golden girl touched him; he couldn’t deny it.
Nicola wrinkled her brow. ‘Make him jealous? That doesn’t sound very Christian, if you don’t mind me saying so, Reverend.’
Peter Callam flinched again, then he had to laugh. ‘You’re right, but desperate situations require desperate means at times. Not that I would advise you to actually—’
‘Commit adultery?’ Nicola suggested with some irony.
‘Most certainly not. Um...does anyone know how things stand? His first wife, for example?’
‘No one really knows, although some people might suspect. I’m not sure what Marietta thinks. She’s usually amazingly, even embarrassingly forthright, but she just—’ Nicola shrugged ‘—wished me luck and carried on as if it was a fait accompli. I suppose, if you look at it another way, it’s also her children I’m good with,’ she added ruefully.
‘But you suspect she may still be in love with him?’
‘I think there’s a kind of fatal attraction between them and there always will be.’
‘I still feel you shouldn’t walk away from this marriage without one last test,’ he said stubbornly.
‘You probably don’t think I can take care of myself either,’ Nicola observed.
‘I don’t think it’s a bad thing to be preserved from fortune-hunters until you’re twenty-three, Nicola. It’s no great age. And you never know.’
Nicola stood up and regarded him quizzically, as if to say, I might have known. What she did say was, ‘Look, don’t you worry about it, Reverend. I always knew there wasn’t going to be an easy solution. Not that that will stop me from trying to find one. But thanks for listening. I feel a bit guilty about taking up your time. I’m sure there are much more worthy causes and desperate women you could really help.’
Peter Callam stood up and handed her a card. ‘My time,’ he said quietly, ‘is always available to those in need, even if it’s only to listen.’
Nicola stared at him, then smiled at him radiantly. ‘It’s people like you, Reverend, who restore one’s faith. Thanks a million.’ With that, she left.
Brett Harcourt drummed his fingers impatiently on the steering wheel of his sapphire-blue BMW convertible as he waited at a traffic light. The hood was down, although, for Cairns, it was a cooler day than the fierce heat of summer. He was late for an appointment, and every traffic light, this one included, had gone against him at the last minute—and this one took an age to change, he well knew.
Then he frowned as his gaze rested on someone coming out of the Lifeline offices opposite him—his wife. But she didn’t cross the road in front of him, although for her the light was green. Instead, she stopped on the pavement and just stood there, obviously lost in thought.
As usual, although she might be miles away mentally, she was turning a few heads, he observed dryly. Men slowed as they walked past, then looked back. Girls and women looked too, no doubt marvelling at the simple elegance of her clothes, the beautiful, lithe body beneath, the gloss of her skin and hair, maybe wondering if she was a top model or a film star.
But what the hell has she been doing at Lifeline? Brett Harcourt wondered. Looking for some new and devious way to give me the slip? Unless she’s decided to include good works in her repertoire of unusual activities...
He was about to hail her when he realised the light had changed and the traffic behind him was getting restive. He swore beneath his breath and moved off fast. But he noticed out of the corner of his eye as he did so that she didn’t even look up.
As for Nicola, she came out of her reverie and decided to treat herself to lunch in town.
She left her car where it was parked and walked to the Pier, where she chose Pescis, an Italian waterfront restaurant, overlooking the Marlin Marina. Not that there was a lot left of the marina. A cyclone earlier in the year had washed away the pontoons, leaving only the piles.
But it would be rebuilt, for it had famous associations, the Marlin Marina, with people like the late Lee Marvin, who had come to Nicola’s home town of Cairns, in far North Queensland, to set out in pursuit of the fabulous black marlin in the tropical waters of the Coral Sea.
Pescis was always busy, and today was no exception, but she found a table on the veranda and ordered a light lunch—chopped cooked tomato and basil on toasted bread.
While she waited for it, and sipped mineral water, she fiddled absently with her wedding ring and thought back over her interview with the Reverend Peter Callam—but, more particularly, on the impulse that had made her go in the first place.
I suppose it was because I can never talk to Brett about it, she mused. Not that I’ve tried for a while, but it always ended up in an argument... I must have been mad...
She looked down at the gold ring on her left hand. It had never been accompanied by an engagement ring—she’d insisted she didn’t want one, that it would be a bit ridiculous, because they could hardly call themselves engaged when they were to get married within a bare week of Brett proposing the marriage of convenience quite out of the blue to her. And, finally, weren’t engagement rings a token of love?
She’d asked her husband-to-be this with a dangerous little glint in her blue eyes, which he’d observed placidly, then he’d shrugged and murmured that it was up to her. But he’d gone on to say that their wedding would not be a hole-and-corner affair if she had that in mind as well.
‘But surely you don’t want all the trimmings?’ she’d protested. ‘I certainly don’t.’
‘What would you like?’ he’d countered. ‘Don’t forget we need to make some kind of a statement, after what’s happened to you and what people are saying.’
‘Well...’ She’d coloured. ‘Something quiet and dignified.’
A look of amusement had flickered in his eyes, causing her to say rashly, ‘I’m quite capable of being dignified, Brett.’
‘Oh, I believe you, although I sometimes prefer you when you’re not, but...’ He’d shrugged.
Her eyes had widened—and, she recalled, sitting now on the veranda, watching the green waters of Trinity Inlet, which formed Cairns Harbour, that had given her another cause to hope.
So she’d made no further objections, and she’d married Brett Harcourt in a simple but beautiful, ballerina length dress of ivory stiffened silk, with a matching pillbox hat crowned with flowers, no veil and short gloves. The ceremony had taken place in the garden of his home, before a marriage celebrant, and the handful of guests had all been of his own family. His children had been present, but, at three and four, had had no real idea of the significance of the occasion.
They’d been wild with delight, however, when she’d moved in permanently from that day.
She finished her lunch with a sigh and remembered that, when making her marriage vows, she’d been uncomfortable and barely audible. Then she’d taken hold and told herself that at least she was in love with her tall, worldly husband, so it couldn’t all be a sham. But of course
