Christmas Where She Belongs

Relationship?

Where was his head?

‘Start again with you, McAlister,’ Clancy was saying. ‘At the door you said you were a lawyer, then you show a hospital ID with “Angel Flight” on it, which I know doesn’t make you a doctor because you could just be a pilot with a plane, but none of this explains why were you sponging off this Hester until she died. Were you hoping to get the house and dog yourself?’

‘Heaven forbid!’ he retorted, pleased the woman’s accusation had cleared his head—if not his chest. ‘The place is falling down. I just didn’t want to leave her on her own. Also, it’s a good house, and has historical value, and it deserves to live. But so much needs doing to it. I could only keep things going, getting a tradesperson in when necessary, although I’ve become a dab hand at changing tap washers and cleaning blocked drains.’

‘That’s not making anything clearer,’ Clancy told him as she battled to make sense of the situation. She didn’t know if it was what he was saying or because of her reaction to him as a man, but for whatever reason every time the man spoke she grew more confused. ‘What are you really? A doctor, a lawyer, a carpenter, odd-job man …?’

The man had the hide to laugh and Mike, apparently hearing the sound, came trotting across, grinning his stupid grin, a little bit of bacon dangling from the beard beneath his chin.

The dog nuzzled his head beneath Mac’s hand and as Mac’s long fingers rubbed the dog’s head Clancy had the weirdest sensation that the fingers were touching her—rubbing her head, and ruffling her hair.

‘A doctor first. The lawyer and odd-job man are part-time jobs, like the farming. It probably won’t surprise you to know that although doctors are desperately needed in country areas across Queensland, the only lawyering the locals need is the odd will or a bit of conveyancing when they buy or sell something.’

‘Farming? Did you sneak farming in there as well?’ Clancy asked. ‘Law and medicine are both long degrees, and then there’s articles for a lawyer and internship for a doctor. So that makes you, what—a hundred and ten years old?’

‘I am thirty-six,’ Mac replied, somewhat stiffly, Clancy felt. ‘And for your information I started studying law, then switched to medicine after four years. After I moved to Carnock I finished my law degree as an external student and did the practical legal training course to get my practicing certificate.’

‘Okay, so you’re the town doctor and the town lawyer and you live in my house, which is falling down. Is that it?’

‘More or less.’ The reply this time was grumpy, to say the least. ‘Although it isn’t your house, it’s Mike’s.’

‘Mike’s?’

The word came out as a yelp, which won an answering yelp from the dog himself, who shifted his allegiance from Mac to her.

Clancy stared at the man who had, in less than an hour, turned her neatly ordered life completely upside down.

‘Can a dog inherit a house? Own a house? Are you sure that’s legal?’

She patted Mike’s head to show she had nothing against him personally, and, apparently liking that, he rested his chin on her leg, liberally smearing her clean white cargo shorts with dog slobber.

‘Life tenancy,’ Mac responded, ‘after which it reverts to you, but—’

Up to this point, the man had been looking at her as he explained things—in fact, he’d been looking at her so intently she’d felt uncomfortable, although that could have been the attraction thing. Now, not only had he left an ominous-sounding ‘but’ dangling at the end of his sentence, but McAlister Whoever was gazing over her left shoulder—towards the road behind them, not looking at her at all …

‘But?’

‘Well …’

The man was hedging.

‘Actually,’ he began again, ‘to get the house, you have to take the dog.’

‘Actually,’ Clancy mimicked, ‘having heard about the house, I doubt very much I’d want it, while as for the dog—’

Unfortunately, perhaps understanding he was the dog in question, Mike looked up at her at that moment … and smiled.

No! No way! You do not disrupt your carefully planned life because a dog smiled at you!

‘Couldn’t the dog be mine in name but continue to live in the house with you?’

The man did look at her now, studying her for what seemed an inordinate length of time before answering—only what he said wasn’t an answer at all.

‘I can understand you haven’t much time for your father, but have you no curiosity at all about him, about his family, your forebears? Wouldn’t you at least like to see the town, look at the house?’

