Stone Castles (17 page)

‘The funeral was just beautiful, as it happens' said Tracey, rolling her eyes. ‘Thanks for asking. I'll just change Chloe and give you a hand.'

Craig looked remorsefully at Pip. ‘Aw, sorry Pip, I should have asked that first. How'd it go?'

‘Beautifully,' she said, letting him off the hook. ‘I'm glad to have it behind us. Luke's just helping me out with something. Did Trace tell you? I've got a lead who my father might be.'

He straightened. ‘Oh, maybe that's why Trace called earlier. I was entertaining the head honcho from Adelaide and couldn't take the call. What kind of lead?'

‘Ever hear of a bloke called Colin Armistead?' Luke said. ‘I figure the Ag store must have accounts with just about everyone in the district.'

Craig screwed up his mouth as he frowned. He gave his head a decisive shake. ‘Can't say as I have. Why?'

‘All we've got is a note from this guy called Colin Armistead. It looks like he paid off Pip's mum before she married Gerald. This is going back more than thirty years mind, so it could be a stretch.'

Craig shook his head, slower this time. ‘You sure he's from around here?'

‘No idea where he's from. Pip's been checking phone numbers this morning and I did some searching online. We're about to go over to the B&B and compare notes.'

‘Oh, well,' Craig said, as he pulled the fish fingers out a second time and gave them an assessing glance before pulling the tray free. ‘You can do that here if you like.' He looked over to see Pip and Luke exchanging glances and hastily back-tracked. ‘Then again, you might want to avoid feeding time at the zoo and compare notes over there.' He cleared his throat. ‘Good thinking.'

Chapter Twenty-five

T
he walk across the yard seemed to last forever and Pip had to check herself from breaking into a run, knowing someone might happen to glance out a window or one of the kids might wander by on the way to dinner. All day she'd been aching to be alone with Luke again, but she'd done the right thing when they left the wake. She'd come home with Tracey while Luke had followed in his ute.

So right now she was desperate for alone time.

That's what Adam had seen in her eyes at the cemetery, she rationalised. Lust. Pure out-and-out lust. After the session she and Luke had enjoyed yesterday, that was hardly a surprise. And after the week she'd had, who could blame her for wanting a little escape?

‘Did you learn anything new today?' she asked, her breath catching as he did that thing with his swinging hand again so it brushed against hers as he walked, his fingers almost catching hers before swinging right on by. A tantalising promise of things to come. An unmistakeable hint that he was feeling this same desperate urge to rush.

‘I learned you deliver a mean eulogy.'

‘Thanks, but that wasn't what I meant.'

‘And I learned how much I like that dress.'

She blinked. ‘Really?'

‘Well, maybe how much I want to peel it off you.'

She gasped, all the muscles between her thighs clenching down. Hard. ‘What about Colin Armistead?'

‘Nope,' he said, catching her hand this time and raising it to his mouth to kiss. ‘He can leave his frock on.'

‘I'm serious,' she said, as she unlocked the door.

‘Yeah,' he said, as he slammed the door behind them and pushed her up hard against it. ‘So am I.'

And she forgot all about Colin Armistead with or without a dress as Luke's hot mouth crashed down on hers and his seeking hands rendered every inch of her body an erogenous zone.

‘Do you know what it's like,' he gasped, lifting his mouth from hers for just one second, ‘to watch you for hours and not be allowed to touch? Do you know how hard that is?'

And as if to prove a point, he took her hand and placed it over him.

‘That hard,' he said, as he lifted the hem of her dress and cupped her butt cheeks in his hands. She groaned as he drew down her underwear. She sizzled, realising what he had in mind, liking it as his fingers sought her core, making her gasp, feeling herself already teetering on the edge.

‘So hot,' he said as he unzipped himself. ‘So slick.'

He lifted her high and she curled her legs around his waist so that he was nudging at her core. He held her there as they kissed, until she was wild with need, wild with wanting, before giving in and permitting her the long, evocative slide down.

‘Oh god,' he said, his voice ground out between his teeth. ‘This is going to be fast.'

‘I want fast.'

He gave it to her.

