Australia: Outback Fantasies: Outback Heiress, Surprise Proposal / Adopted: Outback Baby / Outback Doctor, English Bride

Bryn had taken time out to fully alert her to security threats. The offices and executive conference room were regularly swept for bugs. Telephones, cellular and cordless, were by their very nature a threat. If royalty could have their phones tapped, so could anyone. Some years back a small transmitter had been discovered to be concealed inside her Uncle Charles’s phone. She knew her grandfather from that day on had upgraded security measures, making sure all telephones and audio visual equipment were removed from conference rooms where confidential matters were discussed. Even so, more and more sophisticated devices were coming on to the market. Trusting one’s staff was extremely important. A strip search apart, who knew what anyone was hiding? Thank God it hadn’t come to that.

It would have given Francesca the greatest pleasure and satisfaction to have been able to take Carina on board. A different Carina, who herself was open to change. But Carina continued to complain bitterly to anyone who would listen about how she and her father had been robbed. Court action, however, to overturn their grandfather’s will did not eventuate. The view of the public was that the right heiress had been handed the job. The public was rarely wrong.

‘Leopards don’t change their spots,’ Bryn remarked during a late-night telephone conversation. They both had such a packed agenda it was difficult to meet. ‘You can’t seriously believe Carina would involve herself in any kind of work?’

‘It could make her feel better about herself. It could be the start of some sort of reconciliation between us.’ Francesca spoke hopefully. ‘I don’t want this feud to continue, Bryn.’

‘Dream on, Santa Francesca!’ A theatrical groan travelled down the wires. ‘Carina doesn’t share your concern for the less fortunate. She thinks by looking gorgeous she’s more than repaying her debt to society.’

Gradually Francesca was brought around to thinking she might ask Elizabeth to come on board. She still wanted people she could trust. If needs be, with her life. She no longer felt as safe as she once had. She was a sitting duck in so many ways. She had her allies, but she had to become a hard-headed realist. She had her enemies too. People who were lying low, waiting for her to fail. But Elizabeth was different. Elizabeth had raised her. Elizabeth had always been on the charity circuit, but Francesca thought she could do a great deal more if she were allowed to.

She spoke to Bryn about it, over a hastily arranged lunch date.

‘An interesting idea—maybe a bit provocative, given the estrangement in the family.’ He had taken his time to reply. ‘You know that Lady Antonia and I have done everything we possibly could to get my mother involved in our foundation, but her heart doesn’t seem to be in anything any more. Not since my father died. My mother is a one-man woman.’ His sigh was full of a deep regret. ‘But I have to say I understand it.’

‘Do you think Annette would help me?’ she stunned him by asking.

In the middle of taking a bite out of a bread roll he coughed, then quickly swallowed a mouthful of water. ‘God, Francey!’ he exclaimed, touching a lean hand to his scratched throat.

‘I’ve shocked you?’

‘You have. But shock on.’

She kept her eyes on him. ‘Annette and I get on so well together. You know we do.’

He nodded. ‘Okay, so you’re very sensitive and intuitive. Both my grandmother and my mother have a soft spot for you. And it’s you more than anyone outside myself that my mother confides in. She knows whatever she says to you you’ll be certain to keep it between yourselves. My mother doesn’t trust a lot of people. With good reason. But she trusts you.’

Francesca did something she had never dared to do before. His lean tanned hand was lying on the table. She reached across and closed her hand over it, interlocking their fingers. ‘That goes both ways,’ she assured him, feeling stronger for his touch. ‘I trust Annette. I’ve told her a lot of things I haven’t told anyone else.’

‘Including me?’ Did she know his senses were being heightened to a painful edge? He wanted to pick up her hand and carry it to his mouth. But he knew that would only scare her off.

‘Yes, including you.’ She blushed, rose mantling her beautiful skin. ‘But just think of this for a moment. Lady Macallan is such an exceptional woman that Annette might consider herself unable to act on her level. But with me? She’s known me since I was a baby. I’m the merest beginner.’

‘Are you really? The merest beginner? You’d have fooled me.’ Bryn’s brilliant black eyes glittered, but in his way he was already tossing this extraordinary idea around in his head. ‘You could ask her.’

‘I have your permission?’ There was a quick flare of joy in her eyes. ‘You don’t know how much I appreciate that. We both know people might question why Annette Macallan would choose to join the Forsyth Foundation in any capacity.’

‘Count on it,’ Bryn confirmed bluntly.

