Marriage at Murraree

by Margaret Way

  Troy nodded. “Having said that, the view from the top is magnificent. Unforgettable. One of the times when the Rock looks its most beautiful is after the rains when it’s surrounded by a sea of sparkling green water that’s surprisingly cold. Beautiful waterfalls tumble down the many ravines and numerous crystal clear rock pools are formed. Of course the water disappears fairly quickly but it leaves in its wake a verdant belt all around the base. The wildlife love it. There are other amazing places I can show you if you stick around. Kings Canyon. Rainbow Valley. Mount Connor about 100 K’s east. That’s another island mountain with a majestic table top. The Devil’s Marbles about 400 K’s north of Alice. Palm Valley which is quite staggering in the middle of the arid desert—Chambers Pillar the last vestige of an ancient plateau. They’re all wonderful.”

  “You love this part of the country, don’t you?”

  He smiled, his eyes a tawny gold. “My home is my favourite place in all the world.”

  “Have you seen much of the world?” Why not? He’d been born with a solid gold spoon in his mouth.

  Just as she expected, he nodded, but casually. “I and a friend of mine from University—the same friend who climbed the Rock with me—took a year off so we could take the grand tour. We had a wonderful time. The world we live in is truly marvellous. I soaked up everything I saw, but my heart’s here in the Outback. I’m very proud I’m Australian.”

  “But you don’t think your father is going to leave you what you consider is your inheritance?” she prodded, her eyes on his firm but oddly voluptuous mouth. It was generous, curvy, so, so inviting. It made her want to… She reined herself in hard.

  The gleaming eyes burned. “He cracks the whip from time to time thinking he can keep me in line.”

  “You’d think he’d revel in having a son?” Casey said, aware McIvor had been very bitter about the fact he had no male heir.

  “It’s like I said, Casey. My dad and I don’t get on.”

  “Is Leah your mother, sister, sister-in-law, Dad’s mistress?” No one had told her like it was some big secret.

  He went to say something. Thought better of it. “Leah is my sister. She’s broken all the rules for years and years but she could get away with murder as far as Dad’s concerned. He spoils her like you wouldn’t believe. But for some reason he’s been very demanding with me.”

  “He expects more of you obviously.”

  “I don’t know that I have that much more to give,” he confessed wryly. “I’ve led a pretty tough solitary life of late up in the Territory. It’s my job to oversee the chain and keep everyone in line.”

  “It’s as well you’re a great big fella. And your mother? What’s she like?”

  His face was turned to her so for a split second she was witness to the grief in his eyes. In a blink it was gone. “My mother’s dead, Casey,” he said, flatly.

  “I’m sorry. How old were you?” For a minute she thought he wasn’t about to answer.

  “Fourteen. It wasn’t all that long after I climbed the Rock, oddly enough. She and a family friend were caught in a flash flood on the station. You wouldn’t realize it in a million years how quickly a near dry water channel can turn into a raging torrent unless you’ve seen it happen. It was a freak thing. They couldn’t have been paying enough attention. They weren’t prepared.” He made a gesture with his strong brown hand as though warding the memory off.

  “How dreadful.” She was sure he wasn’t telling her everything but she knew better than to pry. “I was eleven when my mother died,” she offered out of some sort of fellow feeling. “She OD’d on drugs. She was thirty-six. A tiny little person. When I came home from school I thought she was asleep. She used to sleep for hours on end. I called the ambulance but I knew she was already dead.”

  “God Almighty!” Troy said quietly. “That must have ripped you apart?”

  She kept staring at the magnificent desert monolith drawing on its strength. “These days, Connellan, I do my best not to let the memories in. I’d say just like you.”

  “Did you have anyone to talk to?”

  “Oh sure,” she said laconically. “I did a lot of talking to myself. No one else wanted to know. No aunts, no uncles, no cousins. Certainly no father. There was one compassionate lady who I think wanted to adopt me, but she was cut out of the frame. Almost immediately I was put in a home. The Home I call it. It was practically unendurable. Full of demons.” She turned to him. Begged. “Please shut me up.”

