She jumped out of the car and grinned. ‘What’s wrong? You didn’t have enough fun here?’
‘Yeah. I did.’
‘Me too.’
He was buzzing as he watched her leave. He’d pulled on his clothes and the smile on his face had lasted the whole morning as he’d gone around town getting his jobs done. He was nearly finished, and filling up at the service station ahead of the drive home, when someone pulled in beside him. Nathan clocked the top-of-the-range four-wheel drive and felt his grin fade for the first time.
He’d kept his head down as his father-in-law –ex-father-in-law – opened the driver’s door and climbed out. Out of the corner of his eye, Nathan thought he saw Keith Walker hesitate. Not for too long though. There were only two pumps, and Nathan was using one. If Keith needed fuel, he had no choice. He picked up the empty one.
‘Nathan.’
‘G’day, Keith.’ Nathan concentrated on the pump. He was going to fill up his tank and drive away. And that was it.
Keith looked over. ‘I spoke to Jacqui yesterday.’
Nathan watched the numbers on the dial turn around. ‘Oh yeah.’ Not a question.
‘And look, she’s instructing her lawyers to push back.’
‘Righto.’
‘Nathan, be reasonable. Asking for that level of contact, it’s too many calls and visits for a kid Xander’s age.’
‘My lawyer reckons it’s a pretty standard custody split.’
‘For divorced couples who live around the corner from each other, maybe. Not with you all the way out here.’
‘She’s the one who left. Not me.’ Nathan shut his mouth, then opened it again. ‘Anyway, I would’ve thought you’d be happy to have Xander around.’
Keith, with four properties, was one of the country’s biggest landowners and, in a good year, occasionally troubled the very tail end of the rich list. Now he shook his head, his mouth downturned. ‘Kathy and I see Xander in Brisbane. There’s no reason for the boy to come out here.’
‘I’m his dad, Keith.’ The pump clicked off. The tank was full. ‘So there’s one bloody good reason for you.’
Nathan looked at his father-in-law properly for the first time. He was a bit pale and seemed tired. Probably stayed up too late counting his money, Nathan thought, as he went inside to pay. Through the window, he could see Keith watching him.
Nathan had never been sure what it was about him that the bloke objected to so strongly. Keith hadn’t got along with Nathan’s dad, but that wasn’t exactly unusual. Nathan hadn’t got along with his dad either. And Keith had been all right when Nathan and Jacqui had first got together. Although, Nathan wondered, perhaps he’d just been biting his tongue, hoping the romance would run its course and fizzle out.
It got worse the better things got with Jacqui, and by the time the wedding rolled around, Nathan was barely on speaking terms with his new father-in-law. Keith had tried to talk Jacqui out of getting married, more than once, as Nathan learned some time later, when Jacqui screamed it at him across the room.
But the wedding had gone ahead, like it or not, and afterwards Keith had carved off part of his own extensive property and called it a peace offering. It was a relatively small strip directly bordering the Bright family’s land, and Keith had presented it to the newlyweds as a gift. Consider it a foothold in Kirrabee Station, he’d explained. If they made it work and outgrew it, they could buy out more from him over time.
Nathan had privately had a few doubts about that bit of land. The strip on that side of the fence had never looked good to him, but Jacqui had been excited, so he hadn’t said anything. She’d encouraged him to pour resources into it, set them up properly as a family property with one eye on the future. Nathan took the third of Burley Downs he inherited when his dad died, and sold half his share to Cameron.
His new land swallowed up the money as fast as he could put it in. Jacqui couldn’t understand it. She encouraged him to sell the remainder of his Burley Downs stake. Invest more. Try harder. Her dad made good money from property, why couldn’t Nathan? He refused to sell the rest of his inheritance and that was their first big fight as a married couple.
Jacqui went to stay with her parents for a few days. When she came back, Nathan voiced his opinion out loud that the land Keith had given them was a dud. That was their second big fight and Jacqui had climbed straight back in the car and disappeared to her parents’ house for another few days. And it occurred to Nathan, as he watched her drive away from the shitty piece of property, that possibly that was exactly what Keith had been hoping for.
Nathan now felt the wheels go over a bump and told himself to focus. The ground was uneven and Cameron’s car was unfamiliar. The last thing he needed was to get bogged in a sandbank. Up ahead, Harry’s car was slowing again. He had stopped twice more along the way, getting out to examine the ground along the fence line, or turn in a slow circle, taking in the surroundings.
‘What does he think he’s going to see at the grave?’ Xander said as it came into sight.
‘I don’t know,’ Nathan said. ‘But he’s known Cam since he was born. Maybe he just wants to see for himself.’
‘Maybe.’ Xander didn’t sound convinced.
Nathan had missed Xander even more than he’d expected when Jacqui had finally left for good. She’d been threatening it for so long it was almost a relief when it happened. She was absolutely sick of things. Nathan was a crap husband, crap dad, crap bloody provider and she let him know it. Nathan had thought he would be glad to see the back of her, but the separation from Xander felt like a physical blow.
He had found himself poring over photos. Looking at Xander’s happy face, his small hands and his thick hair, already with a bit of a wave. Nathan even missed hearing him cry out in the middle of the night, like an engine warming up. When Xander had been a baby, Nathan used to sit next to the cot in the dark and play his guitar softly. It had been one of the only things that seemed to soothe him for a time and Nathan had been surprised when Jacqui found that more annoying than helpful.
