The Cattleman's English Rose

She couldn’t be angry with him. All she could do was cuddle him close and cover him with kisses. ‘I’m here, sweetheart. I love you. You must let me be mummy now.’

To her horror the boy struggled out of her arms and took off, running away from her into the stormy night.

‘You’re no good. You keep losing me,’ he cried.

And he disappeared into the black.

‘Tim! No! Please don’t go. Come back!’

Charity’s terrified cry woke her.

She tried to open her eyes. Ouch! Blinding stripes of sunlight blasted through the Venetian blinds and she snapped her eyes shut again as the trauma of her dream was replaced by reality.

Tim was missing. In Australia.

And then she was aware of physical pain. Her head. And yuck! Her mouth tasted like the bottom of a bird’s cage.

What had happened?

All she could remember of the previous night was having a long, cosy chat with Marsha. Actually…it had been rather a one-sided chat. She had listened while the other woman talked. Marsha had told her about Tim…about what a lovely fellow he was…And Charity had a vague memory that Marsha had insisted they keep drinking if she wanted to hear everything about her brother.

But if she’d learned anything significant it was lost to her now. At some point the conversation had shifted to Kane and his brother, Reid…but she couldn’t remember anything much. Except Marsha’s clear warning to stay away from Kane…

She felt vile. Awful. This had to be a hangover. Her first. And where on earth was she?

Keeping her eyes closed, she lay very still while she explored her surroundings with her hands. There was a mattress, a pillow beneath her head and a sheet covering her. Carefully she turned her head away from the bright window, opened one eye and squinted and discovered that the light on this side of the room was more hangover-friendly.

Okay. There was no doubt that she was in a bedroom. But where was this room?

Bravely, she opened the other eye and took in details. The room was simply furnished, its only decoration a dried arrangement of Australian wildflowers on an old-fashioned pine dresser. The walls were a dingy off-white and an ugly mustard and brown striped rug covered most of the floor. A doorway led to an adjoining room.

It had to be a bathroom, because she could hear the sound of running water. And splashes.

Splashes? Good grief. Splashes meant someone was in the bathroom. It meant…

Before she could come to terms with what it meant, the running water stopped.

For five seconds there was silence except for the desperate thumping of her heartbeats in her ears. And then footsteps.

And a tall figure appeared in the doorway.

Kane McKinnon.

She felt deprived of oxygen. How on earth had she ended up in a bedroom with him?

He was wearing nothing but blue jeans and, although she didn’t want to, she couldn’t help staring at him—at his bronzed skin, which looked as if it had been polished to a high sheen—at his broad shoulders, his taut torso, and his muscles—his exceptional muscles.

Kane and his muscles strolled into her room and he stood at the end of her bed, looking down at her.

She tried to ask him what he was doing in her room—what she was doing there—but when she opened her mouth no words came.

‘Good morning,’ he drawled.

So it was morning.

Which meant…there’d been a night. But where and when and…how?

‘Good—’ Charity gulped. ‘Morning.’ If only her mouth wasn’t so parched. ‘W-where are we?’

A ghost of a smile played at the corners of his mouth. ‘We’re in a cabin at the back of the Mirrabrook pub. Don’t you remember?’

‘No.’ Pain pounded behind her eyes and she closed them, but she felt too vulnerable with her eyes closed while Kane towered at the foot of her bed, so she squinted at him. ‘What are you doing in my bedroom?’

‘I beg your pardon, Miss Denham, but you should rephrase that question.’

‘Why?’ she asked faintly, dreading the answer.

‘This is my room.’

Her eyes flashed wide again. ‘Then how—?’ She had to stop and wet her lips with her tongue. ‘Why am I—’ Oh, help. ‘How did I get here?’

‘I carried you.’

Lord have mercy.

A mocking smile tweaked his lips. ‘I found you in the beer garden with Marsha, tossing back drinks like a ringer. Marsha’s used to grog, but you were on the verge of passing out and in need of a bed, and—’ He shrugged his massive bare shoulders. ‘This was the only room left.’

‘I see. I suppose I should thank you.’

He walked the length of the bed to her side and her breath caught. It was unnerving to have Kane McKinnon so undressed…and so close to her bed. What was he doing here? What had happened last night?