‘Oddly enough, I think she might enjoy it. As much love as there is between Lady Macallan and Annette, Lady Macallan is a formidable woman—a true personage. It’s in that sense your mother might feel overshadowed.’

Bryn gave her a fathomless stare. ‘She told you that?’

‘No, no, no!’ Francesca shook her head. ‘Your mother would never say such a thing. Lady Macallan is her second mother. She adores her. It’s just something I sense. Surely you’ve sensed it too?’

When he answered his tone was crisp enough to crackle. ‘God, Francey, I’m confronted by this every day of my life,’ he said. ‘I’m very proud of my grandmother. What a woman! And I think I get some of my own strengths from her. But she and I have been waiting for years now for my mother to take back her life. She was only a girl when my father married her. Just nineteen. She had me less than two years later. Dad was her lord and master. He didn’t aim to be that. It just happened. They were very much in love, right up until the end. We were all so damned happy. Too happy. One shouldn’t ever tempt the gods. After Dad was killed much of my mother died too. Her own parents—my Barrington grandparents—didn’t stand by her. Oh, they tried for a while, but gradually they became impatient with her. She was supposed to pull out of it after a certain period of mourning. She didn’t. I’m sure she’ll be saying my father’s name with her last breath.’

‘And who’s to say he won’t be waiting for her?’ Francesca spoke gently to this man she loved, wanted to be with through eternity. ‘Millions and millions of people believe in a resurrection, an afterlife.’

Bryn’s sigh was jagged. ‘Be that as it may, we have to get through what life we have now. Speak to my mother if you want. Anything that helps her helps me. But don’t be disappointed if she gently rejects the idea.’

‘That’s fine. I won’t press her. I understand her pain. I understand the way she felt nearly destroyed without your father. But she did live for you.’

A terrible frustration showed itself in Bryn’s eyes. ‘She can’t continue to live for me, Francey. She has to live for herself. God, she’s only just turned fifty. She’s a beautiful woman. Yet she has locked herself away for years. Dad would never have wanted that. He loved her so much he would only want her to be happy.’

Francesca smiled in an effort to relieve his tension. ‘Let me talk to her. In some ways I’m not in a good situation, am I? A lot of people are waiting for me to screw up. Carina is hoping one of these days I’ll simply disappear into the desert and never come back. I need help. No one knows that more than you. I want a woman—women, as it happens, as Elizabeth is another—I can trust. I’ll put it to Annette that way. I won’t be asking a great deal of her. I’ll do as you say. Take it day by day.’

Bryn gave a hollow laugh. ‘If you can get my mother out of the house I’ll worship at your feet for ever.’ Though wasn’t he already doing just that? ‘Did I tell you, you look stunningly beautiful?’

‘Yes, you did.’ Colour mounted beneath her flawless skin. ‘It’s a new outfit. I didn’t go shopping. No time. I asked Adele Bennett to pick me out a wardrobe, which she did, and then brought it all over.’

‘You couldn’t have asked for anyone better,’ Bryn said, his eyes travelling over her. She wore a sleeveless navy silk dress that showed off the elegant set of her shoulders and her slender arms. The dress was very simple in design but striking in effect, with broad strokes of colour as if she, the artist, had taken to it with a brush: violet, yellow, and a marvellous splash of electric blue that put him in mind of a kingfisher’s plumage. It looked wonderful on her. Adele Bennett he had met at various functions. She owned exclusive boutiques in several state capitals. She must have relished the job of outfitting Francesca, with her beauty, her height and her willowy figure.

‘You like what you see?’ she prompted gently, though she felt more as if she was being consumed by his brilliant black gaze.

‘Francey, I have to say yes.’ He threw up his dark head, then gave a swift glance at his watch. ‘Shame we have to part, but there it is. I have a meeting at two-thirty.’ He lifted a hand to signal the waiter, who came on the double. ‘By the way, I thought we’d take this weekend off to visit Daramba.’ He spoke as if he wouldn’t brook any argument. ‘I’ve cleared my schedule sufficiently to warrant it. I can’t and won’t wait another week. It’s absolutely essential to find time for relaxation. We’ve both been doing precious little of that. So see you keep the weekend free. Understood?’ He lifted his eyes from the plate where he had placed his platinum credit card and smiled.

Such a smile! His whole face caught light.

