Outback Angel

by Margaret Way

  Angelica shook her head in sympathy, nevertheless surprised by Stacy’s disclosures so early in their acquaintance. She tinked the rim of her crystal glass against her white teeth. What a life it must have been, to be constantly belittled. She believed her own mother, wife, earthmother, restauranteur, superstar, would have put Clive McCord right. Men seemed to pick their mark. On the face of it Stacy McCord seemed like a natural-born victim. There wasn’t going to be any small talk, either. Stacy had major traumas to unload with seemingly not a minute to lose.

  “Of course in my youthful ignorance I thought loving him was enough,” Stacy continued in that soft reminiscent voice. It wasn’t often she found herself with a captive audience, consequently she found it difficult not to keep going. “Clive was everything I dreamed about. I thought I was in for a life of married bliss, a home of my own where I could be in charge for a change. And my parents were over the moon with such a splendid match. The McCords are an old pioneering family.”

  “And rich?” That upped anyone’s eligibility, Angel thought.

  “There’s always something about money,” Stacy agreed. “It made my mother so happy. She was proud of me for once. But the money didn’t mean anything to me. I loved him. He was such a striking-looking man and I was little more than a silly schoolgirl. I didn’t have a glimmer of an idea he’d bought me like he’d buy a pedigreed little heifer. I was young and pretty, if you can believe it. I was soft, and by the way I mean soft in the head, as well. I had no instinct for trouble. I didn’t even notice Clive wasn’t a bit of fun.”

  By this time Angelica herself didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “I doubt many people have it all together at eighteen,” she consoled. I mean, did she? The answer was a resounding no. “It takes time to understand human emotions and passions. If we ever do. Anyway there’s nothing like getting married to bring out the best and worst in people.”

  Stacy, to her credit, gave vent to a surprisingly hearty laugh. “Why is it I think I’ve known you forever?”

  “It happens like that.” Angelica smiled.

  “But I am talking too much.” Stacy suddenly flushed, blotching her apple-blossom skin.

  “I really appreciate the fact you trust me,” Angelica told her with sincerity. The fact of the matter was she often received unsolicited confidences the moment people laid eyes on her. She supposed she must look kind, or they thought they’d never see her again. She’d even received off-the-cuff marriage proposals.

  “I used to think if the portrait of Roxanne came down, Clive would start to forget.” Stacy pushed at her wispy fringe, a mannerism Angelica had remarked. “But he never did. He was absolutely faithful to her to the end. I suspect when he was dying alone out there in the desert he cried out her name. Maybe they’re together again at last.”

  “Maybe they are,” Angelica said, with a kind of fascinated sadness. If she were a romance writer instead of a caterer she could have turned the whole thing into a block-buster. “I believe in an afterlife, but you have to let go, Stacy.”

  Stacy nodded. Nodded again with great vehemence. “Oh, it’s so good to talk. Very few would be interested.”

  “You’re still young.” Angelica intuited Stacy had been thinking along these lines. “There’s no reason why you can’t re-marry. Happily this time. Life goes by so fast you have to grab it on the wing.”

  “Oh, God!” Stacy exclaimed almost despairingly. “That’s all very well for you. You’re young and so vibrant. I don’t believe I ever was. I was Little Miss Helpless. Only child syndrome. Older parents. Anyway, who’d have me?”

  “A lot,” Angelica answered dryly.

  “Aha, the money.” Stacy saw the irony.

  “Don’t put yourself down. You’re a pretty woman.”

  “Am I?” Stacy sounded pleased and even took a very human little peek into a well-positioned gilded mirror. “But how could I meet anyone out here?”

  “Dive right in,” Angelica advised. “We have all these wonderful Christmas functions coming up. I absolutely love Christmas. We must have a great big tree. I know you’ve got one.”

  “No we haven’t got one,” Stacy announced surprisingly. “Clive only died three years ago. He didn’t want any Christmas trees.”

  “Why didn’t you get one yourself? Even afterwards?” Angelica was so amazed, her voice cracked.