She shivered at the thought that this mega-masculine body might have lain next to her, that she might have…they might have…

Had she touched that satiny skin?

No. Surely not.

She realised he’d brought her a glass of water and two pain-killers.

‘I imagine you’ll need these.’

‘Thanks,’ she said, but she didn’t take them. There were too many important questions that had to be clarified. ‘You didn’t sleep here—with—with me, did you?’

His eyes were the silvery-blue of an early morning sky and now they glinted with suppressed amusement. ‘I didn’t have any choice. I told you this was the only cabin left.’

‘But why couldn’t you have gone home? Why did you stay here?’

‘I had to make sure you were okay.’

Was that true? Was she supposed to be grateful? What kind of man was Kane McKinnon? She had no idea whether he was trustworthy. The tanned skin on his face was cut by a pale scar that sliced through his right eyebrow and almost reached his eyelid and she couldn’t help wondering what had caused it.

‘What did we—? We didn’t—Did we—um—’ How on earth did she ask this? ‘We didn’t—make love or—or anything, did we?’

She saw a flash of white teeth as he grinned. ‘Make love? Hell, no.’

‘Thank heavens,’ she whispered and felt some of her tension let go.

‘I don’t think I’d call it love,’ he said in a slow drawl.

Charity braced herself for the worst. The tension returned one hundred fold.

‘What we had was more like straight out lust—’

‘No!’

‘Simple, uncomplicated sex,’ he said and the blue eyes gleamed.

A horrified moan escaped her. Wrenching the sheet over her, she cowered beneath it. But now, with her eyes closed, she saw a vision of all the devout women in her father’s parish staring at their rector’s reprobate, drunken daughter with scandalised, open-mouthed horror.

Kane’s voice reached her through her shame. ‘Don’t worry, sweet Charity. It was wild.’

‘Go away!’

‘You were fabulous—sensational.’

Her head shot above the sheet. ‘Stop it! You’re despicable.’ She hated him.

But she was also beginning to suspect that he was lying. Surely he was teasing her?

Emboldened by the thought, she lowered her gaze…and saw…

…that she was fully dressed.

Every bit of clothing was still in its proper place, except for her shoes. Thank heavens.

She spun sideways to check the other side of the room and winced because the movement made her head hurt. There was another bed beneath the window, a twin of hers, and its rumpled sheets indicated that Kane had slept there.

He’d definitely been teasing her…which made him even more despicable, because she was left feeling foolish for leaping to assumptions.

‘If that’s Australian humour, I don’t think much of it,’ she snapped.

‘Come on, take these,’ he said again, pressing the tablets into her hand.

She had little choice but to sit up and accept the tablets and glass of water and to swallow obediently, but she wouldn’t look at him. She didn’t want to see that mocking amusement in his eyes.

He said, ‘I’ve brought your bags up, so be a good girl and hop into the shower. Then you need a big recovery breakfast before you leave.’

‘But I don’t plan to leave.’ She couldn’t let this embarrassing situation throw her. No doubt Kane McKinnon was still trying to scare her away, but she had to remember her mission—why she was here. Tim was still out there in all that terrible outback. Still missing.

‘Of course you’re leaving,’ he said. ‘You should have left yesterday when I told you to.’

Running frantic fingers through her hair, she tried to tame its tousled disarray. ‘I’m not going anywhere, Mr McKinnon. I mean it. I have no plans to leave Mirrabrook. I’m here to find my brother and I’m not taking orders from anyone, especially from you.’ She remembered something she’d learned during her conversation with Marsha. ‘I understand you have a brother and a sister, so if you won’t help me I’ll talk to them. That’s what I plan to do next.’

‘Do you indeed?’

‘Yes, I do indeed. I assume Tim had dealings with them as well as you?’

He shrugged. ‘Not really and Annie’s away in the city at the moment, so she won’t be able to help you.’

She was determined not to be put off. ‘I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I’m not leaving.’ Throwing off the sheet, she gripped the bedside table for support while she swung her legs over the edge of the bed and stood carefully. ‘I have a strong feeling that I’m going to get the answers I need right here in Mirrabrook. I’m not budging until I get to the bottom of all this.’

The phone rang, cheating her of the opportunity to hear Kane’s reaction to her brave little statement.

