Rescued By A Millionaire

CHAPTER SIX

THE cake was not great. The cake, in fact, was ghastly, but Karli would have eaten cardboard if she’d been told it was birthday cake and Riley manfully got his down. Then, with the excitement over, Karli drooped and Jenna took her off to bed while Riley did the washing-up.

She came back into the kitchen as he was stacking newly washed plates on her newly washed shelves. He was fingering each plate as if he couldn’t believe it.

She stood in the doorway for a moment and watched him. He was so big. His masculinity filled the room, she thought. And here he was, polishing his plates as if they were giving him pleasure. The man was seriously…nice?

He turned and found her watching, and she found herself starting to blush.

‘What?’ he demanded and she hesitated, searching for the answer. What? She didn’t know what the question was. What?

‘I like to see a man immersed in domesticity,’ she told him at last, and she managed a smile. ‘There’s been little enough domesticity around here to make me notice it when I see it.’

‘Hey, I’m domestic.’

‘Would Maggie agree?’

‘Sure she would.’

She knew nothing about him, she thought. Nothing. She was in his house, he was supplying their food and accommodating them and being wonderful to her little half-sister and she knew nothing about him at all.

‘Where’s Maggie?’ she asked.

‘At Munyering.’

‘Where’s Munyering?’

‘Out the back of beyond,’ he told her, and then, as she looked exasperated, he motioned south. ‘It’s about five hundred miles thataway.’

‘So you and Maggie have a distant relationship.’

‘About as close as I ever want with a woman,’ he told her, and then looked as if he didn’t understand why he’d just said what he’d said. He caught himself. ‘I mean… We suit each other just fine.’

‘But she’s not your wife.’

‘No.’

‘You’re definitely not married?’

‘No.’

‘Have you ever been married?’

‘What is this?’

‘Twenty questions,’ she told him. ‘You know far too much about me and I know nothing about you. Have you ever been married?’

‘Once. It didn’t work out.’

‘Kids?’

‘No.’

‘Dogs? Guinea pigs? Budgerigars?’

‘No and no and no.’

‘Friends?’

‘No.’ That was out before he could stop it. He stilled and she met his eyes across the room and their gaze locked and held.

‘No friends,’ she said softly. ‘Apart from Karli, who’s your devoted friend for life. She’s gone to sleep clutching her fossil like other kids go to bed clutching their teddy bear.’

‘Why hasn’t Karli got a teddy bear?’

The question came out of left field, turning the tables neatly.

‘I imagine she’s been given several,’ she said slowly. ‘Nicole would have lost them or given them away or simply left them behind in hotel rooms because they were a nuisance. She’d buy more on a whim. Then when she and Brian split, Brian would have replaced whatever Nicole supplied by something that would have annoyed the hell out of Nicole. And so on. I learned as a kid never to show affection for any of my toys. If my father gave it to me then my mother would destroy it and vice versa. In the end it was easier not to get attached at all.’

‘So you were left with nothing?’

‘I escaped,’ she told him. ‘We’re talking about Karli.’

‘How can you say you’ve escaped?’ he said gently. ‘You don’t escape the past.’

‘Says the man with no friends.’ Two could play at turning the tables. ‘I can’t believe you have no friends. That’s a crazy statement.’

‘I don’t exactly live in a place where friends drop in.’

‘You don’t live here, though, do you?’ she said cautiously. ‘I mean, not all the time. This is a place you come to work.’

‘The place where I base myself is just as isolated.’

‘But not as dusty.’

‘No,’ he admitted, smiling a little. ‘Not as dusty. You really have done an amazing job.’

‘It was fun.’

‘I’ve never met a single woman who’d think this was fun,’ he told her and she shrugged.

‘You move in the wrong circles.’

‘Unlike you. Child of rock star and racing driver.’

‘They have nothing to do with me. My friends aren’t their friends. My friends are mostly nurses and, yes, most of us know what hard work is and we know it can be a pleasure all by itself.’

