by Valerie Parv
She shifted uncomfortably, his praise sitting awkwardly with the real reason she was here—to satisfy Bryan’s quest for revenge. How could he sit there so calmly, knowing she was here under false pretences? ‘I haven’t really done anything yet,’ she evaded. ‘This project is really Bryan’s baby.’ There, let him talk his way out of that.
Fred surprised her by nodding agreement. ‘I should have known, after all he’s done for us over the years. If anyone can make it work, he can.’
So much for her line about delusions of sainthood, she thought furiously. Around the town, he was obviously halfway towards canonisation already. She opened her mouth to say something, but was quickly forestalled by Bryan.
‘This is a team effort, Fred. We’re in this together.’
Fred glanced towards the steaks sizzling on the barbecue. ‘Duty calls, but if there’s anything I can do to help…’
‘We’ll call on you,’ Bryan supplied.
The man returned to his work, flipping steaks and onion rings with a practised hand. Jill watched him thoughtfully. She didn’t like the discovery that the town’s problems had a human face. It complicated her desire to get out of here as soon as she decently could.
Bryan anticipated her thoughts. ‘This town is full of folk like Fred. They built this country and they deserve to get something back for their children, whether you like the idea or not.’
‘I have no difficulty with the idea, only with the way in which you achieve your goals,’ she said tautly. She wondered what Christa thought of Bryan’s feelings for the townspeople. It wasn’t something he was likely to give up lightly, as Jill herself knew to her cost.
She was grateful for the excuse to get up and select her meal from the barbecue. It gave her the time to get her emotions back under control. However worthy Bryan’s goals might be, they didn’t excuse his methods. She still hadn’t forgiven him for threatening her brother and sister-in-law.
Saint Bryan he might be to the people of Bowana, but to her he was still a sinner. Saints didn’t blackmail people and they didn’t mislead them with kisses when they were living with someone else.
Plate in hand, she froze halfway to the barbecue. What was going on here? Was her resentment directed at the way he’d dragged her out here against her will, or at him for kissing her when he was living with Christa? Reluctantly, she faced the possibility that there might be a much more personal reason for her feelings. She couldn’t be attracted to him, woman to man, could she?
It must be the desert heat addling her brains, she told herself. A woman would have to be crazy to fall for such an arrogant, controlling man. Why, he didn’t understand the meaning of the word ‘no’.
She couldn’t imagine pretending to have a headache if he wanted to make love. What he wanted, he would make sure she wanted, too. His dreams would be hers, his star the one he would expect his wife to follow.
‘Steak or chicken, love?’
She snapped out of her reverie. What was she thinking of, entertaining such foolish notions? She was here to do a job, not to get involved with the last man on earth who should interest her.
She summoned a shaky smile for Fred. ‘Chicken, thank you,’ she replied, and wondered whether she was referring to the meal or herself.
CHAPTER SIX
BY THE time Jill returned to the table, leaving Fred in charge of cooking her meal, she was composed again, at least on the outside. Inside, she was more confused than ever.
It was obvious from the way Bryan was treated by the others in the dining-room that she was the only one with any reservations about him.
They didn’t stop her heart from picking up speed as she approached his table. A shaft of sunlight spilled across it, catching him as if in a spotlight, and a lump rose in her throat.
His mouth was parted in a half-smile at something he was thinking. Recalling the pressure of that same mouth against hers made the plate of salad she carried tremble in her hands.
She put it down quickly and dropped into her seat before he could come around and pull her chair out for her. She found she needed the width of the table between them to tame her whirling thoughts.
‘You didn’t order anything,’ she said, coughing to clear a dry throat.
He nodded towards the barbecue. ‘Fred knows how I like my steak.’
A question rose in her mind. ‘How did he know what I’m doing here?’
‘It’s a small community. News travels fast.’
‘Do they also know I’m not exactly a volunteer?’
