Outback Bride

CHAPTER SIX

'Mal? Are you-?' Brett's voice broke through the dizzying pleasure that had them in its thrall. It stopped abruptly as he took in the scene. 'Uh-oh!' he said, and, even lost in a different world as she was, Copper could hear him grinning.

Mal didn't even tense. Without haste, he lifted his head and looked at his brother. 'What is it?' he asked, with not so much as a tremor in his voice.

Copper, dazed and shaken, almost fell as he made to release her, and if he hadn't tightened one arm around her once more she was sure that she would simply have collapsed in a heap on the track. Her legs were trembling uncontrollably and her cheeks burned. She couldn't have spoken if she had tried.

'I was coming to see if you were ready for a beer,' said Brett, still grinning broadly. 'But I can see that you're busy!'

'We were until you interrupted us,' said Mal. How could he sound so normal? Copper's heart was pounding, her head spinning, her body aroused and gasping for air, and he wasn't even out of breath!

Brett refused to take the hint. 'I thought it was my job to kiss the housekeepers,' he said, pretending to sound aggrieved.

'Not this housekeeper.' Mal glanced down at Copper, who was still struggling to adjust to the abrupt return to reality. 'This one's mine.'

He looked back at his brother and his voice held a distinct note of warning. 'Copper's going to marry me, so you'll just have to count her as the one that got away.'

'I knew it!' Brett gave a shout of laughter and bounded forward to slap his brother on the shoulder and sweep Copper into an exuberant hug. 'I knew it! Mal thinks I can't read that poker face of his, but I could tell how he felt about you right from the start!'

'Really?' she croaked. When he set her back down on the ground, her knees were so weak that she clutched instinctively at Mal, who drew her back against the hard security of his body.

'I didn't realise you were so observant, Brett,' he said, and Copper wondered if the sarcastic edge was as obvious to Brett as it was to her.

Apparently not. Brett was nodding vigorously. 'I notice more than you think. You pretended to ignore each other but I could tell by the way you watched each other when you thought the other wasn't looking that it was real love!'

'What would you know about real love?' asked Mal, not even bothering to hide the edge to his voice this time.

'Not much,' his brother admitted. 'But I can recognise it when I see it all right, and I think you're both lucky.' The blue eyes sobered briefly. 'Very lucky,' he added seriously, and then grinned. 'Come on, let's celebrate!'

'I-' Copper was appalled to hear the squeak that came out when she opened her mouth, and cleared her throat in a desperate attempt to pull herself together. She couldn't stand here clutching Mal for ever. 'I'd better go and fetch Megan.' She tried again, not that she sounded much better second time around. But how could she be expected to sound normal when the world was still rocking around her and that wonderful, glorious, heart-stopping kiss was still strumming over her skin?

'I'll come with you,' said Mal easily.

'I'll go and make sure the beer's cold,' Brett offered. 'Don't be too long.'

'Let's hope everyone's as easy to convince as he is,' muttered Mal as his brother strode off towards the homestead. He looked down at Copper, who was leaning against him and trying to work up the determination to move away. 'Are you all right now?'

The concern in his voice snapped her upright. The last thing she wanted was for Mal to think that that kiss had meant any more to her than it had to him! 'I'm fine,' she said sharply, pushing her hair defensively behind her ears.

She set off down the track at a cracking pace, but as Mal refused to hurry, and she could hardly walk the whole way with him a ridiculous ten paces behind, she was forced to stop until he caught up and then carry on more slowly. The silence was agonising.

'Fancy Brett thinking we were in love all along!' said Copper at last, with a nervous laugh.

'Fancy,' Mal agreed expressionlessly, and she wished that she had kept her mouth shut.

The evening deepened as they walked back to the homestead with Megan. She skipped along between them, full of how naughty one of Naomi's toddlers had been and delighted to have been able to look down on his behaviour from the lofty heights of four and a half years. Copper was very aware of Mal, bending his head to listen gravely to his daughter's chatter. His gentleness with the little girl, somehow unexpected in such a strong, silent man, always wrenched at her heart. He must love

Megan very much if he was prepared to marry a woman he didn't love just for her sake.