He was staring at her as if he couldn’t work her out.

‘Are you really a nurse?’

‘I really am a nurse.’

‘How the hell does Charles Svenson’s daughter end up being a nurse?’

‘I don’t think you understand anything about me,’ she said softly.

‘No. I don’t. So tell me.’ He left the sink and sat down, gesturing to the chair on the other side of the table.

‘You’re tired.’ She hesitated, but sat down as well. ‘You don’t want to listen to my life history when you should be going to bed.’

‘Sure I’m tired,’ he said, and he threw her that gorgeous, disconcerting smile. ‘I need a bedtime story.’

‘I…’

‘Just tell me,’ he said gently, and suddenly his hand came across the table and gripped hers. Strong and sure and compelling. ‘I want to know.’

‘I don’t know why,’ she said, trying to haul her hand away, but still he held.

‘I don’t know either,’ he admitted. ‘But tell me. Tell me about your parents.’

‘I don’t… I don’t know my parents. I never have.’

‘Why not?’

She faltered. How to describe the relationship or the lack of the relationship? How to tell anyone?

But his hand was warm and strong and he’d given Karli a gift that Jenna knew she would treasure for ever.

She owed him the truth.

‘Nicole gave birth to me, but that was it,’ she told him, tugging once more on her fingers and then giving up. She liked her hand being in his, she decided. It didn’t mean a thing, she knew-but she liked it.

‘And your father?’ he prodded and she made herself go on.

‘Charles fathered me but there wasn’t any attachment there either. I was the only link they had to each other. They hated each other and I was a financial obligation. I was placed in boarding-school when I was younger than Karli. Then they fought over who should pay-and who had to shoulder responsibility for me during the long holidays. Which of them had to fork out for hotel bills for me.’

‘Hotel bills?’

‘You don’t think they’d care for me themselves, do you?’

‘I guess not.’

She shrugged. ‘I didn’t mind the hotels so much. But school… Every now and then the school would ask that I be taken away as no one had paid the fees. The kids gave me a hard time about my celebrity parents who refused to pay and never came near me. Then, when I was fourteen, the school said I couldn’t stay any longer. My fees were so far overdue that the school wrote to my parents and said to come and collect me.’

She hesitated, but she’d gone this far. She might as well tell him everything. ‘So I lied and forged a letter from Nicole and told the school authorities I had to catch the train and meet my mother in London.’

He frowned. Still his hand held hers. ‘Why did you lie?’

‘Because no one was ever coming to get me,’ she said, and the old anger echoed in her voice. ‘Every girl in the school knew that my fees hadn’t been paid. I hated it. I think… I hated everyone then. Anyway, I caught the train and went to London and tried to get work. I lived on my wits for months until a reporter from a tabloid daily found me.’

Riley was rubbing her fingers, caressing each in turn. ‘How did he find you?’ he asked gently, and she flinched at the gentleness in his voice.

‘Don’t you dare feel sorry for me.’

His lips curved into a half-smile. ‘I daren’t.’

‘I was fine,’ she told him, almost belligerently. ‘I had a job washing dishes in a little Chinese restaurant where they didn’t ask any questions and they paid cash. Neither of my parents even knew I was missing. That was okay by me. But I was stupid enough to talk about my background to one of the kids in the squat I was living in and he told the press what Nicole Razor’s daughter was doing. For money. The press had a field-day.’

‘Tough,’ Riley said softly, and she flashed a suspicious glance at him. But his face was almost impersonal. That was how she needed him to be, and somehow he knew it.

‘So what happened then?’ he asked, and she made herself continue.

‘My parents were mortified. Of course. Their daughter living as a street kid. But they weren’t as mortified as I was. I was dragged back to school by one of my father’s employees. My mother’s agent rang me and told me I was ruining Nicole’s career and I should be ashamed. I had to put up with the girls at school reading the whole story in the scandal pages of the newspapers.’ She shrugged and managed a small smile. ‘Okay, you can feel sorry for me now a little bit, if you like.’

