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  “Oh, that’s dreadful,” Coco responded almost absently. She paused and Jem heard a door shut on the other end of the line.

  “Actually, I’m glad you’ve phoned just now as I’m thinking of leaving Phillipe,” Coco confided with hushed excitement to Jem’s stunned silence. “I’ve met an exciting American called Derek. He’s in oil. But this time I don’t plan to rush things,” she said with a little laugh. “Margeaux and Jilly will be collecting me any moment as we’re going on Margeaux’s cousin’s yacht and will cruise the Mediterranean for the next week as Phillipe has business in Sweden and you know how I hate the cold. I’ve decided not to make a final decision until we return.”

  Jem pulled the phone from her ear and looked at it incredulously. Could mothers be switched at birth?

  Reluctantly she replaced the phone against her ear.

  “Sounds like you have a bit of fun planned,” Jem commented bitingly. “Don’t you at least have anything to ask or say about Jess?”

  As expected, her tone of voice went right over Coco’s head. Heaven forbid her mother change her plans because one of her daughters was on life support.

  “No. You covered everything well so what more could I possibly add?”

  “Maybe say something to show you care,” Jem muttered under her breath.

  “Of course I care. I already plan to send her flowers,” Coco said indignantly, annoyed that her daughter would consider that she felt otherwise. She didn’t know why she bothered telling her about Derek, Jem clearly didn’t care about what was going on in her life.

  Jem winced when she realised that her mother had heard what she had said. Why couldn’t there be a distorted echo or an annoying beep on the phone line when she wanted one?

  “You can’t have flowers in intensive care,” she told Coco flatly. As usual her mother was completely absorbed with herself and deep down Jem knew the only reason she kept in touch was familial obligation. Why had she dared to hope for a genuine show of concern after all these years?

  “Then I’ll send a card.”

  “She’s in a coma and won’t be able to read it.”

  “She’ll have visitors and they’ll know my thoughts are with her.”

  Only for as long as it takes to write the card and address it.

  “The only visitors she’s allowed are family so the only person other than me to read it will be Eben.”

  “Eben? You mean that bum that Jason had as best man at their wedding? Is he still around sponging off them? He’s not family.”

  “He doesn’t sponge Coco. He does a lot of things with them; he’s the children’s honorary uncle and probably babysits more than I do,” Jem said in his defence, belatedly realising that it was the truth.

  Coco sniffed. “How is it that he is invited to participate in their activities and I’m not?”

  Because he’s a good friend, he doesn’t make every encounter all about him like you’re doing right now or engineer everything to suit him. Oh, and he chooses to live nearby, not the other side of the planet. Pick one.

  Instead of voicing her thoughts Jem picked up her pen and started making stronger slashes through the crossed off items on the list as she listened to Coco continue her grievances. Why couldn’t the communication satellite her phone was using fall out of the sky right now?

  Eben stopped trying to force a large blue pilates ball behind the chair in the corner when he saw the way Jem stiffly held herself and the jerky motions of the pen across the paper. Coco was one of the few people he truly didn’t like.

  Although she could be a charming and fun person to be around, everything had to revolve around her wants and she would become “difficult” when she didn’t have her own way. Eben found out that wasn’t often because Jem and Jess would go out of their way to keep the peace.

  He didn’t think Coco wasn’t a bad person, just someone spoiled with an egocentric view of life and oblivious to the needs of others which probably contributed to her multiple marriages. From what he had heard, Coco’s wealthy, indulgent parents had never said “No” to her but Eben bet her ex-husbands had and she couldn’t deal with it so had moved on.

  She was selfish and self-absorbed yet gave the appearance of being anything but to her friends and acquaintances. Her daughters were forever being told how lucky they were to have such a caring and generous mother.

  He almost snorted. In the beginning he had thought similarly about Coco but then he got to know her. His friend Jase had no time for the woman and that was long after she had boycotted his wedding because Jess wouldn’t let her take it over.