‘Understood,’ she said calmly, when inside she felt wildly happy. She had held the thought of them being together at Daramba all these long days. The thought had sustained her—a wonderful weekend that was waiting for her. And she had no intention of taking along a chaperon. A chaperon was all very well for the old Francesca Forsyth. But the old Francesca had been forced out of her shell. She was now the Forsyth heiress, like it or not. She no longer lived her old life. She no longer lived like a normal person. She even felt emboldened enough to throw her own cap in the ring. Maybe Bryn had been right all along. He was a free man.

It was getting on towards four on the Friday afternoon prior to their trip to Daramba when Carina of all people burst through the door, bringing with her a whoosh of perfumed air.

‘Carina!’ Francesca rose from her desk, aware that Valerie Scott was hovering in the background, wringing her hands and looking extremely agitated. Obviously she had taken fright. ‘It’s all right, Valerie,’ she said, a model of calm.

It was doubtful if anyone on the planet would be capable of stopping a Carina hell-bent on gaining entry to what after all was their late grandfather’s resplendent office. Francesca had reduced the splendour considerably by stripping it of its more florid touches and personalising the space. She had taken down two of the blue chip colonial paintings that would fetch a small fortune and replaced them with one of her best paintings, which she had held back from sale, an Outback landscape, and one of Nellie Napirri’s stunningly beautiful waterlily paintings. In a very short time they had proved to be excellent conversation starters, putting visitors at their ease.

‘Yes, go back to work,’ Carina instructed the woman in imperious tones. ‘And never try to stop me from entering this office again.’

Scarlet in the face and mottled in the throat, Valerie made a valiant effort to defend herself. ‘I wasn’t trying to stop you, Ms Forsyth. I was merely trying to let Ms Forsyth know you were here.’

‘It didn’t look like that to me,’ Carina said in her clipped, high-handed voice. ‘You can shut the door.’

‘Of course.’ A deeply mortified Valerie was already attempting to do that very thing.

Inwardly churning—the cheek of her!—Francesca waved her cousin into a leather chair opposite. One of their grandfather’s choices, it should swallow her up. ‘Is there something you want, Carrie?’

Carina remained standing. ‘What do you think I want?’ she challenged, already falling into what could be a question-for-question session.

‘I have no idea. Why don’t you tell me?’ Francesca invited, surprised her tone was so easy and natural, and giving a thought to her composed inner strength—which was growing by the day. As ever, Carina looked a million dollars. A goddess of glamour in a white linen suit cinched tightly at the waist by a wide gold metallic belt. There were strappy gold stilettos on her feet, and a very luxurious white and gold leather tote bag over her shoulder. No wonder she had tempted Bryn. Carina would make the blood run hot in an Eskimo’s veins.

Carina frowned, carelessly plonking her very expensive bag on the carpeted floor before dipping into the plush seat, showing off almost the entire length of her very good legs. No neat ankle crosses for Carina. Her wonderful hair had been cut to clear the shoulder, side parted, full of natural volume.

‘How are you, by the way?’ She looked up to fix Francesca with a piercing blue gaze growing more and more like their grandfather’s.

‘I’m fine, thank you. And you?’ What was this all about? Francesca thought. Was Carina’s bad-girl side in remission? Dared she hope? The word epiphany sprung to mind. Maybe Carina had had one on the way over.

Carina flicked a frowning, all-encompassing glance around the vast room—the wall-to-wall bookcases crammed with weighty tomes, a magnificent pair of terrestrial and celestial globes on mahogany stands, the large paintings, memorabilia, dozens of silver-framed photographs of Sir Francis with famous people, trophies and awards—then said sarcastically, ‘Made changes, I see. Like to show off you’re such a clever chick.’ Her eyes moved to the painting of the waterlily lagoon surrounded by aquatic plants. ‘I don’t like that! Too highly coloured. Aboriginal work, isn’t it?’

‘Nellie Napirri,’ Francesca said. ‘I love it. The colours are very true to our lily-filled billabongs. Surely you recognise that? You’ve seen enough of them. It’s not a misty Monet, though I’m absolutely certain Monet would have loved it too. You mightn’t be aware of it, Carrie, but Nellie’s work is fetching big money these days.’

Carina made a face that signified complete uninterest. ‘She’ll only blow it on the rest of her tribe. That’s the way they are. The place looks okay—more feminine, I guess—but you scarcely fit into Gramps’s shoes.’

‘Neither of us do, come to think of it,’ Francesca answered evenly.

‘Are you happy?’ Carina shot at her.

