Shipwrecked with Mr Wrong Page 8
She sighed. Maybe yesterday wasn’t the finest day for either of them. He had manipulated her into going out on his boat, intentionally or not, and she had dumped all her troubles into his lap and then left him hanging when he’d opened up to her with his shame.
Was that why she’d panicked? She didn’t want to be drawn to him, to like him or understand him. Imagining herself in his arms was nothing more than pure physical reaction. It was so much simpler when he was superficial and unlikeable. Safer.
She’d already exposed her soul; exposing her heart, too, would be the height of foolishness.
Honor shook her head to clear her unwanted thoughts and pulled her shirt on over her swimsuit. Yesterday’s shirt and the one from the day before. She only brought a handful of clothes to the island. What did it matter if the birds and crabs saw her in the same clothes week in and week out? It was ridiculous to be self-conscious about it now just because there was a man on the island. She reminded herself that Rob was in a worse position. He only had the clothes he’d sailed out in and a couple of spare T-shirts from The Player. The man was gadding around, shirtless, in black board shorts most of the time, but every time she saw him, it was like seeing that sensational torso for the first time. If the catch in her breath was any indication.
Honor moved away from camp towards the far side of the island, back towards the bay where the Emden memorial stood proudly. It would be the last place he would expect to find her if he was looking for her. It was also the first place she’d be likely to find him if he wasn’t.
She ignored the thought.
She stepped carefully around clumps of trees bordering the inland lake, moving quietly so as not to disturb the wildlife resting there. The collective noise of hundreds of birds clucking, chortling or roosting disguised her movements and allowed her to reach the opposite shore with relative stealth.
Her heart lurched as she spotted him through the trees. He stood ankle-deep in the wash, his hands shoved deep in his pockets, his head tipped forward in thought. Honor shrank back into the shade of the shore trees to watch him. She wasn’t ready to see him again, to confront the anger in his eyes. Or, worse, the pity.
A frown creased his forehead where his hair fell forward over it. He kicked absently at shells on the sand under the lapping waters. Not rough enough to be anger, but agitated enough to be … What—confusion? There was no question in her mind that he’d never admitted to anyone what he’d admitted to her yesterday. Perhaps not even to himself. That he was self-absorbed.
She studied him, free for the first time to do so unobserved. Standing one-quarter onto her, his board shorts hung low on his narrow hips, fit snugly across firm buttocks and draped over toned quads. Above them, his tanned back broadened out to a pair of shoulders that spoke of hidden strength. Not massive, but well formed and powerful. Not for the first time, Honor wondered how much of the real Rob he hid from her. From the world. Possibly from himself.
He turned and moved onto the shore. She held her breath and tucked back into a cluster of emerging coconut plants below the trees. If he saw her, she’d look completely ridiculous hiding in the bushes, but if she stepped out now, he’d know she was looking for him— spying on him—and after she’d given him such a earful for spying on her …
She squirrelled deeper, then froze as he moved up into the trees. If he looked to his right, he’d see her. Pin her with that heart-stopping gaze. Honor had a fleeting urge to rustle in her hiding spot, to bring on the confrontation.
But it passed and so did Rob and she hissed her breath out slowly and closed her eyes.
CHAPTER SEVEN
SHE was fast running out of excuses—and island—but tonight was a perfectly legitimate reason. It was work and, conveniently, it was one more way to keep a comfortable distance between them. She sat on her camp chair, perched on a flat vegetated spot about five metres back from the edge of the sandy turtle nesting site, her logbook ready in her lap. The sun hung low in the sky, just minutes away from sinking into the dark blue ocean.
She switched on her ultraviolet lamp, invisible to the turtles and not likely to frighten them away. Not that she would need it much tonight; it was a full moon, making for prime hatching conditions. Although she’d be lucky to get a hatching in any of the marked nests so soon.
The damage to the dunes told her female green turtles were still visiting nightly. Some of the fluorescent ties marking the survey nests had snapped. If a turtle dug her nest out over the top of another, the first clutch of eggs was usually destroyed. Honor looked along the beach philosophically. It was such a small stretch of beach and dozens of females had laid already, more than once, so some losses to friendly fire were inevitable.
The first time she’d had to stand back and let nature take its course was the hardest. It was on a mainland project and many rare cockatoo nests had burned in a bushfire that went through while she was in the area surveying.
‘If people knew what happened in nature, they’d shut it down’
Nate’s words still resonated, all these years later.
Honor sighed. She didn’t let herself think casually of her husband, or Justin. She remembered them, every minute, but tried not to think about them. Now she’d done nothing but think of them all afternoon and evening.
It didn’t feel as bad as she thought it would. It still ached but it didn’t suck all the air from her body as it once had. She turned her head for the millionth time and stared to the north.
At least they were together.
Tingling senses warned her a split second before she heard the crunching of leaves behind her and she stiffened. He’d come for her.
‘Hi, stranger.’
Honor kept her eyes firmly glued to the nest markers as Rob squatted on the sand nearby. Not that she needed to look at him; she could practically feel every move he made through the highly charged place where her energy met his. Her pulse picked up.
