by Annie Seaton
About Kakadu Sunset
In the ancient lands of Kakadu, it’s not just the crocodiles you should be afraid of . . .
Helicopter pilot Ellie Porter loves her job. Soaring above the glorious Kakadu National Park, she feels freed from the heavy losses of her beloved family farm and the questions around her father’s suicide. But when a search-and-rescue mission on the boundary of the older property reveals unusual excavation works, Ellie vows to investigate.
The last thing she needs is her bad-tempered co-pilot, Kane McLaren, interfering. The son of the current owners of the farm, her attraction to him is a distraction she can’t afford, especially when someone threatens to put a stop to her inquiries - by any means necessary.
Ellie will have to trust Kane if she is to have any hope of uncovering the truth of what is really going on. Between Ellie’s damage and Kane’s secrets, can they find a way to open up to each other before the shadowy forces shut her up . . . for good?
Annie
Seaton
KAKADU
SUNSET
Contents
Cover
About Kakadu Sunset
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Chapter Twenty-five
Chapter Twenty-six
Chapter Twenty-seven
Chapter Twenty-eight
Chapter Twenty-nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-one
Chapter Thirty-two
Chapter Thirty-three
Chapter Thirty-four
Chapter Thirty-five
Chapter Thirty-six
Chapter Thirty-seven
Chapter Thirty-eight
Acknowledgements
About Annie Seaton
Copyright page
To my husband, Ian . . . and to the
beautiful family we created together.
I am blessed.
Chapter 1
Thursday
Arnhem Highway, Northern Territory
The three oversized trucks in front of Ellie Porter’s small red sedan were loaded with pipes and earthmoving equipment, and they’d slowed her trip home along the Arnhem Highway from Darwin airport. After spending two weeks with her mother and sister in Queensland, she was itching to get back to her job at Makowa Lodge, the five-star tourist resort on the South Alligator River, but the construction vehicles had been hogging the road for the last twenty kilometres.
She let out a sigh of relief when the truck in front slowed and indicated it was turning. But a tinge of concern tugged at her when she realised where they were; the truck and the two ahead of it had turned in at the eastern gate of the old mango farm.
Ellie hadn’t been back there for years – not since Mum sold it – and would normally have just driven straight past. But today curiosity won out. She drove another three kilometres until she reached the front gate of the property, then pulled off the highway, parking on the rutted road that led up to the old house.
From here the place looked abandoned; the grass was long and the curtains were drawn. The old timber sign proclaiming it was the ‘Porter Farm’ still hung crookedly from the eaves above the front step. She and Dru had made it the first winter after Emma left for medical school. They’d almost caught the packing shed on fire while trying to give the sign a charred edge with Dad’s blowtorch. She remembered how the wood had glowed orange and one of the mango cartons on the bench where they’d been working had burst into flame. Dru had laughed as she’d run for a bucket of water from the dam and then doused the small fire. Ellie hadn’t heard Dru’s husky laugh for a long time. Too long.
She got out of the car, walked over to the fence and rested her arms on the weathered rail. Across the dam was the graceful old homestead where she’d grown up. Once graceful, anyway – ‘old’ was the operative word these days. From this distance, the posts on the wide front porch were crooked and yellow and the verandah was sagging. It was a wonder the whole place hadn’t toppled down the hill. At least the front fence was still standing. The tropical weather took a toll on anything man-made, but the fence looked remarkably good after – how long was it – eight years?
One hot summer afternoon she and her sisters had arrived home to find her dad repairing the wire in this fence, working with his friend Bill Jarragah. Emma and Dru had run straight from the school bus, brandishing the latest Dolly magazine to show Mum, but Ellie turned her nose up at such girlish pursuits; she was the tomboy of the family, and preferred to spend her afternoons helping Dad and Bill on the farm.
‘Our people come from the land and it nurtures us on our journey until we return to it.’ Bill had leaned against the fence post, the half-stub of a roll-your-own hanging from his mouth as he strained the wire. ‘We must respect it.’ He’d looked sharply at Peter, and Ellie’s father had dropped his eyes before he picked up a lump of dirt and then let the dry soil run through his calloused fingers.
‘Sometimes we have to compromise, Bill. Respect is a fine thing, but a man has to provide for his family.’
‘Peter, good seasons and bad.’ He’d paused and Ellie had waited for the rolling cadence of his words to continue. ‘The creation ancestors taught us how to live with the land. You whitefellas have to learn patience. The land will renew, but while we wait, we have to care for it. What scars the land scars our spirits too. You remember that.’
Dad had grunted and reached for the wire strainer. ‘I’m still thinking.’
The noise of a car door slamming at the top of the hill pulled her from her thoughts. An engine roared to life, and as Ellie watched, a black Jeep backed out from the far side of the homestead and accelerated down the hill, a cloud of red dust billowing behind it. She caught a glimpse of a man in a baseball cap as the vehicle roared past her, kicking up a spray of gravel.
