Page 57 of Cinderella and the Outback Billionaire

‘Did you tackle your stepfather as well?’

She shook her head. ‘Too risky. He’s too deep in the bottle right now. That’s not my fight.’

‘Wise.’

‘I have a healthy sense of self preservation. Unlike some.’

He deserved that.

‘Do you ever wish we could go back to the tent and just talk?’ she asked quietly. ‘Because I’ve been wishing that a lot. Whatever else, we were honest about our needs back then. We wore our vulnerability with ease.’

‘It was memorable.’ On that he could agree.

‘I keep wondering what I’d say or do to let you know how much I respect and treasure you.’ He stilled and she drew a quick breath and kept right on speaking. ‘I’m crazy in love with you, but I might have forgotten to mention it last time we spoke. I wondered whether you’d missed that about me, what with your no longer excellent eyesight. I mean, do you really need to see me light up like Sydney Harbour bridge on cracker night whenever I see you?’

He wanted to see that so badly.

‘You should ask my crew about the way I behaved the day I found out you’d been in that cliff accident. So much stomping around and staring tragically at my phone in between trying to call you. I already knew you were smart and generous and could make me feel good about simply being me, but that was the day I realised how much I wanted to have the right to be there for you.’

‘You want someone to need you, that’s all. And I refuse to be your patient.’ Finally, some spoken words he actually meant.

‘I’ve thought about that.’ She crossed her arms in front of her, classic defensive posture. ‘Another demon I wrestled with while I tossed up whether to track you down again or not, because I do like being needed, yeah. Trying to fix you while you were hurt made me feel that I had something of value to offer. And afterwards, you went out of your way to make me feel good about simply being me. You made me believe I had plenty to give, so here I am. Making my play for your love and attention. Again. Just in case I didn’t give you enough information the first time.’

She took a deep breath—he could hear the inhale even if he couldn’t see her chest rise with the effort. ‘I can’t make you love me if you don’t—it would be foolish to try. But if you’re pulling away because some of your body parts don’t work the way they used to and you no longer believe that what you have to offer is enough, just stop with that way of thinking.’

She unlocked her arms and spread them wide as if offering him her all. ‘Your dodgy eyesight isn’t going to keep you down for long. It isn’t going to prevent you from loving someone with all that you are. There are so many ways to connect. A million ways to show and feel love. What’s one more curve to navigate? That’s what I really came all this way here to say. If this is the end of us, I didn’t want to finish it by being cranky with you. You deserve better than that. I can be better than that.’

‘You’re going to go a long way, Ari Cohen.’

‘Maybe so.’ She tapped her heart. ‘But this? For better or for worse, this is yours. And you know where to find me, if ever you want to get in touch.’

‘May I kiss you goodbye?’ His words came out all cracked and torn.

She took a step back. ‘Best not. I’ll cry.’

He closed his eyes and turned away.

And she was gone.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

AFTER ONE WEEK of solitude, Reid was second-guessing his decision to let Ari walk away. After two weeks, he’d taken to living in one of the cabins at site six and walking the tracks she’d laid out for him several times a day. In the mornings he listened for the birdsong. At midday he sought out the shady rest areas. Come sunset, he could be found in a bath, watching the colours of romance and fire light up the sky.

He found a carved wooden walking stick hanging from a tree branch on one of his walks. Oiled and knotted and handy should he ever encounter a snake he wanted to send on its way without getting too close.

He found an ice pack for migraine sufferers that covered a person’s forehead and eyes in every freezer in every cabin.

He found a single lens binocular, a monocular, in the bird hide that had been built in the curve of the channel bank and used it to bring the moon close enough to see every colour with his one good eye, with its pinpoint tunnel vision.

His phone did not stop ringing, with his key employees asking for his opinion on one thing or another, and he came slowly to the realisation that he wasn’t superfluous to requirements and his brain worked as well as it always had. He was a linchpin in a world he’d spent many years building and that wasn’t about to change because his vision was no longer twenty-twenty.

Demons were being slayed. Time was taking care of them.

Time and the slow realisation that he was still capable and needed.

Ari’s landscape worked its magic on him and brought him back to his senses, and those senses were stronger now, stepping up, getting a workout here in this garden of sensory engagement.

Ari was like no one else he’d ever experienced.

---