The thought steadied Copper's nerves. The future might be an unknown quantity, her own feelings for Mal confused and uncertain, but for now it was enough to walk beside him through the hush of evening and smell the dryness of the gums drifting up from the creek.

Megan released their hands to run ahead, legs and arms completely uncoordinated. Stampeding up the steps, she disappeared into the kitchen and let the screen door clatter behind her.

'Are you going to tell her tonight?' Copper asked, worry beginning to seep back. Megan was used to having her father to herself; what if she was jealous?

'I may as well,' said Mal.

At the bottom of the verandah steps Copper faltered. The brief moment of serenity had dissolved, leaving her once more with all her doubts and uncertainties about the marriage and what it would mean. Once they had told Megan there would be no going back. They were going to walk up these steps and into a new life. For the next three years they would both be playing a part, deceiving everyone except each other.

'Do you really think we can carry it off?' she asked, abruptly apprehensive.

Mal had stopped beside her, and he turned now to look down into her troubled eyes. 'Of course we can,' he said, taking both her hands in a compelling clasp. 'I'll remember Megan and you remember your project, and we'll make it work together.' Strength seemed to flow through his hands, and Copper's fingers curled instinctively around his as she felt herself steadied.

They stood like that in the dusk, and the air between them shortened with a new intensity. Mal's grip on her hands tightened. 'It will be all right,' he promised quietly and slowly, very slowly, he bent his head and touched his lips to hers. The giddy excitement of before dissolved into tenderness and warmth and infinite reassurance, and Copper relaxed, leaning into his kiss for one enticing moment before Mal lifted his head.

Fingers entwined, they looked at each other in silence, as if dazzled by that unexpected glimpse of sweetness, and then Brett was banging through the screen door and calling to them to hurry up.

'Hey, break it up!' he ordered after one look at the tableau below him. 'You're not alone and the beer's getting warm!'

Inside, the kitchen seemed very bright, and Copper avoided Mal's eyes. She didn't know what to do with her hands. They felt very conspicuous, as if branded with the imprint of his fingers, and her lips tingled still with that brief, sweet kiss. Had he meant to kiss her? Had he been caught unawares, as she had, or had he just been trying to reassure her? Or had he heard Brett coming out from the kitchen and forced himself into his new role?

Megan was puzzled by the atmosphere until Mal took her on his knee and explained that he and Copper were going to be married so that Copper could stay with them all at Birraminda. 'Would you like that?'

Megan wasn't prepared to commit herself yet. 'How long will she stay?'

'A long time.'

The big blue eyes looked at Copper with unnerving directness. 'For ever?' she insisted, and Copper's smile went a little awry. Her eyes met Mal's for a fleeting moment over the small head.

'I hope so, Megan,' she said. By the time she left Megan would be seven, nearly eight. That would seem like for ever to a child of four.

Megan seemed to take that as the end of the discussion. Copper had somehow envisioned the child rushing into her open arms, but Megan had seen too many strangers come and go to put her trust in anyone immediately. She simply slid off her father's knee and carried on with what she had been doing before, but when she was tucked up in bed, and Copper bent down to kiss her goodnight, two small arms shot up to cling around her neck.

'I love you,' said Megan fervently, and Copper's eyes stung with tears.

'I love you too, sweetheart.'

'I'm glad you're going to marry Dad,' she confided in a small voice.

'So am I,' whispered Copper, only to look up and see Mal watching them from the doorway.

'So is Dad,' he said.

'I can see him!' Megan tugged at Copper's hand, dancing up and down with excitement as she spotted Mal's lean, rangy figure appear through a door at the other side of the terminal, Brett close behind him. They paused for a moment, searching the crowd with their eyes.