  “No, let it out,” he said from a great reservoir of compassion. “Though I can’t talk, I see the importance of bringing things out into the open, but I can’t seem to do it. The only trouble is bad memories reverberate down the years.”

  “You can say that again.” Casey shuddered. “After I lost my mother it was like I had nothing and no one. I was nothing. You can see why I hate McIvor?”

  Troy was shaking his head. “I’m certain he didn’t know about you, Casey.”

  Her sapphire gaze turned stony. “He could have prevented a tragedy. My mother was a very vulnerable person. She couldn’t come to terms with abandonment. She needed a man in her life. Not any man. McIvor. She was very pretty before she let herself go. She could have found a decent man but she was totally one track. Sometimes I think my mother and I came from a totally different species. I saw little kids like her in The Home. It chewed them up and spat them out.”

  “When did you leave?” he asked, really wanting to know.

  “The grand old age of sixteen. No sweet sixteen, though somehow I emerged a virgin if you’re interested in trivia.”

  A look of anger swept his face. “Casey, couldn’t you have spoken to someone?”

  She shrugged as though it were all too much in the past. “The place was full of creeps and monsters. There was one guy I called the Cobra—for obvious reasons—he was always set to strike. He had a greasy medusa of dreadlocks that stank. He was always trying to grab me. My heart used to beat like a drum at a military tattoo whenever he was around. He nearly scored one time—I was pinned to the mat—but I managed to get in an almighty kick that settled him very nicely. It certainly wasn’t my pitiful cries of Help! Help! Somebody help me! that did it. He didn’t come back for more. In fact, I didn’t have a lot of trouble with anyone after that.”

  “And that was?” Troy questioned.

  “When I was fourteen. So we both had terrible struggles at the same age. Now why have I told you all this?” she asked, frowning. “I don’t talk about any of this stuff.”

  “Maybe it’s the timelessness of our surrounding,” he suggested very seriously. “The peace and the power. You’re safe here. Safe from all the suffering of the past.”

  His eyes held her, full of fire, intelligence, understanding, more compassion than she had ever seen. It reminded her just how much she was falling under his spell.

  “Only one thing. I can’t set up a tent here.” She veered off to joking. “Hard to nip out for a loaf of bread and a bottle of milk.”

  He smiled, stood up and extended a hand. “Let’s walk. The caves around the base of the Rock are shrines for the aborigines. Hundred of rock paintings decorate the walls. Uluru is holy.”

  Maybe some of that holiness will rub off on me, Casey prayed.

  Like the night before they had dinner together. Nothing elaborate. Grilled fillet of prime beef with a horseradish sauce and a rocket salad on the side.

  “That was good!” Casey said, “I’ve never tasted such flavoursome tender beef in my life.”

  “Well if you can’t get it here you can’t get it anywhere,” Troy said, a smile on his curvy mouth.

  “Dessert?”

  “I think not. Maybe a short black then I intend taking a walk before turning in. The stars out here have to be seen to be believed.”

  “No pollution,” Troy explained, topping up her wineglass with the last of the shiraz they had shared.

  “You can’t think a couple of glasses of wine will make me tipsy?” she mocked.


  “No. Absolutely not,” he replied dryly. “Making love to disoriented women isn’t my scene.”

  She stared back at him wondering if he were joking. “Do you want to add anything to that?” she asked. “Like you’re hoping, damned well expecting you’re going to make love to me?” Suspicion was built into her.

  “Isn’t making love the most wonderful thing in the world?” His golden gaze was fixed on her, brilliant, unblinking. Just like a big cat.

  “Try bungee jumping,” she said. “Now that’s a real thrill.”

  “You’ve done it?” Intensity turned to considerable interest.

  “Sure have.” Casey shrugged. “Had the time of my life. Beats sex hands down.”

  “So what say we go bungee jumping together?” he suggested, his mouth curling.

  “Maybe. I promise you you’ll be back for more.”

  “You’re some woman, McGuire,” he said, holding up a hand to signal the waitress.

