Grace Under Fire, page 19
He hadn’t told her. Why?
With a week until her parents’ deadline, she’d lose everything if she pulled out.
Doubt was the evil-smelling miasma swirling above a witch’s cauldron—choking her. This was the first time she’d broken her own rules. Smithhouse had smiled at her father before he’d presented him with a summons. The town’s matriarchs had informed a packed café she was a tramp who’d been conned. Her stomach jittered.
What’s in it for him?
She clicked on the document to open it, her hand clammy where she held the phone. Her vision blurred, so it took a few seconds to find the new clause Jake had highlighted for her. Panic coalesced into a tight ball in her chest. Her world came crashing down.
The phone sat where she’d dropped it, on the seat beside her. The words danced through her skull, like a ticker-tape newsreel on a relentless loop where you were forced to read the same breaking news again and again.
She’d been naïve. Or played by a master. Blue Sky was the jewel in the crown in this valley. With this new clause, she’d hold ownership by the thinnest of threads.
Compromise isn’t defeat until it is.
She’d compromised until she had nothing left. Nausea swirled, leaving her dizzy. She’d trusted him. Enough to surrender part of her dream. She couldn’t give more, not when she’d given her heart. She focused on the road ahead, on keeping to the speed limit in the short distance to Ryan’s. Stupid, really, she dashed away a tear. Ryan’s final condition, offered at the eleventh hour made his motivation for everything else clear. She needed to focus on his betrayal, use her devastation to get her through this conversation.
He hadn’t warned her of a new clause.
Ryan pushed through the door to stand above her on the veranda when she pulled up. Magnificent—her returning hero—legs apart, balanced, his arms hanging loosely at his sides—all cool strength and hot passion, and she wanted to beat at his chest until the bruises in her heart showed on his skin. Head bare, with the wind riffling through it, his shirtsleeves rolled up to reveal his muscled forearms, and she wanted him. Her love was her flaw. Love shattered her. She’d had such dreams. Becoming a cheese maker, owning the family farm, convincing Ryan they were good together. Not just in bed.
Satan danced against the Ute door in welcome. Pushing it open, she climbed out and bent to bury her face in his fur. She dug deep for the anger she needed to salvage some pride from this wreckage.
“Hi, boy. This is goodbye,” she whispered. He whimpered as if he knew something was wrong, barked and loped up the veranda steps to his master.
“Down, Satan,” he ordered. The dog dropped beside him.
She reached back into the van to pick up her phone, then rejected the prop. She dropped her sunglasses on the dashboard. He’d forced her to confront the power he had over her. She couldn’t change his power over her farm. She could end one part of this lie.
“You bastard!” She walked up the steps to face him.
An eyebrow shot up. “Is there a reason for this fight? Or do you want an excuse to make up?”
“Did you ever want me?” Her throat burned with despair.
He frowned. “What are you talking about?”
“Jake sent me your new condition.”
“And?” He ran a hand through his hair. A shaggy lock fell forward, shielding his eyes as effectively as his sunglasses. “Spit it out, Grace, so I know what I’m accused of this time.”
“You’re the only one who knew Dad and Mum gave me three months. The contracts need to be signed or the farm goes on the open market.” Her words tumbled over each other.
“They’ll be signed.” He stood taller somehow, braced.
“Because you’ve backed me into a corner,” she accused. “It’s too late for alternatives. I have to accept your new condition.” A condition making her work about as relevant as shifting a pile of hay from one side of the paddock to the other then back again.
“I don’t see the problem?”
“You get first option to buy if I’m forced to sell. Was that your plan all along?” She turned and paced to the end of his veranda. Looking at his stony face should have stiffened her pride, but it made her weak at the knees. She sagged against a post. She didn’t want an affair with him. She wanted forever, and she wanted to hate him. Instead she pushed herself upright and turned. “You’ve spent weeks finding out my weaknesses, learning exactly what my cash flow is.”
“And that’s a problem because?” His patience had bled into confusion.
