“You, child—” Maura pointed across the table at Angie. “You made me happy when you came to live here. You were such a wild, joyous little thing. So full of life and so eager to give these boys a kick in their arrogance.”
“It was an easy target.”
Maura’s smile couldn’t disguise the lingering sadness in her eyes. “And now you’re making a baby with my son. Have you planned a wedding I know nothing about, too?”
“We’re not getting married,” Tomas answered, and his voice was about as tight as the constriction in Angie’s chest.
“Even if a baby comes of this?”
“That’s right.”
Maura stared at her son a second longer, then shifted her attention one place to the left. “And is that all right with you, Angie?”
“Tomas was very straight with me,” she said carefully, “about not wanting to marry again. I offered to have this baby, regardless.”
Maura nodded once, accepting that answer even though she obviously didn’t like it. Her disapproval and disappointment fisted hard around Angie’s heart and squeezed with all its might. She longed to blurt out the truth, to say she wanted the marriage, the together, the forever, and she would probably keep on wanting it until the day she died. If she couldn’t change the stubborn man’s mind in the meantime.
“I’m not going to tell you how to live your life, Angie, that’s not my place. But you know I was a single mother, twice over. I was lucky Charles came along and gave us all his love and this life and a complete family. I know which option I preferred, and that’s all I have to say to you.”
That’s all? Lucky there was no more because Angie’s poor heart would have caved. And the damn tears prickled the back of her throat so she couldn’t even look Maura in the eye and say she knew what she was doing. Then she felt Tomas’s hand on her knee, not a prolonged caress, but a single moment of pressure that expressed support and comfort and solidarity even.
It also made the battling-tears thing much, much worse.
“If you want to talk to me, Angelina,” Maura said, pushing back her chair and getting up from the table, “you know where to find me.”
“Thank you,” Angie managed.
“Angie won’t be staying much longer,” Tomas said at the same time.
Maura paused, her gaze flicking from one to the other and obviously reading Angie’s reaction correctly. “Charles and I told you a long time ago that this is your home,” she said. “You stay as long as you want.”
“I thought you were going to Wyndham today.”
Angie’s voice cut cleanly through the chill pre-dawn, catching Tomas midway through saddling his horse. His hands froze for a full second while his mind processed the facts. Angie. Out of bed. This early. At the barn. Carefully he finished cinching the girth before he turned to acknowledge her greeting. “I am.”
“It’s a long way on horseback.”
Another time, after more sleep, he might have smiled at that comeback. Wyndham was a bloody long way by any transport other than plane. “I don’t have to leave till eight. I’m riding out to Boolah first.”
“Feel like some company?”
He hesitated—not to consider her request, but to decide how to put her off without a prolonged debate. After Maura’s return and last night’s dinner he knew they needed to talk, but not here, not yet. He hadn’t slept more than an hour and as for Angie…
“You look like you should still be in bed.”
“At this hour of the morning, everyone should still be in bed.”
“Funny.”
Except he didn’t smile, not when she shifted her weight from one foot to the other and drew his attention to what she was wearing and not wearing. Like shoes. In fact, she looked like she’d rolled out of bed, tossed a denim jacket over her pajamas and raced from the house. And if her elevated breathing was anything to go by, she’d not only raced but sprinted the hundred yards from bedroom to barnside.
He gestured at the bare feet she was busy shuffling between. “Aren’t you afraid you’ll step in something fresh?”
“Funny.” And she did manage a smile. “I heard you walk by my room and I was in a hurry to catch you before you left. For Wyndham. Since I thought that’s where you were going.” Her explanation started off jaunty and bright and then trailed off, as if she’d suddenly noticed his flat expression. At least that’s what he was striving for. Flat, forbidding, go-back-to-bed-Angie.
“Sorry I woke you,” he said, turning back to his horse and trying to recall where he’d left off with the saddle.
“Oh, you didn’t. I was awake. Still.”