The nut roast had looked more like a dinosaur than a turkey, Clancy remembered, an image of the monstrosity flashing through her brain. While as for the wine …

Now here was the perfect excuse not to go to Nimbin for Christmas. The summer break was three months long—she could visit Carnock for a couple of weeks and still have plenty of time to complete her ‘to do’ list.

And though she was reluctant to admit it, the man was right, she did have a good deal of curiosity about her father. She’d just left it packed away in the cellar of her mind since her abortive attempt to find him back when she’d been a child.

‘I don’t have a car. Is there a bus, or a train?’ she asked, and Mac frowned at her.

‘You don’t have a car?’

She frowned right back at him.

‘You make it sound as if it’s a sin against humanity—have you not heard of minimising your personal carbon footprint? And why would I need a car? A pleasant stroll across the pedestrian bridge over the river takes me to work and the city, I have parklands all around me, I have a bicycle if I want to go further afield. So, no, I don’t have a car.’

‘Well, you could fly back out there with me. I’m going this afternoon and I’m almost sure to be coming back down before too long. Otherwise someone in town could give you a lift.’

He paused, again studying her a little too intently.

‘You’ll come?’ he added.

She thought of her eight-year-old self setting out to walk to the place called Carnock, the page she’d torn from the atlas in the school library folded in her pocket, and suddenly the idea of seeing the town she’d been headed for all those years ago filled her with an excitement she hadn’t felt for a long, long time.

‘I’ll come!’ she said, and she scratched Mike’s head, ruffling the rough hair on it.

CHAPTER TWO

ASKING for trouble, that’s what it was, encouraging her to visit Carnock. But who’d have expected Hester’s great-niece to look the way she did? Obviously as sensible and capable as Hester had been, yet somehow vulnerable at the same time.

On the other hand, it was only fair she see the house before she made any decision, Mac reminded himself.

Her attention was focussed on Mike at the moment, so he could study her without making it too obvious. Not that he hadn’t been studying her ever since they’d met, trying to analyse the unexpected physical bond he’d felt from the moment he’d laid eyes on her.

Maybe there was a look of Hester about her, but if there was he couldn’t see it. And as far as women were concerned, his preference was for blondes, and longhaired blondes at that. This woman with her gamine looks and hair like a pixie’s cap—she just wasn’t his type.

‘You said “fly back” with you. You have a plane?’

She’d looked up and caught him staring at her, embarrassing him enough to launch him into speech.

‘Cessna 172, handy little plane, four seater, has a range of about a thousand k …’ He stopped and smiled at her. ‘You don’t really want to know all that, do you? But, yes, I have a plane.’

‘I’ve never flown,’ she said, the vulnerable part of her looks coming to the fore.

‘Never flown in a small plane?’

Well, a lot of people hadn’t!

‘Not flown at all,’ she said. ‘Early on I didn’t have the money for expensive holidays and now—I don’t know, I guess I just haven’t got around to planning one.’

Instinct told him there was more to that story but he wouldn’t pursue it now.

‘You’ll enjoy it. It’s only a couple of hours’ flight, three at the most. The weather’s great, and we go over pretty country—the Great Dividing Range and the Downs. It will be all green and gold at the moment with either new crops planted or the last of the sunflowers. Now to plans. I want to call in and say hello to my parents while I’m in town. How long will you take to pack? How about I collect you at one?’

She was shaking her head, a stunned look on her face, then her lips tightened and she gave a final head shake.

‘It’s not that I don’t trust you, but how do I even know you’re who you say you are? I mean, I know it’s highly unlikely someone would choose me to abduct because I’m worth nothing as a hostage. But I’ve known you, what, a couple of hours at most? And now you expect me to hop in a small plane with you and fly off to a place I’ve barely heard of.’

‘Ah, but you had heard of it, that’s the point. I suspect that’s why you let me in, when everything about you tells me you’re a very cautious person. I don’t blame you for feeling apprehensive. Look …’ He fished in his pocket for his wallet and, pulling it out, produced a rather squashed card. ‘The hospital number is there—phone the hospital and ask any questions you need to ask. Being Sunday, Annabelle Crane, our—’

‘Annabelle Crane—beautiful blonde with a sexy laugh and a never-ending stream of terrible jokes?’ Clancy spoke in what she hoped was a light-hearted voice, although the mention of Annabelle’s name had started heart palpitations.