He smiled back, just a little. ‘How much can I feel sorry for you?’

‘Minimum,’ she told him. ‘I don’t need it. I didn’t need it then.’

‘Why not?’

She grinned. ‘Because from then on it was better. It was like I’d hit a wall and managed to get through. I’d learned some street smarts and the bullies at school learned to leave me alone.’

‘I might have guessed they would,’ he said, and there was no mistaking the sudden admiration in his voice. ‘Any woman who conquers my roofing iron must have run rings around a few school bullies.’

‘I did,’ she said, and her smile deepened. This man had the capacity to lighten her spirits. Lighten her…life?

‘So then what?’ he prodded, and she had to force herself to remember where she was in her pathetic little story.

‘I’d had enough,’ she told him. ‘I stayed at school until I was old enough to get into a nursing course, and then I was out of there so fast you couldn’t see me for dust. I didn’t talk about my parents and they sure as heck didn’t talk about-or to-me. I worked my way through my nursing training and I’ve asked for and accepted no help from either of my parents since. That’s it. End of story. If it wasn’t for me finding out-via the tabloids again-about Karli’s existence, I’d have had no contact with them since.’

Silence.

It had been a long speech for Jenna, she decided as she sat still with her hand still in his. She’d so seldom talked about her life. Just once, as a lonely fourteen-year-old, she’d told someone the story of her upbringing. She’d thought the kid in the squat was a friend and he’d sold her story for money.

She’d learned the hard way to shut up.

Riley could sell this story for money, too, she knew. The tabloids would have a field-day with what was happening, especially now with Nicole recently dead.

She looked across the table, absorbing the fact that he was still holding her hand and he didn’t look as if he intended to give it up.

‘I…you won’t tell? I mean, it’s private. I don’t…’

‘Do you really think I’d sell you out?’

She blinked. Riley was looking at her as if he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. But the expression on his face…

She could trust this man. She knew she could trust him.

‘You really are on your own,’ he said slowly, but she shook her head.

‘I’m twenty-six. I have a career, and back home I have friends. I’m not alone any more. It’s only Karli who’s desperately alone. Nicole’s dead, but Karli’s still legally dependent on Brian. I don’t know what will happen to her now.’

His eyes were on hers, asking questions. Receiving answers? Maybe. He could see into her, this man. The more she saw of him, the more she knew she was exposed.

He was still holding her hand.

‘You’ll try and keep her with you,’ he said softly, as if he was stating the obvious, and she nodded.

‘Yes.’

‘And who’ll pay?’

But it was a mistake. She’d been telling all, he’d been pushing the boundaries and suddenly here was a boundary she didn’t want broached.

‘Back off,’ she said, and her anger startled her as well as him. But it was the way to go. In truth she had no answer to his question and she’d learned-the hard way-that in times of crisis it was infinitely better to attack rather than defend. She hauled her hand away from his and stared at him across the table-to see him looking astonished.

‘Hey, I’m not about to push. If you don’t want to talk about it, that’s fine by me.’

He looked taken aback.

Maybe she had overreacted.

‘Um…whoops.’ She gave a rueful grin, but she kept her hand very firmly on her side of the table. ‘Sorry. It’s just I’m not used to people helping. I’m not used to people asking questions when they don’t want something of me.’

‘I don’t want anything of you.’

‘I know that.’ She did.

‘You really are by yourself.’

‘No,’ she said, and, despite her regret at her reaction, the anger was still there, try as she would to fight it. ‘Alone I can cope with. I’ve learned that alone is a really good way to be. But now I have Karli and it’s a whole new world. Somehow I have to figure out a way to keep her safe. If she’d been left money…’

‘But Brian’s robbed her of that.’

