The Last-Minute Marriage

He had his own problems and they were nothing to do with New York.

Or maybe they were. He walked outside and a car was pulling up before the main house. As he stared in astonishment, out stepped Darrell. Darrell gave him a wave, then walked around the car and opened the passenger door.

Ruby.

‘It was too complex to do from New York.’

They were all seated on the edge of Peta’s veranda. Peta had brought out lemonade and handed it out like a good hostess. She’d ditched her gumboots. Now she sat and swung her feet. One sock had a hole in it. Her toe peeped out.

Marcus was trying to concentrate on two things-what Ruby was saying and Peta’s toe. If anyone had ever told him he’d find a woman’s toe erotic he would have said they were crazy.

Her toe was driving him wild!

‘What was too complex to do from New York?’ he managed and Ruby beamed. She looked thoroughly pleased with herself. Darrell sat by her side and he, too, looked like the cat that had just got the canary.

What had got into the pair of them?

‘It’s about your will,’ Ruby said.

‘My will?’

‘Peta’s aunt’s will,’ Ruby told him, as if humouring a child. ‘For heaven’s sake, Marcus, focus here.’

Ruby-telling him to focus? ‘Okay.’ He put up his hands as if in surrender. ‘Hattie’s will. What about it?’

‘You asked me to find out about it before you left. There wasn’t time for any investigations before you needed to be married, but we’ve done it now.’ She turned to Peta. ‘You told Marcus that your aunt had high calcium levels and was confused in the last weeks of life?’

‘I… Yes.’ Peta frowned. ‘She was a bit confused. She wasn’t all that clear when she left here. I was really worried.’

‘Did you know that your doctor here took blood samples two weeks before she left Australia?’

‘She was having blood tests all the time.’

‘That’s right.’ Ruby pulled a form from her capacious bag. ‘One of the forms Marcus had you sign before you left gave us the power to check medical records. We put in a request for the information on the grounds that she’s now deceased and you stand to lose.’

‘How do I stand to lose?’

‘You stand to lose by her change of will. There’s an earlier will leaving you the farm.’

Peta’s frown deepened. ‘I remember. She always said she wrote one. But that was well before she went back to the States.’

‘Of course it was,’ Ruby told her. ‘And we found it. Our lawyers discovered that Hattie wrote a will two years before she died-long before she got sick-and she lodged it with a Yooralaa solicitor.’

‘What’s that got to do with me?’ Peta asked.

‘That’s why we’ve come,’ Ruby said triumphantly. ‘I knew you two couldn’t do the investigations. You had to stay on the farm and be happily married. I was planning on sending one of Marcus’s solicitors but then I thought, maybe I could do it. And Darrell decided to come, too.’ For the first time she looked a little disconcerted. Embarrassed, Marcus thought, stunned.

But she was moving on.

‘And guess what we’ve found?’ she told them. ‘Hattie’s medical records. Marcus was right. The tests here said her calcium levels were through the roof before she left Australia. Once she had medical attention in the States, her records there confirm it. The calcium levels would force any judge to concede that her judgement was significantly impaired for at least six weeks before her death. Darrell and I have been here for two days and we’ve been working hard. We’ve had legal opinions from Australian lawyers and we’ve had legal opinions from US lawyers. They concur. The new will doesn’t stand, Peta. The farm is yours. Married or not, Charles can’t touch you.’

Peta stared, not immediately comprehending. ‘It’s… The farm’s mine?’

‘It’s yours.’ Ruby was still smiling. She cast a sideways glance at Marcus, expecting him to be pleased. ‘Marcus told me to do everything to get the will overturned. He suspected this.’

‘He suspected…’

‘He wasn’t sure, of course, or he’d never have married you.’

‘No.’ Peta looked blankly at Marcus. ‘No. Of course he wouldn’t.’

‘So now all you have to do is get the marriage annulled,’ Darrell told them. And then he, too, smiled. Teasing. ‘You can use the old non-consummation line. Unless, of course, you have…’

‘No,’ Marcus snapped. ‘We haven’t.’

‘That’s good,’ Ruby told them, her smile fading. She looked from Peta to Marcus and back again, for the first time seeming to sense the deep undercurrents running between them. ‘I’m glad you’ve had that much sense.’

‘Ruby…’

‘Well, that’s what we came to tell you,’ she said, setting down her lemonade glass with a definite clink. ‘Adam and Gloria presented Charles with the legal evidence invalidating the will last night our time. The evidence is indisputable. Peta, the farm is yours and no conditions apply. So… There’s no need to keep on with the marriage. I’ve brought the annulment forms. If you both sign them you can go on with your lives as if this had never happened. Marcus, there’s no need for you to stay.’

‘No.’

‘Unless you want to,’ she added. ‘You really could do with a holiday.’

‘This isn’t much of a holiday,’ Marcus told her and Peta flushed.

‘Our accommodation isn’t quite five-star,’ Peta muttered. She, too, lay down her glass and turned to Marcus. ‘So you can go home?’

‘Yes.’ There was nothing else to say.

‘I need to thank you. So much…’

‘There’s no need.’

‘There is.’ It was an absurdly formal little tableau but there seemed no right way to go forward from here. ‘I can’t… I don’t know how to repay you. If I could think of anything…’

‘My offer still stands,’ Marcus told her while Ruby and Darrell watched in silence.

‘What-to make our marriage last?’

There was an audible intake of breath from Ruby but Marcus didn’t move his gaze from Peta.

‘That’s right.’

‘Marriage when you can fit me around the edges.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ he told her. ‘We could do this. If you’d be prepared to give it a chance…’

‘It doesn’t have a chance.’

‘What doesn’t have a chance?’ Ruby demanded and Peta turned to her, despairing.

‘He wants to build me a mansion, right here, instead of my veranda. He wants to visit for a couple of weeks a year and for the rest of the time he wants to install me in his black marble apartment and keep his bed warm for the twenty minutes a day he can spare for me.’

‘That’s not fair,’ Marcus snapped.

‘What else are you offering?’

‘I run a financial empire, Peta,’ Marcus told her. ‘I’ve never asked anyone else to marry me…’

‘And I should be really grateful,’ Peta told him. ‘I’m sure Cinderella did it really well. But not me.’

‘What else do you want?’ They were almost unaware that Ruby and Darrell were staring, agog. This was too important to be distracted.

‘You.’

‘I don’t know what you mean.’

‘Then figure it out,’ Peta told him. She sighed and her shoulders slumped as the rest of the world appeared to enter her consciousness again. She turned and faced Ruby and Darrell. ‘I’m sorry. You’ve been so good. Do you have to go back to the States immediately or can I put you up here for a night or so? My accommodation’s pretty basic.’