“Yeah, well, after last night I don’t imagine any of us slept well.”
He heard her shift feet again, heard the soft exhale of her breath, and when he walked around his horse to check the offside he noticed that she’d started twisting her chain—the one he’d fixed for her yesterday—around her fingers. A for aftermath.
“It wasn’t only what Maura said. I lay awake thinking you might come.”
To her room? As he’d done the previous two nights?
Across his saddle their eyes met and held, sparking sudden heat into the chill morning air. For a long moment there was nothing between them but that heat and her honesty, and Tomas found he couldn’t lie. “I thought about it,” he said, moving back to his horse’s head, gathering his reins. “Most of the night.”
“But you didn’t…because of what Maura said?”
His hands tensed on the reins and Ace tossed his head in protest. With a few soothing words, he rubbed the green colt’s nose and promised to do better. For the horse, for his mother, for Angie who deserved much better than his recent treatment.
“I’m sorry she found out like that.”
“Not as sorry as I am.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” she said softly, and he sensed her coming closer, felt the way his body responded. “The will clause stated she wasn’t to know.”
“That doesn’t make any of us feel a whole lot better.”
“I know.”
They stood in silence for several seconds, still but for the stroke of her hand on his horse’s neck. That he could see from the corner of his eye, a long, slow, absent caress that made his own skin tighten. That made it remember every touch in the dark, every slow caress, every driving stroke of passion.
“I’m sorry, Angie,” he found himself saying. “That first night in Sydney, you told me about the teenage crush. I knew you expected more from me than what I was prepared to give, but I didn’t let it stop me. I should have. I’m sorry I’ve let you down.”
“You haven’t.”
“Don’t bullshit me. I know you wanted more these last nights.”
Her hand stopped the idle stroking, and his horse whinnied a protest. Tomas sympathized. She had that effect, with her soft hands and warm eyes and easy touch. “It wasn’t all bad,” she said. “In fact some of it was pretty good. And I had plans for a spectacular last night.”
“I noticed the dinner, the flowers, the candles. The dress.” Especially the dress and the fact she’d not been wearing a bra. Same as now. When she lifted her hands to twist at her chain or rub at her arms—as she was doing now—he could see the dark outline of her nipples through the thin material of her pajama top.
“You liked the dress?”
Tomas swallowed. “Yeah.” He liked.
A small smile touched her lips, a sweet and innocent contrast to the sultry heat in her eyes. “Maybe it’s not too late. If you wanted to give this ride a miss and, well, you said you don’t have to leave till eight.”
Two hours. One last time. And it would be all about her, about what she liked, about her fulfillment. A for atonement. His body thickened in readiness; the air thickened with anticipation. And somewhere in the world beyond, a ringer whistled tunelessly as he approached the barn and the start of his working day.
“Mornin’, boss,” he said. Then, “Bit early for you, eh, Ange?”
&nbs
p; He continued on his way, but his interruption hurtled Tomas back into the real world. His real world. “I think it best if we leave things as they are.”
The hand at her throat stopped twisting the chain. “Do you mean altogether? Not try again at all, even if this time didn’t work?”
“Yes. I do mean altogether,” he said stiffly. He gave the girth one final check and excused himself so she stepped out of the way.
“Because Maura doesn’t approve?”
He put his boot into the stirrup and looked her right in the eye. “Because Maura was right not to approve.”
“But what about the inheritance?” She waved her arms wide. “What about all this? What about the ownership you’ve worked so hard for?”
“I’ve tried. It’s up to Alex and Rafe now.”
“Alex isn’t married yet, and Rafe said he’s still considering.”
He swung into the saddle, adjusted his weight. “He’s made up his mind…he’s not telling Mau is all.”
As intended, that news sidetracked her attention. She huffed out a breath. “Really?”
“Apparently he’s going to ask her tomorrow night.” He held up a hand, anticipating her next question. “Don’t ask me. Ask him.”
