The Auction a Romance by Anna Erishkigal Page 20

"Yes, Mrs. Jackson."

  "That's Bristow-Jackson," Eva snapped. "Until the court rules otherwise, I am still Adam's wife."

  "Y-y-yes, Mrs. Bristow."

  I followed behind her like a helpless waif as she barged through the house, straight into Adam's mother's-slash-my room. She frowned as she saw the feminine décor.

  "Where does Adam sleep?"

  "Just down the hall." I pointed to the door at the end.

  Eva shoved past me and knocked me into the door frame. She opened Adam's door, a threshold that I, myself, had the common courtesy not to snoop past, and barged in. She stood in the middle of the room, staring at the boxes piled upon boxes. Just for a moment, her bitch-like façade cracked as she pulled off her sunglasses. Her eyes glistened, and I noticed they were brown.

  What is wrong with you? Stop being such a wuss!

  --She's a quarter meter taller than me!--

  Harvey was two meters taller than you and 500 kilos. You wouldn't let -him- get away with this. So don't let Adam's ex-wife…

  "M-m-mrs. Jackson, uhm, Bristow," I stammered. "I must insist. Adam would not want you rifling through his things."

  Eva's bitch-like mask came back on. She shot me an accusatory glare.

  "You can't seriously tell me my husband sleeps here?"

  I lifted my chin and forced myself not to stutter. Horse. Pretend she's a horse. You need to show her who's the boss…

  "There is nothing wrong with any of these rooms. Now, I hate to be rude, but Adam doesn't allow me in here, so I'm certain he doesn't want you in here, either."

  "And where do you sleep?"

  "That's none of your business."

  My eyes gave me away, for I looked out the door towards Adam's mother's former room. Eva gave an indignant sniff, but for some reason my reaction seemed to please her.

  "Very well, then. Where is it?" Eva said. "I want to see this curriculum which is more important for my daughter than spending the summer with me."

  A feeling of dread opened up in the pit of my stomach. Why, oh why, hadn't I insisted Adam purchase the latest and greatest textbook rather than limp along, using my own talent for hands-on learning? Because Pippa doesn’t learn well from a book, that’s why. But how do I explain that to Eva Bristow-Jackson, oil heiress and recipient of the best education money could buy?

  "I, um, it's in there."

  I pointed back towards the kitchen. Eva pushed past me, right past Pippa's room without opening the door or looking in. She stared at the book on the grey Formica table as though Thunderlane had left a cow flap in the middle of the kitchen table. Her aquiline nose wrinkled in disgust.

  "That's it? That book has to be from the 1960's."

  "1981," I said. "But it doesn't matter. Lower-level math hasn't changed much since Pythagoras discovered his theorem."

  A shadow crossed Eva's features. That Gitano sense of knowing whispered 'attack.' This was an area where Eva Jackson was weak.

  "In fact," I said. "All evidence indicates that Socrates was right when he theorized children learn best when they think things out themselves using items from the everyday world." My eyes drifted over to the measuring cup I'd left on the counter. "For example, cooking. Were you aware, Mrs. Bristow, that the best way to learn fractions is to multiply a recipe?"

  I picked up the tray of muffins I'd beautifully arranged.

  "Would you like to eat one of Pippa's math lessons? She made them this morning just for you."

  Pippa at that moment came bursting back into the kitchen.

  "Is this outfit alright, Mommy?"

  The child looked as though she were about to go out for dinner at a high society restaurant in her white button-down blouse, black A-line skirt and white sandals with a heel that was far too high for a ten-year-old. Eva glanced over the outfit, and then pointed at the tray in my hand.

  "Did you make these?"

  Pippa's eyes dropped as though she was ashamed. Her voice sounded tiny.

  "Yes."

  Eva snorted.

  "Very well. I guess it will have to do."

  That overbearing sense of being under a microscope suddenly lifted. Eva turned to Pippa.

  "Get in the car. You have made me late already."

  Pippa. Had made. Eva. Late?

  A long whining howl came from the back door, along with a yip. Still juggling the tray of muffins, I moved to let Thunderlane back into the house. Something wet and furry brushed past my bare legs. The stench of muddy wet dog filled the kitchen.