  “I think I expected Clive might come back to haunt me. Anyway if I put up a big Christmas tree you can count on its falling over.”

  “It won’t fall over on me,” Angelica said. “Have we agreed on a Christmas tree? I know exactly where it should go. The bigger the better.”

  “We’ve no pines here, dear, only desert oaks.” Stacy smiled.

  “We’ll find something,” Angelica said. “But getting back to our functions, you know who’s coming. Surely there’s an eligible man or two? There must be, I can see you smiling.”

  “Really just a friend.” Stacy’s voice softened. A dead give-away. “He’s a lovely man, but I can’t think he’d be all that interested in me. There are others.”

  “Look on the positive side,” Angelica advised. “You can have what you want if you go after it. I’ve found it really doesn’t pay to be tentative and hold back. Why don’t we try to sort things out this week? I’m going to have to press you into service, if that’s okay? No need to worry. You’re going to enjoy it. Have fun. Offering hospitality to friends should be fun. You don’t have to perform miracles. Gillian has to do her bit, too. Is there a guy in her life?”

  Stacy glanced over her shoulder as though Gillian was about to return. “Gilly’s got a crush on one of our jackeroos,” she confided.

  Angelica’s jaw dropped. She thought jackeroos were supposed to keep their distance. “Really?”

  “He’s a fine young man, but he’s English.”

  Angelica, disconcerted, just stopped herself from snorting. “Is that a problem?” She stared at Stacy, wondering if Stacy had been hoping for a local.

  “It is in this way…” Stacy started to clarify. “Charlie could go back home at any time. He’s here for the adventure. He read all about the Outback as a boy and fancied himself living the frontier life. They must have made it sound very glamorous. Anyway he loves it but his family will want him back home. Who could blame them? He’s the Honourable Charles Middleton by the way.”

  Angelica was fascinated. “That sounds safe enough. You mean Gillian has a member of the English aristocracy in her pocket?”

  “Well, it hasn’t gone far, but they seem very fond of each other. Charlie is such a nice young man. Jake likes him, too, which makes things so much easier. That’s where she’s nipped out to.”

  “To see Charlie?” Angelica asked, further intrigued.

  “They don’t go a day without seeing each other.” Stacy brushed at her fringe, torn between feeling happy for her daughter and worry. “I pray and pray she won’t get hurt. I mean, she’s a real softie like me.”

  “And the Honourable Charlie isn’t your normal, average guy.” Angelica nodded in understanding. “This must be an entirely new way of life for him?”

  “You’d think he was born to it.” Stacy smiled fondly. “Though he’s had his learning curve. He finished up in hospital last year with a back injury. We were all so worried, but he made an excellent recovery. Jake keeps in contact with his family and of course Charlie does, too, but his father likes Jake to tell him how his son is getting along. I suppose you could call him much more than the normal jackeroo. He often comes up to the house for dinner. He hero worships Jake. He thinks he’s marvellous even when Jake has had to tear strips off him for being too reckless. But those were the early days.”

  “I’m looking forward to meeting Charlie.” Angelica had to laugh.

  Please don’t take him off Gilly, Stacy thought. Most men wouldn’t be able to tear their eyes away from Angelica. But she seemed such a nice girl. Generous and kind.

  They were still chatting when Jake returned. He heard their laugh
ter as he made his way to his stepmother’s sitting room. Miss De Campo certainly knew how to charm people, he thought. Every time Dinah came over there was no hint of laughter from Stacy or Gilly.

  Both women looked up as he entered the cool, charming room. “How’s it going?”

  “We haven’t stopped talking from the moment we sat down,” Stacy told him, pink-cheeked and happy. “In fact I haven’t enjoyed myself so much in ages.”

  “That’s good.” Miss De Campo was either very kind or very clever. Maybe both. He glanced at her. She had changed her eye-catching mini for an equally hot little number; a cool white cotton knit top over pink cotton jeans that sat as sweetly on her hips as the oval-dipping top clung to her breasts. She had a major talent for wearing clothes. It was no problem to imagine her naked, either. “If we’re going to look around, we’d better get started,” he said, sounding crisp.

