Outback Boss, City Bride

CHAPTER THREE

‘POOR Richard!’ said Lucy again, shaking her blonde head as she tried to take in Meredith’s news. ‘I can’t believe it. And his poor parents! They must be worried sick.’

‘They are.’

Meredith was sitting at the kitchen table, drinking a mug of tea and explaining what had happened. There had only been time to give Lucy the bare bones when she’d arrived. Hal, for all his grumpiness, had insisted that she have a shower and a sleep before she did anything else, and Meredith had to admit that she was feeling a lot better for it.

Now she watched her sister preparing the supper and tried to think how best to raise the question of going home. Hal had warned her that Lucy was enjoying outback life and, much as Meredith had wanted to believe that he was wrong, it was obvious that her sister was very happy. She was going to have to lead up to the real reason she was here very gradually.

Lucy was a good cook, but a notoriously messy one, and Meredith had to fight all her instincts to get up and start tidying up after her. But she knew it would annoy Lucy if she did, so she averted her eyes from the mess and sat, turning the mug of tea between her hands and wondering how to start.

‘Poor you, too.’ Lucy turned up the heat under a pan of potatoes and turned to lean back against the worktop, her blue eyes serious for once as she regarded her elder sister.

‘Me?’ Meredith looked up from her tea in surprise.

‘I know how you feel about Richard,’ said Lucy gently. ‘It must be awful for you too.’

‘I’m all right,’ said Meredith in a brisk voice, hoping to ward off any further questions, but Lucy patently wasn’t convinced.

‘Meredith, I’m your sister,’ she said. ‘You don’t have to pretend to be Superwoman with me.’

‘That pan’s boiling over,’ said Meredith, nodding to the stove beside Lucy.

Lucy turned obediently to lift the lid and reduce the heat under the pan, but she cast a beady glance over her shoulder at Meredith as she did so. ‘Don’t change the subject!’

‘I’m not. I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about. I’ve never thought of myself as Superwoman!’

‘You might not think you are, but you’ve never been prepared to admit that you might be lonely or scared or unhappy like the rest of us,’ said Lucy, adding salt to the pan. ‘I know you’re in love with Richard. What’s wrong with admitting that you’re heartbroken and sick with worry about him?’

Unable to sit still any longer, Meredith got up and began clearing the dishes out of the sink where Lucy had dumped them as she’d gone along.

‘You always romanticise everything, Lucy,’ she said crossly. ‘I’m not heartbroken. Yes, there was a time when I hoped that Richard and I would get together…but it didn’t work out. He fell in love with you instead,’ she said, her voice carefully neutral. ‘I don’t blame him for that, and I certainly don’t blame you.’

‘Maybe you should blame yourself,’ Lucy suggested, and Meredith turned in surprise at the unexpected note of exasperation in Lucy’s voice, a bowl still in her hands.

‘Did it ever occur to you that if you had given Richard the slightest encouragement, he probably wouldn’t have fallen for me?’ Lucy went on.

Meredith rolled her eyes. ‘Right, a man like Richard is going to think, Hmm, here’s someone plain and dumpy, but over there is a tall, slim beauty…I know! I’ll go for the short, fat one!’

‘He might have done if you’d ever let him close enough to find out what you’re really like,’ said Lucy. ‘And you are not plain! You’ve got beautiful skin and your eyes are gorgeous, and I know loads of women who’d give their eye teeth for your cleavage.

‘You should try showing off your body some time, not hiding it away,’ she scolded Meredith, who had turned back to the sink, having heard this argument many times before. ‘Richard probably didn’t know that you had a cleavage! You were so busy being careful and not letting him guess how you felt that he thought you were only interested in being good friends, and of course then he’s going to start looking around.

‘I just happened to be the first likely person he came across,’ she said, ‘and if you had told me, I would never have thought about going out with him, and we could have saved ourselves the whole mess!’

Lucy stared in exasperation at her sister’s unresponsive back, but something about the set of those shoulders made her relent suddenly. With a sigh, she went over and hugged Meredith.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said guiltily. ‘I’m sorry. The last thing you need after that journey is me having a go at you. I just want you to be happy, as happy as I am now with Kevin, and you won’t be as long as you keep everything bottled up like this.’

