Outback Baby

‘I beg your pardon?’ Not going to allow her? Could she be hearing this? Gemma had always wondered what people meant when they described hackles rising on the backs of their necks. Now she knew.

‘You heard me. I’m not going to abandon my niece.’

‘Abandon her?’ she echoed. ‘How dare you insinuate that leaving her with me is the same as abandoning her?’

‘Don’t take it personally, Gem.’

The relaxed way Max leaned back against her kitchen bench doubled Gemma’s anger.

‘How on earth am I supposed to take it?’

‘This is a family matter. You know the old saying about blood being thicker than water. A friend can’t be expected to take on such responsibility.’

‘For crying out loud, I’m more than a friend,’ Gemma cried. ‘I’m Mollie’s godmother!’ But as the words left her lips, she realised they weren’t much help. This man, this enemy, this ogre—was poor Mollie’s godfather.

‘How on earth are you going to look after Mollie?’ Gemma challenged before Max could respond. ‘You’ve no women on your property and only a handful of ringers. I doubt they’ll be much help.’

‘I’ll hire a nanny, of course. Someone with the very best training.’

She made an exaggerated show of rolling her eyes in disgust. ‘If Isobel wanted a nanny for Mollie, she could have hired one herself. The poor woman doesn’t know how long she’s going to be away and she wants someone she knows, someone who really cares about her baby, not a stranger who happens to have official qualifications.’

Max sighed and ran long fingers through his hair as he stared at the waxed tiles on Gemma’s kitchen floor. ‘Isobel said she didn’t want a nanny?’

‘Yes,’ she replied firmly.

‘OK,’ he said at last. With another deeper sigh, his head flicked sideways and his eyes locked onto hers. ‘You and I are both Mollie’s godparents, so we should make this a shared responsibility.’

CHAPTER TWO

‘WHAT exactly do you mean?’ Gemma asked, appalled by what Max seemed to be suggesting.

‘We’re both the baby’s godparents. So we look after her.’ His eyes revealed the briefest twinkle. ‘Together.’

She knew her mouth was gaping. ‘You and me?’ she gasped.

‘Yeah.’

‘But we can’t.’

‘Why not?’

‘It—it’s not necessary. Being a godparent is simply a gesture of intent.’

Resting his hands on the counter top, Max leaned forward. ‘You can’t have it both ways, Gemma. Either being Mollie’s godmother is a good reason for you to take care of her, or it isn’t.’

She knew she was losing ground fast. Apparently Max had been honing his skills as a bush lawyer. She ran frantic fingers through her short, dark hair. ‘But it doesn’t mean we’re obliged to—For crying out loud, Max, that doesn’t mean we have to actually do anything parental together.’

Max’s eyes teased her. ‘It’s the only sensible solution. You and Mollie should come and stay on Goodbye Creek Station until Isobel returns. That way we can share the load. It’s called co-operation.’

Her stomach lurched as if she were coming down in a very fast elevator. ‘Co-operation, my foot!’ she said at last. ‘How much co-operation are you planning to contribute? I’m the one who’ll have to make all the sacrifices. Why should I give up everything here to head off into the bush and stay with you?’

‘Because, as I’ve already explained,’ Max said, with exaggerated patience, ‘we need to share this responsibility. That way we can both get on with our work commitments.’ He pointed to the pamphlets and papers on her sofa. ‘I imagine it will be much easier for you to bring your stuff to Goodbye Creek and to carry on your business from there, than for me to bring thousands of head of cattle down to this, er—cosy little suburban flat.’

He was so smug and sure of himself, Gemma wanted to thump him. She was beginning to feel cornered. ‘It won’t work.’

‘I think it’s a compromise that has distinct possibilities.’

If only she could tell him she was far too busy—booked up to organise half a dozen events—but even if she did tell such a lie, she was sure he would find a way to use it against her. Instead she glared at him. ‘We’ll spend the whole time fighting!’

He pretended to be shocked by her words. ‘Why on earth should we do that?’

Gemma groaned. ‘Maxwell T. Jardine, I don’t believe I’m hearing this. We would fight, for the simple reason that we have never agreed about anything. Haven’t you noticed the only thing we have in common is that we both breathe oxygen? We can’t stand each other!’

Just to prove how utterly detestable he was, Max burst out laughing.