  "Ugh! Thunderlane!"

  The dog raced towards Pippa, howling in that doggie-speak all dogs use when they sense their master is upset and wish to protect them. Eva shrieked as the dog brushed against her pant legs and left a streak of brown river mud. Eva stumbled backwards and almost fell.

  "Get that creature out of here!" Eva shrieked like a wounded banshee.

  I put down the tray and grabbed Thunderlane by the collar, all twenty-five kilos of stinky, wet, hairy, muddy dog, and dragged him down the hallway to lock him into Pippa's bedroom. When I got back, Eva bent over her pale, silk pantsuit, cursing in French about how stupid I was as she wiped at the dirt with a paper towel.

  "Look what that thing did to my suit!"

  I stared at the top of Eva's head where her parted hairline exposed a tiny, slender line of dark brown roots. Eva dyed her hair? Just like my mother? For some reason, the knowledge that the Black Widow's natural hair color was a mousy brown made the billionaire oil heiress seem not-so-threatening after all.

  Mirror, mirror, on the wall…

  "I'm sorry," I smirked, feeling not one iota of remorse. "When it’s hot out, sometimes Thunderlane goes for a swim."

  "Bah!" Eva whipped her paper towel onto the counter. "Pippa. Get in the limo."

  Pippa hid her smile behind her hand.

  "Bye, Rosie."

  "Bye, nipper."

  Eva glared while I gave Pippa a warm hug and kissed the top of the white-blonde head with hair that didn't come out of a bottle. When Pippa got back, I would read her the story of Snow White and explain that sometimes, when a mother felt insecure, she would nit-pick a daughter who she perceived to be more beautiful.

  I grabbed the tray of muffins and trailed the two of them back out to the limousine. As the driver came around to shut Eva’s door, I stepped forward and held out the tray of muffins, the perfect hostess offering her nemesis a gift.

  "Would you like to bring some muffins on your trip, Mrs. Bristow?" I asked in a sickeningly sweet voice. "We made them especially for you."

  "No!"

  Eva slammed the car door.

  The limousine driver snitched two off the tray and slid them into his pocket. A knowing, silent nod passed between us. We both knew what it was like to cater to a prima donna. I watched as the taillights disappeared up the driveway.

  "Good dog," I whispered to the empty air.

  Chapter 20

  The grass grew taller the closer I got to the river.

  “Harvey?” I called. “Harvey … is that you?”

  The sad, mournful cry wafted gently across the still, dark night, soundless, but how could I not feel its pull? Every nerve ending in my body whispered: Hurry. Hurry before you are too late.

  I ran faster, pushing aside the scrub brush.

  “Harvey? Where are you, sweetheart?”

  At last I reached the place where the waterline was supposed to drop. The wide, sandy beach where Adam had almost kissed me was now an angry, white deluge that bubbled and frothed like a pot of boiling water. Sometime during the night a rainstorm must have occurred upriver, for the flash flood licked at the top of the grassy edge.

  The sound which had awoken me drifted across the river, only it wasn’t the churning current, but more of a plea for help. My heart raced faster.

  “Harvey?” I called. “Harvey? Where did you go?”

  I looked around, hoping the girl on the white horse would appear and show me where to go, but there was no sign of her. I searched in
the water, for that was the direction the call had come from. At last I spied the source, a small dun-beige calf, struggling to swim to shore. The current had caught it up and carried it swiftly downstream.

  “Come on! You can do it!” I called to the calf. She swam and swam, but the harder the calf tried to reach our side of the river, the harder the river repelled her. I ran downstream, calling to the poor thing to keep on trying, but the rain swollen river carried her further and further away.

  “Harvey! Where are you?”

  I had never used a lasso, but my father had trained Harvey to perform Jimeta. Spanish bull-wrangling. While not as safe as using a rope, on a big, strong gelding like Harvey I could swim out and push the calf against the current.

  A piece of shadow stepped out of the darkness and materialized in front of me, a tall, lean rider on a horse.

  “Harvey?”

