Page 29

Lori

It was so fucking quiet in the Belgian countryside.

Still only two days post-race for me, I would normally have let myself sleep late, maybe even watched a few episodes of something in bed, but I didn’t want to wake Seb, haunted by how much pain he’d been in last night.

Trying to be quiet seemed to turn me into a restless troll in bed – a restless, horny troll, if I was completely honest – and I rolled around as best I could with my sore shoulder, trying to keep my hands off him.

He didn’t help my cause, murmuring in his sleep when I nudged him in the small double and fisting a hand in the shirt he’d given me to wear.

When he mumbled, ‘Lori,’ so softly my hair stood on end, I was tempted to press my lips to his and not give a damn if he needed his z’s.

‘Go back to sleep,’ I whispered instead.

‘But you feel good,’ he continued with a sigh. ‘You smell good too.’

‘I used your soap last night,’ I told him with a smile he couldn’t see, since his eyes were still shut – swollen from exposure to the wind yesterday after he’d lost his cycling glasses somewhere.

His mouth turned up and he rolled towards me with a sigh that was part groan from stiff muscles.

He reached for me, his hand landing first on my hip, giving me a fumbling stroke, and then a smearing caress over my cheek, as though he needed to confirm I was truly there.

Then his hand fell back to the sheet between us, where I studied his thick knuckles and weathered skin, wondering what it would feel like to slip my fingers between his and hold on.

I needed to get up before I did something weird like kiss his fingertips.

Sneaking out of the bed, I rummaged in his wardrobe drawers until I found a pair of socks – ignoring the deflated form of Matilda staring jealously at me from where she’d been stuffed behind the hangers.

Padding into the hallway with its beige tiles and frayed woven rug, I headed in the direction of the dining room where we’d eaten a late dinner last night.

It was empty, so I crossed the little foyer, pausing to peer at an old photo of Seb as a child, blond and with several teeth missing, his arm draped over a slightly smaller girl with glasses.

His sister… I didn’t even know her name.

I tried the last door and was welcomed by wafting heat and the smell of coffee.

The country-style kitchen was tired but cosy, with a stone feature wall and a cast-iron stove lacquered beige.

A solid-wood buffet cabinet stood against one wall, in the place it had probably held since before Seb was born.

R?sine stood at the stove, dirt already on the seat of her heavy-duty trousers, wearing a thick woollen pullover. She called something over her shoulder without looking, of which all I understood was ‘petit’. Turning with a smile, she froze when she saw it was only me.

‘Good morning,’ she said, her tone more measured.

R?sine was a handsome woman, with Seb’s high cheekbones and honey colouring.

Her hair was turning grey and tucked underneath a patterned bandana headband, and her thin, straight mouth gave her the look of someone who could deliver a calf – or in this case a goat kid – while also canning vegetables and fixing a fence.

‘Good morning,’ I mumbled in response. ‘Seb’s still asleep. I didn’t want to disturb him.’

R?sine glanced down at my bare legs and feet in Seb’s socks, her expression barely changing although she must have realised I didn’t have any clothes with me.

‘You want breakfast?’ she asked.

‘You don’t have to… serve me. I’m sure I could just find something,’ I suggested, colour rising to my cheeks.

The look she gave me was quelling. ‘You’re a guest.’

‘Well, I’m sorry I… invited myself then,’ I said with a sigh, hoping my dad had accepted my short message and wasn’t phoning Europol. I should get back in touch with him before he suspected kidnapping and the cops showed up and scared the goats.

R?sine was silent for so long I thought perhaps she agreed I shouldn’t have come.

Taking a heavy kettle from the stove, she poured water into a French press and the blessed smell of coffee reached my nose again.

Giving it a stir, she set the plunger on top and placed the coffee on the table, adding two small cups and four spiced biscuits.

She pulled out her chair with a short, pointed glance at me and, hoping that was a subtle invitation, I scrambled to accept, taking the seat opposite. When I found myself fiddling restlessly with the painted china cup, I wrenched my hand back and sat on it.

R?sine pressed the plunger and wordlessly poured out the coffee.

I lifted the cup to my nose and inhaled, more out of habit – Melbourne habit – than anything else, but a hint of caramel and something like burned toast tickled my nostrils and R?sine’s brow furrowed.

‘It’s mixed with chicory. That’s our way of taking coffee. I hope you don’t mind.’

Taking a cautious sip, it was very bitter on the tongue at first, but I suspected I could get used to it.

‘Did you argue with Seb?’ R?sine asked, watching me splutter over my hot drink as though she’d orchestrated the timing of that question.

‘Um,’ I said with a gulp.

‘I hope it wasn’t about visiting us?’

‘No!’ I assured her immediately. ‘Nothing like that. But I should probably admit that there’s… we’re not really together or anything.’ My words petered out on my tongue when I tried to explain what we were if we weren’t together, especially since we’d spent the night snuggling.

R?sine laughed, but there was a bleakness to it. ‘I understand. I don’t know if he’s ever been really together with someone before – only “sort of” or “maybe”. I didn’t expect anything else.’

If she was attempting to reassure me, it backfired. I’d been one of a few girlfriends – now former girlfriends – of Gaetano, but with Seb I was only one of his ‘maybes’. Wow, that hurt. I took another slurp of the scalding, bitter coffee because it fitted my sinking heart.

