Page 77 of Lime Tree Hill

Tayla sighed. “No. I meant to grab it, but then Mum called, and I forgot.”

“Just as well I brought a spare. I was at Petrie Bay yesterday. It’s freezing.” Tim opened the back door and grabbed the wetsuits. “Has Mitch given you any lessons yet?”

Tayla wanted to say yes, but Mitch hadn’t mentioned surfing lessons again. “Not yet.”

“I thought that was one of your conditions.”

“It was, but we’ve been busy.” She shot him a sly smile.

Eyes wide, he stared at her. “Doing what?”

She laughed. “Orchard stuff. He’s replacing the cherry trees at Mum and Dad’s with grapefruit this week.”

“So you talk business together, do you?”

“Sometimes. You know how passionate he is about organics.”

“I do.” Tim flashed a wide grin. “Even so, it sounds to me like he wants you to be a real couple. Shit, you’ll be having babies soon.”

Chuckling, Tayla snatched the wetsuit out of his hands, and as she stripped down to her bikini and tugged it on, her body bumped with the cold. “I’m pretty sure you can’t get pregnant just from kissing.” She put her hand over Tim’s mouth as he went to say more. She didn’t want the third degree. And anyway, there was nothing else to say.

“Come on,” she said, removing her hand. “I’ll race ya. Go.”

When she entered her bedroom later that evening, a red hoodie with ‘Ducati’ printed on the front sat folded on the end of her bed. Frowning, she read the attached Post-It-Note.

T

You want to wear my hoodie, babe?

M xx

Tayla smiled as she pulled on the hoodie and studied herself in the mirror. With the length and huge fit of it, she looked ridiculous. But it was warm and snuggly, and although she’d never seen it before, well-worn and smelled faintly of Mitch.

She moved through to the bathroom and turned on the shower, eager to wash away the salt and sand. The wetsuit’s buoyancy had provided a level of security, and with Tim’s encouragement, she’d dipped her shoulders under the swell twice without feeling rooted to the spot.

Small steps, significant gains.

Sleep was difficult to find that night. The loft was isolating without Mitch, and even though Tayla had lived alone in Bondi and loved it, she wondered how she’d feel when it was time to leave Lime Tree Hill. She enjoyed being part of someone’s world. Part of a couple.

Most Thursdays, Mitch texted her around lunchtime, asking when she’d be home. But that Thursday, there was no text. When she walked through the door that evening, the place was a mess. Dirty dishes toppled out of the sink, and files and stacks of papers covered one end of the dining table.

She knocked on his office door to no answer. By the time Mitch bounded up the stairs, she’d cleaned the kitchen and made a start on dinner.

He picked up the remote and turned down the music. “Thanks for cleaning up. Sorry, the day got away on me,” he said without offering her the usual hello kiss she’d come to expect.

“Is everything okay? You look exhausted.”

He stood at the table, gathering files and papers. “I feel it too. Someone’s stripped half our avocado trees.”

“Who would do that? Aren’t they too young to ripen?”

“That’s what I can’t fathom. The pricks must know that. What the hell were they thinking?” He ran a hand through his hair, not bothering to look at her, then sat at the table and shuffled through a file in front of him. “And now someone’s laid a complaint againstus with the OCA. We have a large export order ready for Japan, so it’s bad timing.”

“What’s the OCA? Is it serious?”

“The Organic Certification Association. And yes, it’s serious. They’ve ordered an audit of our practices. I’ve nothing to hide, but we’ll be tangled up in sticky red tape for a while.”

She wanted to go to him, to massage the tension from his shoulders, but his body language told her to stay back. “Will it affect your other exports?”

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