Charles said. ‘We’re sort of used to her being around.’
‘You mean you love her,’ Cal said gently, and the smile returned. ‘You want to tell me how it happened?’
‘Her uncle wants her adopted,’ Charles explained. ‘He’s her legal guardian. He wants a married couple.’ He turned to the tray of surgical instruments and focused on what needed attention.
Nothing needed attention.
‘We can’t let her go,’ Jill said warmly, life returning to her voice. ‘We all love her.’
‘Ofcoursewedo,’ Cal said. Lily was playing with Gina and Cal’s small son, CJ, right now. CJ and Lily were best friends. They were in and out of each other’s houses, they slept over at each other’s places; in fact, sometimes Charles thought Lily regarded Gina and Cal as just as much her parents as he and Jill.
It was a problem, he thought. Oh, it made life easy that Lily transferred her affections to whoever she was with, but Wendy worried that the child’s superficial attachments were the result of trauma.
It didn’t matter, Charles thought. It’d settle.
‘So when’s the date?’ Cal asked, and Charles looked questioningly at Jill.
‘I… We need to do it within a month.’
‘Hey, it’s a magnificent excuse for a party. It’ll be headline news…’
‘Private ceremony,’ Charles said before he thought about it. ‘No fuss.’
‘No fuss,’ Jill agreed, and Charles looked sharply up at her. Kicking himself. He’d done it again. He’d made the decision without consulting her.
‘And no photographs,’ she said. Her voice was flat, inflexionless. No joy there.
Of course not. She’d had the marriage from hell the first time round. Marriage could never be something she approached with joy.
He knew few details of her past, and those he hadn’t gained from Jill. His friend Harry, the Crocodile Creek policeman, had passed on information to Charles when he’d become involved with Jill that he’d thought might be important.
Married absurdly young and with no family support, Harry reported that Jill’s marriage had been a nightmare of abuse. She’d tried to run, but she’d been hauled back, time and time again. Her final attempt to defy her husband had nearly cost her life. Only the fact that there’d been a couple of tourists on the jetty as Jill had staggered from her husband’s fishing boat had saved her life.
But despite her appalling marriage, Jill Shaw was a woman of intelligence and courage. She’d still been young enough to start a new life. Cautiously, and with the encouragement from women she met at the refuge she’d ended up in after she’d been discharged from hospital, she’d applied for a nursing course as far away from the scene of her marriage as she’d been able to. She still feared Kelvin and had changed her name to keep hidden, but she’d moved on. She’d lived on the smell of an oily rag to get what she wanted.
She’d graduated with honours, she’d embraced her profession and when she’d applied to Crocodile Creek—it had to be one of the most remote nursing jobs in Australia—Charles hadn’t believed his luck.
But she wasn’t happy. Normally bossy and acerbic, with a wry sense of humour, the events of the afternoon seemed to have winded her. Was she afraid? Of more than her ex-husband finding her? Hell, she had to know he’d never hurt her. And she’d agreed. She did love Lily, he thought. She wanted this.
He was going to Wallaby Island tomorrow without her. He had to have her smile about this—he had to have her feeling sure before he went.
‘Cal, we’re finished now,’ he said, maybe more roughly than he intended. ‘Do you think you and Gina can hang on to Lily for a few more hours?’
‘Of course,’ Cal said easily. ‘We’re packing to go to Wallaby Island tomorrow. Having Lily will get CJ out of our hair while we organise ourselves.’
‘Fine,’ Charles said. He had his own packing to do but it’d have to wait. ‘Don’t mention what’s happening to Lily—we want to tell her ourselves tonight. But Jill and I are going out to dinner and we need to leave now.’
‘It’s only four now,’ Jill said, startled. ‘What’s the rush?’
‘We need to get changed,’ Charles said. ‘And we need to get into town before the jeweller shuts. I’ve never been engaged before and if we’re going to do this…Jill, let’s do this in style.’
He wouldn’t listen to her objections. She didn’t need a ring. She didn’t need…marriage.
What was she doing?
Jill stood in her bare little bedroom and gazed into her wardrobe with a sense of helplessness. She was going out to dinner with Charles. She should wear clean jeans and a neat white shirt.
‘A dress,’ Charles called from his bedroom, and she winced.
A dress. The outfit she’d bought for the weddings?
It was an occupational hazard, working in Crocodile Creek, she thought ruefully. So many young medics came here to work that romance was inevitable. They’d had, what, eight weddings in the last year? So much so that the locals laughingly referred to the doctors’ house as the Wedding Chapel.
She’d never lived in the doctors’ house. She valued her independence too much.
What was she doing?
She wanted Lily. It was like an ache. From the time she’d held her, the night her parents had been killed, her heart had gone out to the little girl. Even Lily’s fierce independence, the way she held herself just slightly aloof from affection… Jill could understand it and respect it.
‘Dress?’ Charles called again, and she smiled. He was as bossy as she was. But not…autocratic. Never violent. She’d seen him in some pretty stressful situations. There’d been a family feud. His brother had been responsible for his injury, yet his father had vented his fury on Charles. He’d considered his injured son useless.
Charles had never railed against the unfairness of fate. He’d taken his share of a vast inheritance—a share which his father hadn’t legally been able to keep from him—and he’d proceeded to set up this medical base. He’d funnelled his anger and his frustration into good.
He deserved…
A dress.
OK. She tugged her only dress from its hanger—a creamy silk sliver of a frock that hugged her figure, that draped in a cowl collar low around her breasts, no sleeves, a classy garment Gina had bullied her into for Kate and Hamish’s wedding. She slipped it on, and then tugged her hair from its customary elastic band.
Her glossy chestnut curls had once been a source of pride. She brushed them now. They fell to her shoulders. She looked younger this way, she thought as she stared into the mirror. There was no grey in her hair yet.
She was a woman about to choose her engagement ring…
It was
