Winter Beginnings Read online

  She was unable to elaborate, because everyone joined them then, ready for the big unveil. Liv bumped companionably against his shoulder then pulled her phone from her pocket. She quickly dialled a number, pressed a few buttons, then Sam’s face filled the screen.

  ‘Hi!’ she said excitedly. Dean could hear the rumble of conversations and shouts of laughter in the background as Sam moved to a quieter spot in the yard. ‘Are they ready?’

  ‘Yep, I’ll just turn you around.’

  Liv moved the phone and gave Sam a prime view of the newly installed window. Cal and Ethan smiled at each other and Dean found himself wishing that Alice and Ben were here. If he managed to win Alice’s heart, this would be a moment they’d missed.

  Ethan and Dean stood to one side of the frame, each staring at the opaque film of protective plastic covering the two large panes of glass. Ethan stretched high to peel the corner from the topmost pane, and Dean crouched to do the same to the lower one. Their eyes met, there was a beat of reverence, then both of them pulled the film free of the window, laughing as they bumped into each other.

  When the film fluttered to the ground, they stood back and looked through the glass at the new view: at the low hills in the distance, the bald trees scattered throughout the grazing fields and the big grey clouds that had the town in their sights. A car streaked through the scene in the far distance, its headlights on despite the hour, lighting the way through the winter gloom.

  Dean raised his arms from his sides and his kids appeared under them. Nina’s small fingers hooked in the side pocket of his jeans. She rested her head against him and sighed. ‘Lay beautiful.’

  Chapter 20

  Ben had moved his chair over by the window, which meant he’d had to move his Avengers clock too. Exhaustion was making his eyes heavy and sometimes his arms and legs didn’t move as fast as he wanted them to. He’d slapped himself in the face—he’d seen someone do that in a movie once—but he’d accidentally poked his eye, so now he was still tired, but with a sore eye.

  It was twenty minutes past one AM. His mum had never stayed out this late before, and Ben was moving past worry to distress. When he’d called her phone, he’d followed the sound of its ringtone into her bedroom and found it under a sock.

  Now cradling the phone between his hands, Ben leaned forward in his chair and tried to see far into the night, along the length of the country road and around the bend that led to Yarram, the town he didn’t like as much as Denman. But there was only black and the noise of rain.

  Ben shook his legs to keep them awake, and continued to wait.

  When two circles of light appeared around the distant curve in the road, he stood. His mum didn’t know he waited up for her each night, but that was going to change. He was going to march downstairs and tell her never to keep him waiting like this again. He wasn’t going to cry—he was twelve. But he wasn’t going to take no for an answer, either.

  The lights grew larger, then he could hear the whoosh of tyres on the road. He was about to turn and rush downstairs when the car shot past the house, leaving only the inky night in its wake.

  Ben stared, his heart beating wildly, his mouth open, then he dropped back onto his seat, opened the contacts list on his mum’s phone, selected a number and dialled.

  The voice that answered was muffled and disorientated. ‘Alice?’

  ‘Dean?’

  There was a sudden rustling on the other end of the line.

  ‘Ben, what’s going on? Where’s your mother?’

  ‘I don’t know. She’s late. Really late. I don’t know what to do.’

  ‘You have her phone,’ Dean said, amongst more hurried noises, ‘but you haven’t heard from her?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘When did she leave the house?’

  ‘At four.’

  ‘Four?’ Ben didn’t hear what Dean said next; it was muffled and angry. ‘Ben, I’m getting in my car now and I’m coming over. Check it’s me before you open the door and call me back if your mum comes home, okay?’

  ‘Okay.’ Ben hung up and stared at the lit screen until it went black. Dean was coming. Dean liked his mum; he’d find her. And Dean could tell her not to stay out so late too. She might not listen to her son, but she would have to listen to her boss.

  Ben’s relief ebbed away. What if Dean wanted to know why she was out so late? His mum had asked Ben never to tell anyone she worked two jobs, but what else could he say?