Bad heart palpitations!

‘You know Annabelle?’

Fighting an urge to press her hand to her chest, Clancy said carefully, ‘I trained with her, but I lost touch after she married. You said she’s Annabelle Crane? She’s not married now?’

Not married to James?

Forget James. The question she needed to ask herself was could she face Annabelle again as if nothing had ever happened?

The palpitations were so bad she seriously considered telling Mac to keep the inheritance and get out of her life, but the name of that town—Carnock—kept echoing in her head, while memories of a man who’d tossed her in the air as a child …

And James falling out of love with her and into love with Annabelle hadn’t really been Annabelle’s fault, any more than James using the overseas honeymoon bookings he’d made for himself and her—the insensitivity of which had caused Clancy the most pain—could be blamed on Annabelle …

And the pirate wondered why she’d never flown anywhere.

‘Definitely not married.’ Mac’s reply dragged her out of the past. He spoke casually, but Clancy heard a hint of something behind the words. Were he and Annabelle an item? Why did he put so much stress on the word ‘definitely’?

‘They must have split up,’ Clancy said, telling herself it was none of her business if Annabelle and Mac were involved, and that the uneasiness in her stomach was nothing more than to be expected, given how her life had shifted in the last couple of hours.

‘Do you want to phone her?’ he said, offering his mobile. ‘The hospital is on speed dial, just press two.’

Clancy studied the phone—a much better idea than studying the man. But taking it, pressing the number two, would show a level of distrust she no longer felt. Hadn’t really felt at all with this man from the moment she’d seen his picture in the camera by the door.

Which was stupid.

But taking the phone, pressing two, would put her onto Annabelle …

You’re over it! You moved on years ago!

She took the phone and pressed the number two, wondering at the same time who would answer if she pressed one instead.

Annabelle?

‘Carnock Hospital, Annabelle speaking. That you, Mac?’

Clancy pressed the button that cut off the call and handed the phone back to Mac, whose hand closed over it just as it began to ring. He glanced at the number displayed and somehow stopped the noise without answering, instead slipping the phone back into his shirt pocket.

‘You didn’t want to chat with Annabelle? Catch up on what’s happening? Share a few student reminiscences?’ he asked, though it was apparent he hadn’t wanted to speak to Annabelle either, for who else would have been phoning right then?

Now she studied the man, a move aimed at distracting her mind from the reminiscences that lay between her and Annabelle!

Scruffy, that’s what he was, yet it was a very appealing scruffiness, maybe because of the twinkle that was almost always evident in his dark brown eyes.

It was dangerous, that twinkle, something to beware of, so she ignored it, and the teasing note in his voice, and answered as coolly as her overheated and still-jolted body would allow.

‘I imagine we can catch up in Carnock,’ she said, although catching up with Annabelle had never been high on her wish list for the future.

‘You will, at that,’ Mac assured her.

Some assurance!

‘So, one o’clock!’ Clancy said, knowing she had to get away right now, before the clashing chaos of attraction and memories had her disintegrating into a twisted mass of nerves on the footpath. ‘I need to pack,’ she added as she stood up, knocking over her chair in her haste. ‘It’ll be hot, I imagine.’

She bent to pick up the chair but Mac was before her, his hand brushing hers as she grabbed at it, his quiet ‘Let me’ suggesting he’d somehow read the turmoil inside her.

And now they were both bent, heads close together, gazes locked, something shimmering in the air between them, something that definitely wasn’t distrust …

Mike saved the day, leaping over the fallen chair and knocking over the table.

Clancy had to laugh. The dog was sitting in the middle of the shambles, grinning his idiotic grin.

‘Well, I’m glad someone’s laughing,’ Mac growled, as he righted the table. ‘You go and pack. I’ll settle up for the damage before I kill your dog.’

‘You brought him here,’ Clancy reminded him, and Mac sighed.