Gemma gave in to her anger. She smashed her fist onto the counter. ‘What’s so funny?’ she yelled.

‘Oh, Gemma,’ he chuckled. ‘You certainly are all grown up now, aren’t you?’

Choking, she gasped and spluttered. Trust Max to point out that she wasn’t nearly as sophisticated and worldly wise as she liked to think she was. She had a sneaking suspicion that she might never become mature and discerning. It was her long-term ambition to become cool and detached—especially when this man was around doing his best to flummox her.

For a brief moment, Max’s expression softened. Then he stepped around the counter and towards her. Gemma wished he wouldn’t. When he rested his strong, warm hands on both her shoulders, her nerves were way too strained to cope.

‘Gemma Elizabeth Brown,’ he said, his voice low and gravelly.

Her eyes widened at his use of her middle name. She hadn’t even realised he knew it.

‘We agree on the most important thing.’

She could feel the heat of his hands as they held her. Her lungs appeared to be malfunctioning, but Max didn’t notice, he just kept on talking.

‘We agree that Mollie deserves very good care and, on this occasion, I think most definitely, we do have to do something together.’ His eyes flashed as he added, ‘Something parental. You’re right, we’ll probably fight like cats and dogs, but we’ll manage somehow—for Mollie’s sake. On our own, we’d both have major difficulties looking after the poor little kid properly, wouldn’t we?’

She allowed her gaze to meet those deep blue eyes, those disturbing blue eyes, and Gemma felt less sure of her line of argument.

‘Together, we stand a fair chance of success—both for Mollie and our work.’

What he proposed was unthinkable! She couldn’t let this happen. How on earth could she live with Max while he inspected her babysitting skills? She’d be a dithering mess. Holy smoke, he’d be checking up on her every minute of the day and he would soon discover she knew absolutely zero about babies.

Gemma felt as if she’d stepped aside and become a spectator of this discussion. Incredibly, she realised she was nodding, accepting Max’s terms.

If only she could remember exactly when Max had turned their battle to his advantage, but she had loosened her grip on this whole scene. She’d lost sight of her counter-argument.

‘I’ll do my fair share,’ Max added. ‘I’ll give Mollie her tucker or bathe her, or whatever’s necessary. We can work out some sort of roster if you like.’

She passed a dazed hand across her eyes. Never in her wildest dreams had she pictured this rough-riding cattleman in a hands-on relationship with a baby. She tried to visualise him attending to Mollie, but her musings were interrupted by the telephone.

‘Oh, heavens! That’s probably the printers.’ Gemma had almost forgotten her current project and her deadline this afternoon. ‘I have to get some pamphlet designs to them before five o’clock.’ She glared fiercely at Max as she hurried to the phone.

‘Hello, Gemma Brown speaking.’

A woman’s voice reached her. ‘Gemma, Sue Easton from Over the Page. I was wondering…’

The printers were chasing her copy. Gemma reassured the woman that everything was ready and she would be at their office shortly. As she spoke, she heard Mollie begin to cry behind her and she was acutely aware of Max moving quietly in the flat.

Mollie’s wails ceased abruptly and by the time Gemma put the receiver down and turned to face Max again, she was startled to find him perched on the arm of her sofa and jogging the delighted baby on his knee.

He looked very pleased with himself. ‘See? You can’t manage without me, can you? I’ll mind this little possum while you do whatever running around you need to this afternoon.’

‘Thanks,’ she replied uncertainly.

‘And after that,’ he said with confident assurance, ‘we can plan your move to Goodbye Creek. I’ll book into a pub tonight and we can head off first thing in the morning.’

As he continued to favour both Gemma and Mollie with a look of smug satisfaction, the baby’s face turned red and Gemma noticed that she seemed to be concentrating very hard.

‘Oh-oh.’ Max’s confident grin slipped. Cautiously, he lifted Mollie away from his knee.

‘Has she dirtied her nappy?’ asked Gemma.

‘I—I think so.’

At the sight of his sudden dismay, Gemma felt an urge to grin, but she managed to keep a straight face. ‘Thanks so much, Max. It would be great if you could watch Mollie for half an hour or so. I do have several errands to run—especially if I’m moving house. Let me show you where the clean nappies are…’ She rummaged in the pile of things Isobel had left and produced a freshly folded nappy and a container of baby wipes and, with a deadpan expression, handed them to him. ‘These are what you need.’

