Книга - In Her Husband’s Image

In Her Husband's Image
Vivienne Wallington








Rachel felt as if she’d come face-to-face with the ghost of her dead husband!


Only it was no ghost. It was a solid, flesh-and-blood male. A male with the same handsome, square-jawed face, the same piercing gray eyes, the same whip-hard, broad-shouldered frame, the same unruly dark hair and deeply bronzed skin.

The same man, she realized in shock, who’d fooled her five years ago, to her eternal shame, who’d made her feel things she’d never felt before or since, who’d haunted her dreams and tormented her waking hours for the past five years.

Zac Hammond, her late husband’s identical twin brother. The brother she’d met only one time, on that fateful night, and saw again every time she looked at her son.


Dear Reader,

Well, it’s that time of year again—and if those beautiful buds of April are any indication, you’re in the mood for love! And what better way to sustain that mood than with our latest six Special Edition novels? We open the month with the latest installment of Sherryl Woods’s MILLION DOLLAR DESTINIES series, Priceless. When a pediatric oncologist who deals with life and death on a daily basis meets a sick child’s football hero, she thinks said hero can make the little boy’s dreams come true. But little does she know that he can make hers a reality, as well! Don’t miss this compelling story….

MERLYN COUNTY MIDWIVES continues with Maureen Child’s Forever…Again, in which a man who doesn’t believe in second chances has a change of mind—not to mention heart—when he meets the beautiful new public relations guru at the midwifery clinic. In Cattleman’s Heart by Lois Faye Dyer, a businesswoman assigned to help a struggling rancher finds that business is the last thing on her mind when she sees the shirtless cowboy meandering toward her! And Susan Mallery’s popular DESERT ROGUES are back! In The Sheik & the Princess in Waiting, a woman learns that the man she loved in college has two secrets: 1) he’s a prince; and 2) they’re married! Next, can a pregnant earthy vegetarian chef find happiness with town’s resident playboy, an admitted carnivore…and father of her child? Find out in The Best of Both Worlds by Elissa Ambrose. And in Vivienne Wallington’s In Her Husband’s Image, a widow confronted with her late husband’s twin brother is forced to decide, as she looks in the eyes of her little boy, if some secrets are worth keeping.

So enjoy the beginnings of spring, and all six of these wonderful books! And don’t forget to come back next month for six new compelling reads from Silhouette Special Edition.

Happy reading!

Gail Chasan

Senior Editor




In Her Husband’s Image

Vivienne Wallington







www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)


For John




VIVIENNE WALLINGTON


lives in Melbourne, Australia. Previously a librarian and children’s writer, she now writes romance full-time. Reading, family and travel are her other main interests. She has written nineteen Harlequin Romance novels under the pseudonym Elizabeth Duke and now writes for Silhouette Books under her real name. Vivienne and her husband, John, have a daughter and son and five wonderful grandchildren. She would love to hear from readers, who can write to her c/o Silhouette Books, 233 Broadway, Suite 1001, New York, NY 10279 or e-mail viv.wallington@bigpond.com.




CAST OF CHARACTERS


Rachel Hammond: Her husband’s death had put her in charge of their family cattle station, Yarrah Downs, and she was determined to make it a success. But Zac, her handsome as sin and twice as tempting brother-in-law, kept intruding on her thougths….

Zac Hammond: In the wake of his brother’s death this nomadic photographer had finally come home and found Rachel, the one woman who made him yearn to settle down. But the flaxen-haired beauty was a forbidden desire.

Mikey Hammond: An adventuresome little boy sorely in need of a father figure…one he found in his uncle Zac. They shared the same wild streak—and love for Rachel. Little did they know their bond went even deeper than that.

The Saboteur: The nameless, faceless enemy bent on destroying Yarrah Downs. Rachel and Zac would stop at nothing to save the cattle station. If only they knew who it was they were fighting.




Contents


Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen




Chapter One


“Mummy, will you buy me a gun for my birfday? Then I can go out shooting wild pigs with Vince.”

Rachel nearly fell over. “Mikey, you’re only three years old—”

“I’ll be four in three more sleeps. Vince says I can’t go out shooting wif him till I get my own gun.”

Rachel silently cursed her head stockman for not telling her son outright that guns and wild-boar hunting were only for grown-ups. Maybe when Vince had children of his own, he’d have more sense. “He meant when you were grown up, Mikey. Only grown-ups can use guns. Come and help me feed the chickens. And let’s see how many eggs we can find.”

“Okay.” Mikey brightened and ran on ahead with Buster, his frisky Blue Heeler.

Rachel vowed to have a word with Vince the minute he returned from checking the water bores. She was already peeved with the sandy-haired stockman for not consulting her more on station matters and making decisions that were rightfully hers. She was in charge here at Yarrah Downs now that her husband was gone, not Vince.

But of course Vince didn’t expect her to stay on here. Nobody did. Widows with young children weren’t usually interested or capable of running outback cattle stations. Especially pampered city-born widows.

Rachel glowered into the dust. The lack of any good spring or summer rains and the continuing hot dry spell was the last straw. If they didn’t get some real rain soon, the already low dams would dry up, the parched paddocks would run out of feed and they’d be in even bigger trouble than they already were. A couple of brand-new water bores would help, but she simply couldn’t afford them.

As she trudged after Mikey, she heard a light plane coming in. Her father wouldn’t fly up here today, surely, three days before Mikey’s birthday. He would never stay at Yarrah Downs overnight, let alone for three nights. He hated the outback, and besides, he was always far too busy running Barrington’s.

Her frown deepened. Had he flown up here expressly to try again to talk her into selling and coming back to Sydney? Hedley Barrington never gave up!

She could hear him already. “This is no place for a woman without a husband, or a boy without a father. You can’t possibly run this huge, isolated place on your own, Rachel, now that Adrian’s gone. Nobody would expect you to.”

She kept telling him that she intended to try, that Yarrah Downs was her home, and Mikey’s, too. But she never got through.

“And what about Barrington’s? You’re my only child, Rachel. Running our chain of department stores is what you trained for and what I’ve always counted on. I won’t live forever—you lost your mother last year and I’m five years older than she was. I want you to come back and help me run Barrington’s so you’ll be ready to take over when I retire…or shuffle off altogether.”

“Dad, I belong here. I love it here. I feel free and at peace. I never felt like that back in Sydney. I felt stifled…suffocated…trapped in a life I didn’t want.”

“Rot! You always had everything you could possibly want and all the freedom you could need. I even let you go off and travel the world, on the understanding you’d come back when I needed you. I even let you marry that hick Queensland cattleman of yours against my better judgment. But he’s dead now. There’s no need for you to stay here any longer. I’m the one who needs you now.”

“But I want to stay. I’m going to stay. Out here in the bush I can breathe. I feel alive.”

“How can anyone breathe or feel alive in this heat? In these harsh conditions, without a husband to help you, how can you possibly survive? It won’t get any easier, taking on the sole responsibility yourself—it’ll get harder, the longer you stay. Don’t expect any help from me. I want you back home!”

Rachel kicked up the dust at her feet, shutting her mind to her father’s endless arguments. Was she about to hear them all over again?

“I’ll just go and see who it is,” she called out to Mikey. “You stay with Buster. You can start gathering eggs, but be careful with them!”

The sealed airstrip that Adrian had put in a year or so after Mikey was born and the light plane that had just arrived were out of sight from here. Maybe it wasn’t her father. Come to think of it, it hadn’t sounded like his Citation jet. Or any kind of jet. One of her neighbors, maybe? Or someone from the bank, heaven forbid! They’d already clamped down on her credit. What next? As if she didn’t have enough problems!

She cut across the yard, skirting around the sprawling ranch-style homestead with its shady, vine-covered veranda that still held humiliating memories she hadn’t been able to shake, even after all this time.

Her visitor should have had time by now to trudge up from the airstrip. She quickened her steps, weaving through the thick shrubbery and gum trees overhanging the garden path.

A man appeared. She stopped, her eyes drawn to his face. A whooshing sensation swept through her, as if the lifeblood was draining from her.

For a disorienting second, she felt as if she’d come face-to-face with the ghost of her dead husband!

Only, it was no ghost. It was solid, flesh-and-blood male. A male with the same handsome, square-jawed face, the same piercing gray eyes, the same whip-hard, broad-shouldered frame, the same unruly dark hair and deeply bronzed skin.

The same man, she realized in shock, who’d fooled her five years ago, to her eternal shame, who’d made her feel things she’d never felt before or since, who’d haunted her dreams and tormented her waking hours for the past five years, even as she’d tried to despise him, to blot out the shameful memory of him.

Zac Hammond, her late husband’s identical twin brother. The brother she’d met only that one time, on that one fateful night, and saw again every time she looked at her son, Mikey.