  Afterwards they took a stroll beneath the desert sky. He with the easy graceful lope she had come to admire. He looked like he had all the time in the world to get anywhere. Scorching hot during the day, the desert cooled off to a surprising degree at night. The air was crisp but as soft as silk. The desert scents subtle but wonderfully aromatic. Maybe it was the wine but her body felt warm, darn near hot. The memory of that incident at Kata Tjuta had stayed with her. The sexual intimacy. Never mind his response, it was hers she was worried about. Even so she knew Troy Connellan wasn’t the kind of guy who would pounce on her for all his resemblance to a big tawny cat. She had more than enough experience to pick the bad guys. But she had to face the fact he was pushing her sexual buttons with no trouble at all.

  Above them the stars were blazing. There was only a horned moon. The stars were unbelievably beautiful, dominating the vast sky.

  “This is enthralling!” She blew out a little breath, wondering if being in the Outback was the source of a new-found inner serenity. The Outback was so vast. So open. So free. Incomparable Nature, the great healer.

  “There are innumerable aboriginal myths about the sun, the moon and the stars,” Troy was saying with that seductive edge to his voice. It was inbuilt, she’d noticed, not assumed. “The desert tribes know practically every star in the heavens. They all have a story.”

  “Do you know any?” she asked, lifting a hand to her loose blazing hair.

  “Of course I do,” he scoffed. “This is my country.”

  “So tell me. I love stories. I used to make up tons of stories to comfort myself when I was a child.”

  “Did you?” His eyes burned brighter than the stars. “Well there’s the one about the Moon and the Morning Star. Our magnificent waterlily—you’ve seen them crowding the lagoons at Murraree—is the aboriginal symbol for a star. The flower is its beautiful luminous glow. The stalk is the star’s path across the sky. We have a magnificent bark painting of the Morning Star back on Vulcan. I’ll show it to you one day. It’s mine and no one else’s. My mother left it to me. She’s up there, you know, in the Milky Way?” He lifted his heavy handsome head to the diamond river in the sky.

  “That’s lovely!” Casey breathed, for once without her trademark tinge of sarcasm. “So’s mine.”

  “So we’re friends, McGuire.” He turned to her, holding out his large strong hand.

  “Friends.” Almost solemnly they shook hands. “Now tell me the story,” she said, needing to downplay the emotion of the moment.

  She hadn’t meant him to kiss her when he showed her to her door. She opened her mouth to say good night, but he drew her fully, completely, into his arms, breast to breast, hip to hip, long legs near matched. Wave after wave of steamy sensation flowed down Casey’s spine. She’d known from the beginning he could kiss like this.

  He didn’t hold back. Neither did she. This was something she wasn’t going to think about. She was going to take. When the kiss broke, they were both breathing hard.

  “Nice going, Connellan,” she managed to gasp, starkly aware she wanted him with a force that shocked her.

  “I want that to last until the next time I see you,” he said huskily, slowly sliding his hands down her bare arms. He half turned towards his room at the end of the hallway. “Sleep tight, Red. Your mouth has the taste of sugar and spice. I have to tell you I just loved it on my tongue.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  SOMEONE of influence must have speeded up the DNA report because it came back less than a fortnight later. Casey was indeed who she said she was: Jock McIvor’s daughter.

  The only one who was shocked was Casey herself. On receiving confirmation, she tore down the front steps of the homestead where the three McIvor women had been relaxing over coffee, and out into the scorching noonday sun heading for the station jeep, mercifully parked in the shade.

  “Oh, she’s terribly upset!” Tender-hearted Courtney clutched her throat. “We should go after her.”

  “No, let her be.” Darcy put out a restraining hand. “She has to be on her own for a while. It’s asking too much of her not to be upset. All her life Casey hasn’t known who her father was. She’s only learned that fairly recently. It’s a lot to take in. In a weird way Casey, too, had to have proof positive. I’m so glad Adam is coming this weekend,” she breathed. “We have to sort out Casey’s fair share.”

  “That’s okay with me,” Courtney readily agreed. “Casey’s not one to confide, but I’d say she’s had a pretty awful life. Plenty of hard knocks.”