‘As you say.’ Her face closed. It was time to move on. For heaven’s sake, what was she thinking of, telling her personal problems to this man? Just because he was big and kindly and he’d given a gift to Karli that had made her want to weep…

He was exhausted. She could see it in his face-and she was none too perky herself. She’d worked very, very hard today.

‘It’s time we went to bed,’ she said, attempting briskness. ‘I’m sorry about the life-story bit.’

‘I asked.’

‘Yeah, people do,’ she told him. ‘And I’m usually not stupid enough to answer.’

‘I don’t think you’re stupid.’

There was a moment’s silence. A loaded silence. She stared down at her hand that had so recently lain in his. She missed the contact. The warmth. The strength.

She had to be sensible. She needed to be sensible.

‘You’ll go out again in the morning?’

‘I have more work to do.’

‘Us, too. We thought we’d attack the bedrooms in the morning.’

‘There’s no need.’

‘Call it payment for board and lodging. There’s only one more day before the train comes through and Karli and I are having fun.’

‘Fun?’

‘Yeah, it is.’ She smiled, moving on. ‘We’re enjoying ourselves. And…it’s time out before we face what we have to face.’

‘You know you’ll have paparazzi all over you the minute you get on that train.’

She stilled. ‘Pardon?’

‘They know you’re here.’

‘The press knows I’m here?’

‘I was talking to the Territory police today and there’s huge press interest. You could sell your story-’

He got no further. She was standing, her face blazing anger. ‘You told them. You radioed them and told them I was here. So I’ll have every newspaper reporter and every cameraman known to man in Karli’s face the minute I get on board that train. You toe-rag. You low-life, belly-crawling worm. You lying, cheating, dirt-bag.’

‘Hey, steady on,’ he said mildly, but she was in full swing.

‘How much did they pay you? How much have you embellished the story? And are you going to head out to your radio right now and add in what I’ve just told you for good measure? I thought I could trust you, Riley Jackson. I’m stupid, stupid, stupid. Of all the two-timing, low-down, bottom-feeding-’

‘You don’t feel you might just be being a teensy bit over-dramatic?’

She paused for breath. The man was looking amused. Amused!

‘Dramatic?’ She grabbed the first thing to hand-the remains of one sad chocolate cake-and threw it straight at him. It hit him fair in the chest. It rolled to the floor.

It bounced.

His lips quirked.

‘If you laugh I’m going to have to kill you,’ she said carefully and his lips quirked again.

‘Death by chocolate cake. I can see that.’

‘It’s nothing to laugh about.’

‘No, but it’s nothing to yell about either.’ He rose and retrieved the cake. ‘We ate some of this,’ he said, examining it doubtfully from all angles. ‘It looks like it’s turning to concrete. What do you reckon it’ll do to our insides?’

‘It’s a fine chocolate cake,’ she snapped, and the quirk of his lips turned into full-scale laughter.

‘Dehydrated eggs, no butter and flour milled last century…’ He lifted it up to the light and examined it some more before dropping it into the waste bucket-where it definitely bounced again. ‘It’s a fine chocolate cake,’ he agreed, still grinning. ‘Or a fine small nuclear missile, ready charged.’

She swallowed. ‘Do you mind? And stop changing the subject. I was in-’

‘Yeah. You were in the middle of calling me a low-life, belly-crawling maw-worm or some such.’ His tone was suddenly admiring. ‘You’ve been practising your insults. They’re very good.’

‘Luckily,’ she said scathingly, ‘I’ve had heaps of people to practise on.’

‘I guess you have,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘Nicole, Charles, Brian. The kid who sold your story to the papers. Others maybe. Jenna, I’m not like that.’

‘You told-’

‘I didn’t tell,’ he said, and the restraint in his voice was suddenly obvious. It was as if he were trying to placate a child. ‘You know the lady who was reading Karli a story when Brian came into the carriage to tell you that Nicole was dead?’

It was so unexpected a statement that it caught her flat-footed. She stared. ‘What’s that got to do with it?’