She began to tremble. “You’re a little late.” Her voice cracked, but attack seemed the only way to deal with this latest, totally unexpected bolt from the blue. “Your brother’s funeral was a month ago.”

Adrian’s lawyer had notified his absent twin brother of the tragedy, sending Zac word in plenty of time to attend the funeral if he’d wanted to come. When Zac had failed to turn up, she’d assumed he wasn’t coming back at all. And she’d been relieved. Relieved and irked and bitter and angry, all at the same time.

But mostly she’d been relieved. It was one less problem she would have to deal with. Facing him again, dealing with what his return home would mean…

“I was stuck in a remote part of Zaire, out of contact.” His impassive tone gave nothing away. “I headed home as soon as I heard.”

But too late…

She drew in her lips. It was so like the excuse he’d used five years ago when he’d finally made the effort to come home after missing his brother’s wedding, not by a day or two, but five months. Zac, Adrian had complained on the rare occasions he’d mentioned his estranged, footloose brother, always put his work and his own needs first. He always had and always would.

Zac’s priorities, she’d come to realize, were himself first, family last, morals nonexistent. Well, she knew all about Zac Hammond’s morals. And she’d do well to remember the kind of man he was. She felt her cheeks heating. Had her own morals been so squeaky-clean?

But she’d had an excuse. Not knowing Adrian had an identical twin, she’d mistaken the man on her veranda that night for her husband of five months, thinking he’d come home early from his two-week cattle-buying trip down south. The darkness, the hot steamy night and her own foolish romantic yearnings and frustrations had done the rest.

“I wasn’t sure I’d find you still here.” Zac’s sun-sharpened eyes narrowed, raking over her in a way that made her feel he was undressing her, just as he had on that highly charged moonlit night. She took an unsteady step back, another rash of tremors quivering through her. She willed them away, maddened that a mere look could still spark a reaction.

“Oh, you thought I’d have bolted back to the city by now, did you?” Just like everyone else, she thought, eyeing him coldly. Not a word of sympathy on the loss of her husband, his own twin brother. Did he think that after the shameful way she’d thrown herself at him the last time he was here, she didn’t deserve his sympathy? Did he still believe she’d known all along who he was?

She clenched her hands in suppressed fury, offering him no sympathy, either. He didn’t deserve it. He and Adrian might have been identical twins, but they’d never been close, never had time for each other, never had a single thing in common.

“If you thought I’d already gone back to Sydney, why did you come back to Yarrah Downs?” The second the words were out of her mouth, the answer struck her. He wanted to see what he could salvage from his twin brother’s estate. From his old family home.

Maybe he even had thoughts of buying the property himself if it came up for sale.

Not to live here permanently, of course. Zac, with his remote work in the wilds, wasn’t the settling-down type. But having lived here in the past, he might still have some sentimental attachment to Yarrah Downs and want to keep it in the Hammond family. The vast central Queensland property had belonged to their father, Michael, and to their grandfather before that, before it passed to Adrian.

He could always put a manager in charge in his lengthy absences. Vince would be a prime candidate for manager.

Her breath burned in her throat. The sooner she disillusioned Zac the better! “Well, as you can see, I am still here. And I intend to stay. But you’re welcome to a bite of lunch before you go. How did you know, by the way, that we had an airstrip here now?”

Five years ago, he’d been driving a rented four-wheel-drive vehicle that had fooled her into thinking it was Adrian’s when it pulled up outside the homestead. As he’d fooled her when she first set eyes on him in the heady moonlit darkness.

Zac quirked an eyebrow. “I checked when I landed in Brisbane to see how far things had progressed here over the past five years. Nearly five, to be precise.”

Rachel’s skin broke out in a prickly sweat. Oh, my God, he remembered it was just under five years ago! Four years, nine and a half months, to be exact.

She thought of Mikey and felt a flare of panic. Would Zac guess the truth when he saw her son? Their son? But how could he know or guess, even if he saw the amazing likeness? Mikey was the spitting image of the only father he’d ever known—her husband, Adrian, Zac’s identical twin brother.

“I didn’t know you could fly a plane,” she said, quick to change the subject.

“I got my pilot’s license four years ago. It’s handy to know how to fly when you do a fair bit of flying in small planes.”

She shivered, having a sudden vivid image of the life Zac must have been leading over the past years—the dangers, the isolation, the remote areas he must have ventured into to photograph his wild animals. And the lack of human contact, the lack of responsibility to anyone but himself. A reckless, irresponsible adventurer, Adrian had called his brother.

But at least, by burying himself in the wilds, Zac wasn’t hurting anyone but himself. He only hurt people when he came back to civilization.

She scowled. She must keep remembering that, remembering how unthinking and unscrupulous he was. Already, just by seeing him again, she was feeling things she didn’t want to feel, things she mustn’t feel.

“So you’re still living and working in the perilous wilds? You haven’t married and settled down, obviously.” Regretting the comment the moment it left her lips, she swung her gaze to the sky, pretending an interest in a brilliant scarlet-and-blue parrot overhead. What did she care what Zac was doing with his life? She just wanted him to go.

Not waiting for an answer, she said briskly, “Well, I guess you’ll want to return your charter plane before dark, so we’d better stop prattling and have some lunch.”

“I don’t need to return the plane for a couple of days. I was hoping—having found you still here—that you might put me up for a night or two.”

His words stopped her in her tracks. Let him stay here overnight? Possibly two nights? This was getting worse by the second! To have him sleeping under the same roof! But how could she refuse? He was her late husband’s brother after all, and alienated as the two brothers had been, Zac must have felt something at the loss of his twin.

She gulped hard and came up with a compromise. “I guess you could bunk down here, just for tonight.” It wasn’t very gracious, but what did he expect after what had happened the last time he was here?

She almost moaned aloud. She’d tried so hard to forget that shameful night, to pretend it had never happened, but there’d been reminders every day since. Her own heated dreams…her husband’s inadequacies…and Mikey. Above all, Mikey.

“Only for one night? After I’ve come all this way?” Zac’s eyes glinted like pewter under her baleful gaze. “You’re not going to kick me out the way you did five years ago, are you, before I’ve even had a chance to look over the place? That wouldn’t be very…sisterly.”

Sisterly! As if there’d ever been anything the least bit sisterly between them! Just one fevered, uncontrollable night of passion.

She felt heat surge into her cheeks. How dared he remind her of that mortifying night! It just showed he was no gentleman. But she already knew that. Adrian had always said his brother was uncivilized and untamable and did whatever he wanted, caring for nobody but himself. She’d seen firsthand evidence of it.

“You’d better go inside and clean up.” She spoke curtly. “You can stay in the guest room next to the bathroom. The room’s always made up and ready—for guests who blow in,” she added deliberately, her eyes telling him that he could blow out again as soon as he liked. “I need to finish up out here. Be in later.” She turned on her heel and headed back the way she’d come, across the yard to the chicken shed.

She would have to prepare Mikey for the shock of meeting an unknown uncle—an uncle who was the spitting image of his dead father. Thank heaven Mikey had stayed out of sight until now. At least she had the chance to warn him.

As Zac strode back to the plane to fetch his bags—mainly photographic equipment, with only a small bag for his few personal belongings—he found himself fighting a gamut of emotions, none of them comforting. He’d hoped to feel nothing at all.

It was a shock to find Rachel still here. He hadn’t really expected to, though deep down he’d wanted her to be here. Wanted and dreaded it at the same time, nagged by an unwanted but overriding need to resolve the torment that had plagued him for the past five years.

He’d tried to erase his memory of her, initially by sheer will and ultimately in the arms of other women—on the rare occasions he’d had the opportunity. But it hadn’t worked. Rachel had haunted his thoughts and dreams in a way no other woman ever had. And it had been hell, because she was married to his brother and the guilt of what he’d done, losing control the way he had, had left a bitter scar in his heart and mind, a scar that, far from disappearing over the years, had grown only deeper.

Even when he’d heard that his brother had been tragically killed and that Rachel was widowed, he’d hesitated to come back. The inexcusable wrong he’d perpetrated on his brother—that he and a passionate, love-starved Rachel had perpetrated together—still tormented him, and he knew it would always be there between them, whatever happened in the future.

Yet he hadn’t been able to stay away. He hadn’t been able to forget the powerful feelings she’d stirred in him, the unbridled passion that had spun him completely out of control for the first and only time in his life. Only by seeing her again would he know if those feelings had been real, or simply magnified in his mind over the years.

As they could have been. It wasn’t every day a beautiful, half-naked woman threw herself at him—especially in his line of work, where he was more likely to be confronted by a hairy, naked gorilla. He was lucky even to see a woman for weeks and months at a time.

