Marriage & the Mermaid (Hapless Heroes) (2 page)

His father’s expression morphed in an instant. “Don’t you blaspheme, boy!” he snapped, his eyebrows like thunder. “You’re not too old for me to put you over my knee.”

Baz had a momentary flicker of internal reaction, then he said, “Yes, I am too old, dad. I’m twenty–eight. You wouldn’t get away with it.”

A two second pause. “With what?” Ted blinked like an owl waking up.

Baz felt a pulse start to throb beside his eye. “So Randolph sent you the Power of Attorney and you signed it?”

“Yes I did.”

“Did you send it back?”

“I think so.”

“And you picked this Randolph,”
instead of me,
“because…?”

“He likes
Grieg,
“ Ted said, and started plucking shells out of the construction to put them into the pocket of his pajama shirt.

Baz simply stared at his father, too overwhelmed to feel angry.

Yet.

But it would come. He could sense it inside his chest, like a Tsunami gathering force. “I like
Edvard Grieg’s
music too, dad,” he said softly.
“In the Hall of the Mountain King
is one of my favorites.”

Ted smiled then, a genuine smile of delight. “Mine too!”

This is so fucked.
Baz turned away and considered getting drunk. Very drunk. He was a responsible, employed adult, eminently capable of handling any amount of paperwork his father’s finances entailed. And the old bastard knew it. So that left only two explanations. Either the forgetfulness Baz had witnessed was a sign of legitimate incompetence, or the old man was foxing and the Power of Attorney was proof of what Baz had always suspected — that his father wouldn’t trust him with milk money, let alone the Wilson estate.

Yet instead of railing against the injustice of it all, Baz held his temper and said, “Is Randolph’s email address still in the computer, Dad?”

Ted frowned at his son, his lips curled into a pucker of uncertainty. “I like Randolph.”

“Me too,” Baz lied. “We’re mates. Hell, we all love
Grieg.
I was just going to tell him about an orchestral concert coming up. We could all go together.”

“A concert.” Ted’s eyes cleared and he smiled expectantly.

“It’s on soon. So I’ll need to email him today. Unless you’ve got a phone number?”

“Oh, somewhere …” Ted said, going vague.

“A phone number?”

“The concert will be somewhere and you’ll need to tell him where.” Ted frowned and looked down at the half destroyed mini–beach. “Unless we pick him up,” he said carefully. “But he might rather go in his own car in case he needs to leave early. People do, you know.”

Baz stared at his father.
People also die of seemingly natural causes, when in fact they’ve been smothered by a pillow in their sleep.

“You were never mothered properly,” Ted replied, nodding at his own wisdom.

Baz blinked. Had he said that about smothering out loud? He had to get himself back under control. Focus on the big issues: the Saltwood estate, his family’s heritage, protecting his father. “Let’s get that email address, Dad,” he said, and walked around the desk to take his father’s arm, tugging until the old man rose, reluctantly.

“The beach looks after itself,” Ted said wistfully as Baz dragged him away from his sandy creation towards the new computer. “But the ocean…”

“Looks after itself too, dad. Come on.”

Ted turned for one last glance at his handiwork. “It’s what’s under the ocean that looks,” he said. “And we look at it, but we mustn’t touch, we mustn’t … It’s trouble if you touch it, you know,” he said, pinning Baz with a disarmingly penetrating glance.

“It’s just fish, Dad. Ease up.” But there was something uncomfortable in the old man’s knowing eyes. Baz found he preferred the child–like innocence of the witless–dad he’d recently become accustomed to.

“Just… fish,” Ted repeated.

“Sure. You eat them.”

Ted shuddered at that and looked at his son as though he’d suggested they murder the mailman.

“Well, you don’t,” Baz said. “But I do. Come on, dad. The email address,” and with another gentle tug he set his father in motion. However, the expression of dazed horror on his father’s face stayed with Baz for the rest of a frustrating morning.

Chapter Two

W
inifred Malone sat in a fuchsia recliner, staring over the head of her busy fingernail technician to the wall mirror behind her. If Wynne turned her head slightly she could inspect the tilt of her own upturned nose. Definitely asymmetrical. She wondered if everyone noticed her flaws, or if it was only her. “What’s wrong with me, Rache?” she asked.

