Memories Of You: Allenby Romance Series, #5

By Vicki Connellan

It’s been ten years since Clover and Zeke have seen each other, and a lot’s happened in that time. Neither are the naïve teenagers they once were, especially Clover. She’s been through more than her fair share of heartache, and Zeke has too, but when circumstance force them together, can they come to a resolve on their past?

For Clover, all the old feelings come rushing back. The thought of having Zeke back in her life after all these years is one thing, to find out that the past was all a lie, is another. Clover needs to decide if she can forgive Zeke for the past ten years, or if she’s happy to leave things as they are. Daisy, Clover’s ever insightful grandmother, has other ideas. She believes the two are meant to be together, and much to Clover’s disgust, she’ll do whatever she can to help, even if that means giving advice on more intimate matters.

While Detective Zeke Rafferty struggles to deal with his mother’s lies, and all that he has missed over the past ten years, he vows to win Clover back and have the life that they should have had all along. The only thing standing in his way is the murder investigation, where all fingers point to Clover. Before he can win her heart, and have her back in his life for good, he must first prove her innocence, and his mother’s guilt. For Zeke, it’s a bittersweet time. To have the woman that he loves, he has to let go of the idea of having a loving mother in his life, something that he’d all but given up on a long time ago.

Can Clover and Zeke reconnect after all these years, or is the history they share bound to tear them even further apart?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Vicki Connellan
• Release date: Mar 9, 2017
• ISBN: 9780648053101

Vicki Connellan

Vicki was born in Orange, NSW. When she was two years old her family moved to Dapto, a southern suburb of Wollongong. She was kicked out of pre-school at the age of four (for reasons that she will keep to herself).   When she was sixteen she moved with her parents and two sisters (Vicki is the typically misunderstood middle child) to the ACT where, ironically she studied Child Care so she could work in a pre-school. Now, at the age of 45 she still lives in Canberra with her husband and three adult/teenage children.   Vicki works full time (not in the child care industry!) and is an avid baker. She spends her time taxiing her kids around and baking cup cakes for all the kids who constantly fill the house.    Vicki has always enjoyed writing and is now taking the time to put her stories to print.  You can contact Vicki via email at [e-mail] with any questions or  feedback on her book.  If you enjoyed the book please take the time to leave a quick review. 

Book preview

Chapter 1

Clover

At first, I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me, but they weren’t. It took me a moment to pull my eyes away from him, but I could only look away for a few seconds. I couldn’t stop myself from turning back, from looking at him one more time. Only this time, he was looking straight at me. As our eyes locked, my heart began to pound, and I couldn’t move. Gran knew everything that was going on in this town, only she didn't tell me he was back. I kept looking at him, and him at me, neither of us moving, neither of us looking away. A kid bumped into my legs, but I didn't look down, I couldn’t take my eyes of the man standing on the other side of the street. It’s been ten years since I’ve seen him, only now he’s a man, not the scared sixteen year old that left me when I needed him the most. No, he was definitely not a boy anymore. He was tall, broad, and he looked hotter than sin, and straight away, I wondered what he’d look like naked.

What am I doing? Jeez Clover, pull yourself together. I shook my head and turned away, thinking that I really did need to stop talking to myself. I need to get out of here. I need to get home. I looked back over my shoulder to see that he was crossing the road, coming after me. I wasn’t ready for this. I wasn’t sure if I’d ever be ready for this. I broke into a run and headed for my car. The last thing I wanted was to see Ezekiel Rafferty here, in the main street of Allenby on a Wednesday afternoon. I’d have to talk to him at some point. That was a given. Allenby wasn’t exactly a thriving metropolis, but it was big enough that I should be able to avoid him for a few months at least.

As soon as I made it to my car, I threw the shopping in the back seat, and then climbed in behind the wheel. Old Bertha had been playing up a bit lately, and I prayed to the car gods to make her start. The second the engine sputtered to life I flicked on my blinker and pulled out into the street. My heart was already pounding, and it only got worse when a car horn blasted behind me. I raised my hand and gave them a little I'm sorry wave, then took off down the street. I could see Zeke in my rear view mirror. He was watching me drive away, much like I’d watched him drive away ten years ago.

As soon as I walked into the house Gran knew something was up. You look like you’ve seen a ghost, she put her knitting down on the couch and followed me into the kitchen. You saw him didn't you? I didn't answer, but she knew. Did you talk to him?

Why didn't you tell me he was back? And no, I put the milk and butter into the fridge. I couldn’t speak to him, I stopped and looked at her. I froze, at first I couldn’t move, I couldn’t think, then my brain kicked in and I ran.