Meredith could feel tears pricking behind her eyes and she blinked them away furiously. She must be even more tired than she had thought.

Setting the last of the pans on the work surface, she wiped out the sink and began to run the hot water. ‘I’m not bottling things up, Lucy, I promise you,’ she said. ‘I was-I am-fine about you and Richard. There was no need for you to throw everything up and dash off to Australia.’

‘I felt so awful when I realised how you felt about him,’ Lucy tried to explain. ‘But it wasn’t just that, to be honest. I was bored with my job and…well, Richard’s lovely, but we didn’t go out for very long, and it was never that serious.’

‘It was for him.’ Meredith turned off the tap and turned to face Lucy. ‘He really loves you.’

‘You can’t know that.’

‘I do.’

Meredith wasn’t going to tell Lucy about the evenings Richard had spent with her, talking about how much he loved Lucy, how empty life was without her, wondering what he had done to make her leave so suddenly. Meredith had listened and comforted him as best she could. It had seemed all that she could do for him, but she had never told him the real reason Lucy had left. She had told herself that Lucy would soon get bored with Australia, that she would come home and Richard would have another chance to be happy.

But she had left it too late.

Lucy was bending to take a huge joint of beef out of the oven. ‘Richard didn’t seem that upset when I left,’ she said.

‘He didn’t want to make things difficult for you,’ said Meredith. ‘Lucy, you’re really important to Richard. He needs you now.’

Biting her lip, Lucy basted the joint. ‘I wish there was something I could do to help.’

‘There is.’ Meredith took a breath. ‘I think-it’s not just me, though, his parents and the doctors think it too-we all think that the sound of your voice might be what it takes to bring Richard round.’

Lucy’s head came up at that, and she froze in mid-baste. ‘What?’

‘The doctors told us to keep talking to him,’ Meredith hurried on, ‘so that’s what everyone’s been doing, but I’m sure it’s you he wants to hear. I’m sure he would wake up for you.’

To her horror, she found her voice cracking a little at the end and she clamped her lips together in a fiercely straight line for a moment. ‘I just think that if you were to sit next to him,’ she went on after drawing a steadying breath, ‘if you were to hold his hand and tell him that you were there, I think Richard would make that extra effort that he needs.’

Lucy put the roast back in the oven. ‘You want me to go back to London?’ she said in a dull voice.

‘Yes.’ Meredith nodded eagerly. ‘Richard’s parents have given me the money for your ticket. They just want you there as soon as possible.’ She paused, seeing the reluctance in her sister’s expression. ‘It wouldn’t be for ever, Lucy. You could come back to Australia as soon as Richard was out of danger, but…yes, please come back with me,’ she said. ‘It would mean so much to Richard.’

‘And to you?’ asked Lucy.

Meredith looked away, unable to meet her eyes. ‘I just want him to get better,’ she said in a low voice. ‘That’s all.’

Lucy sighed. Pulling out a chair, she sat down at the table and rubbed her eyes. ‘I’m on a contract,’ she said. ‘I’m committed to staying here for another four months, at least.’

‘Hal Granger told me about that,’ said Meredith. ‘It sounds to me as if he was taking advantage of you, Lucy. He can’t hold you to it if you want to leave.’

‘But that’s just it, I don’t want to leave,’ Lucy confessed, raising her head. ‘I love it here.’

She half smiled at Meredith’s expression. ‘I know it’s not your kind of place, but I feel as if I’ve finally found the place I want to be and the man I want to be with.’

‘You’ve fallen in love again?’ said Meredith, resigned, and Lucy bridled.

‘Don’t say it like that! This time it’s for real…it is!’ she insisted, offended by her sister’s sceptical expression. ‘Kevin’s different from anyone else I’ve ever met. You’ll understand when you meet him.

‘He’s so…’ She hugged her arms together, trying to find the words to describe him. ‘Well, he’s special,’ was the best she could come up with. ‘It’s an incredible feeling when you look at someone and your knees go week, and you just think, That’s the one!’

Meredith didn’t say anything. She was thinking about the first time she had met Richard. She had taken one look into his smiling brown eyes and her heart had done a strange flip. There you are, she had thought. I’ve been waiting my whole life for you.

