Outback Bride

by Jessica Hart

  CHAPTER THREE

  By lunchtime the next day, Copper was exhausted. Mal hadn't been wrong about the hard work. She had been up at five to cook breakfast for Mal and Brett, as well as the three jackaroos, and she seemed to have spent the whole morning since then running between the cookhouse and the homestead.

  She had washed and wiped, swept and scrubbed. She had fed chickens and dogs and six men who had appeared for morning smoko and now lunch, and in the middle of it all she had had to deal with a lively and strong-willed four-year-old.

  It hadn't helped that she had spent most of the night lying awake and thinking about Mal-the one thing she had sworn not to do. Her body had craved sleep, but her mind had refused to settle. It had turned Mal's image round and round, testing it from all angles, disconcerted to find him at once so familiar and yet a stranger. Did he really not remember? Had he forgotten touching her, tasting her with his tongue, tangling his fingers in her hair as they surrendered to the wild beat of their bodies?

  Copper had struggled to bury the memories. She was at Birraminda on business, she'd told herself fiercely, gritting her teeth as she worked doggedly through the morning. It was the business that mattered now, and she had better not forget it.

  She had had lunch with the jackaroos and all the other men except Bill in the cookhouse. It was a long, wooden building that didn't look as if it had been decorated since the days when sixty thousand sheep had grazed at Birraminda and whole teams of men had moved in at shearing time and had to be fed at the two huge tables. Bill was an older man who was known as the "married man". While the jackaroos slept in quarters he had his own house a mile or so from the homestead, and he went home at lunchtime. His wife, Naomi, prepared a meal for the men in the evenings, so that was one job she wouldn't have to do, Copper thought. Dinner for three ought to be a cinch after all she had done this morning!

  Mal had told her that cold meat and bread were all that the men wanted at lunchtime, so that had not been too difficult to get ready. Now Copper ticked 'lunch' off her list and studied her remaining chores, wondering if she would have time to explore around the homestead. She would need to take photographs and get the feel of the place if she was to put together an inspiring brochure.

  'What are you doing?' asked Mal, craning his head to see as she pencilled times against 'prepare vegetables' and 'bath Megan'. He raised his eyebrows derisively when he saw what she had written. 'I never met anyone who had to have a timetable just to get through the day before!'

  'I like to be organised,' said Copper, instantly on the defensive. 'Otherwise nothing ever gets done.'

  'I hope you've given yourself time for breathing.' Mal wasn't actually smiling but she knew perfectly well that he was laughing at her.

  'I need to with this much to do!' she retorted, more ruffled than she cared to admit by the amusement gleaming in the depths of his brown eyes. 'I hadn't realised slavery was still legal in the outback!'

  Brett twitched the list out of her hand. 'You've been working much too hard,' he agreed. He had greeted the news that Copper was to stay with flattering enthusiasm, and now he edged along the bench towards her. 'You deserve a break this afternoon,' he went on, echoing Copper's own thoughts. 'Why don't I take you out and show you the waterhole your father had in mind for a site?'

  'Possibly because you've remembered that you're going to check those bores this afternoon,' Mal interrupted, before Copper had a chance to accept. His voice was quiet but implacable. 'Megan and I will take Copper out.'

  Megan looked up, suddenly alert. 'Are we going to ride?'

  Mal glanced at Copper. She was more practically dressed today, in jeans and a fresh, mint-coloured shirt, but there was still something indefinably citified about her. Over lunch, all the talk had been about the forthcoming rodeo, and the expressive green eyes had been appalled at the thought of wrestling a steer to the ground, or trying to cling onto a bucking bronco.

  'I think Copper would probably prefer to go in the car,' he said, but a smile lurked around his mouth.

  Copper stiffened, well aware of how out of place she looked. 'Not at all,' she said, lifting her chin. She wasn't going to give Mal the excuse of dismissing her proposals just because he thought she couldn't cope in the outback! So what if she had never ridden before? It couldn't be that difficult. 'I'd like to ride.'

