Kiss It Better Page 3

That won him another glare from Cassie. ‘Meaning what?’

  He met Mick’s frowning gaze. ‘Getting a job with family doesn’t require references. If he was let go from his previous position…’

  Mick understood. ‘You think Leighton has stolen before?’

  ‘I’m a realist. People don’t tend to change.’

  ‘You’re wrong,’ Cassie said passionately. ‘People change all the time. They do the best they can, but things force them to compromise, to fail.’

  ‘To steal?’ Yes, he was a cold bastard. His family had told him often enough.

  She flinched. ‘You’re a cynic.’

  ‘Theo’s not blinded by emotion like we are.’ Mick patted her shoulder, clumsily. His own shock showed in his paler skin and an uncharacteristic blankness of expression. ‘I’ve suspected something for a couple of months, but I didn’t want to believe it. Now it’s out there. I thought about oversight or regular audits…but the bottom line is he betrayed us. It’s up to Leighton to rebuild our trust, not for us to offer it for abuse again.’

  ‘Dad, that’s harsh.’

  ‘It’s nothing to how I feel,’ Mick said.

  Theo looked away from Cassie’s face and saw the emotions Mick, standing beside her, was fighting. Leighton’s actions were more than fraud. They were a betrayal.

  Mick laid it out. ‘He’ll still be family, Cassie, but he has to stand on his own feet. There has to be consequences for what he’s done.’

  ‘But Aunt Gabby will pay them.’

  ‘Whatever you do she’ll suffer. We all saw that,’ Theo intervened. ‘You can’t let Leighton hide behind her. Family loyalty and love makes things difficult, but I agree with your decision, Mick. Loving Leighton as your nephew is separate to honouring your responsibilities to JayBay and everyone who works there. They’re family, too.’

  ‘Stop talking about family, you hypocrite.’ Cassie stormed up to him. There was a counter between them, but she leaned over it to stab a finger at his chest. ‘You want to steal JayBay.’

  ‘Buy it,’ he corrected. He’d known Mick would be unhappy with the news of Leighton’s responsibility for the fraud, but that was the extent of the emotion Theo had anticipated dealing with. Cassie was a wildcard. He glanced at Mick, but Mick had his own problems, his head turning to watch them.

  Rather than walk through the factory — where the workers had to be aware of strange happenings — Leighton and Gabby had exited through some side door, rounded the factory and were now making their way to the car park out front.

  ‘Oh damn.’ Cassie sagged against the counter as she too saw the departure.

  Theo decided on his own tactful retreat. He’d intruded because he had a commercial interest in assessing Mick’s commitment to the sale of JayBay, and less rationally, because having helped identify the fraudster, he felt emotionally involved in the Freedoms’ difficult situation. He looked away from Cassie’s downturned head with its tangle of messy brown hair. Despite the unexpected tug of attraction between them, they were strangers. He had no right to respond to her pain of disillusionment. ‘Mick, I’ll leave you to talk with Cassie. I’m here for a week, so I’ll book a room in town.’

  ‘You’ll stay with us.’

  ‘Dad!’

  ‘Cassie, I’m selling JayBay. You don’t want it. I don’t want it. We have other plans. When Theo buys it, he’ll become part of life here. Bringing him into the JayBay family will make it easier on everyone.’

  ‘Huh,’ was her brilliant response.

  Theo nearly echoed it. He didn’t need another family. The one he had was problem enough. Moreover, he wouldn’t become part of the JayBay family. That would be the role of whomever he appointed as manager. He might have argued the point, about his residence at any rate, but Gabby came crashing back in.

  Outside, a sports car tore out of the car park and, tyres squealing, vanished down the road; Leighton, presumably, leaving Cassie and Mick to deal with the results of his selfishness and theft.

  Gabby was crying, trying to say something and failing.

  Mick waved Cassie off. ‘Gabby and I need to talk. You take Theo home. We’ll be in the office. I’ll send Poppy out to mind the store.’

  Unless she wanted to prolong the fraught scene, Casse was left without options. She led the way out.

  ‘I’ll stay in town,’ Theo said.

  She shook her head. ‘You heard what Dad said.’