  Eben would never confess to understanding women but even he could see why Jess would want to pick her own wedding dress and get married amongst friends instead of a huge society wedding with the majority of guests made up of Coco’s friends and acquaintances.

  Then when Jeremy was born Coco insisted upon moving in with them to “help out”. Instead of helping, Jess ran around after her, acting as her social secretary while Coco caught up with her friends. She’d even taken their one car out for the afternoon and couldn’t be reached when Jess went into labour.

  Luckily Jem had been able to cross town in time to take her to the hospital and have Eben collect Jase from work to meet them there. Then Coco had the audacity to complain about arriving back to a dark house and about them not trying harder to get hold of her.

  Coco’s stay for Daisy’s birth had been the breaking point for any tolerance as far as Jase went. Coco had arrived on Jess’s due date and had planned to stay for two weeks. By that stage Jase was working from home so was aware that Jess was picking up after her mother as well as Jeremy who Coco wouldn’t take with her on her many outings because she had decided he was too young to be away from his mother. More likely keeping track of a busy toddler was too much like work.

  She didn’t help out with the housework either and had decided to go on a wheat and gluten free vegetarian diet which made meal planning challenging when Jess had enough to deal with. If he’d been in Jess’s position he’d have been scouting the best site for an unmarked grave.

  Six days after her due date Jess had been collecting glasses and plates Coco had left around the place and had skidded on one of Coco’s scarves that had been left on the stairs. The resulting fall broke her ankle and sent her into labour. Jess couldn’t walk so he and Jase had carried her to the car. All her mother had been concerned about was being left with Jeremy when she had plans for the evening.

  Poor Jess. At the hospital they didn’t want to x-ray her foot while she was pregnant so she had the extra agony during labour and was whisked out for x-rays afterwards. Then she had her leg in a cast and was on crutches for the following six weeks with a new baby and a toddler to care for.

  When it became clear that Coco would have to help out she conveniently recalled promising to stay with friends on Waiheke Island before she returned to London. She had left before Jess and Daisy had been discharged from the hospital but somehow made out it was Jess’s fault that her time with them was cut short because Daisy arrived past her due date. Coco’s contribution had been to pay for a cleaner for a couple of months because that was how long Jess was supposed to stay off her ankle.

  He joined Jase in biting his tongue when visitors told Jase how lucky he was to have such a generous mother-in-law. They knew better. Coco had caused the problem and had solved it by throwing money at it, something she wouldn’t miss as she had plenty. Heaven forbid she gave something of herself.

  It came as no surprise when Aidan was born that Coco had decided to stay in London after no invitation to visit had been forthcoming. Instead she had wanted them to come to her and couldn’t understand why her self-employed son-in-law wouldn’t leave his contracts for a month or why her daughter refused to fly to the other side of the world with two pre-schoolers and an infant on her own while they were in the middle of construction on their new home.

  Eben rounded the breakfast bar and came up behind Jem. Her slashes had turned to do
odling and he put his hands on her tense shoulders and looked to see what she had drawn. There wasn’t a picture but the o’s in Coco’s name had been turned into a’s. He grinned.

  There was a change to her mother’s tone and Jem guessed that Coco’s current husband Phillipe had walked into the room.

  “You know I would be there if there was anything I could do to help but I’ll be busy until I’m back from my cruise. It sounds as though you and Jason’s friend have everything in hand but know that we will be thinking of Jess. I’ll send the card before we leave.”

  There was a murmur in the background. Jem heard Phillipe ask if anything was wrong and Coco reply that Jess wasn’t well but Jem was helping her out by looking after the children.

  Mistress of the Understatement, Jem thought in disgust as her mother hung up without a goodbye.

  Eben took the phone from her hand and hung it up.

  “Is Caca still with the comb-over?” he asked as he turned Jem around to face him.