Gran stepped over and took the bag of groceries from me. Love, you need to talk to him. I saw him last week and I could tell by the look in that boy’s eyes that he still loves you. I can tell these things, it’s the gift, she was shaking her head at me now. You two are meant to be together, it’s the way the universe planned it, and you can’t go against the universe, there’s no point in trying.

My gran had been predicting things since she was a little girl, she called it the gift or her second sight, and maybe it was, but to me it was the family curse. All through school, I was teased and made fun of because of my family and their hippy ways. I didn't blame my classmates for this, it’s just the way kids are, it’s what they do. They single out anyone who’s different and hone in on them. It makes sense really, pick on the odd man out as it takes the heat off you. If you’re making someone else the focus, kids don't notice things like your big ears, or your twitchy eye, or your ratty old hand me down shoes. And that’s how school had been for me, most people teased me about my name, with the exception of Zeke, and my best friend Sarah and her big brother Trav. They’d always been there for me, well, almost always. When Zeke walked out of my life, I was crushed. I wanted to die. But I couldn’t, I needed to keep going, I had to keep going. I didn't have a choice.

Well if the universe wants us to be together then no doubt there will be another opportunity for me to talk to him, I pulled a beer from the fridge and looked at her. And that’s all it will be Gran, talking, don't go getting your hopes up where Ezekiel Rafferty and I are concerned, there’s way too many years between us now, and more tears than I care to remember, I raised my eyebrows at her. Besides, he probably has a girlfriend or a wife, I doubt he’s been sitting around waiting to get back together with me.

She shook her head at me as she walked back to the couch. You need to be open to all possibilities Clo, she picked up her knitting and looked at me. He’s come back to town for a reason, and my money’s on that reason being you.

I looked at her questioningly and shook my head. There was no point in telling her I thought she was wrong. She’d only tell me that it’s in the stars, or it’s destined to be. I’m going to check the plants, that rack’s got to be almost done by now. She didn't look up as I grabbed my hat and walked out the door.

The air in the pressing shed was stifling. It had to be almost fifty degrees in here, but there wasn’t a lot I could do about that. Not the area where we pressed the canola oil in the main part of the shed anyway, the back part of the shed, well that was a different story. It was temperature controlled, and the humidity was controlled too. It had to be. My plants needed the optimal conditions if they were going to thrive. And thriving they were. Not that anyone apart from Gran and my customers had any idea what I grew in here, and I wanted to keep it that way. The fewer people who knew about my operation the better. The last thing I needed were the good folk of Allenby finding out they had a marijuana grow house right here in their little town. They’d have me burnt at the stake for sure. And right there leading them would be good old higher-than-thou Mary Rafferty. She might even crack a smile as she lit the bonfire.

I unlocked the door hidden at the back of the shed and stepped inside. Cheers Mary, I raised my beer in the air and smiled. Here’s to pot smoking hippies everywhere. I finished off the rest of my beer and dropped the bottle into the bin. From the outside of the shed, you couldn’t tell this section was here. The shed was huge, forty metres long and about twenty wide. It had to be this big to house the canola pressing machinery and the bottling equipment. The wall that divided the back ten metres of the shed from the rest looked like it was the rear wall. Not even the help that we hired during harvest season knew that it was here.

After checking all of the gauges and adjusting the temperature to compensate for the sweltering heat outside, I went to the drying rack and checked on the buds that had been drying for the past week. This was a one-woman operation, two if you counted Gran, but I could hardly ask her to help with the manual labour. Nope, this was all on me. When I first decided to grow medicinal marijuana, it was a small-scale operation. It only needed to be. I was only doing it to help Emily, but things had progressed from there, and now I had a booming business. Learning the process was the easy part, making sure I got it one hundred percent right every time was the hard part. Everything about my operation was organic. It needed to be. The last thing sick people wanted was to be taking in toxic chemicals on top of what they were already dealing with.

While I worked, my mind kept going back to Zeke. He looked hot, way hotter than he had a right to look. But then again, I’d always thought he was the best looking boy in school, only he didn't see it. He always said he felt like he wasn’t anything special, but he was. He was my first love, my only boyfriend in high school, hell, he’d been my only boyfriend ever. Not that I hadn't had my share of one night stands, and that was fine with me, it’s not like I had time for a relationship over the past ten years, nor did I want one, but a girl has needs. If I were honest with myself, I’d have to say part of my inability to commit to anyone was because of Zeke. Whether it was because I never really got over him, or if it was because I was afraid to love someone again, I didn't know. One thing I did know for sure, was that the universe might have had plans for me, but I was pretty sure Zeke Rafferty wasn’t part of them.