  “God alone knows what happened at that orphanage.” Darcy grimaced. “And finding her mother like that! What can one say? It makes our stories pale into insignificance.”

  “Do you really suppose Dad didn’t know?” Courtney searched her sister’s crystal clear eyes.

  Darcy turned her considering gaze to the home gardens, shimmering in the golden heat. “I couldn’t bear to think he abandoned a pregnant woman. I couldn’t cope with that. Then again that’s not being fair to Dad. I knew him as well as anyone. I’m certain he had no idea.”

  “Surely he could have checked?’

  “I suppose he relied on the woman protecting herself. Casey’s mother should have contacted him. I’d say she didn’t feel able. She must have been a young woman with lots of problems. She didn’t contact her parents, either. Not even for Casey’s sake. She must have come to believe herself an outsider. I can’t think much of her parents not searching for her. It’s a sad story, but we have to care for Casey now. She’s our sister. We won’t do the half sister bit.”

  “Sister is better,” Courtney agreed. “So why don’t we turn the news into a little celebration? Nothing Casey would find hard to handle. She’s not used to being fussed over.”

  “What do you have in mind? A few people over for the weekend?”

  “Exactly.” Courtney smiled. “Troy Connellan for one now he’s back. I think Casey really likes him even if she won’t let on.”

  “Leah’s home.” Darcy frowned, like that was a problem. “We can’t avoid inviting her. She’s probably got some guy in tow.”

  “You’re the one who knows her,” Courtney said. “We only met up that once in town. She struck me as very, very snobby.”

  “And no one would know what about. She’s not a bit like Troy, and her father has spoilt her rotten. Yes, a nice weekend shared with friends might well be what we need. Nothing that will drive Casey away. I want her to enjoy it.”

  “I don’t imagine anyone will be surprised she’s Dad’s daughter?” Courtney asked, beginning to stack the cups and saucers.

  “No,” Darcy answered simply. “Not when Dad spent years enrapturing women.”

  “What would we do if someone else turns up?” Courtney paused in what she was doing.

  “Interesting question,” Darcy sighed. “They’d have to do like Casey. Prove themselves. One thing’s certain. If Dad has a son we can be absolutely certain he knew nothing about it. I spent years feeling guilty I didn’t have a penis. Besides I don’t
believe his gold digging girlfriends wouldn’t have told him. So that’s one issue out of the way. As for Casey? I don’t want her to disappear out of our lives, do you?”

  “Oh, no!” Courtney shook her head. “She’s our blood. Why, do you think she will? After things are settled I mean.”

  “She could.” Darcy sighed. “She has her own life. She’s very talented. And she’s knock your eyes out stunning. Surely that’s a winning combination in show business. But Casey has fitted right in. She seems to love it here. Her personality is unfurling like a flower to the sun. She has a wicked sense of humour. She makes us laugh. We love to hear her sing. She’s so good. She pours her heart into everything. And she writes her own material. Add to that, she’s very supportive and so effective around the place.”

  “I’ll say!” Courtney agreed with a wry shrug. “Sometimes she makes me feel a touch inadequate.”

  “Don’t be silly!” Darcy looked at her younger sister, sharply alerted by some tentative note in her voice. “We all have our strengths. You’re the brains of the outfit.”

  “Now you’re being silly.” Courtney smiled, at the same time feeling reassured.

  “You know what I mean. I rely on you to keep the homestead running smoothly. As far as the business side goes you’ve been a great asset. We’re a team. A team I’d like Casey to join if she ever wanted to.”

  “Well she looks to you more than me,” Courtney admitted freely. “When she first arrived she reminded me of a boxer forever dancing on his toes. Now she’s learning to relax around us.”

  “She’s family,” Darcy said.

  Courtney didn’t delay inviting the weekend guests. At first Casey looked doubtful. She didn’t want to be put into the position of guest of honour but Darcy assured her there simply wasn’t going to be any fuss. They were all going to enjoy themselves. What was more Casey’s status as Jock McIvor’s daughter would be confirmed. No family conflicts. All the gossipmongers could forget about that. Casey McGuire-McIvor had been readily accepted by her sisters.