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‘Anyone spare is already on their way to other isolated strandings that the aerial boys identify along this stretch of coast. They know we’ve got this one in hand.’
Beth laughed a little too much and waved her paltry, dripping T-shirt around. ‘This doesn’t feel very in hand.’ Marc dived forward and covered the whale’s blowhole to protect it from the cascading water. The whale feebly blew out at the same time. At least she could still do that much.
He found himself suddenly possessed of very little tolerance. ‘Hey, if you want to go, knock yourself out. I’ll do better without your negativity anyway.’
Beth lifted her head and glared, the first sign of fire in those bleak eyes since they’d got out of his Land Cruiser. ‘I’m not negative; I’m terrified. I don’t know what I’m doing.’
The raw honesty spoke to some part of him a decade old. It triggered all kinds of unwelcome protective instincts in him. This really was more than she’d bargained for when she came cruising down his drive, looking all intense.
He sighed. ‘You’re doing fine. Just keep her body wet and her blowhole dry. It’s all we can do.’
They fell to silence and into a hypnotic rhythm in time with the wash of the ocean, the groans of the whale and the slosh … slosh of their wet fabric. Marc did his best to ignore her, but his eyes kept finding their way back to her. To features drawn tight that had once shone with zest. Trying to work out why she’d come. Part of him was curious—the part that had always wondered what the heck had happened all those years ago. But the other part of him wasn’t into lifting lids off unknown boxes any more. And he’d done far too good a job of driving Beth Hughes clear out of his memory. Until today.
‘Do you need to contact Damien? Tell him where you are?’
Frosty eyes lifted to his. ‘I’m not required to report in.’
‘I didn’t say that. But I figured he’d be concerned about you.’ She looked as if a stiff breeze would send her tumbling. I’d be worried if you were mine to worry about.
Whoa. Thank God for inner monologue. Imagine if that little baby had slipped out. A blast well and truly from the past.
Beth dipped her head so the hood shielded her face from his view. ‘He won’t be.’
There was something in the way she said it. So final. So cold. He couldn’t help himself, although he really didn’t want to have any interest in her life ‘Why not?’
Slosh … slosh. Silence.
‘Beth?’
Even the whale seemed to flinch at the sudden outburst of skinny arms to its right. ‘We’re not together any more, okay? I no longer answer to anyone.’
Her marriage was over? The King and Queen of Pyrmont High were no more? A nasty imp deep inside him badly wanted to smile. But there was nothing satisfying about the pain on her face.
‘I’m sorry, Beth.’
‘Don’t be,’ she mumbled from down the tail end of the whale. ‘I’m not.’
She moved like a car wash up and down the three metres of the whale’s body, sloshing as she went. The animal was relaxed and trusting enough now to let her do it without fussing. Her hand trailed along the marbled mercury of its skin as she went and every now and again it shuddered as though ticklish. He empathised completely. There was a time he would have given just about anything to have her hands touch him like that.
He slammed a door on that memory.
So she’d married McKinley young but now she was single again. And hot on the trail of her old pal Marc. A light bulb suddenly came on in his mind. ‘I hope you’re not expecting to pick up where we left off, Beth?’
She froze and looked up at him. ‘Excuse me?’
Ooh. He hadn’t forgotten that arctic look. The ice princess. There was a masochistic kind of pleasure in having it levelled on him again after so long. ‘Because as far as I’m concerned we were done that day behind the library.’
Even under the hood of her oversized sweatshirt he could see her nostrils flaring. About as wildly as the whale’s blowhole. ‘You think I’m here to come on to you?’
‘I’m still waiting to find out why you’re here. You came a long way for something. Go ahead and say what you wanted to say.’
Permission seemed to paralyse her. Her mouth opened and closed wordlessly several times. Whatever she was going to say, it wasn’t easy.
Her hands stilled on the whale. ‘I hurt you back in school and I wanted you to know I’m very sorry,’ her soft voice began.
Every part of him stretched sling-shot taut. He cast her a sideways glance. ‘You didn’t hurt me.’
Her pretty face folded. ‘That can’t be true. I was there, I remember.’
‘What do you remember?’
She blew air out of full lips. ‘How you looked. How we left things.’
How badly he’d handled himself? He shrugged. ‘Like I said. Friendships end.’
‘Not usually like that. You kissed me, Marc.’