Yeah, that was more likely all it had been—a buildup of sexual need, raging, out-of-control hormones and the sweltering heat of that hot summer’s night, as he’d tried to tell a distraught Rachel as soon as reality had hit and they’d both been able to think straight. He’d been trying to convince himself ever since.

He’d had to come back to find out.

His first glimpse of her had blown that convenient theory to bits, proving that the mere sight of her still profoundly affected him, still sent blood racing through him, far hotter and more potent than any feelings of lust he’d had for any other woman.

It was the first time he’d seen her in daylight. Her clear, long-lashed eyes were as blue as a field of corn-flowers, her braided hair a gleam of gold under the hot Queensland sun. He’d found it hard to take his eyes off her, harder still to resist those soft lips, lips he’d tasted once and never forgotten.

So he’d better take care. He’d better take mighty good care, or he’d blow everything, just as he’d done the last time.

Rachel had baked bread that morning and made a large pot of soup, using her own homegrown vegetables and herbs. She hoped that the aroma, as Zac ambled into the kitchen while she was preparing lunch, would turn his thoughts to food and away from his first meeting with—she gulped, refusing to think of Mikey as his son—his nephew, who was already at the table, chomping away at a beef sandwich.

Only she knew the embarrassing truth—her own doctor didn’t even know—so there was no danger of Zac’s finding out unless she showed something in her face, and she’d had years of practice at masking that.

But it wouldn’t be so easy with Zac, because he knew her shameful secret, even if he was ignorant of the consequences, whereas Adrian had never known. Her husband had never even suspected, even when they’d failed to have another child. He’d blamed fatigue or overwork after his long days out on the station or even some medical problem of hers, never imagining that he might be at fault, possibly even infertile, which she’d finally begun to suspect. They’d been married for more than five years and he’d never made her pregnant. Mercifully, he hadn’t known that.

“Take a seat at the table, Zac,” she said, busying herself at the kitchen counter so she wouldn’t have to face him yet. “Help yourself to some bread while I slice some more cold meat and pour you some soup. And say hi to your nephew, Mikey. We named him after Adrian’s father. Well, your father, too, of course. I’ve already told Mikey he has an uncle who looks like his daddy, but forgive him if he stares.”

Oh, heck, she was babbling. She forced herself to slow down. “This is your uncle Zac, Mikey, your daddy’s twin brother,” she said as Mikey gaped at Zac. “If you’re a good boy, Uncle Zac might tell you about the wild animals he photographs in the jungle,” she said to give him something else to think about. Mikey was crazy about animals.

“Have you seen lots of lions and tigers?” Mikey asked in awe, breaking into Zac’s friendly greeting, which to Rachel’s relief sounded perfectly normal and unsuspecting. She relaxed a trifle.

“Yes, lots.”

“Tell me, Uncle Zac. Tell me now.”

With a slow grin, Zac launched into a string of colorful tales of close, dangerous encounters that held the boy spellbound. Rachel relaxed even more. She even felt able to join them at the table, seating herself at the far end to avoid facing Zac.

“I wish I could go hunting lions,” Mikey said as Zac paused to take a few mouthfuls of soup. “I’m going to when I grow up.”

Rachel felt a prickle of alarm. Her son had always had an independent, adventurous spirit—a wild streak, Adrian had often worriedly called it. Mikey was a child with boundless energy, forever getting into mischief—so unlike Adrian, who’d always been the quiet, steady, cautious type, a man who thought things through before taking action. Had Mikey inherited his reckless spirit from his father? His real father?

“I thought you wanted to muster cattle and break in horses?” she reminded her son.

“I want to do that, too,” Mikey said at once. “Can you ride, Uncle Zac?”

“Sure can. I was brought up with horses. Ever ridden a horse yourself?”

Mikey pulled a face. “Not on my own. Daddy wouldn’t let me. He said I’m too little. But I’m not. I’m nearly—”

“Mikey, drink your milk.” Rachel hoped she’d muffled her son’s “four” before Zac could catch it. “Then take this big soup bone out to Buster and check his water. And then you can take him for a run to see Uncle Zac’s plane. Well, it’s not really his own plane, he’s just—”

“Actually, I’m thinking of buying it,” Zac put in, cool as you please.

Her heart stopped. “Why would you want to buy a plane? You work on the other side of the world.”

“It just happens that my next assignment’s here in Australia. The wilds of far-north Queensland and the Northern Territory.” There was a teasing glint in his eye, a roguish look she’d never seen in Adrian’s more serious gray eyes. “I was hoping you might allow me to use Yarrah Downs as my home base.”

“Yeah!” The exultant cry burst from Mikey. “You can teach me how to ride, Uncle Zac. On my own.”

Rachel was glad she was sitting down. A wave of light-headedness was washing over her, making the room spin. She could feel a weakening in her bones, as if they were dissolving.

“You’re going to work here? In Australia?” She tried to take it in and what it could mean. So he hadn’t come back merely to pay his respects to his brother’s widow or to reclaim his old home. He’d come back here to work. How stupid to think he might have wanted to see her. Work always came first with Zac Hammond, Adrian had often said, in the derisive tone he’d used when speaking of his absent brother.

“Yeah…and it’s high time,” Zac drawled, his eyes dwelling on her face for a disconcertingly long moment. “There’s plenty of unusual wildlife in Australia. Much of it highly venomous.” The way his gray eyes glinted made him look highly venomous.

Unlocking her tongue, she asked, “For…for how long?”

“As long as it takes. I don’t have a deadline. I’m my own boss.” Zac let his gaze slide away as he spoke, clearly satisfied that at least he’d given her something to think about.

As long as it takes. Rachel swallowed and pushed her plate away, her appetite gone. Zac’s assignment could take months, even years, if his previous assignments were anything to go by.

And in those months or years, he could turn up at Yarrah Downs at any time, staying just long enough to stir her body and emotions and revive memories she didn’t want revived before disappearing again, leaving her burning and riddled with renewed guilt for still having feelings for her late husband’s twin brother, a man she didn’t admire or respect or even like.

“I’ve finished my milk, Mummy.” Mikey put down his empty mug with a clatter. “Can I take the big bone out to Buster now?”

“Here.” She pushed back her chair and stepped over to the bench. “Give it to him away from the house,” she said as she handed it to him.

“Ta! See you, Uncle Zac!” The kitchen door slammed behind Mikey, rattling the windows.

“Don’t bang the door, Mikey!” she called after him, but it was a halfhearted, affectionate protest. Her son never walked when he could run and never closed doors without banging them. That was just Mikey.

“Fine boy you have there, Rachel,” Zac commented as she turned back to the table. “The image of his father. And his uncle, come to that.”

Her heart missed a beat. With effort she managed to find her voice. “Yes, Adrian was chuffed that his son looked so much like him. He adored Mikey.” Adored and despaired of him, convinced that his son’s exuberance would lead him to disaster one day.

“Seems to have plenty of energy. How old is he? I can never tell with kids.”

This time her heart stopped altogether. “Three,” she said, gathering plates and swinging away from the table to avoid looking at him. No need to mention that Mikey would be four in three days. By then Zac would be gone. Back to his solitary life among the wild animals and birds that meant more to him than any home or human being ever had or ever could.

He would be gone by then, wouldn’t he? Put me up for a night or two, he’d said. Not three nights.

“When do you start your assignment?” she asked. “Tomorrow? The next day?” After that, hopefully, she’d have some breathing space. She mustn’t panic! She’d rarely see him while he was working here in Australia, in the wilds of the far north. He only wanted to use his old home as a base. What his fleeting visits would do to her she refused to think about.

“The starting date will be up to me—or maybe you.” Zac reached for another slice of bread. “I’d just like to draw breath here for a few days first, maybe help you out a bit…”

A few days now, not just one or two! She felt her stomach knot as she realized that the longer Zac stayed, the more likely he’d be to find out that Mikey was four, not three, as she’d let him think.

But that still needn’t mean he’d suspect the humiliating truth. For all Zac knew, her husband could have made her pregnant at around the same time as Zac’s brief, ignominious visit.

Zac need never know that Adrian had been rushed to a hospital with acute appendicitis the day after Zac’s late-night visit, and that he’d caught an infection and hadn’t felt up to having sex for a month after he’d come home—by which time she’d known she was already pregnant. She’d delayed telling Adrian and been deliberately vague about the due date, hoping that her first baby would arrive late, which Mikey conveniently had.

Adrian had never suspected the mortifying truth, and Zac mustn’t, either. It was inconceivable to think of Zac Hammond, the irresponsible, unprincipled black sheep of the family, as Mikey’s father. Adrian had been the reliable, steady, home-loving brother, the kind of man any woman would have been proud to have as the father of her child. At least—

“Tell me what happened, Rachel.” Zac’s voice intruded, softly compelling.