‘I really love him,’ Lucy was saying, ‘and I’m sure-well, almost sure-that Kevin feels the same way about me. We’ve been getting on really well. Kevin’s not someone who rushes into things-he’s not like me, which is a good thing, isn’t it?-but I’ve just got this feeling, here,’ she said, thumping her heart, ‘that’s it’s meant to be.’

‘I see,’ said Meredith flatly.

‘It’s not that I don’t want to help Richard,’ Lucy said. ‘I do. I’m very fond of him. He’ll always be a friend and, even if he wasn’t, I’d do it for you, Meredith, but…’

She bit her lip. ‘If I go, I won’t be able to come back,’ she said. ‘Hal Granger is a hard man. He’d be furious with me if I broke my contract, and I know he wouldn’t let me come back. And how could I leave Emma and Mickey on their own? The poor kids have just arrived and they’re horribly homesick. Hal’s too busy to look after them and-’

Lucy stopped abruptly, catching sight of the look on Meredith’s face. She covered her face with her hands and shook her head slowly. ‘Listen to me,’ she said, appalled at herself. ‘I shouldn’t be talking like this when Richard’s so ill. I’m sorry, Meredith.’

Lowering her hands, she took a deep breath. ‘Do you really think it will make such a difference if I go back?’

It was Meredith’s turn to hesitate. She hadn’t realised until now quite what she was asking Lucy to give up. ‘Yes, I do,’ she said slowly. ‘I wish we had some way of finding out how he was. If he’s come round already, then of course there would be no need for you to go back, but how can we know? I tried ringing Richard’s mother when I got here, but then I remembered that my phone wouldn’t work.’

‘I’ll ask Hal if we can use the phone in the office,’ said Lucy, pushing back her chair. ‘He’s hard, but he’s not mean.’

Barely five minutes later, Meredith was listening to Richard’s mother weeping down the phone. ‘He’s still just lying there,’ she said through her tears. ‘We’re at our wits’ end. The doctors say we need to find something to stimulate him, but we’ve tried everything. If only Lucy were here! Have you found out where she is yet?’

Meredith hesitated, not wanting to commit her sister to anything before she was ready, but Lucy, who had been listening in, reached calmly across and took the phone from her.

‘Yes, she’s found me, Ellen. I’m coming back as soon as I can.’

‘Lucy…’ said Meredith a little helplessly when she had put down the phone.

‘It’s OK.’ Lucy smiled at her. ‘Richard being ill didn’t seem quite real when you told me about it, but hearing Ellen so upset brought it home to me. Of course I’ll go back.’

‘What about Kevin?’

‘He’ll wait for me,’ said Lucy, determinedly bright. ‘I know he will. I’ll come back to him. Something will turn up. Maybe he could find a job on another station and I could join him there.’

‘Or,’ said Meredith slowly, ‘you could come back here.’

Lucy shook her head. ‘I wish I could, but Hal is a man who means what he says. If I break my contract now, there’s no way I’d ever be able to come back. Don’t worry about it, Meredith. It’s Richard that matters, really, and there’s nothing you can do about Hal.’

But Meredith wasn’t a girl who liked to be told that there was nothing she could do. Her lips pressed together in a determined way and there was a look in her eye as she thought through her plan that Lucy recognised with a little lift of her heart. When Meredith looked like that, Meredith made things happen.

‘We’ll see about that,’ she said.

The homestead was much bigger and more rambling than it seemed from outside, and it took Meredith some time to find Hal. Preoccupied by supper and the decision she had just made, Lucy had waved vaguely in the direction of the back of the house and said he would probably be on the back veranda.

He was. At least, Meredith assumed that it was the back veranda, since that was where she found him. He had showered and shaved and was wearing clean jeans and a faded red shirt, although she didn’t notice at first.

‘Oh,’ she said as the screen door that separated every room from the outside clattered to behind her and she found herself staring at quite the most spectacular sunset she had ever seen.

The kitchen was on the other side of the house and, although she had been vaguely aware that the light was fading, nothing had prepared her to step through the door into a blaze of gold and red and orange. It was so dramatic that for a long moment she could just stand and gape.

‘It’s quite something, isn’t it?’ Hal’s voice from the end of the veranda startled her out of her trance and she walked slowly down to join him, her eyes still on the sunset.

‘It’s beautiful,’ she acknowledged. ‘But a bit overwhelming too. It’s so big and so…so there. You feel like you could almost reach out and touch it.’