Francesca pushed the file she had been reading to one side. ‘Off hand, I’d give it an eight out of ten. But I’ve been much too busy to question my state of mind, Carina. Would you like to tell me what you’re here for? Not that I’m not pleased to see you. I am. I don’t want bad feeling between us. You’re my cousin. We’re family.’

‘Some family, right?’ For a moment Carina regarded the impressive array of gold gem-studded bracelets on her right arm—emerald, ruby, amethyst, topaz, a couple more. On her left she wore a solid gold watch set with diamonds; a diamond-set gold hoop encircled the narrow wrist above it. Every mugger in the world would have thought her a dream target. ‘Look, I’ll come straight to the point. It’s not easy for me, but I want to apologise for the way I’ve been acting. I’ve been a damned fool. It’s just …’

‘You were shocked.’ Francesca hastened to help her cousin out, even though she knew she might never rate another apology in her life. ‘You’ve been led to believe everything would be different. I felt the same way.’

‘Ah, well …’ Carina sighed, a recent convert to being philosophical. ‘I think Gramps was way ahead of Dad and me.’ She gave Francesca a wry smile. ‘Dad is a lot happier these days. Bless him. Had Gramps left him in control he would surely have died of a heart attack before his time. As for me! Want the truth?’

‘Yes, please.’ Lord knew she didn’t want more lies.

‘Doing what I do makes me happy,’ Carina confessed, as though Francesca had never for a moment known. ‘I wouldn’t want to be cooped up like you, trying to get your head around mind-boggling stuff. I know you’re smart, but Gramps left too heavy a burden on those bony shoulders. You’re too thin, you know that? Men don’t like skin and bone. Anyway, very few people ever take women seriously in business. I expect you’ve already found that out?’

‘I could name you any number of women being taken very seriously in business, Carrie,’ she said. ‘Maybe you’re not as much in touch with the current scene as you thought. People have been very helpful, as a matter of fact. I have a great deal to learn, but I seem to be coping. I don’t do things on my own. As I said, I have help.’

‘Of course! The staff would probably be able to run the place without you,’ Carina flashed back, a teeny crack showing in the bonhomie. ‘First thing you want to do is get rid of the thumper outside the door.’

Francesca struggled with that for a moment. ‘Thumper?’ Her black eyebrows rose. ‘I thought a thumper was a nightclub bouncer?’ Carina, big on the nightclub scene, would know.

‘Whatever!’ Carina threw her head back so forcefully her hair bounced. ‘I don’t like her. She was having an affair with Gramps—did you know?’

‘Well, I’m sure Gramps put the hard word on her.’ Francesca spoke very dryly, to her own amazement. She had never called her grandfather Gramps in her entire life. ‘Grandfather wasn’t everything he should have been.’

‘Oh, hold on!’ Carina was about to take umbrage on their grandfather’s behalf—took a short pause for reflection and thought better of it. ‘Why her?’

‘Being right outside the door might have helped, don’t you think? But I’ve never much liked gossip, Carrie. Valerie is divorced. Grandfather was a widower—’

‘With one helluva sex life!’ Carina gave one of her little whoops. ‘If there was a Nobel Prize awarded for a lifetime of having lovers it would have been given to Gramps. I suppose that’s what did him in at the end. Thought he was God’s gift to women, isn’t that right? Maybe he had a premonition he was going to die. There was another will, you know.’

Francesca nodded. ‘Yes, Douglas told me.’

‘Still retaining that old fool?’ Carina reacted with disgust.

Francesca remained calm and confident. Just a taste of power had given her a massive injection of those much needed qualities. ‘I trust him, Carrie. He has a fine reputation. And he’s gentlemanly.’

Carina’s mouth down turned sceptically. ‘At least that’s what he likes to present to the world. I bet he can talk dirty just like the rest of us.’

‘Now, that, Carrie, defies belief. I must lead a different life to you, as well. I’ve never talked dirty in my life.’

‘No, you’re a terminal Miss Goody Two-Shoes,’ Carina said with affectionate contempt. ‘You really ought to stop. Or maybe you intend to? Bryn tells me you’re off to Daramba for the weekend?’ Her tone made it clear she thought Francesca knew she and Bryn were back in touch and didn’t give a hoot.

