Her Outback Rescuer

by Marion Lennox

  Then there were ‘normal’ women, those who didn’t know the army world and who didn’t know the Thurston world. Asking someone not in the military to understand the dangers of his job, to live with not knowing where he was, what he was doing, to ask her to live with his nightmares, his world, when he couldn’t explain... Such a relationship would be impossible and he’d never attempt it. Nor could he ever ask someone unfamiliar with it to cope with the media hype of the Thurston world.

  And Amy was normal, he thought. She was small, blonde and cute. She came across as vulnerable. She was definitely in the third category—not of his world.

  So it had been a bad idea to kiss her—he knew it had—but he looked down at her now and he really badly wanted to kiss her again.

  ‘Don’t even think about it,’ she growled and he took a step back.

  ‘About what?’

  ‘You know very well what.’

  Was he that obvious? Maybe he was. He was in a tiny sitting room with a beautiful woman in lacy satin pyjamas. Maybe it’d take a stronger man than him not to be obvious.

  ‘I don’t think...’ he started.

  ‘Excellent. Don’t think, except what letters you have in front of you. Scrabble. Is this your position or your grandmother’s?’

  ‘Mine.’

  ‘You’re losing.’

  ‘Story of my life,’ he said. ‘So you won’t kiss me again?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Can I ask why not?’ Of all the dumb questions... Where was he going with this?

  And she didn’t know, either. She was looking at him as if he had a kangaroo loose in the top paddock—which pretty much summed up how he was feeling.

  And, as if she knew best lunatic practice, she relented and explained simply, in words even a lunatic could understand.

  ‘One,’ she said, patience personified. ‘I’m not a one-night stand sort of girl. I may have been desperate enough to lurch in here with my dog and my pyjamas, but I’m still respectable. So if you’re thinking of pushing it, don’t. Your grandma’s right through that door and I know enough of Dame Maud to bet one scream will have you chastised like you’re six years old. You may look like a warrior but you’re a warrior with a grandma. I’m prepared to use her kindness as a human shield.’

  ‘Right,’ he said faintly. ‘And two?’

  ‘Two? Two is that I’m not interested in any sort of relationship. What Dame Maud was suggesting... No. If you’re thinking one kiss could signal the beginning of an affair, even a tiddly, inconspicuous affair, I’ll tell you where to put that as well.’

  ‘Can I ask why?’ He shouldn’t ask—this was the craziest of conversations—but she had him intrigued.

  ‘Because, even though you’re drop-dead gorgeous, and even though the tabloids have you as a billionaire and your grandpa’s heir, and you even say you’re hero material, I’m totally, absolutely not in the market for any sort of relationship. It’s taken me months to persuade Rachel to come away with me. You think two days into our journey I’m going to turn around and say, “Sorry, Rachel, go back to your books for a while because I have this hot guy in Car Two”?’

  ‘I understand,’ he said, and did, but what he didn’t understand was his unfathomable sense of loss.

  There was an attraction between them. She’d felt it—she must have felt it. He’d intended that kiss to be fast and hot and leave her flustered enough to look...well, flustered. What he hadn’t counted on was that it had left him feeling as he’d intended her to look.

  As if he’d been interrupted in the midst of something vital to them both.

  ‘Scrabble,’ she said, and started checking her squares. ‘Sit. Play.’

  ‘Yes, ma’am,’ he said and sat and played, and if neither of them found a word that’d make either Rachel or Maud proud...well, what was to be expected when neither of their minds were on Scrabble?

  CHAPTER FOUR

  TWO hours later they decided even Amy’s conductor would be convinced they’d had enough time to have a red-hot liaison. They’d certainly run out of Scrabble options.

  There were lots of things Amy would have liked to ask this guy. He’d been in the army since he was seventeen. He’d travelled in some of the most amazing countries in the world and she’d never been out of Australia. She would have loved to ask him...lots.

  But there was something about Hugo Thurston that stopped her asking anything, and he very carefully didn’t ask her anything back.

  After five games of Scrabble, Amy was one to Hugo’s four, she was pretty much close to screaming and thankfully it was time for her to go back to Car Six.

  She settled Buster into Hugo’s bed and told him to stay. During Rachel’s marriage, the little dog had become accustomed to being left with friends while Amy was performing. He was a handbag dog and he made no demur when she left him. In fact, he looked as if he kind of liked Hugo’s man-sized bed.

  Why not? It was better than the narrow bunk she was going back to, she thought, but she shoved the thought aside—and then thought: hooray, thanks to this night she’d be travelling Platinum on the next leg. That was a thought to cheer a girl up. She headed out into the corridor—and Hugo came with her.

  ‘There’s no need to take me home,’ she said a trifle breathlessly. Just being near this guy made her breathless.

  ‘Maud’s orders,’ he said simply. ‘I’m a man who follows orders.’

  ‘Scared of your grandma?’

  ‘All of my life.’

  ‘I don’t believe you.’

  ‘I don’t tell lies.’

  ‘Says the man who dusted dog hairs out of my purse.’