‘Will you listen?’ he said patiently. ‘It seems the lady wasn’t just any little old lady. Enid’s a chief magistrate of the West Australian court, retired. She’s one very astute woman and she wanted to know what happened to you.’

‘But-’

‘So Enid made enquiries,’ Riley said patiently. ‘As the train continued and she didn’t see you again she got more and more worried. By the time the train reached Kalgoorlie she’d instigated a search. When you weren’t on the train she forced the rail authorities to contact the police. Brian had to face a very uncomfortable interview, and then the police started searching the track. They contacted a couple of the people who collected goods from the train when it stopped here. One of the locals remembered I was staying here. He radioed me and I let the police know your whereabouts. After Enid’s fuss, if I hadn’t confirmed you were here you’d have had search parties out looking for you, planes doing overhead searches-the works.’

It stopped her in full flight. It shocked her to silence. She stood and stared.

‘So…we wouldn’t have died at the siding.’

‘You’d have had a bad twenty-four hours, but Enid would have got you help.’

‘I… I don’t know what to say.’

He grinned again. ‘Try an insult. I really like your insults.’

‘Shut up,’ she told him and his grin broadened.

‘You can do better than that.’

She glared and he grinned some more.

‘Hey, you accused me of telling the press. I’ve explained it wasn’t me. It’s me who’s supposed to be glaring.’

So why was she glaring? It was because he was smiling, she thought. It was because…she had no defences. She just had to look at this man and things inside her crumpled that had no business crumpling. She made a desperate attempt to haul herself together.

‘I’m sorry,’ she managed.

‘Think nothing of it,’ he said, his tone almost avuncular. ‘I enjoyed it. No one’s ever called me a low-life, belly-crawling worm before.’

‘I can’t think why not,’ she said, and he grinned again.

‘Ouch.’

His tiredness had receded, she thought suddenly. The fatigue that seemed almost part of the man had faded a little. She’d made him laugh.

She liked it that she’d made him laugh.

Oh, for heaven’s sake, this was dangerous territory and she had no business treading there. She needed to move on.

She needed to concentrate on Karli.

‘So… So you’ve told everyone that I’m here?’ she managed and his smile faded.

‘No. I told the Territory police. But the officer I talked to said there was huge press interest. They searched the train at Kalgoorlie, which created interest. Other passengers saw what happened and they’ve figured out who you are. The police sergeant said the press won’t be told exactly where you are, but everyone knows you got off the train somewhere along here. So if I was a reporter, I’d be waiting for you to get back on the train again.’

She stared up at him, immeasurably distressed, but there was no reassurance in his face. Riley was telling the truth. He didn’t like it any more than she did, she thought suddenly. And at least…at least the eyes she was looking into were totally frank.

How could she have called him those names?

Riley Jackson was a man she could trust. Among all the fear and disillusion of the last few days-of her whole life, if she was honest-this stood out as an absolute truth. Whatever else Riley was, he was a man who was ruthlessly honest.

Riley’s honesty didn’t make what he was telling her one bit more palatable. She bit her lip.

‘Which means Karli…’

‘Karli will face cameras and reporters as soon as you board.’

‘Which will be awful,’ she said. ‘It’s the last thing she needs. I never should have got off.’

‘If Brian’s as bad as he sounds, you hardly had a choice.’

‘At least I won’t have to have anything to do with him again,’ she whispered, thinking it through. ‘If Karli had inherited, then Brian would want her. This way, he thinks he’s won and he’ll go away with the money and leave us alone.’

Riley stayed silent.

‘But what will I do?’

‘Get back on the train,’ he suggested. ‘Face the music. Shield Karli as much as you can, but explain to her that there’ll be couple of awful days before you get on with the rest of your life. Hit Perth in a blaze of publicity and make life very, very unpleasant for Brian.’

‘Why?’

‘Because he deserves it,’ he said flatly. ‘For all Brian knows, you’re dead of thirst by now. If Enid hadn’t contacted the police there’d have been no search party, no enquiries, nothing.’

