‘It’s not going to happen,’ Molly told her, and they sat and stared at each other in increasing misery.

‘What we need here is something for really desperate people,’ Angela said at last, coming to a decision because someone had to. She rose and tossed her keys onto the sideboard. ‘I’m off to the supermarket and I’m walking, because just thinking about what I’m going to buy will put me over the legal alcohol limit.’

‘What are you going to buy?’

‘Irish cream, Tia Maria ice cream and an industrial sized packet of Tim Tams,’ her friend told her. ‘That should fix all the men in our lives. Properly.’


Molly opened one eye and shut it again. Firmly. Mistake, she thought. Big mistake. On a scale of one to ten, it fell off the counter.

‘Molly?’

It was Sam. He was bending over her, lifting an eyelid. ‘Are you in there?’

‘No.’ She groaned and he chuckled.

‘Yes, you are. Angela was asleep in the lounge room. She told me she wasn’t in there either, but she is really. And you haven’t washed your dishes. There’s empty ice cream tubs, which I don’t think is fair because I didn’t eat any, but you haven’t finished all the Tim Tams so I ate seven for breakfast.’ He burped a very satisfactory small boy burp and grinned. ‘And now we’re going to be late.’

Oh, help. Molly lifted one eyelid a fraction of an inch and checked the time. And yelped. Late! She’d be lucky to be on time for the afternoon shift. And Sam should be at school. What sort of a responsible guardian was she, anyway?

But this was the first time he’d been late in the six months she’d been taking care of him. Maybe it wasn’t a hanging offence. She groaned and eyed her nephew with caution.

‘Sam, do you suppose you could work really, really hard and still be a brain surgeon if I declare this morning a holiday?’

Sam considered, his grin growing broader. Where had this grin come from? Molly thought, shaken out of her bleariness by its intensity. On Friday it had been as if his face would crack if he smiled. Now the grins were coming fast and furious.

‘Why is it a holiday?’ he asked, and Molly sought for inspiration.

‘It’s National Frog Day,’ she said promptly, and his lovely giggle filled her room.

‘You are silly.’

‘Yeah, and I’m also risking being sacked. Though I have just made the world’s biggest sale.’ She sat up and rubbed her eyes. ‘Sorry, pet. Have you been awake for long?’

‘Mr Baird woke me up.’

‘Mr Baird?’

‘The doorbell went and I opened it,’ he told her. ‘He’s here and he’s brought a froghouse. In bits. We have to build it. It’s in the lounge room. Angela was there, but when I said come in to Mr Baird she went, “Yikes!” and she’s now in my bedroom, in my bed, with the bedcovers drawn up over her head. Do you think Mr Baird will give me another swimming lesson?’

‘I doubt it.’ The temptation to join Angela was almost overwhelming. ‘Um…is Mr Baird still here?’

‘Of course he is. With his present. The froghouse legs are in bits on the lounge room floor and I’ve been helping him read the instructions. We want to know where to put it, ’cos Mr Baird says he’s blowed if he’s moving it after it’s assembled. So he said I’d better wake you up, hangover or not.’ He peered closely at his dishevelled aunt. ‘That’s what he said. Have you got a hangover?’

‘No. Yes!’ Molly was staring at her nephew as if he’d grown horns. ‘He’s out there now?’

‘Yes.’

‘Tell him to go away.’

‘Tell him yourself.’ The voice was deep and growly and wonderfully familiar-and it made Molly jump a foot. She swivelled to find Jackson standing in the doorway, and by his unholy grin she knew he was enjoying himself very much indeed. ‘But why you’d want to I don’t know.’

‘What are you doing here?’

‘That’s not a nice way to greet a guest. Especially a guest who’s brought a gift.’

‘What gift?’

‘I told you. He’s brought us a froghouse,’ Sam explained, as if she was being deliberately obtuse. ‘It’s the hugest fishpond, but we’re not filling it all with water. It’s set up so there’s ponds and a waterfall and rocks for them to lie on. But we can’t get the legs together. Guy says the book of instructions reads like we’re building the Taj Mahal.’

‘Guy?’ What on earth was Angela’s fiancé doing here?

‘Hi,’ Guy said over Jackson’s shoulder, and Molly’s jaw dropped somewhere round her waist.

‘Guy…’

‘That’s me.’ The man managed a smile, but only just.

‘Does Angela know you’re here?’ She was practically squeaking.

