Page 41 of Sharing Forever in Hope Creek (Hope Creek #2)

Jack sat back down on the cheap plastic chair as he watched the guard escort Callie from the room. The four walls pressed in on him, a stark reminder that his whole life had been tipped upside down and his freedom curtailed.

Wanting to hold on to something of Callie, he found himself breathing in more deeply. The faint scent of her floral perfume was barely perceptible as it lingered in the otherwise sterile air.

Callie was a breath of fresh air who’d made his whole existence more meaningful.

He’d noticed her hands trembling as she clutched the edge of the plastic table between them—seen the angst and the shame in her eyes as she confessed the truth of her parents’ deeds.

He’d wanted to wrap her in his arms when he’d witnessed her fear that he would reject her because of her parents’ actions.

Worse, he’d seen guilt in her eyes, as though she held herself responsible for what her parents had done.

Oh, Callie, my love. You are not responsible for your parents.

His love.

It was true. He did love Callie. The realisation had hit him with the force of a freight train. Now the weight of his unspoken emotions tightened like a vice around his chest.

He’d almost said it.

Callie, you’re an angel. I absolutely love you.

The confession had been on the tip of his tongue, the emotion more real than anything he’d felt in years. Yet, he’d swallowed the truth down deep inside him.

Why?

You did the right thing.

What right did he have to tell her now how he felt?

He couldn’t say those words and leave her to carry them while he sat behind bars.

Besides, if he had uttered them then, she might’ve thought he said them out of gratitude. And, although his gratitude was monumental, it wasn’t gratitude that made him love her.

She was the mother of his child, but he didn’t love her for that reason either.

He loved her for the happiness she’d brought him when they were together; for the dreams they could share for their future together and for everything he’d come to understand that she was. Callie was a strong woman who was standing by him even when the police had arrested him for a heinous crime.

The events of the last few days must’ve shaken her to her very core.

Geez! She must’ve thought history was repeating itself—that their child was going to grow up with a father in jail and thinking he was a murderer. It must have taken her to hell and back.

Not only had she been brave enough to confess the truth of a secret she’d buried years ago, but she’d gone back into the graveyard of her past, dug up those skeletons and confronted her mother.

And she’d done it all for him.

Jack could see, as Callie had retold of her visit to her mother, she’d paid a huge emotional price for that visit.

Callie was a woman who’d stand by him through thick and thin, but that wasn’t the way Jack wanted this. Call him a traditionalist, but he needed to prove his innocence and be free to stand by her and protect her through all the challenges life threw at her.

Jack buried his head in his hands and realised that Callie—beautiful, brave Callie—had provided him with the answer to securing his freedom.

Marcus Covington.

‘Time to go back to your cell, Jack,’ the guard told him.

The thought of that cold, grey, lifeless cell made him shiver. ‘I need to speak with my lawyer straight away.’

‘We can take a detour via the telephone.’

The guards here weren’t officious—possibly because at this stage Jack was being detained rather than having been convicted of a crime.

However, he’d had to give up his mobile phone along with his freedom and that had hit him hard.

He could only imagine how the news of his arrest had impacted on his company share price.

Damn Marcus Covington! He was getting his so-called revenge big time and must be having a huge laugh at Jack’s expense.

As he walked alongside the guard, the metallic jingle of keys broke up the echo of their footsteps down the lifeless corridor. The flicker of one of the harsh fluorescent bulbs that lit their path was a reminder of how old everything was in this detention centre.

‘Hey! Where are you off to?’ The guard, who Jack hadn’t seen before, was built like a front row forward and wore a menacing expression.

The short, tubby guy who accompanied Jack replied, ‘He wants to phone his lawyer.’

‘It’s his lucky day then, because she’s here to see him.’ The front-row-forward guy stretched his arms out in front of him and cracked his knuckles. ‘She’s waiting for him in interview room three.’

That was good news. Jack had always considered three as his lucky number.

As soon as he entered the room, Jack saw Sian, her expression sharp and businesslike, her slim figure clad today in a dark blue suit with a fine grey pinstripe. But before he could greet her, his attention was drawn to movement from the opposite corner of the small room.

‘Jacinta!’ His voice almost cracked with emotion.

His sister looked at him with hazel eyes that carried a steel edge, honed from years of fighting tough, often unsavoury, courtroom battles. She was every inch the barrister when she was in professional mode in Sydney and had been dubbed as fierce as a great white shark in the courtroom.