  ‘Shush.’ They were approaching the butler’s pantry but the door was closed. Hopefully, Henry was fast asleep.

  ‘No one’s awake,’ she said. ‘And I don’t need company.’

  ‘What if there’s a camel and no Buster to protect you?’

  She smiled and kept going, but she didn’t feel like smiling. In truth she was feeling totally...disconcerted. The last few hours had been weird enough, but now, making her way through the jolting, rumbling train, with this really disconcerting guy right behind her...

  What was it about this guy that made him...disconcerting?

  The train rolled a little and she stumbled. He was right behind, and he caught her shoulders and steadied her.

  More disconcerting. Really, really disconcerting.

  The train steadied and so did she. Sort of. She set off again, feeling ridiculous, absurdly aware of the warrior behind her, ready to catch her if she stumbled. Woman in pink satin being escorted home by her own personal bodyguard.

  No one was awake. Thanks be. One foot after another, she told herself, and ignore the bodyguard.

  Not possible.

  She reached the door of her compartment and turned and he was even more impossible to ignore.

  He was far too near for comfort. He hadn’t done his shirt buttons up since that crazy interlude with the train staff. She’d noticed those undone buttons. Of course she had. Maybe that was why she’d lost at Scrabble. Once or twice she’d thought about asking him to do them up—as she’d done hers up really fast the moment the train staff had left. He hadn’t, though, and she wished...

  Or maybe she didn’t wish. Maybe she had no idea any more what she was wishing.

  ‘Thank you and goodnight,’ she managed, and she couldn’t stop herself sounding breathless. Like an overawed teenager. ‘You’ve been..
.very good.’

  ‘I have, haven’t I,’ he said gravely. ‘Is Maud right? Does Buster snore?’

  ‘He dreams,’ she admitted. ‘When he does, he wuffles.’

  ‘If he has nightmares, should I fetch you?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘No?’ he said and grinned. ‘You’re condemning me to sharing my bed with nightmares.’

  ‘You look big enough to cope.’

  ‘I am,’ he said, and his smile faded. ‘I’m big enough to cope with anything.’ His smile had suddenly disappeared.

  Nightmares.

  She thought suddenly that this man had almost twenty years in the army, in a unit she knew of only by its fearsome reputation. What nightmares were there? She knew by his face that the word had conjured up images that appalled. And even before the armed forces? She knew enough of his parents to think there’d have been nightmares for Hugo Thurston since birth.

  Maybe the warrior thing was out of place. She looked up at him and was hit by an almost irresistible urge to...to...

  The train jerked again and his hands once more caught her shoulders. She felt herself fall against him.

  Accidentally?

  Maybe not so much.

  His hands felt amazing. His chest felt amazing, and if she just tilted her chin...

  Her chin tilted all by itself as she searched his face. His eyes were grave and questioning, and she felt...

  Exposed. A flashlight, from so close...

  The door to the next compartment had opened. It was the guy who’d yelled about the dog, and he was holding his phone as a camera.

  The door of his compartment slammed behind him and he was gone almost before she knew he’d been there. And Hugo had let her go and was shoving the guy’s closed door.

  It was locked. Of course it was locked. Amy had glimpsed the guy’s face—he’d looked excited but he’d also looked scared.

  Hugo thumped on the door. Nothing. He raised his fist to thump again but Amy grabbed his arm.

  ‘No! Do you want to wake the whole car?’

  ‘If that photo...’

  ‘If he wakes the car, we’ll have the whole train seeing me here in my pyjamas. Ask him to delete it in the morning.’

  ‘Amy...’

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said wearily. ‘He’ll be the one who reported the dog. Maybe that’s what he was doing—waiting for me to come back with a dog. Well, he didn’t see a dog, and if some perv wants to take photos... We weren’t even actually kissing. Just close.’

  She laid her hand on his arm, wanting to dispel the anger, the flash of darkness across his features. Once again came that insight, the certainty that there’d been nightmares in this guy’s past and they were with him still. ‘Hugo, let it go,’ she said, gently now. ‘I need to go to bed. You need to go back to Buster. It’s a whole new day tomorrow and we don’t need to spoil it by creating World War Three now.’

  He looked furious. Frustrated. A coiled spring...

  She glanced out of the window, trying to think of something that’d dispel that black look. ‘There are lights out there,’ she said. ‘Wow, this is practically a city.’

  They were indeed going through a settlement. She counted a whole six lights.

  ‘It’s a wonder we don’t stop to shop,’ she said, still struggling to reach him. ‘Do you think we should pull the emergency cord? I haven’t bought a souvenir yet, on this whole trip.’

  ‘You’d need to consider the way you’re dressed before pulling the cord,’ he said, his grim look fading a little as he reluctantly moved on. ‘You won’t get the respect you need when you face a sales assistant in pyjamas.’

  ‘There is that,’ she said ruefully, and she looked up into his face and saw all sorts of tensions she couldn’t hope to understand. ‘It’s okay,’ she said softly. ‘There’s no war zone here. Relax. We’ll talk to the guy with the phone in the morning. Now, off you go and sleep with Buster. There’s an offer impossible to resist.’