‘Indeed I did,’ he said, and Clancy couldn’t miss the regret in his voice.

She slipped away, thinking not of Annabelle Crane and James but of whether Mac’s regret was for bringing the dog to the city, or was it for getting himself involved with her?

Although they were hardly involved—he was a lawyer who had contacted the beneficiary of a will, and she was the beneficiary. It was purely a business meeting.

Maybe!

Packing took all of fifteen minutes, cleaning out the refrigerator and giving her next-door neighbour the perishables another ten, which left Clancy with two hours and twenty-two minutes to fill before one o’clock.

She considered using the time to contact her mother, a process that could take easily that long as it involved contacting a neighbour who had a phone, who then raised a flag to indicate there was a message for someone in the commune. It could be that the flag wouldn’t be seen for hours. Or days.

And if days, she’d be gone before her mother phoned back, and then she’d worry when she couldn’t get hold of Clancy, so all in all it was better to write.

Two hours and eighteen minutes—decisions didn’t take up much time.

Well, sitting around was no good because then she’d start thinking, and if she started thinking she’d regret making the impulsive decision. She never made impulsive decisions, knowing they invariably led to loss of control, and being in control was the mainstay of her life.

Or had been for some time …

She found some paper and began the letter, telling her mother of the unexpected appearance of Great-Aunt Hester in the family tree, and the strange bequest.

I’m not going because I still hanker for a father, she wrote, although as she put the words on paper, she wondered if they were entirely true, but because this woman left me her house and dog in good faith, so the least I can do is have a look at the situation, sum it up and make a decision.

There, that sounded sensible. No need to mention Annabelle Crane being in Carnock.

Sometimes Clancy thought her mother regretted the break-up with James more than she herself did. But hadn’t it been the shock of James’s visit to the commune, and meeting her mother’s extraordinary friends, that had started the disintegration of their relationship …?

Determined not to dwell on the past, she finished the letter and went into the alcove in her bedroom that she thought of as her office. Once there, she was able to lose herself in the first item on her ‘to do’ list, the preparation of lectures for the following year. She wanted to make them more challenging, particularly for the first-year students, so they would get a feel for the job they were training to do.

So, of course, rather than waiting by the front door at one o’clock, she was lost in Lecture Two when the buzzer buzzed.

Shoving her laptop into its case, she slung it over her shoulder, grabbed the small bag with her belongings, and her handbag, and hit the button to allow Mac and Mike entrance to the lobby. ‘I’ll be right down,’ she said into the intercom, and raced down the stairs, knowing it would be faster than taking the elevator.

Flushed from her downward dash, she arrived in the lobby to find Mike in trouble again, this time from a tenant Clancy didn’t know, a woman who’d emerged from the elevator with a Siamese cat on a lead.

‘He likes cats,’ Mac was saying to the woman, who’d grabbed her pet from beneath Mike’s smiling face and was glowering at Mac.

‘Dogs are not allowed in this building,’ the woman said, and she stalked out the door.

Mike let her go, discovering Clancy instead and rushing up to her to greet her with his front paws on her chest, so with the weight of her baggage she’d have gone flying if Mac hadn’t slung his arm around her to steady her.

The area of skin beneath the clothes that touched that arm prickled with awareness, then the arm dropped away, while Clancy battled an urge to run straight back up the stairs.

Control!

‘Does he cause trouble wherever he goes?’ she asked, determined to ignore her reactions to the man, and looking at Mike, who was now sitting in front of her doing a perfect dog act.

‘Everywhere!’ Mac said in a despairing voice, but Clancy heard the smile behind the words and understood that Mac loved the silly animal, just as Great-Aunt Hester must have.

Great-Aunt Hester—just thinking about the woman gave Clancy a weird sensation in her stomach.

She had family! Real family! Or at least she had done …

Of course, she’d always known her mother had family, somewhere down south, maybe in Victoria, but her mother’s insistence that the fellow members of the commune were the only family she wanted or needed had meant Clancy had never known any of them. Which, by and large, had been okay.