  “Fine!” Instantly, Angelica jumped to her feet. “I can’t wait to see around. My bedroom is simply beautiful. Very grand.”

  “I decided on it, dear.” Stacy looked pleased.

  “A four-poster is a real treat for me.” Angelica said. “I’m really going to enjoy myself going to bed.”

  You’d make me pretty damned happy, as well, Jake thought, not insured against dangerous thoughts.

  They made a tour of the house, moving from room to room of the mansion. They started with the reception rooms but Jake took little time in the beautiful Yellow Drawing Room that housed the portrait of his mother, and Angelica sensed some inner emotional struggle. They spent more time over the very fine library with its collection of rare books, and now they stood inside Clive McCord’s memento- and trophy-filled study, a room Jake told her he didn’t use.

  Eyes dark and brilliant, Angelica looked up at the portrait of Clive McCord that dominated the generously sized room. “I must be a fanciful person but I feel the people who lived in this house all around us,” she said quietly. “There’s been happiness here, hope, love and sorrow.”

  “Certainly my father waged his own personal war against fate,” Jake said without bitterness, looking into his father’s painted piercingly blue eyes. He looked wonderfully handsome, arrogant, with the promise of a glorious life ahead of him. This had been painted as a companion piece to the portrait of his mother in the Yellow Drawing Room.

  “It was wrong of him to make his family suffer,” Angelica said gently, “but the joy must have gone out of him the day your mother was killed.” She turned to look into Jake’s handsome face. It wore a sombre expression, as though he remembered constant duels in this very room.

  “I hate to admit it.” He shrugged. “I’m a grown man, but he hurt us all. He never treated me like a son. More like a usurper whose only aim was to steal his throne from him. Contradictory really because my father always said life was meaningless.”

  “I expect he meant without your mother. It was very hard on Stacy.”

  “She told you?” And if she did, who did Stacy really have to talk to?

  “Why not? Stacy accepts me as the person I am.”

  “Whereas I’ve dipped into your past?” he murmured, thinking how that had complicated things.

  “Is it you don’t trust me or you don’t trust anyone?” she asked directly.

  Something flashed in his eyes. “Maybe I’m more like my father than I care to acknowledge.”

  “Is that a fear?” Both her voice and her expression was very soft, near tender.

  It affected him so much he wanted to grab her. Pull her into his arms. Rain kisses down on the luscious mouth. Instead he said coolly, “Is this a psychoanalysis session?”

  “I think life would be unendurable if we couldn’t talk to someone,” she countered, realising there was a lot of stress in him.

  “I don’t know you…” He only had to lower his head.

  “Strangely, I don’t feel like that.” The atmosphere was so intimate she found herself near whispering. “I think you fall into the category of people I’ve known in another life.”

  “How fanciful…Angel.” Now why had he called her that?

  On his lips it sounded heavenly. “Millions of people believe in reincarnation,” she said, her blood racing. “I still say I met you somewhere along the way.”

  “And did you love me or hate me?” he asked, some note in his voice sending shock waves along her nerves.

  “I don’t know,” she admitted, her voice so breathy it touched his cheek. “But I know you. I can’t explain it.” She looked back at the portrait of Clive McCord. “That’s a very powerful painting. Clearly you don’t have your father’s colouring, but you do have a look of him.”

  “So tell me, is it the arrogance?”

  “You might have a touch of it but I should think it was the arrogance of achievement. I think you’re going to be a winner in life’s battles, Jake McCord.”

  He tried to clear the huskiness from his throat. “Who taught you how to heal?” he asked.

  She looked at him in surprise. “I’m not aware I have that talent.”

  His amber gaze was brilliant and unblinking. “I swear you’ve been using it on me since the moment you stepped off the plane.”

  “Maybe I’m looking for the man behind the tough façade.” A beautiful smile moved over her face. “My poppa is a little bit like you. Very much the dominant male in the old tradition but he has a sweet centre. My mother soon found it.”

