ALISON ROBERTS lives in Christchurch, New Zealand. She began her working career as a primary school teacher, but now juggles available working hours between writing and active duty as an ambulance officer. Throwing in a large dose of parenting, housework, gardening and pet-minding keeps life busy, and teenage daughter Becky is responsible for an increasing number of days spent on equestrian pursuits. Finding time for everything can be a challenge, but the rewards make the effort more than worthwhile.

       CHAPTER ONE

      THIS was…weird.

      As though reality had become a dream. Of course, Wallaby Island usually had that effect on new arrivals. The largest of a collection of tropical islands off the coast of North Australia, it was a picture-perfect mound of exotic rainforest greenery, bordered by white sandy beaches, surrounded by a warm turquoise ocean and almost always bathed in brilliant sunshine.

      Susie Jackson was not a new arrival, however. This environment was reality for her and the anticipation created by watching the privately chartered seaplane come in for a smooth landing and taxi to the pontoon at the end of the jetty was due purely to an empathy with the young girl standing by her side. Pressed close enough for the tremor to feel like her own. She tightened the arm around the girl’s shoulders with a quick, reassuring hug.

      Figures emerged from the small aircraft. The pilot stayed to secure the mooring and it was a single figure who began to walk down the timber slats of the narrow jetty.

      That was when it happened.

      When the edges of reality began to blur.

      So much for the generic ‘parent’ figure she had expected to greet. Any last-minute words of encouragement for the girl beside her died on Susie’s lips and she could only stare as the man striding towards them turned the jetty into a catwalk.

      Modelling the latest Armani suit, perhaps, with an appropriate aura of elegance and power. Beautifully tailored dark trousers. A dark tie that had been loosened and a pristine white shirt with the top button undone. The suit jacket slung carelessly over one arm and a slim, black briefcase dangling from that hand. A mobile phone was in his other hand, held to his ear.

      Was it the way he was walking? A mixture of casual grace but purpose with an unmistakable air of being very accustomed to attracting a spotlight. Demanding it, almost.

      OK, maybe the man was a highly acclaimed neurosurgeon from Sydney and maybe he was a key figure in tomorrow’s opening ceremony because he had donated enough money to help make the new, fabulous medical facilities on Wallaby Island a possibility in the wake of Cyclone Willie, which had devastated the area six months ago, but this wasn’t about him right now, was it?

      It was about Stella. The girl nervously standing beside her. Without the aid of her crutches. Waiting for the most important person in her life to applaud what was, quite literally, a huge step forward.

      The nerves were contagious. Or maybe it was a trickle of apprehension