‘You’re running out on me at a moment like this?’ he asked, clearly horrified. By now he was holding Mollie at arm’s length.

‘I’m sorry,’ Gemma murmured sweetly, ‘but I really do have important deadlines to meet. You’ll be fine.’ She gathered up her designs and her handbag and rushed out her front door.

‘He thinks he’s such a hotshot babysitter, he can manage this one,’ she muttered under her breath.

But she wished she didn’t feel quite so guilty about deserting him.

The next day, when Max piloted their plane over the vast property that made up Goodbye Creek Station, Gemma was stunned by the unexpected flood of homesickness that swept through her. It was five years since she’d been back, but she knew the Jardine family holding almost as well as she knew the township of Goodbye Creek, where her own home had been. Her parents had owned a stock and station agency in the town. They had sold up and moved to the coast about the same time she’d gone away to university.

Now, she and Max were flying back, the plane stacked carefully with the baby’s gear. Max explained that he had a well-equipped study complete with an up-to-the-minute computer and a fax machine, so Gemma only needed to bring her clothes, a box of computer disks and her paperwork.

They’d left Brisbane just as dawn broke and during the five-hour flight Mollie had alternated between napping and waking for little snacks and drinks. Gemma had kept her entertained with picture books and games of ‘This little pig went to market’.

Max had chatted very politely about the weather and the scenery beneath them, but it occurred to Gemma that he was behaving more like a newly introduced acquaintance than someone who had known her for more than twenty years. But now, as heart-wrenchingly familiar red soil plains unfolded below, she felt edgy, knowing that once they landed their shared past could no longer be ignored.

Wriggling forward in her seat, she peered eagerly through the windscreen, wondering why the sight of dry, grassy paddocks and straggly stands of eucalypts should make her feel so soppy and sentimental. Way below, she could recognise the signs of spring merging into summer. Early wet season storms had brought bright green new growth and purple and yellow wild flowers were poking up through the grass.

Max’s flight-path followed the course of the old creek that had given its name to the district and Gemma noted that water was already flowing down its entire length. She could make out the shallow, rocky stretch of rapids and finally the deeper section they called Big Bend.

Fringed by majestic paperbarks, this cool, shady pool had been a favourite spot for childhood picnics. At the age of ten, Gemma had rocketed in a tractor tube right through the rapids as far as the Big Bend. She’d been so proud of herself and Dave had been lavish with his praise.

‘You’re as good as a boy,’ he’d shouted. ‘You made it the whole way without squealing once. Max, isn’t she great?’

But Max, of course, had merely grunted and looked bored.

As they neared the homestead, her sense of nostalgia increased.

‘Nearly home,’ said Max, with a contented little smile, as he worked the controls to increase their angle of descent.

First came the stockyards and the corrugated iron roofs under which hay bales would be stacked to protect them from the rain. Then she could see the smaller, original holding yard, made of old timbers weathered to a silvery grey and built in the rustic post and rail design that had been around since the pioneering days.

Gemma glanced at Mollie dozing in her little safety seat beside her. ‘Has Mollie been out here before?’ she asked.

‘No,’ admitted Max. ‘This will be the first time she’s set foot on Jardine soil. It’s a significant moment.’ He made a sweeping gesture with his arm. ‘All this is her inheritance.’

‘Unless you have children of your own,’ Gemma said softly. ‘I guess then they would all be shareholders.’

He turned and their eyes met. His blue gaze held a disquieting mixture of uncertainty and bitterness. ‘Yeah,’ he said, and then jerked his head back to the front. ‘There’s always that possibility.’

They swooped a little lower and the familiar sight of the muddy dam dotted with black ducks and the rusty metal skeleton of the old windmill standing sentry nearby made her feel ridiculously emotional. She blinked her eyes to clear the misted view. In her imagination, she could hear the squeak and clank of the old windmill as it slowly pumped water to the drinking troughs.

Within seconds she was exclaiming. ‘Max, my goodness! You’ve installed a satellite dish.’

‘Got to keep up with technology.’

Their plane continued its descent and he nodded to their right, past the machinery sheds and workshops. ‘I’ve put in some new windmills, too. That one over there has a solar panel and an electric pump.’