Copper saw Mal at the same moment as Megan. Two weeks she and the child had been in Adelaide and now suddenly he was here, looking as quiet and as cool and as self-contained as ever, and all the careful composure that she had practised had crumbled at the mere sight of him. She wished she could be like Megan, running towards her father, confident in the knowledge that he would reach for her and smile and catch her up in his arms.

Pride forced Copper to follow more decorously, although her heart was hammering and her breathing uneven. 'Hello,' she said with a wavering smile as she reached them, and Mal stilled as he saw her at last.

She was wearing a summer dress in a faded yellow print, with a scoop neck and a soft swirl of skirt, and she was carrying a simple straw hat in her hands. Mal drew a long breath. 'Copper,' he said, and then stopped as if uncertain how to go on. His voice sounded odd, almost strained as they looked at each other.

Then he shifted Megan into one arm and reached slowly for Copper with the other, drawing her into his side, and she found herself lifting her face quite naturally for his kiss, her own arm creeping instinctively around his waist so that she could cling to him for the reassurance she hadn't even known she craved until then.

The touch of his mouth was electrifyingly brief. 'I've missed you,' he said as he raised his head.

Did he mean it, or was it just an act for Brett, who was watching them indulgently? 'I've missed you too,' she said huskily.

In her case it was true. She had brought Megan down to Adelaide over two weeks ago, and she had missed Mal more than she had thought possible. She had got used to him being there, used to the way he'd smile when he came in every evening. There had been times when she had almost forgotten that it was all a pretence.

Sometimes, when Mal had taken her riding along the creek, or when they'd sat on the verandah and watched the moon rise, it had seemed utterly natural that they should be together, talking easily about the day. It was only when their eyes had met unexpectedly that the tension would seep back into the atmosphere and Copper would remember that they weren't really in love. They were just pretending.

It wasn't as if Mal hadn't made his position absolutely clear. Judging by his ostentatious absence every night, Brett had no doubts about their relationship, but Copper had been all too conscious of the fact that she and Mal said a polite goodnight in the corridor and retired to their separate rooms.

'I suppose he thinks he's being tactful,' Mal had sighed that first evening, when Brett had taken himself off with much nodding and winking.

'You realise he's expecting us to fall into bed the moment the door closes behind him?' said Copper. She tried to sound amused but it didn't quite work.

'Of course he does.'

Copper fidgeted by the sink. 'Do you want…do you want to start now? Sharing a room, I mean,' she said awkwardly. 'Do you think it'll look odd if we don't?'

'Let Brett think we're making the most of it while he's out,' said Mal, unconcerned. 'It won't be long until we're married, and there'll be plenty of time for you to get used to sharing then.'

Copper should have felt relieved, but instead was left faintly disgruntled. In the face of such indifference she could hardly insist on dragging him to bed, could she?

During the day there was so much to do that it was easy to forget, but at night the knowledge that Mal didn't really want her was a constant reminder of the reality of the deal they had made, and as the weeks went by the contrast between the way things seemed and the way they were left Copper feeling increasingly edgy and irritable.

In the end, it was a relief when Mal flew her to Brisbane with Megan and put them on a plane to Adelaide to organise the wedding, but being apart hadn't done anything to lessen the knot of mingled apprehension and anticipation inside her. It was permanently lodged somewhere in her stomach, and it tightened whenever she thought about Mal. As the prospect of marrying him drew nearer she grew more and more tense, until she felt hollow with nerves that looped and dived inside her. Now, in the busy airport building, she could feel them still, quivering distractingly just beneath her skin.

Things had been so busy at Birraminda that Mal and Brett had left it until now, two days before the wedding, before flying down in the small six-seater plane that sat on the landing strip. When they all flew back together afterwards, Copper would be Mal's wife. At the thought, a slow shiver snaked down her spine, and her shoulders flexed in response.

'Hey, Megan!' called Brett. 'Come and give me a hug so that Dad can say hello to Copper properly!'

