Well, aren’t you?
Her stomach churned. To think a short time ago they’d made love like they didn’t have a problem between them. There wouldn’t be the follow-up long and slow lovemaking session. Not yet, possibly never. ‘I’ve looked into the financial side of setting it up here and in Sydney. Likewise the feasibility of employing nurses, and the medical centres and emergency rooms that might use my agency.’
‘Where have you decided on?’ he ground out.
‘I haven’t come to a final conclusion.’ This was where she should be saying she’d been waiting to talk to him about it and make a joint decision about where they lived. But she was equally riled up now. ‘Cairns would be a lot easier. I know a lot of people here, whereas in Sydney—well, the population’s enormous.’
‘Why is this so important now? Why not four years ago when I signed up for the military and you apparently told me? That would’ve kept you busy and left no time to be lonely.’
‘We were newlyweds and I was busy making a home for us and being there for you whenever you came home. Don’t forget we were living in the married quarters until you went offshore the first time and I chose to return to our apartment.
‘You could’ve run an agency from anywhere. Still can.’ He wasn’t buying it. Also ignoring the reminder she’d given.
‘At the time I had my dream job in the emergency department so thought I’d wait a bit.’
‘You—’
She stabbed the air between them with her finger. ‘Hear me out. After the miscarriage I couldn’t face going into the department every day, pretending all was fine in my world. It was nowhere near. By then I’d been looking into this idea of mine more thoroughly. When I got pregnant...’ gulp ‘...it seemed a great way to still be actively working while at the same time being a stay-at-home mum. For once I was thinking about doing what was important for me. As well as you.’
‘That sounds like an afterthought. You working while raising a child when I can afford for you not to work doesn’t add up to me, and doesn’t tie in with any ideas we had when we talked about having a family.’ Cole was still watching her intently.
‘What about my own self-worth? Doing something that I get enjoyment from? I don’t want to get to my fifties and realise I haven’t followed my dreams too.’ She nodded. ‘I know I’d get that from being a mum if I carried a baby to full term.’ She hesitated. That was a question she’d refused to consider before. But seeing Cole’s bewilderment at her ideas made her face up to reality.
Instantly, his expression softened. ‘Miscarriages are common, and most women go on to have normal pregnancies.’
‘The nurse in me knows that. The want-to-be mum has doubts.’
‘A perfectly normal reaction.’
Her smile was tentative. Were they getting back on side? ‘So I’m normal. Thank goodness for something.’
‘Did I say that?’ Cole smiled back. ‘Not too normal. That’d be boring, and the last thing you are is boring.’
This was all very good but once again they hadn’t finished the discussion that had started with what Cole had done about getting a position in a medical centre. ‘Where do you intend working?’
‘I’d thought Sydney because that’s where we live. Lived.’
Nice to have mentioned it. ‘Have you applied for a place yet?’
‘I’ve got a third and, hopefully, final interview at a medical centre near Rose Bay first thing Monday morning. The partners have intimated the position will probably be mine. It’s quite exciting, and so different from anything I’ve done before. We could find a house in the area, and even have a boat since the harbour’s on the doorstep.’
Bang. Exactly as she’d thought. It was like a fist to the heart. Sydney, whether they agreed or not. Discussed it or not. Added in her requirements or not. Where was the heads together, talk about the pros and cons discussion? ‘Did you come here to tell me you’re going to live and work in Sydney regardless of what I thought?’
‘Jeez, Vicki, give me a break here. I came because I love you and want to get back together.’
‘In Sydney. Near Rose Bay, to be precise.’
‘Yes, because that’s where I’ll probably have a job.’ His excitement was waning. Beginning to understand she mightn’t be rushing to join him wherever he chose. That the divorce was for real.
‘Did it never occur to you to tell me what you were aiming for? Before you went to your first interview?’
‘We hadn’t been talking a lot.’
‘That’s pathetic, Cole. You never even tried to tell me. No wonder this isn’t working. You still expect me to toe the line. Sure, I can have my own business—it just has to be where you decide.’ She stared at him, shaking her head in frustration. ‘I don’t believe this.’
Yet she should. Nothing had changed. Not really, despite everything he’d said this weekend about them being together.
‘Here I was, waiting until we’d worked out if we were still together and then where we’d live before making my final decision on where to set up the agency, and all the while you’ve gone ahead with your own plans. That’s not togetherness, Cole. That’s me following you around again. Even if you’re not going away any more, I’m a partner in our marriage. Or I was.’
Stop. Right. Now. Too much.
But it was how she felt. Hurt, disappointed, humiliated even. She wouldn’t be accused of not telling Cole what she thought. Not now or later, if there was going to be a later.
Cole sank onto a chair and dropped his head in his hands. ‘I thought you’d be pleased I was settling into a long-term job in the city where we’ve always been happy. It was supposed to make you feel sure of me and my motives. Look, I’m here for good, no leaving you to carry all the hard stuff on your own any more.’
The genuineness behind his statement rang loud and clear between them. It still didn’t make the situation acceptable. Vicki pulled out another chair and sat down. Her legs were a bit wobbly and her head was spinning. They’d made wild love as only they could do, kissed until her body melted; laughed, talked, and worked together over the past twenty-four hours. Even argued, spoken of the past and the future, and yet here they were, stuck, unable to move in any direction.
But she wasn’t ready to give up trying. Not yet.
‘Cole, why do you make decisions that involve both of us without saying a word to me first?’ The shock of finding out one day he’d joined the army still had the capability to rock her at times. He hadn’t told her he was actually going to do that either, just mentioned in passing a coup
le of times that he was interested in finding out more about joining up one day.
He stood up, rolled his shoulders. ‘Want a beer? Wine?’
May as well. Nothing else was working. ‘Wine would be nice.’ She was exhausted. Her body ached everywhere. The banging inside her head was worse than ever. It would be a darned sight easier to give up trying to make Cole see her side of this and just go with the flow. A lot simpler. And a lot more frustrating, which would eventually lead right back to this moment.
* * *
Cole returned with their drinks and a plate with Brie and crackers. The nibbles weren’t so much a peace offering as something to quieten his rumbling stomach, which he hoped was caused by hunger and not despair of ever getting things right with Vicki again. Probably kidding himself there.
He didn’t sit, instead leaned against one of the pillars holding the roof over the deck and sipped his beer. Vicki was watching him, waiting for an explanation. A long overdue one, true, and still difficult to deliver. More so because he’d shied away from it for so long. But this was the right time. Now or never, and never meant not being able to win Vicki back. ‘I did tell you I was accused of stealing some money from a local charity in our town.’
Her gaze didn’t waver. ‘You were cleared of it. Or so you said.’
‘I was.’ And that was as much as he’d ever told her.
‘I don’t understand how you could’ve been accused in the first place. You’re not the kind of person who’d do anything like that.’
Warmth filled him briefly. ‘Thank you for that.’ He sipped his beer before continuing. ‘If only others had reacted the same way. The town was in an uproar, not because the amount of money taken was well over ten thousand dollars but that anyone would steal from the charity at all. That I would. The fact I came from a well-off family seemed to make it a worse crime in everyone’s eyes.’
‘As in your family and friends?’
He nodded abruptly, swallowed the bile that question had brought on. ‘At first Mum and Dad accepted I was guilty. Then they began listening to me and finally admitted they’d been wrong. Dad tried to make up for it by ignoring those who believed I was guilty and burying himself in work more than ever. Mum became more withdrawn as the loss of her friends hit home.’