Shadows of the Past by Frances Housden

until he fell asleep without putting a name to what he’d been doing.
    Making excuses to keep seeing Maria.

Chapter 6

    N ext morning Maria waited on the flagstone-paved patio for Franc. Arching her foot, as she used to as a child, she pointed her toes above the line where two paving stones abutted, arms outstretched to prevent wobbling from side to side. An appropriate game, considering she felt she’d been practicing a high-wire balancing act since the moment she’d gotten out of his bed, and none too steadily at that.
    She was still woolgathering when Franc appeared at her elbow and caught her as she finally lost her balance. He didn’t look as if he’d spent the night squashed up beside her in a single bed. It was as if shaving had given him a new lease on life. Though she’d rather liked him slightly bristly. “All ready?”
    “I am if you are, but what’s going to happen when your family finds out we don’t have gifts for each other?”
    His words brought home to her what a nice guy Franc really was. Although he liked to pretend otherwise, what with his avowal that commitment was the last thing on his mind, and his only goal in life was to become a partner in his brother-in-law’s company. “I’ve thought of that. Though I don’t like fooling my parents I think we should say that we’d already exchanged gifts in Auckland before we knew you would come home with me.”
    “Do you think they’ll buy it?”
    “Of course they will, they like you. And I’m their daughter, they don’t know I have any reason to pretend.” Lying to her family was another corruption to blame on Randy Searle. Although, maybe she could c it out by remembering if it hadn’t been for him, she would never have met Franc.
    “Let’s turn it into the truth when we get back to Auckland. How ’bout I buy you a pair of earrings that will highlight the graceful curve of your neck.”
    Color raced into her cheeks as if acknowledging the compliment. She could see from the gleam in his eye that he recognized she wasn’t used to receiving them.
    Hmmph. Well, two could play that game. “I’ll have to think of something to buy that will bring out your best feature.” But she didn’t have enough experience to compete against Franc and win.
    “Better wait a day or two then, because, hon, you haven’t seen my best feature yet.”
    She was still blushing, her mind bedazzled as they walked into the lounge, and the madness that constituted Christmas in the Costello household.
     

    Someone should have warned him.
    The Christmas ritual began with small panini rolls, liberally filled with with smoked salmon or ham, and for the sweeter-toothed members—the children and Maria—there were chocolate-filled croissants. Franc had never experienced a Christmas morning like it. No one sat at the table. They piled into the lounge, filling the sofas and chairs, as well as stools and cushions on the floor, and everyone except the children washed down the food with another glass of Falcon Rise’s special Italian-style sparkling wine.
    Maria had insisted he take the chair while she sat on a pile of cushions at his feet. Every now and then she would look up to catch his reaction to what was happening.
    It hadn’t taken long to occur to him that, if she had told her family about Searle, the rituals would have gone ahead but only for the children’s sakes. And he doubted if even they would have gone about their business so lightheartedly, once the unease permeated down from their parents.
    One of the younger children, he’d forgotten his name, said, “Are you guys never going to finish eating? We want to open the presents.”
    Maria, who was on her third croissant, looked up at Franc, eyes twinkling and a smile on her face as if Searle didn’t exist. There was a small streak of chocolate on the side of her mouth. He swiped it off with his thumb then sucked it off. Her pupils blurred as they swallowed up the dark brown in her irises, making him clamp