‘Is it better than the old one?’ she asked, doubtfully eyeing the shiny modern equipment.

‘Too right. Before, it was always a case of no breeze, no water. Now we can get a constant flow if we need it.’

But the biggest surprise came as they made the final dip towards the airstrip, when Gemma saw the homestead, which for as long as she could remember had been a comfortable but shabby timber home with peeling paint and vine-covered wrap-around verandahs.

‘Wow!’ Her breath exhaled slowly as she absorbed the changes. Max’s home was now a showplace. ‘What have you done to the house?’ she asked.

He was concentrating on making an initial swoop over the strip to clear the ground of horses and birds before attempting a landing. ‘Painted it,’ he muttered tersely as he swung the plane around to double back for the approach.

Below them, skittish horses cantered out of their way and a flock of cockatoos, feeding on grass seed, lifted their wings to disperse like so many pieces of white paper caught in a wind gust. The plane plunged lower and finally touched down on the gravel runway.

‘What a difference,’ Gemma exclaimed, still staring at Max’s house, amazed by the transformation. The homestead’s timber walls were now painted a pretty powder blue, the iron roof was a clean, crisp silver and all the trims and the lattice on the verandahs were gleaming white.

As they taxied down the short airstrip, Max shot her a cautious glance. ‘You like it?’

‘It’s beautiful, Max. I had no idea the old place could look so lovely.’ She was startled to see an unexpected red tinge creep along his cheekbones. ‘Who did the job for you?’

‘Did it myself,’ he muttered. ‘During the dry season, of course.’

Another shock.

As the plane came to a standstill, Gemma assimilated this news and sat quietly, thinking about the lonely weeks Max must have spent on the task. The life of an outback cattleman was solitary and hard and the men who survived it were tough, complex creatures. And they didn’t come much more complicated than Max, she thought with a wry grimace. ‘It’s fantastic,’ she told him with genuine warmth. ‘You’ve done an amazing job.’

He looked embarrassed and she realised he was probably more used to her scorn than her praise. She allowed herself a private smile as she thought about that. They were probably both much more comfortable fighting than co-operating.

An old utility truck had been left at the end of the runway and Gemma and Max were kept busy for the next ten minutes, transferring Mollie and the gear into the vehicle. Even though it was only a few hundred metres to the homestead, there was too much to lug such a distance.

It was late morning. The sun was already high overhead and very hot and so, by the time they reached the kitchen, a cool drink was the first priority. Gemma found Mollie’s little feeding cup, while Max swung his fridge door open and grabbed a jug of iced water.

Just before he closed the fridge, he paused to survey its contents and frowned. ‘I might have to stock up on a few things from town,’ he commented before filling a glass and handing it to Gemma. ‘I’m afraid I wasn’t expecting you and I haven’t got the kind of fancy things that women like for breakfast. I’m still a steak and eggs man myself.’

Gemma’s eyes widened. ‘How do you know what women like for breakfast?’ The question was out before she really thought through what she was saying. She’d always pictured Max as a crusty bachelor living the life of a lonely recluse in the back of beyond.

Max went very still and she cringed with sudden shame as she recognised just how rude and downright stupid her query sounded. How on earth could she retract her words?

Before any bright ideas struck, he spun around, and the glance he sent her way was tinged with wry amusement.

Had she left her brains in Brisbane? Of course this man would have attracted and entertained women. He was quite well off and had the kind of rugged and rangy masculinity that swarms of women hunted down. Unlike her, they’d be willing to overlook his gruffness.

She knew by the heat in her cheeks that her embarrassment was obvious, but she was also just as sure Max wouldn’t miss an opportunity to make her suffer further for her foolishness.

‘Now let me see.’ He cocked his head to the ceiling as if considering her question. ‘How is it that I know so much about women’s breakfast habits?’

His eyes narrowed as if he was giving this matter his undivided attention. ‘I think I probably picked up some pointers—like women’s belief in the importance of orange juice—from all those television advertisements.’

Totally flustered and unable to think of an appropriate retort, Gemma concentrated very carefully on holding Mollie’s cup at just the right angle for her to drink easily.

