An Outback Affair/Runaway Wife/Outback Bridegroom/Outback Surrender/Home To Eden (40 page)

“How do you continue to love him when he leaves you
out in the emotional cold?” he asked with a rush of impatience.

She stiffened slightly.

“Don't go away.” His hand soothed her.

“My parents continue to suffer, Brock,” she pointed out, her body relaxing. “They don't need me to hate them.”

“Which makes you a little saint?” His tone was dry.

“I didn't say I don't have my bad days when I'm faced with the question: What am I doing staying around, working so hard?” she retorted. “It's such a struggle, yet no one seems to care. Far from being a saint—and I know you're having a go at me—I have an underlying anger at the way I'm treated. But I guess the bottom line is I'll never abandon my family.”

“Surely you'll marry?” he asked crisply. “One wonders why some enterprising guy—which automatically excludes my cousin—hasn't swept you off your feet already?”

“Perhaps he'd recognise I come with too much baggage to allow for any real development,” she suggested, straightening before she found herself lying against his chest.

“I saw Philip's face tonight. I'd say he was very much in love with you. Just seeing you with me blew him apart.”

She was desperately aware of his closeness, his arm lying along the park bench just behind her shoulders, the glimmer of his pale shirt, the male scent of him. “I can't help the fact Philip has formed an attachment. Ours is a relatively small community and he's partnered me at dances. We see one another at every social occasion. We talk a lot. But, I repeat, there's no love affair that I'm aware of.”

“You'd better tell him that,” he said bluntly.

“Anyway, his mother thinks he should drop me. I'm not good enough.” She said it with a trace of black humour.

“Then she's got very poor judgement. Say, you're shivering. Are you cold?”

She rubbed her bare arms. They were faintly chilled by the desert breeze. “When we start walking I'll warm up. This blouse is quite sheer.”

“Just the sort of blouse I like.” His voice was a deep purr. “Listen, I'm sorry I don't have anything to put around your shoulders. Except my arm, of course. So come along, Shelley.” He stood up, extended his hand. “We'll make our way back to the pub.”

The friendly gallantry should have worked. They should have gone on their way with nothing sexual to complicate the evening. Only that never happened. Brock was a man on the edge, his hard desire for this spirited little redhead spiralling.

Even the wind was his co-conspirator. Gradually it had increased in strength, becoming a whirling force. It began to tug at her hair. Though she immediately put up her hand it had no difficulty loosening the pins that held the glittery loops in place. It slid and uncoiled through her fingers.

He hadn't reckoned on this, so he wasn't really to blame, was he? Her ability to move him, to capture his attention when he knew he should disengage, quite simply overrode his best intentions. He didn't need or want involvement, but the sight of her with her arms behind her head, tussling with her beautiful long windblown hair, her slender body in a spin in an effort to throw off curling skeins that lashed her face with silk, played on his erotic imagination, giving him immense pleasure.

Her laughter was so young, so carefree, like ripples of silver. Surely it summoned any red-blooded man to pull her into his arms?

A tremble ran down his strong forearms. He imagined her in his embrace even before she was there. There was no question of pausing, of caution, or even catching his breath. He gave his passionate nature full rein, taking small comfort in the fact that he hadn't planned any of it. This was a means to assuage his sick hunger, the griefs that could destroy him.

Heart torn, he hauled her to him so it was impossible for her to escape, stopping her laughing mouth with his own, feeling the impact run through his body like flame. For an instant her soft lips didn't move beneath his—he'd shocked
her—but he parted them with his tongue, whispering her name into her open mouth.

“Shelley!” It was a marvellous feeling. The child he had known the whole of her life had turned into a beguiling woman. A woman with enough power to bewitch him.

“What are you doing, Brock?” Shelley gasped, overcome by sensation. Even the moon and stars faded to nothing. There was only his body, his hands, his mouth. His physical presence so familiar to her, yet totally foreign.

“Kissing you,” he muttered, struggling with the torment to go further. He should stop, but he couldn't. Not from the moment he found her lips.

Only she was so unprepared for it. “Wait.” She put a hand to his chest.