  The rider stepped closer; not a palomino, but an enormous painted appaloosa, a brumby by the shortness of its tail. The horse chewed at his bit and pawed the ground. This was no gelding, but a stallion kept under rein by the sheer will of its master. The craggy face which stared down at me from the horse’s back was familiar, and yet it was not.

  “Adam?”

  A shadow of recognition crossed the man’s harsh, unyielding features, but unlike Adam, this man possessed sun-leathered skin. He touched the brim of his drover’s hat, a symbol of recognition or perhaps permission to traverse his land, and then he signaled his horse to go.

  “Wait!” I shouted. “What about the calf?”

  I pointed to the poor dun calf which struggled desperately to keep her head above the water.

  The man’s features hardened. There was not one whit of compassion in that face. None at all as he watched the calf struggle not to drown. He tugged at his reins and turned his painted stallion to disappear.

  I stared at the now-empty darkness with dismay.

  “Wait! You’ve got to help her!”

  The calf cried out. Help, or no help, I did not have it in me to watch a creature drown when, only last weekend I had swum across this river and back again. Sure, it had become swollen with rainwater, but how hard could it be? She was only a dozen meters from the shore.

  “I’m coming!” I shouted.

  I waded into the frigid water.

  My eyes shot open. I sat bolt upright as I clawed at the air, fighting to stay above the surface of the water. I realized the roar which filled my ears was not the river at floodtide, but my own scream. In my arms was not the crying calf, but Thunderlane, licking frantically at my face to get me to wake up.

  “Bloody hell!” I shrieked, coughing imaginary water out of my lungs. I began to sob.

  “It wasn’t real! It wasn’t real. Oh! Thank God it wasn’t real!”

  I hugged the worried dog, shivering from the cold water until; at last, my heart rate began to slow. It was just a dream. Just a dream. Oh, sweet lord, it was nothing but a dream!

  I got up and padded to the window which faced the river. The sun had just begun to heave itself up above the horizon. Off across the flood plain, the sleepy river trickled well below its banks.

  So much for sleeping in. There was no bloody chance I’d drop back off to sleep after that dream. I pulled on my bathrobe and trudged out into the kitchen to set a pot of coffee to percolate. There were six strawberry-rhubarb muffins left from my failed attempt to impress Pippa’s mother. I ate two of them and fed the rest to the dog. Thunderlane whined to go outside.

  “Go ahead, boy.” I let him out to do his business.

  I stepped out onto the patio and walked to the edge. The daylight betrayed the flood had only happened in my dreams. I stood in the rising sun until its warm, pinkish rays chased away the chill from my nightmare. With two whole days to myself and nothing to occupy my time, it was time to reflect on where my life was headed. Time to obsess about Gregory’s betrayal and all the ways he fell short compared to my tormented, handsome employer.

  I got dressed and pulled out the list of potential teaching positions I’d downloaded from the U-Queensland job connector before I’d moved to Nutyoon. There'd been no word from the resume's I'd mailed out several weeks ago. Come the end of the summer, I'd need to find another job. With both Pippa and Adam gone, I had no excuses left to procrastinate.

  I dug my mobile out of my purse, praying the mobile phone fairy had sprinkled some magic fairy dust over the station overnight and given me reception, but as usual, all I had was one lonely little bar. I flipped open my laptop and, for the five hundredth time, reminded myself to ask Adam how I could set up an internet account that wasn't dependent upon the satellite phone he took with him out into the Basin. It was just as well. Without the distraction of social media, by lunchtime I had drafted inquiry letters to every potential school system on my list. My inkjet was buried someplace out in the barn. Perhaps I could use the printer I'd seen when Eva had barged into Adam's room?

  I stared at the door which sat diagonally across the hallway from my own. Several times I had opened the door, but I wasn't rude enough to go inside. I slipped inside, feeling guilty, but if Adam was home he'd give me permission or, at the very least, take my flash drive and print out the resumes for me.

  A narrow twin bed sat pressed against the wall adorned with a denim quilt that looked like it had been made out of his cast-off blue jeans. A triangular blue sports banner with Nutyoon State School emblazoned in gold letters adorned the wall above it. Next to the bed stood a simple chest of drawers with three pictures displayed of Pippa, Adam’s mother in her older years, and one of Adam wearing workman’s gear with some burly looking men and an oil geyser gushing in the background, all of them dripping with black, gooey crude.