Mal put his daughter down and she ran happily over to her uncle, who swung her up and tickled her until she squealed. Copper hardly heard. Mal had turned back to her, a smile lurking in the depths of his brown eyes, and the gentle trembling inside her erupted into a frantic flutter at the knowledge that he was going to kiss her again.

Only because Brett had reminded him that a brief touch of the lips wasn't enough for lovers who had been apart for two weeks, she told herself feverishly as Mal took both her hands and tugged her gently towards him. Her head struggled to hang onto the shreds of her pride and be the business-like Copper he expected her to be while her heart urged her to stop fighting the longing that unwound itself inside her. She had promised to act as if she was in love with him, instinct reasoned, and instinct won, allowing her to relax against Mal with a tiny sigh. It was only pretending, after all.

They were standing very close, marooned together in a hushed circle of awareness. The hustle and bustle of the airport faded into insignificance and there was only Mal, sliding his hands up her bare arms to her shoulders to cup her throat and tilt her face up to his. Very slowly he lowered his head, until his mouth was just brushing hers. Poised on the brink of release, Copper closed her eyes in delicious anticipation, and then the terrible, tantalising waiting was over. Mal secured her against him, his lips possessing hers in a kiss that was fierce and hard and yet achingly sweet.

Copper felt all her doubts dissolve in a golden rush of enchantment. Her hands crept up his chest and coiled around his neck as she abandoned herself to the swirl of sensation that carried her up out of time. It was bliss to feel his arms around her, to cling to the hard strength of his body and let the warmth of his mouth vanquish any last, lingering thoughts of resistance so utterly that when she sensed Mal begin to draw away, she couldn't prevent a murmur of protest. He stopped it with another kiss, softer this time and briefer, and then another, briefer still, until the green eyes opened languorously and Copper found herself back on earth.

Mal smiled at her dazzled expression. 'Hello,' he said, obedient to Brett's instructions.

'Dad, I've got a pink dress!' Megan tugged at his shirt, bored by the way they were just standing there looking at each other. She had much more exciting things to report.

Copper blinked and gave a rather shaky laugh, certain that she ought to be grateful for Megan's interruption. Take it lightly, she told herself frantically. It wasn't a real kiss. Mal had just been pretending because Brett was there. She had just been pretending too.

Hadn't she?

Her legs felt as if they belonged to another body entirely, and, acting or not, she was pathetically glad when Mal took her hand again. His clasp was calming, invigorating, indescribably reassuring.

'A pink dress?' he was saying to Megan, holding out his other hand to her. 'That sounds very smart.'

'Yes, and I've got a friend called Kathryn,' Megan informed him importantly. She skipped along beside them as Brett followed with the bags. 'I'm going to play with her this afternoon.'

'I hope you don't mind?' Copper moistened her lips, amazed to find that she sounded quite normal. 'I know you haven't seen Megan for a while, but she's had such a lovely time playing with my cousin's little girl.'

'No, I don't mind,' said Mal as they reached the car that Copper had borrowed from her father. 'I'm going to be taking Megan out tomorrow, while you and your mother do whatever it is women do before weddings, so I was hoping for a chance to get you on your own today.'

'Oh?' Hoping she didn't sound too pleased, Copper concentrated on digging into her bag for the car key.

Megan had run around the side of the car to pull on a doorhandle. Mal glanced back at Brett, who had been diverted by a pretty girl who wanted directions, and lowered his' voice. 'I've arranged for a legal office here to draw up a contract for us,' he said, and Copper's fingers clenched around the key. 'Today will be our only chance to sign it before the wedding.'

'Fine,' said Copper in a tight voice, feeling a fool for allowing herself even a moment's dream that he might want to see her for herself. Well, what had she expected?

That one kiss would make any difference to Mal? He could hardly have found a better way of reminding her that their marriage was strictly business as far as he was concerned.

Megan chattered excitedly all the way back to the house and Copper was glad to concentrate on driving and on fighting down the wash of bitter disappointment. She was nervous, too, about Mal's first meeting with her mother, who had always been very fond of Glyn and who was less convinced than her father that Copper wasn't making a terrible mistake.