He snatched it up. ‘McKinnon speaking…Oh, hello, Reid…Yeah, I’m still in town…No, I didn’t have any luck, mate…There’s no one available. Yeah, of course, I really tried.’

Over his shoulder, he scowled at Charity and she hurried to her suitcase, grabbed the first items of clothing she found and disappeared into the bathroom.

As she closed the door behind her, she heard Kane snap into the phone, ‘What choice do we have? You and I will just have to manage on our own, won’t we? We’ll have to become New Age types and discover our feminine sides.’

In the privacy of the shower, Charity rested her aching forehead against the cool ceramic tiles and let warm water pour over her.

What was she going to do now? It was all very well to toss off some grand sounding words to Kane about her plans to stay in the Mirrabrook district to search for Tim, but who would help her and where was she going to stay?

She wondered how much a cabin like this one would cost her. She didn’t have much money and had been hoping to clear the problem up quickly.

When she emerged from the bathroom with her hair wrapped in a huge white towel, she was dressed rather inappropriately in the first clothes she’d grabbed—her best cream trousers and pale blue silk blouse. Kane had hidden his muscles beneath a cotton shirt and he was sitting on the edge of his bed, his expression morose.

‘Is something wrong?’ she asked.

‘Just a stubborn brother.’ He looked up at her and stared hard at the towel on her head.

She felt frozen by the sudden intense spark in his eyes.

‘What’s the matter?’

‘I was wondering what colour your hair is when it’s wet.’

Surprised and flustered, she said, ‘I don’t know. It’s just red, I think.’

He stood and seemed to tower over her. ‘No, not red, Charity. Your hair could never be just red.’

For a moment she thought he was going to reach out and unwind the towel. But he didn’t. He just stood there and the intense way he looked at her caused a shivery pang—an empty hollow, deep inside her.

‘I came out to find my hairbrush,’ she said, sounding more panicky than she meant to. No man had ever looked at her with such unsmiling, focused attention. At home in Hollydean she’d had a few boyfriends—some unimpressive, others a little more serious. There’d even been a marriage proposal. But none of those men had made her feel so—so aware.

She dashed to her handbag, grabbed her hairbrush and hurried back into the bathroom, shutting the door behind her again.

Safely inside, she used the electric hair-dryer to blow her hair dry. At home she usually let her hair dry naturally, encouraging it to fall into soft waves, but today she didn’t care if it went as straight as sticks as long as it stopped Kane McKinnon from looking at her that way.

The intensity in his eyes had awoken a strange longing deep inside her—a need so acute that it left her with the fear that it might never be eased.

Shocked by her reaction, she wound her flamboyant hair into a prim knot and secured it with several pins before she ventured back into the bedroom.

‘Now you look like a Sunday school teacher,’ he said, and she was relieved to see that his eyes were less intense.

‘Perhaps that’s because I am a Sunday school teacher,’ she replied with necessary dignity.

‘Fair dinkum?’

‘Yes. I’m a genuine Sunday school teacher.’

He cocked his head to one side and studied her. ‘What else do you do?’

What else did she do? Annoyed by the underlying taunt in his manner, she straightened her shoulders and lifted her chin to an even more dignified angle. If only she could offer this man an impressive answer. If only she could manage to lie without feeling guilty.

What else she did was less than impressive.

While most of her school chums had gone away to travel, or to university, or to jobs in London, she’d stayed behind in Hollydean to help her father and Tim. Whenever her friends came home, they took pains to point out that she’d been living in a time warp since she left school.

She knew Kane McKinnon wouldn’t be impressed by the news that she played a vital role in the parish—taking care of the rectory household, accompanying the choir practice, teaching at Sunday school, visiting the elderly and the sick…

And it was of no use to point out to him that she was so indispensable to the running of the parish that the ladies in the Mothers’ Union had organised themselves into a roster to take over her tasks while she was away.

Nevertheless, her green eyes flashed and she cast him a look ablaze with haughty pride. ‘I am an excellent housekeeper,’ she said.

His lips pursed as he released a low whistle. ‘Are you now? That’s very interesting…’

Letting out an impatient huff, she folded her arms across her chest. She’d had enough of his teasing. ‘I seem to remember you mentioned breakfast?’

‘That’s right. I did. Are you ready?’