  In front of the window sat an identical wooden desk to the one in Pippa's room with a large flat screen monitor, a keyboard and a mouse. From the absence of a CPU, I surmised this was a docking station for Adam to plug in his laptop. On the wall next to the desk, dozens of geological surveys and mining reports were pinned to a corkboard. Immediately beneath it, a printer sat on a cardboard box labeled ‘divorce paperwork’ in black magic marker.

  I ran my fingers over the desk chair. I could almost feel Adam’s worry as he tried to work from home. Am I spending enough time with Pippa? Should I blow off double-checking this report and hope it's enough? Or should I make sure my boss doesn’t drill holes in the ground for nothing? I pulled my hand away.

  My USB adapter plugged easily into his setup. While I waited for my resumes to print, I shut my eyes and imagined what it must have been like for Adam to grow up here as a child. I could picture a slender boy, studying frantically so that someday he would be good enough to please the grim horseman who had visited my nightmare.

  “I know how that feels,” I whispered to the boy in my mind. But it was merely my imagination. It wasn’t as though I'd inherited my Gitano grandmother’s gift to see.

  A box of pictures sat stashed next to the closet door. These were, I suspected, the photographs which had once hung in his mother’s room, now my room while I was here. I flipped through them, smiling at the awkward photos of Adam and his twin brother captured in family snapshots. One of the twins always stood in front, while the second twin brother other always hung behind, his brow forever pinched with worry.

  "Adam."

  I paused at a picture of a tall, stern jackaroo seated upon a painted appaloosa. I traced the same tall frame, muscular build and the features I found so compelling in Adam, but where there was an endearing vulnerability about my employer, or even his more bodacious twin brother, there was not one whit of softness in the man whose cold blue eyes gazed out at me from the photograph.

  I must have glimpsed this picture at some point in the past, and that is why I dreamed of Adam's father…

  I put the pictures back exactly as I'd found them. I had no business snooping through Adam’s things. As soon as the resumes finished printing, I unplugged my laptop and made certain everything looked exactly the w
ay it had before I’d invaded his personal space. I brought the letters out onto the kitchen table to sign and hand-addressed the envelopes to each prospective school … over 72 of them.

  I paused to scrutinize the last cover letter, the one not listed on the University of Queensland’s job connector list. It was the lead given to me by Linda Hastings; Saint Joseph’s School, the private school in Nutyoon. It was only a substitute teaching position for a few weeks in January, just long enough for Macy to take her maternity leave, but if I got a job here, maybe it would buy me time?

  Time for what?

  --To stay close to Pippa.--

  Who are you kidding? You're hoping Adam will ask you to stay on…

  I licked the envelope and stuck it into the pile.

  The telephone rang. I picked up the land line.

  “Hello?”

  “G'day, Miss Rosamond,” Adam's warm baritone tingled through me, accompanied almost immediately by a feeling of dread. Why was Adam calling when Pippa wasn’t home?

  “Yes?”

  “Eva called,” he said softly.

  Oh. Crap. Eva ratted me out.

  “It was an accident,” I stammered. “Thunderlane didn’t mean to get her muddy.”

  Adam laughed, which caught me by surprise.

  “I was calling to make sure you were alright.”

  “Me?”

  “Yes, you,” Adam said. “The last four times Eva called me on such a tirade, she’d driven one of Pippa’s poor governesses to quit.”

  “She’s not the first difficult person I’ve ever had to deal with.”

  “Are you certain?” Adam’s voice carried that same concerned tone it had whenever Pippa skinned a knee. “You’re much too important to allow Eva to run you out on a rail.”

  My heart fluttered, but I reminded myself Adam only meant it was important he have somebody to watch Pippa. Not that –I- was important.

  “I don’t scare easily,” I said.

  There was a long, awkward pause.

  “Adam,” I finally said. “The way Pippa acts when her mother comes to pick her up. Is that normal for her?”

  Adam’s sharp intake of breath was muffled by the telephone. I could picture him counting to ten. When he did answer, his voice sounded tight.