Outback Angel. Margaret Way
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hair, glossy as a magpie’s wing. Even thinking about it drew all the blood into his loins. But he didn’t know a single girl with large lustrous dark eyes and a beautiful soft body that drew a man like a magnet. At one point he thought he had actually seen her someplace. Somewhere outside his dreams. Then he decided she was simply a figment of his imagination.
Stacy was waiting for him the moment he set foot in the homestead. Even after all these years she still had the capacity to surprise him. She was sitting cross-legged on the parqueted floor, flanked by the two coal-black Labradors, Juno and Jupiter, tails thumping in an ecstasy of greeting.
“What on earth are you doing down there?” He braced himself as the dogs bounded towards him.
Stacy smiled sweetly and shrugged. “Why not? It’s nice and cool. Besides I’ve never felt comfortable in those chairs.” She nodded at two very imposing and valuable antique carved mahogany hall chairs with sphinx-like figures for arms. At forty Stacy was in great shape. She still looked like a girl, with her fair hair and skin and large cloudy blue eyes. She’d lived a lifetime of constantly trying to please, but somehow she didn’t show the burden of endless stress.
Arrested development, one of the acerbic McCord aunts had observed. No one in the extended family could ever work out why the high-handed, difficult and demanding Clive had married such a consistently shy and ineffectual little thing. Stacy wasn’t considered interesting or exciting at all. Why, she couldn’t be more different to the beautiful, vivid Roxanne whom everyone had adored and greatly mourned.
Now Stacy stood up, swaying a little because she had pins and needles in her left foot, a neat figure in her cotton shirt and jeans, the great crystal waterfall that was the hall chandelier putting highlights into her short cap of fair hair.
“Isobel called,” she announced, as though conducting a conversation with his dynamo of a cousin had left her vaguely distraught.
“Oh?” At this time of year Isobel’s business was running full-tilt, but she had come to his rescue yet again. Isobel, married to a well-known Federal M.P. was particularly sensitive to his plight. Kinder than most of the McCord clan, even Isobel found Stacy’s lack of social and organization skills extremely unfortunate.
“So what did she want?” he prompted as Stacy seemed to have come to the end of her speech.
“Malcolm had a sick turn in the P.M.’s office.” She said it like it was the high point of Malcolm’s career. “He’s going into hospital in the morning so they can run a few tests.”
“Oh, Lord, I’ll have to call her.” He ran a hand through his thick hair, dismayed on two counts. He really liked Malcolm, and this could put paid to the up-coming Coori festivities. “Maybe exhaustion,” he mused, hopefully. “Malcolm works harder than most.”
“I didn’t know any of them really worked,” said Stacy who had no insight into a busy politician’s life at all. “But I’m sorry about Malcolm. He’s one of the few to never be nasty to me. And they’re such a compatible couple.”
“I guess some marriages have to work out,” he offered distractedly, his mind ticking over. Even his rock-solid cousin would be a mess if anything was really wrong with Malcolm, God forbid. And it would put paid to Isobel’s indispensable services. Maybe he would have to turn to Dinah, after all. She’d really love that.
“What if Isobel can’t handle our functions?” Stacy asked thoughtfully, not considering for a minute she should have a go. “You might have to fall back on Dinah. I hope you don’t have to.” She cast him a quick look. “Isobel flusters me, I almost have to run to catch up with her, but Dinah makes me feel an utter fool.”
“Why don’t you tell her off?” he suggested briskly, no longer embarrassed by his stepmother’s inadequacies. “That might give both of you a good shake-up. Eventually, Dinah might even stop.”
“But she’s your friend!” Stacy stared at him incredulously, as if somehow that gave Dinah free rein. “I’m not game to say a word to her,” she confessed, thinking even Dinah’s smile had a sneer in it. “I must be such a disappointment to you, Jake.” Stacy brushed her wispy fringe from her forehead. “I was certainly cut from a different cloth than the likes of Isobel and Dinah.”
Wasn’t that the truth! From his childhood his role had been to be supportive of Stacy. Even now Stacy couldn’t speak his mother’s name, though he had often caught her staring up at Roxanne’s portrait. Roxanne, who even as a young bride had handled the role of mistress of a great historic station with brilliant aplomb.
“From all McCord accounts an imbecile.” From nowhere tears suddenly rolled down Stacy’s cheeks, though he knew from long experience anything could trigger them.
After all these years it didn’t break him up. “Cut it out now,” he braced her automatically, feeling it would be wise to get Gillian started on some course or other. He didn’t want his half sister feeling such confusion about herself and her life. “Organising and running functions isn’t the only thing in the world.” The Lord is my strength and my shield, he thought wryly. He had been relying on Isobel to get them through.
“I’m really, really sorry, Jake.” Stacy’s tears stopped on the instant. It was taking time for her to remember with his father gone there was nothing to fear.
“Don’t worry, we’ll manage,” Jake reassured her.
Stacy sighed with relief. Nothing ever rattles him, she thought gratefully, looking up into her stepson’s dynamic face. Even terrible things. She supposed that was keeping up the McCord tradition, when the McCord tradition had beaten her down. As often happened, she had the sense of looking at his mother. The beautiful young woman her husband had never forgotten. Jake had the same glorious tawny colouring. The thick, thick, wavy hair, amber, streaked with gold. Roxanne, in the portrait, had great coils of it. Jake’s was a lion’s mane. They both had amber eyes to match, which were spectacularly beautiful, full of sparkle and life. The passionate nature of mother and son showed in the vitality of their expressions, the cut of the beautifully defined sensuous mouths. Mouths you couldn’t look away from. Jake was tall, as had been Roxanne. At six-three, even taller than his father, young-man lean, wide shoulders narrowing to a trim waist, long taut flanks. He was superbly fit from his hard outdoor life. Jake was a wonderful-looking young man, exotic in his tawny splendour. His mother, Roxanne, had been incandescent in her beauty. Even dead, she’s more alive than I am, Stacy thought ironically. She was quite quite certain she would never have survived living with Clive McCord if it weren’t for his son.
Malcolm as it turned out required surgery. An ultrasound confirmed he would have to have his gall bladder removed. It would be keyhole surgery with a minimum recovery time, but his devoted wife couldn’t think of leaving him. Isobel apologised to Jake twice. Jake said not to worry. But even then, worried Isobel took charge. By midmorning of the next day she left a message that she had found someone she thought would be perfect to take over her job. A wonderful young woman she had taken under her wing, with a background in fine food. Her parents owned and ran a prizewinning restaurant. Her protégée was a food writer with the up-market magazine, Cosima, sometimes she guested for other highly regarded magazines. She wasn’t a chef as such, but a darn good cook—she had helped Isobel with several important functions. Isobel could highly recommend her. The paragon whose name was Angelica De Campo, would ring Jake that very night. If he liked the sound of her, the deal could be stitched up. There was little time to lose.
Jake received all this information when he returned to the homestead at sundown. He started to relax as his worries began to fall off him. Isobel wouldn’t recommend anyone she didn’t have the utmost faith in. He was at his desk in the study looking over an industry report when Miss De Campo’s call came through.
“Mr. McCord?”
Her voice was so mellifluous, so much like honey, he actually slumped back in his leather chair, feeling a delicious lick of it on his tongue. “Miss De Campo. How good of you to call.” He on the other hand sounded quite sardonic. Sometimes, he thought ruefully, he even sounded like his father,