  Ben went downstairs and dragged a kitchen chair over to the front door to wait. He felt sick with nerves and hoped more than ever that his mum got home soon. She could think of something to tell Dean when he got here. She could protect her secret because Ben didn’t know how to.

  And didn’t know if he wanted to anymore.

  * * *

  A little over twenty minutes later, Dean had Ben sitting in his car. Understanding and fear were duking it out in Dean’s body. Finally, the mystery was solved—Alice had a second job. But she hadn’t returned home from it tonight.

  He wanted to believe that she’d stayed late to have a drink. She didn’t know Ben waited up for her, so she might have thought it would go unnoticed. But if she hadn’t lingered, if she’d left on time with every intention of coming straight home …

  Ben had left a note on the kitchen table explaining that he and Dean were looking for her, just in case she returned to an empty house and freaked out, but Dean privately thought this night wouldn’t resolve itself that way. The boy was belted into the passenger seat, his eyes wide and his mother’s phone clutched to his chest. Alice would ring her number if she was trying to reach Ben and he didn’t pick up the landline. Or if anyone else was trying to reach Ben, they might call Alice’s mobile …

  He shook his head to loosen that thought before it could find a foothold. He would not think of hospitals and sombre voices calling with news, he would only think of finding Alice, hugging her tightly, and reuniting her with her son.

  ‘I’m glad you called me,’ Dean told Ben, wanting to break the silence between them and give the kid something else to think about besides maybes and what ifs.

  The light rain fell ceaselessly on the windshield as they drove towards the function centre Ben had said Alice worked at, and the rhythmic rub of the wipers was calming. Dean tried to slow his jogging heart to match them, but failed.

  ‘Do you love my mum?’ Ben asked. His fingers flexed on the phone.

  ‘Yeah, buddy.’ No fear, no hesitation—loving Alice wasn’t anywhere near as terrifying as not knowing what had happened to her tonight.

  Ben nodded. ‘Okay. That’s good.’ He swallowed.

  Dean followed a bend in the road, watching for wildlife and keeping close to the outer white line on the tarmac. They hadn’t passed a car yet. There was only darkness around them and two lines of light ahead, illuminating the slumbering countryside. He wondered if she’d hit a kangaroo or if she’d broken down somewhere, and had to force himself not to lower his foot on the accelerator.

  ‘Why didn’t Nina and Rowan come?’

  ‘They’re in bed. Ethan went over to keep an eye on them.’

  ‘They’re so lucky. They have so many people around all the time.’

  Dean glanced at Ben, then back at the road. ‘Would you like me to be around more?’

  ‘Yeah. Lots more.’

  ‘I’m going to ask your mum if she’d like that too. That okay?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Well, there you go. One big gesture, coming up.

  Dean was wondering what to say next when a brief flash of white distracted him. It was gone before he’d fully realised it was there. He looked in his rear-view mirror beyond the faint red hue of his rear lights, but saw nothing. The car slowed as he lifted his foot from the accelerator.

  Dean put on his left indicator and contemplated the twisting road ahead. Instinct told him to turn around. His headlights had reflected off something that hadn’t been a trick of the night or a seeking imagination. Something
was on the roadside, among the trees.

  He checked for non-existent traffic then carefully executed a three-point turn. Now that the headlights were burning in the right direction, he could see a car. A white Holden Commodore, just like the one that had driven off with his Friday night plans.

  Ben lunged forward in his seat so fast his seatbelt seized. ‘Is that Mum’s car?’

  Dean couldn’t decide whether he hoped it was or wasn’t. He eased off the verge and into the grass, turned his hazard lights on and killed the engine. ‘Ben, listen to me.’ He waited until Ben prised his gaze from the car and looked over at him. ‘Stay in this car.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘I mean it. Stay here.’ He kept a stern stare on Ben until he was out of the car, then shut the driver’s door and carefully approached the Commodore.

  There were deep tyre tracks leading from the road. The driver had missed the bend at full speed then turned sharply, just in time to avoid colliding with a tree. Dean knew it was Alice’s car when he saw the indent on the left rear bumper—he’d noticed it weeks ago and wondered what had caused it. His pace quickened. Careful not to slip in the mud, he rounded the boot and gaped at the hand’s width distance between the car and the trunk of the enormous gum tree.