She nodded in reply, glanced quickly at him and then back to the nests, not trusting herself to speak. That quick glance had told her all she needed to know. First—a day apart had done nothing to reduce the simmering tension between them. Second—he was still worried about her, judging by the cautious glance he returned.
Third—he’d shaved. That smooth jaw line called to her more than ever.
‘You haven’t been avoiding me, have you?’ Was that hurt in his voice?
‘I’ve been busy.’
His silence told her he knew she was lying. She squirmed under his steady regard. ‘Any luck?’
The turtles. Good. Safe. ‘Nothing yet, but they’ll come.’
‘Honor … about yesterday …’
She stopped him with a raised hand. ‘Don’t, Rob. You’re sorry you asked me and I’m sorry that I put you through all that. Can we just leave it at that? Two very sorry people?’
‘Some are more sorry than others.’ He smiled and she recognised it instantly as that other smile of his, the fake one. But his intense stare was genuine.
She turned away on a blush, lest he read her mind. It was wrong to be surprised that he not only had read Orwell but could also joke with it, but she was. She hadn’t pegged him as the literary type. Then she realised she’d started having trouble pegging him as any particular type. He still stared at her intently and, for a frightening heartbeat, she wondered if he could read her mind.
She sidestepped the awkward silence. ‘How long have you been a diver?’
He sat up straighter and considered. ‘Since I could swim. I was always the one who freaked the other kids out by sitting on the bottom of the pool for too long. I found it so tranquil. Private.’
That was at odds with his adult life. ‘I wouldn’t have picked you as someone who likes tranquillity.’
‘There are lots of things you don’t know about me.’
Hadn’t she just been thinking that very thing? ‘You quote the classics, can’t stomach the sight of blood and are kind to animals. Anything else I need to know?’
Her laugh was fast and loud. Birds flapped off their roosts and then settled again and their activity drew her gaze. When she looked back at him, he was staring at her openly. Curiously.
‘What?’
‘You’re such a mystery. Yesterday I would have put good money on you never speaking to me again. Now you’re laughing at my jokes.’
Honor knew that deserved an honest answer. She sighed. ‘Rob … Something like yesterday has never happened to me. Never. Even when they died, I didn’t really have a chance to just fall apart. I was even stuck in hospital up north for their funeral.’
Pity showed on his face before he schooled it.
‘It wasn’t anyone’s fault. It had to be conducted quickly because of how …’ She swallowed hard. ‘I was still in hospital in Darwin recovering from surgery and they were flown home to Perth. Anyway, to tell the truth, I didn’t want to go. I didn’t think it would make any difference to how I felt.’
‘So, that decision finally caught up with you?’
She dipped her head. He understood her very well for a stranger.
‘Right. I’m still quite shaky inside and out, but I think it was also very necessary, and overdue. This is not to say that I’m not mortified it happened in front of you, but … I guess it wouldn’t have happened without you.’
‘That’s what I—’
Her hand on his folded knees cut him off. ‘In a good way.’ His leg felt strong and cool under her hand. When he glanced down at it, she tucked it back into her lap. ‘Better out than in, as my mum used to say.’
‘Used to? Is she not still alive?’
She let the pause drag out too long. ‘Things were difficult between us after the accident. She lives in Broome now.’ She glanced to the east, back towards Australia. As though Tanya Brier might sense it. She’d put her life on hold for six months to nurse her only child back to full health, and she’d been repaid by …
‘Look, can we talk about something other than my mother?’
Rob blinked. ‘I’ll trade you.’
‘Mothers?’ She couldn’t help the eyebrow lift.
He laughed and she thought maybe he’d take her up on that. ‘Hard luck stories.’
‘What makes you think mine’s a hard luck story?’
‘Educated guess.’
Honor knew she wasn’t getting out of this without airing some kind of dirty laundry. The piper wanted payment. She sighed. ‘You first.’
‘Chelsea Dalton.’ He said her name after a moment, as if it was a fashion label. ‘Beautiful.
Sexy.’
You knew you’d been on an island too long when a snort like the one she let rip then wasn’t embarrassing. ‘You can’t call your own mother sexy.’
‘Obviously not to me.’ He settled onto the sand at her feet.
Don’t get too comfortable. She had no intention of making this a long conversation.
Rob went on. ‘But I can see the effect she has on other people. The effect she must have had on my dad.’
Despite her better judgement, interest prickled. ‘Had—past tense?’
‘I’m not sure when it wore off,’ he said as a shadow crossed his face, even in the moonlight. ‘Just one day in the middle of my teens it was gone. That look in his eyes.’
‘What does she do for a living?’
‘Oh, Chelsea doesn’t work.’ His mouth twisted self-deprecatingly. ‘At least not in the conventional sense; she’s made rather a career out of freeloading.’
Honor sucked in a breath at the harshness in his voice. She, of all people, knew how complicated relationships with mothers could be, and the guilt that came with that. ‘Do you love her? ‘
Rob looked at her hard, as though it was an impossible question to answer. ‘She’s my mother. Of course I love her.’
‘But do you like her?’
He looked out to sea. ‘Not always.’
Honor watched him steadily, glancing briefly at the nest markers to make sure she wasn’t missing anything. She still had a job to do tonight.