‘He mustn’t realise…’

‘He’ll have realised. Either that or the man’s a fool.’

Jenna swallowed. No. Brian wasn’t a fool. And this was his daughter he’d put at risk.

She could bring him down, she thought. She could denounce him to the gutter press and they’d have a field-day. But…

‘He’s Karli’s father,’ she whispered. ‘What sort of legacy does that leave her?’ She gazed at him for a long minute, searching for answers.

There were none.

‘If you’ll excuse me,’ she faltered. ‘I need to go to bed.’

‘To face unpleasant facts in the morning?’

She shrugged. ‘They might seem less hopeless then,’ she admitted.

‘Jenna…’

Riley stood looking down at her in the flickering lamplight. What was it with this man? Jenna felt small and lonely and utterly bereft-sensations she hadn’t felt since childhood. She’d decided early on that feeling small and lonely and bereft wasn’t the way to survive. She’d learned tough.

So where was tough when she needed it most? She needed tough right now.

And when his hands came out and caught hers in a gesture that seemed almost unconscious, she felt the tough layer she’d so carefully built up slip away even further. He made her feel… He made her feel…

She didn’t know how he made her feel. Just different. Alive. And very, very vulnerable.

Something of how she was feeling must have got through to the man before her. He was a fool if he couldn’t see how confused she was-and if there was one thing she’d learned by now it was that Riley Jackson was no fool.

‘It’ll seem better in the morning,’ he told her and there was something in his voice that told her he was as unsure as she was. He was entering unchartered territory as well. The territory of caring. ‘You’ll get through this.’

‘I know I will,’ she whispered. ‘I always have. But I don’t see how I can shield Karli.’

His hold on her hands tightened. He stood staring down at her, his mouth twisting into an expression that Jenna couldn’t define. She looked up into his eyes-and then she looked away. She didn’t trust…herself?

He was so close. So strong. So… So Riley. She stood in her bare feet with her soft pastel dress seeming somehow too insubstantial. It was no barrier. Not when she wanted to sink against him. To feel his strength. To have him hold her.

He was so close to her heart.

The silence went on and on. Absolute silence. The world stopped.

And something within Jenna’s heart formed and grew-bud to flower almost instantaneously. It grew so fast that it threatened to overwhelm her.

What was it? Need? Desire?

Whatever it was, her overwhelming compulsion was to lay her head against this man’s chest and claim it as her home. The home she’d never had was suddenly right here.

Right here in this man’s heart.

Only it wasn’t. Of course it wasn’t. This man had nothing to do with her. He was a stranger. He was an Australian dust farmer of whom she knew nothing, except that he lived in the most barren place in the earth and he wanted nothing to do with any woman.

But he was holding her. And she was feeling…what? What was this sensation that was swelling beneath her breast, so much that she thought she must surely burst? Or cry. Or do something even more stupid, like falling against him and holding him hard against her and raising her face to his and…

No!

Somehow she made herself push away, so that Riley was holding her at arm’s length, his face grave and troubled, and the weariness in his eyes replaced by concern.

‘I’m sorry,’ she managed. ‘You have enough troubles of your own without landing you with mine.’

‘Maybe I can help.’

‘You already have. But from now on I’m on my own. Mr Jackson…’

‘Riley.’

‘Riley, then,’ she whispered, and the word sounded wrong on her lips. It was as if it were the embrace she so desperately wanted to give him. Wanted him to give her.

‘What’s your biggest worry?’

‘Karli,’ she admitted. ‘To make her face reporters. If there’s media on the train and we’re stuck on board for two days…’

‘I can fly you out of here.’

‘You said you couldn’t.’

‘I said I couldn’t immediately,’ he told her. ‘Which was true. My job here is to get the bores operational and to make the house habitable enough for a couple of men to use as a base for muster.’

‘Muster?’

