by Lucy Gordon
Only of course he’d forgotten there was no cellphone reception out here. Or maybe he’d never known. He’d left practically before cellphones were invented.
Enough. He needed to get back to the highway, put sentiment aside and focus on sense.
Focus on the road.
A blind bend. Darkness. Rain.
Mardie’s house was a couple of hundred yards from the road. No lights. So that was that. Maybe she’d moved.
Of course she’d moved. Did he expect her life to have stood still?
And then … a dog, right in the middle of the road.
He hit the brakes, hard.
If it wasn’t wet he might have made it, but water was sheeting over the bitumen, giving his tyres no grip.
His car skidded, planing out of control. He fought desperately, trying to turn into the skid, trying …
A tree was in front of him and he had nowhere to go.
Bounce was quivering beside the bed, flinching at each clap of thunder. Growling at the weird shapes made by lightning.
‘You’re starting to spook me,’ Mardie told him as she snuggled under the covers. ‘One more growl and you’re back in the kitchen.’
The next clap of thunder sounded almost overhead and suddenly Bounce was right under the duvet.
Farmer with working dog. Total professionals. Ha! She hugged him, taking as well as giving comfort.
‘We’re not scared,’ she told Bounce in her very best Farmer-In-Charge-Of-The-Situation voice.
Thunder. Lightning. The house seemed to tremble.
Another crash.
This one had her sitting up.
Uh-oh.
For the last crash was different. Not thunder. Not a falling tree.
It was the sound of tyres screaming for purchase, and then impact. Metal splintering.
And then?
And then it looked as if she was braving the elements, like it or not.
He wasn’t hurt. Or not much. There was a trickle of blood on his forehead—the windscreen had smashed and a sliver of metal or glass must have got past the airbags. But he’d hired a Mercedes. If there was one thing these babies were good at it was protecting the occupant.
One of his headlights, weirdly, was still working. He could see what had happened. The trunk of the tree had met the front of the car square on. The whole passenger compartment seemed to have moved backward. The windscreen seemed to have shifted sideways.
The tree was about a foot from his nose.
Rain was sheeting in from the gap where the windscreen had been.
He ought to get out. Fire …
That was a thought forceful enough to stir him from his shock. He was out of the car in seconds.
A dog met him as he emerged, knee height, wet, whining, nuzzling against him as if desperate for reassurance from another living thing.
The dog. The cause of the crash.
He should kick it into the middle of next week, he thought. Instead, he found himself kneeling on the roadside, holding it, feeling shudders run through the dog’s thin frame. Feeling matching shudders run through his.
They’d both come close to the edge.
He tugged the dog back a bit, worried the car might blow, but it wasn’t happening, not in this rain. Any spark that might catch was drenched before it even thought about causing trouble.
The sparks weren’t the only thing drenched. Thirty seconds out of the car and he was soaked.
What to do? He was kneeling beside his crashed car in the middle of nowhere, holding a dog.
He was four miles from Banksia Bay, and Banksia Bay was in the middle of nowhere. It was a tiny harbour town two hours from Sydney, set between mountains and sea. He’d already checked for phone reception. Zip.
He had a coat in the car. He had an umbrella.
It was too late for coats and umbrellas. He was never going to be wetter than he was right now.
The dog whined and leaned heavily against him. A border collie? Black and white, its long fur was matted and dripping. The dog was far too thin—he could feel ribs. It was leaning against him as if it needed his support.
He put a hand on its neck and found a plastic collar, but now wasn’t the time to be thinking about identification.
‘We’re safe but we’re risking drowning,’ he said out loud, and he stared through the rain trying to see Mardie’s house.
Dark.
Still, it was the closest house. It was over a mile back to his aunt’s old home which, someone had told him tonight, had become a private spa retreat, but was now in the hands of the receivers. Deserted. After that … He couldn’t think.
The trees around him were losing branches. He had to get out of the weather.
Did Mardie still live here?
How ironic, after coming all this way because he’d stupidly assumed she’d be at the school reunion, to end up on her doorstep like a drowned rat. Waking her from sleep.
Crazy.
His head hurt.
He had no choice.
He turned towards the house and the dog plodded beside him, just touching.
‘Mardie and a husband and six kids?’ he asked the dog. ‘Or a stranger.’ And then, despite the rain, despite the shock, he found himself grinning. ‘I came all this way to find Mardie. It seems fate’s decided I’m still looking.’
The phone was dead.
There was no mobile reception here ever, but she did have a landline. Not now. The lines must be down.
She was on her own.
A car crash.
This was worse than vampires. Much worse.
She hauled on her outdoor gear at lightning speed, her sou’wester with its great weatherproof hood, her waterproof over-pants and her gumboots. She grabbed her most powerful flashlight.
Bounce refused to come out from under the bedcovers.
‘Watch the house, then,’ she conceded, thinking she’d be better without him anyway. She’d like the comfort of his presence but if it was a disaster …
She’d need an ambulance, not a dog.
She felt more alone than she’d ever felt in her life.
‘It’s you or no one,’ she said savagely to herself and hauled open the door.
To be met by Blake Maddock.