“Happened?” Her throat tightened. Did he mean four years and nine and a half months ago, after she’d ordered him to leave Yarrah Downs and never come back? She could still remember Zac’s cold, flat words as she’d turned away from him before he could glimpse any other emotion in her eyes than anger—anguish, yearning or even regret. I’ll stay out of your life, Rachel, you can count on that. You and your husband have nothing to fear from me.

“All I’ve heard is that he was killed in a tractor accident.” Zac spoke gently, jolting her back to reality. He must have assumed, by her choked silence, that she was thinking of her late husband, not, thankfully, of him. “How the hell could that have happened? Adrian was the most safety-conscious man I ever knew. He never took risks.”

Rachel’s heart settled back into place. Of course Zac would want to know about her husband’s fatal accident. He was Adrian’s twin, after all.

“Not normally, no,” she agreed. She’d often wondered if Adrian had had something on his mind that day, some niggling doubt about what he was about to do that had diverted his attention for a fatal second. A second was all it had taken.

“He’d hired a bulldozer—it wasn’t a tractor—and had taken it up to Bushy Hill to do some work there. Apparently he was working on the steep lower slope of the hill when the bulldozer hit a huge wombat hole and tipped over. He was thrown out and…and crushed.” Cute and furry as the burrowing native wombats were, they did a lot of damage with their holes.

“What was he doing up at Bushy Hill with a bulldozer?” Zac was frowning, she noticed. He looked more angry than pained or sympathetic. “It’s supposed to be an animal and bird sanctuary and to be left untouched, in its natural state.”

She raised her brows. She’d known there was a lot of native wildlife in the thick scrub and eucalyptus forest of the big sloping hill, but a sanctuary? This was the first she’d heard of it. All she knew was that kangaroos and other animals had a habit of jumping or climbing under the fence skirting the cattle paddock below to drink at the small dam there, and that Adrian had been forever mending the fence.

“Adrian wanted to turn the hill into a vineyard,” she told Zac. “He said it was ideally positioned to grow vines—facing the right way and that kind of thing. He’d gone up there to start clearing the trees and undergrowth—”

“He intended to turn Bushy Hill into a vineyard?” Zac’s expression turned thunderous. “Our father made it quite clear to us that the hill was to be left as an animal and bird sanctuary. How much bush had Adrian cleared before his accident? Had he knocked down any trees? Have you gone ahead with it?”

She bristled. What right had Zac Hammond to come back after all these years and start bawling her out for something that was no business of his? He’d never even been interested in the family property, according to Adrian.

“No, I haven’t.” She snatched up Zac’s empty plate and whisked it away without asking if he wanted more. “Nobody’s touched the hill since. We couldn’t afford to, for a start—”

“You’re saying you still intend to go ahead with the vineyard when you can afford it?”

She glowered at him. “I didn’t know it was a sanctuary…or that it was meant to be kept as a sanctuary. Naturally, if that’s true—”

“Adrian never told you?”

She clamped her lips together. It didn’t feel right to be talking about her husband’s failings when he was no longer here to defend himself.

Zac swore softly. “I’ll need to see how much damage has been done. If he’s destroyed that hill and driven the birds and animals out…”

“What do you care about Yarrah Downs or what we do with the place?” she flung back. “Adrian said you couldn’t get away from here fast enough.”

Zac shrugged, drawing her reluctant gaze to the breadth of his shoulders. The same shoulders she’d once kneaded with feverish fingers and dug her fingernails into with frenzied yearning. She flinched and snapped her gaze away.

“Yarrah Downs couldn’t have two bosses,” he said mildly. “Especially two bosses who disagreed on most things. My father left the property to Adrian because being a cattleman was all he’d ever wanted to be, while I wanted to see and do other things before I thought of settling down in one place. And my brother was good at his job. He had the skill and experience a cattleman needs, even if he lacked judgment in certain areas.”

“While you were never interested!”

“Not true. I lived here for most of my life. I spent my childhood here and all my vacations. It was only when my father died and left the property to Adrian that I stopped coming back—except for that one time, a few months after he married you. He’d written to tell me about the happy event. It seemed a good time to finally shake hands and let bygones be bygones.”

His eyes caught hers and she flushed, remembering his short-lived visit five years ago. What had happened between them had put an abrupt halt to any happy brotherly reunion. And she couldn’t put all the blame on Zac. She’d virtually seduced him!

To cover her embarrassment she blurted, “You must have resented the fact that Adrian inherited everything. Is that why you’ve always been so jealous of your brother and so hostile toward him?”

“Where did you get that idea? From Adrian? I was never jealous of him. We just didn’t get on. Too different. Chalk and cheese. I assure you I haven’t been seething with resentment all these years. I didn’t miss out. My father left me a generous cash pay-out and a bundle of blue-chip stock that’s grown over the years. I’ve also made a lot of money from documentary films and feature articles. I can afford to help you, Rachel.”

Her eyes sparked. “To help Yarrah Downs, your old home, don’t you mean? You don’t want to see it go under, and you think it will, now that I’m in charge. A woman! What’s your secret agenda, Zac Hammond? Are you trying to sweeten me up so you can buy me out if I sell, like everyone expects? Though why you’d want the place…”

Her voice trailed off as she became aware of a dog barking outside. “It’s Buster,” she said, glad of the diversion. “Mikey must be back. Excuse me… I have things to do out in the yard.”

“I’ll come out with you. Mind if I borrow a motorbike, Rachel?”

She paused, frowning. “What for?” Did he want to check up on the state of the cattle and the paddocks to see what a mess she was making of the place? So he could criticize her some more, undermine her confidence some more?

“I want to see what damage has been done to Bushy Hill and if there’s anything I can do to salvage it.”

“Anything you can do?” She tried to sound withering—what right had he?—but how could she blame him for wanting to check? This had been his home once and the animal and bird sanctuary clearly meant a lot to him. And if his father had specified that it be kept as a reserve…

Funny that Adrian had never mentioned it. Had he thought she might try to stop him from planting his vineyard there? She probably would have tried if she’d known about the sanctuary. The thought of her husband keeping things from her was sobering. But hadn’t she kept far worse secrets from him?

She hadn’t been back to Bushy Hill since Adrian’s fatal accident. She wasn’t sure how much clearing her husband had done. She’d simply told Vince to stay away from the hill until she decided what to do with it. They had more-urgent priorities. But the truth was, to have squashed the idea of the vineyard outright would have felt like crushing Adrian’s dream.

Only now that she knew the facts…

“Quiet, Buster!” she shouted over the dog’s barking, wondering why he was making such a din. What was Mikey doing to him?

But when she stepped outside, Mikey was nowhere in sight. The yard was empty. “Where’s Mikey?” she cried as Buster’s barking grew even more frenzied at the sight of her. He started to run off, then wheeled back, whining and pawing at her, before scampering off again.

She got the message and broke into a run. “Something’s happened to Mikey!” The words whipped over her shoulder at Zac. “Find him, Buster!” she urged the cattle dog. “Take me to Mikey!”




Chapter Two


As she rushed across the yard in Buster’s wake, she heard faint screams—a child’s petrified screams.

“Mikey!” she cried out. Where was he?

She faltered, her blood running cold. Ahead, down past the sheds, stood the big windmill, its glinting blades whirling in the warm May breeze. A small dark shape was huddled way up near the top, crouched on the uppermost rung of the narrow steel ladder, dangerously close to the rotating blades.

Oh, dear God. Mikey!

She felt Zac’s hand on her arm, steadying her, his touch, even in her panicked state, bringing a tingling heat to her skin.

“Try to be calm,” he rasped in her ear. “Don’t let him see how scared you are. You don’t want him to panic.”

Biting down on her lip, she covered the remaining ground at a sprint, managing not to scream at the terrified boy. Buster reached the windmill first, his barking giving way to whimpers and whines as he circled the foot of the steel ladder.

“Mummy’s here, Mikey. Don’t move!” Rachel called. Perilously close to him, the whirling blades glinted ominously in the midday sun, sending a black, twisting fear through her. “I’m coming up to get you.” She spoke reassuringly, though she had no idea how she would be able to hold on to her son and keep a firm grasp on the narrow steel ladder at the same time. “Don’t look down!”

She felt Zac’s hand on her shoulder, easing her to one side. “I’ll climb up and get him, Rachel. I’m stronger. I’ll keep him safe, I promise.”

Would he? She gripped his arm in agonized indecision. Would he be as careful as she would be, the boy’s own mother? Mikey meant everything to her, but what did he mean to Zac? He’d never met the boy until today, and he only knew Mikey as the son of a brother he’d never had any time for, a nephew he’d known nothing about until today.