‘Watch,’ said Hal, and she stood next to him in silence as the golden sky flushed deeper and deeper until it was a fiery red and the range of bare hills in the distance darkened into purple and then black. A strange hush marked the moment when the great ball of the sun sank behind below the horizon, and the breath caught at the back of Meredith’s throat. It was as if the earth itself had stopped turning and the whole world was waiting for a sign that the evening could begin.

And then, quite suddenly, it was over. An insect rasped somewhere. She could hear Lucy clattering dishes in the kitchen and Emma and Mickey’s voices raised in a squabble.

Meredith let out a shaky breath and cleared her throat. ‘Gosh,’ she said weakly.

Hal was glad that the sunset at least had impressed her. Nothing else about the outback had. Then he wondered why he cared whether she was impressed or not.

And why he was so aware of her standing next to him.

‘You’re looking better,’ he said gruffly.

Meredith put a hand up to her clean hair, remembering with a grimace how long it had taken her to wash out the dust and the tangles. ‘I certainly feel better,’ she said. ‘I don’t know how long it will take to get all the sand out of the shower, though. I’ve never been that gritty before!’

She didn’t look gritty now. She looked soft and warm and voluptuous, and Hal could actually feel his hand tingling with the temptation to reach out and see if her skin felt as smooth as it looked.

Averting his eyes, he leant on the veranda rail and wished she hadn’t mentioned being in the shower, wished he wasn’t finding it quite so easy to picture her there. In spite of keeping his gaze fixed firmly on the darkening sky ahead, he was very conscious of her body as she stood beside him, which was strange as she was doing absolutely nothing to draw attention to it.

The loose, flowing skirt and top with its V-neck and three-quarter-length sleeves could hardly have been less revealing. The skirt was a little out of place, but otherwise Hal had to admit that she was dressed sensibly enough, certainly more so than she had been earlier.

So there was no reason to notice that the top outlined curves that he hadn’t noticed before. No reason to find her feminine and somehow alluring, in spite of the fact that her expression was perfectly composed. She was cool and businesslike and not in the least interested in trying to attract him.

Any more than he wanted to be attracted.

‘I was wondering if I could have a word,’ she said, sounding exactly as if she had popped her head round an office door to talk to a colleague.

The realisation that she was all business while he was struggling like an awkward adolescent to keep his eyes off her riled Hal.

‘If you’re going to try and talk me into changing my mind about Lucy, forget it,’ he said brusquely. ‘I made the situation clear when I hired her and she accepted the conditions.’

‘I appreciate that,’ said Meredith, ‘but I do have a proposal to put to you.’

Hal scowled. Why did she have to make everything sound like a business strategy? Why couldn’t she sound sultry and seductive, the way that mouth should sound? ‘What sort of proposal?’ he asked suspiciously.

‘A sensible one, I think.’

It would be, of course. She might have a body meant for fun and flirtation, but Hal was prepared to bet that Meredith’s head would always stay cool and clear.

‘As far as I’m concerned, the only sensible solution is for Lucy to stay and do the job she’s contracted to do,’ he said.

‘But it’s getting the job done that’s important to you, rather than who does it?’

‘I guess so,’ he said grudgingly, wondering where all this was going.

‘Then it wouldn’t matter to you if I took Lucy’s place and did the job for her, would it?’

‘You?’ Hal straightened from the rail in surprise. He wasn’t quite sure what he had been expecting her to say, but it certainly hadn’t been that.

‘Why not?’ said Meredith coolly. ‘I’m quite capable. I can do everything Lucy can do. I can cook and, while I don’t have much experience of children either, I don’t see why I shouldn’t help Emma and Mickey with their lessons. I’ve got a degree and they’re not going to be studying brain surgery, are they?’

She looked, thought Hal, completely serious, and for a moment he could only stare at her, trying to think of a reason why it was so obviously a ridiculous idea. ‘You would hate it out here,’ he said at last and Meredith shrugged.

‘I’m not proposing to stay long,’ she pointed out. ‘Just long enough for Lucy to get to England, do what she can for Richard and come back as soon as possible.’

‘And how long will that be?’

‘That depends how Richard is. We can’t tell until she gets to the hospital. Maybe two or three weeks?’

