Required: Three Outback Brides: Cattle Rancher, Convenient Wife / In the Heart of the Outback... / Single Dad, Outback Wife

‘Your father must be a monster,’ she exclaimed, leaning her head in her palm.

‘Is that why you left your husband? He was a monster?’ The fact he couldn’t let the subject alone proved he was in over his head.

‘He was a clown!’ The words burst from Allegra before she could take them back. ‘God that sounds awful. Forget I said it.’

He didn’t speak for half a minute, he was so surprised. Clown? He hadn’t been expecting that! ‘So you don’t hate him so much as despise him,’ he asked, registering an involuntary wave of relief.

‘Why are you so interested in my past life?’ she asked.

He smiled. Tantalising. Heartbreaking. It seemed to her that smile was coming more frequently.’ You know why, even if I am trying to slow myself down. I don’t want to frighten you away, but you’re the most romantic, the most glamorous woman I’ve ever met. And you smell like a million crushed wildflowers.’

Her heart faltered, plunged on. ‘That’s one sweet compliment for a cautious man, Rory Compton.’

‘I just can’t help myself. There’s something so right about you, Allegra. Too much danger, too.’

‘In what way?’

He looked past her. ‘I’m an Outback cattleman. You’re a woman with a glamorous career in Sydney.’

‘So I am,’ she said, suddenly plummeted into bleakness.

He wanted to pull her into his arms, stroke that melancholy expression away, instead he spoke bracingly, trying to keep both of them on an even keel. ‘It was one hell of a trip around the property with Chloe. Her driving isn’t so much dangerous as unlawful. What about the two of us riding out? I know you’ve still got some good horses.’

Instantly she felt a surge of pleasure that blew her troubles away. ‘Great minds think alike! I was planning that myself. You can ride Cezar if you like?’ She was aware of her desire to see him on horseback. She hadn’t the slightest doubt he’d been a superlative rider.

His eyes widened for a second. ‘I’d really appreciate that, Allegra,’ he said. ‘And I’m honoured. Cezar is a splendid animal.’

‘You’re welcome.’

‘Great!’ He stood up, cattleman coming to the fore. ‘I hope you’ve had your men shift the cattle off the river flats. If there is more rain the water will rise above the escarpments of the creek. It will run a bumper and then, you’ll have trouble on your hands.’

Allegra rolled her eyes heavenwards. ‘Do you think I don’t know? I’m not stupid, Rory Compton.’

‘I’m starting to think you’re a paragon,’ he said dryly.

Allegra took the final gulp of her coffee.

‘Right!’ He pushed back his chair. ‘Let’s get going while the sun’s out.’

CHAPTER FIVE

HE WAS already acting like Naroom was his own, Allegra thought, torn between acceptance and an understandable sense of loss. It was midafternoon, stiflingly hot and humid even though the sun had disappeared under a great pile-up of incandescent clouds. The smell of sulphur was in the air. It was as though one only had to strike a match for the whole world to go up in flames. Even the birds had stopped singing, lapsing into the silence that precedes a storm. Presently a wind sprang up, gaining velocity. Spiralling whirlwinds danced across the darkening landscape sending out their own clouds of dust, leaves and split, sun-scorched grasses.

There was a lot of water stored in those ominous clouds. The rain couldn’t have been more welcome but she dreaded the thought of hail. Many times in her life she’d seen it come down on Naroom with hellish fury, hailstones as big as cricket balls, bombarding the herd and sometimes killing the small game scurrying through the pastures.

Allegra roused herself from her thoughts. Rory hadn’t been at all happy with the distance north of the homestead Gallagher and his off-sider Mick Evans had moved the cattle so he rode off with steely purpose to let them know. Allegra sat silently on her horse watching. There was always work to be done on a station; always another job.

Rory would get the men moving, she thought with satisfaction. It seemed only a man, a tough cattleman with a superior knowledge and experience of cattle could fill the shoes of Boss Man. Women need not apply. The outer areas of the run would be safe but he wanted all the cattle concentrated in the home pastures mustered and moved off the creek flats. One of the major problems with the station hands since her father’s death, then the loss of their competent overseer—Valerie’s disastrous decision—was that the men were sinking deeper and deeper into lethargy, understandably uncertain of their future when times weren’t easy. Even the cook had taken off, but cooks were always guaranteed of a job.