  She wasn’t in the driver’s seat, nor were the airbags deployed. Had she seriously walked off into the night?

  Dean could feel the frenetic drumming of his heart all over his body—everything seemed to pulse with anxiety.

  The slick ground had near-swallowed the tyres. The car had embedded itself in thick, viscous mud and would need to be towed, and the woman whom Dean was in love with—the very same woman he’d decided life was too short to live without—was nowhere to be seen. This fact darkened an already coal-black night.

  ‘Mum?’ There was a sucking, squelching sound as Ben’s shoes sunk into the mud. ‘Mum?’ His voice was changed by fear.

  Dean stepped away from the abandoned car and went to Ben. He was surprised the kid had stayed in the car at all, and he couldn’t find it in himself to be cross, not when they were both desperate and frightened, not when Alice could have been here, hurt or worse. ‘She’s not here, buddy. She missed the tree and the airbag’s still in, so she didn’t crash.’ Dean squeezed Ben’s shoulder and considered the scene. ‘Just came off the road, by the looks of it.’

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘Could be walking for help.’

  ‘Is she hurt?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Dean said, not wanting to guess, ‘but there wasn’t any blood or anything like that, okay? I reckon she gave herself a nasty fright, couldn’t get the car started and maybe waved someone down or something. She didn’t have her phone, remember.’

  ‘What do we do now?’

  He was so pale, Dean thought. ‘We keep looking.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘We’re closer to her work than we are to your house, so she’d walk back to the function centre, don’t you think?’

  Ben nodded. ‘Yeah.’

  Dean moved to squeeze Ben’s arm, but Ben misunderstood and took his hand. It was a young thing for a boy Ben’s age to do, but Dean understood Ben’s need to hold onto something. A moment passed, the two of them standing in the night, soaked in the headlights of Dean’s car, hands linked and expressions sombre. Dean waited for the swirling, hot sensation in his chest to subside.

  They walked back to the car, climbed in and buckled up without speaking.

  When Dean had turned the car around and they were back on the road, he searched his mind for something comforting to say. Something that was true. He didn’t want to make promises or baseless assumptions; truthfully, he didn’t want to say anything at all, but this expectant, dread-filled silence needed to be conquered. It had to be a good thing Alice hadn’t been in the car. Wherever she was, she was well enough to move or be moved.

  Wanting to eliminate some possibilities, Dean said, ‘Have any of your grandparents had any problems with their hearts?’

  Ben looked up at him, eyes wide and dazed. ‘I dunno.’

  ‘Okay.’ Crap. Maybe interrogating the kid on Jaye medical history wasn’t the way to go. ‘Never mind.’

  Dean eased the car around a gentle bend in the road and flexed his hands on the steering wheel. His own heart couldn’t take much more of this.

  The headlights touched on a distant shape. The soft illumination sharpened as the car moved closer, adding definition and shadow, but before Dean could get too excited, he was let down. A kangaroo stood in the middle of the opposite lane, as tall and broad as a person, startled by the approaching noise and lights. It lowered its head, preparing to flee.

  Dean slowed, wary that it might leap in front of them. Ben strained against his seatbelt to better see as they drove past, and Dean lifted his gaze to the rear-view mirror when the creature was behind them.

  ‘Mum!’

  Ben was looking forward, eyes fixed on something Dean had yet to see.

  There was another shape, half black, half white, a short distance up the road, just within reach of the high beams Dean had turned back on the moment he’d passed the kangaroo. The shape was moving. The shape was a woman, one arm across her face to protect her eyes from the light, the other over her head, waving furiously.

  Dean turned the beams down and pulled off the road for a second breathless time. The car was still rolling when Ben threw open the passenger door, unclipped his seatbelt and vaulted into the night.

  ‘Mum!’ he shouted again, and the woman coming towards them screamed.

  ‘Ben? Ben!’