  “Yes,” Jem replied. “But I think his days are numbered. She’s found an oil baron called Derek.”

  She smiled tightly in return and Eben felt her shoulders tense so left his hands in place and started rubbing the knots he could feel under his thumbs.

  “That will make him husband number what?”

  “Not sure. We weren’t invited to the last few weddings so he could be number seven or eight but then she doesn’t marry them all.”

  Coco’s relationships seldom lasted more than a year or two and being fond of whirlwind weddings, she had sometimes forgotten to invite her children. They had found out more than once from the newspaper’s society pages.

  “At least he’s a trade-up from Jim,” Eben said, thinking of Jess’s disparaging comments about a past ex-stepfather.

  Jim had owned a large cattle station and probably still did in the middle of nowhere, Northern Territory, Australia. Coco had been attracted to his money and the amount of land he owned until she found herself living on it, almost two day’s drive to the nearest mall. Because of the isolation Jem, Jess and Freddie had all been sent to boarding school in New South Wales.

  During the school holidays she and Jess had always felt uncomfortable in Jim’s leering presence, something Freddie must have picked up on because he was their shadow while Jim was around.

  When Jess told her father Toka about the situation he insisted upon all three children moving to live with him in New Zealand on a rural sheep farm up the coast from Gisborne. Coco made a token play at wanting custody but didn’t try too hard in case Toka changed his mind.

  The culture shock had been big. Suddenly they had been taken from exclusive schools and absorbed into an extended Maori family in a different country. Instead of being expected to keep clean and quiet and out of the way at home while others took care of everything they were now expected to help out.

  When Jess’s cousins got into mischief they were looked at sideways if they weren’t participating. Toka’s sisters would cluck their tongues in disbelief when their clothes were still clean at the end of the day and would tease them about not having played hard enough.

  From being in a society where you were only accepted on the basis of your pedigree and parent’s earning power to one where you were accepted for being you was heady stuff. It made no difference that Jem and Freddie were not related by blood to Toka and his family. They were included in all the work and the fun that always followed. For the first time in their lives they were all settled and happy.

  It didn’t even bother them that Coco declined having them to stay with her when the next holidays rolled around. By then Coco had left Jim for a Greek olive oil exporter and was busy holidaying on his yacht somewhere.

  Jem sometimes wondered how her life would have turned out differently if her father had chosen to take custody of her. Her parents had separated before Coco knew she was pregnant and Coco had contrived to marry Toka less than a year later. It was apparent to anyone with eyes that Toka wasn’t her biological father but that had never mattered to him.

  Her father was another story. He had remarried within a few years of his divorce and had another daughter and son. She had visited him a few times when she was younger but the visits had always been uncomfortable for all. He and his wife didn’t like the reminder of his youthful “mistake”. Their contact was limited to sterile letter-less Christmas cards written by his wife that Jem had worked out years ago were only sent after receiving hers.

  Eben’s hands stilled on her shoulders.

  “Would you like to go and visit Jess? I’ll keep an eye on the kids,” he offered.

  Jem turned in his arms to face him. “I’d appreciate that.”

  She closed her arms around his waist wanting the comforting contact of a hug. Surprised, it took Eben a moment to return the hug and neither let go. It was the first time in the eight years they’d known each other for her to initiate physical contact with him.

  He enjoyed the feel of her in his arms and the homey scent of dinner that faintly competed with the scent of passionfruit from her shampoo. They stood for long moments before Jem reluctantly broke free.

  “I’d better go.”

  Eben nodded and watched her gather up her shoulder bag and keys then followed her down the hallway where she collected her trench coat from the stand by the front door. He was still looking at the door to the garage that she’d gone through when he heard the exterior garage door rumble shut.

  “You’ve got it bad,” he muttered to himself. He turned and faced the family room with a sigh.

  “I’ll keep going until I liberate the couch,” he grumbled.

