and this was the result…
He didn’t need any more distraction.
And she didn’t actually know his phone number.
But…
But.
‘You reckon the puppies can do without you for a few minutes?’ she asked Marilyn. ‘I know this is a big ask, but it’s dark on the beach and I wouldn’t mind company.’
Dom was going nuts, pacing in the darkness, waiting for news. More than anything else, he wanted to join the searchers, to yell his lungs out as half the town was doing. But Graham was right. He had to be accessible if Nathan needed to be coaxed out of hiding.
The country west of the road was wild and mountainous. A little boy would lose himself quickly.
And stay lost?
The thought didn’t bear thinking, but it was with him and it wouldn’t go.
Nathan had been gone for two hours. Terrified, he could have travelled fast.
I’ll be crossed off the list of foster-parents after this, he thought grimly. Even if Nathan was found. He’d had to do a hard sell to be allowed to take these two boys. Both, it had been argued, would be safer in a secure facility.
And suddenly he thought, I wouldn’t mind keeping them.
The thought was like a sunbeam piercing through thick cloud. To keep these boys…To give emotional commitment, long term…
He’d been walking back and forth along the headland behind the house, watching the moonlit beach, desperate to see a small figure struggling home. But the tide was almost full. Nathan would have to be off the beach. There was nowhere to hide there.
The thought wasn’t fading. He wouldn’t mind keeping them.
Martin and Nathan.
He’d had Martin for six months now, and Nathan for only a little less. It was the longest he’d ever had kids.
They were great little boys, brimful of potential. Scarred by life, they were starting to emerge from that scarring and become great.
Every other child he’d cared for he’d said goodbye to with a sense of relief. His plan-what he did for all of them-was to care for them while there was a threat, then pass them on. Tansy did the warm and fuzzy stuff. She’d divorced early from a bad marriage. She loved the kids. He provided the house, the security. She did the rest.
But now…
He wanted more.
And he wanted Erin.
After two days?
Stupid.
Only maybe it wasn’t stupid. What if such a thing really existed? His mother had believed in it with her whole heart. Love at first sight.
What if Erin was…it?
She was messing with his head. Erin. Nathan. Erin.
Martin. Marilyn.
Erin.
His…family?
Okay, so she’d just walk slowly along the beach. Carefully, so her feet didn’t hurt. She wasn’t holding anyone up and she couldn’t get lost. She was her own personal little search party.
Marilyn strolled a couple of hundred yards with her, then looked apologetically up at her. I have my pups, her look said. But I’d rather be doing what you’re doing.
She turned and headed sedately back along the beach.
So it was dark and she was alone, with just a torch for company. She couldn’t go much further, anyway. Half a mile from her house the headland became rocky and hard to negotiate. She’d found the torch in the kitchen cupboard but she didn’t know how long the battery would last. The last thing she wanted was to become another person on the lost list.
Okay, she conceded finally. Dom was right. Her feet hurt. And she’d run out of beach. The cliffs loomed dark and dangerous. There was no way Nathan could get round here at high tide.
But a little voice was still whispering. If he’d tried and the tide had come in…
She should go home.
But first…
Crazy or not, she picked her way over the rocks, as far as she could before it got downright dangerous. Then she stared out into the night, waiting for there to be a pause in the crash of the surf.
Waiting.
Then, ‘Nathan!’ She yelled it with all the power she could muster.
She ached to hear. She wanted to hear so much that when she did she thought she was imagining it.
But no. It was a child’s thin voice, high and terrified.
‘Help me.’
Dammit, he’d ring her.
He’d rung every set of searchers. He’d paced so long he was practically paced out. He was going crazy.
Nathan. Nathan.
And along with it, like an echo, Erin. Erin.
Erin couldn’t help. But he could just…phone. He had her number to let her know when Nathan was found.
It wasn’t a real weakness. It wasn’t like he was admitting he needed her. He was just giving her an update.
Four rings. Five.
It switched to the message bank.
The phone would be inside and she’d be outside, pacing. He knew it as surely as he knew himself.
He knew her. And he’d hurt her.
She’d offered to be with him and he’d knocked her back-but it was more than offering to be with him. That was why he’d sent her away. They both knew what was happening between them.
Hell, his head was doing him in. He wanted Nathan to be found so he could concentrate on something else.
Like Erin.
‘She seems lovely.’ It was Ruby, coming up behind him.
He groaned.
‘Nathan’ll be safe,’ Ruby said with quiet confidence. ‘You kids used to run away all the time. The townspeople won’t give up till they find him.’ She tucked her arm into his. ‘You have a whole community of caring. Not bad for a loner.’
‘I’m not.’
‘A loner?’ She put her wrinkled hand into his and held hard. ‘I know. As I said, she seems lovely.’
‘Ruby, it’s way too soon. I’ve known her for less than three days.’
‘It’s never too soon,’ she said serenely. ‘You’ve been waiting all your life for this. Don’t be ridiculous.’
‘She’s not answering her phone.’
She picked her way gingerly over the rocky outcrop. The cliff face was sheer, but part of the cliff had caved in years before to form a sort of path between cliff and sea.
She climbed maybe two hundred yards, her torch playing out ahead, trying to see where the cry had come from.
Once she slipped. She fell, only a couple of feet but it scared her. She clambered back, vaguely aware her phone was ringing.
Nathan was screaming again and she forgot about her phone. For now it wasn’t a come-and-get-me scream. It was a scream of sheer terror. From the sea.
