bottlebrush tree on the front path that was so laden with red blossoms it sagged beneath their weight. It took him a moment to realize the hum came from the bees in that tree rather than his shock.
He’d researched Tuncurry on his phone at a roadside restaurant a couple of hours back.
Apparently it was a seaside township purportedly inundated with holidaymakers in the summer, four hours north of Sydney. A glance at his watch told him he’d been on the road for five hours.
Five hours? He hadn’t even had the sense to pack an overnight bag. He dragged both hands back through his hair. He didn’t even have a plan.
He did know the outcome he wanted, though. For Kit to return to Hal am Enterprises.
He pushed out of the car and straightened his tie.
Al he had to do was the right thing. He had to make things right for Kit again so she could go back to the job she loved. End of story.
The gate squeaked when he opened it and the wood and wire fence swayed when the gate slammed back into place behind him. The door to the house stood wide open, but nobody appeared at his first knock, or his second.
He hesitated, then opened the screen door.
‘Hel o?’
The room was empty—unlived in empty. No furniture. No people. He was about to hol er another hel o when a door at what he guessed was the back of the house thudded closed and a few seconds later Kit came tripping into the room wearing faded jeans, a navy-blue singlet top and with her hair scraped back into a ponytail. He cleared his throat. She swung to him and froze in one of the shafts of sunlight that came streaming in through the front windows.
His stomach hol owed out. Dear Lord, she was lovely. A sense of regret stole through him, giving him the strength to push his shoulders back. ‘Hel o, Kit.’ He took two steps into the room and let the screen door close behind him.
‘Alex?’
Two lines creased her forehead. He had an insane urge to walk across and smooth them out.
‘What on earth are you doing here? I thought you’d ring or email, but…’
The sound of a truck screeching to a halt outside had her glancing behind him. ‘You’l have to excuse me for a minute.’ She shook herself, dusted off her hands. ‘It sounds as if my new furniture has arrived.’
She moved past him and out to the veranda to wave to the truck. She smel ed of soap and fresh cotton and she barely spared him a glance. He surveyed the room in an effort to distract himself from the way her jeans hugged the curve of her hips, at the memory of how his hands had traced those curves and how she’d—
His heart started to pound. He gritted his teeth. He glanced to his left, guessing the hal way that opened off there led to the bedrooms and bathroom. Given the proportions of the outside of the house, he’d guess there would be two bedrooms.
The mundane calculations helped settle his heart rate.
Kit half-turned in the doorway, not quite meeting his eyes, and smiled as if he could be anyone. ‘How was Africa?’
‘Amazing.’ He found himself suddenly eager to tel her al about it. He knew she’d appreciate it, that she’d understand. He opened his mouth to find she’d already swung away to greet a burly man with a clipboard.
‘Delivery for Mercer?’
‘That’d be me,’ Kit said with a smile that held genuine warmth, and Alex’s stomach dropped. Kit genuine warmth, and Alex’s stomach dropped. Kit didn’t want to hear about his trip. And there was no conceivable reason on earth why she should be glad to see him.
‘Do you need a hand?’
The burly man glanced at Alex, took in the suit and tie and shook his head. ‘We’l be right, mate. We do this for a living.’ He turned back to Kit. ‘Just tel us where you’d like the stuff.’
Bemused, Alex watched as Kit indicated where she wanted the dining table and chairs—in the smal part of the L-shaped living room, which he discovered adjoined the kitchen with a door that led out to the back garden.
‘I want the dresser there, the sofas here and here, and the entertainment unit against that wal .’
‘Rightio. Oh, and the boss was real y sorry the delivery was delayed so he sent someone to instal those shelves you ordered.’
‘That was kind of him. I want them on that wal there.’
She indicated an internal wal and Alex had never felt more like a third wheel in his life.
She turned to look at him again. And again those two lines creased her forehead. ‘We’l um…be out the back if you need us.’
‘No probs.’
Kit hitched her head in the direction of the back garden and Alex fol owed. Her back garden wasn’t any neater than the front. A row of haphazard azaleas bloomed along the fence to the right. A banksia stood sentinel at the back fence while, to the right, a giant frangipani stood wedged between the back of the house and a garden shed, threatening to push them both over. Some patches of the lawn were more sand than