But she had forgotten how charming Mal could be when he tried. In a remarkably short space of time her mother was treating the two brothers like the sons she had never had, and by the time she had embarked on the most embarrassing stories from Copper's childhood Copper decided that she would prefer signing the contract after all.

Dan Copley, correctly interpreting her anguished glance, hastened to change the subject. 'I'm afraid that you're going to have to face a family party this evening, but we thought you and Caroline might like some time alone together this afternoon as you haven't seen each other for some time.'

'Sounds good to me,' said Mal. Glancing at his watch, he got to his feet. 'Brett and I are booked into a hotel in the city centre, so we'd better go and check in. Why don't you come with us, Copper, and I'll take you out to lunch?'

Copper smiled stiffly, knowing that as soon as he had got rid of Brett Mal would be whisking her off not to a romantic restaurant but to a lawyer's office, where they would sign three years of their lives away to a loveless marriage.

It didn't take long. Briefed by Mal from Birraminda, the admirably discreet lawyer had drawn up a concise document setting out exactly the terms of the coldblooded deal they had agreed. Copper bent her head over the contract, pretending to read it through, but her eyes were shimmering with tears and when she signed her name it seemed to waver over the page.

'Here's your copy,' said Mal as they left. 'You'd better keep it safe.'

The day seemed hot and very bright after the air-conditioned cool of the office building, and Copper was glad of the excuse to hide her eyes with sunglasses. 'Can you keep mine until after the wedding?' she asked, rejoicing at the coolness in her voice. 'I don't want Mum or Dad finding it by mistake and knowing just what price I'm paying for our business to succeed.'

'If that's what you want.' Mal's face closed and he tucked the two contracts into his top pocket. 'Well, shall we go and have some lunch, since that's what we're supposed to be doing?'

They walked in strained silence down to the Torrens and along to a restaurant that overlooked the river, its tables shaded beneath a vine-covered pergola. Mal had changed at the hotel, and now, in light moleskin trousers and a pale blue washed cotton shirt, he looked casual and stylish and somehow unfamiliar. Copper had expected him to look out of place in the city, and it was oddly disconcerting to find him instead as at home in this cosmopolitan setting as he was riding Red under the huge outback sky.

Mal took the contracts out of his pocket and laid them on the table between them, where they lay taunting Copper in their pristine white envelopes. She tried not to look at them and fiddled with her fork as Mal dealt with the waiters, only lifting her head in surprise when he closed the wine list and coolly ordered a bottle of the best champagne.

'We are getting married the day after tomorrow,' he explained, in answer to her unspoken question.

'I know, but…well, we don't need to pretend when we're on our own, do we?' said Copper with some difficulty.

'No, but your parents might well ask you about your lunch, and I think they would expect us to have champagne, don't you?'

'I don't think they need any more convincing,' she said, concentrating on crumbling a roll between her fingers. 'Mum thought it was a bit sudden at first, but it helped that Dad had already met you, and he didn't seem to think there was anything odd about it at all. And they've both loved having Megan, so they feel as if you're part of the family already.' There were crumbs all over the tablecloth by now, and she brushed them into a careful pile. 'I don't think it's even occurred to them that we're not exactly what we're pretending to be.'

'Brett's the same,' said Mal. 'He's accepted the whole idea without question.'

Copper smiled painfully. 'We must be better actors than we think we are.'

There was a tiny pause. Was Mal remembering that kiss at the airport this morning? Or was he thinking of the contract, with its brisk specification that they should both behave in an appropriate manner whenever they were with other people?

'I suppose we must be,' he said at last.

The wine waiter was hovering, opening the champagne with a flourish. Copper could see the other diners smiling at the scene, obviously thinking that they were lovers, and she wanted to stand up and shout at them that it wasn't true, Mal didn't love her, it was all just for show and it meant nothing, nothing!