“You said it yourself. Scale is everything. You know how fragile my cash flow is. This contract gives you leverage to cut my legs from under me at any time.”
“Let me see if I’ve got this straight?” His voice was dangerously quiet. “I paid for Bluey to do farm work so he could ...? I know, learn your spread so I can leave him to run it when I take over. I dumped the chemicals to force you to sell me the land, and then I cheated you on the price. Probably organised the break-and-enter at the farmhouse as well. Makes sense from where I stand.”
“You went straight from my bed to your lawyer with this new condition.”
“Speaking before you think is a good way to lose friends, Grace.” He’d withdrawn without taking a step.
“Friends!” She threw an arm into the air, frightened she was right, terrified she was wrong. “You wanted everyone to know I was your mistress. You claimed it would protect me. It shames me. And when you take off, like you did before, you’ll have taken everything. My land, my reputation, my independence.”
He paled. His mouth set in a straight line. “You’ve said enough.”
She slapped a hand against her thigh. “You didn’t need to seduce me to get this far.”
“As I recall, you came to my bed.”
If he’d raised a fist to her, the blow couldn’t be greater. He couldn’t have been clearer about it being sex for him.
Arms raised, she flew at him. He reacted faster and caught her before she could land a punch, holding her while she struggled to free herself. Satan moved between them, whining in distress.
“Back,” Ryan ordered, and Satan backed away. “I want you to leave.” He dropped her hands as if he couldn’t bear to touch her, as if every word the old women in the café had uttered was true.
“You’re the one who’s going. That’s one thing you didn’t lie about. You’ll have a rolled-gold option on my farm as a nice sweetener for your buyer. I’ll always be looking over my shoulder, waiting for the option to be cashed in.” She’d trusted him and stood to lose everything—a reduction in the milk price, a fall-off in orders or a negative organic assessment. Her buffers were wafer-thin.
“Enough.” He threw up a hand, cutting her off. “I get the caution. I understand what Smithhouse did to you and your family. I get the need to prove you can do things by yourself. I’ve been as driven. Sometimes I enjoy you exploding like a firecracker because making up is so much fun.”
She pounded her fist against her heart. “Damn you! I love you. I’ll never forgive you for tricking me.”
“You don’t love me, Grace. You just need something to dress up the sex.” He sounded impossibly weary. “Love needs trust, and you’ve never trusted me.” His barriers were firmly back in place. “I’m tired of walking on eggshells to prove you can.”
Satan had risen to his feet to circle them, trying to herd them.
“You can’t fix this, boy.” She rested her hand on the animal’s head when he followed her to her van. As she drove out, Ryan and the dog stood in the same place, the man keeping his dog close. Tears blurred her vision.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Grace unlocked her door, and the cold emptiness of the farmhouse enveloped her. Ryan had done that too. Occupied her space so she was lonely without him. Already abandoned. Her phone rang; she hated Anthony Callea’s every ringtone and message tune.
“Hi, Ella.” She tried to level her voice.
“What did you say, Grace?” Her sister skipped her usual breezy hello, her voice tight with anxiety. Had the entire world turned upside down?
“Oh!” She couldn’t find an answer. Jake had asked her to call and confirm hours ago for the sale of the poppy fields to go through tonight. She caught sight of the kitchen clock. Jake wouldn’t have gone ahead without her say so. “I lost track of the time. Is Jake with you?”
“He’s redrafting the contract. The clause is gone.”
Grace closed her eyes. Why didn’t Ryan’s response feel like a victory? She’d told him she loved him, and he hadn’t believed her.
“Answer me.” Her sister’s impatience cut through Grace’s misery. “The clause was my idea.”
“Your idea?” Grace slumped into a chair, one hand propping up her head while she held the phone to her ear with the other. She didn’t understand.
“The threats are too close. Mum and Dad have been frantic since the break-in, agonising about whether they should return, cancel the sale.” Her sister’s answer made no sense. Her parents had no option but to sell the farm. “Jake ran it past Ryan this morning. Ryan agreed.”
Grace fumbled through her sister’s clarification to the key point. “The clause wasn’t Ryan’s idea?”