Right on cue, he got a flash of the wide-eyed awakening on her face. The coconut taste on his tongue as her mouth had parted with surprise. As he’d sunk into the heaven of her lips. He clenched his teeth against the bittersweet memory. Forced it back down deep where it belonged. His muscles clamped up again. He calmed himself for the whale’s sake. It was stressed enough for all of them.
‘That wasn’t a kiss, Beth. I was trying to make a point.’
Confusion marred her pale skin. ‘What point?’
A lip-searing, unforgettable point. A friendship ending point. ‘That you would have kissed anyone offering at that point.’ That you didn’t need McKinley for that.
She disguised her sharp intake of breath behind loudly dumping her whale-washer in the drink and then she bought herself some recovery time by wringing the life out of his old T-shirt. For one second he felt like a heel for hurting her. But he pushed that away too. Best course now—like back when he was a kid—was not to let himself feel anything at all for Beth Hughes. Time had passed. They’d both moved on. In a couple of hours she’d be gone.
‘It’s been ten years. It’s not like I’ve been sitting around obsessing about it.’ At least not for more than a few months. ‘What else is there to say?’
Slosh … slosh. Her eyes glittered as she measured what he’d said. ‘Other than “Good to see you, Beth”.’
Her tight words cracked and his stomach flipped fully over. He was still a sucker for those big brown eyes if they were awash. Either she was a master manipulator or this really was a big deal for her. But it was for him too, after years of not letting himself think about her. Good to see her?
‘We never lied to each other before.’
Her face grew pale beneath his hoodie and he turned his attention back to the whale, unable to stomach her expression.
They worked silently for another twenty minutes until Marc couldn’t stand the quiet. ‘If you want to take the Cruiser back to my place, that’s fine. I’ll get a lift back when reinforcements come.’
She lifted tired eyes. ‘No, thank you.’
No? ‘Why are you still here? You’ve said what you came for. You’re sorry for the hurt you imagine you caused. ‘ He made his shrug much more casual than he felt. ‘Doesn’t that mean we’re done?’
It should. If it was the real reason. He could see in her eyes it wasn’t.
They flicked away and back in a blink. ‘You haven’t accepted my apology yet.’
That stopped his hands and he slowed his bend to re-wet his towel. ‘Is that a requirement?’
Her eyes held his. ‘I’d like you to.’
Which meant the apology was more about her than him. Why does that surprise you? Just acknowledge the woman’s apology and get her the hell off this beach! Yet something in him couldn’t do it. ‘I don’t see you for ten years and then you turn up looking for absolution?’ Uncertainty filled her eyes. ‘Why would you expect it?’
‘Because … ‘ Her pale face scrunched up, confused. As if she hadn’t thought about that until now. ‘Because you’re Marc.’
He had to take two steps back from the whale for that one. In case it felt his surging anger through his touch. ‘That might have been our dynamic as kids, Beth, but a lot has changed in the years you’ve been gone. I’m not a gutless boy any more.’
She seemed shocked. ‘You were never gutless, Marc. You always went straight for what you wanted.’
Not always. He struggled to get his temper under control, his hands back on the whale. ‘Bully for me.’
‘You don’t believe me?’
‘I don’t believe that’s why you thought I’d fall for your apology.’
Her colour started to rise. ‘I just want to know that you forgive me for what I did.’
And here we go … ‘Ah, now we’re getting to it. So, in addition to accepting your apology, you want forgiveness? What is this, some kind of twelve-step programme?’ He’d studied up on those back when he was researching his mother’s condition. Back when he still gave a damn. ‘Make good for all the people you’ve burned in life?’
It was Beth’s turn to sway away from the whale. He crashed onwards, too worked up to give much care for her enormous eyes. ‘Where did I fall on the list, Beth? How did I fare against your other screw-ups in life? I hope I was at least in the top half.’
Her eyes blazed and it was beautiful and awful at the same time. Now that he was faced with opportunity, hurting her was not quite as satisfying as he’d imagined back when he was seventeen and holding all those feelings close to him.
She stood and stared, her head tilted, her eyes glittering magnificently. ‘Thank you, Marc. This actually makes it easier.’
He was already frowning into the sun too much to do it further. ‘What?’
‘In my head you were still the old Marc—gentle and concerned about people. I was really anxious about facing that man. But the new Marc is just a sarcastic pig and much easier not to give a stuff about.’