She wondered who the driver was. Mum had sold the farm to a man named Panos Sordina after Dad died, but as far as she knew he’d never actually lived there. Sordina was another friend of her dad’s, and they all figured he’d bought the place as a favour, or out of pity. Last she’d heard, he’d moved back to Darwin and got elected to parliament. Maybe he’d sold the place. Maybe another dreamer like her father had bought it; a man determined to make his fortune from an orchard that could be neglected most of the year. After all, trees grew by themselves while a man was drinking with his mates in the local watering hole, didn’t they?
With a final throaty roar, the Jeep disappeared around a bend and Ellie walked back to her car, taking a last look at the paddocks. The half-dead mango trees at the edge of the dam cast wavering shadows across the water, as insubstantial as her father’s dreams. The late afternoon breeze kicked up small waves on the water, making blue plastic drums slap against the rotten wood of the short piers at the end of the jetty where she and her teenage sisters had once lain in the hot tropical sun working on their tans.
She could almost smell the coconut oil they had plastered on their bodies as they lay dreaming of lives far away from the withered trees and the ramshackle house. After Dad’s death, Dru and Em
ma couldn’t wait to get away, but the Territory was in Ellie’s blood, and she’d made her life here.
The locals loved to complain about the arid heat of the dry season and the pressing humidity of the long wet each year, but Ellie wouldn’t have it any other way. When she was away, she felt incomplete, as though part of her had been left behind. It was more than being away from the childhood memories. Her connection with the land was spiritual; she’d shared her father’s love for the land and their farm.
But in the end, it was the land that had taken his life. Patience was not enough. The three girls had grown up eating mango pie, frozen mango, mango chutney . . . the products of a crop not good enough to go to market. For a couple of summers, Emma and Dru had even manned a fruit stall on the highway with the spotted fruit. But there had never been enough money. In the last six months of Dad’s life, Ellie had watched her father’s joy in the farm evaporate like the morning mists that hung over the river at the back of the farm. Even all these years later, she remembered the exhaustion in his face, the leaden despair that had eventually driven him to the pub night after night.
Five searing dry seasons had passed since Mum had found Dad’s body hanging in the packing shed. His suicide had come as such a shock – a fundamental line between the before and after of their lives. And now the farm was someone else’s responsibility. Funny how she’d forgiven Dad for dying before she’d forgiven Mum for selling up so soon after.
If Ellie could ever afford it, she would buy the farm back and establish the best damn mango plantation in the Territory in her father’s memory.
She shrugged and kicked at the fine red dirt with the toe of her boot before she turned back to her car. Time to grow up, maybe.
But the trucks she’d followed up the highway left an uneasy niggle sitting in her stomach. She let out a little sigh as she opened the car door. She could never afford to buy the place back, but at least she had a great job, even if helicopter pilots here in Kakadu didn’t earn enough to invest in old dreams.
The hot leather burned the back of her legs as she slid onto the seat. She had just pulled back onto the road when the theme song from Black Hawk Down filled the small car. She grinned at the custom ringtone.
Jock flashed on the screen. She reached for her phone and tapped hands-free.
‘Hey boss. Long time no speak.’
‘Ellie? Where are you?’ He was barking, a sure sign of stress.
‘Just heading back to base.’
‘How far out? I need a pilot.’
Ellie glanced down at her watch. For a fleeting second, she thought about reminding him she was still on leave, but the anticipation of going up made her change her mind. ‘I’m just down the highway from Jabiru. I could be at Makowa in an hour or so.’ If she drove at the same speed as the new owner of a hundred dead mango trees. ‘What’s up?’
‘We’ve got a group of tourists missing. Stupid fools set out on a walk just on dark last night and they haven’t come back.’
‘No park choppers available?’ Ellie frowned. The lodge choppers weren’t usually called in to help this early in the tourist season.
‘The national park choppers are all down at the southern end of the park so they’ve asked us if we can get our bird up before dark. They expected the ground rangers would pick them up quickly because they’re not in one of the remote areas and they haven’t been missing for long.’
‘And the ground rangers didn’t find them?’
‘Not a sign.’
Ellie thought of the wide expanses of the park. When she did her tourist commentary on the scenic flights for the lodge, visitors often found it hard to believe that the park was almost half the size of Switzerland.
‘It’s not like I can see into a croc’s belly from the air,’ she pointed out with a little shiver. ‘But you never can tell in this place.’
‘We’re hoping they stayed up in the rocks away from the river. Three adults and a child.’ Her boss didn’t sound very hopeful. ‘The rangers have been out since noon, and now they want our chopper up before dark. Can you make it? You’re my only pilot today.’
Ellie was speeding along the road now, heading for the Kakadu Highway turn-off. Purpose filled her; she was back doing what she loved. ‘Where’s Mike?’
‘His ex-wife tracked him down and he’s done a runner. I’ve hired a new guy, but he doesn’t know his way around yet.’
‘Can he spot for me?’
‘Yeah, I called him in a few minutes ago. I’ve asked him to check over the chopper for you since he’s doubling up as engineer for us.’
