Chapter Thirty-Seven
Zane released his rope and abseiled back to the floor. He looked at Matt.
“I know you lied.”
Matt leaned back against the wall. “I thought you might have figured it out. You know me too well, mate. I did have a good reason though, honestly.”
“You had a good reason for lying to me about having slept with my girlfriend? You really think such a thing exists?”
Matt nodded and reached for a bottle of water. “Yep. I was trying to help. It doesn’t matter what happened, or didn’t happen, all those years ago, not really, does it? What matters is that I’m not sleeping with her now.”
“There’s some kind of twisted logic to that. But, talking of now, you’ve tried it on with her over these past few months, haven’t you? How do you explain that? Was that, in some crazy way, supposed to help as well?”
“Yes, and, er, yes.”
“OK.” Zane sighed. “Shoot. Tell me. How was any of this supposed to be helping Faith and me?”
“I lied because I was mad at the world, at Karo, at myself. Mad at you, jealous because you were in a good relationship. Not because I wanted Faith.”
“Yet you still hit on her?”
“Yes. I did it for you. To test her. You’re a good mate. I knew you were in deep with her, and I knew that with all the stuff in your past, you were worried. So I thought, OK, if she is going to cheat on him, it will be with me. We had a history, so…”
Zane turned away, shaking his head. So his suspicions about Matt’s motives had been right. “You are arrogant at times.”
Matt shrugged. “Yeah, yeah, I know. Anyway, it makes sense though, doesn’t it? That if she was going to be tempted by anybody, it would have been me she’d have gone for. So I tried it on with her.”
“Do I really have to listen to this?”
“Yes. You do. You need to know that she wasn’t even remotely interested in me. I pulled out all the stops, full-on charm on several occasions. Nothing. Zilch. In fact, in a Faith kind of way, she totally put me in my place.”
Zane frowned. “What did she say?”
“She said I should be ashamed because I was with Emily and she was with you. That you were my best mate and business partner and you deserved better. That I was crazy if I thought she was interested in anyone but you.”
“You deserved it,” Zane said, pleased at how Faith had spoken to Matt. “So what if Faith had gone for it with you? Would you have taken things further with her?”
Matt shook his head vehemently. “Of course not!”
“You’re sure?” Zane checked, eyeing him closely.
“Yes I’m sure. Give me some credit!”
“And if she had gone for it, you’d have told me?”
“Yeah, of course.” Matt nodded. “I’d have hated having to tell you something like that, but yeah. I mean, we both know no guy wants to hear the woman he loves is cheating on him, as I know from Karo and you know from all that business with your parents. But even so, yeah, I’d have told you. Better to know and deal with it than live in ignorance, I reckon.”
“I suppose.” Zane sighed. “But why didn’t you tell me all this ages ago? Explain why you were flirting with her? You knew it was winding me up. You could have said something.”
“No, I couldn’t. That would have been way too weird. You’d have, quite rightly, gone ballistic at me. Plus, if all of this had come out and Faith had found out you knew what was going on, it would have jeopardised your relationship with her.”
Matt peered at Zane sceptically.
“Anyway,” he continued, “if you knew I’d lied about sleeping with Faith, then why did you finish with her? What happened on that camping trip to make you look for an excuse to end things?”
Zane didn’t answer.
“Come on. Spill. I’m not going to give up until you tell me. Oh, right, I get it. You panicked about how heavy things were getting between you two, and I gave you a convenient excuse to get out of the relationship.”
“Something like that.” Zane shrugged. “I was already thinking maybe it was time.”
“Time for what? To end your relationship with the woman you love? Come on, mate. You and Faith, you were the best. I’ve never seen you happier than when you were with her, not even when you were with Holly. What happened?”
“Just something that hit me out of nowhere. Some words I wanted to say to Faith, came close to saying to her in fact, that night in the tent.”
Matt frowned. “What? That you love her?”
Zane shook his head, his voice quiet. “No. We said we loved each other a while ago.”
“Then what?”
“Just two little words.” Zane took a deep breath and slowly let it out. “Marry me.”
“I could make a joke out of that and say thanks and I’m flattered, but as you know, I’m already married.” Matt stopped and peered at Zane again. “But this isn’t funny is it? You’re serious aren’t you?”
“Never been more so.”
“Wow.” Matt shook his head. “For once I’m speechless.”
“Well, I suppose that’s one good thing to come out of this conversation,” Zane quipped.
“I know I don’t have the best history in getting relationships right,” Matt went on, “but I must admit I’m confused. You want to marry her, so you finish with her? I don’t get it. But, yeah, hang on. With you, and your history, yeah, it does actually make some weird kind of sense.”
Zane looked away. “I’m not ready for any of this.”
Matt laughed and clapped him on the back. “Your head might say you’re not ready, but I’ve got news for you, mate. The rest of you seems to think otherwise, or you wouldn’t have almost asked Faith to marry you.”
Zane sighed.
“When I was with her I felt different. I honestly thought I could do the whole relationship thing after all. I thought it would be OK and I could handle it. I thought it was all under control – until I almost proposed to her. And then I just felt overwhelmed. And terrified.”
“You’ve got to let go of the past, man. Stop letting it shape your future.”
