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She shrugged. ‘Fine.’
‘And how are you really doing?’
Seriously? He wanted to do this? Then again, they talked about Blake every year. He was their connection, after all. Their only true connection. Which made being here now that Blake was gone even weirder. She should have just stayed home. Maybe they could have just done this by phone.
‘The tax stuff was a bit of a nightmare and the house was secured against the business so that wasn’t fun to disentangle, but I got there.’
He blinked at her. ‘And personally?’
‘Personally my husband’s dead. What do you want me to say?’
All the champagne chugging in the world wasn’t going to disguise the three concerned lines that appeared between his brows. ‘Are you...coping?’
‘Are you asking me about my finances?’
‘Actually no. I’m asking you how you’re doing. You, Audrey.’
‘And I said fine.’
Both hands went up, one half filled with champagne flute. ‘Okay. Next subject.’
And what would that be? Their one reason for continuing to see each other had gone trundling down a conveyor belt at the crematorium. Not that he’d remember that.
Why weren’t you at your best friend’s funeral? How was that for another subject? But she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.
Unfortunately, for them both, Oliver looked as uninspired as she did on the conversation front.
She pushed to her feet. ‘Maybe this wasn’t such a—’
‘Here we go!’ Ming-húa appeared flanked by two serving staff carrying the first amuse-bouche of their marine-themed Christmas degustation. ‘Obsiblue prawn and caviar with Royale Cabanon Oyster and Yuzu.’
Audrey got ‘prawn’, ‘caviar’ and ‘oyster’ and not much else. But wasn’t that kind of the point with degustation—to over-stimulate your senses and not be overly bothered by what things were or used to be?
Culinary adventure.
Pretty much the only place in her life she risked adventure.
She sank politely back onto her sofa. It took the highly trained staff just moments to place their first course just so and then they were alone again.
Oliver ignored the food and slid a small gift-wrapped parcel across the table.
Audrey stared at the patched-up wrapping. Best he was prepared to do after she’d stood him up? ‘Um...’
‘I don’t expect anything in return, Audrey.’
Did he read everyone this well? ‘I didn’t imagine we’d be doing gifts this year.’
‘This was from last year.’
She paused a moment longer, then pulled the small parcel towards her. But she didn’t open it because opening it meant something. She set it aside, instead, smiling tightly.
Oliver pinned her with his intense gaze. ‘We’ve been friends for years, Audrey. We’ve done this for years, every Christmas. Are you telling me you were only here for Blake?’
The slightest hint of hurt diluted the hazel of his eyes. One of the vibrant dragonflies flitting around the enormous terrarium matched the colour exactly.
She gifted him with the truth. ‘It feels odd to be doing this with him gone.’
She didn’t want to say wrong. But it had always felt vaguely wrong. Or her own reaction to Oliver certainly had. Wrong and dishonest because she’d kept it so secret and close to her heart.
‘Everything is different now. But our friendship doesn’t have to change. Spending time with you was never just about courtesy to a mate’s wife. As far as I’m concerned we’re friends, too.’
Pfff. Meaningless words. ‘I missed you at your mate’s funeral.’
A deep flush filled the hollow where his tie should have been. ‘I was sorry not to be there.’
Uh-huh.
‘Economic downturn made the flight unaffordable, I guess.’ They would spend four times that cost on today’s meals. But one of Oliver’s strengths had always been courage under fire. He pressed his lips together and remained silent. ‘Or was it just a really busy week at the office?’
She’d called. She knew exactly where he was while they’d buried her husband. ‘Or did you not get my messages in time?’
All eight of them.
‘Audrey...’ The word practically hissed out of him.
‘Oliver?’
‘You know I would have been there if I could. Did you get the flowers I arranged?’
‘The half-a-boutique of flowers? Yes. They were crammed in every corner of the chapel. And they were lovely,’ honesty compelled her to admit. And also her favourites. ‘But they were just flowers.’
‘Look, Audrey, I can see you’re upset. Can I please just ask you to trust that I had my reasons, good reasons, not to fly back to Sydney and that I had my own private memorial for my old friend back home in Shanghai—’ Audrey didn’t miss the emphasis on ‘old’ friend ‘—complete with a half-bottle of Chivas. So Blake had two funerals that day.’
Why was this so hard? She shouldn’t still care.
She shouldn’t still remember so vividly the way she’d craned her neck from inside the funeral car to see if Oliver was walking in the procession of mourners. Or the way she’d only half attended to the raft of well-wishers squeezing her hand after the service because she was too busy wondering how she’d missed him. It was only later as she wrote thank-you cards to the names collected by the funeral attendants that she’d finally accepted the truth.
Oliver hadn’t come.
Blake’s best friend—their best man—hadn’t come to his funeral.
That particular truth had been bitter, but she’d been too swamped in the chaos of new widowhood to be curious as to why it hurt so much. Or to imagine Oliver finding a private way of farewelling his old mate. Like downing a half-bottle of whisky.
‘He always did love a good label,’ she acknowledged.
A little too fondly as it turned out since Blake’s thirst for good liquor was deemed a key contributor to the motor vehicle accident that took his life. But since her husband sitting in his den enjoying a sizeable glass or three with the evening newspaper had given Audrey the space and freedom to pursue things she enjoyed, she really couldn’t complain.