The wooden door at her back rattled and bumped on its catch as his hard body pumped into hers, the sound of their breathing choppy and frantic. As aroused as he was, he filled her and refilled her, taking her higher and higher with every thrust until there was nowhere to go, it seemed, but everywhere, in a rush of stars and a cry of exultation that she couldn't tell whether had come from him or her.

She was breathless by the time he let her down, breathless and boneless and utterly spent.

Utterly satisfied.

And it occurred to her that it was almost a shame she had to leave in two days' time.

They were sitting naked together in the big old iron bed, Luke with his arm around her shoulders and nothing new to report after a morning spent collecting grain and fixing broken down trucks, Pip going through the list of calls she'd made with Tracey.

The room was lit by two scented candles, softly flickering, and a solitary lamp, a lace shade throwing patterns of light and shadow around the walls. There was just enough light to read.

‘This is the most positive lead to date,' she said, after recounting the endless calls and the dead ends and left messages. ‘Although I don't know if it's actually going to help. Marlene Armistead in Fremantle, who sounds like she's in her eighties. Her husband's name was Colin. He died a few years back. I've got a feeling he might be that same Colin you found the death notice for.'

‘Oh.' His voice was flat.

‘She couldn't talk because her carer had just arrived to take her out for the day, but she's asked me to call her tomorrow, around twelve, her time. And I'm not sure if it's anything, or if she's just lonely and wants to talk to somebody, but she mentioned they'd lived in Adelaide for a few years before Colin retired.'

He nodded, eyebrows raised. ‘Okay.'

‘And that,' she said, tapping her pen on her notepad, ‘is the best lead I've got so far.'

‘Right. So you'll give her a call?'

‘Sure. I mean, it might be nothing, but I have to try. ‘

He looked like he was about to say something but stopped. ‘What?' she asked.

He shook his head. ‘Don't go getting your hopes up too high, Pip. There are no guarantees. There's a chance you're never going to find an answer.'

‘I know.' She sighed against his shoulder. It was so comfortable leaning against Luke, the steady beat of his heart solid and sure—like Luke himself.

One more night, that's all they had left. It would have to be enough.

And then she remembered . . .

Oh, and Luke?'

‘Yeah?'

‘Trace is planning a picnic lunch on Moonta beach for my last day tomorrow.' Her teeth found her lip. ‘Would you be able to come?'

Warning sirens went off in his head. ‘A picnic.'

‘Sure, it'll be fun.'

‘What? Like a date or something?'

‘No! Like old friends getting together for a goodbye lunch. It's not like we'd be there as a couple.'

‘Oh I get it. It'll be like here, where we're in bed together, only not as a couple.' He couldn't help it. There was no stopping the hint of bitterness from creeping into his voice.

‘It's only a picnic, Luke.'

‘Yeah, like this is only sex.'

‘Exactly. So will you come?'

Of course she was going to ignore the irony. He ran a hand through his hair and over a whiskery jaw. He'd once imagined spending the rest of his life with Pip, and here they were in a romantic little B&B with its pink walls and lace cushions with candles flickering like it was some kind of tryst. She was the woman who had dumped him, who had walked away and cut him off completely, left him for a new life on the other side of the world. What the hell was he doing here?

Having sex, the answer came back. Great sex. That's what he was doing.

‘Why not?' he said, because if he could manage
just sex
, he sure as hell could manage
only a picnic
. Not that he understood any of it.

Except that she was leaving again. Just when he was getting to like having her around again. When he'd just started feeling like she might belong in his world again.
Don't go there.

‘Of course, I'll come.'

For all the pain he knew was coming, he wasn't about to bring it on any earlier. Friday would come soon enough. But he'd cope. The same way he always had. And he'd have a little storehouse of Pip memories to play back if he got lonely. Might as well add a few more to the playlist.

Pip set her notebook and pen down on the side table, and snuggled in close. He kind of wished she wouldn't do that, because it made it harder to remember this was
just sex
. But he liked it too much to object. ‘Fancy saving some more water?' she said, and he looked down at her. ‘There's a spa in the bathroom. A big one.'

