‘We can’t cancel the event,’ Nina said pointedly. ‘But we still have two weeks after that to decide if we’re going to get married.’
Scotty sighed. He seemed to be doing that a lot lately. ‘I gave you my word. I won’t let you down.’
‘Mr Decisive,’ she said. ‘Solver of the world’s problems. Don’t forget, Scotty, that you don’t have to cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.’
‘That sounds like something straight out of the yoga handbook.’
Nina arched an eyebrow. ‘Maybe it is, but it doesn’t make it any less true.’ Her tone turned serious. ‘I’m giving you an out. No strings attached. It’s up to you.’
‘Thank you,’ Scotty said. ‘I’ll think about it.’
But he knew he wouldn’t call off the wedding. He’d made a promise to Nina and she didn’t deserve to have her life turned upside down because her fiancé had a schoolboy crush he couldn’t get over. Scotty’s word was his bond. He always did what he said he would.
There was no reason to cancel the wedding anyway. He knew where Claire stood. She didn’t want him. She had been unequivocal about that – he’d just been too hard-headed to see it. In fact, Scotty understood now that Claire had been telling him for years that she could do without his love. It was time he started listening.
‘Come on,’ she said. ‘Let’s get back to our party. People will be wondering where we’ve got to.’
Nina turned and went back down the path to the beach. Somehow, Scotty managed to put one leaden foot in front of the other and trail after her.
He followed his wife-to-be back to a celebration for their sham wedding, while the woman he’d always dreamed he would marry was out there somewhere, alone, in the dark.
The shrill ring of her mobile phone roused Claire from sleep on Thursday morning. She sat up with a start, her head spinning. Her mouth felt as dry as the sand on Bindallarah Beach. But this wasn’t a hangover. She hadn’t had a single drink at Scotty and Nina’s party.
This was actual sand. She had fallen asleep on the beach and she was covered in it. Claire felt parched and shaky. She figured the salty air had made her dehydrated – that or the hours of violent sobbing she’d enjoyed the night before.
Without warning, a deluge of gut-wrenching snapshots of the evening crashed into her brain with the force of a rogue wave catching a swimmer unawares. Realising she’d wasted months trying to delude herself that she wasn’t still in love with Scotty, when all he needed to hear was that she was. Learning he’d been ready to give them a second – or was it a third? – chance if only Claire had managed to stop vacillating long enough to make a decision.
Finally understanding that Scotty would not be coming back to her. Ever.
Claire fought back a fresh batch of tears as the magnitude of her loss sank in. She had squandered her last chance to have the love of the only man who had ever made her happy – and she hadn’t even known she was doing it.
Her phone trilled insistently and with trembling fingers Claire retrieved it from her bag. Good old Bindy, she thought as she saw that her wallet and keys were still in there. Searching for her belongings after waking up on a Sydney beach wouldn’t be such a heartening experience, she knew.
Claire frowned as she saw Jackie’s name flash up on the screen. She had been keeping her friend up to date on the disaster that was her life in Bindallarah via text message, but they hadn’t spoken since Claire had left Sydney nearly two weeks earlier.
‘Jackie?’ she said by way of a greeting. ‘What’s up?’
She expected Jackie to launch into a detailed description of some horse emergency she needed help with. Instead she said, ‘Thirty days.’
Claire’s brain was still too foggy to say anything more intelligent than ‘Huh?’
‘I’ve been thinking about your one-and-only’s shotgun wedding,’ Jackie said.
‘It’s not a shotgun wedding, Jac. Nina’s not pregnant. I’ve seen her sink half a bottle of rosé in one go.’ It was a catty thing to say, but she couldn’t muster any magnanimity at this hour. She recalled the horrified look that had crossed Nina’s face when Claire had jokingly mentioned her future grandchildren the day they’d gone dress shopping. She was certain no bundles of joy were imminent.
‘Maybe not, but something just didn’t sit right with me about it,’ Jackie went on.
‘That makes two of us.’
‘Right? So I finally got around to doing a little bit of googling.’ Jackie suddenly fell silent.
‘And?’ Claire prompted. Her friend was acting like Hercule Poirot laboriously explaining how he’d solved a murder mystery.
‘And it turns out you can’t get hitched in New South Wales until you’ve lodged a Notice of Intended Marriage,’ she said triumphantly.
‘So? I’m sure Scotty and Nina are on top of the paperwork.’ Claire frowned.
‘No,’ Jackie said, and Claire could practically hear her rolling her eyes. ‘You can’t legally get married until thirty days after you lodge that notice. They got engaged on the Friday night of the heat stroke, right?’
It was seeing Scotty in the flesh after eight long years that made that day significant in Claire’s memory rather than Autumn’s first brush with death, but she replied, ‘Yeah.’
‘And Scotty didn’t get back to Brindywoopwoop until the Monday after you saw him here in Sydney?’
‘Bindallarah.’ Jackie was doing it on purpose now, surely. ‘And yes, that’s right.’
‘So even if he and Little Miss Yoga were at the registry to file their form at nine o’clock on the Tuesday morning —’
Claire could suddenly hear her heartbeat pounding in her ears. ‘They can’t legally marry until . . .’ She squeezed her eyes shut and pictured a calendar in her head. ‘The middle of January.’
‘January eighteenth, to be exact,’ Jackie confirmed.