Well, I gave them their orders, Allegra consoled herself. The right orders. ‘Remember now. High out of the creek’s reach!’ It was clear they had only half done the job. She had fully intended to check on them. She knew she had to, but Rory’s arrival had set her back. She watched him ride back to her, the stirring sight bringing the sting of tears to her eyes. Cezar was more than a touch temperamental but Rory wasn’t having the slightest trouble making a near instant communication with her father’s horse, essentially a one man horse although Cezar had gradually accepted her.

‘You’re not happy are you?’ she asked, studying his expression as he reined in alongside.

‘No, but there’s no use worrying about it. We have to get cracking. We need to shift all the cows and calves on the other side across the creek.’ There was a dark frown on his face. ‘I’ve told those two layabouts if they’re interested in holding on to a job they’d better shake themselves up. Big time. We’ll never get the stock across if the creek starts flowing any faster. As it is we’ll have to push them with stock whips. They’re certain to be nervous, especially with this wind blowing up.’ He glanced heavenward at the threatening sky. ‘I’ve sent Gallagher to get the Jeep and bring it down here. Some of those calves are pretty small. They’ll hold the rest up. We can pick ‘em up and shove them in the back of the Jeep.’

‘Right, boss!’ She spoke in a voice of exaggerated respect.

‘It needs to be done.’ He gave her a querying look.

‘Of course it does. Just having a little joke. I did tell them, you know.’

‘Obviously they weren’t paying the right amount of attention,’ he said crisply. ‘They will now. If you ride back to the stables you can tell young Wally we need a hand. On the double. Doesn’t anyone use their own initiative? What about you?’ He cast a dubious eye over her slender, ultrafeminine frame. ‘I’ll understand if you don’t want to join in. It’ll be hard work and we’re pushed for time thanks to those two. We need them otherwise you should sack them on the spot.’

‘They need sacking,’ she agreed. ‘And don’t be ridiculous. Of course I’ll help. That’s what I’m here for.’ She wheeled her horse’s head about. ‘They’re all docile beasts on Naroom. We don’t have your mighty herds to contend with. No rogues, no wild ones, no clean skins, either.’

‘Off you go then,’ he urged. ‘We’ve got a lot to do before the weather worsens.’

A big storm broke around dusk but by then they had every last lowing beast up on high ground. Allegra’s ears were ringing from the crack of the whips. They kept them sailing well above the backs of the herd while the loud sound drove them on. Darkness was closing in fast, the sun almost swallowed up. The familiar landscape was shrouded in a sodden mist that drenched them in seconds.

‘Dig your heels in!’ he called to her.

She didn’t need to be told twice. The temperature had dropped considerably and she was shivering. When they arrived back at the homestead, the two of them ran quickly from the stables towards the rear entrance of the house. Once she went for a sickening skid, floundered wildly for a moment before he caught hold of her, amazingly surefooted in the quagmire.

At last they reached the back door, pushing it open and making for the mudroom cum first-aid room.

‘While you take a shower I’ll hunt you up some clothes,’ Allegra told him, gasping from exertion ‘That’s if you don’t mind wearing some of the clothes Mark left here? I was going to give them away. But so far I haven’t got around to it.’

‘Sentimental reasons?’ He was busy pulling off his muddy boots.

‘No,’ she said shortly.

‘I couldn’t wear them otherwise.’ Now he was stripping off his soaked T-shirt with total unselfconsciousness, throwing it in the tub before he turned back to her. His eyes blazed like diamonds in his dynamic face. His hair was like black silk. A beautiful man. ‘Sure there’s nothing of yours I could wear?’ he joked, putting up both hands to skim back that wet hair.

Her heart skipped a beat and her blood coursed to her most sensitive places. She wasn’t sure how she liked him best. Dressed or undressed? Hell, she couldn’t just stand there admiring him, though she actually felt like taking the grand tour around him. Instead she managed a laugh. ‘We’re not really of a size. Don’t worry, everything’s clean. You can’t imagine how fastidious Mark is. Most of the stuff is brand-new.’

‘Beggars can’t be choosers,’ he said, running a careless hand over his wet chest, a gesture she found incredibly erotic.

‘There are clean towels in the cupboard.’ Never in her life had she drunk in the sight of a man’s body like this. ‘Everything you need is there. Don’t get under the shower before I come back.’