‘We’ll bring in trucks and take the surviving herd south where they can graze on some decent feed. These poor beasts won’t know themselves. But getting men to stay here before the place was liveable was impossible. You’ve saved me a couple of days’ work. I’ve fixed the most urgent water problems. If I spend tomorrow making your repairs permanent-putting wood where you’ve stuffed newspapers-and spend another day south of here doing a head count, then I can fly out. That makes it Tuesday. You’re welcome to come with me.’

‘But…where will you go?’ She gave a futile tug to her hands.

‘Munyering. My home farm.’

‘Another farm?’ She forced her emotions to one side-sort of-and made herself concentrate. ‘Like this one?’

He smiled at that. ‘No, Jenna, not like this one. Munyering’s isolated, but we have decent bore water and it’s in much better condition.’

It’d have to be, she thought, but it was hard to think it. Hard to think anything, really, with this man’s hands holding hers.

‘Then…how could I reach civilisation from Munyering?’

‘I’ll take you.’ And his fingers moved through hers in a gesture of reassurance.

It was strange, Jenna thought desperately. Riley was talking-he was touching her-as if he was unaware of the effect he was having. As if he didn’t feel what was running through her hands. It was like an electric current, bringing warmth and strength and…

And nothing. Make yourself think, she told herself harshly. Cut it out with the hormones. Just because this guy makes you feel like you want to jump him…

Jump him? What was she thinking?

She knew exactly what she was thinking.

‘I’ll refuel at Munyering and fly you on down to Adelaide,’ he was saying. ‘You can take a flight from there to wherever you want to go.’

Where did she want to go?

Home is where the heart is. The saying drifted through her mind with awful bleakness. According to that criterion she’d never had a home. Somehow she had to create one for Karli.

But at least she had a start. Riley would save them from the train. He’d fly them to Adelaide and then…

She looked up into his concerned face and felt her foundations shift.

This was crazy. What on earth was she thinking?

With a gasp she jerked her hands back and this time she was released. She stepped back as though fending him off, but Riley didn’t follow.

‘I’ll pay you.’

‘You’ll do nothing of the kind.’

‘I don’t accept help without payment.’

‘Then learn to do so. If not for you, then for Karli.’

‘But you can’t afford-’

‘I can afford. Believe me, Jenna. Just accept.’

She sighed. It was all too hard. She didn’t want to be beholden to this man. Not like this. But it seemed she had no choice.

She wasn’t on her own any longer. Choices were out of her control. She had to think of Karli.

‘I…thank you,’ she whispered.

‘Think nothing of it,’ he said gently. ‘And you don’t need to thank me. You and Karli have worked long and hard making this place liveable. It’s me who’s grateful and I pay my debts.’

He was grateful? He was offering to fly them out of here because he felt grateful? Was that the emotion she wanted him to feel?

No. Not one bit.

‘Go to bed, Jenna,’ Riley said softly. ‘You’ve done a hard two days’ work.’

‘So have you. Saving your cattle.’

‘While you saved my house.’ He stared around again as if he still couldn’t believe what he was seeing. ‘I’m aching to see it in the morning.’

‘If it’s still standing,’ she said and she heard a note of asperity enter her voice. She couldn’t help it. Was the man totally insensitive? Here she was practically aching for him to touch her-kiss her senseless and make her forget every darned thing she’d ever taught herself about keeping her distance-and he was talking about housekeeping.

She glared up at him, aware that it was crazy to glare, but she couldn’t help herself.

He gazed back at her and his expression was inscrutable.

Then, finally, Riley touched her cheek lightly, as if he was touching something that was almost infinitely precious-and totally beyond his reach.

‘It’s late,’ he said flatly, and his voice was solid and uncompromising. ‘Go to bed, Jenna.’

Her glare faltered. Her hand lifted and caught his. Her eyes held his for a long moment. Asking questions she knew he couldn’t answer.

Go to bed?

She had to. She must.

A girl had some dignity.

She dropped his hand as if it burned-then turned and fled before she did something she might regret for the rest of her life.