It took a tremendous effort for Francesca to keep the shock off her face. ‘I didn’t realise you were speaking to him these days?’ She told herself Carina was a pathological liar. But that posed the question: who else knew? She hadn’t said a word to anyone. She couldn’t believe Bryn went about advertising his intentions. He operated on the basis that one could never be too careful. Then there was the fact he had never mentioned having contact with Carina, let alone a reconciliation.

‘Oh, come off it, sweetie,’ Carina mocked, as though she knew every thought that was running riot through Francesca’s head. ‘We’ve both known Bryn since we were kids. Do you honestly think Bryn and I would remain out of touch for long?’ she jeered. ‘Actually, it was Bryn who made the first move. Surely he told you? Maybe not. My intuition says he didn’t. He plays his cards close to his chest. But that’s half the reason I’m here. It was Bryn who suggested it. He really does think everything through. He says it’s not wise for any of us to continue this feud in public or in private. Besides, the last people I want to quarrel with are you and Bryn. How can I put this?’ Her stunning face took on an unfamiliar expression of earnestness, even soul-searching. ‘I need you both. The people all around me I can’t trust. I don’t for one moment think they’re for real. They’re all over me to my face; treacherous behind my back. Envy, of course. You were never like that, Francey. Neither was Bryn. We’re all just too bloody rich for most people. They hate it. Money has to stick with money. It’s Them versus Us!’

‘Sounds a bit like paranoia to me, Carrie,’ Francesca said. ‘Besides, we do get all the perks. I can’t afford to see it your way. I’m now dealing with so many people from all walks of life. So, when did Bryn tell you we were off to Daramba?’ She spoke as if it were of no great importance when inwardly she was feeling sick and vulnerable. It had only been over lunch on Wednesday that Bryn had suggested bringing forward their trip.

‘Yesterday, I think,’ Carina said, rolling her eyes upwards, as though yesterday’s date was written on the ceiling. ‘Yes, it had to be yesterday. I’d go with you, but Daramba has never held the same fascination for me as it has for you and Bryn. The break should do you good. I’m off to Sydney tomorrow myself. The Cartwrights are having another one of their gala parties. All the glitterati will be there. I have the most incredible dress! You’d love it! Not that you could pull it off. It’s so darn sexy. Softly, softly does it with you, doesn’t it, luvvy? I, on the other hand, like to shake people up.’

‘No one better at it in the country,’ Francesca assured her. ‘Have you spoken to your mother?’ She tacked that on as though it were an afterthought. In reality she was trying to divine whether her cousin was on the level. People expressed themselves in so many ways. Speech, of course, but also body language—the way they moved, their hands, eyes. Wasn’t there a theory that the eyes moved left or right according to whether one was telling the truth or not? The trouble was she couldn’t remember which side indicated the lie.

‘Next one on my list,’ Carina told her with a saddened little smile. ‘It’s taken me over-long to rebuild my bridges. What say we do lunch early next week? I think it would be good for the press to see us out and about together.’

‘Next week is all pencilled in, I’m afraid, Carrie,’ Francesca said. It was true enough. ‘Maybe the following week?’

‘I’ll have to think. Let that secretary do some of your work,’ Carina suggested crossly. ‘It won’t hurt her. What’s her name again?’

‘Valerie Scott. Surely you’ve met her any number of times before? You were always calling in on Grandfather.’

‘Unlike you,’ Carina abruptly fired up, fixing Francesca with a steely eye. ‘I’ve met her, of course, but some people you just meet and forget. It’s people like me that make a lifelong impact. That hair has to go, and she could lose some weight. No wonder she lost hubby. Did you see the size of her backside?’

‘You’re too figure-conscious, Carrie,’ Francesca sighed. ‘Valerie is a very attractive woman.’

‘One can never be too figure-conscious.’ Carina shuddered, retrieving her tote. ‘I hate that matronly upholstered look. I’m almost tempted to tell her.’

‘Please don’t,’ Francesca begged as Carina rose to her feet. ‘Sure I can’t offer you a cup of coffee?’

‘No time!’ Carina gave a clatter of her heavily weighted down arm. ‘I’m having dinner tonight with someone you know.’

‘Oh, who’s that?’ Francesca looked up casually, but her hands were gripping the edge of her desk hard, the knuckles showing white. If Carina said Bryn, their trip would be off.

‘Greg Norbett.’

Francesca’s fingers unlocked as the ferocious tension disappeared. ‘Greg? Isn’t he still married?’ she asked, as calmly as she could. ‘Gosh, it’s only been a couple of years.’ They had both attended Greg’s wedding to a lovely girl.