Free Her Knight in the Outback by Nikki Logan

counter.
    â€˜I could have said no. At any time. I’m not made of jelly.’ Except when Marshall smiled at her a certain way. Then anyone would be forgiven for thinking so.
    â€˜I never would have—’
    â€˜It wasn’t the bike’s fault. It’s good for me to remember that.’
    He took a long, slow breath and Eve distracted herself poking the steaks.
    â€˜A 250cc, you said. Not your usual family wagon.’
    â€˜Oh, we had one of those, too. But she got her motorcycle licence not long after having Travis.’ Like some kind of statement. ‘She rode it whenever she didn’t have us with her.’
    Which was often in those last five years.
    â€˜I think it was her way of fighting suburbia,’ she murmured.
    Or reality, maybe.
    â€˜But she had your brother with her that day?’ Then, ‘Are you okay to talk about this?’
    Surprisingly, she was. Maybe because Marshall was a fellow motorbike fanatic. It somehow felt okay for him to know.
    â€˜Yeah—’ she sighed ‘—she did. Trav loved her bike. He couldn’t wait to get his bike permit. I think she was going to give him the Kawasaki. He’d started to learn.’
    â€˜How old was he when it happened?’
    â€˜Fourteen.’
    â€˜Five years between you. That’s a biggish gap.’
    â€˜Thank God for it. Not sure I could have handled any of it if I’d been younger.’
    It was hard enough as it was.
    It was only when Marshall’s voice murmured, soft and low, over her shoulder and he reached past her to turn off the gas to the steaks that she realised how long she’d been standing there mute. Her skin tingled at his closeness.
    â€˜New subject?’
    â€˜No. I’m happy to talk about my family. I just forget sometimes...’
    â€˜Forget what?’
    Sorrow washed through her. ‘That my family’s different now. That it’s just me and Dad.’
    â€˜You say that like...’
    Her eyes lifted. ‘That’s the reality. If Trav is missing by force, then he’s not coming back. And if he’s missing by choice...’
    Then he’s not coming back
.
    Either way, her already truncated family had shrunk by one more.
    â€˜You really believe he could be out here somewhere, just...lying low?’
    â€˜I have to believe that. That he’s hurting. Confused. Off his meds. Maybe he doesn’t think he’d be welcome back after leaving like he did. I want him to know we want him back no matter what.’
    Marshall’s head bobbed slowly. ‘No case to answer? For the distress he’s caused?’
    Her hand fell still on the spatula. For the longest time, the only sound came from the low-burn frying pan. But, eventually, her thoughts collected into something coherent.
    â€˜I ask myself is there anything he could do that would make me not want to have him back with us and the answer is no. So giving him grief for what he did, or why he did it, or the manner in which he did it... It has no purpose. I just want him to walk back in that door and scuff the wall with his school bag and start demanding food. The
what
,
why
and
how
is just not relevant.’
    Intelligent eyes glanced from her still fingers to her face. ‘It’s relevant to you.’
    â€˜But it’s not important. In the scheme of things.’
    Besides, she already had a fairly good idea of the
why
. Travis’s escalating anxiety and depression seemed blazingly obvious in hindsight, even if she hadn’t seen it at the time. Because she hadn’t been paying attention. She’d been far too busy shrugging off her substitute mother apron.
    Thinking about herself.
    She poked at the steak again and delicious juices ran from it and added to the noise in the pan. She lifted her wineglass with her free hand and emptied a bit into the pan. Then she took a generous swig and changed the subject.
    â€˜So, who is