‘It’s difficult for him. I suppose that’s what happens when your father leaves and never sees you again. I hope one day he can commit, but they’ll have to be someone… very special,’ she said with an apologetic smile that looked more like a wince.

Before I could decide between a defensive response and an indignant one, the kitchen door banged open, making me jump and scald myself again. ‘Il se passe quelque chose avec Seb? Mamie m’a envoyé un message bizarre!’

On a gust of cool, damp air, a tall woman with tight curls and a baby on her hip swept into the room, approaching R?sine with a kiss, while my brain tried to catch up, managing to understand the final two words of the French and something about Mamie and Seb.

Belatedly catching sight of me, the woman – undoubtedly Seb’s sister – performed a double take worthy of a slapstick film.

‘C’est vrai?’ she cried, close enough to a shriek for the baby to cover its ears with chubby fingers.

Collecting herself, she gulped and opened her mouth to say something, although it took several seconds for anything to come out.

‘Mamie said Seb brought a pretty Australian girl home to meet the family and I was certain all I’d find was a big plastic kangaroo. ’

‘We do have a blow-up kanga—’ Suddenly I was thinking about Matilda and I probably shouldn’t mention that in front of his family. ‘I’m Lori,’ I said instead, getting to my feet.

Her smile would have been lovely if she’d toned down the glee a notch. ‘Denise,’ she said, taking my hand and shaking it. ‘I’ve been waiting my whole life to torment him with this!’ she said, her voice high with something like wonder.

‘They’re not actually together,’ R?sine added with a twitch of her lips.

‘Of course not,’ Denise said with a snort. ‘She just accidentally came home with him!’ She burst out laughing and even R?sine snickered.

‘Well,’ I began, but quickly gave up. Even I struggled to believe the chain of events that had brought me into this kitchen, with these two women.

Denise clasped my arm. ‘Sorry, dear, but it’s just so… Seb . It’s a constant mystery to him – and only him – why the women he’s interested in always leave. My brother is a disaster.’

‘He might be a disaster,’ I blurted out before I’d thought through the end of that sentence. ‘But he’s…’ my disaster. ‘A good disaster,’ I finished weakly, gulping when the two women just blinked at me in surprise.

Oops. So much for not getting their hopes up. Seb would just have to explain to them later and take the blame, since it seemed he had a history and this mess wasn’t all my fault after all.

I should have expected the absurdity of Mamie striding in at that moment, but she still surprised me when she peered through the door and said to Denise, ‘Oh good, you got my message. Give me the baby.’

She fussed over the child, with its curls and pudgy cheeks, until he – or she, I couldn’t be certain – wriggled to be put down. He mustn’t have been too young because he toddled confidently around the kitchen.

‘I love great-grandchildren,’ she said, pointedly not looking at me in such a way that she was definitely inwardly winking at me.

‘Mamie!’ Denise scolded. ‘You can’t say that – and we should know better!’ She turned to me, grasping my arm again as though she was already fond of me. ‘We’re a whole family of single mothers – and poor Seb!’

‘Single or not, women do the work – well!’ Mamie said, slapping her thigh for emphasis. ‘But why are you standing here talking? There is shit to clean!’

Seb

I woke up groggy and befuddled in the mid-morning, as though I’d rattled out part of my brain yesterday on the cobbles. But the lethargy felt deeper, in my bones somehow – a pleasant sort of contentment I couldn’t initially identify.

My jersey had disappeared, but I was still in my clean bike shorts from the podium. I had vague recollections of warm touch, hands on my skin and in my hair. I’d never had hallucinations after a tough race before, but would Lori—? Lori!

I sat up with a start – and a groan at the loud complaints from my body. Looking around frantically for her, I found I was alone in my room.

Had she left? Already?

That possibility got me out of bed in an instant and I threw on a tracksuit, hopping into the hall while pulling on my socks.

The kitchen was empty, with only the lingering scent of chicory coffee.

The dining room was too. Racing for the front door, I noticed her sneakers were gone and my heart rate kicked up again.

Shoving my feet into the first pair of my shoes I found, I dashed outside into a crisp, sunny day.

I hobbled across the garden like an old man, thinking Lori wouldn’t exactly congratulate herself for knowing me just then and perhaps it was for the best if she’d called her father and was already on her way back.

Damn, I was even more of a loser than I’d thought. She’d come home with me – even if it had been under false pretences – she’d touched me and stretched out next to me and all I’d done was fall asleep! If she was gone—

What could I do? I’d never expected she would stay.

It didn’t make any sense that my heart was in my throat as I scanned the property for signs of life, ignoring the bright yellow rapeseed field at the back and the rolling hills of home that were usually a comfort, regardless of whether I won or lost.

Hearing voices in the barn – Maman’s measured tones with animated replies from Mamie – I shuffled in the direction of the bleating, no idea what I’d say to them if I discovered she’d gone. She was too good for me anyway … wouldn’t work on my biggest cheerleaders.

I also couldn’t admit the embarrassing truth: We didn’t actually have sex .

That wasn’t my greatest disappointment either, although I had vivid, physical memories of touching her skin, dewy from exertion, of hearing her hitched breaths as a secret language only I could interpret. I just… didn’t know what this was.

With a sigh, I swung open the door of the new barn – Maman’s pride and joy – to a sight that was close to the last thing I expected.