Two or three weeks with Meredith. The thought was unaccountably unsettling and Hal frowned.

‘You’re determined for her to go, aren’t you?’ he said. ‘Do you always get your own way?’

‘If I had my way, I would be leaving with Lucy,’ said Meredith tartly. ‘The fact that I’m offering to stay here is entirely due to the fact that you are determined to have your way.’

She met Hal’s gaze, her own bright with challenge. ‘Lucy loves it here,’ she told him. ‘More than anything else, she wants to be able to come back, but you’ve made it clear that she can’t do that if she chooses to help Richard. I know she’s only agreed to that for my sake, so the least I can do is to keep her job open for her. I don’t see what difference it makes to you, anyway,’ she finished. ‘I’ll do everything Lucy does.’

Hal couldn’t really think what difference it would make either. He just knew that it would. Lucy fitted easily into the homestead. She was friendly and relaxed and everything was the same when she was around.

Meredith was different. She would change things, Hal knew she would. She was changing things just by standing there. There was something challenging about her, something that made him feel edgy and slightly defensive, and Hal didn’t like it.

‘What about your job?’ he prevaricated. ‘Can you take three weeks off just like that?’

‘You’ve got a phone line, haven’t you?’

‘Yes,’ he admitted.

‘Well, then.’ Meredith seemed to think that solved the problem. ‘I’m freelance, as I told you,’ she said. ‘If I can connect to the Internet, I can work. I’ve got all my files on my laptop and I can contact clients by email. They won’t know that I’m in Australia. It’s not ideal, but it’s perfectly possible for me to carry on as normal.’

‘Except that you’re not going to have time for working if you’re planning to do everything Lucy does,’ Hal pointed out. ‘You’re going to have to provide proper meals for seven men and two children every day, and often there’ll be other people around as well. You could be cooking for twelve or fifteen or even twenty people sometimes. They’ll all need breakfast, lunch and supper, and then there’s smoko twice a day.’

‘Smoko?’ Meredith echoed dubiously, her heart sinking at the thought of all those meals. She was used to cooking for one, not ten!

‘It gets hot out there,’ said Hal. ‘The men start early and traditionally they stop for a cup of tea and smoke halfway through the morning, and then again in the afternoon. They like a bit of cake or biscuit or something then too. Personally, I’m very fond of a rock cake.’

Rock cakes. Fine. Meredith gritted her teeth on a sigh. ‘I expect I can manage those.’

‘And then there’s all the cleaning,’ Hal went on, rather enjoying her growing dismay as he pointed out exactly what she had so confidently offered to take on. ‘Lucy’s housekeeper as well as cook, so she cleans the homestead, does the laundry, monitors the radio and keeps an eye on the garden.’

Meredith did sigh this time. ‘What did your last slave die of?’ she asked, and Hal gave a grim smile.

‘I haven’t finished,’ he said. ‘Now she has to look after the kids too. They’ll be starting School of the Air on Monday. That means they’ll have to be at the radio at the set times, and then they’ll have to do correspondence work for five or six hours, all of which has to be supervised. Most outback kids are used to working like that, but Emma and Mickey are from Sydney and they’re going to need more help getting their lessons done.’

‘Are you trying to put me off?’ asked Meredith sweetly. ‘Because, believe me, there’s no need. I was put off quite enough before you started!’

‘I’m just trying to point out that you won’t have a lot of time for your own work.’

She lifted her chin. ‘I’ll find time.’

‘That’s up to you,’ said Hal, ‘but don’t think you can get away with skimping on the job in order to catch up on your own work. I’ll agree to let Lucy go, but only if you’re prepared to do the job properly.’

‘I always do a proper job,’ said Meredith coldly.

Looking at her, Hal could believe it. She was off-puttingly competent, with a body that couldn’t have been more unbusinesslike.

The body that he was not supposed to be noticing at all. He turned to lean back against the railings and cross his arms, thereby keeping his hands firmly under control.

‘What about the rest of your life?’

It was Meredith’s turn to look puzzled. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Lucy might be away for a few weeks-as you say, it’ll depend on if and when your Richard comes round-so you could be stuck out here for a while. Not many people can just walk away from their lives without warning the way you’re proposing to do.’