It was a familiar question, and Rachel’s reply probably didn’t require a great deal of thought. “Nothing’s wrong with you, Wynnie–bear,” she said without looking up. “You’re beautiful, talented and kind. You know that,” she added, then when there was no reply she added “Don’t you?” shafting a pointed glance up at Wynne before she went back to applying base coat.

Wynne nodded. “I know that,” she replied dutifully.

“Head still, honey. It moves your hands.”

I know that too,
Wynne thought, wondering why she couldn’t sit still. She couldn’t do anything right.

“You’re a catch, sweetie,” Rachel added. “And your absent–minded–professor type will wake up to it soon enough.”

Wynne tried not to frown at that, tried to stay hopeful. She’d always dreamt of being unforgettable, the sort of woman whose shy attentions no man could turn down. And living in her own little fantasy world, she’d almost convinced herself of that.

Until Balthazar Wilson had walked into her life.

“You sent him the letter, didn’t you?” Rachel asked, and picked up the nail polish.

“Registered mail,” Wynne replied, then after a few seconds she added, “You don’t think I’m in danger of becoming obsessed, do you?”

Rachel smiled at Wynne’s hand. “That’s your mother talking, girl,” she said. “Not you.”

“But I
Googled
him to find out what his ex wife looks like. Isn’t that… stalkerish?”

Rachel looked up at her, still smiling and shook her head. “Sweetie, everyone uses
Google.
It’s dating foreplay. You’re not crazy. You’re just in love.”

“Am I?” Wynne asked, and Rachel nodded as if there was no question about it.

Wynne had to admit she’d never felt this way before she met Baz. Sure, she’d felt sexual attraction and sexual arousal. She’d moaned her head off the first time a boy had gone down on her in bed, and in fact, every other time since. But she’d never ached to return the favor, had never lain in bed dreaming of all the exciting things she wanted to do to her lover’s body.

Yet from the moment she’d been introduced to Balthazar Wilson and had shaken his firm, sensuous hand in the staff lunchroom, Wynne had been smitten. Her classroom painting examples had suddenly become lush and colorful: flowers with powerful, rigid stamens in the lilies, and trembling rose petals that opened shamelessly to expose the delicate pollen within.

Still, it was all so tenuous. “But we’ve only spoken twice in the staffroom,” she complained to Rachel. “I’m not even sure he remembers my name.”

Rachel smirked to herself. “I’ll bet he remembers that raincoat,” she said, painting Wynne’s fingernails a delicate shade of pink.

Ah, the raincoat debacle. Best not to remember that drunken misadventure. It was at the end of their acquaintance, and such a pity because the beginning had been so promising! Straight after she’d met him she’d spent six hundred dollars darkening her mousy–brown hair to a shimmering burgundy and buying a new set of short skirts and stiletto heels which she’d brazenly wore to school in term three. It was a sharp departure from her previous
Laura Ashley
style but she’d toughed it out, hoping that anyone who noticed would think that artists – of all people – were allowed to express their creativity visually.

Baz, ever focused on the job at hand, hadn’t noticed a thing.

Admittedly it was a large school with over forty teachers, but on three separate occasions Wynne had managed to get him alone in the staffroom and each time she’d forced herself to walk up and back to the refrigerator while engaging him in a conversation so he’d have to notice her legs and…

Nothing.

He’d been polite, but eye contact hadn’t been achieved. There’d been no spark of interest such as she’d seen in the eyes of a couple of the other male teachers. No invitation to dinner followed by a roses and romance. No proposal of marriage.

In short, nothing that Wynne could continue to fantasize about. And as Rachel popped her hands into the nail dryer and stood to get them both a coffee, Wynne had to acknowledge that it was Baz’s indifference that had forced her hand, because everyone knew that desperate situations called for desperate measures.

And that’s how she’d gotten herself sacked.

Tuesday

Chapter Three

Y
es, my father loves classical music,” Baz lied into the phone, wondering how far the little bastard had ingratiated himself with Ted. “And so do you I hear.”

Randolph
arsehole
Budjenski made an insipid reply about the raptures of Rachmaninoff and the sensuality of Schubert before Baz could cut him off with, “So that paperwork you sent for dad. It’s being transferred over to me now that I’m home.” No point being specific in case the little shit didn’t realize what he’d sent. “But I really appreciate you helping dad out while he was alone.”