  She regretted her bravado as soon as she laid eyes on the horse that Mal led towards her. It looked enormous, and as Copper edged closer it rolled its eyes and shook the flies off its mane with a snort. Backing rapidly away, she clutched her wallet file nervously to her chest. Maybe the car would be a better idea.

  Mal nodded at the file. 'What have you got there?'

  'Just a few things I want to check-Dad's plan of the site, the measurements of the tent, that kind of thing- and I'm bound to need to take some notes.'

  'Where are you going to put it?' he asked in exasperation. 'Or were you planning to ride one-handed?'

  Copper hadn't even thought about it until that moment. 'Isn't there a saddle-bag or something?'

  Mal sighed. 'Here, give it to me. I'll hold it while you get on.'

  'Right.' She blew out a breath and squared her shoulders. 'Right.'

  The horse tossed its head up and down impatiently as Copper seized the reins. She had seen this lots of times on television. All she had to do was put one foot in the stirrup and throw her other leg over. There was nothing to it.

  On television, though, the horses stood obligingly still. This horse danced sideways as soon as she got her foot into the stirrup, and she ended up hopping around the yard while the three jackaroos sitting on the fence watched with broad grins. Tipping their hats back, they had the air of settling down for a rare afternoon's entertainment.

  Cursing the horse under her breath, Copper clenched her teeth and hopped harder. Mal shook his head with a mixture of amusement and exasperation. 'Would it help if I held him?' he asked, the very politeness of his voice a humiliation. He took hold of the bridle, and the horse, sensing the hand of a master, stopped dead.

  'Thank you,' said Copper grittily. Gathering the reins more firmly in her hand, she tried again, but with no more success than before, and in the end Mal had to take her foot and boost her unceremoniously up into the saddle where she landed with a bump.

  'Oh, my God,' she muttered, horrified to find herself so far from the ground. She would need a parachute to get down again! Too nervous to notice the resigned expression on Mal's face, she stared straight ahead as he let the horse go and stepped back.

  Flicking its ears at the delay, the horse immediately set off. 'Whoa!' squawked Copper in alarm, and yanked at the reins, but it only seemed to take that as encouragement and broke into a brisk trot around the yard. Copper's feet bumped out of the stirrups and she bounced hopelessly around in the saddle, bawling at the horse to stop. Somewhere in the background, she could hear the sound of heartless laughter. At least someone was enjoying themselves!

  The horse was heading straight for the gate into the paddock. Oh, God, what if it decided to jump? 'Who-oo-oo-oa!' yelled Copper, pulling frantically at the reins, and the horse turned smartly, sending her lurching sideways before it discovered Mal barring its way and stopped dead. Unprepared, Copper pitched forward, slithered down its neck and landed on her bottom in an undignified heap at Mal's feet.

  He was grinning callously. 'Are you OK?' he asked, not even bothering to conceal his amusement as Megan squealed with laughter and the jackaroos hooted and whistled from the fence.

  Without waiting for an answer, Mal reached down and put a firm hand beneath her arm to lift her easily to her feet. Copper was very conscious of the strength in his fingers and the whiteness of his teeth against his brown skin as he grinned. She jerked her arm away and made a great show of brushing the dust off the seat of her jeans. 'I think so,' she said a little sulkily. Much he would have cared if she had broken her leg! That would have been really funny, wouldn't it?

  'Why didn't you tell me you coul
dn't ride?' Mal asked, his voice still warm with amusement.

  'I didn''t think you'd put me on a beastly wild horse!' snapped Copper, almost disappointed to discover that the only injury was to her pride. It would have served him right if she had had to be stretchered back to Adelaide!

  Mal only laughed. 'Wild? Old Duke here is the laziest horse we've got. I picked him specially for you.'

  'Sweet of you,' she said between her teeth. 'Remind me never to ask you for anything else special!'

  'How did you think you were going to manage with a file under your arm when you'd never ridden before?' He shook his head. 'Wish I'd seen it, though! It would have made quite a story to keep us going in the wet!'

  'Perhaps I'll just take a notebook,' said Copper coldly. 'I can put it in my shirt pocket-or is that too bizarre for you?'

  'You want to have another go?'