‘Hey, big brother.’ Her voice was soft but cautious, as if she wasn’t sure how close she could get before she touched the bruises he carried on his soul from his current ordeal—as if she was wanting to respect him and not get too close in case he broke down in front of her.

Jack guessed that if he broke down, Jacinta’s tough exterior would crack right down the middle as well.

‘I didn’t expect you to come,’ he said. ‘You should be home with James and Eden.’

‘I love them to bits, but James is a big boy. He can take care of himself and our beautiful daughter,’ she retorted firmly. ‘You, on the other hand, need some taking care of right now.’

Jack gestured towards Sian, who was opening her briefcase. ‘You already arranged for me to be in good hands.’

‘The best hands,’ Jacinta acknowledged.

‘Hi, Sian,’ Jack said belatedly.

‘ Jack,’ she acknowledged tonelessly.

Jacinta walked around the small windowless interview room. ‘This place doesn’t suit you, Jack.’

‘No kidding,’ he muttered, rubbing at the back of his neck with his hand and hating the rough fabric of the state-supplied overall that abraded his skin.

‘That’s definitely not your colour either,’ his sister said as she screwed up her nose at the outfit.

‘Mitch phoned.’ Sian cut through the reunion with her usual efficiency as she crossed her arms over her chest. ‘He said I needed to come to see you. Apparently, Callie had phoned him and said she was about to give you a lead and that I needed to take it to the police?’

Jack nodded.

‘Sian said Callie is your girlfriend?’ Jacinta questioned.

‘She’s more than that,’ Jack said more passionately than he’d intended to. He clamped his teeth together. This wasn’t the way he wanted to tell Jacinta that Callie was the love of his life and pregnant with his child.

‘Tell me about this lead.’ Sian took a notebook and pen from the briefcase.

Jack started relaying all that Callie had told him. As soon as he named Covington , Jacinta’s lips parted into a stunned O.

‘Marcus Covington?’ she demanded. ‘Oh no! I thought he’d still be in jail.’

‘Why is this Covington carrying a vendetta against you?’ Sian asked, looking up from her notes.

‘Because he’s a low-life snake who offered to help Jack with a building project when our father had a heart attack, then proceeded to break every rule in the book. He’s never forgiven Jack for testifying against him.’

Jacinta brought Sian up to speed on the rest of Covington’s sad and sorry history.

‘So, he’s done time for bribery and sexual assault?’ Sian clarified.

‘He may still be out on parole,’ Jacinta said. ‘That would be helpful as we could find a current address.’

‘Back to the information Callie gave you,’ Sian said. ‘How did she come by this information?’

Jack hesitated. Callie had hidden the truth about her mother—her parents—for most of her life. It wasn’t his right to reveal her secret. ‘I can’t reveal her source.’

Jacinta stiffened.

Sian rolled her eyes. ‘Are you sure it’s legitimate?’

‘Callie didn’t even know about my background with Marcus, so the fact that she could name him lends to the credibility of her information, don’t you think?’ he challenged.

Jacinta’s high heels dug at the the floor as she paced back and forth. ‘I’m getting a bad feeling about your girlfriend, Jack. Does she have links to the criminal world? Could she be involved, somehow, with Marcus and trying to frame you here?’

‘What would she have to gain?’ Sian asked.

Jacinta shrugged. ‘I don’t know, but something’s off if Jack won’t tell us how she came by this information.’

‘Callie’s above board,’ Jack told his sister firmly. The way Jacinta set her jaw forward a fraction told him that she didn’t believe him.

‘Thompson’s whole Ponzi scheme reeks of organised crime,’ Jacinta surmised. ‘You could be in a dangerous situation here, Jack.’

‘I don’t see how.’ His left hand went to the back of his neck again to try to loosen his stiff muscles.

‘All I know is that the Ponzi scheme existed and I passed that information on to the police. I have no idea, other than that, of any aspect of its organisation. I don’t even know the address of the warehouse Thompson used to house the fake wine. ’

‘So let me get this straight,’ Sian said as she pointed her pen in Jack’s direction.

‘Thompson lent Covington money. Thompson was fleeing the country and wanted the money back. Covington couldn’t repay the money, found out about the Ponzi scheme, found out about your connection with Thompson with you wanting to buy the vineyard.

He sends you an anonymous text message—’