‘I told you, I’m self-employed,’ she said. ‘If I work, which I will, I’ll be earning. My mortgage and bills are paid on direct debit. I’ve got no pets, not even a cat, and the alarm is on at my house. The post may build up a bit, but otherwise I think everything should be under control.’

Of course. Meredith’s life was probably always under control.

‘What about boyfriends?’

‘What about them?’ she asked stiffly.

‘I wouldn’t be that pleased if my girlfriend told me that she was going away for a short trip and ended up staying away for weeks.’

Especially not if his girlfriend had a body like hers and he was used to losing himself in her softness and her warmth.

Hal refolded his arms more firmly.

‘There isn’t anybody special at the moment,’ said Meredith after a tiny pause. ‘Not that it’s any of your business,’ she added.

‘It is if you start getting yearning phone calls, begging you to come home,’ Hal pointed out. ‘It is if you end up distracted and having to choose between your sister and your boyfriend. That wouldn’t be an easy choice to make.’

‘Yes, well, I don’t think you need to worry,’ said Meredith, with just the slightest trace of bitterness. ‘I’m not exactly overwhelmed with yearning lovers, and even if I were, I wouldn’t find it at all difficult to make my choice. I’ve said that I’ll stay here and take Lucy’s place, and I will.’

‘I don’t know…’ Hal regarded her with a brooding expression. ‘It’s easy to say that, but what happens when you’re struggling to get everything done and you hate the heat and the flies and you’re bored and lonely? There’ll be nothing to stop you changing your mind and running back to England the moment the going gets tough.’

‘Nothing except my word,’ said Meredith, lifting her chin at him. ‘I’m not expecting to like it here. I’m quite sure I will be bored and I hate the heat and flies already, but none of that matters. I’ve promised Lucy that I’ll stay as long as necessary so that she can come back to her job, and I always keep my promises.’

‘I’ve heard that before.’ Hal’s voice was hard. ‘As far as I can see, the promises women make don’t seem to mean much.’

‘Then you’re just going to have to trust me, aren’t you?’ said Meredith, wondering who had made him that bitter. ‘You might as well. If you don’t, you won’t have a cook at all. I know Lucy. She’s someone else who always keeps her promises, and she’s promised Richard’s mother that she’ll go back to see if she can help. She won’t stay now, so if you’re sensible you’ll take me in her place,’ she went on crisply. ‘At least then you’ll have someone to help, as opposed to no one at all.’

Hal eyed her with frustration. He knew that she was right, but he couldn’t help resenting the way she appeared to be rearranging his life to suit herself. ‘Are you always like this?’ he demanded, scowling.

‘Like what?’

‘This…managing,’ he said, having searched for the right word. ‘I don’t like being managed,’ he warned her. ‘I’ve been running this property for nearly fifteen years. If there’s any managing to be done, I’m the one that likes to do it!’

‘I’m not managing you,’ Meredith objected. ‘I’m just offering a practical solution to the problem.’

‘There wasn’t any problem until you came along,’ he grumbled.

‘Well, there is now,’ she said in a brisk voice, ‘so, one way or another, you’re going to have to deal with it.’

‘Oh, very well,’ he conceded irritably. ‘If you’re so determined to stay, stay!’

‘Thank you,’ said Meredith, cool as ever. ‘There is just one thing more, though.’

Hal muttered under his breath, ‘What now?’

‘I want you to promise that Lucy can have her job back whenever she wants.’

‘You’re pushing it a bit, aren’t you?’ he said, his eyes narrowed. ‘I don’t think you’re in a position to demand promises from me.’

‘That’s the deal,’ she said stubbornly. ‘I’ll only stay if you’ll promise to keep Lucy’s job for her.’

With an irritable gesture, Hal pushed himself away from the rail. ‘Fine, I’m prepared to promise that, but you’re not leaving a second before she gets back. If you leave, the deal’s off.’

‘Good,’ said Meredith. ‘We’ve got a deal.’

‘Deal.’

Without thinking, Hal held out his hand and, after a moment’s hesitation, she took it. His fingers closing around hers, warm and strong, sent a strange sensation down Meredith’s spine. It was too dark to read the expression in his eyes properly, but something in his face as she looked up at him made her pull her hand away rather too quickly and she was suddenly, unaccountably, breathless.

‘Deal,’ she said.