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Ruby, the middle of the three Anderson sisters, was a different kettle of fish altogether. She was nomadic, nothing remotely like Rose, who was the epitome of a homebody. Marrying Noah was the first ordinary thing Ruby had ever done, but even then she’d gone for the unusual. Not too many people were married to professional race car drivers. Ruby had always had a point of difference, whether it was her dress sense, her living arrangements or her boyfriends; no one could ever accuse her of being ordinary, whereas Rose longed for an ordinary life—a husband who adored her, perfect children and her own happily ever after.
She wanted to re-create that perfect world she used to live in. The world she’d inhabited until the age of eight. She wanted to fall in love and have her own family. She believed in true love and part of her still hoped it would happen for her. She still imagined her white knight would come and sweep her off her feet. He would give her the world and would be so blinded by love that he wouldn’t notice all her flaws.
The Anderson sisters had grown up with their own labels. Scarlett was the clever one, the career girl; Ruby was the fun one, the slightly wild and offbeat sister; Rose, not overly ambitious, had been content to be the pretty one. Until recently.
She used to be so confident, used to be able to walk into a room and know that men would look at her. She knew she was pretty and her blonde hair and big green eyes lent her an air of innocence that men couldn’t resist. But Rose didn’t feel pretty any more. She was scarred, emotionally and physically, but she hated the idea of anyone else knowing it.
She was also scared. Scared that no one would want her now.
Scarlett kept telling her to give herself time. To get back out into the world without expectations. To relax, have fun and see what happened. Her psychologist was telling her the same thing—give yourself time—but Rose wasn’t convinced that time was the great healer that everyone professed it to be.
It had been almost two years since her last relationship had ended and she didn’t feel any closer to being ready for another one. Not when she knew she would have to open herself up.
She was scared and scarred and she didn’t believe that was a combination conducive to finding love.
Scarlett held out a tray of burgers and shashliks to Rose.
‘Would you take these out to Jake for me, please?’
Rose could see her brother-in-law at the barbecue, talking to one of his friends.
‘I know what you’re doing,’ she said.
‘What?’ Scarlett replied, all wide-eyed and innocent.
‘You want me to talk to Rico.’
‘He’s a nice guy.’
‘I’m not saying he’s not, but—’
‘You’re not ready.’ Scarlett finished the sentence for Rose with her usual retort but that hadn’t been what she was about to say. ‘I’m worried about you, Rose. You need to get out there. You’d have fun with Rico. It doesn’t necessarily have to be anything more than platonic fun but at least you’d be out and about. Working and spending time with Holly isn’t enough. You’re twenty-three, have some fun.’
Rose couldn’t mount a good argument so she reached out and took the tray of barbecue meat, resigned to the fact that she would have to let Scarlett win this round. Scarlett won most rounds. She was the bossy older sister. Rose knew she did it out of love and so she gave in. It was easier that way. ‘All right,’ she sighed, ‘I’ll go and talk to him.’
She was aware of Scarlett watching her through the kitchen window as she stepped outside. She knew her big sister was worried about her. Scarlett had always mothered her. They had all suffered when Rose’s father had died suddenly and their mother just hadn’t coped with the aftermath. Scarlett, at the relatively young age of sixteen, had taken it upon herself to be the champion for her two younger sisters and that instinct had never quite left her, even though her sisters were now both adults.
Rose looked around, taking in Scarlett’s house, small but filled with love, her gorgeous husband, and a garden overflowing with their friends. Despite the fact that Scarlett was eight years older than Rose, Rose couldn’t deny that she wanted what Scarlett had. A career, a husband who adored her, and a baby. Actually, she would settle for two out of three; unlike Scarlett, she wasn’t that interested in a career. She enjoyed teaching but it was a job rather than her calling, and she didn’t have the same burning ambition about it that Scarlett had about her career as an anaesthetist.
And Rose knew exactly why Scarlett was pushing her to get outside and mingle. She had never made a secret of the fact that she dreamt of marriage and babies, certainly not to her sisters, but she wasn’t sure that she was in the right frame of mind to mix and mingle today. Although she couldn’t complain about the talent on offer. Jake’s friends were lovely, a good mix of polite, gentle, charming and good-looking; many of them, including Rico, were professional men who were also former colleagues of Jake’s from the strip club, The Coop. They took pride in their appearance without, for the most part, any vanity, and Rose was happy to appreciate the efforts they went to in order to stay fit and in good shape. But she wasn’t sure that getting involved with one of her brother-in-law’s mates was a good idea. What if things didn’t work out? Wouldn’t that be awkward?