‘Why not?’ He shot her a questioning glance…

‘Naked men make me uncomfortable,’ she joked.

He laughed aloud, looking wonderfully vital. ‘Really? And you an ex-married woman! Surely you saw a naked man on a daily basis? Anyway there is such a thing as a towel. I assure you I’d have one at the ready. The last thing I want to do is throw you into a panic. I’ll sit right here.’ He turned, presenting the wide, gleaming fan of his tanned back and pulled up a chair. Then he sat on it, back to front, aiming his wonderful smile at her.

How had this man got so close to her? Why had she let him?

You didn’t have a choice.

Yet he could cast her adrift. Anything was possible in life. But for now, he was making her feel things she had never felt before. She had to will herself to move. ‘Won’t be long.’ She had already taken off her boots and used a towel to mop up the worst of the mud, now she padded towards the doorway leading into the hall. ‘Not much chance of your driving back to Jimboorie.’ She half turned back. ‘Not in this!’

‘So what are you saying, I can stay?’ His tone was disturbingly mocking, even erotic.

She held his gaze as long as she could, shocked by the wrenching physical sensations in her body. She wasn’t a schoolgirl with a crush on the captain of the football team. She was an experienced woman, twenty-seven years old. ‘Well you’re welcome to bolt if you think it’s too risky,’ she said tartly.

‘Never!’

Rory offered up a silent prayer.

And lead me not into temptation.

‘I’ll stay,’ he said. ‘Thank you most kindly, Allegra. It’ll give us the opportunity to have a good long chat.’

Rory washed out his gear and threw it in the dryer. Then he turned to examining Mark Hamilton’s clothing most carefully. Everything Allegra had selected was brand-new and fine quality. He read the labels. From the dark blue polo shirt to the beige cotton trousers and the classy underpants. He tried to visualise Allegra’s ex-husband. Couldn’t. Chloe had called him a ‘lovely guy’ handsome and clever. Was he all of those things? Allegra in a driven moment had called him a clown! What did that mean exactly? A man forever playing innocuous but annoying practical jokes? A man not seriously minded enough for her? He had to be impaired in some way. He was a poor lover? He was a violent lover? Clown didn’t sound violent. Who knew what went on inside a marriage anyway? Besides he couldn’t trust Chloe. Chloe had made an art form out of putting down her exquisite sister.

Hamilton was a heavier build. And some inches shorter. The shirt was okay. He had to hitch up the trousers with his own belt. Rory was much leaner through the waist and hips. The length fell short but okay, who cared? She had even found him a pair of expensive leather loafers that fitted well enough. He took a look in the mirror, thrust back his damp hair and laughed. He had never worn a shirt of such a wondrous electric-blue.

‘Gosh you look like someone famous!’ Allegra swallowed when she caught sight of him.

‘Don’t say a rock star.’ He grimaced. ‘The blue makes me look swarthier than usual.’ He glanced down at the shirt.

‘Far from it. It’s great. You’re a good-looking guy, Compton.’ She led the way into the kitchen. ‘I could find you work tomorrow.’

‘You surely can’t mean as a male model?’

‘You want to check out what they’re earning,’ she retorted. ‘The guys who get to model here and overseas earn a fortune.’

‘No, thanks. For better or worse I’m buying Naroom. All we need is the paperwork done.’

‘And Valerie’s and Chloe’s okay,’ she tacked on.

‘Consider that a fait accompli.’ He watched her take salad ingredients out of the crisper in the refrigerator.

‘What are we having?’

‘Something easy,’ she said. ‘Steak and salad and maybe some French fries. This afternoon was pretty strenuous.’

‘I did warn you.’ He let his gaze rest on her, feeling a surge of desire. She had teamed a delicate little lilac top, which looked like silk—he had a mad urge to feel it—with a flowing skirt. Her beautiful hair streamed over her shoulders and down her back, drying in long loose waves. There wouldn’t be a man alive who wouldn’t get a buzz from simply looking at her, he thought. She was just so effortlessly beautiful. Exclusive looking yet she had worked tirelessly that afternoon. Tirelessly and extremely well. This might be a woman who looked like an orchid but she didn’t hesitate to pitch in. He found himself full of admiration for her. She was a woman of surprises.

‘Valerie and Chloe were prepared to say yes to $3.5 million,’ he reminded her, picking up the conversation. ‘Thanks to you they get more.’