“I will, but I still won’t believe it until I see it. I mean, Rafe as a father?”
“He never backs down from a challenge.”
Her abstracted expression tightened and she looked up at him sharply. “Is that what this is between you three? A challenge?”
“Not to me. Not to Alex. But to Rafe…probably. A challenge is the only thing that drives him.” He gathered up his reins. “He’s flying back to Sydney today.”
“And you think I should go with him?”
“That’s not my decision to make.”
“I’m not staying if you want me gone,” she said simply. “So it is your decision.”
And what could he say? Go, because I’m afraid to have you here. Go, before I can’t walk past your door at night. Go, because I’m afraid of what you expect of me, afraid of what I can’t give.
“Stay until you know if you’re pregnant. Then we’ll both know.”
“Well, Charlie, here we are then.” Angie coaxed the elderly stock horse right up to the fence and sucked in a deep, dusty breath. “Wish me luck.”
Being of the seen-it-all-before persuasion, Charlie didn’t wish her anything that she could detect. In fact she thought the old darling might have nodded off around the three-mile mark and sleepwalked the rest of the trip. But he’d got her here, albeit slowly, and that was the main thing.
“Here” was the stockyards at Spinifex Bore, where Maura suggested she might find Tomas. And as she gathered up her reins and prepared to dismount, she cast her eyes over the cattleyard activity and zeroed in on his broad shoulders and tan hat instantly. Angie climbed from her saddle to the top rail without shifting her gaze from that tall, powerful figure standing right in the middle of the bellowing melee of cattle and dust and ringers. As always the sight of him turned her breathless, tight, hot in a dozen separate places, but as she watched him work the desire softened like candle wax before reshaping into a fuller, richer craving.
This was a man in his element, doing what he loved, what he was born for. This was her man, and this was the life she longed to live with him. Even through the pall of dust raised by a thousand milling hooves, nothing could have been clearer in Angie’s eyes or mind.
It bolstered her resolve and reaffirmed her reason for riding out to see him today.
The notion had been simmering around in her brain for the five days since Maura’s return, since the morning at the barn when he terminated their arrangement. In that time she’d caught occasional glimpses of the old Tomas, and the more she saw, the more she wanted that man back. Over and over she’d recalled her conversation with Rafe about coming out here.
He needs you more than he needs this baby, Ange. He needs you so he doesn’t hole up in his shell like a hermit crab. That’s why she’d come out here, and she was determined to do whatever she could with the little time remaining—not to get him back in her bed, but to remind him of the life he’d cut himself off from.
This morning Maura, unknowingly, handed her the perfect first step.
A slow smile spread across her face as she remembered her excitement as the plan took shape in her mind. As she recalled turning Maura’s initial horrified, “Oh, no, child, no thank you,” to nervous consent.
If Tomas approved.
Her smile wavered momentarily, but she forced it wider and lifted her chin. He would approve. She had her argument all worked out, an answer for every permutation of no she’d anticipated on the long, slow ride out here.
It was, simply, a flawless plan…and she’d been unable to sit around all day and wait.
“Moment of truth, sister,” she muttered, and started to climb down into the action.
Tomas didn’t see her arrival. What he saw was a jackaroo’s distraction and a bullock charging at the draft. In one swift motion, he managed to push the kid aside and grab control of the gate.
“Shee-oot.” The youngster dusted off his backside and cast a sheepish glance in Tomas’s direction. “That was a close one.”
“Unless you like hospitals, you don’t even blink when you’re working the draft. Understood?”
“Yes, boss.”
Tomas nodded and handed control of the gate to the head stockman on this camp. “Watch him, Riley. I don’t want any accidents.”
“Then you better get the girl out of here.”
Shee-oot.
He swung around and instantly saw the reason for, not one, but pretty much every ringer’s distraction. Angie, wearing jeans that molded every inch of her backside, climbing into the yards. And smiling widely at every man who tipped his head and said “G’day, Ange.” And paying scant regard or respect to the beasts in the yard.
