If he hadn’t been here…Misty would be trampled, he thought. Misty was no match for this… He couldn’t find words to describe her. Not even Tajikistan had a good one.
‘I have good lawyers,’ Grace snarled and he faced her with disgust.
Maybe a fight through the courts would give the house to Misty, but the thought of it not succeeding, and the thought of what Misty would go through to claim it…
She might not even try. Misty was a giver, and he loved her for it.
‘We need to get this in writing…’ he started but he didn’t finish. The back door slammed open. Misty.
She was standing in the doorway, his crimson bathrobe all but enveloping her. The towel around her hair was striped orange and yellow. Her eyes matched her outfit. They were flashing fire.
‘What do you think you’re doing?’ she demanded and she was talking to them both.
Grace stubbed her cigarette out in her saucer and smiled at her daughter, a cat-that-got-the-cream smile that made Nick feel ill.
‘We’re discussing business,’ she said sweetly. ‘Your man’s being very reasonable. There’s no need for you to get involved.’
‘Nick’s not my man.’
Uh oh. Nick sensed trouble. Where was the woman who’d melted into his arms last night, who’d surrendered completely, utterly, magically? The look she gave him now was one of disbelief. ‘You’re offering to buy my house. From my mother.’
‘We want to live here.’
‘So?’
‘It’s easier, Misty. I’ll just pay her and she’ll leave.’
‘She’s leaving anyway,’ Misty snapped. ‘Grace, get out of my house. Now.’ She picked up the ash-filled saucer and dumped it in the bin. ‘You light up one more cigarette in this kitchen and I’ll have you arrested for trespass.’
‘This is my house.’ Grace looked as stunned as Nick felt. This wasn’t Misty. This was some flaming virago they’d never seen before.
‘You left this house when you were eighteen,’ Misty told her, cold as ice. ‘You came back only when you needed money-or to dump a baby. What gives you the right to walk in now?’
‘They’re my parents,’ Grace hissed. ‘This house has always been waiting…’
‘For you to sell it the moment they’re dead? I don’t think so. Gran left me this house, and its contents.’
‘I’ll contest…’
‘Contest away,’ Misty snapped and Nick could hear unutterable sadness behind the anger. ‘Gran had macular degeneration for the last fifteen years. That’s meant she’s been almost blind. Since I was sixteen I’ve been signing cheques, taking care of all the business. Grandpa left Gran well off but almost all her income has been siphoned to you. You’ve been sending pleading letters. I’ve read them to her and every time she’d sigh and say, “What shall we do, Misty?” To deny you would have killed her. So I’ve sent you cheques, over and over, and every single one was documented. You’ve had far more than the value of this house, yet you couldn’t even find it in you to come to her funeral. I don’t know what gene you were handed when you were born, but I thank God I didn’t inherit it. Gran loved me. She wanted me to have this house and I will.’
‘Misty…’ Nick started and she turned on him then.
‘And don’t you even think of being reasonable. You’re doing this to protect me? Thank you but I don’t need protecting. I’ve had no experience of the real world? Maybe not, but I’m not going to get it with you protecting me. So I’m telling you both what’s going to happen. First, Grace is going to get out. The cheques have stopped. You’re on your own, like it or lump it. And Nick, you want a quiet life? That’s what you can have because I’m leaving, too. Oh, not for ever, just for twelve months. I have a list to work through and for the first time in my life I’m free. I had Gran but she’s dead. I thought I had Ketchup but he has Took and he has you. You and Bailey will love this house. It’s safe…as houses.’
She took a deep breath, holding her arms across her breasts as if she needed warmth. He rose to go to her but she backed away. ‘No. Please, Nick…’ Her anger was fading a little but she seemed determined to hold onto it. ‘This is hard but I have to do it. I know it sounds ungrateful, but…it’s what I’m going to do. Now, I need to go and get dressed. Grace, when I get back here I don’t want to see you. You’ll be gone. Nick will be looking after my house-my house-but it’s my house in absentia.’
They were left looking at each other. Grace looked…old, Nick thought and, despite the shock of Misty’s words, he felt a twinge of pity.
Misty hadn’t called her Mom or Mama or Mother. She’d called her Grace. If Bailey ever looked at him as Misty looked at Grace…
She deserved it. She’d been no mother to Misty, but still…
‘You’d best go,’ he said and Grace looked at him like a wounded dog.
‘I don’t…I can’t. I don’t have any money.’ It was a defeated whine.
He hesitated. There’d been a resounding crash from Misty’s bedroom door. They were safe from her hearing.
Had Misty meant what she said?
Don’t think about that now. Just get rid of Grace. Without Misty knowing?
Definitely without Misty knowing.
He tugged out his chequebook and wrote, and handed over a cheque. Grace stared down at it, stunned.
‘I want the value of the house.’
‘And instead I’m giving you your plane fare back to Perth and enough for approximately six months’ rent. If Misty finds out I’ve done it I’ll cancel the cheque. It’s the last you’ll get off us, Grace, so I suggest you take it and leave.’
‘Us?’ She dragged herself to her feet and regarded him with loathing. ‘It didn’t sound to me like there’s any us. She sounds like she’s leaving.’
‘That’s up to us,’ he said evenly. ‘But you’re leaving first.’
Misty found him on the veranda, in his normal place, in his rocker, dogs at his feet. She was feeling ill.
She’d yelled at him. He didn’t deserve to be yelled at.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said quickly before he could rise. ‘That was dreadful. I sounded like I was a witch. You were only trying to help.’
‘I’d like to help,’ he said. ‘You know I want to marry you.’ He rose and came towards her. ‘I’ll protect you in any way I can.
‘But I don’t want to be protected. Nick, I’m sorry, but I don’t want to marry you. Or…not yet.’
His face stilled. He’d taken her hands but she wouldn’t let her fingers curl around his. She mustn’t.
‘I’ve never taken a risk in my life,’ she said.
‘That’s why I love you.’
‘You see, that’s what I’m afraid of. I won’t be loved because I’m safe.’
That he didn’t understand was obvious. ‘I don’t love you just because you’re safe,’ he told her. ‘I love you because you’re beautiful and warm and big-hearted and fun and…’
‘And safe. I’m someone to share a rocker with.’
‘Misty…’
‘It’s okay,’ she said, feeling unutterably weary. She didn’t want to say this. It would be so easy to sink into the rocker beside him, to wait until Bailey came home, to live happily ever after.
Was there something of Grace inside her? Some heartlessness?
No. She felt cold and fearful and sad, but she knew she was doing the right thing. If she didn’t go now…She’d seen what bitterness could do.
‘If you still want me in a year…’ she said.
‘A year?’
‘I think I can do most of my list in a year.’
‘What list?’
‘It’s a dream,’ she said. ‘I’ve had it since I was little. To fly away, to see something other than this town. Occasionally, when I was little, Grace used to send postcards, from one exotic place after another.’
‘You were jealous of Grace?’