How could you not see someone for fifteen years and know in an instant that you were looking at the same man?
She did. She was.
At seventeen, Blake Maddock was the best-looking guy in grade school. He was tall, dark and drop-dead gorgeous. He had deep black hair and skin that seemed to tan without the sun. At seventeen he’d needed a bit of filling out, but not any more.
This was Blake Maddock all grown up.
The grown-up version of Blake Maddock was wearing a black dinner suit, black bow tie, white shirt and silver cufflinks.
His jet-black hair was dripping. His suit was sodden.
Blake.
She must be dreaming.
But it didn’t pour with rain in dreams, or she didn’t think it did. This wasn’t an apparition. Blake Maddock was standing on her veranda.
‘Mardie?’ he said, and she figured he couldn’t see her. She was in the hallway and of course it wasn’t lit. The lightning was almost continuous now though, and whenever it forked it lit the veranda as bright as daylight. She could see him, over and over again.
Blake.
‘H … hi,’ she managed but she stuttered the word. She tried again but the stutter got worse.
‘It is Mardie?’ he said, trying to see.
‘Y … yes.’
She caught herself and stepped outside. The wind practically knocked her sideways.
A black shadow moved from Blake’s side to hers. It leaned against her legs as if seeking refuge.
Blake Maddock and dog. What the …?
Her mind stopped whirling. The night slid away. Blake Maddock was right in front of her—Blake, her very best of friends.
She grabbed his hands and held on, and he stared down at her and attemp
ted a half smile. She stared up at him, incredulous. His smile twisted, self-mocking, and it was the smile she remembered. Blake …
His smile faded. He stared down at her in the weird light provided by lightning—and then he tugged her into a bear hug.
She let herself be tugged. He was soaked to the skin. He was bigger than she remembered, taller, harder.
She let herself be crushed against his chest. Right this minute, all she could feel was joy.
‘Blake.’
It was barely a whisper. Her past had returned. Her past was dripping wet on her veranda.
Her past was hugging her as if he’d missed her as much as she’d missed him.
Another crash of thunder, deeper, longer. This was no night for standing in the sleet, hugging. He put her at arm’s length, but still he held her, hands gripping hers. As if holding on to reality.
‘I’ve crashed my car,’ he said and she thought … she thought …
She didn’t think anything. She was too flabbergasted.
‘Where …? Why …?’
‘I’ve come from the school reunion.’
The school reunion. Things settled. Just a little.
She’d heard what was happening—a reunion for the class above hers from fifteen years ago. Tony Hamm, the local butcher, had been organising it. Her friend Kirsty had told her about it when she was in the local store this morning.
‘They’re so excited. But dinner suits … That’s only because Jenny Hamm wants to wear the dress she bought for her sister’s wedding. You should hear the complaints.’
Tony’s class.
Blake’s class.
She’d thought then …
Yeah, she’d thought, but she hadn’t said. She hadn’t asked: Is Blake Maddock coming?
Obviously he was. Obviously he had.
He was on her veranda.
He’d said he’d crashed his car. There was a trickle of blood on his forehead. She struggled to get her confused mind to focus.
‘There’s blood …’ she managed. ‘Your head …’
‘A scratch. I’m fine.’
‘Really?’
‘Really.’
She was getting her breath back. She hadn’t seen this guy for fifteen years. There were so many emotions in her head she didn’t know what to do with them.
‘Get into the hall,’ she managed. ‘Out of the wind.’ She pulled away, then stood aside and ushered him into the entrance porch. As if he was a casual acquaintance.
‘Is anyone else hurt?’ Her voice sounded funny, she thought. ‘The other car …’
‘Only me,’ he said, and his voice astonished her. Deep and rich and growly. All grown up. ‘I hit a tree.’
‘A tree?’
‘I’m not drunk,’ he said, and he truly was Blake, his voice touched with the lazy humour she knew so well. ‘I’ve been to the reunion dinner. They served Tony Hamm’s home-made beer and Elsie Sarling’s first attempt at making Chardonnay. It wasn’t a struggle to stick with water.’
Her lips twitched in return, smiling back. Tension eased. An old school friend in trouble. She could do this. ‘So the tree?’ she said cautiously.
‘It jumped out and hit me.’ He sighed. ‘No. The dog jumped out. I managed to miss the dog. I hit the tree instead.’
He’d hit a tree. A car crash, late at night. Blake.
So many emotions …
Priorities. ‘Is the car blocking the road?’ she managed and was absurdly proud of herself for sounding so sensible.
‘No. I was aiming to miss the dog and I made a good fist of it. It’s well off.’
That, at least, was a plus. She didn’t need to get the tractor and drag a wreck from the road to stop others crashing into it.
She could focus on Blake.
Or actually … not. Focusing on Blake made her feel weird, like stepping through the wardrobe into Narnia, into another world. The world of fifteen years ago. Concentrate on the dog, she told herself. The dog seemed far less complicated.
It was a border collie, mostly black, with touches of white. It, too, was wet to the bone. She felt it shudder against her legs, and it was a far deeper shudder than Bounce’s vampire-and-thunder-induced shudder.