“Wait what? Am I going too fast for you?”

She ought to say, yes, but the mounting forces seemed colossal.

He pulled her back to him, drinking her in like a draught of wine.

She sounded a tiny bit frightened. A man could never assume anything and he was carrying her along too fast. But the male drive to know the female was vibrating through him, subduing her to the extent she seemed at a loss to stop him.

He held her face up to his, his tongue plunging deeper, drinking her in like a draught of wine. Heat sizzled along his veins like a fever, but it was a fever he was eager to suffer.

She was so beautiful. So sensitive. So right. He wanted to lift her. Carry her away. Show her what lovemaking was all about.

His hand moved to the porcelain skin of her throat, where a pulse beat so full and fast it betrayed her. Her delicate neck was flushed with agitation and excitement. His hands were frantic to move lower, to take full possession of her breasts, to find the rosebud nipples swollen in arousal. He forced them to stay where they were, when they wanted to
range over her body, stroke naked skin. In a moment he would go too dangerously far when all he'd meant to do was walk her back to the hotel and the safety of her own bed.

This was Shelley Logan he was plying with fierce, insistent kisses and caresses. Had he forgotten? Her body was rippling now, at his every stroke. She was panting a little, leaning into him, her beautiful hair all over her face, his face. He could inhale its clean scent. He knew he had only to apply a little more pressure, but a kind of purity attended her.

He released her so abruptly Shelley was obliged to make a grab for his shirt.

“Brock!” She held tight to him, disoriented, genuinely worried for a moment that she might faint. She didn't feel solid at all, but floating. Every part of her he had touched was scintillating, aglow.

“I didn't mean that to happen.” His own speech was rough with emotion.

“I never dreamed you did.” This was far beyond anything she had experienced before.

“But you wanted me to.”

“Did I?” She pressed a hand to her breast. Her heart was beating crazily. “I thought you were going to kiss me until morning.”

“Believe me, I want to,” he said edgily. “But I had to decide against it.”

She tried hard to adjust to his abrupt change of mood. “Would it be too much to ask why?”

“You want the truth?” He stared down at her with intensity. “You're simply too sweet, too soft, too succulent. And I'm too hungry. I couldn't have it ending in tears.”

In brief seconds Shelley found the strength to stand clear of his lean, powerful body. “You won't be getting any tears from me, Brock,” she said, putting a lot of fire into it. “Your innumerable conquests have gone to your head. It's
not the first time you've kissed me, anyway, and I've managed to survive.”

“Well, was that better or worse than the last time?” He took a step towards her, but she took a corresponding step back.

“Let's say it was marginally better than shaking hands.”

“That's why you couldn't stand by yourself for a few moments?” he taunted. “I don't want to upset you, but now's not the time to run off the rails—even if I'd like nothing more. My future is under threat.”

“Not from me,” she rejoined.

He gave a wince. “That was as sharp as a slap.”

“You deserved it!” Finally she managed to subdue her hair. “Let's forget about it, shall we? I know I can.”

His laugh was mocking. “Don't get mortally offended, but I don't think you'll find it as easy as all that.”

“Won't I?” She put out a flat hand and pushed him in the chest. “I'm a very disciplined person, Brock Tyson, you devil.”

“Really? A devil?” He locked his fingers around her wrist. “Think about it. I could have taken that further.”

“I bet you do that a lot!”

“Well, tonight I just couldn't handle it.” He spoke with so much self-mockery she blushed. “Have you any idea how beautiful you are?”

This was a man who could melt a woman without laying a hand on her. “You're the one having difficulties, not me,” she countered. “Are you going to let go of me?”

“No.” He raised her hand lingeringly to his mouth. “But I am going to walk you back safely to the pub. Isn't that the decent thing?”

“Next you're going to tell me I'm different to every other girl you've ever met,” she said tartly.

“Well, of course you are.” He sounded amused. “You're the only girl I've ever kissed who doesn't keep her eyes closed.”