***

Zeke

I hadn't been able to think straight since seeing Clover in the street this afternoon. She was still the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen, but even with the distance between us, I could see that her eyes had lost the sparkle they once had, and that saddened me. She was always so happy, so positive and upbeat about things, it’s one of the things that made loving her so easy. I should have made my feet move sooner, if I did, she wouldn’t have gotten away from me. But I couldn’t move. She was the one person that I’d thought of every single day since I left Allenby ten years ago. Even when I heard she’d gotten engaged, then when she was married. I still thought about her every day, her and Emily. And what did that make me. Pathetic probably, but I couldn't help it. Clover wasn’t someone that you could easily move on from. She was special.

Maybe I should drop around and see her, say hi, let her know that I’m back in town. At least then she wouldn’t be surprised to see me in the street like she was today. Maybe if I saw her with her husband it would make it sink in that she’s gone, that she’s out of reach. I laughed at that thought. I’d been trying my best to move on from Clover Pederson for the past eight years, nothing was going to change the fact that I still loved her. My phone started to ring as I pulled into the driveway of Dave’s place. I looked at the screen and hit reject. Talking to my mother could wait until later, after I’d had a beer, or six.

Dave was on night shift, which meant he wouldn’t finish until seven o’clock in the morning. He had been my best friend from when we were babies. Our mother’s had been part of the same church group, and they were both as fanatical as each other as far as religion went. The two of us had to sit through more bible study classes than I could count. When we were younger that wasn’t such a bad thing, it was the way we were raised, we didn't know any different, and had we been a normal family who went to church on a Sunday and left it at that, it would have been fine, but we weren’t. Every day of the week was taken up with some sort of bible class or altar boy practice, or cleaning the church, or having the priest around to dinner. There was always something. But that stuff wasn’t for me now. It hadn't been for a while, and Dave was the same. I’d been here two weeks now and most nights Dave stayed at his girlfriend’s place. I didn't mind that, I was used to living on my own. Last Friday he invited me to drinks with his crew after their shift. I recognised a few of the guys from school. Cam and Reece always said they wanted to be firemen, and I always said I wanted to be a cop. Funny how things work out sometimes.

I grabbed a beer and sat on the couch, and as I flicked through the channels, I kept telling myself not to pull out the photo. I didn't need to keep looking at it. I could close my eyes and see the picture perfectly in my head. Clover sitting on the sand, her long golden hair blowing in the breeze. She has her eyes closed and a small smile on her face. Emily’s sitting in her lap, and she’s smiling too. They’re both barefoot, and Emily looks just like her mother. The photo is creased and tattered. Some of the colour is gone from where it’s been folded down the middle, but I don't care, it’s the only photo I have of them.

––––––––

The ringing of my phone pulled me out of my broken sleep. It had been a long time since I’d had a decent nights sleep, but that was nothing new. The dreams about Clover and Emily were nothing new either, and they were all almost always the same. First, we’d be sixteen, and we’d be together at the river, or out lying in the endless fields of canola. Just talking about life and our dreams for the future, or we’d be making out. Those were my favourite dreams. Not the dreams where I had to tell her I was leaving, and not the dreams where I kept seeing the tears rolling down her cheeks as she held onto my hand, begging me to stay. I hated those dreams. By the time I picked my phone up it had stopped ringing, but it didn't take long to start up again. Rafferty, I sat up and ran my hands over my face as I listened to the dispatch woman tell me that I was needed out on Murphy Road. I’ll be there in ten, fifteen tops,

I looked at my watch as I flung the covers back. Just after six in the morning, this was going to be a long day. I had a quick wash, threw on my suit and tie, grabbed my shoulder holster and shield, and headed out. Nowhere was far from anywhere in Allenby, it only took about fifteen minutes to get from one end of town to the other, so I made it to the crime scene in under fifteen as promised. Hey Trav, I spoke to the sargeant first. Trav and I had gone to the same school, only he was two years ahead of me, and his sister Sarah had been one of my good friends. Up until I left town that was. What have we got, why the call out? I looked towards the blackened shell of a car. Dave’s crew were cleaning up and packing up the fire truck.

Old man Dunn up the road called this in about an hour ago, he was out rounding up his cattle when he heard an explosion, came over the ridge of his farm and saw the car alight. The firies said it was totally engulfed by the time they got here, but you need to see this, we started walking towards the car.

Trav reached his gloved hand forward and lifted the boot. Jesus, I looked at the charred body scrunched up in the boot of the car. Do we have an I.D. on the body?

Trav looked back over his shoulder at the patrol car. Jenny’s running the plates through the system now, the firies only just finished a few minutes before you got here, looks like a pretty old car though, eighties model Holden I’d say, a few oldies around town still drive these juice guzzlers.