  ‘Making a difficult situation worse won’t help anyone.’

  ‘It’s a bit late to worry about that now. Hell. Look, come home with me. We’re just next door. Whatever happens, Dad will have to talk to you. The house is through those trees.’ She pointed south, along the coast. ‘But since you’ve got the bike, you’ll have to take the road. I’ll meet you there.’

  He nodded and shrugged on his jacket, acknowledging the truth of her comments even as he accepted the lack of welcome. Cassie was bound to resent him. Blaming the stranger was a lot easier than accepting a screw-up in the family. He ought to know.

  ***

  Cassie dropped down from the veranda, landing on the soft earth of a flowerbed and causing a couple of bees to buzz angrily. She wanted to growl back at them, to snap and snarl and release her tension.

  How could Leighton do this to them?

  She crossed the lawn, which was green from winter rain, and entered the replanted bushland. The shrubs closed around her and the trees provided privacy for the house from the factory and its visitors. The crushed limestone path was hard, cold and damp underfoot, with moss growing in a couple of shaded patches. She stubbed her toe and swore.

  Behind her, in the car park, Theo’s motorbike started up. It sounded impatient and demanding. Powerful. A challenge, like its rider.

  A responsive hum surged through her veins, although she tried to deny it. The wall of ice she’d regretted was gone, shattered by Theo’s blows: Leighton exposed as a thief, Aunt Gabby in tears, and JayBay and all it meant to them about to be torn away.

  Already torn away. Leighton had ripped the heart out of JayBay — its love and trust — and now Mick would sell its shell to Theo.

  Theo was a businessman. He wouldn’t have the time or inclination to work through the JayBay staff’s feeling of betrayal.

  Her hands shook as she unlatched the gate and continued through the bushland on her dad’s side of the fence. In other circumstances she’d be rushing in to heal the emotional wounds of Leighton’s fraud, but just the thought of taking on that burden had her skin prickling with panic. Her feet dragged across the tough lawn that surrounded the house. In a couple of months it would yellow, but survive the summer. She remembered summer nights, sitting on that lawn, spitting watermelon seeds into the grass and watching a cheap, transportable television. Back then everything had seemed possible.

  She paused, grieving for happier days. Simpler days when she’d expected the best from everyone and hadn’t begun to guess that she herself had limits.

  The low rumble of the motorbike halted at the front gate. Theo would have to open and close it, then navigate the curving driveway. Mick hadn’t laid a straight path from A to B, but had meandered around the few tall, century-and-more old tuart trees on the property.

  Like the factory, the house was angled to make the most of the views from the headland. But unlike the factory, it jutted out and turned corners unexpectedly to also provide sheltered nooks, places that would be protected from the strong sea winds even on the stormiest days.

  What would protect them from this storm?

  The motorbike roared up to the house. Cassie ducked under the branches of a fig tree, ran along the cement path and jumped up onto the veranda. When she rounded the corner, Theo was kicking the stand down on his motorbike. Like in most country homes, visitors arrived at the back of the house. She stared down at their guest from the vantage point of the veranda.

  There was a masculine grace in how he swung off the bike. Just like cowboys dismounted in the movies. No need to swagger be
cause they had nothing to prove. They commanded their environment.

  Once she’d been like that; confident in her strength. Now she both resented and craved his power. She admitted her shameful need, but only to herself: there had been comfort when he’d held her in the shop. That scared her more than misbehaving hormones.

  ‘Come in.’ She unlocked the kitchen door and walked in, leaving him to follow.

  The polished floorboards were cool and smooth under her bare feet. On the left was a large table and chairs with a vase of kangaroo paws, the traditional red and green with velvety petals, from Aunt Gabby’s garden. An island bench divided it from the cooking area. To the right, an alcove with its own window had a casual, cosy feel with a long couch and a couple of armchairs. The angle of the window showed blue sky and sea. She’d spent a lot of time there over the years, both with friends and by herself, thinking about life and dreaming dreams.

  Now she was too conscious of Theo looming behind her to dream of anything. She shrugged out of the heavy coat. Too late, she realised that gave the man behind her a great view of the saggy bum of her trackies.