Point being, that he’s not alone any more, Randy. So he doesn’t need some Internet scum trying to scam him.
God, Baz wished he could say that. But until his solicitor had new forms drawn up, signed and lodged, they were still vulnerable.

Baz felt sick just thinking about it.

“What are you doing?”

Baz swiveled around to find his father walking into the library, rubbing his eyes, a halo of disheveled white hair floating around his face while a grey cardigan, buttoned askew, hung over striped pajamas. He stopped in front of the floor–to–ceiling bookshelves looking like a character out of a children’s novel.

“Who are you talking to?” he asked, more curious than cranky.

Baz slipped the walk–around phone behind his back and fumbled for the
end call
button. “What are you doing up so early, dad?” Damn. Too cheery. He sounded like he was hiding something. “I thought you were still asleep.” Baz eased the phone down onto the shelf behind himself and then crossed his arms.

“I heard someone. Out here.” Ted went over to the French doors and tried to open them.

“Let me, dad.” Anything to get away from the phone.

But before Baz had walked two steps they both heard,
“Hello! Help! Is anyone home?”

Baz turned back to the phone, disoriented for a second before he realised it wasn’t that. The plea for help was followed by bashing and yelling from the opposite direction and Baz suddenly realised his father was right. There was someone on the veranda. Baz leap forward and fumbled with the door catch.

“Who is it?” Ted demanded, as if Baz should know. “Have you invited —”

“Help me!”

The sticking catch finally gave way and Baz shoved the door open and fell out. Then he ran — along the side veranda to the back where he found a gasping, bare–chested surfer banging on the windows, shouting.

“Hey! I’m here,” Baz yelled, hoping his father would stay in the study.

The surfer turned on him. “My brother,” he gasped, and grabbed Baz by the shoulder. “He’s gone in after a girl. She was drowning. Up the beach a mile. I saw a shark in the water. I ran…”

“You’re not wet.” It was the first thing that had come into Baz’s head.

If it sounded like skepticism, the surfer didn’t respond to it. “I can’t swim. Steve’s not much better.” Not a surfer then. Just a young man with sun–bleached hair. “Can you?”

There was something contagious about his terror. Baz could feel it in the pit of his stomach. “Yeah, I swim,” he said quickly. “I’ve got a car. We’ll take that.” He pointed to the driveway.

“What’s going on?” Ted came around the corner of the house and practically smacked into them, a walking bundle of querulous flannelette.

“Someone’s drowning.” Baz tried to push past him.

Ted’s eyes narrowed. “Where?” he snapped.

“A mile north,” the young man shouted, as if he was unable to modulate his voice.

Baz was about to tell his father to stay inside and not panic when Ted replied, “I’ll ring the Bundaberg Police. Balthazar, you take this young man in the Range Rover.”

“Where is it?” the blond snapped, but Baz was still trying to get his head around his father’s three hundred and sixty degree turn into common sense.

“In the garage,” Ted said, then continued speaking calmly to Baz. “Carlos leaves the keys in the ignition.” Then his father turned to go, presumably back inside to phone the police.

Baz led the surfer at a run across the rattling floorboards of the veranda and down the back stairs, across the rose garden with its bordering hedge to the big garages which were Carlos, the gardener’s, domain. Two minutes later they were in Ted’s pride and joy roaring down a dirt track that led from the cliff Saltwood presided over, to the beach. The young man was a trembling wreck beside Baz, his breathing harsh, his hands knotting against each other as though the lack of running and yelling was too much for him. He looked like he needed some activity to prove to himself that he was helping his brother save the girl. But there was nothing to do except wait.

“I’m Baz,” Baz said, hoping to distract him.

“I’m… Matt. My brother’s Steve.”

“And the girl? In the water?”

“Don’t know her name,” Matt said, and he turned to look out the window, his palms flat on his thighs now, pressing down. “We only met her last night. She drove up to our campsite and Steve took a shine to her. They went off alone, and he came back all smilin’.” Matt hiccupped a breath then, as if he was going to cry. But he didn’t. Maybe the talking was helping him calm down. “I think he got his end in. But later, after she’d driven off, he couldn’t find his wallet. She’d snitched it while they were… Stupid bastard,” Matt said and shook his head. “He didn’t care. Said she was worth it.”