Scarlett had insisted that Rico was a genuinely nice guy who treated women with respect. Rose knew she could do worse than go out on a date with him.
Not that he’d asked her yet, she chided herself as she crossed the paving and headed for the barbecue. She was thinking of excuses unnecessarily. Why would he be interested in her? Just because Scarlett had put the idea in her head it didn’t mean that Rico was entertaining the same notion.
* * *
‘Could I have your number?’
Rose had been chatting to Jake and Rico for several minutes when Rico asked the question. She was glad he’d waited until Jake had taken a tray of cooked hamburgers inside to Scarlett. She didn’t think she had the heart to turn him down in front of his mate but she couldn’t give him what he wanted. He was handsome in a swarthy, dark, Mediterranean way, he had a great body, hours in the gym having toned it to perfection, and he seemed genuinely nice, but there was no spark. Rose wondered if she’d ever feel that spark again. Rico was just the type of man she normally fancied, tall, dark, good looking, a few years older than her but she wasn’t interested. She hadn’t been interested in a long time.
Not quite true, she thought as she remembered a man with chocolate brown eyes, a triangular jaw and an easy smile. She might make an exception for a man like him. But that was just a silly fantasy about a complete stranger. She didn’t even know his name.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, ‘I’m not dating at the moment.’
She knew she had to figure out how she was going to fulfil her dream of having a family when she didn’t feel ready for a relationship. She still dreamt of finding love but in reality she was scared. She knew she couldn’t wait for ever, she didn’t want to wait for ever, but she was afraid to take that first step back into the dating game. She knew that first step would lead to others, which would lead to her having to share parts of herself, and that was the part she wasn’t ready for.
Rico looked as if he might be getting ready to plead his case and Rose tried to remember how she used to turn invitations down without appearing rude. ‘Why don’t you give me your number?’ she added. ‘And if I change my mind, I’ll call you.’
‘Sure.’
‘Great,’ she replied, pleased he wasn’t going to argue with her. ‘I’ll just grab my phone.’
She ducked inside and rummaged through her handbag. Her phone was lying in the bottom of the bag under a tin of coloured pencils she’d bought for Lila. She pulled the pencils out with the phone. She’d get Rico’s number and then she would go and see Lila. She’d had enough of the party. She knew it would only be more of the same. Talking to Jake’s friends, getting asked for her number. She made her excuses to Scarlett, promising to call back later, hoping that Jake’s friends would have left by then and she could play with Holly without interruption.
But right now there was somewhere else she’d rather be. Someone else she’d rather talk to.
* * *
He was there.
He was sitting beside Lila’s bed, his long legs stretched out in front of him, feet crossed at the ankles, watching as his daughter scrolled through what appeared to be photos on his phone.
She couldn’t deny she’d been hoping to see him but now she was ridiculously nervous. What had she expected? That she could just feast her eyes on him from a distance, hiding in the shadows without being seen herself?
That was exactly what she’d hoped. She hadn’t thought about the reality of seeing him. Of talking to him. She wasn’t ready to make scintillating conversation. She had nothing to say. She was completely out of practice.
But she couldn’t stand in the doorway for ever. She crossed the room and the movement caught his eye. He lifted his head and his chocolate eyes followed her progress. He stood up as she got closer and Rose put another tick in the box that would be beside his name if only she knew what it was. He had manners. She adored men with manners. Having someone who would open a door for her or pull out her chair at dinner and seat her first, not because he thought she was incapable, just because it was a nice thing to do, always made her go weak at the knees. She always thought it gave a little glimpse about what he would be like as a husband or a lover. A mark of consideration and kindness. A man with manners would treat a girl properly.
‘I didn’t mean to interrupt,’ she said. ‘I just brought some drawing things for Lila.’
He smiled at her and Rose’s knees wobbled as the ground tilted a little under her feet. She’d liked his smile yesterday when he’d looked at his daughter but that was nothing compared to having him smile at her. His face brightened and his brown eyes warmed and darkened like melted chocolate as he looked straight at her. ‘You’re not interrupting, Rose.’
A rush of happiness flooded through her and she could feel a faint blush stealing over her pale cheeks. He’d remembered her name!
She stopped next to Lila’s bed before realising she should have continued to the opposite side. She was standing far too close to him. Her head barely reached his shoulders. If she turned her head towards him, all she could see was the powerful breadth of his chest; if she looked down she got an eyeful of a narrow waist and long, lean legs; if she breathed in she could smell him. He smelt clean and fresh as if he’d not long been out of the shower, and his scent overrode the antiseptic smell of the hospital.