‘Yeah?'

‘Interested?'

‘I haven't had a bath for ages.'

She crinkled her nose. ‘I didn't like to say.' And she laughed when he flipped her over his lap to smack her bare bottom.

‘You'll pay for that.'

She squealed and squirmed and he got a hard-on right there. ‘Oh, and there was me going to offer to wash you.'

‘Yeah?'

‘If you wanted.'

‘Maybe I'll let you off with a warning this time, then,' he said, as she scooted off to run the bath.

When the bath was half full, he grabbed her wrist and caught her with the bath gel in her hand ready to pour under the stream of steaming water. ‘No bubbles,' he said. ‘I don't want you hidden under the foam. I want to see you.'

I want to be able to remember every single little thing about you.

She washed him, like she'd promised, and when it was his turn to soap her skin he slid his hands over every curve, every indentation, committing every sweet part of her to memory. And only when they were mad with the touch and taste of each other, only when they were at fever pitch and she was whimpering with need, did he seat her over him and slowly, achingly, draw her down.

It was dark, the water cooling, by the time they emerged from the big spa, and they wrapped themselves in white fluffy robes from the wardrobe and turned off the lights and lay on the small patch of grass between the rose bushes, and watched the night-time display of the endlessly shifting cosmos.

‘We don't have stars in New York City,' she said softly in the darkness, her head on his shoulder, gazing upwards. An owl hooted somewhere close by and the old windmill squeaked as a lick of wind coaxed it into motion. ‘We have stars on the ceilings of stretch limousines and we have stars above the beds in posh hotels to remind us that they're up there somewhere, but we don't have stars. At least, nothing you can see. Nothing like this.'

‘Maybe it's true what they say,' he said, drawing her closer.

‘What do they say?'

She felt his lips kiss her hair. ‘You can't have everything.'

She said nothing for a while, just lay there thinking. She didn't want everything, if that's what he was suggesting.

She just wanted to be back in her apartment with Carmen and for things to settle down and be normal again.

She wanted to get that promotion.

And she wanted this tangled heavy feeling in her chest to unravel itself and go away.

And as she lay beside him feeling the steady drumbeat of his heart beneath her ear, she thought, what was so wrong with a girl wanting a few stars?

Chapter Twenty-six

T
he sapphire waters of Moonta Bay sparkled under the December sun. Pip breathed in the fresh salt air and drank in the view, the wide white expanse of sand, the belt of ruddy shore dotted with rock pools, and the long crooked jetty. It was the perfect day, the temperature in the high twenties, with not a cloud in the sky, and there were ripples rather than waves at the water's edge, so the foam looked like rows of lace edging along a pale blue border to the deep blue coverlet of the sea.

Tracey's boys were busy trying to herd the twins around the rock pools, and there were shrieks and whoops and laughter as Turbo barked happily in pursuit, while Tracey and Sally packed what was left of the picnic back into plastic containers. They'd dined on sandwiches and cold chicken and cake and washed it down with lemon cordial and soft drinks under the big beach shade and now there was little more left than crumbs and chicken bones. Even the squawking seagulls had finally given up fighting for scraps and flown off in search of new horizons.

Fi was sitting in a corner, sipping on a flask of ginger tea and setting Chloe's rocker gently rocking with her toes, giving wan smiles and generally doing her best to look more cheerful than she felt, while Luke was doing a run to the rubbish bin.

Pip sat on the rug, feeling the peace of the ocean and the warm air wrap around her as she took it all in. Tomorrow she would get back on that plane, and this place would once again be relegated to her past. Strange how once she couldn't wait to get back on that plane, while now . . .

She felt a pang inside her chest. She'd miss it more than she'd realised. She'd miss the dry air and the endless sky and the wide open spaces. Miss the awe-inspiring night-time display of stars. Miss Trace and Fi and the gorgeous bundle that was Chloe.

And then Luke returned and bent down to pop the lid on the esky and pull out a cool drink and she got a glorious view of his tight butt and the play of muscles in his arms and back.

‘Pip?' he said, catching her staring, and adding a smile. ‘Anything you'd like.'