But Zac was strong, far stronger than she was. With those powerful hands and shoulders he’d be more likely to bring Mikey down safely. She must trust him. She must trust the man who’d shown he wasn’t worthy of trust by betraying his own brother, as she’d unknowingly betrayed her own husband. But this was a matter of life and death, not morals.

“Please…take care,” she whispered, and let her hand drop away.

“I will, don’t worry.” He started scaling the ladder, his strong, tanned hands gripping the rungs in a way that gave her a measure of comfort. She’d felt those same hands on her body and knew they could be gentle, too….

She held her breath, clenching her teeth in a frenzy of suspense. Zac was nearly at the top now and she could hear him speaking gently to Mikey. Her heart leaped into her mouth as he managed to loosen Mikey’s frightened grip on the ladder and gather him in one arm, keeping his other hand firmly on the ladder. And then they were coming down, Mikey’s arms curled around his rescuer’s neck and his small plump legs wound around Zac’s upper body.

Rachel didn’t start breathing again until they were nearly at ground level, close enough for her to catch her son if he fell. She let her gaze dwell for a second on Zac’s strong, competent arms and broad shoulders, feeling a rush of gratitude.

The wayward thought popped into her head that Adrian, if he’d been here, instead of Zac, would probably still have been hesitating down below, or calling for backup, or putting a detailed plan into action, weighing up the pros and cons before acting—always the safe, precautionary approach, so different from his more risk-taking, man-of-action brother.

And who was to say which approach was the best? On the one hand, Zac could have lost his grip on Mikey or the ladder as he’d come down, while on the other, her son could just as easily have panicked and fallen while Adrian was preparing a rescue plan, with safety harnesses and bales of hay to provide a soft landing if the worst happened.

But all that mattered was that Zac had brought her son down safe and sound, without any delay or fuss at all. When the two reached solid ground, she gathered Mikey in her arms and held him tightly for a long moment, her eyes moist as they sought and found Zac’s.

“Thank you,” she said, and felt a tiny frisson of shock as his eyes caught and held hers for a heart-stopping second before she broke eye contact.

She could feel Mikey’s weight dragging on her arms and shoulders and was thankful she hadn’t been forced to bring him down from that great height herself. Already he was wriggling to be put down, which only added to his weight. She set him on the dusty ground but didn’t release him, instead placing her hands on his shoulders and leaning over to bring her face close to his.

“Mikey, you know you’re not to climb up the windmill. I’ve told you a hundred times. We’ve all told you. It’s far too dangerous. Why did you do it?”

His answer floored her. “I was spotting tigers from the treetops, like Uncle Zac.”

Like Uncle Zac… She tossed her brother-in-law a sharp glare, her gratitude disintegrating. Damn Zac and his exciting tales of wild animals. Already he was causing trouble and exerting a dangerous influence on her son.

“Mikey, there are no tigers in Australia. And a windmill is not a treetop.”

“Just a boy’s lively imagination.” Zac’s tone was benign, not the least concerned or penitent. “I was just the same. Always dreaming of adventure and excitement and travel to exotic places. Always getting up to mischief. Mikey must have inherited his high spirits from his uncle.” He said it with a certain amount of satisfaction.

Rachel’s heart did a double flip. “He’s more likely to have inherited it from me,” she said in her most squashing tone. “I was a tomboy as a kid, always getting up to pranks. But putting yourself in danger is a different thing entirely. I’m trying to raise my son to be responsible.”

“You can be too cautious, too careful, Rachel. It can make you vulnerable, tighten you up, cause you to make mistakes. Look where caution got Adrian.”

She sucked in a vexed breath. “That was a freak accident. It could have happened to anyone. It had nothing to do with being too cautious and tightening up.”

“Maybe. Or maybe he felt guilty about what he was doing to Bushy Hill and lost concentration just long enough to make a lethal mistake.”

She snapped her mouth shut. Hadn’t she had a similar thought herself?

Adrian had always tended to put the needs of the cattle station ahead of conservation and the rights of native animals—“vermin,” he’d called them. He’d been forever complaining about the kangaroos, wallabies and wombats and the damage they caused, kicking down fences and digging holes that tripped the horses.

And her husband had had a point. The wildlife often did cause problems. Only yesterday Vince and her young jackeroo, Danny, her recently arrived apprentice farmhand, had found a dead kangaroo in one of the outlying dams. If they hadn’t discovered it so quickly, by a sheer fluke, it could have polluted the water over time. Especially with the dam so low.

Worse, the dead kangaroo had been shot. Its body must have been deliberately thrown into the dam. She couldn’t imagine anyone at Yarrah Downs doing such a thing and had put the incident down to intruders, trespassing onto the property at night to hunt wild boar and shooting the ’roo in frustration after failing to find what they were looking for.

Her chest swelled in a sigh. Since her husband’s death, nothing had gone right. It had been one problem after another.

“You can take Adrian’s motorbike,” she told Zac. “It’s in that shed over there.” She waved a hand. “You’ll find bottles of water in the cool room in the same shed. Better take some with you.” She paused. “Let me know what damage has been done and I’ll see what we can do about it.”

“Whatever damage has been done,” Zac said grimly, “I’ll fix it—if it’s not too late.”

“Can I go with Uncle Zac?” Mikey begged. “Dad used to let me ride on his motorbike.”

Only once, Rachel recalled, and only around the homestead yards. Her husband had decided it wasn’t safe. Safety had been paramount to Adrian. Until he’d made his one fatal mistake.

“No, you can not go, Mikey.” Best to keep him under her eye and away from Zac. Away from further trouble. “You can stay here and help me. And later I might give you a ride on Silver.”

Adrian had bought the pale-gray gelding for her as a wedding gift, after she’d told him she’d taken riding lessons for years and had competed in show-jumping events. On the rare occasions she could find someone to look after Mikey for a few hours, she loved taking Silver out on musters or for invigorating gallops to blow the cobwebs away and feel the wind in her hair. More and more often lately, at Mikey’s urging, she’d been letting her son ride around the yard on Silver.

“Wifout a lead?” Mikey gave her a beseeching look.

She hesitated. Silver was a big horse and could be hard to hold. But if they stayed in the yard and she stayed close by…

“If you do as I say.”

Zac gave a quick grin, as if he’d helped Mikey win a point. “Well, be seeing you.”

As he ruffled the boy’s dark curls and strode off to the shed, Rachel let out another sigh, remembering Zac’s comment about her husband’s assault on Bushy Hill. If it’s not too late, he’d said, in a harsh tone. There’d plainly been little love lost between the twin brothers.

Zac raised a trail of dust as he roared across the paddocks. His brow was lowered, but he wasn’t thinking of Adrian. He was thinking of Rachel. She clearly didn’t want him here. She hadn’t forgiven him. He’d be lucky if she ever did. And how could he blame her? Hadn’t he been blaming himself for what had happened on that highly charged night ever since?

He let out a savage groan. The only woman he’d ever wanted, ever cared about, ever lost his head over, and she could never be his, even now that she was free. She would never be able to forgive him or trust him again. She despised him. Damn his stupidity, his weakness, his pathetic loss of control. Damn it to hell!

Even now, he couldn’t understand how it had happened. Nothing like that had ever happened to him before. No woman had ever had that kind of power over him, making him forget everything but his scorching need for her and the mind-numbing, earth-shattering way she affected him. He’d always prided himself on his strength of character, his integrity, his loyalty.

But they’d deserted him the moment his brother’s wife had thrown herself at him and pressed her fevered lips to his, at the same time running her hand down his body and over his shorts, boldly gripping him, setting off a reaction he would never have believed possible. Some power or demon stronger than himself had taken possession of him.

If only he’d stayed away five years ago, today could have been their first meeting…and she just might have looked on him differently, despite what she’d heard about him from Adrian. At least she could have made up her own mind, with no preconceived ideas of her own to influence her.

But now it was too late!

He put his foot down even harder, almost flying through the air as he deliberately increased his speed, heedless of the danger, not caring in that black, reckless moment what happened to him. Even if he broke his neck, who would care?

And then he thought of Mikey, his nephew, a true Hammond by blood, as well as looks. The boy had recently lost his father. To lose his newly discovered uncle, as well, a man who looked just like his father…what would that do to him? Zac ground out a curse, at the same time giving an ironic laugh when he had to jam his foot down hard on the brake. There was a gate ahead and he would have to stop to open it.

By the time he’d reached the other side of the gate and shut it behind him, the black moment was past and his mind was focused on Bushy Hill.

It was dinnertime before Zac came back. Rachel had already fed and bathed Mikey, wanting him in bed and out of the way early, before he could blab to his uncle that he was about to turn four. She needed time to think and decide what would be the best thing to do—to keep her embarrassing secret or tell Zac the truth.