Her heart was racing, making her hands shake. She wasn’t sure why but he really unsettled her and she was unbelievably nervous. As she reached forward to pass the pencils and sketch pad to Lila the tin slid from her hands. The lid popped off as the tin hit the floor and pencils spilled around their feet.
His reaction time was faster than hers. He crouched down and gathered the pencils up as she stood there, trying to work out what had just happened. His head was level with her knees and she could look down onto the top of his head. His hair was cut short but it was thick and she had a sudden urge to reach out and thread her fingers through it. Instead, she curled them into a fist at her side.
He stood and handed her the pencils but the touch of his fingers sent a jolt of awareness through her that was so strong she almost dropped them a second time.
Maybe it had been a mistake, coming here. She was well and truly disconcerted and had lost all trace of coherent thought.
‘I can’t stay,’ she said as she finally managed to put the pencils and sketch book on the end of Lila’s bed. ‘These are for you,’ she said before she bolted for the door as fast as her disfigured feet would allow.
He followed her from the ward. She didn’t turn around but she could feel him behind her. Her whole body was tense, her nerves taut, fighting against her as she tried to walk away.
‘Wait!’
Her steps slowed of their own accord as he called to her and then he was beside her, his hand on her elbow, sending her heart crazy. She turned to face him.
‘Thank you for getting those pencils for Lila. Can I reimburse you?’
She was looking into a pair of eyes that were so dark she could see her own reflection. Her eyes were wide, startled, and she knew that he had caused that look as his touch had sent her body wild.
He was waiting for her answer. She shook her head. ‘No, I wanted to do it. I thought it would help to keep her occupied.’
‘I meant to bring her things with me, she asked me to, but with all the other hundred things I had to organise to get away I forgot. Her brothers have been acting up, they’re missing Lila and are upset with me for leaving them behind, and with all their carry-on I got completely distracted and forgot to pack Lila’s things.’ He paused to take a breath and gave her a half-smile along with a slight shrug of his shoulders. ‘But you don’t want to hear about all of that.’
Oh, but she did. She wanted to know everything.
‘If you won’t let me reimburse you, can I at least buy you a coffee?’
She gathered her hair in her hand and twisted it, bringing it forward to hang over her shoulder. She toyed with the ends, something she always did when she felt out of her depth. Keeping her hands busy helped to calm her down and it worked again now, giving her just enough breathing space to be able to reply. ‘I don’t even know your name.’ As if it mattered. She already knew what her answer would be.
‘It’s Mitch. Mitch Reynolds.’
Mitch. It was perfect. The Reynolds part she had assumed but the rest of his name suited him perfectly. It was strong, straightforward and honest. He had an honest face and an honest name. He seemed like the type of man who could be trusted. He would call a spade a spade.
He put out his hand but Rose hesitated. She’d been thinking about him all night but even so her reaction to him today had surprised her. She was almost afraid to touch him again, afraid of what she would feel, afraid her body would betray her and he would be able to read on her face all the conflicting emotions that were coursing through her. Part of her wanted to see if she experienced the same sensation again but she knew she had to prepare herself first. If she was flustered she didn’t want him to see. She needed to appear in control.
Almost against her better judgement she put her hand in his. His fingers closed around hers, his grip strong but not threatening, and Rose had the strangest sensation of familiarity, that her body already knew his touch. It certainly responded to it as though she’d had some knowledge, some experience, of him before.
‘So now that we’re no longer strangers, will you let me buy you a coffee? I wanted to talk to you about Lila.’
He had sounded so guilty about forgetting Lila’s things; he’d sounded like he had the weight of the world on his shoulders and Rose couldn’t deny she was desperate to know more. This could be her chance to find out.
She nodded, not trusting herself to speak. She didn’t want him to guess how he affected her and she suspected her voice would be high and quavering. That was not the way to appear in control.
‘The social worker stopped by the ward after you left yesterday,’ Mitch said as he placed the cafeteria tray on the table and handed her a coffee. ‘Did you have anything to do with that?’
Rose knew that the social worker had been trying to contact Lila’s parents but she’d had nothing to do with the visit. She shook her head. ‘No. I imagine she’d left instructions with the nurses to call her when you got here.’ She took a bite of the doughnut that Mitch had insisted on buying for her and asked, ‘Who came to see you?’
‘Annabel.’
‘What did she want?’
‘She wanted to find out about Lila. Something about hospital policy for children who have no family support. Lila has family support, but I can’t be in two places at once.’
