Page 1 of The Beach Cottage
One
The girl looked just like Aidan Whitlock. Especially those long, spindly legs. That’s what ran through Beatrice Rushton’s mind when the teenager confronted them on the beach beside the roaring flames of a bonfire at her housewarming party. The cottage was lit up by the glow of a few lights she’d flicked on before she stepped outside to greet her guests. She’d also lined the pathway down to the beach with solar lanterns.
Guests meandered along the path, drinks in hand as they chatted and laughed. Several milled around the food table where she’d laid out a spread of finger foods, including olives, cheeses, crackers, breads and dips.
None of that mattered in the moment. The party faded into the background of Bea’s thoughts as she turned her focus back to her boyfriend and the girl standing before him.
What had she said?
You’re my dad.
Bea glanced around at her group of friends — Evie, Taya and Penny all gaped, eyes wide.
Aidan took the teen to one side and spoke to her in hushed tones, one hand on her shoulder, his head bent low towards hers. Bea no longer had the comfort of his arm around her shoulders. She was the outsider, looking in on a private conversation between two people she didn’t know. She thought she knew Aidan, but in that moment, he seemed a stranger to her. She shivered in the cool night air and hugged herself as Evie came up alongside her.
“Are you okay?”
Bea nodded. “Of course, I’m fine. I’m sure it’s a misunderstanding. She must be about fifteen or so. Aidan was married fifteen years ago, and I know he wouldn’t have cheated on his wife. We’ve had so many conversations about my marriage breakdown, and he’s always expressed disgust at Preston’s affair.”
Evie patted her arm. “I’m sure you’re right. He’ll get to the bottom of this. Perhaps she made a mistake. What was her name again?”
“She introduced herself as Grace Allen and said her mother’s name is Kelly Allen. Aidan’s never mentioned a Kelly to me. Has he said anything to you about her?”
Evie shook her head. “I didn’t really see much of him fifteen years ago. He lived in Brisbane then.”
The girl reached for her long, golden hair and twirled it between her hands while Aidan said something to her in a muffled tone. Bea wished she could take a few steps closer without being obvious. Perhaps then she’d be able to hear what they were saying to one another.
Her certainty wavered — maybe Aidan had been unfaithful to his wife. If so, that would change everything between the two of them. Bea’s heart had been broken by her own husband’s unfaithfulness. She wasn’t sure she could stomach Aidan having done the same thing, especially when his wife had died of cancer several years later and wasn’t there to confront him over it.
She shouldn’t jump to conclusions. She’d give him a chance to defend himself. To tell her what’d happened. But she couldn’t get over how much like him the teen girl looked — even the way she held herself, the way she looked up at him with a barely veiled rebelliousness flashing in her eyes. It was all so Aidan. Memories of him as a teen boy helping her sneak out of the house, or urging her to leap off a cliff into the ocean before following, or giving her a cigarette to try for the first time, flashed before her eyes. This girl was the spitting image of him. With a sigh, her shoulders slumped, and she turned on her heel to stride back in the direction of the cottage.
There was no point fighting it. Aidan had a daughter.
“Where are you going?” Evie asked, jogging to keep up with her.
“Let’s get out of here. I can’t bear to stay a moment longer.”
“But it’s your party,” objected Taya with a frown as she hurried after them, with Penny close behind.
“I don’t care,” Bea replied. “I’ve got to go.”
Grace Allen.
A name that Beatrice Rushton wouldn’t soon forget. She paced back and forth in her bedroom, worrying a fingernail with her teeth. She stared at her phone where it rested on the dresser against the wall. Why hadn’t Aidan called?
She’d left the party at her own beach cottage, with guests exchanging puzzled looks and the fire still burning, food on the tables and drinks cooling in buckets. She, Taya, Evie and Penny had all headed back to Evie’s place, a small timber house only a few hundred metres away from her bookshop, to spend the night.
They’d debated what the revelation could mean until the wee hours of the morning over glasses of wine and in between bites of cheesecake and chocolate. They’d raised so many questions, and Bea’s anxiety levels rose exponentially with each hour that passed until finally, she’d declared herself exhausted and headed to bed on the couch in the den.
Before she left the party, she’d locked the cottage door and left Aidan with the key. He promised to clean up the beach and send the rest of the guests home. She’d had to feed and water the pademelon that Penny had brought back from the wildlife refuge, then took it up to her father’s house so he could care for the creature for a few days. She didn’t have the capacity to care for it and was hardly home lately. He seemed quietly excited at the prospect and was already putting together a meal of leaves and vegetables when she left.
“Good luck,” she’d whispered as she pulled the door shut behind her with a sigh of relief.
She’d forgotten to pack pyjamas or a toothbrush. Hadn’t thought of anything much other than getting out of there. The idea of facing anyone after what’d happened was more than she could take.
They’d all seen it. Been witness to her humiliation.
She pressed both hands to her face and rubbed her eyes. This was insane. Why didn’t he call? Surely he knew they had to talk. If nothing else, she wanted the truth. It might mean their relationship, as young and tender as it was, wouldn’t last. But she deserved to know. He had to understand that, given the fact that her own husband had lied to, cheated on and stolen from her, she wouldn’t stand for secrets in a relationship.