Zac Hammond was not the kind of man she wanted as a father for Mikey. Aside from his dubious character, he would seldom be around. Not that he would want the responsibility of a child, anyway. Zac wasn’t the type to take on responsibilities. He had his own life, his own world with his wild animals. That was how he liked it and would want to keep it.

And what would the truth do to Mikey? As an acknowledged father—a largely absent father figure— Zac would be an unsuitable influence on the boy, unsettling him and putting wild, reckless ideas into his head. She wanted Mikey to grow up to be a steady, responsible adult, with a normal, settled home life and a family one day, not to be an aimless loner like Zac, without any ties or responsibilities or anyone to love and care about or to love and care about him.

Yet how could she lie to Zac outright if he asked the question? Would it be right to stay silent, now that Adrian was gone and not here to be hurt? But how could she tell Zac the truth? What emotional turmoil and disruption to their lives would it lead to? She would have to sleep on it first.

Zac looked a real mess when he walked in. Dirt had mingled with sweat, his naturally unruly hair was matted and more disheveled than ever, and his shirt was filthy. Yet something deep in the pit of her stomach stirred at the sight of him. He still looked breathtakingly sexy and strong and disturbingly virile.

That he could affect her in such a raw, basic way brought a sharpness to her voice. “You’d better clean yourself up before you tell me what you’ve been doing.” What you’ve been doing to my land. “You can tell me over dinner. My head stockman, Vince, and his wife, Joanne, will be joining us.” She’d heard Vince’s Land Rover returning a while ago and had rushed out to meet it.

She often invited Vince and his new bride to the homestead to talk over station matters. If not to dinner, to drinks on the veranda, sometimes joined by Danny and whoever else was working at Yarrah Downs at the time.

“Can you wait for a cold beer until they come?” she asked Zac. “Or make do with some water for now?” How lucky that she’d asked Vince and Joanne for dinner tonight. Now she wouldn’t have to be alone with Zac.

He grinned.

“Sure. Where’s Mikey?”

“He’s already in bed. He tired himself out.”

“Reaction to all the excitement earlier in the day, hmm?” Zac’s dirt-smudged lips curved in that roguish way he had—so unlike his more serious twin brother, and so like Mikey. So disturbingly like Mikey.

“Reaction to being scared to death, more like it,” she heard herself snapping back, her nerves suddenly on edge. “Are you going to go and clean up or not?”

“Yes, ma’am.” He loped off, still grinning.

While she was waiting for him to come back, Vince and Joanne arrived, freshened up after their day spent checking the water bores. They lived in the head stockman’s cottage on the far side of the yards, past the communal bungalow Danny shared with any other stockmen working on the property.

Vince and his wife were both hardworking, rough-diamond types. Vince was short and muscular, with a shock of sandy hair normally hidden beneath a battered Akubra hat. Joanne, as strong and tough-talking as a man, had inherited her wiry strength from her stockman father and her dusky beauty from her Aboriginal mother. She pulled her weight with the men out on the station and acted as cook on musters.

Rachel often worried that Joanne knew more about station life than she did. She had a feeling that Vince thought so, too, that he still thought of his new boss as a cosseted, wet-behind-the-ears “townie.”

“Is there something wrong?” she asked the moment she saw their faces.

Vince’s mouth was dragged down in a grimace. “We found that one o’ the bores—Boomerang Bore—has been tampered with and put out of action, maybe wrecked beyond repair. We’ll have to bring in a contractor quickly to fix it. If it can be fixed. We might need to sink a new bore.”

Rachel’s heart sank. How on earth would she be able to afford to fix it, let alone pay for a new bore if they needed it? It would cost a fortune! Yet she had to find a way. Without water her cattle would die.

Tampered with, Vince had said. “Who would do such a thing?” she cried. Her eyes clouded. Someone who didn’t want a woman running Yarrah Downs? Someone who wanted to demoralize her and drive her out?

The person most likely to benefit if she did leave was Vince. He’d made no secret of the fact that he wanted to manage a cattle station one day, now he was a married man with responsibilities. He must think this a perfect opportunity—the city-bred widow, left alone with a young child, finding herself unable to cope with the demands of a busy cattle station. Putting a few obstacles in her way might drive her out all the faster.

Rachel felt a wave of despair. How could she keep Yarrah Downs running if she couldn’t even trust her own head stockman?

“Beats me.” Vince shook his sandy head. There was no sign of guilt on his sun-weathered face, no sliding away of his crinkled gaze, but then, Vince seldom showed any emotion. “Young hooligans? One of our neighbors, keen to buy up your land if you decide to sell? Or maybe some contractor who doesn’t like dealing with a female station owner.”

“Is that how you feel, Vince?” she asked bluntly.

“No, of course not.” But his ready denial wasn’t convincing. He didn’t expect her to stay. Not for the long term. Not when he knew her own father was doing his best to persuade her to sell and move back to town. Nobody expected her to stay. And Zac, she suspected, shared the sentiment.

As if her thoughts had conjured him up, Zac appeared, his hair still damp from his shower, his clean shirt splashed with droplets of water. In place of the boots he’d been wearing earlier was an old pair of sneakers. He looked perfectly at home already in his brother’s house.

She sensed Vince stiffen at the sight of him, heard Joanne’s quick intake of breath and said as coolly as she could, “I don’t suppose you’ve met Adrian’s twin brother, Zac Hammond? Zac, this is my head stockman, Vince Morgan. And this is his wife, Joanne.”

“G’day, Zac.” Vince stretched out a freckled hand. By the mystified look on his face, it was clear that Adrian had never mentioned a brother to his head stockman, or if he had, he’d kept quiet about Zac being an identical twin.

As Zac clasped the outstretched hand, Rachel could almost read Vince’s mind: couldn’t have been much brotherly love between ’em if the boss never mentioned having a twin brother. And how right he would be!

To explain her brother-in-law’s long absence from Australia, she gave a sketchy background. “Zac’s a wildlife photographer. He works in remote parts of the world, taking photographs for geographic and wildlife publications and making documentaries. He’s come back to Australia to do an assignment here.”

Was that a flicker of relief in Vince’s eyes? Or merely a flicker of interest? Had he wondered for a second if Zac had come back to take over the family property, dashing any hopes he might have had of running the station himself?

“Good to meet you, Vince. Joanne.” Zac was all smoothness and charm as he turned to Vince’s bride, who gave one of her rare smiles and thrust out her own hand. Rachel had the strangest feeling, as Zac’s hand closed over Joanne’s, that it was her own hand being clasped in that warm, firm grasp, and she had to swallow and look away.

“How about a cold beer?” she asked, and receiving nods all round—Joanne always joined the men in a beer—she hastened back to the kitchen. She normally had a weak gin-and-tonic herself, but tonight she chose mineral water, knowing they’d be having wine with dinner. With Zac around, she needed to keep her wits about her.

Over drinks she asked Zac about his inspection of Bushy Hill, half dreading his answer. She wasn’t sure how much damage Adrian had done before his fatal accident. For Mikey’s sake she’d kept well away from the hill in the past month.

Zac pursed his lips. “I guess it could have been worse. Most of the hill’s been untouched, luckily, but quite a bit of native scrub and a few trees along the lower slopes are gone, exposing the bare earth to the elements. I’d advise putting in some drains before the rains come, or you could face an erosion problem.”

Drains? How much would they cost? Rachel took a quick gulp of her drink, wishing she had chosen something stronger.

“We can only hope the wildlife hasn’t been disturbed too much.” Zac’s jaw gritted as he said it. “My other worry is that the dam below the hill is almost empty. We’ll need to bring in a water tanker to refill it, or the wildlife and the cattle out there will run out of water. Or be in danger of getting trapped in the mud if the dam dries up any more.”

Rachel’s spirits nose-dived. Drains…trucking in water…repairing or maybe even replacing the damaged bore… All tasks that would cost money she simply didn’t have.

She felt Zac’s eyes on her face and knew he’d sensed her dismay. Now he, too, would assume the property was too much for her, just as everyone else did.

“Don’t worry, Rachel. I said I’d fix my brother’s mess and I will. I need to fly to Brisbane in the morning to see about the plane and to bring some more fuel in, but first I’ll arrange for a water tanker to come and for a truck to deliver the plastic pipes and gravel I’ll need for Bushy Hill. I’ll work on that when I get back tomorrow. Then I’ll scatter some seeds around for eventual regrowth when the rains come.”

As her lips parted in protest—how dared he take charge and leave her to face the bill?—he drawled, “My expense, naturally. Bushy Hill’s always been my special interest. Please don’t deny me this one thing I can do for Yarrah Downs, Rachel.”

