And that was before they danced, touching each other for the very first time.
Chapter Six
WALKING home with Gus that night was even more sensational than dancing with him. They had to go all the way along the beachfront because Poppy’s house was at the far end of the Bay, and it was Freya who suggested they should take off their shoes and walk on the sand.
Gus agreed with gratifying enthusiasm, and they left their shoes beside a pile of rocks. Gus shoved Freya’s evening bag into his trouser pocket and rolled up the bottoms of his trousers, while Freya scooped up the hem of her dress in one hand, leaving her other hand free to hold his. Bliss City!
If there were other couples on the beach that night, they stayed well in the shadows and Freya and Gus felt quite alone as they strolled hand in hand on the edge of the sand beneath a high, clear sky blazing with stars.
Freya could have stayed out all night. She’d never felt so happy, so unbelievably alive. She kept wanting to turn to look at Gus. To stare at his gorgeousness. There were so many things she loved about the way he looked—his dark hair with the bit that flopped forward, his deep-set dark eyes, his strong, intelligent profile, his broad shoulders, his long legs, his sturdy hands.
Then there came that moment, the moment when Gus let go of her hand and touched the back of her neck.
Freya usually wore her hair down, but that night it was swept up by the hairdresser into a romantic knot.
‘Did you know you have the most gorgeous skin right here?’
The feel of Gus’s fingers on her nape made her want to curl into his arms.
‘I sit behind you in History,’ he said. ‘And your hair falls forward, and I spend hours admiring the back of your neck.’
‘So that’s why I get better marks than you in History.’
‘Could be.’ His fingers stroked just below her hairline. ‘I love this bit just here.’
And while she was melting from the touch of his fingers, he touched his lips to her neck.
Freya was shaking. His gentleness was excruciating. She bowed her head, exposing her skin in a silent appeal, begging for more. The touch of his lips on the curve of her neck made her ache deep inside, made her want to cry and to laugh, to dance, to lie down in the shallows.
Then Gus kissed her lips.
Of course it was late when they finally reached her house, especially as they forgot their shoes and had to go back to search for them, and it took ages to remember which pile of rocks they’d left them beside. They were laughing, giggling like children, drunk with happiness.
Gus kissed her again on the front steps. He was still kissing her when Poppy flung the front door open, letting bright light spill over them, and making them blink.
Arms akimbo, her mother glared at Gus.
‘Freya should have been home hours ago. Who do you think you are, coming down here and making all sorts of assumptions about my daughter?’
To his credit, Gus was very restrained and polite, but he left in a hurry. It was Freya who lost her cool, later, after he’d gone.
‘How could you be so mean, Mum? We were only kissing. Why did you have to be so awful to Gus?’
‘I don’t trust him, or any of that snobby lot up on the hill.’ Poppy picked up the damp hem of Freya’s dress and frowned elaborately at the clinging grains of sand.
‘Well, I trust him, and surely that’s what counts?’
It was an argument that came back to bite Freya four months later, at the end of the summer, after Gus had already left for university in Brisbane and she missed her period.
Now, Freya was so lost in the mists of the past that when the bell at the front door rang, letting her know that yet another visitor had come into the gallery, she didn’t look up. Most people liked to be left to wander about looking at paintings without being observed, and she wasn’t in the mood for an exchange of happy banter with a tourist.
When a shadow fell over her desk, she realised she was out of luck. She looked up and heat rushed into her face. ‘Gus!’
Gus’s heart was pounding, actually pounding. As he’d walked into The Driftwood Gallery, he’d seen Freya sitting at the pale timber desk in the corner. She had her back to him and she was wearing jeans and a grey knitted top that shouldn’t have looked sexy, but it was soft and it clung lovingly to her shoulders before falling loosely to her hips, and somehow it managed to look incredibly feminine.
She was leaning forward so that her hair, light brown and streaked with gold, parted like a curtain to show a V of smooth, pale skin on her neck. And suddenly he was remembering every detail of falling in love with Freya Jones and the heady, blinding happiness of that magical summer.
Their summer.
To his dismay, he felt the sting of tears and he found himself recalling all the silly nicknames Freya had given him—Huggy Bear, Hot Stuff, Angel Eyes.
Her favourite had been Sugar Lips, while he’d simply called her Floss.
Memories pulled at him as he approached her desk but, when she looked up, he saw shock in her eyes and then unmistakable fear, and their happy past disintegrated like a jigsaw puzzle breaking up into a thousand separate scattered pieces.
Gus was wrenched back into the present in all its unhappy complexity.
‘Hi,’ he said, forcing the breezy greeting past the constriction in his throat. Freya’s smoky blue eyes were so clouded with worry that he tried to cheer her with a joke. ‘I’ve finally escaped from the evil clutches of the vampire.’
‘The vampire?’ She looked more worried than ever.
‘Hasn’t Nick mentioned her?’
‘No.’
Damn. Gus grimaced.
‘I thought you were at the hospital. What are you talking about?’
‘I have been at the hospital,’ he assured her. ‘Every one of my vital organs has been X-rayed and scanned from every conceivable angle, and I’ve given vast quantities of blood.’
‘Oh. Is that the vampire connection?’
‘Yeah. Bad joke. But you can blame Nick. He told me about the vampire nurse when he called in this morning on his way to school.’
‘Really?’ Freya was on her feet, twisting a locket at her throat with anxious fingers.
‘I’m so glad Nick called in to see me, Freya. He came to thank me, and it meant a lot. He’s a great kid. You must be proud of him.’
She showed no sign that his words reassured her. She looked distressed and rubbed at her temple, as if her head ached. ‘Nick didn’t tell me he was going to see you.’
‘Well, I think he felt bad about yesterday’s reception. And he’s entitled to see me. I’m his father, after all.’
‘Yes, of course.’ She was still frowning and not looking at him.
Gus’s jaw tightened. If Freya was going to be a dog in the manger about their son, she’d have a fight on her hands.
‘So what will you do now the tests are out of the way?’ she asked. ‘Will you fly straight back to the Northern Territory?’
‘Why?’ he asked coldly. ‘Are you keen to be rid of me?’
‘No. But you said you had commitments.’
‘I don’t want to rush away till I’ve had a chance to get to know Nick.’
Freya regarded him thoughtfully.