A warning light flickered in his eyes. ‘I didn’t see the need to pass along that particular detail.’
‘It wouldn’t exactly enhance your reputation, would it?’ she snapped, disturbed by her growing tension. In the face of Fred’s warmth, she felt like a fraud. This project meant much more to the townsfolk than she liked to think.
‘My reputation doesn’t matter,’ he dismissed her taunt. ‘You saw how much your presence here means. Would you like to be the one to disillusion Fred and his family?’
She looked down at her plate. ‘No.’
‘Neither would I.’
As she picked at her plate of salad, he gave a growl of impatience. Now what had she done wrong? He went to the bar and returned with slabs of home-made bread which he dumped on to her plate. ‘You can’t exist on rabbit food alone. Those shadows under your eyes could be mistaken for a solar eclipse.’
‘I realise I’m no Christa Bernard, but you don’t have to be insulting,’ she said. She was tempted to push the bread away as a further act of defiance, but it smelled so mouth-watering that she couldn’t bring herself to do it. Mechanically she began to butter a piece.
He looked startled. ‘You think I’m comparing you to Christa?’
‘And finding me wanting,’ she said around a mouthful of the delicious bread.
‘Hardly that, Jill. No man could look at you and find you wanting, as I’m sure you’re well aware.’ Unexpectedly, he cupped her chin and turned her to face her reflection in a mirror over the bar. ‘What do you see when you look there?’
What she saw made her limbs feel weak. Her dark brown hair was haloed with light from the garden behind them. Her head was close to Bryan’s, her chin caught in his fingers. They were so close together that the slightest turn would bring their mouths into alignment.
What was she thinking of? Only moments before they had been discussing Christa. Jill wrenched her head away. ‘I see a fish out of water, if you must know.’
‘Are you sure, Jill?’
‘What does it matter anyway? I’m only here to do a job, not to fall in love with the town.’ Or its charismatic leader, she added to herself.
She was reprieved by Fred calling them to collect their meals. Bryan got up to collect them, and by the time he returned she was composed again, at least outwardly.
‘Will Christa be joining us later?’ she asked doggedly, ignoring the pang which shot through her as she voiced the question.
He shook his head. ‘She’s gone to Bowan Run to check on a breeding programme I’m running there.’
Her surprise was quickly masked. ‘I didn’t realise that Christa was involved in your pastoral company. I thought she was mainly your housekeeper.’
He gave her a calculating look. ‘I can imagine what you thought. But Christa can do the work of most men. As well as farm management, she rides, ropes and brands a calf with the best of them. It’s a damned shame her older brother will inherit their family property, but her father’s old-fashioned. He wants Christa to marry and live on her husband’s place.’
From Christa’s disparaging comments about the town, she was hardly likely to care if the land went to her brother, although she was wise enough not to betray herself to Bryan. And he thought city women were manipulative.
Jill vented some of her annoyance on the chicken kebab, prising the tender meat off the skewer with unnecessary vigour. It gave her some small satisfaction to be sure that Christa wouldn’t find it easy
to persuade Bryan to exchange his outback lifestyle for something more to her liking. He was the original immovable object.
There was no reason why it should concern Jill, but it did. Christa’s wiles offended her. It had nothing to do with the attractiveness of the man sitting opposite her, eating his steak with quiet appreciation.
His stillness was one of his most appealing qualities, she realised. He could make silence seem companionable. Yet he was also the man who had blackmailed her into taking this job, she made herself remember. His threat to foreclose on her brother’s mortgage still rankled. He and Christa probably deserved each other.
He put his cutlery down and reached for his beer glass. When he drained it, there was a rim of foam frosting his upper lip. She stared at it, mesmerised, until he skimmed it away with the back of a finger.
She swallowed tautly, forcing herself to bring the other woman back into the conversation. ‘I suppose you and Christa grew up together.’
‘Not really. We’re neighbours, but the two homesteads were half a day’s ride apart. We spoke on the radio through School of the Air, and met at social gatherings, but I didn’t really get to know her until my father became seriously ill.’