‘But it beats me if I can remember just how I uncovered the mysterious feminine desire to dine first thing in the morning on low-fat yoghurt and muesli. That really has me stumped.’ Relaxing back in a wooden kitchen chair, he joined his hands behind his head with elbows pointing to the ceiling. ‘I guess I found out about European women’s predilection for coffee and croissants from some foreign movie.’

‘For heaven’s sake,’ Gemma growled at him. ‘Good luck to any long-suffering woman who’s had breakfast with you. The poor thing would need a ton of luck and a truckload of tolerance to put up with your chauvinism.’

He took a deep swig of iced water and chuckled. ‘I’d say you’re probably right.’ Setting the glass back on the table, he grinned at her. ‘You’ll be able to find out tomorrow morning, won’t you?’

‘I think I could do without your early-morning charm,’ she sniffed. ‘And Mollie and I will have soft boiled eggs and toast soldiers for our breakfast.’

She turned away from his mocking grin and made a fuss of Mollie. But it was difficult to stop her mind from dwelling on the unexplored area of this conversation—the particular circumstances that led to a woman sharing breakfast with Max.

They didn’t bear thinking about.

And yet, in spite of her efforts to ignore such offensive details, an unbidden picture planted itself firmly in Gemma’s mind. A vision of a lamp-lit bedroom—with cool, white sheets—and Max’s brown, muscle-packed back encircled by softly rounded, pale and feminine arms. A night of intimacy…

She felt an unpleasant wave of panic.

Would Max Jardine be charming in the company of other women?

Surely not.

‘Do you have any bananas?’ she asked, in a desperate bid to change the subject and to rid herself of these extremely unsettling thoughts. ‘I—I could mash one for Mollie’s lunch while you set up her cot.’

His eyes surveyed the kitchen. ‘No bananas, I’m afraid. You might have to give her some of the tinned stuff we brought with us. I’ll take a run into town first thing tomorrow morning. We should make up a shopping list.’

Gemma was so grateful they were no longer talking about Max’s women that she spent the afternoon being particularly obliging and co-operative. Max made cold roast beef sandwiches for their lunch and they ate them at a table on the side verandah and washed them down with huge mugs of strong tea while Mollie played with her blocks on the floor nearby. Out in the paddocks the white cockatoos screeched raucous greetings as they returned to the grass seed to feed.

Then, after lunch, as Max had never bothered with a housekeeper, together they dusted and vacuumed spare rooms for her and Mollie’s use. They set up Mollie’s folding cot and her other equipment in a bedroom on the cool side of the house, with doors opening onto the verandah.

Gemma’s bedroom was right next door. She had stayed in it before—a pretty room, very feminine, with pink and white curtains and a white candlewick bedspread on the old-fashioned iron bed. The bed-ends were decorated with shiny brass knobs and pretty pieces of porcelain painted with rosebuds.

She was startled to see a silver-framed photo of Dave and herself on the mahogany dressing table. It had been taken five years ago—in the days before Dave met Isobel—when Gemma was eighteen and she and Dave had still been ‘going together‘. Their liaison had been a casual arrangement that they’d drifted into as they grew older. She’d come back from university for his twenty-first birthday.

In the photo, they were dancing. Dave, dressed in a formal dinner suit, was laughing, and she was smiling at the camera and looking very pleased with herself in a pale blue evening gown with thin straps, a fitted bodice and a softly floating, long skirt. There were tiny white flowers dotted through her dark brown hair. At the time, she’d thought she looked very romantic.

Now she shuddered as a painful memory forced itself on her.

The night of Dave’s party had ended with a shameful and embarrassing incident. A scene she had worked desperately hard to forget over the years. Surely Max had wanted to forget it, too? At the time he had been as upset as she was about what happened.

Shaking, she turned to him now. ‘Why didn’t you throw this old photo away?’

Max set down her suitcase, straightened and frowned in its direction. An unreadable emotion flashed in his eyes and his mouth tightened. After a moment, he said with a shrug, ‘Didn’t cross my mind.’

Rigid with tension, it took Gemma a moment or two to take in his words. Then relief flooded her. He must have forgotten what had happened that night! Either that or the incident that had caused her so much grief over the years had never really bothered him. Gemma forced herself to shrug as nonchalantly as he had. ‘Fair enough,’ she said.

She knew she should be relieved, but it took some time for her to feel calm again and to convince herself that she was happy with his detached reaction.