S
HELLEY
drove right up to the front steps of the homestead, trying to forget just how long and hot the trip had been. Her big concern on the journey had been dust storms. They were inevitable in a time of drought, when the wind picked up the Interior's precious top soil and dumped millions of tonnes of it a thousand miles away in the ocean. She'd lived through quite a few dust storms, some of considerable severity. They desperately needed rain, but though the whole Outback prayed, they weren't getting any. The skies above her were a hard enamelled cobalt with not a single cloud on the horizon.

If it hadn't been for the permanent waterholes and billabongs on the station she'd have had to toss the whole idea of running Outback Adventures out of the window. The bores served their purpose, but in the Dry they sent fountains of near boiling water high into the air.

She wished there was someone there to help unload. There was no use hoping Amanda would help her. Amanda—and she was seriously disgusted with her sister about this—was bone-lazy. In the heat she acted like wax to a flame. It was a real con too, the way Amanda always complained of her bad back and her fears of hurting it.

Amanda found any way there was of avoiding physical toil, though she spent extravagant amounts of time lying around waiting for life to happen. She didn't in fact get out of bed before ten. She wrote songs. Some were good. She played the piano and guitar, both well. Shelley herself had never qualified for music lessons.

“Why do you ask when you know money's tight?” her father had always said, turning away as though he couldn't
bear to look at her too long. As if all she evoked was memories of her twin.

Well, at least she'd had one heck of an experience last night. A blazing bonfire of the senses. Brock Tyson was dangerous, his sexual prowess legendary. If she hadn't been certain of it before, she was now.

And what of Philip? Philip had gone out of his way to suggest there was a romance between them. She would have said he had seemed driven to do it, probably for Brock's benefit, just to let his cousin know she was taken. Not that Brock had taken the slightest heed of the warning, if that was what it had been. It might even have been an act of sheer devilment.

The fact remained that everything was different now—a violent shift in their relationship. Not that she'd ever been one of Brock Tyson's girls. She'd still been a student, years younger than him. And now he had to go and pique her by telling her he wasn't looking for involvement. The cheek of him!

Yet she'd spent the whole night tossing and turning, reliving the unprecedented excitement of his performance and her humiliating response. That was black magic… She had imagined he had come to her, bent over her, his arms curving beneath her body. He was the lover she wanted.

She was out of her mind!

Her head, her heart, her blood and nerves were still tingling from the rain of kisses, though a full ten hours had gone by and she was back in her world, with its massive ongoing problems.

They'd said little to each other on the short journey back to the hotel, walking in a fraught silence, but she'd wished the moonlit road would stretch forever. Brock had told her he'd be leaving very early in the morning but that he would take up her offer to visit Wybourne some time. That was if she could clear it with her father. He'd laughed a little as he said it, radiant energy coming off him like rays of the sun.

For reasons of his own her father had taken to Philip.
Philip always took good care to be very respectful around her father. Brock was someone else again, proud and spirited. He would never play-act a deference he didn't feel. Philip, on the other hand was the definitive “yes” man.

There had always been a lot of drama around Brock Tyson. Lots of sparks. Brock, unlike Philip, had always been ready for anything, but—as the whole community had acknowledged—full of generous emotions. Certainly her father, a hot-hearted man for all his griefs, had had a fierce dislike of Rex Kingsley and his brutal ways with his high-mettled, headstrong grandson.

Shelley knew in her bones she would be in terrible trouble if she ever allowed herself to fall in love with Brock. It would be as easy to tame him as tame an eagle.

She was halfway through unloading the vehicle when Amanda, shoeless, and in a pretty pink ruffled sundress she'd made herself, appeared on the verandah.

“Home again, are you?” she called blithely, leaning on the wrought-iron balustrade. “Good trip?”

“You're joking! It was as hot as Hades, bouncing over the tracks.”

“Someone's got to do it,” Amanda said breezily. “But I finished up those letters you asked me to do.”

“Thank you.” Shelley's tone was dry. “They must have taken a long time.” Maybe twenty minutes.

“Aren't you a good little girl, doing all that yourself?” Amanda observed, quite willing for Shelley to have all the credit.

