The Girl in the Yellow Vest (12 page)

She blushed, as he gave her a look that seemed to indicate that all he needed was an invitation. Will unlocked the ute and they both hopped in.

She soon became absorbed in her surroundings as he turned the car out onto the dirt track that led to the top of the jetty. They passed through a foreign city of stockpiles with a maze of conveyor belts and plant machinery connecting them – like a giant game of Snakes and Ladders. Will pointed out the surge bins and the drive tower.

‘I’m working on that,’ he revealed.

‘The driver tower?’

‘Yeah.’ He nodded and then looked over at her. ‘And you’ll be helping me with it.’

She sucked in a deep breath. Working on a building that was about six storeys tall as her first project would be pretty bloody exciting. Then the coastline came into view. The ocean, a vast fathomless blue, spread out to infinity. The jetty, though nearly four kilometres in length, was but one small dent in this great expanse. Excitement crept up her bones. It may be one small dent but it was one giant operation for them.

A couple of White-Faced Herons flew out of the way of the ute as they reached the start of the jetty. This consisted of two roads sitting on trestles an average of fifteen metres above the water depending on where the tide was at. Each road provided a pathway, one going out to sea and one coming off. Three conveyors ran parallel to the roads, two through the middle and one on the side going out. As soon as the car boarded this lonely concrete road, walls made of conveyors and metal sheeting rose up around them, blocking out nature. The road was narrow with only a couple of passing bays along the way. She couldn’t see the ocean or even hear it among the whir of passing coal. Tonnes and tonnes of it travelling as fast as Will’s ute headed out to the ships with unrelenting efficiency. Moving between the two belts was like entering a roofless tunnel made of steel and concrete. Then all of a sudden they came to a T-junction and the view widened.

They were on the wharf now. The concrete deck was much wider and she could see the ocean again as the conveyors moved out both to the left and to the right, heading straight for the shipping berths.

Will turned the car out onto the right arm of the wharf where new construction was taking place. The new conveyor trusses were being installed a couple of storeys above the main deck. She noticed that there wasn’t much parking or space. The deck seemed crowded with utes, trucks, small cranes, other machinery and dongas.

‘Wow, this is incredible,’ she muttered. ‘I’m so glad you brought me.’

He looked over at her and smiled. ‘Me too.’

They unclipped their belts and got out of the car.

‘So what are you working on out here?’ she asked enthusiastically.

‘The access tower for the conveyors.’ He pointed this steel structure out to her.

‘Awesome.’

‘Do you want the tour?’

‘Of course.’

They didn’t have to walk very far to see it all because everything was so big you could see it from any vantage point. But they made a leisurely stroll of it anyway. The wharf was mostly deserted, except for the occasional straggler. She felt like she was on a private tour.

He pointed out the two giant shiploader cranes that stood as tall as his drive towers above the deck. The interesting thing about them, though, was that they could move and frequently did, along heavy rails embedded deep in the concrete on the wharf. The shiploaders did exactly as their name suggested. They loaded ships, guiding the coal off the conveyors and into the massive bellies of cargo carriers – like a dinosaur feeding its young.

‘And we’re installing another one,’ Will explained. ‘It’ll be arriving fully fabricated by ship in four weeks’ time. Caesar’s beside himself.’

‘Caesar?’

‘The project manager,’ he grinned. ‘Everyone around here has nicknames. You’ll get used to it.’

‘Ah-huh.’ She smiled.

He was about to show her the shipping berths and the site of the new one under construction when he suddenly stalled.

‘
Oh shit
.’

‘What?’ She followed his gaze to see a tall, dark stranger talking to some welder near where their ute was parked. ‘Who’s that?’

‘Caesar.’

‘So what do we do?’ she asked.

‘Hide.’

‘Hide?’ she repeated dubiously as he grabbed her hand and yanked on it. ‘
Will
,’ she whispered hoarsely as he dragged her behind a nearby donga. ‘Wouldn’t it be better if we just came clean and you introduced me? I mean, he can’t be that bad, can he? He’ll forgive us.’

He looked at her like she was crazy. ‘He’s not that sort of person.’

‘But –’

He put a finger to her lips. ‘Ssshhh.’

Perhaps it was the intimacy of his touch that stalled her rather than the threat of impending discovery. She suddenly realised that she had her hand tucked firmly into his, cradled against his leg. They stood shoulder to shoulder, his finger on her mouth. She could smell the faint scent of his deodorant and hear the gentle rush of his breathing. A sudden overwhelming yearning washed through her like the waves she could hear below the deck. She came up confused and aroused.

This is Will we’re talking about here.

Will.

Trent’s best mate. Your best friend. You’re one step removed from incest, girl. Are the FIFO crazies getting to you already?

‘He’s coming,’ he hissed.

It took all her willpower not to giggle as he pulled her away from the donga and they ran towards a giant plastic portable loo, like a couple of kids playing hide and seek. He opened the door and the pungent waft of urine mixed with some sort of cleaning agent overwhelmed her.

‘Get in.’

‘Do I have to?’ She wrinkled her nose.

With a sigh, he grabbed her by the arm and they both climbed in together. He pulled the door shut behind them, putting his arm around her to stop her from toppling straight into the dunny. There wasn’t really enough room for two people to stand in there. Especially if those two people did not want to brush up against the dirty-looking toilet and the grubby-looking sink. So they held onto each other, which was perhaps a little more befuddling than all the rest.