She blinked and shook her head. She looked at her watch, realised it would be twelve in Perth and sprang to her feet. ‘I have to make a phone call. Excuse me a minute, guys. I'll be right back.'

‘Who're you calling?' asked Tracey, as Chloe started fussing for a feed.

‘That woman in Perth – Marlene Armistead. The one who asked me to call her back.'

Sally looked over, a crease in her brow. ‘Who?'

Tracey explained the note Luke and Pip had found as she picked Chloe up from the bouncer and sat down in a chair to feed her. Sally's troubled eyes swung to Pip. ‘This is what you were talking about at the funeral. You think this person paid your mother off because she was expecting you.'

‘It looks that way. Trouble is, this Colin died a few years back, so I'm not sure what she's going to be able to tell me. Anyway . . .'

Sally nodded, her features pinched. ‘You better go make that call. I think I'll take a walk,' she said, and headed towards the water's edge, her long maxi skirt floating around her legs in the gentle breeze.

Luke watched Pip strolling across the sands, holding the mobile to her ear, coming to a stop when someone at the other end picked up.

‘What's going on?' Fi asked, coming to stand next to him.

‘She's just making that call.'

‘No. Not that. Between you and Pip. Are you guys back together?'

His head swung around. ‘What gives you that idea?'

She rolled her eyes. ‘Oh, come on, Luke. I might be pregnant, but I'm not brain dead. The fact you're even here suggests something is going on. Not to mention the way you guys can't keep your eyes off each other.'

Or our hands.

He looked at Tracey, who knew, and who was listening as she fed Chloe, and he figured Fi was going to find out one way or another, so what would it hurt to tell the truth now? ‘You ever hear that expression, “making hay while the sun shines”?'

‘Is that what you're doing, then? Making hay?'

He smiled, though his gut twisted at the thought of Pip leaving and the sun turned cold. ‘More or less.'

‘But she's still going tomorrow?'

‘Oh, yeah.'

Fi flung the rest of her ginger tea on the sands. ‘Well, that just sucks.'

Doesn't it just?

‘You should talk to her, Luke,' Fi said, sounding determined. ‘Make her see that she belongs here.'

He huffed. ‘You think that'd work?'

‘You have to try.'

He was about to shake his head and tell her it was pointless and that she'd never listen to him anyway, when suddenly he thought about the emptiness of tomorrow after she'd gone, and all the empty tomorrows to come, and thought, dammit, he didn't want them empty.

He wanted Pip in each and every one of them. Because damn it to hell and back, he still wanted her. God!

Pip was still on her call when Sally wandered back from her walk, looking troubled. ‘You okay, Mum?' said Tracey. ‘You should have brought a hat.'

Sally smiled. ‘I'll be fine.'

‘I think we're all a bit down,' offered Tracey. ‘Not knowing when we'll see Pip again. Especially if she gets this new hotshot promotion of hers.'

‘Yes,' said Sally, as she sat down on the blanket. ‘That's it.'

Luke straightened. ‘She's coming,' he whispered, and every face turned to Pip's, searching for any hint in her expression. ‘Well?' Luke said, when she got close.

Pip flung her phone down on the blanket and herself after it, running her fingers through her hair. ‘That was twenty minutes of my life I'll never get back.'

‘You talked for ages and you got nothing?' said Fi.

‘What did she say?' asked Tracey.

‘Everything. Nothing. I heard about her bridge club every Wednesday, and what Meals on Wheels serves from Monday to Friday, and what her neighbour thinks of the new skirt she bought yesterday at Millers. She's lovely really, but she's lonely. She had the chance to tell someone her life story and she took it.'

‘But what did she say about her husband? What did he do in Adelaide all those years?'

‘That was useless too. He was with some church. Pretty high up by the sounds. Moderator or something. Not that it matters.'

‘What church?' asked Sally softly.

‘It's pointless. I just have to accept that I'm never going to find out who my father was.'

‘What church?'

And everyone looked at Sally, sitting on the blanket with her elbows on her knees and her face a tightly drawn mask.

