Required: Three Outback Brides: Cattle Rancher, Convenient Wife / In the Heart of the Outback... / Single Dad, Outback Wife. Margaret Way
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help me?’ Since when? When there was a job to be done it had never taken Chloe long to disappear. Born and reared on a working station Chloe had no love of the outdoor life or work of any kind. As a girl she had always wanted to stay at home with Mum who had never encouraged Chloe to pull her weight.
Valerie, as was her practice, jumped in on Chloe’s behalf. ‘Chloe has opted to take Rory for a drive around the property. But we would like coffee first. Coffee for you, Rory? Or tea if you prefer?’ Valerie smiled at this extraordinarily personable young man. Chloe had already told her how strikingly handsome he was. Not to mention those eyes!
Rory, however, turned to Allegra. She was so damned magnetic he decided there and then caution had to determine his every response. ‘Coffee’s fine,’ he said. ‘Sure I can’t help you bring it out?’
Some imp of mischief got into Allegra. ‘Thank you so much,’ she said gracefully. ‘Please come through.’ She turned to lead the way, but not before catching the glare in Valerie’s eyes.
Under the terms of her father’s will his estate had been split three ways, but not in the way any of them had expected. Certainly not Valerie. She and Chloe had each inherited quarter shares; Allegra half, much to Valerie’s outrage.
If I want to invite this man into the house I have a perfect right to do so no matter the scowl on Valerie’s face, Allegra thought. Her father’s will had further alienated her from her family when she had thought their mutual loss would bring them closer together.
Faint hope! She knew Valerie and Chloe believed she had received a handsome divorce settlement from Mark but she had refused to take a penny. How could she do such a thing? The choice to end the marriage had been hers. She wanted nothing of Mark’s, even the beautiful jewellery he had given her. She hadn’t even opted to take her wedding ring let alone the magnificent solitaire diamond engagement ring. He could save that for her successor.
Rory followed her into the large well equipped kitchen, definitely troubled by the undercurrents. He was surprised Allegra—who looked like she was used to being waited on hand and foot—was the one to organise the morning tea. He really had to stop being so quick with his assumptions Blame it on his unnatural bias.
‘Coffee, you said?’ She gave him a glance that just stopped short of challenge.
He understood because he felt the same powerful urge to challenge her. He didn’t understand exactly why, but he did know everything had changed since he had met her. ‘Yes, thank you.’ He looked about him. ‘You have a very attractive home.’
‘It actually needs refurbishing,’ she said, setting the percolator on the hot plate. ‘Nothing has been touched since my mother redecorated it in the early days of her marriage.’
That meant well over twenty years surely? Chloe had told him that first evening she was twenty-three to Allegra’s twenty-seven. She had made twenty-seven sound more like seventy-two. ‘She hasn’t felt the urge to try her hand again?’ he asked. ‘I thought women loved rearranging things.’
Allegra sliced into the fruit cake she had made the previous day. ‘So we do, but my mother, sadly, is no longer with us. She was killed in a car crash when I was a toddler. I would have been killed, too, only it was one of the rare times I wasn’t with her.’
Initially he felt shock, then an explanation for the things that were troubling him. ‘I’m very sorry for your loss,’ he said with sincerity. ‘So Valerie is your stepmother?’
‘And Chloe my half sister,’ she nodded. ‘My father remarried when I was three. A lot of people think Val is my mother because she’s always been there.’
He looked at her keenly. ‘But she wasn’t the mother you wanted?’
She took a few moments to answer. ‘You’re going to psychoanalyse me?’
‘No, just a question.’
‘Why would you say that?’ She wasn’t surprised, however, by his perception.
He gave a self-deprecating shrug. ‘I’m an authority on mothers that go missing. Mine left home when I was twelve and my brother, Jay, fourteen.’
‘And the reason, seeing we’re cutting right through the usual preliminaries?’
‘She couldn’t take it anymore,’ he offered bluntly.
‘She was having marital problems?’ Allegra began to load the trolley.
‘You would know about them,’ he answered in a low dark voice.
‘Indeed I do,’ she returned smartly.
‘Yes, she was having problems,’ he admitted, thinking the very air scintillated around her. ‘My father was and remains a very difficult man.’
‘You look like you might have a few hang-ups of your own?’ She stopped what she was doing and pinned him with her gaze
‘Thanks for noticing,’ he said suavely.
‘Don’t feel bad about it. I have them as well. So name one.’
‘I don’t trust beautiful women.’
Her stomach did a little flip. He could say that yet it was as if he had reached out and kissed her. ‘Never in this world?’ Somehow she managed a smile.
‘No.’ Slowly he shook his head, not breaking the eye contact.
‘Wow!’ The expression on her face was both satirical and amused. ‘We’re going to have lots to talk about. I don’t trust handsome men.’
‘I understood your ex-husband adored you?’ Now that was definitely a challenge.
‘We had different ideas about what being ‘adored’ meant. I think you actually did adore your mother?’
His eyes turned as turbulent as a stormy sea. ‘We both did. Jay and I. Seen from our point of view her leaving was an abandonment.’
‘But you see her now?’ she asked, fully expecting the answer to be yes.
He picked up three lemons and juggled them in his sure hands. ‘Not for many years,’ he said and returned the lemons to the bowl. ‘Close on fifteen.’
‘Good grief!’ She didn’t hide her surprise. ‘So you haven’t seen her since you were a boy?’ She wondered how that could have been allowed to happen.
He held aloof. ‘That’s right, Mrs Hamilton.’ He focused on watching her move around the kitchen. She was very efficient in her movements. In fact she was perfectly at home in a kitchen when he had been too ready to think she was the quintessential hothouse flower who lay about gracefully while someone else did the work.
‘Allegra,’ she corrected, speaking sharply because he was unnerving her and he knew it. ‘Sorry, I don’t care for Mrs Hamilton,’ she said more calmly. ‘You don’t feel motivated to find her?’
He didn’t hesitate. ‘No. But I know where she is.’
She had to suck air into her lungs. ‘You make it sound like the outer reaches of the galaxy.’
‘Might as well be.’ Rory had to steady himself, too, unwilling for her to see just how much the old trauma still hurt. ‘It’s a long, hard road back from betrayal, Allegra.’ He placed mocking emphasis on her name.
She studied his handsome, brooding face for a moment. ‘Isn’t it strange how we punish the ones we love? You’re absolutely sure you know the reason? She must have been desperately unhappy?’
He took so long to answer she thought he was going to ignore her question. ‘That’s there under the abandonment,’ he conceded. ‘I guess she was unhappy. For a while at least.’ He put a mocking hand to his heart, his luminous eyes dangerously bright. ‘She remarried a couple of years later.’
‘Life goes on.’ She shrugged. ‘So did my