Page 1 of Hearts of Stone

Chapter 1

The week I found out I had inherited a mansion started the same way my weeks had started for months. Terribly.

One: when I woke up, I realised I was sleeping on the couch. Not because I’d fallen asleep binge-watching Disney cartoons like I would’ve liked, but because the couch was my bed, and would be for the near future.

Two: it wasn’t my alarm that woke me up. It was the sound ofhimclattering around in the adjoining kitchen.

Him being my ex—Trevor.

My head jerked up off the pillow and I blinked, then blinked again, pulled from a deep sleep by the noise of cupboards creaking open then banging shut, and the kettle boiling. As I woke up properly and remembered why I was sleeping on the couch, the pressure in my head started up, increasing as the sound of the kettle got louder. I felt as though I’d only just gotten to sleep, and now… I popped my head up over the back of the couch to see Trevor, dressed smartly, busily getting himself a coffee, and I wondered how the hell we’d gotten to this point.

This was not the way we’d started. When we arrived in the city as childhood sweethearts, we hadn’t lived anywhere asswanky as this. We certainly hadn’t been able to afford single origin coffee that came in gold bags. I watched Trev portion out coffee beans that clattered into the grinder, then winced at the abrasive sound when he pressed the button and the smell of fresh coffee filled the air. After high school, we’d both been supposed to go to university, but Trevor’d talked me into working at the local supermarket to support us, so he could study law full time. He’d explained that it would mean he could get through faster; that when he was done, he’d set us up somewhere nice, guarantee our financial security and then I’d… I sighed to myself. There was no point thinking about those promises because they’d all been broken.

“Aren’t you getting up?” Trevor asked me, as he looked in my direction, and I saw his face had taken on that dissatisfied, pinched expression again.

It still struck me with a strange kind of horror to see disgust in his expression, rather than love. Those once warm eyes now hard and cold, the lips I'd kissed a thousand times pressed into a thin line. But, to my shame, I did as I was told, clawing my way out from beneath the blankets I’d been nestled under.

“I don’t start work until eleven,” I said, walking into the kitchen while he looked me up and down.

I was wearing one of his old band t-shirts, from back when he was a nerdy guy who liked to listen to old school metal like Iron Maiden. He took in the faded cotton, the cracked print on the shirt, and his eyebrows jerked down into a severe frown. No band t-shirts for Trev any more. He wore a sharp suit, personally tailored to fit him, with a crisp white shirt and a tie with a subtle design embossed upon it.

“Then you can spend the morning looking for a place to move into.” He poured the coffee into a travel mug, not offering me one, then pushed a sheaf of printouts towards me. “Here. These seem like they’d be in your price bracket. I’ve been patient, Jade.I’ve let you stay here because it would cause dramas between our families if I simply evicted you.”

And that's when I felt a flash of red hot anger. I wasn't the one who got us here. It wasn't my fault it’d all gone to hell. It was a tale as old as time. He’d been working late more and more before we split, telling me he was putting in the hard yards to try and build a future for the two of us. Turned out the only hard thing he was doing was screwing one of the paralegals on his desk once everyone else had left for the night. And I’d found out in the worst way possible. I’d opened the door to his office with a smile on my face, then stopped dead in shock, dropping the takeaway containers I’d brought to surprise him, leaving the Thai curry to seep into the expensive carpet. And she’d watched me over his shoulder, holding my gaze as those perfect brows had creased and she’d let out a helpless little moan as she came. All I could manage was a low groan of pain, as if I’d been punched in the guts, the sound a pathetic echo of hers. My attention came back to my current situation as Trevor pointed impatiently at the pages on the counter. I picked up the printouts of rental listings and flicked through them quickly.

Some stupid, deluded part of him seemed to think I hadn’t moved out yet because I still wanted to be with him. It seemed incomprehensible to him that the real reason might possibly be the fact that we were in the midst of an economic downturn, that everyone was struggling to find money for rent and food and, on top of that, there just weren’t enough places available. We hadn’t seen a shortage of rental properties like this in thirty years, the newscasters had said. Some blamed immigration, some pointed the finger at Airbnb, and others said it was due to interest rate rises. All I knew was what it meant for someone like me.