But she couldn't do that. She watched the bubbles fizzing in her glass and reminded herself about the successful business she would run and how happy her father was to know that his beloved project was going ahead. Her mind skittered to Mal, to the warmth of his mouth and the hardness of his hands, before she forced it back to the agreement they had made.

'Well…' She smiled bravely and lifted her glass. 'To our deal!'

Mal hesitated a moment, then touched his glass to hers. 'To our deal,' he said evenly.

There was a jarring silence as their eyes met and held, and then Copper managed to look away. She put her glass down on the white tablecloth rather unsteadily and tried desperately to think of something to say, but all she wanted to do was to snatch up those contracts lying there so mockingly and tear them into tiny pieces.

It was Mal who spoke first, anyway. 'So,' he said, 'how's it been going?'

'Not too badly.' Copper seized on the subject. Anything was better than that awful, jangling silence. 'I'm afraid the wedding's going to be bigger than we wanted, though. My mother's spent the last twenty-seven years looking forward to my wedding, and she's not going to be done out of it now.' She sighed. 'I kept telling her that we both wanted the ceremony to be simple, with just a quiet party afterwards, but every time I turn round she's invited someone else and the celebrations are getting more and more elaborate.'

'I'd have thought all the organisation would have ap-pealed to someone with your business instincts,' said Mal indifferently. Nobody would guess that they were discussing his own wedding, Copper thought with a flash of resentment.

She turned the stem of her glass between her fingers. A couple were strolling along the riverbank opposite, hand in hand, absorbed in each other. Copper watched them with wistful green eyes. It had been a difficult two weeks. The strain of trying to keep her mother's plans under control had been bad enough, but far worse had been the effort of acting the part of the happiest girl in the world the whole time.

'I wouldn't have minded if it had been for a real wedding,' she said. 'But all the pretence gets tiring after a while, and it seems stupid to go to so much effort when you and I know the whole thing's just a charade.'

Mal's eyes were shuttered, expressionless. 'It'll soon be over,' was all he said.

'It won't be over for another three years,' said Copper bleakly, and he put down his glass.

'Are you trying to tell me that you're having second thoughts?'

She looked deliberately down at the contracts. 'It's too late for that now, isn't it? We've signed on the dotted line.'

'We're not married yet,' Mal pointed out impassively. 'It's not too late for you to change your mind.'

'And find somewhere else to set up the project? No.' Copper shook her head, avoiding his eye. How could she change her mind now, when her father was better, when Megan was thrilled at the prospect of being a bridesmaid? When cancelling the wedding would mean saying goodbye to Mal and never seeing Birraminda again? She smoothed the cloth over the table. 'No, don't take any notice of me. I'm just…'

'Nervous?' he suggested.

'Nervous?' she tried to scoff. 'Of course I'm not nervous!' She picked up her glass and made to drain it, only to discover that it was empty. Feeling foolish, she set it back on the table and tried to meet Mal's gaze confidently, but her defiance collapsed at one look from those shrewd brown eyes. 'Oh, all right, I am nervous!' she admitted crossly. 'If you must know, I'm absolutely terrified!'

'About the wedding?'

'About everything! We hardly know each other and yet in two days' time we're going to be married.' She flicked the white envelopes with her hand. 'It's all very well to talk about contracts, but a piece of paper isn't going to help us live together, is it?'

'At least you know what to expect out of the marriage,' said Mal, watching her over the rim of his glass.

'I know which jobs you'll expect me to do every day, yes, but I don't know how we're going to get on, or whether I'll be able to cope living in the outback, or what it will be like suddenly becoming mother to a four-year-old… or anything!' Copper finished despairingly.

'You've been living in the outback with Megan for nearly two months,' said Mal reasonably. 'And as for us getting on…well, we've got on in the past and I don't see any reason why we shouldn't do the same again- particularly as neither of us has any illusions about the other or any false expectations about what the other one really wants. And if it's a disaster at least you'll know that you're not trapped and that your life isn't going to change for ever. When three years is up, you'll have established your new business. You'll be able to come home to Adelaide, sit back and reap the benefits, and simply carry on as you were before.'