  At the hospital Jem had braced herself for Jess’s appearance but was still shocked by the number of monitors hooked up to her sister and the sight of her bruised and bandaged face underneath the ventilator. She felt the back of her nose tingling which meant tears were imminent and sucked in several deep breaths before sitting in the chair beside the bed. She carefully reached for Jess’s hand, the back of which was attached to a drip.

  “Hi there,” Jem said to her sister quietly, conscious of the nurses bustling between the bays attending patients.

  Not knowing what else to say she burst out with the first thing she thought of.

  “You have to get better. We all need you.”

  Despite her best intentions tears fell from her eyes and Jem placed her free hand over her mouth to stifle a sob. She bit her lip to help her get herself under control, knowing that crying wouldn’t help anyone. On the bedside table she saw a box of tissues and pulled out a fistful which she used to wipe her face and blow her nose.

  “Lucky I don’t wear makeup,” she said with forced cheer to her motionless sister “or I’d be an even bigger mess now.”

  From her jeans pocket her cell phone dinged to indicate a text message had been received. Still holding Jess’s hand, Jem dropped the tissues in her shoulder bag, pulled out her phone and read the message. It was Mark from work wanting information on a potential client that she hadn’t finished compiling the information for. She texted back and told him she’d email the document overnight.

  While she did this someone lifted the chart hooked at the foot of the bed. He made a few notations on the chart then put it back. Then he looked at her, saw what she was doing and frowned.

  “Excuse me but you need to have your cell phone turned off in ICU.”

  Startled, Jem looked up to see a tall man with closely cropped fair hair wearing a navy pinstripe suit over a grey tie and white shirt looking at her.

  “Pardon?” Jem asked.

  “You need to turn off your cell phone in ICU as it has the potential to interfere with the equipment,” he said and indicated a picture on the wall of a red circle with a diagonal line crossing the centre over a picture of a cell phone.

  “Oh. Sorry,” Jem said and quickly switched the phone off and stuffed it back in her pocket. “I’ve just got here and hadn’t seen the sign yet.”

  Pleased that she
was following his directions the man smiled and stepped forward.

  “I’m Mr Carstairs the consultant on Mrs Reardon’s case,” he said and offered his hand.

  Jem released Jess’s hand, stood up and offered him her hand in return.

  “I’m Jem Flint, Jess’s sister,” she said.

  After shaking hands he stepped back.

  “Ah yes, it was you who phoned earlier.”

  Jem nodded.

  “Would you mind coming with me as I have a few things to share with you,” he said.

  Jem looked back at the sight of her uncharacteristically pale sister on the bed.

  “Can’t you tell me here?” she asked.

  “I can explain better in my office,” he told her.

  Reluctantly she picked up her shoulder bag and followed him past the nurse’s station to a small office just beyond the entrance to ICU. After they were both inside he shut the door behind him and offered her a seat.

  Jem sat down feeling worried about what he was going to tell her.

  Please tell me she’s going to be okay.

  “I’m sorry to take you away from your sister at this time but there is always the chance that she can hear what is being said despite being heavily medicated. I just want to explain how she is at the moment and then you may ask any questions you have.”

  Mr Carstairs then proceeded to explain that Jess would be kept in an induced coma for a day or two to provide relief from the pain of her injuries and give her body time to heal. He gave her details about what the accident had done to Jess and what they had done in surgery to repair the damage but because Jem wasn’t medically trained some of the things he talked about went over her head.

  He told her that they were still waiting to receive Jess’s file from her GP and asked Jem to share any medical information that she knew about Jess. Jem spent the next few minutes telling him things that he scribbled down. When they finished he thanked her and escorted her back to Jess’s bedside.

  Jem spent the next few hours trying to be cheerful, rambling of inconsequential things while the nurse regularly came in and copied details from the machines to the clipboard hooked on the foot of the bed. She began to feel soothed by the rhythmic pumping of the ventilator and the various bleeps coming from other machines.