Chapters (50)
- Cover
- About the Book
- Dedication
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-one
- Twenty-two
- Twenty-three
- Twenty-four
- Twenty-five
- Twenty-six
- Twenty-seven
- Twenty-eight
- Twenty-nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-one
- Thirty-two
- Thirty-three
- Thirty-four
- Thirty-five
- Thirty-six
- Thirty-seven
- Thirty-eight
- Thirty-nine
- Acknowledgements
- About the Author
- Also by Sandie Docker
- Book Club Questions
- Welcome to the Kookaburra Creek Café
- Prologue
- One
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She climbed back into bed beside Mark and wrapped her arm around his chest. She would be up in a few hours for her early writing stint and really needed to get some sleep. Unaccustomed to wearing much jewellery, the ring on her finger felt heavy and strange and she stared at it in the dark, smiling until slumber finally came.
Three
Nicole stripped the last of the paint from the fireplace as the midday sun streamed through the old leadlight window in the living room, casting pools of rose, olive and lemon light across the cedar floorboards. She’d got up at five to clean the last of the dust from the windows throughout the cottage and then started on the next task on her list.
Danny had offered to restore the fireplace as a labour of love, a personal interest project, and Nicole had to get it prepared. The carved mantelpiece, aged and chipped, was supported by damaged columns and scrolls. The cracked tiles of the hearth lay dull, with life beneath waiting to be freed. In the middle of the lintel Nicole could see something carved into the stone.
Was it an insignia? She’d seen it some place before.
She ran into the kitchen and pulled out the old box she’d found hidden in the fireplace. There it was, the same lettering on the lid. And each envelope was sealed with the identical ‘I&T’ in wax.
She’d seen it elsewhere, too. On the bench outside the boatshed. A spark of interest sizzled and Nicole shoved the box back in the cupboard. No. She couldn’t read those letters. They were someone’s private thoughts and she had no right.
Standing back in front of the hearth, Nicole tried to imagine it restored to its former glory. How many nights had Ivy sat in front of a warm fire, reading a book maybe, or knitting perhaps? Had she sat there alone? With the Thomas from the letters? With a brood of noisy children swirling around her feet?
She took a dustpan and brush and swept up the last remaining dirt, making sure she got right into the back corners of the fire box, thick with ash and tiny debris. The brush caught something heavy. Heavier than the piles of ash she’d been sweeping up. She fingered through the pile and pulled out a small piece of wood. It looked singed, but not burned. She turned it over in her hand. A spinning top perhaps?
A knock interrupted her contemplation and she ran into the kitchen and put the relic in the same cupboard as Ivy’s letters before opening the door.
Danny stood on the other side of the screen in his King Gees, toolbox in hand. His well-defined jawline, warm smile and sandy-coloured hair were quite a combination. Tall and strongly built, he looked every bit ready for the work that lay ahead.