While we waited for the car registration information, I went to talk to the fire crew. Hey Cam, I reached out and shook his hand. What can you tell me?

Fire definitely started in the back seat of the car, from the damage to the underside of the roof it looks like an accelerant was used, he pointed towards the burnt out car. The boot was closed, but I’d say the body was doused in fuel as well, once the fire spread to the boot that person didn't stand a chance. I just hope that they were already dead, it would have been bloody torture otherwise.

Thanks mate, I scribbled Cam’s statements into my notebook. Let me know when the reports written up, I’ll swing by the station and grab a copy. I thanked him again and nodded to Dave who was climbing up into the fire truck. Jenny and Trav were securing the scene, so I went to have another poke around the car.

Coroner’s on their way to collect the body, and the crime scene techs should be here soon, Trav handed the tape roll to Jenny and came over to me. Car’s registered to Terrance Mead, I looked up at Trav when he said the victims name. You know him?

Yeah, old guy, widower, mid sixties, lives two doors down from my mother, well, he used to live two doors down. I shook my head and went to have another look at the body. Nice old guy, he lived there when we were kids, one of the few that didn't get the shits if our ball came into his yard when we were playing street cricket. I took the gloves that Trav was holding out to me. He was sick, cancer I think. What would a sixty something year old man, who was dying of cancer, be doing in the boot of a burnt out car? I lifted the remnants of a mobile phone and dropped it into the bag that Trav held out to me. Tech guys should be able to get something off that, some of his contacts or his last call at least.

The crime scene guys arrived and immediately got to work. One of the things they photographed were the foot prints around the car. They could have been from the firies, but we’d need to rule that out. They photographed the body from all angles, took the phone that Trav and I had found, then started riffling through the car. It took almost five hours to process the scene, cart the body away, and have the car towed.

Because I was the only detective stationed in Allenby, and protocol was for us to work in pairs, Trav was assigned to the case with me. I didn't mind this. The guy was smart, and he knew this town and the people better than anyone. He might have been a player with the women, but he was one hundred percent down the line when it came to his job. Terrance Mead’s place first? he looked over at me as we walked to my car.

Yeah, we’ll have a poke around his house then interview the neighbours, I climbed into the car and looked over at him. How often does this sort of thing happen in town? I thought I was coming to a sleepy country town, at least that’s the way I remember it.

He laughed as we pulled out into the street. It used to be a sleepy country town, but over the past year or two things have started to pick up. We’ve had some issues with drugs, pot mostly, lots of kids getting high and wandering the streets. But we’ve been lucky, some of the other towns have big problems with ice and the harder drugs, he glanced over at me, then looked back at the road. Why did you come back to Allenby? I would have thought the big city would have been way more exciting for a detective than this place.

I shrugged at his question. Truth was, I wasn’t sure why I came back. Maybe for closure, but I couldn't be sure. Not sure why I came back. I saw Allenby on the list of options when I got my promotion to detective, I shrugged again. Thought it would be good to re-connect with old friends.

Old friends including Clover? I shouldn’t get annoyed with him for asking that. I knew everybody wanted to know where things stood with the two of us. Especially with me leaving town the way I did. The way I was made to leave.

Maybe, we’ll see, we pulled up in front of the victim’s house and he looked at me, waiting for me to elaborate on my answer. I’ll go see her soon, I need to apologise for past actions, not sure that she’ll want to hear my apology, but I need to give it anyway, I motioned towards the house. Let’s get this over with.

Because Terrance Mead lived alone we were forced to jimmy open the back door to get inside. The place stunk. There were a few smells, but the one that hit me the most was the smell of pot. You smell that? I looked at Trav who was nodding. The kitchen was about as clean as you’d expect from an old man that lived alone. There were some dirty dishes in the sink, but not many. I don't think he left this house willingly, I pointed to the oxygen tank and facemask that lay on the lounge room floor. The oxygen tank was one of those little ones on wheels so the patient could cart it around with them. There were newspapers strewn about the floor too.

While Trav went to check the bedrooms, I headed for the kitchen. The first thing I noticed was a scrap of paper with a name and phone number. It was tucked under the phone dock on the kitchen bench. Damn it. I pulled out my phone and took a photo of the paper. Why would Terrance Mead have Clover’s name and phone number? What connection could she have to this old man? As far as I knew, her gran and her parents were the only family she had in town, and apart from hanging out with Sarah, I knew she wasn’t big on socialising. Well, she never used to be. Zeke, I looked away from the scrap of paper when Trav called my name. "Come