  He was close enough to touch her. To run his fingers down her cheek, brush back the glossy dark tumble of hair. He did none of those things. Instead he asked, “Are you saying you could find mine? Always supposing I have one.”

  “You must!” She shrugged an elegant satiny shoulder. “Stacy and Gilly love you.”

  “So basically I’m a good guy,” he said with wry humour.

  “That’s about the size of it.” She glanced up at him, looked away quickly before he saw invitation in her eyes. For reasons she couldn’t entirely fathom she found this complex man utterly irresistible. This man who for his own reasons had decided to condemn her. But such was the power of attraction, irrational in its way. She made a silent vow to find the real man beneath. Jake McCord was one enigma she intended to solve.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  ONCE in a blue moon did you see showcase country kitchens like this, Angelica thought, pausing in the open doorway to admire the extraordinarily inviting king-size room. It was a delightful mix of old and new with homestead charm allied to the finest modern appliances money could buy. Such a highly functional kitchen with plenty of work spaces would make her job so much easier. In fact it would have fitted seamlessly into her parents’ flagship Italian restaurant.

  Her trained eye moved with approval over marble bench tops, lots of gleaming timber—cupboards, a polished hardwood floor—a timber hanging rail displaying copper utensils above a huge central work station. Along the back wall, a restaurant-size stainless-steel oven, stainless-steel refrigerators with matching freezers side by side. There was even a small informal dining area, circular table and four cottage chairs by the window where deflected sunlight streamed in. On the centre of the table stood a bright ceramic bowl full of lemons. A must in any cook’s kitchen.

  The housekeeper—for a godsend, they had met and taken to one another on sight—preferred to be known only as “Clary.” The name suited her, Angel thought, uncertain whether Clary by chance stood for Clara, Clarice or even Clarabelle. No one had enlightened her if they even knew.

  Clary would have been well into her sixties conforming to the traditional idea of “cook,” stout of figure with an air of great energy, shrewd, genial eyes and a fine head of thick pepper-and-salt curls. Given the size of the homestead and the family and the stacks of visitors to the station to feed Angel could well see she would always be on the go. In a year or two, maybe less, Clary would surely want to retire and have some time to herself. Apparently she had been running the household since it was discovered the second Mrs. McCord had little aptitude for the job
. Coming up twenty years? In that time Clary had created her own super-functional, super-efficient kitchen environment over which she reigned supreme.

  As Angelica stood admiring a world-renowned double cooker, Clary emerged from an adjacent doorway to the rear. “Hello there, Clary,” Angelica called, her admiring voice not lost on the housekeeper. “I hope I’m not disturbing you. I was just looking at your marvellous kitchen.”

  “You can disturb me all you like, love,” Clary said comfortably, waving a hand to welcome Angelica in. “I take that as a real compliment coming from you. I see copies of Cosima, you know. I really like the way you write. It’s infectious. And I like your recipes with all the little surprises. You make food preparation fun.”

  “Which, of course, it is if you love food and all the wonderful produce of the earth. I must say you’ve a splendid working environment here,” Angelica commented, running a hand over a bench top. “Great for serious cooking. It will make the job of catering so much easier.”

  “That it will,” Clary agreed, picking up a dish cloth to wipe away a non-existent spot. “Would you like to look at the pantry, love. It’s well stocked but you’ll be wanting lots more. You do need a hand?”

  “You bet I do, Clary. I’m counting on it.”

  “I’m in.” Clary injected pleasure and enthusiasm into it. “Isobel appreciates my help, too. We want to do Coori proud. You won’t get Stacy, God love her, on the team though,” she added wryly. “She’s not domesticated, I’m afraid, but Isobel would have told you that. In the early days I used to try to show her something but she always disappeared. It used to make the master simmer, I can tell you, but it seemed to make no impression on Stacy. She didn’t always pick up on his moods. You know and I know that to feed people successfully, come up with menus, et cetera, you have to love food. Like it at least. Stacy and young Gilly only eat to survive. They have little interest in what I put before them.”