  Wonderful. She hitched up the pants. ‘The guest room is this way.’

  The elegance of the house design meant furnishings could be minimal. The jarrah floorboards — a regional timber, in this instance reclaimed from demolished homes and polished to enhance the red darkness — gave definition and balanced the dazzling view from the glass sliding door. A queen-sized bed, built-in robes, leather armchair and writing desk completed the room. Heavy wheat-coloured drapes ensured privacy if required.

  ‘Keys.’ She picked them out of the pottery bowl on the writing desk. The bowl was a local craftsman’s work, blue and cream like the beach below the headland. ‘Kitchen door, your door.’ She nodded in the direction of the room’s sliding door. ‘And garage key if you’d like to put your bike under cover.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  She dropped the keys back in the bowl. ‘I’ll leave you to settle in.’

  He put his helmet on the armchair and his luggage on the floor. ‘I’m settled.’

  Huh. Surely he’d want to change out of his leathers? But she was not about to voice the question. Not with the bed so close and her imagination suddenly active. She fled. ‘Lunch in half an hour.’

  Her own room welcomed her with soft blues, bare wood and sand tones. Restful. She closed the door and leaned against it before sighing and stripping off her daggy clothes. She dug jeans and an old olive-green knit top from her closet. The top had used to be too tight. Now it clung to her breasts before falling loosely around her rib cage. She sat on the floor to tie the laces of her boots, yanking them fiercely.

  Theo and her dad had caught her unawares, but she would cope. She’d be prepared now. For anything. Just for a moment she leaned forward, resting her head on her knees. Would there ever be a time when she didn’t have to cope, to brace against fate? The independence and strength she’d prided herself on had become a trap, but she kept marching forward, unable to change, unable to ask for or accept help. She’d seen her family and friends’ worried glances over the last few days, but she kept them all at a distance. None trespassed on her obvious desire to deal with things herself.

  ‘Because I’m doing such a good job of that.’ She dragged a brush through her hair, untangling the knots ruthlessly till it fell straight to her shoulders. It needed a cut.

  If she were a car, she’d book herself into the mechanics for a thorough overhaul followed by detailing. It would be nice to emerge shiny and new.

  Instead her improvement was limited to jeans that wouldn’t, unlike her trackies, suddenly slip off.

  Theo sat in the corner alcove of the kitchen, legs stretched out and head bent over his phone. Like her he’d changed, but he’d also found time to shower. His wet hair curled and he wore a rugby shirt over blue jeans. Did everything he wore emphasise his lean muscles?

  He glanced up at her entrance.

  The way his eyes widened could have been an insult for how bad she’d looked before — or a compliment for the improvement. Her dad’s old coat and her old trackies could make a supermodel appear slobbish, so his slow smile almost had her smiling back.

  No. This wasn’t the time for flirting and letting a little admiration confuse her. She was already confused and she needed time to untangle herself, and for that she needed everything to stay as it was. This was home, a safe place.

  She couldn’t let Theo take it from her.

  Riding up on a motorbike. Puh-leez. What sort of pretence was that? And if he was from Brigid Care, an eastern states company, she doubted he’d ridden the bike across the Nullarbor Plain. He’d had to have flown in to Perth and hired it. Did he think it would make him seem more ordinary, someone her dad and the people of Jardin Bay could trust?

  ‘I hope you’re not on a gluten-free diet.’ Even she could hear the tone in her voice that said the opposite. If Theo said he was on a gluten-free diet, she sounded as if she’d force-feed him wheat flour.

  ‘I’ll eat anything.’ The mock-servility of his tone was threaded with laughter, which just made his voice sexier.

  ‘Potato bread.’ She opened the breadbox and tried to sound normal, or at least, minimally polite. Small talk was her friend until her dad came home and explained things. ‘The local bakery is incredible.’ She’d picked up the loaf of dense, chewy potato bread on her morning run into town for newspapers, food and distraction.

  Well, now she had a distraction in the house.

  It wasn’t helping.

  She slammed the bread onto a cutting board and investigated the fridge.

  ‘Can I help?’ Theo stood to the side of the island bench, not intruding, but close.

  ‘No.’

  Unfortunately, he remained standing there, watching.