“More window-dressing for the local rumour mill, making it clear Ryan had first option to buy Blue Sky if it went on the market again.” Ella might look all yummy mummy, but her brain was as sharp as her husband’s.
“You should have told me.” Grace’s stomach churned. Realising what she’d done, a wave of nausea shook her.
“We needed Ryan to agree first. Another bit of protection for you. Someone we know we can trust.” Ella skewered Grace.
They did trust Ryan, a test she’d failed, with her surrender to past fears and malicious gossip. “I have to go.” She had to crawl under a hay bail and hide.
“Not. Before. You. Answer. Me.” Her sister separated each word with intent.
Grace heard Kit’s gurgle and imagined Ella placing her hand on the child’s head for mutual comfort, much like Ryan touched Satan.
Ella repeated, “What did you say?”
“You should have told me.” Grace shivered, cold dread creeping through her. “Should have asked me. Should have warned me.”
Should have stopped me from accusing Ryan.
“Are you crying?” Ella switched from exasperation to concern.
“No.” But Grace touched her cheek and found it wet.
“Jake was going to explain to you. That’s why he asked you to call.” Her sister made their actions sound so reasonable.
“What did Ryan say?” Grace asked. He’d been quick, ringing Jake within minutes of her departure. Severing his connection to her at a speed to leave her breathless.
“Not much. He’d changed his mind, didn’t think it was a good idea. What did you say to him?” Ella resumed her cross-examination.
“That I didn’t trust him. That he’d shamed me by letting everyone know I was his lover.” Grace’s breath emerged as a sob. “That I loved him.”
“Oh, baby,” Ella crooned, instantly Grace’s supportive big sister.
“He didn’t believe me.” Because she’d used the words as a lash to whip him. “I’m scared of how I’ll feel when he leaves town.”
“So you’re pushing him away.” Ella’s insight hit Grace like a nudge from a bull.
She loved him. She knew he’d go. A locked-in first option on the farm gave a ruthless man incredible leverage over her future. Only Ryan wasn’t a ruthless man. Her emotions were as messy as when she’d shouted at him as a fifteen-year-old. She’d been trying to protect herself from a second abandonment. Instead, she’d pushed him away. “I ruined everything,” she whispered.
Ella didn’t answer, and the silence crowded Grace.
“What aren’t you telling me?” Grace’s hand climbed to her throat.
“He wants seventy-two hours to think about the purchase,” her sister admitted.
“I don’t have much more than that.” The churning in Grace’s stomach picked up speed.
“He wants to think about it,” Ella emphasised. “That’s all he said.”
“If he doesn’t buy the river paddocks, I’m finished.” Grace no longer cared. Her accusation had been criminally unfair. Gossip and her uncertainty about Ryan’s feelings for her had been the trigger. Ryan had told her not to let it get to her. She’d listened and absorbed the poison.
“He hasn’t withdrawn the offer.” Ella sounded uncertain.
Yet! Grace heard the yet and couldn’t blame Ryan when she’d called him a liar and a cheat. She covered her mouth with her hand as her stomach heaved. “I have to go.”
“Will you be okay?” Ella paused. “What a stupid question. I love you, Grace. I’ll ring tomorrow.”
“Talk soon.” She dropped the phone on her run to the bathroom, reaching the toilet in time to be violently sick. When the second bout of nausea hit, she was already on her knees, hugging the bowl, her body trembling.
She cleaned herself up, fed Bailey—back home after his stint at the vet’s—and was about to crawl into bed, for the warmth, for the hoped-for oblivion, when the headlights lit the drive. A vehicle was slowly approaching the house. She hit the external lights and walked back onto the veranda, torn between hope Ryan had come to see her and fear she’d disgrace herself by throwing up again. Then she recognised Bluey’s van.
Swinging himself out, he loped towards her, stopping a few feet away. “Ryan called. Said he couldn’t get here tonight.”
Tears spilled onto her cheeks, and she knuckled them away. “You don’t have to stay. I’m fine.”