  They’d collided with each other by the time Dean had stopped the car and stepped out to join them. He ran towards them, eyes only for Alice. He wouldn’t believe she was okay until she was in his arms.

  She was shaking and gasping. Her hair had fallen forward, curtaining part of her face, and there was a pair of filthy heels clutched in one of the hands she was pressing into Ben’s back.

  Alice unfolded herself from his embrace, her chest heaving, and looked at Dean. He’d never seen her look as she did now, and he hardly recognised the expression. Context told him it was a combination of relief, stress and exhaustion, but there was another element he couldn’t name.

  ‘I was …’ She interrupted herself, panting. She pointed over her shoulder at the vast expanse of nothingness. ‘Going back … for help. I looked back and saw … I ran.’

  Dean couldn’t move, couldn’t react. His own relief had filled his body to its capacity. It was she who crossed to him, who folded her arms around him and held on. When he finally managed to raise his arms and wrap them around her, she sighed, her breath shaky and heavy.

  ‘Thank you,’ she murmured against his shoulder.

  He drew her closer, then made room for the smaller body that pressed against their sides.

  The three of them didn’t dare let go for a very long time.

  The drive back to the Jayes’ place was a quiet one. Dean was saving all his questions for when Ben was in his room, and Ben, who had not too long ago been wide-eyed and rambling, was now asleep, leaning against Alice, his arm around her. Both of them were in the backseat, Ben hadn’t wanted to be parted from her. She held him tightly, kissing his head often.

  When they reached the house, Dean carried Ben to his room. It was a typical boy’s room, full of colour and toys and posters of superheroes and cars. The chair by the window said everything about the boy’s earlier fears, but now that they were vanquished, now that his mum was safely home, he slept soundly. Dean tucked Ben in, gazed at the boy he’d come to love like his own, then eased quietly out of the room.

  He heard Alice in the bathroom when he walked down the hallway. He crossed to the small table in the kitchen—adequate for two but woefully undersized for five, and retrieved the note he and Ben had left her. He used a pizza delivery magnet to secure it to the front of the fridge. She needed to see what this night had done to the men in her life.

  Dean dragged a chai
r away from the table and angled it at the hallway before he dropped onto it and waited. Alice walked in minutes later wearing plush blue slippers.

  ‘What happened?’ He wanted the facts before he gave a few of his opinions.

  ‘I fell asleep at the wheel,’ she said quietly. She leaned against the door jamb and rubbed her face. ‘I saw the tree just in time but got the car bogged.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘I’d left my phone here. I couldn’t call anyone. I waited over half an hour but only one car came past and they didn’t see me. So I started to walk back to work.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘About fifteen minutes later I saw your headlights. I started running back, intending to flag you down. Not knowing it was you, of course. You know the rest.’

  He nodded. He felt faintly sick—nauseated and drained, as if the adrenaline had sucked him dry when it had left his body. There was no point lecturing her about leaving the car. She’d been in a shitty situation with only bad options, and she’d been anxious and stranded. He might have walked too—it was hard to say.

  He said, ‘Why weren’t your hazards on?’

  ‘They were until I left the car.’

  He pushed his hands through his hair and sighed. There was only one thing left to talk about now: how this would never happen again. ‘Alice, the second job’s got to go.’

  Alice’s expression hardened. She narrowed her eyes at him and crossed her arms over her body.

  ‘If you chuck in the garage, then you chuck in the garage.’ He rubbed his eyes and balanced his elbows on his knees. ‘Or quit the function centre, but you’ve been a ticking time bomb for weeks and you can’t let this happen again. You know, I’m shocked, but I’m not surprised. You don’t get enough sleep.’ He dropped his forehand onto his hands and spoke to the floor. ‘I’ll give you a raise.’

  ‘Don’t be absurd,’ she said quietly, ‘I haven’t earned one.’

  ‘Then damn your pride, I’ll lend you money.’ Dean looked up. ‘You can’t do this to Ben again. You have no idea what he went through, what he was thinking as he waited for you to come home. He waits for you every night, you know. He doesn’t go to bed until you’re in the house.’