‘Oh right, yes, sorry. The Peats Ridge Road exit.’ He shifted the phone away from his mouth for a moment. ‘She said her husband is gone,’ he said to Darren, pointing at the passenger seat. ‘I’m worried he’s been thrown from the car; we need to look.’

Darren straightened up.

‘What the hell? She was driving alone. My dad’s dead. He died a year ago.’

Chapter Eight

CHAPTER EIGHT

Christmas Eve — a year ago

Jill

‘So, I called to let him know there was a parcel collection card here for him and you know what he said? He said, could you pop by the post office and pick it up for me? I mean, could you believe the nerve?’

‘Well, why do you get involved with these things? They’ve never done nothing for us.’

‘Because it’s the neighbourly thing to do. And they’ve never done anything for us, dear.’

They’d come out to a café for breakfast and had lingered over their coffees, avoiding joining the last-minute rush in the shops as people grabbed their final food and shopping for Christmas tomorrow.

Frank dipped his spoon in cappuccino froth, positioned it like a catapult and flicked it across the table at Jill. ‘I ain’t changed the way I talk for fifty years and I ain’t about to change it now, woman.’

Jill picked up a serviette to wipe the froth off the front of her top, but she was smiling. She would never admit it, but she actually liked it when Frank did childish things like that. It made her feel like they were teenagers again. Although if she’d been wearing her silk blouse she might not have been so amused.

Her own parents had always hated the way Frank spoke. Not to mention his table manners. The fact they disapproved was one of the reasons Jill had pursued Frank in the first place. Growing up on the Upper North Shore meant Jill’s parents weren’t too keen on her dating a boy from the west. They never did stop looking down on him — even after he built his own construction company from the ground up.

In the end, he was worth more than Jill’s parents had ever been, yet whenever he came to visit, they continued to speak to him like a poor farmer boy who might steal the silverware, right up until they’d both passed on. To his credit, he let their barbs fly right by, never biting.

The good thing was that Frank had always been determined to treat his own sons’ girlfriends with kindness and respect. Mimi and Andrea were welcomed into the family with wide open arms. As was Darren’s girlfriend, Charlotte — and fingers crossed that boy would get off his backside and pop the question to her soon too.

‘You’re not going to pick up the parcel for them?’ Frank asked.

‘Well, I could hardly say no.’