His voice grew distant and his knuckles tightened around the empty beer glass. ‘If it hadn’t been for Bill Bernard, we’d have lost our land to the bank. Heaven knows how, but he kept our place going as well as his own when Dad was too sick to manage.’
‘What about your mother?’ she asked, recalling Christa’s remark about outback women working alongside their menfolk.
His gaze softened. ‘Mum did what she could, but she had her hands full caring for Dad.’
‘So most of the hard work fell to you.’
‘I couldn’t have done it without Bill Bernard. When I found out he’d seen your column and been hurt by it, I could have cheerfully killed you.’
Now she understood why his vendetta was so personal, and a sharp pang of sorrow for her inadvertent action pierced her. She hadn’t meant any of this to happen. Even if Bryan overestimated Bill’s role in saving his property and underestimated his own, it was obvious he believed himself heavily indebted to the other man. To the point of marrying his daughter? She was surprised by the rush of feeling the question generated.
‘And now you’re the big boss of the McKinley Pastoral Company,’ she said, unwilling to acknowledge that his story had impressed her. ‘No doubt you enjoy throwing your weight around.’
‘I use my authority when it’s necessary,’ he reminded her silkily. No doubt he included bringing her to Bowana among those times. ‘Otherwise, the company runs smoothly with minimal intervention from me.’
‘Yet you had no compunction in forcing me to do your bidding,’ she couldn’t help throwing at him. Attack seemed like the best form of defence, considering the rampant way her emotions were running as she faced him across the table.
His eyes slitted and his fingers closed over hers, inexorably drawing her closer to him. ‘You’re determined to see me as some kind of outback tyrant, aren’t you? Well, so be it. I have no need to prove— or disprove—anything to you.’
His touch fired her senses, and it took all her resolve not to pull away until he saw fit to release her. Shakily, she reached for her sunhat. ‘I should get back to my research.’
Overriding her feeble objections, he paid for lunch and they walked back to the house in tense silence. She was surprised when he followed her into the library.
‘I’d like to hear more about this cattle trail idea,’ he said, dropping into a winged leather chair.
Ignoring the prickling sense of awareness generated by his presence was an effort, but she managed it. ‘Well, it’s still no more than an idea, but people are always looking for novel holidays. What better than to ride in the footsteps of the pioneers on a real-life cattle drive?’
‘Do you propose to use real cattle?’
Her enthusiasm grew. ‘Why not? Experienced stockmen could supervise the tourists as well as a small herd. The more authentic the experience, the better.’
His frown of concentration deepened. ‘You could be right. I don’t suppose you’re aware that many of the big properties are already returning to traditional means of mustering cattle?’
‘I thought everything was done by motorbike and helicopter nowadays.’
‘It was, but now horses are being brought back after nearly twenty years. Mustering by chopper is fast and efficient, but the pace inevitably sees calves separated from their mothers and the stock getting exhausted and over-heated.’
She felt her skin flush, but refused to consider that his approval had anything to do with the reaction. ‘So you agree that the idea has merit?’
‘Indeed, but it seems to need something more, something unique to this area.’
‘I thought so, too.’ She picked up the blackened stone and hefted it in her palm. ‘I was wondering about this.’
He gave a wry smile. ‘Your journalistic eye doesn’t miss much. Do you have any idea what you’re holding?’
‘Some kind of geological specimen, obviously.’
‘Much more. A piece of the moon.’
The fingers she’d curled around the rock flew open, and she gazed at the fragment in wide-eyed astonishment. ‘You’re not serious?’
‘It’s one of only a dozen lunar samples found on earth, brought here by meteorites. Most of the others were at the edges of the Antarctic. I had this one authenticated at a university lab in Arizona which handled samples from the Apollo moon missions, so it’s the real McCoy.’