Mac had taken her belongings and she was following him out the front door towards an ancient, battered, rusting four-wheel drive while she considered all of this. But as he stowed her bags in the back and opened the rear door for Mike, Clancy realised there was one question she hadn’t asked and probably should have.

With her hand on the doorhandle, she turned to Mac.

‘How did you find me?’

‘I didn’t,’ he said, with a grin that seemed to light up whatever little corner of the world he was currently inhabiting. ‘Hester found you. I have a feeling she had some kind of agent look into it.’

‘An agent? You mean a private detective? She had someone following me?’

The grin turned into a laugh so the dark eyes sparkled with devilment.

‘I very much doubt you were followed,’ he assured her, taking her hand off the doorhandle and opening it for her. ‘As far as I know, most things can be discovered just sitting in an office using a computer. All births are registered, you’d be on a voting register, there’d be school and university records, and a smart agent could probably even find out which dentist you went to.’

Clancy had ducked past him to get into the car, but turned back to face him, horrified by what he was saying yet knowing it was probably true.

‘You think that’s what happened?’

‘Almost sure of it,’ Mac said, then he touched her cheek. ‘We’re all in the same boat, about as anonymous as a pop star. Every time you go for a job, someone is finding out all this stuff about you.’

Clancy wanted to argue, but she knew everything he’d said was true, no matter how uncomfortable it might make her feel. So now she had to wonder just how much this ‘agent’ Mac spoke of had dug up. And was the information floating around the house where Mac now lived alone—apart from Mike?

Did it matter?

Deciding it didn’t, she finally climbed into the car. She was going out to see the house. Yes, she’d probably see Annabelle, but that was okay, they’d been quite good friends through university, and beyond all that a little flutter of excitement threading along her nerves reminded her she was finally going to see the place called Carnock, and maybe, just maybe, find out a little more about her father.

Unfortunately, as Mac got behind the wheel and the flutter along her nerves grew stronger, she had to wonder if it was the thought of seeing Carnock causing it, or this man she didn’t know.

She’d had flutters aplenty with James in the beginning, although flutters seemed to die natural deaths as a relationship progressed, for which she’d been profoundly grateful. She had to hope, if Mac was causing the flutters, that they would also die away when a relationship didn’t exist.

Mac was driving out through the inner suburbs, explaining that he flew in and out of Archerfield, where he kept this vehicle for his convenience when he was in Brisbane.

‘There are any number of old cars like this around an airfield. A lot of pilots are tinkerers, playing with their planes and doing up old cars—the two go together. It’s fortunate for me as there’s an old man out there who loves this vehicle, so although it looks as if it’s coming apart at the seams, he keeps it in good running order for me.’

‘And are you a tinkering pilot?’ Clancy asked.

‘Definitely not. I have no idea what goes on inside any engine, although I had to learn enough about the plane to be able to see anything that was obviously wrong with it. But we’ve a good mechanic in Carnock and I have it serviced down here every year. I just wanted to be able to get about, and in the bush a small plane’s the answer.’

The conversation lagged, and although the silence wasn’t uncomfortable, Clancy felt obliged to break it.

Or it may have been because she liked Mac’s voice, the rich chocolate of it, that she asked, ‘And your involvement with Angel Flight?’

‘Ah,’ Mac said, ‘that’s one great charity. Very few overheads, most of the work done by volunteers, and it’s one thing that is of real benefit to country people all over Australia. You know about it?’

He turned towards her and Clancy smiled, glad she could answer honestly.

‘I’ve supported it as a charity for years and I’m a registered “earth angel”, but only as a hospital visitor. Having a full-time job and not having a car means I can’t do hospital transfers, but when people have to stay down for any length of time, I’m put in touch with them.’

‘So we have something in common apart from Hester,’ Mac said, and when he smiled she knew the flutters were Mac-generated, although the name Carnock still gave her a thrill when she whispered it in her mind.

Thrills—flutters—what was happening to calm, sensible, in-control Willow Cloud Clancy? The girl who’d fled the drifting, laid-back, disorganised life of the commune to build a normal, stable life for herself—planned and controlled to the last detail …

This time she let the silence linger, her head too busy puzzling over her reactions to Mac to be bothered with small talk.