‘She and I don’t agree on a lot of things. I’ve not really … progressed … the way she might have wished.’
‘Meaning?’
‘Meaning I took a job with the government, in a museum, working on mouldy old shipwrecks. I suspect she had grander hopes for me.’
Honor knew that a job in that field was not exactly pedestrian. How sad his parents couldn’t acknowledge his talents. ‘And your father?’
‘Oh, I know he had grander hopes for me, or at least he thinks they’re grander. I can’t imagine anything worse than being a serial flatterer six days a week.’
‘Sounds like they’re a well-matched pair.’
‘On the surface I guess they are, or they were; there’s not much love lost between them these days. Mum carries on like a besieged villager, stoically tolerating occupying forces. It’s no fun to be around when they’re at a peak.’
‘Have you ever asked them?’
‘No. That would require us to have an actual meaningful conversation. With words.’
‘It can’t really be that bad?’
‘Some days …’ He leaned his back against her legs, looking out to sea. It was only a small touch but it was so natural and it carried such intimacy it stole her breath. And not in a good way. She burned to move but his steady weight held her captive. She said the first thing that came to her mind.
‘So your dad’s a player, too, huh?’
She felt him tense against her legs and immediately regretted the words.
‘Depends on your definition. We’re different people.’ There was tightness in his voice. She got the sense that she’d just hit the nail very firmly on the head.
‘What’s he like? Does he look like you?’
‘People say so. But there ends the similarity.’
Honor sat quietly. If he wanted to go on, he would.
He did. ‘He brought me up in his image. Had definite plans for my future—plans that looked a lot like his. He wasn’t happy when I picked archaeology to study at uni instead of commerce.’
‘But he accepted it?’
‘He ignored it.’
‘You prevailed …’
‘Only because I’ve made a real effort over the years to appease him.’ ‘How?’
‘I made sure that we had plenty of common ground. I took my studies and career underground while, outwardly, I lived the life he wanted for me. Sport, networking, women. Lots of women.’ He smiled. ‘It was enough. It meant I could do what I wanted to do and he was content, too.’
‘Didn’t you get tired of living like that?’
‘Hey, it wasn’t all bad. That kind of lifestyle is very entertaining, but … not sure I could live like that for ever. Could you?’
Honor straightened in the chair, made uneasy by the sudden shift in the conversation back to her and the intensity of his questing gaze.
Deflect, deflect, deflect …
Sex. That was safer territory. She didn’t want to know anything more about his childhood and the hurts and failures he’d experienced. It only led in one direction. And she wasn’t going there.
‘You’re talking about all the women.’
‘Partly. I’m not sorry about the experiences I’ve had … But it wears thin after a while.’
She took a deep breath. ‘I’m surprised that you’re still single. I would have thought you were quite the catch. Wealthy family, good looking, bright.’
He turned his head back towards her, his eyes bleak. ‘In that order?’
She shrugged. ‘For them, maybe.’ ‘And what about for you?’ She hesitated. Her spine grew rigid, her voice tight. ‘My order would be a little different.’
‘What would you value highest?’ Passion. Intelligence. Integrity. Charisma … if she was being honest. ‘We’re not talking about me.’
‘I’ve never found any �
�� permanent interest amongst those women. They weren’t what I was looking for.’ He glanced down, his smile pasted on. ‘And … uh … my attempts to broaden my horizon haven’t been particularly successful.’
Honor could believe it. Women like herself would give a man like Rob the widest possible berth out of sheer self-preservation. Demigods and bookworms weren’t the most natural fit. A tiny part of her felt sorry for him. But only tiny. ‘Does that surprise you—with the lifestyle you lead?’
‘I didn’t understand it, then. But when I look at how you perceive me—and I consider you to be the best of women—I begin to see the flaws in my approach.’
The best of women.
The words hit her like a bullet. She’d been downright unfriendly towards him several times in the few days they’d known each other, yet he still rated her so highly. Shame and awkwardness and a trembling heat she couldn’t name washed over her. Even in the moonlight, she could see the appealing stain of colour in his cheeks and she knew he’d said more than he meant to. The knowledge slid between her ribs like a seductive blade.
‘Rob.’
He looked at her. ‘Your turn.’ But as she opened her mouth to refuse, her eyes drifted past his shoulder, where a small patch of sand high in the dunes began to ripple.
A hatching! She really hadn’t expected one tonight, but it was happening! Not in one of her survey sites, which meant she could just relax and enjoy it. Probably the first laying of the season. Rob twisted in his spot to follow her gaze.
The sand seemed to bubble and boil well outside the marker squares. Parts caved in while other parts erupted and the surface looked, for a moment, as though it were breathing.
‘It’s alive!’ Rob cried.
‘It is.’ She laughed and leapt to her feet as dozens of tiny black creatures erupted from the nest and scrabbled over the edge in the moonlight. Ten … twenty … fifty tiny, rubbery reptiles raced each other down the dune and across the beach.
Four frigatebirds, smart enough to stay up late on the night of a full moon, immediately swooped in and began picking off individuals. Honor knew their excited squawks would draw their brethren. Many. And soon.