‘I could be if I knew what you’ve done with my shoes…’

Bending down, he fished for something under the end of her bed, then he straightened and held out her sandals, dangling them by the straps. ‘These do?’

‘They’ll be fine, thank you.’ With icy composure she accepted them and slipped her feet into them, but she felt strangely self-conscious and fumble-fingered while he waited and watched her lean down to do up the buckles.

‘Now I’m ready,’ she said crisply.

‘Good. Let’s go down to the dining room.’ He opened the door and stood aside to let her past. ‘Once you’ve got some decent tucker inside you, we should have a chat. I’ve got a suggestion that might interest you.’

‘Your housekeeper?’

The way she said the word your set Kane’s teeth on edge. She might as well have come right out and said she’d be happy to take care of any other house on the planet—except his.

‘It makes sense, doesn’t it?’ he said, spearing a juicy sausage with his fork then attacking it with his knife. ‘If you’re going to insist on looking for your brother, you need somewhere to stay, and Reid and I need someone to cook and do the housework.’

‘It would probably do your brother and you the world of good to fend for yourselves for a week or two,’ she said in a preachy voice that he supposed she’d perfected during her years as a Sunday school teacher.

‘It would probably do your brother the world of good if he was left to carry on with his life without his sister breathing down his neck.’

‘You don’t understand.’

‘And neither do you.’

They scowled at each other across the table, green eyes and blue sparking with equal ferocity. Then Kane gave a resigned shrug and resumed eating while Charity pushed the food around on her plate. Apart from sipping daintily at her pineapple juice and nibbling at her toast, she’d hardly touched the rest—only a little of the mushrooms and tomatoes.

‘You may as well eat up,’ Kane said. ‘A big pile of greasy food is good for a hangover.’

She looked ill, but he ate steadily on, relishing every speck of food on his plate—softly scrambled eggs, crisp bacon and sausages with tomato sauce, a lamb chop, mushrooms—

‘Very well, I’ll do it.’

Her sudden statement caught him by surprise. He looked up to find her watching him with a deadly earnest expression.

‘I’ll take the job as your housekeeper because it serves my purpose as well as yours,’ she said. ‘But I’m putting you on notice, Mr McKinnon. The only reason I’m coming out to your homestead is because I need accommodation and because I believe that someone in this district will be able to explain my brother’s disappearance.’

‘I can’t promise you anything on that score.’

‘I know you’ve tried to deter me, but that doesn’t change my opinion.’

Kane shrugged. ‘Suit yourself.’

‘And I’ll come to look after your home on the strict condition that you—’ In mid-sentence her composure crumpled. A tide of colour swept up her neck and into her cheeks.

Not for the first time, Kane wondered how a clergyman’s daughter could have such pagan prettiness. This girl’s lissom figure, vibrant hair and dewy green eyes would distract any red-blooded man.

And now this rosy blush…pretty as a sunrise. A Sunday school teacher out of her depth shouldn’t look so damn appealing.

His throat seemed to close and he had to swallow. ‘What was that? You mentioned a strict condition.’

She took a sip of pineapple juice and looked at him over the rim of the glass and her eyes seemed to plead with him to understand.

‘What condition?’ he repeated.

She still didn’t answer. But, as her blush deepened, Kane understood.

Pushing his plate to one side, he propped an elbow on the edge of the table and rested his chin on his hand. ‘Perhaps I should explain my conditions,’ he said.

‘You have conditions?’

‘Naturally.’

‘Then by all means, please explain.’

‘There are very few women I would ask to move into my home.’

Her eyes were huge and she nodded without speaking.

Leaning forward, he said quietly, ‘Apart from Annie, there are no women living on Southern Cross. There’s an old stockman who looks after the yard and he and my brother Reid and I are all bachelors—bachelors, living on an isolated cattle property.’

‘Oh,’ she said very softly and her pink mouth stayed in the shape of a circle.

‘Three men and a pretty young lady living alone could start tongues yapping from one end of Star Valley to the other. A hint of scandal runs through this district like a bushfire. So it needs to be made clear right from the start that there must be no involvement of—how can I put this delicately?’

‘You don’t need to,’ she cried. By now her face was fire truck red. ‘I understand perfectly and I wouldn’t dream—’

Keeping his face solemn, Kane offered his hand to shake hers. ‘Our arrangement is strictly business.’