“It’s not that easy.”
“I know, but you’ve got to try.”
Zane said nothing.
“Look, in my somewhat flimsy defence,” Matt continued, “I flirted with her as well to provoke you, to get you to tell her the truth. If you guys were going to have any chance at a future, you had to tell her. She could see at times you were paranoid, insecure, jealous, possessive, but she didn’t understand why—”
“Yeah, yeah, OK,” Zane said, holding his hands up to silence Matt. “I get the message. You don’t need to pester either of us anymore. I’ve told her everything.”
“What?” Matt looked at him, a stunned expression on his face.
“I told her everything tonight.”
“What did she say?”
“I didn’t give her much chance to say anything.” Zane said with a shrug. “I told her I wanted her to take some time before she made a decision about whether or not we had a chance at a future together.”
“She’ll be fine,” Matt said. “You did the right thing. Look I know you don’t like the fact that Faith and I have a history, but I’m just saying: I know her – and Faith will, I’m sure, come through for you. She loves you. You’ll work it out together. The point of all this is that I can honestly say she’s not interested in anybody but you. I know you find it difficult, but believe me, you can trust her. Faith is as besotted with you as you are with her. Trust her and let this thing between you guys happen. Did you tell her how you really feel about her?”
“No. I’m not ready for all this, Matt. Not for marriage. Not yet.”
“I think you are ready. You’re just fighting it at the moment.”
Zane peered at Matt. “You’re a fine one to talk. You played the field for years with never any sign of committing to one woman, until you met Karo. How did you know she was the one? How did it feel when you knew you wanted to marry her?”
Matt looked uncomfortable.
“I just felt different with her I guess. I’m the first to admit Karo’s a firecracker, and I’ve always had my hands full with her. She was – still is – a challenge, but that’s one of the many things I love about her. One night, I looked at her and thought: This is it. I don’t want another woman, only her. She turned my world upside down. Deep down I suppose I still feel the same way. This messing around with other women these last few months, even dating Emily, I’m not really interested. It’s just the thrill of the chase. Being able to prove to myself that I’ve still got it and can get women if I want to. But at the end of the day all I actually want is Karo. I want my wife back. She’s still the one for me. I’m just not sure if I’m still the one for her.”
Matt paused and then fixed Zane with a questioningly look.
“If you know Faith is the one, why didn’t you tell her tonight how you really feel about her? Tell her you love her. Tell her you’re even contemplating marriage, something which scares the hell out of you after seeing what your parents went through.”
“Because I don’t want to influence her decision about us trying again. If she wants me, it has to be entirely her choice. Not one I’ve tried to persuade her into.”
“You’re too much of a martyr, Zane. You want her, you should have told her and got her back.” He paused, glanced at Zane and then asked, “Did you ever tell Holly all that stuff about your parents?”
Zane nodded.
“What happened?”
“Two weeks later, she left Austria,” Zane replied, his voice flat.
“I’m sorry, man. I thought she left ‘cos of the whole backpacking thing.”
“Partly that, and partly, I think, because what I said freaked her out. Can we climb now?” Zane was keen to change the topic of conversation.
Matt reached for Zane’s arm and pulled him back.
“If you want a future with Faith, you have to forgive your mum for the past and move on from it. I know it’s tough, but that’s what I’m trying to do with Karo. Forgive. I think you and I have both learnt a lot about relationships these past few months. I know now that I can’t do this anymore, mate. I don’t want Faith, or Emily, and I don’t want to mess around anymore either. I just want Karo. I said I wanted to keep my trial separation a secret over here so I could truly live the single life and see how I felt about it. Now I know I have the answer. I know what I want. I don’t want the single life. I want to fly to Austria. I need to see Karo and try to sort things out between us. I need to see if we can try again. Come back here together, so we can have a fresh start somewhere completely new.”
Zane nodded.
“Sure. If that’s what you want to do, just do it.”
“Would it be all right for me to disappear to Austria for a while though? It’s still a couple of weeks to Christmas, and I don’t want to cause problems at the Centre.”
“Don’t be stupid. It’s fine. Go and do whatever you need to for your marriage. Things are starting to quieten down in the run-up to the festivities anyway. I can manage the bookings with the other guys. You go. How soon are you looking to get a flight?”
“Soon as I can really.”
“OK. Does Karo know you’re going out there?”
“In a way.” Matt looked a bit awkward. “We’ve been in touch, had chats on the phone and I said I might try to get over there, and she seemed really keen on the idea. I didn’t say anything definite though, not yet.”
“Fine. Like I said, do whatever you need to. Let me know if you want a lift to the airport.”
Matt slapped Zane on the back. “You’re a good mate, Zane Ferguson, you know that?”
“Yep, I do.”
“Fancy living on the edge?” Matt asked, a grin now on his face. “Want to climb without harnesses and ropes?”
After what Zane had been through tonight he felt like pushing things to the extreme to try to burn off some of the anxiety still bubbling away inside him. Plus, climbing without the safety gear would truly distract him from thoughts of Faith. Nothing focusses the mind better on the job in hand than the prospect of crashing to the ground with one wrong move, even if the safety mats were still out.
“Absolutely,” he said, unbuckling his harness.