“Why don't you give me a hand?” Shelley hung a few bags over her hand and walked up the short flight of steps to the wide verandah, with its planter chairs set at intervals.

“Later.” Amanda waved, drained by the heat. She flopped into a chair. “Let's have a little talk first. Gosh, isn't it hot? I don't suppose you brought back any diet cola?”

“I did, as a matter of fact. Especially for you.” Shelley deposited her last load.

“Gee, thanks.”

“Don't expect me to haul it up for you.”

“Dad will do it when he returns,” Amanda said carelessly.

“Where is he?”

“Shifting some of the cattle. Now…first things first. Your boyfriend was onto us first thing this morning. He had a very interesting tale to tell.”

“Who's my boyfriend supposed to be?” Shelley asked, already knowing the answer. The whole family had been pushing her friendship with Philip Kingsley. If it came to anything it would make things easier for them appeared to be the reasoning.

“Ho-ho, little joke. Phil, of course. If you take my advice—”

“I won't.”

“Don't let him get away. Just how many guys are filthy rich
and
good-looking and, more importantly, interested in you?”

“I could name a few wealthy men around here.” Shelley started to reel off some names.

“Most of 'em are married.” Amanda groaned, thinking she would never get over Mitch Claydon, who had recently wed his childhood sweetheart, Christine Reardon. Okay, Christine was beautiful, but she was six feet tall. At five-six Amanda considered herself just right.

Exhausted, Shelley fell into a rattan armchair opposite her sister, fanning herself vigorously with her cream akubra. “And what did dear Philip have to say?”

Amanda took her time to answer, her eyes focused on her sister's face. After a lifetime she still didn't understand how her sister retained that perfectly beautiful skin while she, a honey-blonde, was always smothering her face in sunblock. Even so she couldn't prevent the tiny coating of freckles across her nose. It just wasn't fair.

“So Brock Tyson is back?” Amanda gave her sister a sharp, searching look.

“His grandfather wanted him home,” Shelley said quietly, hoping she hadn't blushed at the mere mention of his name.

“Then Mr Kingsley must be dying?” Amanda didn't sound upset.

“Didn't Philip tell you that?”

“No way! He just said his grandfather wasn't enjoying his usual good health.”

“Why doesn't he say things the way they are? That's Philip and his mother all over. They're so secretive it's a little paranoid. Rex Kingsley is dying.”

“All right. No need to get huffy. The really big surprise was that you actually had dinner with Brock!”

“So I did.” Shelley had a job keeping her tone normal.

“Anything else?” Amanda stared at her.

“What's that supposed to mean?”

Amanda gave a derisive snort. “I'm your sister, remember? At sixteen you had a giant crush on Brock Tyson.”

“I wasn't the only one. He was and remains fascinating.”

“But trouble. He just threw all his chances away.”

“What chances? He's Kingsley's grandson, for God's sake. Surely that means something—blood?”

“Not to that old tyrant. He's dreadful. The male counterpart to the late Mrs Ruth McQueen, God rest her troubled soul. I bet she's queening it over Hades. These old patriarchs and matriarchs! They had too much land. Too much power. Too much money. It must be true that power corrupts. What's Brock look like these days? Wasn't he sexy?”

“I wouldn't worry about whether he's lost any of it,” Shelley said dryly. “He was always very handsome, very bold. Nowadays he has a real presence about him.”

“Let's call it arrogance. I remember him as arrogant.” And he'd never taken any notice of Amanda, which rubbed salt into her wounded ego.

“Maybe. He's certainly very self-assured, with those remarkable light eyes.”

“They must be a legacy from the runaway dad,” Amanda
commented. “No wonder old Kingsley hates him. Every time he looks at Brock it must remind him of the father.”

“Probably,” Shelley conceded. “Yet Brock has a look of his grandfather. The chiselled features, the height. Rex Kingsley is a very imposing-looking man.”

“But dreadful. So that's it? You had dinner?” Amanda leaned over and seized her younger sister's hand.

“What were you expecting? An orgy?” For such an indolent young woman Amanda had a bone-cracking grip.

“Not with you!” Amanda gave a patronising curl of the lip. “All the guys know you don't put out.”

