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It’s just you that can’t move on, Derek.
I wasn’t sure what coming out to see him was going to achieve. A stupid fairy tale reunion was a pitiful dream, I could see that now. So maybe at best, I could see with my own two eyes that he’d moved on and that I should do the same.
“You feeling okay? Lookin’ a little pale. If you don’t like boats, you should have said.”
His voice was so familiar. I hadn’t heard it in years, yet after just a few hours, it felt as if I’d never missed a day.
I’d missed him every day.
I let out a breath and glanced at him before nodding toward the front of the boat. “Nah, I’m okay.” It wasn’t like I could tell him the uneasy feeling was because I was imagining him having a new lover. “You do know that teaching crocodiles to jump out of the water for food isn’t a good idea.”
He grinned. “They tell people not to dangle over the sides and of course they never listen. Until they see the crocs jump up like that.”
I shook my head. Stupid tourists. Actually, stupid tourism operators who thought of it. I pointed my chin to a group of people who were keeping clear of the edge. “Wanna bet they’re locals?”
Paul chuckled, and with a sigh, his smile faded. “I saw your name on the group manifest. Wondered if it was you.”
“The one and the same.” I also wasn’t about to tell him that I’d found out which tour operation he ran and chose it specifically so I could see him. So I lied instead. “Got a bit of a surprise seeing you.”
He nudged me with his elbow. “I could tell by your face.”
The shock on my face when I’d seen him had nothing to do with surprise. It was that he, after all these years, was standing right in front of me. Even more handsome than he ever had been.
Five years later, like an eternity and no time at all had passed.
“How’ve you been?” he asked.
“Okay,” I replied. “Pretty good. How about you? Got your dream job, I see.”
He flinched like my words had found their mark. I hadn’t meant to sound so bitter. “Yeah. Been doing this for over four years now. I love it.” He looked at me then. “What about you?”
I shrugged. “Much the same.”
“Still at the bar?”
I snorted. “No. Office job. It’s as bad as it sounds.”
“But no nights and weekends or bar fights, right?”
I almost smiled. “Right.”
He kinda smiled, and we watched the tourists marvel at the crocodiles for a while. “Still into the stars, I see,” he said, giving me a smile. “Is that a new telescope?”
I nodded. He’d never really understood my fascination with the night sky. Hell, I didn’t either, really. But he’d never thought it was weird or foolish like other people did, and I was still grateful for that. “Yeah. I’ve had it for about two years now. Someone said I needed to see the view from Kakadu.” I shrugged again. “So here I am.”
No one had told me to come to Kakadu. It was all my doing. Tracking him down, using it as an excuse to see him again. And, like he could see right through my bullshit, he stared at me for a long beat, his gaze searching mine. I don’t know what he was looking for. The truth, probably.
“It’s pretty spectacular,” he said.
My pulse quickened—his effect on me still had a stronghold. Especially this close to me, where I could feel his body heat, smell his deodorant. Before I could form any words to speak, the crowd of idiots watching the crocodiles jump all squealed, and both Paul and I turned at the sound.
“Has anyone ever fallen in?” I asked.
“Not that I know of.” He shot me a half-smile. “I did hear of a guy that needed to be choppered out of a canyon this year. Tried to take a selfie with a brown snake.”
I snorted. “Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. You know, Darwinism is a thing.”
He chuckled. “I try and instil a common-sense approach with my clients.”