Every time I’d gone to an open inspection of a rental property there’d been thirty, forty, sometimes fifty people—couples, singles, families—all looking at the same place. The governmenthad ended up having to put legislation in place to stop rent-bidding, because people had been offering to pay more than the stated rent, all just to secure a place to live. As I thought about how hard it was proving to find somewhere, I had that feeling again, that crushing sensation in my chest, right as my heart began to flutter. My ribs felt like hands closing around the butterfly wings of my heart, even as it kept trying to beat harder and harder… I took a deep breath, trying to find calm.

“Trevor…” I said his name the way I always said it these days, so carefully, as I laid the papers back down on the counter. “I’ve been to every single one of these properties—”

“You can’t have.” The tone of voice and attitude told me that I wasn’t dealing with Trevor, my once dorky boyfriend: this was ‘Mr Davis’, big shot property lawyer. He stood taller, his suit looking like an impervious wall of black wool, making him seem all the more intimidating as his eyes drilled into mine. “It’s notthathard, Jade. We found that place out at Elizabeth easily enough.”

I felt a sudden rush of shame, triggered by his condescending tone, but then I rolled my eyes, internally. That had been seven years ago. The thought fought its way past my initial reaction to his patronising attitude. A few things had changed in that time. We’d had a pandemic, a meteoric increase in property values, and immigration had started again. I wanted to protest that the world had changed; that it wasn’t so easy these days. But I kept my mouth shut, because I knew that once I started talking, all the horror, all the fear, all the terror of potentially being homeless would come rushing out. And arguing with a lawyer? Nothing they liked more. He was already puffing himself up, readying his counter arguments, ready to tell me how it would be easy if I just tried harder.

So that’s when I pulled out my own secret weapon. Something much more powerful than the formality of a bespoke suit.

It was the nuclear option and it’d blow my life up, just as much as his, but it was all I had left. I sucked in a breath and then forced the words out.

“I’m considering moving back home.”

I watched him deflate… no…collapsein on himself. All the arrogance and fire died out of his eyes, leaving him just an ordinary man in a nice suit looking furtively around the room, as if his parents or mine would jump out any second. They all thought we were still together. They didn’t know about the affair, or the fact Trevor was bringing Susan back here some nights to fuck enthusiastically, while I tried to sleep on the couch. I hated it. I hated him, and, by extension, I hated Susan and her baleful looks whenever she entered the fancy apartment Trevor had made us sign the lease for. But, most of all, I hated myself. When I’d discovered what he’d been doing, I’d screamed, raged, cried, screamed some more, then picked up some god-awful expensive vase he’d bought and thrown it at his head. But then… right when I should’ve been striding out of his life to pick up the pieces of mine, he’d laid out the economic reality.

“And what’re you going to do, Jade?” The sneer that appeared, it was the first of many. And I’d never, ever expected to see that look on his face. “Pay for this place on a checkout chick’s wage?” I’d made it to assistant manager, but, still, the situation was basically the same. I’d baulked at the cost of this place when he’d found it, my Spidey sense leading me to recognise I was in over my head. “You can stay here until you get on your feet—and then you can get your shit and move out,” he’d said with finality, the smug bastard looking like he was congratulating himself on his rational, benevolent way of dealing with the situation.

“Moving home?” he asked, no sign of a smug smile on his face. He swallowed, then seemed to try for a sneer but failed, so he resorted to mocking me. “You’re just going to scuttle back home to Mumsy and Daddy?”

His barb was well-aimed. I didn’t want to go back there. Getting out of Daysborough was the best thing I’d ever done. It was a cute town to raise kids in, but there was little to do once they were teenagers. Every time I thought about what it would be like to live there, my chest got tight, just like it was now, making it hard to take a full breath, my lungs burning.

It’s better than putting up with this shit, I reminded myself.

“You want to move Sharon in here,” I said.

“Susan,” he corrected tightly.

“And all I want to do is get the fuck away from you.” The words came out tight, through clenched teeth, because that was the only way I could express my anger.Keep it all locked down, that was my daily motto, the only thing that seemed to get me through one catastrophic event after another. “I can’t find another place. I’ve tried and tried—”

“Try harder.” He shoved the papers back towards me. “Sharon, I mean Susan is coming over tonight. Ring your ‘bestie’ and let him know you’ll be camping out in his lounge room. And get your shit together, Jade. You used to be smarter than this.”

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