Maybe.

For a long time after Jenna left, Riley didn’t stir from the kitchen. He sat over a can of beer-and then another and then another. He was weary beyond belief, but there was an inertia hanging over him that wouldn’t let him move.

Or was it inertia? Maybe it was the unbearable thought of going out to the veranda and walking past the place where Jenna lay.

She was so beautiful. So lovely. A slip of a girl who’d fought her way in life, who reacted like a terrier who’d defend herself and her own to the death. He thought of what she’d faced as a kid, on the streets of London, fighting for a living, and he thought of her parents’ privileged backgrounds, and he felt an anger surging through him that was almost overwhelming. No wonder she was prepared to fight for Karli’s future. If she felt about Karli as he felt about her…

What sort of low-lifes were these people? Brian? Charles? The dead Nicole?

They needed to be shot, he thought, and then he remembered Nicole was already dead and caught himself in a half-smile. Maybe not. But damn, if he hadn’t been here to help… He found himself squeezing his beer can so hard it crushed beneath his fingers. He stared down at the mangled metal in confusion.

‘What the hell has this mess got to do with you, Riley Jackson?’ he demanded of himself. ‘You don’t get involved. Remember? You know what you should do? Get in the plane and take the pair of them to Adelaide tomorrow. You’ve got the worst of the bore problems solved. You could take them and come back-it’d be only an extra day. So do it. Get rid of them fast. Get rid of trouble.’

Trouble.

The word drifted round and round the kitchen.

If he took them now he’d have to come back, he acknowledged, looking round the gleaming little kitchen with eyes that saw just how much work the pair of them had put in to get it the way it was. And, strangely, that was the problem. Take them to Adelaide and come back here? The thought was unbearable.

Why?

‘What on earth are the pair of them doing to you?’ Riley demanded. He lifted one of Karli’s make-do birthday candles and stared at its dead wick as if it might give him answers. ‘They’re making you feel like you swore you’d never feel again.’

‘I’ve never felt like this before.’

‘Yeah, but you know what you’re feeling, boy. Desire. Pure and simple.’

And yet it wasn’t. He knew it wasn’t. The vision of Jenna floated before him, and although Riley’s hand clenched hard on his candle he knew it wasn’t just lust that was making him feel this way. It was so much more.

It was the overwhelming need to make Jenna smile. To take the look of distrust from her eyes. To make Karli chuckle. To take away the hurt…

‘Stop it right now!’ He hurled the can savagely across the kitchen-and then, thinking better of it as it lay untidily on the newly scrubbed floor, he rose, retrieved it and carefully placed it in the waste. It lay on top of the remains of the chocolate cake.

It was a crazy chocolate cake. It had been one crazy birthday.

It had been wonderful.

‘They’re getting to you,’ he told himself savagely. ‘Watch out. If you’re not careful you’ll be caught up in the whole damned web again.’

He took a deep breath, steadying, then walked through the darkened house to the veranda.

Jenna was already in bed. There were two humps in the big bed, Jenna’s body curved protectively around the child beside her.

Was she asleep? He wasn’t sure. Her sheet moved almost imperceptibly in the moonlight with her deep, even breathing.

He wanted her. The ache was a fierce physical pain that threatened to overwhelm him. He could just walk forward to say goodnight, lean over, lift the sheet and kiss…

He did no such thing.

Instead he swore savagely under his breath, then walked back into his newly cleaned sitting room and threw himself onto the old settee. There was no way he could sleep on the veranda. Not feeling how he was feeling.

He’d do the house maintenance tomorrow and then he’d get the hell out of here. Back to his bores. Outback, where the only thing to concentrate on was sheer hard work.

Where a man could forget about women.

She heard him go.

She knew what he was doing. He didn’t want to sleep on the veranda.

She knew how he was feeling.

She turned on her side and stared out into the starlit sky and tried to think why life had suddenly become more bleak.

Why life had suddenly become desperate.