Pip shook her head, thrown. ‘Um, the United Christian Church or the Christian Unity Church. At least I think it was something like that, but my folks were never religious. We never went to church.'

‘Hey,' piped up Fi quietly. ‘Wasn't the old church in Paskeville a Christian Unity Church? The one that's now a gallery?'

‘Yeah,' said Tracey. ‘Yeah, it was. Wasn't that the one where Dad's father was the minister? Mum?'

But Sally had slumped her shaking head into her hands. ‘Oh my god, I am such a fool. Such a damned fool!'

‘Mum!' said Tracey, thrusting baby Chloe in Fi's direction before dropping down on her knees and putting her arm around Sally's quaking shoulders. ‘What is it?'

‘A happy coincidence,' she said through lips stretched tight, ‘when you two girls were born three weeks apart. A happy coincidence.'

And Pip felt her blood run cold. ‘What? Tell me.'

‘Only it wasn't a coincidence. I always wondered, you know, always there were questions in my mind, but if I ever broached the subject, if I even
hinted
that our girls could almost be sisters, Deidre insisted the baby was Gerald's. It was like she'd been sworn to secrecy or something.'

What?

Pip and Luke exchanged glances. He came and stood next to where she kneeled on the rug and put his hand to the back of her head, just to let her know he was there, and she leant her head back against the welcoming warmth and the strength of his touch, grateful he was there, because right now the sands beneath her were shifting and she needed something solid and safe to lean against.

‘I knew he and Dee were going out and that she was crazy about him,' Sally continued on a hiccup, ‘I knew it and so when he told me that she'd turned him down, that if she really loved him, she'd make love to him, I thought . . . I was so stupid and naive and foolish . . . I thought it was my chance to show him that I loved him too. That I loved him better. And he was so charismatic and so handsome. He was the minister's son and he was in charge of the church youth group. All the girls wanted him, but I
had
him that night. I really thought he was mine.'

‘Mum,' Tracey soothed.

Sally put her head up then, staring blindly out towards the sea.

‘I guess he must have told her, because she didn't speak to me for a month, by which time I'd found out I was pregnant and my parents had demanded he marry me.' She sobbed. ‘It was all arranged and the next thing I knew, Dee and Gerald were getting married too – though he was ten years older than us all and we thought she was mad. Until she started to show not long after the wedding, just about the same time I did. That was when I started to suspect.' She turned her distraught face to Pip. ‘Oh Pip, my darling, can you ever forgive me?'

And Pip thought of her mum telling her, ‘Be careful who you fall in love with,' and suddenly understood what she had meant.

She looked across at Trace and Trace looked at her and a throwaway line of Luke's zapped through her mind –
Tracey's got blue eyes
– as numbly she got to her feet and staggered to where her friend was similarly rising. ‘We share the same father,' she said, in awe and wonder, and even the knowledge that their birth father had been a useless womanising bastard didn't matter right now, because . . . ‘You're my sister.'

‘Half-sister? We're half-sisters?'

Pip burst into tears as they fell into each other's arms. ‘I have a sister!' They hugged and laughed and cried until Pip looked up with a start, her hands over her mouth as she realised. ‘Oh, my god, I have a niece! And two nephews! And a brother-in-law!'

She dropped down to where Sally was still hunched over, and threw her arms around the woman. ‘Thank you, Sally,' she said, and squeezed her tight.

Sally blinked up at her, all puffy-eyed and tear-streaked. ‘You don't –' she licked her lips, ‘– hate me?'

She laughed. ‘How could I? I thought I was alone, but now I have family. How could I possibly hate you?'

Sally wrapped her arm around Pip's forearm and squeezed. ‘I always said you were the daughter I never had.'

She had too. Pip looked back over the times they'd been together, the times she'd seen her watching the two girls, almost as if she'd been studying them. And who could blame her if she'd wondered all these years?

‘You've always been there for me,' she said, giving her another squeeze. ‘Always.'

The boys ran up in a spray of sand and squeals. They took one look at the hugging women and the stunned faces in the group, and stopped dead. ‘What's wrong?'

‘Come on, boys,' said Luke. ‘Let's go get an ice-cream.'