She took two prime T-bone steaks from the refrigerator and put them down on the counter before turning to him. Her expression was brushed with worry. ‘Valerie said she was going to consult a solicitor with a view to contesting the will.’

‘In what way?’ He could see that upset her.

‘Dad left me a half share of everything,’ she said, ‘whereas Valerie and Chloe had quarter shares.’

‘Tough,’ he said, thinking she didn’t have a problem. ‘I’m no lawyer but I’m willing to bet your father left his will airtight. Don’t worry, Allegra. I’d say Valerie was trying to make you suffer. You can bet your life she’s already been on to a solicitor who’s told her she hasn’t a chance in hell of contesting the will. You won’t be embroiled in any lawsuit and this deal will go through more smoothly than you think.’

‘I don’t really want it to go through,’ she confessed, leaning against the table.

‘Which part of me don’t you like?’ He stared at her hard.

‘This is home, Rory.’ She met his challenging gaze. ‘My father brought my mother here as a bride. I was born here. Even when I was away from it I still lived here, if you know what I mean?’

‘I surely do.’ He thought she put it well.

‘To be honest I’d like to die here.’

He stirred restlessly at that. ‘Don’t for God’s sake talk about dying,’ he said tersely. ‘You’ve got a long life in front of you. Would you want to stay here and work it?’

‘I could do it,’ she said. ‘I’d have to sack guys like Gallagher and Evans and hire some good men. Then I’d see if I could get our old overseer back.’

‘Well, well, well,’ he said. ‘Like I said, you’re a most surprising woman. But then I don’t know a lot about women. I grew up mostly in an all male environment. Even so I’m sure you’re very unusual. Do you have the money to buy your stepmother and Chloe out?’

She lowered her head, picked up a shiny red capsicum and set it down again ‘No, unfortunately. I didn’t take a penny off Mark.’

‘You were entitled to.’

‘No.’ She shook her head. ‘I didn’t want to do anything like that. He didn’t want to break up the marriage. I did.’

‘So he was the innocent party?’

‘No he wasn’t, Rory Compton,’ she said with sharp censure. ‘I was the innocent party but don’t worry about it. I thought maybe I could borrow like you.’

‘Really?’ He sat back, his hands locked behind his head. ‘You could try but maybe you wouldn’t be so successful,’ he warned her. ‘You’re a woman and you have no real hands on experience.’

‘All right, I know that!’ she said, giving in to irritation.

‘And what about your big city job? I thought you intended going back to it? Surely you’d miss city life? I mean it couldn’t be a more different world?’

‘Rory, I love the land,’ she told him passionately. ‘I know it’s a little unusual my making such a success of being a fashion editor, but that’s only a little part of me. I doubt I would ever have left home had my mother lived. At the beginning living in the city was like living in a foreign country. After life on the land, I felt so hemmed in by all the tall buildings and so many people rushing about. All our space and freedom was lost to me. You should understand.’

‘Of course I do.’

She nodded. ‘It’s not a nice thing to say, but Val drove me away. Val and Chloe to a certain extent. I was made to feel an outsider in my own home.’

‘Have you a photograph of your mother?’ he asked, sitting straight in his chair again.

She sighed deeply. ‘Sure. Wait here.’

Rory rose and walked to the sink feeling vaguely stunned. The last thing he’d expected when they had first met, was such a glamorous young woman would want to live in isolation. In his experience it was men who did that sort of thing. Solitary men who had pioneered the vast interior before admitting women and children to their lives. He knew plenty of reclusives who could only live in the wilderness. Not that the central plains country was anything like wilderness but Naroom was isolated enough. God knows what she’d make of his desert home! Or what had been his desert home he thought with a stab of pain.

His mind wheeling off in several directions, he began to run some of the salad ingredients—tomatoes, cucumber, a bunch of radishes and some celery—under the tap. He could see the mixed salad greens had been prewashed. He felt like that steak. He hoped she had some good English mustard. He was hungry.

Allegra returned a few moments later, holding a large silver framed photograph to her heart.

He held out his hand. Ah, genetics! he thought, much struck by Allegra’s striking resemblance to her mother. There were the purely cut features, the shape and set of the eyes, the chin held at a perfect right angle to the neck. There was the same flowing hair, the deep, loose waves. The photograph was black and white but he was certain the hair was the same shade as Allegra’s. Even the expression was near identical. Confident, forward-looking, self-assured. Yet this woman had died so tragically young. What a waste!