Mitch didn’t wear a wedding ring. She already knew that. She’d checked. She’d also done a little investigating yesterday after she’d left Lila’s bedside and discovered that there didn’t appear to be a Mrs Reynolds. Was that why Mitch needed to be in two places at once?
But surely Lila had a mother? She must have one. Rose wondered where she was. Wild horses wouldn’t have kept her away from her own child if they’d been hospitalised and she thought it odd that she hadn’t come to town, even if she wasn’t part of Mitch’s life any more.
If she wanted to know the answers, she would have to ask the questions. ‘What about Lila’s mother? Where is she?’
‘My wife died, there’s only me.’
‘Oh.’ That wasn’t the answer she’d been expecting. Surely that was the sort of information that should have been passed on to her? But before she could say anything further, Mitch kept talking.
‘So, if you’re not part of the social work team, what is it that you do here?’
Obviously his wife, his dead wife, was not a topic that was up for discussion.
‘I’m a teacher,’ Rose replied, going with the subject change.
‘A teacher?’ Mitch queried. ‘The social worker mentioned educational support... Are you what she was talking about?’
Rose smiled. His phrasing wasn’t quite the way she would have put it. ‘Yes, but not just me. We have a school here.’
‘In the hospital?’
She nodded. ‘Children who will have long hospital stays or frequent admissions, thereby missing school, can attend classes in the hospital. It stops them from getting too far behind and also keeps them socialising. We have a lot of kids, like Lila, from the country, and being away from family can be quite isolating. I imagine Annabel thinks Lila would benefit from attending classes.’ Rose knew that was the case but she got the impression that Mitch wouldn’t want to know the staff had been discussing him. She suspected he would want to feel like the idea and the decision to enrol Lila in the hospital school was his. ‘I teach middle primary mainly.’
‘So you would teach Lila?’
Rose nodded.
‘How does it work? School of the air I’m familiar with, but that’s about it for schools out our way.’
‘We have several teachers on staff covering everything from kindergarten through to high school and we have several classrooms. If children can make it to the classrooms they attend there but we can also teach them in their beds.’
‘And Lila can join in?’
‘Yes. Any child who is going to be in hospital for longer than a couple of days or is admitted frequently can be enrolled and we work closely with their regular school to make sure what they are learning is relevant.’
‘Why is this the first I’m hearing about this?’
Rose smiled. ‘I would guess Annabel has been trying to tell you, and if you’d called her back you would know.’
‘Touché,’ he said, before taking another sip of his coffee. ‘Lila would probably enjoy being in a classroom and having other kids her age around instead of just her younger brothers. How do I organise this?’
‘You’ll have to email Annabel and she can put a request in on your behalf,’ Rose explained.
Mitch pulled out his phone, asked for Annabel’s email address, and sent an email off straight away. He copied Rose in to the email and her phone beeped as the email hit her inbox. She glanced at her screen. Mitch’s signature on the bottom of the email included the contact details for the station.
Emu Downs.
It sounded so romantic. ‘Emu Downs. That’s a beautiful name.’
Mitch smiled and Rose’s heart soared. It was crazy how she reacted to his simple gestures. She’d spent months telling herself she wasn’t ready for a relationship yet this man, virtually a complete stranger, was able to make her body spring to life.
‘You’re imagining huge mobs of emus running across the land, aren’t you?’ Mitch’s question interrupted her fantasy.
Emus? She hadn’t been imagining anything of the sort! But she couldn’t tell him the truth—that she was feeling such a strong pull of attraction that she was amazed he hadn’t noticed. She couldn’t tell him the truth so she fibbed. ‘I was. Are there lots?’
‘Not any more. The dingoes and the drought have wiped a lot of them out.’
‘It’s a cattle station, is that right?’
Mitch nodded.
‘Has it always been in your family?’
‘It belongs to my wife’s family.’
The dead wife. That brought her back down to earth with a thump. This man with the gorgeous eyes and kind smile had children and a dead wife. He ran a cattle station out back of nowhere and he’d told her he had a lot on his plate. Hooking up with a random girl was probably not high on his agenda.
But Rose couldn’t shake the feeling that fate had brought him to her. That they were supposed to meet, that there was something between them and that he was going to be important to her in some way.
Or maybe she was going to be important to him. He looked a little distracted, lost in his memories, and Rose instinctively wanted to help. She had a tendency to feel other people’s pain. Perhaps because she’d suffered a major loss, the death of her father, at a young age, it had fine-tuned her empathy but she definitely felt as though she was the one who could help him. But how?
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