She hesitated, frowning, wondering about his motives. If she allowed him to sink money into the property, she would be obligated to him. He might even expect to become a partner, an equal, if mostly absent partner, with the right to make decisions—decisions she might not agree with.

“No strings attached,” Zac said, as if he’d read her mind. “It’s the least I can do for my family.”

Well, that made sense. He hadn’t done too much for his family in the past. And she and Mikey were the only family he had now that Adrian had gone.

“Well, if you insist,” she said, trying not to sound too grateful. No strings, he’d said. No, of course not. Zac Hammond didn’t believe in strings or getting involved in other people’s lives. Let him do something for his family in the short time he was here. He’d be gone soon, anyway. “I have more pressing matters to deal with,” she said with a shrug.

“The damaged bore should be our first priority,” Vince said, drawing a quick frown from her. It was precisely what she’d been thinking herself. Did he have to treat her like an ignorant female who needed to have decisions made for her?

She stifled her indignation. He was only trying to help. It was his job to help her. “I’ll call the contractor in the morning,” she said, wondering how in the world she was going to pay for it. The bank had refused further credit. “It’ll cost a bit to repair. If we need to sink a new bore, we…we might have to leave it for a while. It’ll cost an arm and a leg. Meantime, we’ll just have to move those cattle to another paddock.” Water for the cattle was vital.

“If you need to sink a new bore,” Zac said, “I’ll see to it. You can pay me back when you can, Rachel.”

She recoiled. To accept that kind of help from Zac would really put her in his debt. He’d have a real hold over her. She’d be in his power. He’d love that.

“I don’t—”

“A loan, Rachel. Just like you’d get from a bank. Only, I won’t be charging interest or putting any pressure on you to pay me back until you’re ready.”

But maybe you’d put pressure on me to pay you back in some other way. She felt her legs go weak. Whatever his motive, he wasn’t making the offer out of the goodness of his heart. Zac Hammond had no heart, according to Adrian.

Besides, she had to stand on her own two feet. Somehow. She’d never asked or expected her father to help her, and to accept help from Zac would be the first step to admitting defeat.

“How did the bore get damaged?” Zac turned to Vince as if the matter was settled.

Vince stuck his thumbs in his leather belt. “Looks like someone dropped a metal tool down the shaft and it’s jammed up the works. As if we don’t have enough problems. We badly need a few extra bores, but I guess we’ll have to forget about gettin’ those till Boomerang Bore’s fixed.”

He shook his head, making Rachel feel personally responsible. Everything’s falling apart since Adrian’s death, he might as well have added.

“Any idea who’s responsible?” Zac asked.

Vince shrugged. “Whoever did it covered up his tracks too well. Could’ve been anybody.” He looked hard at Zac before raising his beer glass and taking a long swig.

Rachel’s heart stopped. Surely Vince didn’t suspect Zac? He’d only arrived today. Unless he’d come back earlier and kept out of sight until now. She felt as if she’d been punched in the stomach. Could Zac have flown into a nearby airstrip, borrowed a vehicle and made nightly excursions onto the property from there? Who would know his way around Yarrah Downs better than Zac, who’d been brought up here?

Her gaze speared his, but he was examining his beer glass with frowning intent, as if pondering the question. Or avoiding her eye?

Or did he simply agree with everyone else and believe she wasn’t up to running the place? Her head stockman certainly had his doubts.

“Yeah, pity the damage to Boomerang Bore has wrecked any chance of puttin’ in brand new bores,” Vince muttered, his brooding gaze still fixed to Zac’s face.

Rachel’s arm jerked, spilling the drink in her hand. Was Vince now trying to inveigle her brother-in-law into paying for a couple of additional bores?

Her eyes flashed a warning—to Zac as much as to Vince. “Try having more faith in me, Vince,” she snapped, and switched the subject. “What’s Danny been doing today? Where is he?”

Vince took a gulp of his beer. “He’s been out checking the fences. He’s not back yet, but he’s been in contact by radio.”

They all used radios because cell phones had poor reception out here. Only Danny possessed one of the powerful new satellite phones. His parents had given it to him, to keep in touch with them.

“There’s more bad news, I’m afraid,” Vince muttered. “Or it could’ve been.”

Her brow knitted. “What do you mean?” she asked, her spirits dipping.

“Danny found a fence post knocked down near Michael’s Gap and a big hole in the fence. He assumed it had been done by cattle until he found that someone had deliberately cut the fence wires.”

Oh, no. A silent moan rose in her throat. “Cut them? Deliberately?” Who was doing this to her?

“Luckily Danny thinks only a few cattle have wandered into the next paddock—where there’s no water, by the way, so it shouldn’t be too hard to round them up in the morning. Jo and I’ll go and help him. In the meantime he’s staying up there till he’s mended the fence.”

Rachel felt a suffocating sensation; she was possibly in the same room as the culprit. She jumped up, needing to get away. Needing to take some long, deep breaths before facing them again. “I’ll serve up the dinner,” she said, and fled the room.

“Been here long, Vince?” Zac asked over Rachel’s tasty beef-curry-and-rice meal.

“About five years,” Vince said. “I started a few weeks before Adrian and Rachel got married. The previous bloke had retired. Too old for the job.”

“You mean Bazza?” Zac’s gray eyes glinted suddenly. “But you kept the old bloke on, I hope, as an odd-job man or something?” He frowned. “Where is he, by the way? I haven’t seen him around.”

“He left. I dunno where he went.” Vince looked at Rachel, who shook her head. Adrian had never mentioned anyone called Bazza.

Zac’s brow plunged, his powerful frame swelling in his chair, which suddenly seemed too small for him. “Bazza would never have left Yarrah Downs voluntarily. He would have had to have been kicked out. This has been his home for as long as I can remember.”

“Well, he must have decided to go somewhere else,” Vince muttered, “because he was gone by the time I came.”

Zac didn’t pursue the subject, but by his brooding silence, Rachel knew he was blaming his twin brother again. It wasn’t until Vince and Joanne left soon after the meal that Zac brought it up again, following her out to the kitchen with a stack of dirty plates. It had obviously been eating at him for the past hour or so.

“Did Adrian ever talk about Bazza, Rachel? Mention where he went? He had no family but us. Hell, I didn’t think even my brother would stoop to throwing Bazza out.”

Her chin jutted out. Was Zac going to blame her husband for everything? “I know nothing about him. Adrian just told me the previous head stockman was too old for the job and had left. He never told me where he’d gone, if he even knew.”

She switched on the hot-water tap, squirted detergent into the sink, and started washing the glasses. “If he was old, maybe he was sick and wanted to live in a town. He could even have died by now. I’m sure Adrian was doing what he thought best for Bazza. For Yarrah Downs.”

Zac gave a snort, at the same time grabbing a tea towel to help her. “Bazza was a tough old codger. He was never sick a day in his life. Adrian always had it in for him. But I never thought his dislike had gone this deep. To deliberately turf the old bloke out. My father told Bazza he’d always have a home here, even when he was no longer able to work.”

“We can’t afford to keep people on out of charity. We’re barely surviving ourselves.” She winced, wishing she hadn’t let that last bit slip out. She didn’t want Zac knowing just how bad things were. She plunged a dirty plate into the sudsy water and swished it with a cloth.

Zac slid a hand onto her shoulder, his fingers spreading over the bare skin at her nape. The touch was so unexpected that she flinched. Or maybe she was flinching at the memory the warmth and texture of his fingers evoked.

With a quirk of his lip, Zac let his hand drop away. “I know it must be difficult, Rachel, especially when there’s some vandal out there trying to make things even more difficult for you. But Bazza was one of the family. He belongs here. And a promise is a promise.”

Something in his voice got through to her. Zac really cared about this Bazza character. It wasn’t just pique at what his brother had done to an old family retainer.

“Look, I’ll try to find out what happened to him,” she promised. “And if he is still alive and didn’t want to leave Yarrah Downs, I’ll see if I can persuade him to come back. But he’ll have to be able to work for his keep. Do odd jobs, at least.”

“Thank you, Rachel. But I reckon he’d be more likely to listen to me than to…Adrian’s widow. He and my brother barely tolerated each other. I’ll make some inquiries myself. I want to catch up with the neighbors, anyway.”

Oh, he did, did he? Why? To let them know the prodigal brother was back in Australia, about to work on an assignment here, before he flitted off again? She gave a jerk of her shoulder. “Well, if you like. If you feel you have the time.”

How long would it take Zac to find the old man? Hours? Days? She felt herself trembling. Zac was becoming far too involved in the affairs of Yarrah Downs, when the place was her responsibility, not his. He’d asked to stay for a night or two, but it was becoming alarmingly obvious that he would never do all he wanted to do in a couple of days, or even a week.