‘It would have been hard for your stepmother to be confronted every day by the image of the woman her husband truly loved?’ he spoke musingly, finding it in his heart to pity Valerie.

‘Hey, I was only three when Val became my stepmother,’ Allegra pointed out.

‘But the extraordinary resemblance was there. And each year you grew it became more pronounced. By the time you were in your teens you were a powerful rival. Or an ever present reminder if you like.’

She gave him a wounded look. ‘Whose side are you on anyway?’

His expression softened. ‘I’m sorry, Allegra. I can imagine what it was like for you. In my family Jay took after my father. Physically, that is. Jay is nothing like my father, thank God. I took after my mother. I have her eyes like you have your mother’s eyes. Eyes tend to dominate a face. My father loved my mother. Or as much as he could love anyone. He sure doesn’t love me. I was one terrible reminder she left him. I had to pay for my mother’s unforgivable crime.’

‘So there’s a parallel?’ she said more quietly.

‘Oddly, yes. Both of us are outsiders.’

The wind and rain kicked up another notch during the night. He awoke to near perfect darkness. Amazingly he had slept. He never thought he would with Allegra sleeping down the hallway. They had talked until after midnight about their lives, their childhood, events that had shaped them, without her ever giving away the reason for abandoning her marriage. He really needed to know. It had become a burning question. Simply put, how could he truly understand until he knew? His mother’s abandonment had played such a destructive role in his life he had a natural fear of handing over his heart to a woman who one day might cast him aside. God knows it happened.

Afterwards they had walked around the homestead together like an old married couple, checking all the doors and windows. Only the sexual tension both refused to let get out of bounds, betrayed them. Their hands had only to come into fleeting contact for Rory’s hard muscled body to melt like hot wax. He wanted her. He wasn’t such a fool he didn’t know she wanted him. Sexual magnetism. Each was irresistibly drawn to the other, yet each was determined to keep control. Besides, there were dangers in acting on the most basic, powerful instinct.

Something had caused him to come awake. Some noise in the house. Downstairs. Maybe they should have made the French doors more secure by closing the exterior shutters? The verandah did, however, have a deep protective overhang. He stood up, pulling on his jeans, which he had removed from the dryer earlier in the night. He opened the bedroom door and looked down the corridor. All was quiet. Why wouldn’t she be sleeping after such an exhausting afternoon? They had shared a bottle of red wine as well.

It turned out to be what he expected—one of the French doors in the living room. It was rattling loudly as the wind blew against it. He opened one side, latched in back, then stepped out onto the verandah, feeling the invigorating lash of the moisture laden wind. It felt marvellous! Rain to the man on the land was a miracle. The most precious commodity. In the Outback it was either drought or flood. He knew the creek would be in muddy flood by now. Thank God he’d arrived when he had. A woman no matter how willing to chip in wasn’t meant to do backbreaking station work.

It took him only moments to secure the shutters, then the interior doors. One of the bolts on the door had worked its way loose, hence the rattle. He padded back into the entrance hall a little disoriented in a strange house. There was less illumination now that he had pulled the shutters. What he had to do was turn on a few lights before he blundered into something and woke Allegra. He didn’t think he could cope with seeing her floating towards him on her beautiful high arched feet. He just might grab her, pick her up in his arms, and carry her upstairs …

‘God!’ He gave a startled oath as a wraithlike figure walked right into instead of through him. He held the apparition by its delicate shoulders.

‘Allegra!’ He sucked in his breath. Apparitions didn’t have warm, satiny flesh.

‘Who did you think it was, Chloe back home?’ Her voice in the semidarkness came as a soft hiss.

‘Out of the question. Chloe’s shorter and a lot plumper than you.’

‘Don’t for God’s sake ever call her plump to her face.’

‘I wouldn’t dream of it. I tried not to wake you.’

‘When you were making so much noise?’ Her voice rose.

‘Pardon me, I was very quiet. Besides, what were trying to do to me? For a split second I thought you were a witch.’ Very carefully he took his hands off her. Steady. Steady. He could smell her body scent like some powerful aphrodisiac.

‘Witches don’t flap around in nighties.’

He was seeing her more and more clearly. ‘Are you mad? Of course they do. What’s the matter anyway? You’re as much out of breath as if you’ve been running.’