‘Great. Two pairs of eyes will be good. Log me a search grid and fax it through to the hangar. I’ll get there as quick as I can.’ She glanced at the turn-off to Ubirr as her car flew past the intersection. Funny to think she’d be up in the air in this same spot in a couple of hours. Ever since Paul Hogan had stood there in Crocodile Dundee, Ubirr Rock had become a tourist icon.
‘Thanks, Ellie. Appreciate it.’ The phone crackled and Jock’s voice faded in and out as she headed away from the high phone tower behind the Jabiru township. ‘It’s good to have you back, kid.’
‘Ditto.’ She turned south onto the Kakadu Highway, opening the window to let the breeze in. For a moment she let the wind blow her hair back, knowing she was grinning like a fool. Family time was good, but this was what she lived for.
Up in the air, where the world was clear and true. And all hers.
*
Kane McLaren drained the last of the avgas into the small Robinson R44 helicopter. He stepped back and placed the empty drum beside the pump, and pulled a rag from the back pocket of his jeans before wiping his hands.
Even though it was late July – winter down under – the heat rose off the tarmac in waves, sending sweat trickling down his bare chest. He’d pulled his shirt off as soon as he’d opened the hangar and the temperature had hit him. Even with the doors open, the air hung thick and humid and motionless.
After the disaster of his last tour, he’d taken the job at Makowa in a bid to lose himself in one of the last untamed areas of Australia for a while. How long he stayed here depended on his mum, and how ill she was. Despite her emails, he’d had a feeling that the prognosis was more serious than she’d let on. Today’s visit had confirmed that. Something was seriously wrong. And what the hell was she doing living out here by herself anyway? He’d deal with that later.
He was about to start the pre-flight checks when footsteps pounded on the concrete floor behind him.
‘Hey.’
Kane put the rag down and turned. Cargo shorts, heavy lace-up boots and a khaki shirt didn’t hide the curves of the hot little package standing in front of him. His mood lifted a fraction. He wiped a sweaty hand on his jeans leg before taking her outstretched hand.
‘I’m Ellie Porter. You’re the new pilot?’
Her grip was firm. ‘Kane McLaren. I’m the engineer.’
‘Jock told me he’d hired a new pilot.’ Her eyebrow was crooked above a steady gaze.
‘I am a pilot, but I only signed on here to do the maintenance work.’
She pulled her hand out of his and gave him a smile. ‘Okay, you can sort that out with him later. Let’s just get this bird up in the air. Is she ready?’
‘You’re the pilot?’ She looked way too young to be in control of a chopper. Her dark hair was pulled back into a braid and she looked like she was barely out of school.
The look she shot him reminded him of the only woman in his unit; Hawk they’d called her – she’d had night vision to rival a superhero.
Ellie didn’t respond to his question, so Kane followed her around the back of the chopper. She opened the door on the left and pulled herself up into the cockpit in one lithe, practised movement. Nice legs. She was short, but her thighs were muscled and slim.
She buckled herself in and pushed the wiring light test switches one by one. He gave a mental shrug and turned towards the back of the chopper to check the fuel tanks f
or leaks.
‘Are we right to go?’ Her voice followed him as he went through his routine. ‘Are you done with the clutch check? Blades okay?’
‘All good so far, but she’s not ready to go up yet.’ He ran his hands down each side of the tail rotor.
‘Why not? Is there something wrong?’
‘No. It’s all fine. But I always do three checks on my birds before they leave the ground.’ He made it a statement, not an excuse.
‘We only do one here.’ She gestured to the vacant seat beside her as he came back around the front of the R44 and closed the cowl doors over the tanks. ‘Climb in.’
‘Not yet.’ Kane wasn’t used to explaining himself and he didn’t intend to start now. He was in charge of the safety routine, and that was that. And besides, he wasn’t going up with her. He reached into his pocket for a piece of gum.
‘In case you haven’t noticed, we’re in a hurry. Did Jock tell you why we’re going up?’ Her voice had an edge now, a husky tone that perversely made it even more attractive.
‘Yeah, I know about the search. I’ll only be another five minutes. Two and a half minutes each pass around.’ Kane blinked as the perspiration ran into his eyes. ‘One down, two to go.’ Heat or not, a chill was running through his body.
He checked the rotor blades and skids again as Ellie’s impatience hung in the air like a heavy cloud. By the time he’d finished his final check, her fingers were drumming on the instrument panel and her mouth was set in a tight line.
Kane strode back around to the side of the cockpit and slapped his hand on the roof. ‘You’re right to go.’
‘What are you talking about? I need you too.’ She levelled a steady gaze at him and he saw that her eyes were pale blue, contrasting with her tanned face. ‘Get in.’
‘No, babe. I’ve got stuff to do down here.’
‘Look, mister, I don’t know where you’re from or what you’re used to, but we all work together here. I need a spotter for this search and Jock said you were it, so haul your arse into that seat so we can get out of here. An extra pair of eyes could mean the difference between life and death.’