He snorted. ‘Story of my life.’
She shook her head, disgust all over her face. ‘Oh, boo hoo …’
Only one person on this planet had ever spoken to him like this—cut-throat honest. Getting straight down to the bones of an issue. And here she was again.
He gave as good as he got. ‘Last time I saw you, Beth, the only thing you wanted from me was a goodbye. Well, you got it. Don’t kid yourself that I’ve been mooching over that all these years. It was a good lesson to learn so early in life. It toughened me up for the real world. It drove me to succeed at school and in life.”
She forced her tiring body to scoop up more water and sloshed it all over the whale, but never took her eyes off him. ‘Fine. Here it is, Marc. I’m sorry that I hurt you back in high school. I made the wrong decision and I’ve come to regret that in my life. I’m sorry that I bailed on our plans for uni, too, and that I might have contributed to you not going—’
Pain lanced through him. ‘Don’t flatter yourself.’
She persevered. ‘But most of all I’m really sorry that I came to find you today. Because, up until now, you were the person I held in my heart as the symbol of everything I wanted to be. Clever, loyal, generous. I’ve spent years wishing I was more like you and—finally—I see the truth. Beneath all those new muscles you’re just an angry, bitter, small man, Marcus Duncannon. And I’ve been wasting my energy feeling so bad about what I did.’
She stood up straighter and looked around her. This was where she should have stormed off. He could see she was dying to—making that kind of spectacular scene just wasn’t complete without a flounce-off. But she had nowhere to go and a whale to save.
He blinked at her. There was absolutely nothing he could say to an outburst like that, which was fine because he was having a hard time getting past one small part of the significant mouthful she’d just spewed. It clanged in his mind like a chime.
You were the person I held in my heart … Every part of him rebelled against the impact of those words on his pulse rate. His mouth dried up and he could feel his heart beating in his throat.
Ridiculous. Unacceptable. She didn’t even know she’d said it.
But it burned like a brand into his mind.
They stood staring at each other, chests heaving equally. Then all the fight drained out of him. ‘Don’t dress it up, Beth. Tell me what you really think.’
She glared at him but couldn’t sustain it. The tiniest of smiles crept through. ‘It’s taken me a decade, but I’ve learned to say what I think. I don’t pull any punches these days.’
‘You never had any trouble with confidence as far as I remember. You were always brash, always willing to go headlong into something with me. With anyone.’
But particularly with me … Those days were some of the best in his life. Back when Marc Duncannon and Beth Hughes were interchangeable in people’s minds. There was nothing she wasn’t willing to try once.
Fearless.
Marc frowned on the realisation. No, she hadn’t been fearless. There were things that had definitely scared the pants off her, but she’d done them. With him by her side.
She looked up at him earnestly. Pained. ‘That is not something I count under my virtues, Marc. Being an enthusiastic follower is not the same as thinking for yourself.’
He snorted. ‘You’re not trying to tell me you were an innocent accomplice?’ He wasn’t ready for another woman in his life blaming everyone around for her problems.
‘I was a completely willing accomplice. I lived to follow you into trouble. I was fully up for any crazy idea you had.’
‘Then what.?’
‘I hadn’t learned yet to ask for what I wanted. To put myself first.’
His stomach sank. McKinley. ‘Don’t tell me. You developed that sense right around the final year of school.’
She stared at him. Hard. ‘On the contrary. It took me nearly a decade.’
Somewhere in there was some hidden meaning he should probably have been seeing. He felt like he always used to with Beth, as if he was operating on seven second delay. Always the last to get it. Always needing things spelled out. He’d forgotten what that felt like. He used to think that he was just not bright enough for her but now, with adult eyes, he wondered if it wasn’t just that she tended to be cryptic.
He blew out a breath. ‘Okay, as much as I’m enjoying our little trip down memory lane, it’s not helping this whale. I want you to take over on the wetting; I’m going to try something.’
‘Wait! What?’
‘You’ll see.’
Beth shifted nervously. ‘No, I… Will it take long?’
‘Probably. Why?’
‘I need to … ‘ She looked around. ‘Despite the heat …’
Understanding hit him. ‘Oh. Well, you’re in the ocean. Go here.’
The look she gave him was hysterical. ‘I’m not going to pee in the water while you’re standing in it. And while a whale’s lying in it.’
‘What do you reckon the whale does, Beth?’