If there was one thing that could touch Mardie Rainey’s heart, it was a dog. A wet and obviously frightened dog was always going to hit her heart like an arrow. It even distracted her from Blake. She knelt down to see, to pat.
‘Hey, sweetheart, where did you come from?’
But then she felt its collar, and she knew.
A ribbon of plastic.
She knew this collar.
‘Oh, no.’
‘Not yours?’ Blake asked.
‘No. This is a pound dog.’ She fingered the collar, feeling ill. ‘The local Animal Welfare van crashed last week and dogs escaped. Stray dogs are turning up everywhere. This collar says this is one of them.’
But this was a border collie.
Farmers round here valued their dogs above diamonds. Border collies were natural workers. For one to end up in the pound didn’t make sense.
But she could only concentrate on the dog for so long. The dog was distracting, but not distracting enough.
She had Blake Maddock in her front porch.
‘Mardie, I’m in trouble,’ Blake said above her. The momentary emotion that had given rise to the hug had faded, leaving manners. ‘Would your mother object if I came in to dry off and ring for help?’
Would her mother object?
Memories of the last time she’d seen Blake flooded back. Blake in this house, in this kitchen. Blake kissing her senseless.
‘Come to Sydney,’ he’d said urgently, holding her close. ‘You’re smart. You could get a scholarship. There’s stuff we can do, Mardie. We can make a difference. Come with me. You can’t be happy here.’
She remembered her whole body melting as Blake kissed her so deeply she thought she surely must say yes. She remembered his hands slipping under her blouse, and she remembered the hot, aching need.
But she was sixteen and her mother was suddenly there, confronting them with anger. Her mother was so seldom angry it jolted them both.
‘Blake, it’s time for you to go home. Mardie and I need to be up early, to draft the sheep ready for crutching.’
And, as she’d spoken, Mardie had seen fear.
Her mother had heard what Blake had said. She’d heard him asking her to go to Sydney.
She’d known, even then. At sixteen, the weight of this farm was on her shoulders.
You can’t be happy here … Why not?
She loved Banksia Bay, and she loved farming. She’d also loved Blake, with every shred of her sixteen-year-old being.
But Blake couldn’t wait to be off. He was heading to Sydney to do medicine.
She could get a scholarship? To do what? Something to make a difference? What was he talking about?
She loved her art, she loved making things, but even then she’d known Blake saw her passion as not to be taken seriously.
Even then she’d known they were moving in different directions.
‘Write,’ she’d told him, feeling desolate.
‘Follow me to Sydney. Finish school and apply to the same university. I’ll wait for you.’
She still remembered the desolation. ‘I don’t think I can. Blake, please write.’
‘And just be friends?’ he’d demanded, incredulous. Her mother was waiting stolidly for him to leave. She moved into the living room, out of hearing but not out of sight. ‘We’ve gone too far to be just friends.’
She thought of that statement now. It had been an adolescent ultimatum: follow me to Sydney, move in my direction or cease being my friend.
All or nothing.
It had to be nothing.
She’d watched him go and her sixteen-year-old heart felt as if it was breaking.
And now he was back—grown, changed, but still Blake. He was watching her face, reading her warring emotions as he’d alway
s been able to read her emotions. ‘Is your mother …?’ he started.
‘Mum’s fine,’ Mardie said.
‘She’s asleep?’
‘It’s midnight.’ She hadn’t seen this man for half a lifetime. Use your head, she told herself. There was no way she should tell this … stranger … that she was home alone. Let him think her mother was still sleeping in the front room.
Even if he had hugged her.
Even if he was Blake.
‘Did I wake you?’ he asked. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘I was still awake. A tree came down and then I heard the car crash. I was coming to find out.’
‘If you could turn on a light …’ Blake ventured.
‘No power. But come in anyway. Are you … are you really okay?’
‘Shaken, not stirred.’
And at that … she smiled.
James Bond movies had been their very favourite thing. That last year together, a new movie had come out. She remembered persuading her mother to take them to Whale Cove. Dressing up. Standing hand in hand in the queue, waiting for tickets. She’d looked as glamorous as a sixteen-year-old on limited means could manage. A home-made dress, all slink and crazy glamour. Stilettos from the second-hand market. Blake had worn a dinner suit, probably not even hired. Money was never a problem for Blake. He’d looked a fairly adolescent Bond, but at sixteen she’d thought he’d looked a Bond to die for.
Shaken, not stirred.
Right now she was stirred.
She stood aside to usher him into the house. His body brushed hers as he passed.
There was no way she could feel him through her waterproofs.
She felt him. Every nerve in her body felt him.
This was weird. A teenage love affair, long over.
It was the night, she told herself. Her fear from the crash. The appalling storm. A boy she’d once loved.
A man, she told herself sharply. A stranger. She needed to be practical, sensible, and together.
‘The dog …’ he said.
‘Dogs are welcome in this house.’ Even stray and sodden ones. Maybe especially stray and sodden ones. ‘Go through to the kitchen,’ she said. ‘It’s warmer. I’ll find towels and shed my coat.’
They were operating by flashlight. She lit a candle on the hall table and handed it to him.
The lightning outside was almost one continuous sheet. The house went from dark to light, from dark to light …