CONTENTS

      CHAPTER ONE

      CHAPTER TWO

      CHAPTER THREE

      CHAPTER FOUR

      CHAPTER FIVE

      CHAPTER SIX

      CHAPTER SEVEN

      CHAPTER EIGHT

      CHAPTER NINE

      CHAPTER TEN

      CHAPTER ELEVEN

      CHAPTER ONE

      THE marital order in Bay Beach was thoroughly satisfactory for all concerned. Matt was marrying Charlotte. Erin, with her five unwanted children, was happily single.

      Then the twins’ bomb exploded.

      Matt McKay was one of Australia’s best known cattle breeders. He was also running late, but he wasn’t so late that Charlotte would be annoyed. He’d been paying a visit to a friend in hospital. Now he was headed to Charlotte’s for dinner.

      He was also headed for commitment.

      Well, why not? Charlotte was beautiful, immaculately groomed and extremely pleasant company. She understood his farming needs. Acclaimed as the best hostess in the district, she’d been loyal to Matt for almost twenty years.

      Back in Bay Beach hospital, Matt’s friend, Nick Daniels, was recovering nicely from his appendix operation. Matt had left him comfortably settled, Nick’s wife and children pandering to his every whim.

      The visit had made Matt think. Life should include pandering, he’d decided. He’d avoided it so far, but it was hard not to feel jealous of Nick’s domestic bliss. Despite his lost appendix, Nick couldn’t be more content.

      Which was why Matt had detoured via the jewellers.

      Something schmaltzy came onto the radio—something about love and snow-white hair and faithfulness forever. Matt glanced down at the velvet box tucked into his map compartment, and he pushed away the last of his qualms. Marriage to Charlotte…

      It had always seemed logical, and maybe that’s why he’d taken so long to get around to asking. He’d had a few flings in his youth, but Charlotte was always calmly waiting for him to return from what she teasingly called his nonsense. Ten years ago her possessiveness had driven him nuts. But now… Maybe she was right. Maybe they were suited.

      And he wouldn’t mind a kid or two.

      Nick was managing fatherhood beautifully, Matt decided, thinking of the family group he’d left at the hospital. With two gorgeous kids and another on the way, Nick and Shanni were blissfully happy.

      Could he and Charlotte be the same?

      Would Charlotte even want children? Charlotte wasn’t a baby sort of person, but if she could produce little Charlottes… Children who were neat and practical and knew what was right…

      That might be a problem. He wouldn’t mind a bit of spirit in any child he had. He grinned to himself, acknowledging that he hadn’t been a childhood angel. In fact he’d driven his mother to distraction.

      But kids were a fifty-fifty gene split. He’d spent most of his childhood with his father, and if Charlotte thought she could breed children who’d wipe their feet and read their story books quietly, then maybe he could persuade her to give parenthood a try.

      They could be hers indoors and his outdoors—which would be a childhood just like his had been.

      So…

      So tonight he’d finally ask her to marry him, he decided, as he drove Charlotte-wards. After all, it was an excellent night.

      Apart from a bomb waiting in the wings…

      And at Home Number Three of Bay Beach Orphanage, things were also excellent.

      Erin Douglas, Home Mother, had all her charges in bed by eight, which was no mean feat.

      The baby, Marigold, had gone out like a light, bless her. She was showing every sign that she’d make her adoptive parents blissfully happy.

      Five year old Tess and eight year old Michael, a brother and sister who’d been placed in the Home while their mother was ill, had gone to sleep on cue. No problems there.

      And—amazingly—the twins had gone meekly to bed when told. When she’d checked ten minutes ago, they had their eyes closed and seemed out for the count.

      This was truly amazing!

      It was worth a glass of wine to celebrate, Erin decided. There weren’t too many nights in a house mother’s life when all her charges went to sleep this early, and it never happened when she had the twins.

      Her hand stilled on the refrigerator door, survival instincts surfacing. It was almost too good to be true, she thought, and her well-honed nose smelled a rat. She tiptoed to the twins’ bedroom yet again, and opened the door a crack.

      But her instincts seemed wrong. They looked beautifully asleep.

      How could she doubt them? she wondered as she gazed down at their intently sleeping countenances. How could anyone doubt them?

      At seven years old, Henry and William were gorgeous. They had bright, curly, carrot-red hair, smatterings of freckles on their cute, snub noses, and a look on their faces that said they were the work of angels.

      That look, Erin knew to her cost, was entirely misleading. There was a solid reason they were in care. Their mother couldn’t control them, and by the time they were four, with no husband and seven other children to look after, she’d abused them unmercifully and then simply abandoned them to foster care.

      That hadn’t worked either. Up until now, no foster parents could cope with their trouble-making, and after each effort to find them a home, back they’d come to the orphanage every time. If