  And then, because she couldn’t help herself, before she even knew she’d intended it, because the grim look was still there and she couldn’t bear it, she stood on tiptoe and she kissed him lightly on the lips.

  It was a feather kiss of thanks, of reassurance, of goodnight. That was all it was, and then she tugged the door open behind her and backed into her compartment.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said softly. ‘You truly are a hero. Thank you, Hugo, for saving my skin. I’d hate to be out there with the camels.’

  ‘Even with a shopping opportunity?’ He was trying to smile.

  She smiled back at him. Then she backed into her compartment and closed the door behind her.

  * * *

  He waited in the corridor until he was sure she wasn’t coming out again. He stood, silent, waiting, as he’d stood and waited and watched in so many dangerous places in the world.

  Then, softly, he knocked on the compartment door of the guy who’d taken the picture.

  No answer.

  ‘Mr Murcott, you know who I am,’ Hugo said, almost pleasantly. But quietly. Amy didn’t want the whole carriage woken and he’d respect her wishes. To a point. ‘You know the power I wield,’ he added. ‘Will you open the door or do I need to take it off its hinges?’

  He waited. Finally the door opened and Hugo was face to face with the guy he’d endured during lunch. The man was wearing blue flannelette pyjamas. He was middle aged, flabby, florid—and wearing pyjamas wasn’t a good look. His wife was in the bottom bunk with her bedclothes hauled up round her neck, looking terrified.

  ‘He got rid of it,’ she said before Hugo could say a word. ‘He deleted it. I said to him, “Roger”, I said...’

  ‘Let me see,’ Hugo said and held out his hand.

  The guy handed over his phone. Hugo knew this model. Top of the range. Capable of taking a high resolution photograph.

  He flicked through to the end of the photo file and saw endless pictures of train and desert and of the meals they’d had. Boring.

  Nothing else.

  ‘When Roger told me what he’d seen out there, I said you wouldn’t like it,’ the woman volunteered. She seemed a mixture of virtue and terror. ‘I said quick, get rid of it. I said Mr Thurston would be angry.’

  He stared at them both. They gazed back and the terror was palpable.

  They were too terrified, he thought. Why?

  He turned and gazed out of the window. Blackness. Nothing and nothing and nothing.

  The bars on the guy’s phone showed no reception.

  ‘You sent it,’ he said, his voice lowering even further.

  ‘How could we send it?’ It was still the woman doing the talking. ‘As if we would.’

  ‘If it’s been sent...’

  ‘We don’t understand email anyway,’ Roger whined and Hugo knew that he did.

  The Internet was out there, vast and all consuming. Somewhere...a photo.

  What could be achieved by threatening the guy?

  ‘You do know the power I possess,’ he said, deciding that being a Thurston had to be useful for something. ‘If I find that photo’s been distributed in any way... you have no idea of the things I can arrange to have happen.’

  Neither did he, he thought ruefully, but that was beside the point. The couple paled, as if he’d promised his SWAT team would be waiting at the next stop with a torture chamber on the back of a camel. He could have smiled if he wasn’t so worried. That photo...

  ‘We ha
ven’t sent it. We couldn’t send it even if we wanted to,’ Roger was bleating. ‘There’s no reception out here. And the photo’s been deleted. Don’t worry, Mr Thurston. And we won’t tell anyone what just happened. You can rely on us to be discreet.’

  I bet I can’t, Hugo thought, but there was nothing else he could do. The photo was no longer on the guy’s phone. If he had managed to send it, all he could hope was that it ended up somewhere innocuous and his threats meant it wouldn’t be taken further.

  There was nothing else he could do.

  He closed the door without bothering to say anything more and then headed back to his carriage.

  Past Amy’s compartment.

  He’d like to...

  No. He had too much sense to like anything of the sort.

  Bed. With Buster.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  RACHEL and Amy had breakfast in Platinum with Maud and Hugo. And Buster. Buster sat on Maud’s knee and ate bacon. They retreated to their own compartment for the rest of the journey, but when the train pulled into Alice Springs Maud was already organising their transport.

  Saying no to Maud was like saying no to a tornado. It had no effect whatsoever. And besides, she wasn’t taking over their lives; she was simply making their lives easier.

  ‘I know you have a bus booked to take you to Uluru but it’s a five-hour drive and how can Buster put up with that?’

  ‘We’ll have rest stops,’ Amy said, but she already knew she was beaten. People were piling onto buses. Lots of people. Closer to the platform, a sleek silver Mercedes was parked in priority parking. The guy who’d delivered it had handed the keys to Hugo as if Hugo was his boss. With deference.

  Amy noticed, as she was noticing everything about this man. She was trying hard not to notice but internally orders were being disobeyed all over the place.

  Right now Hugo was lifting his grandmother’s luggage into the trunk, waiting for Maud to win the argument. Rachel seemed passive. Buster didn’t care and Amy’s only argument as to why they shouldn’t accept a lift with Hugo and his grandmother was all about how she was noticing Hugo. And how she couldn’t stop noticing.