Copper tried to imagine walking away from Birraminda, from Megan, from Mal, and trying to pretend that they had never existed. She couldn't do it now. How would she be able to do it in three years' time? 'Somehow I don't think things will be the same,' she said sadly.

The first course arrived just then, immaculately presented on huge white plates, and as if at a signal the tension was broken. For the rest of the meal they kept the conversation carefully impersonal, and Copper was even able to relax slightly as she listened to the news from Birraminda and told Mal in her turn how excited Megan had been with everything she had seen and done.

It was only when they were drinking coffee that Mal brought the conversation back to their marriage. 'By the way,' he said casually, 'I've booked a hotel in the hills for Saturday night.'

Copper put her cup down into its saucer and looked at him blankly. 'What for?'

He raised an eyebrow. 'For our honeymoon, of course.'

'But…I thought we would be going straight back to Birraminda!'

"The wedding's not until five o'clock,' Mal pointed out patiently. 'By the time we get away it'll be much too late to fly back that night. We'll pick up Megan and Brett in the morning and go then. It's not a problem, is it?'

'No,' said Copper quickly. 'No, of course not.' Stupidly, she had never thought about a honeymoon. She had somehow assumed that they would spend their first night at Birraminda, where it would be so much easier to remember just why they were married. 'I just thought… Aren't you very busy at the moment?'

'One night isn't going to make much difference,' said Mal with a dry look.

It might not make a difference to him, but Copper knew that it was going to make a big difference to her! It was the night she was going to share a bed with Mal for the first time, the night she had to decide whether to lie stiffly by his side or to swallow her pride and succumb to the desire that seeped through her body whenever she thought about it. Copper had no idea whether she would ever find the courage to ask him to make love to her. Perhaps Mal would make things easy for her, she thought hopefully. He might take her in his arms and let passion sweep them up to a place where pride counted for nothing and no words were necessary…

Or he might get out his contract and check for the relevant clause, Copper amended with a bitter smile as she got dressed for the party that night. She was dreading the evening ahead. All the uncles and aunts and cousins and close family friends had been invited to meet Mal and Brett before the wedding, and she knew that she would have to spend the night being bright and cheerful and deliriously happy at the prospect of marrying a man who would expect her to put in a formal request before he would lay a finger on her!

The party was even worse than Copper had feared. Tense and jaded and headachy from too much champagne in the' middle of the day, she had to endure endless teasing about her unsuitability for the outback. People kept kissing her and telling her what a lucky girl she was.

Copper's smile grew more and more brittle. Everyone seemed to be having a good time except her. Mal was relaxed and charming, unbothered by the fact that he was the centre of attention, while Brett had wasted no time at all in cornering her prettiest cousin and was meeting with plenty of encouragement. Her parents were delighted with their prospective son-in-law and all the relatives were entering into the party spirit with gusto.

That left Copper, inwardly cursing the day she had ever acquired a reputation for being good fun at any party. Why couldn't she have been so quiet and shy that nobody would notice if she sat in a corner by herself all evening? Better still, why couldn't she have been born without any family at all?

The party wore on and Copper's smile grew more desperate. She was listening to an elderly aunt tell her how fortunate she was to have found such a husband when she looked up to find Mal watching her from across the room. He was a still, steady focus in the hubbub, and all at once the thought of Birraminda hit Copper with the force of a blow.

The creek, the trees, the white blur of cockatoos wheeling in the sky and Mal, strong and sure beside her as the evening hush settled slowly around them… The longing to be there was so acute that Copper almost reeled. When someone stepped away and blocked Mal from sight, and she found herself back in the middle of the hot, noisy party, she felt almost sick with disappointment.

With disappointment and the heart-stopping realisation that she at least had no need to pretend. It was no use denying it any longer. She had fallen in love with him all over again.