“Whereas you do. You've got yourself a bit of a reputation there, Mandy.” Shelley sighed.

“Don't be so sanctimonious,” Amanda snapped. “I'm not worried about that at all.”

“Maybe you ought to be.” Shelley shrugged.

“You just had to say that, didn't you?” The colour in Amanda's pink cheeks darkened.

“I care about you, Mandy. You're my sister. It might be better if you played a little harder to get.”

“You're saying that because Mitch Claydon dumped me.” Her whole body burned with the terrible memory of the day Mitch had told her in no uncertain terms to get lost.

“He didn't dump you, Amanda,” Shelley said, hoping her sister would think straight. “You should stop talking like that. Mitch was never serious about you. There's only one woman in his life and that's Christine. She's a lovely person. She's my friend.”

“Puh-lease!” Amanda groaned, touching her temple as though the pain there was excruciating. “Say no more about her. I've already forgotten about Mitch Claydon.”

“That's good to know, now he's married.”

“When will you see Brock again?” Amanda frowned. She appeared to be tossing up ideas in her head. Shelley could almost see them simmering. “If he's sticking around I might turn my attention to him. You've got Philip safely hooked. It's about time I settled down. I'm the wrong side
of twenty-five. I'm pretty, I'm bright, I'm talented.” A faint look of torment was on her face.

“Don't worry, Mandy,” Shelley suggested, suddenly sorry for her sister. “The right man will come along. You just have to take it easier. But please don't go around telling people Philip and I are an item. We're not. I don't want to mislead people, least of all Philip, and you're a great one for spreading gossip.” She should have said making mischief. Amanda was stuck with that label as well.

“Listen, do you want to enjoy the finer things of life, or are you dead set on killing yourself with work?” Amanda retaliated. “Mum and Dad are going to grieve for Sean forever. You could die of hard work and they wouldn't pay any attention. Why don't you listen, you silly girl? If Philip Kingsley asks you to marry him—and you could get him to if you gave him a bit more encouragement—say yes. Yes, yes,
yes.
At least he gives a damn about you. It would be better for the family as well. I know a few guys are interested in you, but Phil's your best option. Keep playing hard to get and he might start looking at someone else.”

“He's welcome to,” Shelley said. “I might be trying to help my family at the moment, but I'm not going to commit suicide for you. Getting mixed up with Philip and Frances would be as good as killing myself.”

“How melodramatic!” Amanda pulled a face.

“I don't think so. People can make very bad decisions in life that have serious consequences. Marrying for love is one thing, even if at some stage the love runs out, but marrying for convenience would do me and my self-esteem a lasting injury. One can't love to order, Mandy.”

“Oh, grow up!” Amanda cried in frustration, finding her sister and her principles extreme. “You don't have to be in love with him to make a go of it.” Amanda frowned at the burning blue sky. “That's not the important thing when you're considering a good marriage. What a woman looks for is security. A guy who's going to look after her, provide her with the good things in life. It's better that Philip cares
more about you than you care for him. It gives a girl bargaining power. Besides, Phil's a nice guy. Okay, he's a bit intense but he's good-looking—or he would be if he'd straighten his shoulders and lift his head. Spunky little you could make him do that. If Old Man Kingsley is dying Philip is ready to step into his shoes.”

“You don't really believe that, do you?” Shelley was starting to feel troubled by the conversation. She really wasn't comfortable with this family push towards Philip, though she'd gone along with the friendship because it had seemed to please her parents.

“What I meant was Philip will inherit,” Amanda explained patiently, confirming Shelley's fears. “Do you realize what that means? He'll come into a fortune.”

Shelley shook her glowing head. In the heat damp little tendrils were clinging to her cheeks and forehead, giving her the look of a cherub always associated with the Logan twins. “Philip will never run Kingsley Holdings,” Shelley said. “He works very hard, I know, but he doesn't seem to have it in him to get results. He's not a natural-born leader. He's not good with the men. I'm better myself with our own staff. Our little team pulls together and it's mostly for me. Philip lacks authority. The trouble is he's never been his own man.”