  Copper looked over at the grinning jackaroos. The youngest cupped his hands around his mouth. 'Hey, Copper!' he shouted. 'We're going to enter you for the bucking bronco at the rodeo! Better get in some more practice!'

  'Why not?' she said. 'I'd hate to deprive you all of such good entertainment!'

  'Good girl.' Mal smiled at her and turned to send one of the boys for a leading rein. 'We'll keep good hold of you this time,' he said, and gave her a leg up back into the saddle. 'Look, you hold the reins like this.' He looked up at her and her heart seemed to stop. She saw his face in sudden and startling detail: the grooves at either side of his mouth, the smile crinkling his eyes, the prickle of stubble along his jaw. 'Relax!' he said, giving the strap a final tug to secure it and slapping Duke's rump affectionately.

  Copper smiled weakly and managed to look away. 'I think I've got altitude sickness!' she said. That would account for the queer feeling in the pit of her stomach, anyway.

  Mal rolled his eyes, but his smile burned behind her eyelids as he swung himself easily onto an enormous chestnut horse with a star on its forehead. The jackaroo attached a leading rein to Duke's bridle and handed the end up to Mal, who moved his horse up beside her. 'Ready?'

  'Yes.' Copper cleared her throat. 'Yes,' she said again, more firmly this time.

  Megan was already on her pony, trotting it around in circles with humiliating ease. The gate was swung open. Mal touched his heels to his horse's flanks, clicked his tongue behind his teeth to urge Duke forward, and Copper found herself riding.

  They took it very slowly at first. Megan trotted ahead on her pony, but the two horses ambled contentedly together. The lack of speed didn't seem to bother Mal, but then it wouldn't, Copper thought. He was never hurried, never flustered, never nervous. She was very conscious of him sitting relaxed in the saddle, his eyes creased as he scanned the horizon instinctively and his outline uncannily distinct in the fierce outback light.

  Copper felt very safe knowing that he could control her horse as well as his own, and after a while she, too, began to relax and look around her. They were following the line of the creek, picking their way through the spindly gums that spread out from the watercourse. It was very quiet. In the heat of the afternoon the birds were mostly silent, and there was just the creak of the saddles and the rustle of leaves beneath the horses' hooves as they kicked up a distinctive dry fragrance. Copper breathed it in as it mingled with the smell of leather in her hands.

  She was very aware of Mal, overwhelmingly solid beside her. Unlike her, he wore no sunglasses, but the brim of his hat threw a shadow that divided his face in two. Above, his eyes were hidden, but below, his mouth was very clear, cool and firm and peculiarly exciting.

  It was just a mouth, just two lips. Copper stared desperately ahead between Duke's ears, but it tugged irresistibly at the corner of her vision and her eyes kept skittering sideways in spite of herself. Every time they rested on his mouth, the breath would dry in her throat and she would look quickly away.

  She was so taken up with keeping her eyes under control that she didn't notice at first that Mal had brought the horses to a halt in a clearing beside the creek. He swung himself off his horse and looped its reins around the branch of a fallen tree before lifting Megan off her pony. She ran happily down to the water's edge, where there was a tiny sandy beach, and Mal turned to Copper, who was wondering how she was going to get off. Perhaps she should just try falling off like before?

  'Take your foot out of the stirrup,' he said. 'Then swing your leg over the saddle. I'll catch you.'

  He held his arms up as he spoke but a paralysing shyness had Copper in its grip once more and she could only stare helplessly down at him and wish that he had never been married, that the last seven years would simply dissolve and leave them as they had been then, a man and a girl bound briefly by magic.

  'Come on,' said Mal as she hesitated still. 'You're going to have to get off some time!'

  Somehow Copper managed to wriggle one leg over the saddle, and the next thing she knew she was slithering clumsily to the ground, Mal's hands hard at her waist. He held her for a moment and she stood with her hands resting on his shoulders for support, struggling against the overwhelming temptation to slide them round his neck and lean against him.

  'Thank you,' she muttered, unable to meet his eyes in case he read the longing in her own, and after a tiny moment he let her go.

  'This is where your father wanted to put the camp,' said Mal, looking around him at the tranquil scene.