The sample seemed to glow in her palm, but she knew it was her runaway imagination at work. ‘And you found it around here?’
He folded his arms across his broad chest and regarded her impatiently. ‘This area is the meteorite capital of the world. My moon rock comes from Turuga, the largest McKinley station, where there’s a meteorite crater wide enough to hold your cattle drive in.’
Excitement radiated through her. ‘This is it. This is the answer to Bowana’s problems.’
His expression became shuttered suddenly. ‘If you’re suggesting I should sell the lunar specimen, it’s out of the question. It’s worth far more to Australia’s heritage than the million or so it would fetch in cash.’
Her eyes snapped with annoyance. ‘I don’t mean sell it. I mean exhibit it to attract people to the area. The Turuga crater would be the perfect focal point of the cattle drive, and this could be the drawcard.’
He cupped his chin between thumb and forefinger. ‘It’s good, damned good. We could house the meteorite collection in a museum in the town, for those who don’t want to tackle the cattle drive. Either way, it brings tourists and work for the young people, so they don’t have to move away. By Harry, it might work.’
A shriek was torn from her as his hands spanned her small waist. He swung her off the floor and around until she begged dizzily for release. Taking his time, he complied, and her body slid slowly against his as he lowered her to the floor.
The moment became electrified.
His eyes met hers in silent communion as he kept his hands around her. Tension flooded through her as she became aware of every hard contour of his body aligned with hers. He was breathing heavily, his heart beating a powerful tattoo against her chest. Her own pulses raced, recognising where she was, and how much she wanted to be here.
‘Jill…’ The rawness in his voice startled her, redolent with a passion and a need exceeding her own. It wasn’t possible that he shared this exquisite, torturous sense of longing, was it?
‘Yes,’ she murmured, mindless of everything but the power and passion of his embrace.
A gasp escaped her as he slid a hand under her knees and swept her into his arms, carrying her to the Chesterfield sofa under the window, where he placed her with tender care.
Kneeling beside her, he ravaged her mouth with kisses, and she linked her arms around his neck, kissing him back with an abandonment which astonished her.
This was wrong. The thought echoed hollowly through her mind, just as swiftly overlaid by a desire so strong that she felt shaken. Against all common sense, she wanted him to kiss her as he was kissing her, to touch her in all her secret places as he was touching her. She wanted it so much that she was a quivering mass of needs to be moulded at his whim, to his heart’s desire.
When he undid the buttons of her shirt she moaned with pleasure, because he could finally caress her breasts, which strained her bra. Her nipples felt so sensitised that she wanted to cry out when his fingers teased them.
‘You’re so beautiful,’ he murmured, his lips moving against her throat so she felt his words as well as heard them. ‘So beautiful.’
She arched against him, his breath fiery against her bared skin. His face was dark, his breathing fast and shallow, as if he, too, was as caught up in the moment as she was.
His other hand splayed across her hip, massaging the curve of her thigh with mind-tearing strokes. The hands she had instinctively pressed against his chest to ward him off had somehow entangled themselves in the silken strands of his hair. One slid down the column of his neck, the faint furring of hair unbelievably erotic as it grazed her palm.
‘Yes, my darling, yes,’ she breathed, hardly aware of having voiced the thought until she felt him unfasten her jeans.
The denim flared wide, exposing the frivolous black lace beneath. Her weakness for lacy underthings had made her the butt of family jokes since her teens, but now she was glad to be wearing something so glamorous when she saw the gleam of interest in Bryan’s eyes.
He ran a finger around the lacy band riding low across her flat stomach. ‘How did you know I liked black lace?’
Wave after wave of sensation ripped through her as he traced a pattern across her stomach with his fingers. She could hardly speak for the anticipation which had almost closed her throat. ‘Do you?’ she asked in a hoarse, emotion-clogged whisper.
He traced the flowery pattern all the way to where it disappeared under stonewashed denim. ‘Yes, but not as much as what it conceals.’