‘Yes, but she’s locked the bedroom door,’ he told her, and he sounded bewildered. ‘She was mad at me because I wouldn’t wear white shoes. White shoes, for heaven’s sake. Then, when I started talking about our wedding and said we needed to have my sisters as bridesmaids, and maybe it was time we found a nice house in the suburbs, she started burbling about elopements and purple warehouses and I couldn’t make head nor tail of it. She walked out on me. I’ve been looking for her all weekend and Sam says she’s here but she won’t talk to me. Molly, why is her engagement ring on the coffee table rather than on her finger?’

It was too much for Molly. ‘I don’t know. Go away. The lot of you.’ She was clutching her sheet and thinking her bathrobe was too far away to reach…

‘We had a big night, then, did we?’ Jackson asked. He was leaning against the doorjamb, his arms crossed over his chest in a pose that was starting to seem dangerously familiar. He sounded full of commiseration, but his wide smile was filled with laughter.

‘You especially,’ she flashed at him. ‘Get out of my bedroom. Now!’

‘She doesn’t want us.’ Jackson’s big hand dropped to Sam’s shoulder in a gesture so familiar it had Molly’s heart doing backflips. ‘Sam, boy, we’re being rejected.’

‘At least she hasn’t taken your ring off,’ Guy told him, as lugubrious as a bloodhound on a bad day, and Jackson nodded.

‘There is that. I guess I should be grateful for small mercies. Molly, where do you want us to put your froghouse?’

‘I don’t want a froghouse!’ Molly practically yelled.

‘Molly!’ Sam said, shocked.

‘Of course you want a froghouse,’ Jackson told her. ‘You can’t keep using the bathroom floor. Someone’s going to step on one. Or…’ His eyes glinted with laughter. ‘They might hop down the toilet. Have you thought of that?’

Oh, for heaven’s sake!

‘It’d be an environmental nightmare if they reached the sewerage system.’

If only he’d stop laughing. She gritted her teeth. In fact she gritted every bone in her body and refused to respond to that gorgeous, wicked laughter. ‘Go away or I’ll scream.’

‘Why will you scream?’ Sam asked, interested, and Molly almost groaned. How on earth was she going to get out of this one?

But Jackson relented. Laughing, he took Sam’s hand-and there went Molly’s insides again in their familiar lurch-and drew him out of the room. He propelled Guy with him.

‘We men will be out in the living room when you’re up to receiving visitors,’ he told her, still laughing. ‘Meanwhile, Sam-unless you’d like to see your aunty Molly have an apoplexy, which I admit is a very interesting prospect but maybe risky for all concerned-we’d better vamoose.’

‘Vamoose?’

‘Leave your aunty Molly to recover.’


‘Angie?’

No answer.

‘Angela!’ Molly had hauled on a wrap and pulled a comb through her curls-she was now almost respectable-but she wanted support if she was to go into that living room. Supper last night had been Angela’s idea, so Angela could help her face the consequences.

‘Angie!’ The two bedrooms were off a central passage leading to the living room. As she tried Angela’s door Molly was acutely aware of the silence, and she just knew everyone was listening. She twiddled the doorknob and found it locked.

‘Come on out. I refuse to face this lot by myself.’

Nothing.

‘I’ll fix you.’ Angela was sleeping-sleeping-ha!-in Sam’s room, and the door had a child lock on it. That was, it could be locked, but in an emergency Molly could slip a nail file or a pair of scissors into the tiny slot and…

And the door opened first go.

But inside there was no Angela. There was only an empty bed and a wide open window with drapes blowing outward. With a sinking heart Molly peered out-in time to see her friend hiking off down the street as fast as her legs could carry her. She was wearing her mini-skirt of the night before, buttoning her blouse as she went and carrying her stilettos under one arm.

‘Don’t do this to me!’ she yelled to Angie’s retreating back, but just then a taxi pulled up and Angela clambered in with the speed of light. There was a wave of a frantic hand and the taxi headed out of sight.

Her friend had left her without a backward glance.

‘Oh, Angela, you fink…’

And then she turned and faced the living room door.

Help.

Sink or swim. There was no choice. She went to face the music. Alone.


It was far easier to concentrate on Guy than it was to even think about Jackson. Jackson and Sam were surrounded by construction plans, but Guy was standing by the coffee table, staring down at the ring as if it meant the end of the world as he knew it.

‘Hell.’ He lifted the ring and stared down at it, then peered down the passage. ‘Is Angie still there?’

Molly shook her head. ‘She’s gone.’

Guy sighed, his big shoulders slumping. He might be a very boring accountant, Molly thought, but right at this minute she felt sorry for him. He stood in his blue pinstripe suit with matching waistcoat, looking the very epitome of a successful accountant-and he looked as if he’d lost the world.

‘Maybe you should go after her,’ she suggested.