Emily had hugged Will many times in the past, even kissed him on the cheek more times than she could count. But they’d never just stood there in a prolonged embrace – her ear to his heart, his hand at the nape of her neck, his thumb brushing the bare skin there, sending a weird sort of heat creeping over her.

It’s just because you’re single now. You’re seeing
every
guy as a potential boyfriend
.

Then there was a loud
rat-a-tat-tat
on the door and they both jumped. A dry, derisive voice pronounced slowly and succinctly: ‘William,
what
are you doing?’

‘Er . . . going to the toilet.’ Will cleared his throat and closed his eyes, praying for a miracle.

Here he was, a boner in his pants and his boss breathing fire on the other side of a smelly toilet door.

Why do you do this to yourself?

He couldn’t help it. As soon as he had Emily in his arms, it was like all his blood had rushed straight to his groin. His brain had triggered the ‘Emily Alert’ siren, and the cells in his heart had raised the alarm. ‘We’ve got a code red – all hands on deck now!’

So there he was, trying to stand so she wouldn’t notice when bloody Caesar steps up to the door.

‘Do you take me for a fool, William?’ That silky smooth voice oozed like butter through the grooves around the loo door.

‘No, sir . . . er, Mark.’ He tried to infuse calm into his voice. There had been no discovery yet. He knew nothing.

Didn’t he?

‘Then I want you back in the office now,’ Caesar gave the order briskly. ‘You shouldn’t be here. It’s knock-off time and I’ve got a stack of technical queries for you to answer. You’ll be working late tonight.’

He winced. ‘No problem, Mark.’

‘Good. I’ll see you soon.’ They heard Caesar step back from the door but his amused tone was heard briefly before he walked away. ‘Oh, and Emily Woods. Good to see that you know you’ll be starting your career at rock bottom.’

On this announcement, they heard his footsteps retreat. Will threw open the door and they both burst out choking. Emily looked like she’d been holding her breath and he didn’t blame her.

She moved away from him wringing her hands. ‘We’re in trouble, aren’t we? Big trouble.’

He took off his hat briefly and ran his hands through his hair. ‘Hard to say, really.’

‘Oh.’ Her big eyes flew to his; an instant connection ran between them like a hot wire.

‘Nah, we’re in deep shit. Pardon the pun. But it’s difficult to say how much or for how long. Caesar is a little bit of a sadist. You know, he likes to punish people. I mean, I’m already in the doghouse, working late tonight. I never work late. Not after a twelve-hour shift. You need your rest.’

She put a hand to her eyes. ‘This is all my fault.’

‘How do you figure that?’

‘I should never have let you bring me out.’

‘It was my choice.’ He shrugged and put a hand on her shoulder but she immediately shrugged it off and stepped away. He bit his lip.
Shit.
Had she felt his body reacting to her?

She must be disgusted, given that her relationship with his best mate wasn’t even cold in the ground yet. Should he try to explain by saying, ‘I was aroused because I’ve been in love with you for the last seven years’?

Yeah, because then you won’t sound like a psycho!

She looked up quickly and he was once more arrested by her eyes. ‘We should definitely get you back to the office. I don’t want to get us into more trouble than we already are.’

‘Good idea.’

They accomplished the drive back in relative silence. She seemed okay. She wasn’t saying anything about what had happened in the toilet.

Nothing did happen.

‘So it’s a real shame we can’t hang out tonight,’ she sighed as they turned into the office car park.

‘I know,’ he nodded, taking her disappointment as a good sign. If she was disgusted with him, she would hardly want to spend time with him, would she?

When they got back to the main office donga he said, ‘Go grab your suitcase. I’ll quickly drop you off at the resort and then come back.’

‘You sure you won’t get into trouble for coming back even later?’

‘It’s a one-minute drive.’ He shrugged. ‘If you didn’t have a suitcase you could probably walk it. It’ll be no time at all.’

‘Okay,’ she agreed.

Five minutes later, he was back in the office, looking at a foolscap file that Caesar had put on his desk. The man himself was standing there with arms folded and foot tapping.

‘William, William, William.’ He shook his head. ‘I gave you an inch and you took a yard. Now
I
,’ he said succinctly, ‘will take a mile.’

He swallowed as Caesar patted the file. ‘By morning, thanks.’

With a sigh, Will sat down as the shadow of his nemesis crossed his desk and disappeared.

Caesar was true to his word. Will got about four hours’ sleep that night and the following day he had him running errands in Mackay. He did not get to see Emily till after knock-off, which was a shame because he had wanted to start handing over some of his drive tower work to her. Instead, she had sat in the office all day twiddling her thumbs.

‘I got so bored,’ she told him, ‘I got up and reorganised the stationery cupboard. It wasn’t a good move.’

‘Why?’ he asked.

‘I got several more demands for pacer leads,’ she said.

He did not see Emily in the office the next day either. Alan, the HR manager, said that she was off on her safety induction. He had expected to see her back in the office late afternoon but after a morning full of painful paperwork and meetings that seemed to go in circles, he was called out to the wharf to assist with some issue Fish had.

The problem with lifting something was that once you started, you couldn’t leave the job until you’d put the bloody thing down again. And if it refused to slide into place, you could be left standing there for hours. Earlier that afternoon, Fish had lifted the girder off a truck with the crane and when they went to slide it onto the two piles the connector plates didn’t quite match up.