Woah, slow down, Mosquito. Here’s the story. You guessed right. She’s broken her hip. I’m still here at the hospital. They’ve just taken her into surgery now and it’ll be a few hours before she’s out of there.’
‘God. Poor Harri.’
‘Lizzie, don’t worry about her. She’s a tough old broad. Hey, one of her sons showed up too. He was pretty cut up. Told me his brother’s on his way, too.’
Lizzie let out a huge sigh of relief. She knew Harri would feel better with her sons by her side.
‘I’m going to stay here and wait until she’s out of surgery, make sure she’s okay. It could be really late. You’ll be all right?’ Lizzie listened for any sign of fatigue in Joe’s voice and was surprised to hear him sounding confident instead.
‘I’ll be all right,’ she told him.
‘Is Dan still there with you?’
‘No, he left,’ she said flatly, and her voice caught in an emotional knot in her throat.
He hesitated. ‘You okay?’ God, did nothing escape him, either?
‘Really, I’m fine. Except for being worried sick about Harri. You’ll call me when she’s out of surgery, let me know how she’s doing?’
‘I’ll text you. It could be really late and you sound like you need to get some sleep, little sister.’
Lizzie agreed to wait for Joe’s text and then clicked off the call, pushing the phone away until it slid to a stop on Harri’s kitchen table. Joe was right, yet again. A tidal wave of exhaustion seeped into her and she knew she needed to go home. She locked Harri’s door behind her as she went and staggered home to her bed. Fell into it face first.
CHAPTER
27
Dan was about ready to chew off his own arm. Lizzie hadn’t answered one of his calls in the days after Harri’s fall. And he’d made twenty of them. At first he tried really hard to be understanding. After five messages, his tone morphed into slightly pissed off.
And now, he was simply bat-shit crazy.
He’d tried burying himself in work for a while, throwing himself into the Windswept Development, driving up to Adelaide for a couple of days and then working the phones and communicating via long distance from his beach house with the sea view.
But none of that scratched the itch he felt at not seeing Lizzie. At worrying like hell about her. At knowing there was something she didn’t want to share. That feeling that she didn’t trust him enough to tell him? That hurt the most.
He needed to see her. Needed to prove what he’d said.
Finally, he’d had enough of the shut out. Late one night and, yeah, after a few too many beers, he found himself roaming the dark Middle Point backstreets on auto pilot until the pink flamingos came into view.
Around him, the night was calm but he felt none of it. Above, the Milky Way had exploded like fireworks in the night sky and a mild breeze danced with Middle Point.
Because it was late and the house was dark, he knocked on the door instead of barging right in. He tried to tamp down the crazy he was feeling. Took a deep breath. Tried to let the beer buzz do its work.
A minute later he heard padding feet on the carpet and when the door opened, Lizzie emerged out of the darkness. She looked sleep drunk and his heart lurched at the sight. Her hair was a ruffled mess and she was wearing a barely there singlet top and her knickers.
When she blinked a couple of times and realised it was him, she stiffened, shrunk back from him. ‘What do you want, Dan?’
I want you. Could he risk saying it out loud? Would she slam the door in his face? ‘Can I come in for a minute?’
‘It’s really late,’ she said, not looking at him. ‘I’ve got to work tomorrow.’
Dan jammed his hands in the pocket of his boardshorts. Anything to stop them from ripping the screen door off its hinges and reaching for her.
‘I was wondering how Harri is. Have you heard anything?’
Lizzie squinted and rubbed her eyes. ‘You’ve come here now, at this hour, to ask me about Harri?’
‘Yeah, I have.’
Lizzie paused, the look on her face an indication that maybe she was expecting him to say something else.
‘She’s out of hospital. She’s in a rehab place for a couple more weeks until she’s stronger on her feet. Her sons are there for her.’
‘That’s great. Will she be home soon?’
‘She should be back in Middle Point in time for the wedding.’
‘The wedding,’ Dan repeated. ‘Yeah, of course.’
‘Dan, I—’
‘Elizabeth—’
They both spoke at once but
neither of them could seem to finish the sentence. The air was heavy with secrets and Dan felt the burden of his like a stone in his stomach. He shifted his weight from his bad leg to his good one. Lizzie blew out a breath that fluttered her fringe.
‘You at The Market tomorrow morning?’ Dan finally asked.
‘Yeah.’
‘Maybe I’ll swing by.’
‘Maybe I’ll see you tomorrow then,’ Lizzie said.
Dan stepped back into the dark. ‘Great.’
Early the next morning, Lizzie leaned against the rear stone wall of the Middle Point pub and sipped her first strong coffee of the day. All around her, stallholders were setting up for the final Sunday market of the summer holidays. As she watched the trestle tables unfold and people set out their wares, she was awash with a strange mix of relief and sadness at the fact that it was almost over. It had been a wonderful summer season at The Market and now the school holidays were almost over, it would be coming to an end.
The whole venture had been more successful than she could ever have imagined, with growing crowds as the weeks went on and some positive coverage in the local papers, thanks to Julia. Ry had promised her that it would all happen again next summer, if she wanted it. And she did.
At the rear of The Market, under a shade sail, she could see Ry already cranking up the barbecues to begin cooking breakfast. He’d become a regular on Sunday mornings, had won a reputation for his delicious bacon and eggs breakfasts, clearly loving the atmosphere and the way his pub had become the centre of community life in his adopted town.
Lizzie was about to head over and say hello when she realised someone else was with him this morning. Someone was next to him, bent over an esky. Lizzie squinted through the bright morning light to make out who it was.
When he stood to his full height, she knew who it was. Dan.
She let out a weary sigh and walked over to the two men, clutching her coffee. She could hardly avoid him all morning so there was a part of her that wanted to get this encounter over with. Ry was sporting his cooking attire of a striped apron and a baseball cap. Dan was by his side, in shorts and a T-shirt, wielding a spatula.
Someone Like You Page 26