New Year, New Man. Laura Iding

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      ‘Lots of men don’t. But they change, once they have their own.’

      His glance was sharp. ‘I won’t. Because I don’t intend having any of my own.’

      Sarah kept her expression calm. ‘Why’s that?’

      ‘Fathering is a learned skill, passed on from generation to generation. The only example I ever had of fathering is not something I’d like to pass on.’

      ‘Not every child of abusive parents becomes an abuser themselves, Nick,’ she said carefully.

      ‘Perhaps not. But why take the chance? The world has enough children. They won’t miss mine.’

      ‘You might change your mind if you were presented with one.’

      He whipped his head round to glare at her. ‘You have brought your pills with you, haven’t you? You’re not going to try that old pregnancy trap. Because it won’t work, Sarah. Not with me.’

      The coldness in his eyes sent a chill running down her spine.

      But she refused to give up on him. For now, anyway.

      ‘I have no intention of trying to trap you with a baby, Nick. And yes, I have brought my pills. You can feed me one every day, if you’d like.’

      ‘I just might do that.’

      ‘Have you always been this paranoid about pregnancy?’

      ‘Let’s just say you’re the first female I’ve ever had sex with without a condom.’

      ‘It’s nice to know that I’m unique.’

      He smiled wryly as he shook his head at her. ‘You are that, all right. Now, drink your coffee before it goes cold and I have to call the stewardess again.’

      She drank her coffee quickly, anxious to get back to their conversation. It would be a couple more hours before they landed on Happy Island, with Nick imprisoned by her side all that time. Sarah didn’t think she’d ever have a better opportunity to find out all the things she’d ever wanted to know about him. She suspected that once they hit Happy Island, there might not be too much talking done.

      ‘Tell me about your life, Nick,’ she said when she finally put the coffee down. ‘Before you came to work for Dad. I’m curious.’

      ‘I never talk about that part of my life, Sarah.’

      ‘But that’s silly. It’s not as though I don’t already know quite a bit. I know you had a horrible father and that you ran away from home to live on the streets when you were only thirteen. And I know that you were put in jail for car-stealing when you were eighteen.’

      ‘Then you know enough, don’t you?’

      ‘Those are just the bare facts. I want you to fill in the details.’

      Nick sighed. ‘You do pick your moments.’

      ‘I think I have the right to know some more about the man I’m sleeping with, don’t you? You used to give my boyfriends the third degree.’

      ‘But I’m not your boyfriend. I’m your secret lover. Secret lovers are often men of mystery.’

      ‘Sorry, but you’re not my secret lover any longer. I told Flora last night that we were together.’

      ‘You what?’

      Sarah shrugged. ‘I said I was sorry.’

      ‘Like hell you are. You’re a conniving, manipulative little minx.’

      Sarah could see that he wasn’t as angry as he was trying to sound. And she had no intention of backing off.

      ‘So are you going to tell me your life story, or not?’

      ‘Do you think you’re up for it, little girl?’

      ‘Don’t insult my intelligence, Nick. I might not have been around like you, but I watch the news at night, and I can read. I know about the big, bad world. Nothing you say will shock me.’

      What a naïve statement, Sarah was to discover over the next quarter of an hour as she listened to Nick’s dreadful life story.

      His mother had run off when he’d been too young to remember her, his lone-parent father a violent and drunken good-for-nothing who taught his son to shoplift when he was only five and beat him every other day. Sarah was appalled as Nick described being not only punched and slapped, but also beaten with belts and burned with cigarettes.

      Naturally, Nick’s schooling had been limited—he was kept away a lot—but he was smart enough to learn to read and write. Love, of course, had been an unknown emotion. He’d counted himself lucky to be fed. Survival had been the name of the game.

      When he’d gone into puberty at thirteen, he’d suddenly shot up in height and was able to look his father straight in the eye. For the first time when his father hit him, Nick had hit back.

      He hadn’t actually run away from home as she’d thought. He’d been literally thrown out into the street with only the clothes he was wearing.

      He’d stayed in a refuge for a while, but was unfortunate enough to find one that was run by someone who wasn’t interested in helping, just in pocketing his salary. Not the best introduction to the welfare system for an already emotionally scarred child. After running away from there, Nick had made his way to King’s Cross in Sydney, where he squatted in derelict buildings and made money the only way he knew: by stealing. Not shoplifting. Mostly he broke into parked cars and stole the contents.

      He’d resisted joining a gang, not wanting to rely on anyone but himself. He had made a few friends, but they were all low-life, pimps and prostitutes and drug-dealers. Inevitably, he’d been drawn into drug use himself. Anything to make his existence more bearable.

      Addiction of any kind, however, took money. So he had started breaking and entering, plus stealing the cars themselves, rather than just the contents.

      ‘One night,’ he said, ‘I made a mistake and got caught. I went to jail, met your father and the rest is history, as they say.’

      Sarah was close to tears. ‘Oh, Nick…’

      ‘I did warn you.’

      ‘You survived, though.’

      ‘Let me tell you about that kind of survival,’ he bit out. ‘It makes you think of no one but yourself. You become hard, and cold, and capable of just about anything. When I first met your father when I was in jail, I didn’t give a damn about him, only what he could do for me. I saw a means of escape and I grabbed it with both hands. When I finally got out of jail and came to work as Ray’s chauffeur, I thought he was a sucker. I had no feelings for him whatsoever.’

      ‘But you did, in the end,’ she said. ‘You loved him.’

      ‘I respected him. That’s not the same as love.’

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