The natural pause in the uncomfortable conversation was a cue to both of them to eat, and the tart seafood amuse-bouche was small enough that it was over in just mouthfuls.
Behind her, the gentle buzz of dragonfly wings close to glass drew her focus. She turned to study the collection that gave the restaurant its name. There were over one hundred species in Hong Kong—vibrant and fluorescent, large and small—and Qīngtíng kept an immaculate and stunning community of them in the specially constructed habitat.
She discreetly took several deep breaths to get her wayward feelings under control. ‘Every year, I forget how amazing this is.’
And, every year, she envied the insects and pitied them, equally. Their captive life was one of luxury, with every conceivable need met. Their lives were longer and easier than their wild counterparts and neither their wetland nor food source ever dried up. Yet the glass boundaries of their existence was immutable. New arrivals battered softly against it until they eventually stopped trying and they accepted their luxurious fate.
Ultimately, didn’t everyone?
‘Give him a chance and the dragonfly curator will talk your ear off with the latest developments in invertebrate husbandry.’
His tone drew her eyes back. ‘I thought you only flew down for the day? When did you have a chance to meet Qīngtíng’s dragonfly guy?’
‘Last Christmas. I unexpectedly found myself with time on my hands.’
Because she hadn’t come.
The shame washed in again. ‘It was...too soon. I couldn’t leave Australia. And Blake was gone.’
He stared at her. Contemplating. ‘Which one of those do you want to go with?’
Heat rushed up her neck.
‘They’re all valid.’ His silence only underscored her lies. She took a deep breath. ‘I’m sorry I didn’t come last year, Oliver. I should have had more courage.’
‘Courage?’
‘To tell you that it was the last time I’d be coming.’
He flopped back in his chair. ‘Is that what you’ve come to say now?’
It was. Although, saying it aloud seemed to be suddenly impossible. She nodded instead.
‘We could have done that by phone. It would have been cheaper for you.’
‘I had the Testore—’
‘You could have come and not told me you were here. Like you did in Shanghai.’
Every muscle tightened up.
Busted.
She generally did her best to deal with Shanghai contacts outside Shanghai for a very specific reason—it was Harmer-country, and going deep into Oliver’s own turf wasn’t something she’d been willing to risk let alone tell him about. But how could he possibly know the population had swelled to twenty-five-million-and-one just that once? She asked him exactly that.
His eyes held hers. ‘I have my sources.’
And why exactly were his sources pointing in her direction?
‘Before you get too creeped out,’ he went on, ‘it was social media. Your status listed your location as the People’s Square, so I knew you were in town.’
Ugh. Stupid too-smart phones. ‘You didn’t message me.’
‘I figured if you wanted to see me you would have let me know.’
Oh. Sneaking in and out of China’s biggest city like a thief was pathetic enough, but being so stupidly caught out just made her look—and feel—like a child. ‘It was a flying visit,’ she croaked. ‘I was hunting a Paraguayan harp.’
Lord. Not making it better.
‘It doesn’t matter, that’s in the past. I want to know why you won’t be returning in the future.’
Discomfort gnawed at her intestines. ‘I can’t keep flying here indefinitely, Oliver. Can’t we just say it’s been great and let it go?’
He processed that for a moment. ‘Do all your friends have best-by dates?’
His perception had her buzzing as furiously as the dragonflies. ‘Is that what we are? Friends?’
‘I thought so.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘I never got the sense that you were here under sufferance. You certainly seemed very comfortable helping me spend my money.’
‘Oliver—’
‘What’s really going on, Audrey? What’s the problem?’
‘Blake’s gone,’ she pointed out needlessly on a great expulsion of breath. ‘Me continuing to come and see you...What would be the point?’
‘To catch up. To see each other.’
‘Why would we do that?’
‘Because friends nurture their relationships.’
‘Our relationship was built on someone who’s not here any more.’
He blinked at her—twice—and his perfect lips gaped. ‘That might be how it started but it’s not like that any longer.’ An ocean of doubt swilled across the back of his gaze, though. ‘I met you about six minutes before Blake did, if you recall. Technically, I think that means our friendship pre-dates Blake.’
That had been an excruciating six minutes, writhing under the intensity of the sexiest man she’d ever met, until his infinitely more ordinary friend had wandered into the Sydney bar. Blake with his narrower shoulders, his harmless smile and his non-challenging conversation. She’d practically swamped the man with her attention purely on reactive grounds, to crawl out from under Oliver’s blistering microscope.
She knew when she was batting above her average and thirty seconds in his exclusive company told her Oliver Harmer was major league. Majorly gorgeous, majorly bright and majorly bored if he was entertaining himself by flirting with her.
‘That doesn’t count. You only spoke to me to pass the time until Blake turned up.’
He weighed something up. ‘What makes you think I wasn’t laying groundwork?’
‘For Blake?’
His snort drew a pair of glances from across the room. ‘For me. Blake’s always been quite capable of doing his own dirty work...’ As if it suddenly occurred to him that they were speaking of the dead, his words petered off. ‘Anyway, as soon as he walked in the room you were captivated. I knew when I’d been bested.’
What would Oliver say if he knew she’d clung to Blake’s conversation specifically to avoid having to engage with his more handsome friend again? Or if she confessed that she’d been aware of every single move Oliver made until the moment she left her phone number with Blake and fled out into the Australian night.
He’d probably laugh.