What in the blue blazes did she think she was doing?
Jaw set in a heated mix of fury and fright for her safety, he strode in her direction. A few curt words set the men back on task. A few deep breaths brought his seething response under control.
Her smile faltered and dimmed when he caught her by the arm and swung her back into the relative protection of a corner. “What are you doing?” she asked, when he kept turning her until he was happy he could see both her and the cattle.
“I’m making sure you don’t step into the path of half a ton of beef.”
“I know what I’m doing.” Eyes narrowed with indignation, she waved her free arm toward the activity. “I’ve been around cattle ten times as long as some of these kids.”
“Then you should know this is the most dangerous place on the station. You shouldn’t be distracting those kids.”
She blinked slowly, and her gaze turned contrite. “You’re right. I guess I should have waited up on the rail until you were done.”
Tomas shook his head. Did she really think that sight wouldn’t have distracted any red-blooded male? Her perched up there in her pretty pink shirt and tight jeans and Cuban heeled boots? His gaze narrowed on the footwear and then on the roping gloves that protected her hands. His gut tightened with a new and different fear. “Did you ride out here?”
“Of course I did. Why?”
He swore softly. Shoved his hat back from his brow. “What if you’re pregnant?”
“I rode Charlie, not one of these bulls. I don’t see how that could hurt.” She looked perplexed, as if she didn’t understand his concern. Hell, he didn’t understand it completely. Not the almost irrational rush of terror when he imagined her galloping down here at the bone-rattling speed she’d favored in her youth.
“Charlie, huh.” Readjusting his hat, he exhaled a long, slow draft of remnant fear. Charlie was a safer conveyance than anything on wheels. He’d overreacted, big time. “I can’t imagine you enjoyed that much.”
“He has two speeds—slow and slower. I swear that snails overtook us on the way out here.” She
smiled, but the softening of her expression kind of hitched in the middle when their eyes met and held. Still smiling, she reached out and touched his arm but her eyes were serious, dark, solemn. “I’ll be careful, okay?”
That expression, that touch caught at his throat. He knew he’d have to clear it to speak, if he had anything to say, so he just nodded. And his gaze slid down to the warm pressure of her hand on his arm, not so much arousing as…unsettling. Because he wasn’t thinking about those kid-gloved fingers stroking his bare skin. He wasn’t thinking about them sliding down inside his jeans and folding around him. He huffed out a breath. He was thinking about them sliding down and folding around his hand and, hell, that’s what he didn’t understand.
And she must have misunderstood his intense interest in her touch, because she suddenly withdrew her hand and tucked it into the front pocket of her jeans. He had the weird feeling that she’d taken something from him and tucked it away.
Unsettling? Holy hell, yeah.
There was an uncomfortable passage of silence before Angie tipped the brim of her white hat and cleared her throat. “So,” she said brightly, “do you want to hear why I put up with the slow ride all the way out here?”
Yeah, he did. But not here at the yards where she’d managed to turn him inside out with protective concern. With emotions he didn’t want, didn’t need, didn’t understand. “You can tell me while I drive you back to the homestead.”
“What about Charlie?”
“Riley can bring him home.
Her eyes narrowed with a frown, but Tomas didn’t give her a chance to object. Yeah, he knew Charlie was old and slow and safe. But he also knew he couldn’t go back to work knowing she was out there on horseback. Or still here at the yards with cattle milling around. Remnants of his earlier fear still twisted tight in his gut and sweated on his backbone. “This isn’t debatable, Angie. I need to know you get home safely. You’re riding in my ute.”
Eleven
Angie was enjoying this protective concern of Tomas’s a little too much, especially since she knew in her heart it was all about the baby—a baby she might not have conceived. And she really had wanted to spend some time at the yards, maybe even working the cattle alongside the ringers, as she’d done so many times in her teens. Another day, she promised herself. Today she had a more important agenda.
Princes of the Outback Bundle Page 16