  She attacked the cucumbers with a sharp knife. She quartered small greenhouse-grown tomatoes and tore at a crisp lettuce. She was generous with pitted olives and added cubes of marinated feta before drizzling over golden olive oil for a classic Greek salad. The trick to the dish was to use the freshest and best ingredients.

  Her patience snapped. ‘You could sit down.’

  ‘I’d rather stretch my legs. The ride down…’

  ‘So go for a walk.’

  ‘Not yet.’

  Her dad walked into the kitchen.

  ‘How’s Aunt Gabby?’

  ‘She’s gone home.’ Mick rubbed his forehead. ‘Theo, has Cassie shown you your room?’

  ‘Yes, but I can easily stay at a hotel.’

  ‘You’ll stay here. Your bike’ll fit in the garage. I’ll show you.’

  It all sounded so damn normal, as if Theo was a friend.

  Cassie pulled a small cut of ham from the fridge and unwrapped it automatically as her dad marched Theo off. Her uncle Sean, Aunt Gabby’s husband, had raised the pig and cured the butchered animal. Cassie concentrated and carved wafer thin slices of the salty, honey-glazed ham and laid them on a plate.

  She’d been putting together simple meals like these for years. Meals that could easily be expanded when people dropped in. Mike Freedom believed in an open house. He had the gift of making people feel truly welcome — probably because he was truly interested in them and what they said. Her dad was interested in everything.

  With their extended family and friends, Agnes had ensured that the house — designed and built along with the factory — could accommodate visitors without upsetting existing inhabitants.

  But Theo was different. This was about welcoming a wolf into their home.

  The men returned. Cassie’s shoulders stiffened and she concentrated on the boiling kettle. She had mugs out. The choice was instant coffee or tea bags. Nothing fancy.

  Theo chose the coffee. Her dad had tea with two sugars, as always. Cassie made herself coffee with extra milk. She carried the mugs to the table and found her dad already seated, but Theo unobtrusively standing. Waiting for her.

  The courtesy rubbed her th
e wrong way. He was a guest, but not by her wish. She wanted to ignore him, and hated that she couldn’t. She bumped her chair out, sat and dragged it in, then she stared at the food on the table and realised she wasn’t hungry.

  She sipped at her coffee.

  Her dad ate like a horse. It was nervous energy that burned up those extra calories. He piled salad and ham on his plate and buttered three slices of bread.

  Theo served himself more moderately. His long fingers moved with economical efficiency, almost elegance. Then they stilled. His gaze travelled from her face, to her body, almost analytical, definitely detached, and then he frowned.

  Cassie set her mug down, abruptly seeing her skinniness through his eyes. She did not have an eating disorder, but she did lose her appetite under stress. She needed to eat anyway.

  Theo passed her the salad bowl.

  ‘JayBay’s mine,’ Mick said.

  ‘I know that, Dad.’ She glanced up from serving herself salad, and realised it hadn’t been a veiled reprimand at her strongly-stated opinion.

  Mick was addressing Theo. ‘JayBay is completely mine. I mucked around with a few ideas. After Leanne, Cassie’s mum, left, I got serious. I started JayBay with a loan from the bank. Then as it grew, I employed family and friends. They have been and are part of the company, but they don’t own it and don’t decide its future.’

  ‘They rely on it, though, Dad.’ She turned to Theo. In explaining to him, she could also remind Mick what he was risking — even if he had the right to do it. ‘For employment, for a good workplace. Most of the people who work at JayBay have a talent. They’re musicians, painters, sculptors and poets. JayBay gives them a regular income but also enables them to take time when they need it for gigs or exhibitions or whatever. At JayBay we support one another.’

  Which unfortunately reminded her of Leighton. He’d only looked out for himself. Depressed, she ate a cube of creamy feta cheese.

  ‘Brigid Care is a big company,’ Theo said, ‘but still a family one. I respect the ethos of JayBay.’ He’d also tactfully shifted the focus off Leighton’s fraud. ‘A good manager…’

  ‘Like who?’ she challenged. ‘They’d have to report to you and prioritise profit over…over poetry, over caring about the spirit of JayBay.’