Miranda Lee - Aunt Lucy's Lover

Jessica was given a brief but all-encompassing appraisal. ‘You don’t look much like your mother, do you?’

She certainly didn’t. Her mother had been petite and fair with blue eyes.

Still, Jessica’s heart leapt at Evie’s observation.

‘You knew my mother?’

‘Well, of course I knew your mother, lovie! I’ve lived on this island for near nigh forty years now. Everyone knows everyone around here. You’ll soon learn that. I knew your grandparents, too. Come on,’ Evie urged, taking her arm. ‘Let’s get out of this crowd and into some fresh air.’

Jessica allowed herself to be led down some steps and out into a half-empty car park. Her thoughts were whirling. If Evie had known her grandparents, did that mean they’d lived here on this island, as well? Had her aunt and her mother been born here? Were her family islanders?

The desire to bombard Evie with questions was great, but something held Jessica back for the moment. Probably an instinctive reluctance to admit she was so ignorant about her own past.

Or was she afraid to find out the truth, now that it was within her grasp?

‘The car’s over here,’ Evie said.

It was a Mazda. Small, white, dented and dusty. It was also unlocked, with the keys in the ignition.

Jessica could not believe her eyes. ‘Er, don’t you think you should have locked your car?’ she said as she climbed into the passenger seat, not wanting to criticise but unable to keep silent.

Evie laughed. ‘No one locks their car on Norfolk Island, lovie. You’ll get used to it.’

‘I doubt it,’ Jessica muttered, shaking her head. Imagine doing such a silly thing in Sydney!

‘Think about it,’ Evie said, starting up the engine. ‘Where are they going to go if they steal it?’

Jessica had to admit that was true, but she knew she’d still be locking the car doors, no matter what the locals did.

‘It’s not my car, actually,’ Evie added as she angled her way out of the car park. ‘It used to belong to Lucy, but she gave it to Sebastian before she died.’

Jessica frowned at this news. So Mr. Slade had been given something, after all. Okay, so it wasn’t much of a car but maybe he’d been given other gifts, as well. For all she knew, her aunt might have handed over quite a degree of money to her loyal and loving companion before she died. It would explain why he’d received nothing in the will.

‘This is the main street,’ Evie piped up. ‘A lot of the shops have duty-free goods, you know. It’s one of the main pastimes for visitors. Shopping.’

There were, indeed, a lot of shops lining the road. Some of them were open but most looked pretty well deserted, as were the sidewalks. There was a young boy on a bike, plus a middle-aged couple wandering along, hand in hand. It looked as quiet and dead a place as Jessica had originally thought.

‘It’s pretty slow on a Sunday,’ Evie said. ‘Things will be hopping here tomorrow.’

Jessica decided Evie’s idea of hopping might be a fraction different from her own.

‘Sebastian seemed to think you might want me to come in and do the shopping and cooking while you’re here, like I did for Lucy,’ Evie rattled on. ‘He’s been looking after himself and the place since Lucy’s death, though I do drop by occasionally to give the house a dust through. I only live next door and men never think of dusting.’

‘That was kind of you, Evie. Yes, I think I would like you to do that. I’ll pay you whatever Lucy did. Will that be all right?’

Evie waved her indifference to talking about payment. ‘Whatever. I don’t really need the money,’ she said. ‘My husband left me plenty when he died. I just like to keep busy. And I love cooking. Eating, too.’ She grinned over at Jessica. ‘So what do you like to eat? Do you have any favourite foods or dishes?’

‘Not really. I’m not fussy at all. Cook whatever you like. I’ll just enjoy being pampered for a change. Cooking is not one of my strong points.’

Actually, she could cook quite well, had had to when she was growing up to survive. If she’d waited for her mother to cook her a meal she would have starved. But she didn’t fancy cooking for Mr. Slade. It had also crossed her mind that she’d be able to question Evie with more ease if she was around the house on a regular basis.

‘That’s fixed, then,’ Evie said happily. ‘I’ll come in every morning around eleven-thirty and make lunch. Then I’ll come back around five to cook dinner for seven-thirty. I don’t do breakfast. Lucy always did that for herself. How does that sound?’

‘Marvellous.’ Jessica sighed her satisfaction with the arrangement and settled back to look around some more.

The wide streets of the shopping centre were quickly left behind and they moved onto a narrower road, with what looked like farms on either side. A few cows grazed lethargically along the common. The Mazda squeezed past a truck going the other way, then a car, then a utility, Jessica noting that Evie exchanged waves with all three drivers as they passed by.

She commented on this and was told it was a local custom, and that even the tourists got into the spirit of the Norfolk Island wave within a day of arrival. Jessica was quietly impressed with their friendliness, despite cynically thinking that if all Sydney drivers did that in city traffic, everyone would go barmy. Still, it was rather sweet, in a way.

‘Here we are,’ Evie announced, slowing down and turning into a gateway that had a cattle grid between its posts and an iron archway above, which said with proud simplicity, Lucy’s Place.

The gravel driveway rose gradually, any view either side blocked with thickly wooded Norfolk pines. Finally, the pine borders ceased, and there in front of Jessica was the most beautiful old wooden house she had ever seen. Painted cream, with a green pitched iron roof and huge wooden verandas all round, it stood on the crest of the hill with a stately grandeur and dignity that were quite breathtaking.

Jessica was surprised, both by its elegant beauty and its effect on her. She’d heard of falling in love at first sight, but she’d always thought of that in connection with a man, not a house.

A sudden movement on the veranda snapped her out of her astonished admiration. Someone had been sitting there and was now standing up and moving towards the front steps. A man, dressed in shorts and nothing else, holding a tall glass in his hand. A young man with shoulder-length fair hair.

He stopped and leant against one of the posts at the top of the steps and watched as Evie brought the car round to a halt at the base of the front steps.

Jessica frowned at him through the passenger window. This couldn’t be Mr. Slade, surely. She couldn’t see the details of his face—it was in shadow—but that was not the body of a middle-aged man. Or the hair.

Maybe he was a workman. A gardener, perhaps. Or the man who mowed the lawns. There were plenty to mow, she’d noted, the house set in huge rolling lawns. There was quite a bit of garden, as well, beds of flowers underneath the verandas, backed by multicoloured hibiscus bushes.

‘I see Sebastian made it back from fishing in time to greet you,’ Evie said, shattering Jessica’s delusion over the man’s identity.

He straightened as the car braked to a halt, lifting the glass to his lips and at the same time taking a step forward out of the shadow of the veranda. Jessica sucked in a sharp breath as sunlight fell upon silky golden locks and smooth bronzed shoulders. He continued drinking as he walked slowly down the steps, taking deep swallows and seemingly unconscious of his quite extraordinary beauty.

A couple of drops of water fell from the base of the frosted glass onto his almost hairless chest, Jessica’s fascinated eyes following them as they trickled down to pool in his navel, which was sinfully exposed above the low-slung white shorts.