It seemed inevitable now that he would be here for Mikey’s birthday.

“Mind if I leave you to finish up here?” She threw down the dishcloth. She had to get away from him. She had to do that thinking now. “I have some bookkeeping to catch up on.” Adrian had always insisted on doing the books, and it had taken her a while to sort out the mess he’d left. Records not kept, bills not paid. He’d been no bookkeeper. Yet he’d never asked for her help or accepted it.

“My pleasure, Rachel.” The amused glint in Zac’s silver-gray eyes unsettled her even more as she made her escape. He knew he still affected her. But did he know in what way, or how deeply? Did he wonder just what, precisely, she felt for him? Attraction? Repulsion? Desire? Suspicion?

Did she know herself?




Chapter Three


Zac rose with the misty dawn, expecting to be gone from the house before anyone else appeared, but he found Rachel already up, making coffee in the kitchen. The aroma was seductive. Rachel, damn it, looked seductive, too, even this early in the day.

Before she turned to face him, his gaze drank in the sexy curve of her hips, her suntanned slenderness, the single golden braid snaking down her back. He wanted to tear it free and feel the silky strands slide through his fingers.

He curbed the urge and damped down other more-basic urges that had plagued him since his arrival. “Coffee smells good. Mind if I join you?”

She swung round, her lips parting. No lipstick, he noted, but her mouth was pink and lush enough without it. No makeup of any kind, nothing to hide the faint shadows under her blue eyes, as if she hadn’t slept well or long enough. Had she been lying awake worrying about the problems she faced at Yarrah Downs?

Or had she been thinking about him, and cursing his return, because it brought back the humiliation of five years ago?

He wondered what else it brought back, if anything. That was what he had to find out.

But right now wasn’t the time. “Another hot day coming up.” He glanced out the window. “Still no sign of rain, unfortunately.”

“No.” She seemed distracted. “Here.” She handed him a cup of coffee and poured another for herself, turning her back on him to do it. “I wasn’t expecting you up this early. We normally have breakfast later, after I’ve done a few chores and everyone’s gone off for the day. But a coffee first up is a must. Can I get you something to eat before I go out? Or will you get it yourself?”

She was talking too quickly, sounding breathless. He affected her all right. But he still wasn’t sure if it was in the way he hoped.

“Just the coffee, thanks. I want to leave for Brisbane early, so I can be back in time to put that drainage system in—assuming the stuff I ordered gets delivered today, as promised. Mind if I take your pickup to Bushy Hill this afternoon? Your ute, I should say. Guess I’ve been away from Australia too long.”

Her eyes flickered for the briefest second. “No problem. I’ll get Danny to help you,” she added, as if to reassert her authority. “They should have the cattle rounded up by then.” She took a sip of her coffee, then dashed some milk into it—maybe to cool it down so she could drink it more quickly and rush off, away from him.

“I’m going to Roma to do some shopping, dropping Mikey off at a friend’s place on the way,” she said. “My friend Amy’s married to a doctor in Roma and has a son Mikey’s age.”

“You go all the way down to Roma for your supplies? You don’t use the general store at Booroora? It’s much closer.”

“I want to buy some things you can’t find at Booroora.” She didn’t look at him, rushing on as if afraid he was going to quiz her further. “Amy’s invited me to lunch afterward, so I might not be home when you get back from Brisbane. I’ll leave some lunch for you.”

“Thanks.” He gave her a smile—a bland smile, carefully devoid of any roguishness—wondering why she was so much on edge. Was it him? Because he was outstaying his welcome? Because she felt things for him she didn’t want to feel?

“Danny and I might be late back tonight,” he said, taking a long sip of his coffee, “so you go ahead and have dinner. I’ll grab something when I get back if I need it. I’m used to fending for myself.”

“I know.” She gulped down the rest of her coffee and made a beeline for the door, as if she couldn’t get away from him fast enough. “I must catch Vince and Danny before they go. See you when I see you, Zac.”

“See you, Rachel. Uh, Mikey’s still in bed, is he?”

She paused at the door. “Mikey? No, he’s always up early. I said he could run on ahead with Buster and watch Vince and the others saddling up the horses. Sorry, I must fly. They’ll be ready to go.”

Zac plunked down his coffee mug. “I’ll come, too, and say g’day before I fly out.” But she was gone.

He followed regardless.

Rachel heard Zac behind her but didn’t wait for him to catch up. She didn’t want to be alone with him. She’d had a really rotten night and simply didn’t feel up to it.

She’d come to no real solution during the night, despite hours of tossing, agonizing about what to do. In the end, in sheer exhaustion, she’d given up, deciding to play it by ear and just see what happened. Zac might not want to know, even if he had suspicions about Mikey. He might even assume she didn’t know the truth herself, since as far as he knew, both he and his brother had made love to her at around the same time.

Made love? She almost tripped over her own feet, her lip curling in hot-cheeked rejection. There’d been no love involved in that frenzied, impassioned tumble on the veranda.

And yet…and yet…

She almost groaned aloud, remembering how she’d cried out her love for the man she’d thought was her husband in the final cataclysmic moment of release, and how she’d felt more real soul-wrenching love in those mind-shattering few seconds than she’d ever felt before—or, to her endless shame, since.

I love you. I love you with all my heart, she remembered crying out, and in the months and years since, whenever she’d made love to her husband, it had always been the memory of Zac and that one unforgettable night that had fired her responses and haunted her dreams, possibly because her husband’s clumsy, rushed lovemaking—always in the dark and always in bed, never on a moonlit veranda floor—had become less frequent as time went on, leaving her frustrated and dissatisfied.

But she had disappointed Adrian, too, by not having another child. Unless he’d known in his heart that the problem was his and had let it eat into him, making him feel worthless and impotent.

“Uncle Zac!”

Her son’s screech of joy brought her back to earth with a sickening thud. When had Mikey ever greeted Adrian like that? As the boy hurled himself at Zac, she could only watch in despair. It was as if Mikey loved Zac already, as she had loved him, too, on that one memorable occasion, when her heart and soul had soared to heights never reached before or since.

Was this to be her punishment? Knowing that the love she’d felt for Zac that night, before she’d realized her shameful mistake, could never come to anything, because it had never really existed?

Late that afternoon, as she swung her Land Cruiser into the dusty road winding back to the homestead through the parched paddocks of Yarrah Downs, she saw that Zac’s plane was back. There was no sign of her old utility truck—her ute, as he’d remembered to call it—when she reached the yard, so he and Danny must be still up at Bushy Hill.

Buster bowled up to greet them as she brought the big four-wheel-drive to a halt behind the house. She gave Mikey a bag of provisions to carry in and picked up some shiny black plastic bags herself. She’d bought Mikey’s birthday presents in Roma while he was out of the way with his young playmate Josh, and she wanted to sneak them into the house without him seeing what she’d bought.

Through necessity they were modest gifts—a dinosaur picture book, a new shirt and knee-length shorts, a toy racing car in his favorite red and a bright yellow water pistol, which had seemed less blood-thirsty than a toy gun.

She’d also secretly made Mikey a monster mask out of papier-mâché, painting it in vivid colors at night while he was asleep. Monsters and dinosaurs were his latest craze.

She wondered if she would ever be able to afford to give her son a playground slide or a fancy two-wheeler bike or anything more ambitious. His grandfather had given him a shiny new tricycle for his last birthday, but Mikey had just about outgrown it.

At the thought of her father her mouth drooped. In two days’ time he would be flying up here for Mikey’s birthday and no doubt would give his grandson another lavish gift to show up her own failings in that area.

He’d be sure to point out that both she and Mikey could have whatever their hearts desired if only they’d come back to Sydney. And he’d probably say it in front of Zac, who’d no doubt support her father and urge her to sell in favor of an easier, more comfortable life back in the city.

She’d have no one on her side but Mikey, who loved it here and relished the open, free-and-easy outback life, despite the heat and the dust and the flies. But Mikey, as her father would remind her, had never known life in the city. There were plenty of attractions there that her son was missing out on—movie theatres, science museums, sporting arenas, playgrounds, zoos—attractions that a young boy, he’d argue, ought to be exposed to.

He’d often begged her to let Mikey go and stay with him in Sydney, or for her to come, too, for a short break, but so far she’d resisted, using the excuse that her son was too young and that she was too busy. Her father was a powerful man, and she was half-afraid that once he had them back in town, he would find some way to keep them there.

Since Adrian’s death, her father had been more single-minded than ever about her coming back home and reclaiming her heritage—Barrington’s—and helping him run it, as he’d trained her to do. Having lost her mother last year—the one person who had seemed to understand her need for independence and a different kind of life—her father now had no one to curb his burning ambition for his only daughter and grandson.





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