“We’re not having that argument again.” He took her arm. “Let’s get you inside.”
She sat at the kitchen table, sniffled and then blew her nose. Ryan had withdrawn his support. She had the independence she’d claimed to want. She hadn’t known the price she’d have to pay—this awful sensation of being hollowed out, as if some part of her was missing.
Bluey glanced at her surreptitiously from time to time as he busied himself heating soup and making toast. She pretended a confidence she didn’t feel, chatting about the new calves and the seaweed-based feed she wanted to experiment with. She ran out of small talk.
Seventy-two hours. Three sleeps short of disaster. If Ryan bought the land, she’d hate herself. If he cancelled the sale, she’d hate herself. She’d messed up. Crossing her arms on the table, she lowered her head. The truth in all the obscene taunts—that he didn’t love her—had festered inside her, destroying what they did have. They’d been friends.
Bluey brought the soup and buttered toast to the table. “Eat some, Gracie. You need to eat and sleep. There’s another day tomorrow.”
Lifting her head, she forced a weak smile. “I’ll do the morning milking. You start at six as normal.”
“We’ll do the morning milking.” He brushed a hand over her head before he went to collect his own food, as her father might, and the love in the gesture had tears spilling over. “Your only flaw, girl, is not letting people close enough to help.”
“You know why.” She picked up a spoon. Things were bad when Bluey chastised her.
“That was a long time ago. Bull-headed independence can be a blessing or a curse. It took me a long time to learn that. Don’t make my mistake.”
When they finished eating, she carried their bowls to the sink before turning to face him. “You can’t stay here every night. You have your own life.”
“We’re talking less than a week.” Bluey knew how much time she had left. “Don’t know how that news got out, but it’s common knowledge.” He also knew Ryan didn’t want to see her anymore.
She hunched a shoulder. “Ryan suspects someone at the bank is either indiscreet or deliberately providing a running commentary on the status and timing of my loan.”
“If that’s the case, the world will know it’s on hold.” Bluey pulled on his ear. Was her entire life fodder for gossip?
“Unless Ryan buys some land, I don’t have a deposit.”
“I know.” He rose to his feet. “I’ll sleep in the other house. See you at four.” Bluey had just confirmed the seriousness of the threat against her. Ryan and her family had been trying to give her what she claimed she most wanted, and she’d thrown Ryan’s help back in his face.
When she crawled into bed, she replayed every act of kindness Ryan had shown her until she fell asleep. Her dreams were filled with memories of their lovemaking, when he’d smiled at her the first time, when he’d reached for her as if touching her, holding her was all that mattered. Loving him was all that mattered to her. Afraid of waiting for him to end their affair, she’d thrown a stick of dynamite on the bonfire.
* * *
Ryan settled comfortably into what was probably Bluey’s chair. With Bluey staying over at Grace’s, he’d invited himself to dinner with his mother. It wasn’t often he found her alone. That was a good thing, since he’d been gone eight of the last ten years and would be off again soon. She’d answered his questions about his father, his childhood, about why she’d stayed when Ryan had offered more than once to bankroll her to leave. Grace had been right about his mother not wanting to leave Danny. Plus, she had good friends in the valley and town who’d supported her emotionally after Danny had died.
“And there’s Bluey.” She gave a private smile.
“It took me a while to wake up to that.” Ryan’s only excuse was the punishing days he’d worked when he returned, using work to block out other memories.
“He’s a gentle, decent man.” She’d never liked idle hands and continued now with her knitting, the clacking of the needles a musical accompaniment to match the ebb and flow of conversation, sometimes fast, sometimes silent, mostly steady.
“I’ve worked that out for myself. Why aren’t you married?”
“He wasn’t sure you’d approve.” Ryan’s mother dropped her hands and her knitting into her lap to look at him.
“Why is my opinion even relevant?” He’d never considered they were waiting for some kind of approval from him.
“You’re my son. I value your opinion. Bluey knows that.” She pinned Ryan with the clear gaze he’d treasured every day of his childhood and missed every day of his exile.