‘Oh, yes. Absolutely. That is exactly what I was trying to say.’

‘Then it seems we’re perfectly suited, Miss Denham.’

She looked as if she’d swallowed a grasshopper.

‘Oh, and one other thing,’ he said. ‘Try to stay away from the gin while you’re working for me.’

Charity fumed as she helped Kane load the back of his utility truck with stores. It had been completely unnecessary for him to spell out the need for propriety. And she knew that he knew that. Which meant that once again he’d been deliberately teasing her. And, indirectly, he’d also been making sure she understood that he didn’t desire her.

As if that wasn’t obvious! One look at Marsha had told her she would never be Kane McKinnon’s type.

‘I thought there was only yourself, your brother and one other man on Southern Cross,’ she said as she carried a box rattling with bottles of various sauces and mayonnaise to the truck. ‘Just how many will I be cooking for?’

She was stunned by the quantity of food Kane had ordered. Crates of oranges and apples, bags of flour, rice and sugar, a drum of olive oil, packets of pasta, boxes of tinned vegetables and fruit juice and crates of beer all had to be stowed away along with her suitcase.

‘There will probably be just the three of us—plus yourself, at least for the first few days,’ he said. ‘But we have to stock up properly.’ He took the box from her and stowed it next to a stash of toilet paper rolls. ‘You can’t come running back into town every five minutes.’

‘I realise that.’

‘There’s always a chance that the fencing team we’re expecting later in the month could arrive early,’ he said. ‘It depends on how their previous jobs pan out. But you could handle cooking for a few extras, couldn’t you?’

‘Of course.’ She was determined to sound confident, no matter how many challenges this man threw at her. At least she was getting to Southern Cross where she’d be able to speak to Reid McKinnon. And perhaps in time she would find a way to get more information out of Kane. She was sure he hadn’t told her everything he knew about Tim.

It was a pity his sister Annie had gone to the city; but Charity was sure that if she was patient she would find people in the district who were prepared to answer a few discreet questions.

Kane threw a tarpaulin over the load and began to secure it with rope. ‘That should keep most of the dust out,’ he said when he’d finished. He turned to her.

‘Okay, that’s it. Let’s hit the road, Chazza.’

‘I beg your pardon? Who’s Chazza?’

He dropped his gaze to the dusty toes of his riding boots and grinned. ‘Sorry, that just slipped out. We’re an uncouth lot in this country. We do terrible things to names. Barry becomes Bazza; Kerry is Kezza. So you’ll find yourself getting called Chazza. Or would you prefer Chaz?’

‘Do you have a problem with my real name?’

‘No. But I’m afraid nicknames tend to happen out here whether you like it or not.’

‘Then in that case I’ll take Chaz.’

‘Chaz it is then.’

He grinned again, but her own attempt to smile faltered.

Australians were very in-your-face. Tim had mentioned in his letters that the ringers liked to toss him teasing jokes to see how he handled them. No doubt it was their way of testing a newcomer. And as a new chum she was expected to throw one back.

Her brother would have been able to handle it. She, on the other hand, had always been too earnest to be good at witty exchanges.

She repeated the word Chaz softly under her breath and decided she probably liked it. Chaz. Chaz Denham. It sounded upbeat and trendy. She had never in her life been trendy. But no way would she admit to Kane that she quite liked the idea of being Chaz.

After she had climbed up into the passenger seat, slammed the door shut and buckled her seat belt, she said, ‘I have to admit an old-fashioned name like Charity can be something of a burden. Tim is lucky he isn’t my sister.’

‘Do you think a sister might have been christened Faith or Hope?’

She rolled her eyes. ‘Perhaps.’ It was time to give him a taste of his own medicine. ‘My father excelled himself when he chose my middle name.’

‘Yeah?’ An unmistakable spark of curiosity flashed in his blue eyes. ‘What is it?’

‘Chastity.’

His jaw dropped. ‘You’ve got to be joking.’ For almost a minute he sat with one hand on the steering wheel and the other on the key in the ignition, staring at her, his expression cagey, as if he were sizing her up. Then a knowing smile dawned. ‘This is payback time, isn’t it, Sunday school teacher?’