  'It looks perfect.' Copper cleared her throat and moved away from him in what she hoped would look a casual way. 'Well, I…I'd better take some notes.'

  She threw herself into looking busy. She paced out the site and stopped to make notes, but her mind wasn't on siting tents or camp kitchens. It was on Mal, leading the horses down to the creek to drink before he tethered them in the shade. He looked tough and self-contained and somehow right, she thought, watching him move through the splintered light beneath the trees with his deliberate, unhurried tread. There was something uncompromising about him that belonged with this unrelenting landscape.

  Then Mal turned to see her watching him, and Copper hurriedly bent her head back over her notebook. She couldn't take notes for ever, though, and when she thought she had impressed him enough with the fact that she only cared about business, she went to join him on the fallen tree.

  Mal moved along to make room for her. There was an ironic look about his mouth as she put her notebook away. He made no comment but Copper had the feeling that he knew perfectly well that all her rushing around had just been for show, and she avoided his eye as she sat down beside him.

  For a while they sat without speaking, watching Megan who was busily scooping water from the creek for some unseen project that seemed to involve a good deal of mess and mud. Behind them, the horses shifted their legs and blew softly. Slowly the peace settled around Copper, and some of the tension went out of her shoulders.

  'It's a beautiful place,' she said at last.

  'Yes.' Mal looked around him, and then at her. 'It wouldn't be so beautiful with a clutter of tents and a busload of tourists, though, would it?'

  Copper met his eyes squarely, her own green and direct. 'Everything would be in keeping with the landscape,' she said. 'I think you'd be surprised at how beautiful it will all still be, but I'm not going to try and convince you now.' She smiled. 'I haven't forgotten what we agreed and I'm not going to waste my one chance!'

  'Oh, yes, talking of our agreement…' Mal tipped his hat and resettled it on his head. 'I rang the agency at lunchtime to find out what had happened to my new housekeeper. Apparently she got offered a job as a waitress in town at the last minute and decided to take that instead.'

  Copper looked at the trees reflected in the glassy water and wondered why anyone would choose to work in a restaurant when they could be somewhere like this. Then she thought about the chores she had slogged through that morning and decided that the girl, whoever she was, might have made a sensible decision.

  'Are they going to send someone else?'

  'They haven't go
t anyone immediately available, so they're going to have to advertise. It'll be at least a week before I get someone else, maybe longer.' Mal glanced at her. 'Think you can stand it for that long?'

  'Of course,' said Copper, secretly relieved. She wasn't ready to go back to Adelaide yet, but nor was she ready to enquire too closely into the reasons for her reluctance to leave Birraminda. 'I said I'd stay until you got a proper housekeeper, and I will.'

  'What about your commitments at home?'

  'That's not a problem,' she said with some surprise. 'We got someone in to help out at the office so that I could concentrate on our plans for here, and Dad can keep an eye on things. It's not a very busy time of year, anyway.'

  'I was thinking more of personal commitments,' said Mal dryly. 'Isn't anyone going to miss you?'

  Would anyone miss her? She had plenty of friends who would wonder aloud where she was and wish that she was around to get a party going, but they were as busy as she was and their lives wouldn't stop without her.

  'No,' said Copper with a sad smile. 'I don't think anyone will miss me very much.'

  'What about this man you're so in love with?'

  She had forgotten that she had told him about Glyn. 'I don't think he'll notice much difference.' She sighed and stirred some curls of dried bark in the dust with her foot. 'He was always complaining that I was never at home, anyway. I have to travel a lot, and when I'm in Adelaide there's so much paperwork to catch up with at the office. I can't be home at four o'clock every day, just waiting for him to come home.'

  'You could get a different job,' said Mal.

  'You sound like Glyn,' she said bitterly. 'Quite apart from the fact that Dad needs me now, I love my job. Why should I give it up?'

  'No reason, if your job is more important to you than your boyfriend.'

  'Why does it always have to be a choice between them?' Copper burst out in remembered frustration. 'I was perfectly happy with the way things were. Glyn knew what I was like. Why did I have to be the one to make all the compromises?'