Her Outback Rescuer

by Marion Lennox

  How would that feel?

  It’ll feel like you’ve been a stupid adolescent with a stupid crush, she told herself. Get over it.

  And stop pacing.

  * * *

  ‘What are you doing after you reach Darwin?’ Maud asked, the day before they were due to leave, and it was Rachel who replied. She was happy in Maud’s company now, relaxed and amazingly cheerful.

  ‘We both have teaching jobs.’

  ‘Do you start straight away? If not...Hugo and I are taking a cruise. Why don’t you come with us?’

  The Rachel of two days ago wouldn’t have answered. Instead, she looked interested.

  ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘From Darwin to Broome in West Australia,’ Maud told them. ‘Across the Kimberley. It’s fabulous country. You’d see thousands of rocks.’

  ‘I’m sure we would, but we can’t afford it,’ Amy said, as Rachel looked bleak at all the rocks she’d miss. ‘And my job starts the Monday after I reach Darwin.’

  ‘But I’m not even sure Hugo can come now.’ Maud was suddenly fretful. ‘There’s so much to do for the company. Now he’s made the decision to take over...’

  ‘He’s doing that?’ She shouldn’t ask. She just sort of couldn’t help herself.

  ‘He is.’ Maud sighed. ‘He thinks he’ll hate it, but it’s the thought he hates. My James always said he’d be brilliant.’ She cast a dubious glance at Amy. ‘And he’s started now, even though I’m sure he’d rather be here with y...with us.’

  ‘We’re coping beautifully without him,’ Amy said, determinedly cheerful. ‘It’s been wonderful. Speaking of which...Rachel, would you like to sleep under the stars for our last night?’

  ‘What, here?’ Rachel looked at her as if she’d lost her mind.

  ‘Grandma said it’s magic,’ Amy said. ‘Sleeping outside in the desert.’

  ‘Do you know how cold the desert gets at night?’ Maud demanded, and Rachel shuddered.

  ‘Chicken,’ Amy said. ‘Buster and I are game.’

  ‘There are swags in the store,’ Maud told her. ‘But I’m not sure...’

  ‘It’ll be brilliant,’ Amy said and thought: one more night to go, and if I go outside early enough it’ll be one more night where I don’t have to talk about—or think about—Hugo.

  * * *

  He’d been a bore. He’d hurt her. Hugo hadn’t been at the company base for more than a couple of hours before he was seriously regretting what he’d done, and it was almost unbearable that Amy was at Natangarra while he was here.

  But he’d made his decision, he told himself. He’d made two decisions. One, he needed to run this company. Two, he needed to do it alone. So get on with it.

  At least the work pulled him in. By the end of the first day he found the adrenalin was running almost as high as it was in combat zones.

  The company power brokers had flown in for the series of meetings happening while he was here. His grandfather had set these meetings up when he and Maud had booked the train journey, so Hugo was now here in his grandfather’s place. But the suits, all affability on the outside, were far from pleased to see him.

  There’d been conflict with his grandfather; he knew that. There’d been disagreements with a board who saw the company as pure profit-making, but the size of his grandfather’s shareholdings meant he had the final say. That power was making the suits uneasy.

  Their unease meant he needed to stop thinking of one slip of a girl and what she was doing without him.

  Focus.

  The company was negotiating a new mine, which meant leasing more land. The suits were talking monetary compensation to the native landowners.

  As he worked through the ramifications, the suits watched on the sidelines, gave him the figures he asked for and became more nervous.

  Excellent.

  On the second day he sat in the meeting with the tribal elders. For a while he stayed silent. He listened and he watched.

  The elders were talking money with the suits, but their hearts weren’t in it. They weren’t objecting, though. The mines wouldn’t harm their community. They were to be sited well away from settlements and the land would be restored when the company was done.

  But these people didn’t need more money, Hugo thought. He’d seen the figures.

  In his head he reread one of his grandfather’s last letters:

  Thurstons is more than a company. The social conscience is what your grandmother and I have worked for. As majority shareholder, I can always influence direction. If you take over... That’s what I dream of, Hugo. I know you don’t want this life, but maybe this life wants you.

  This life wants you...

  Whether he wanted it or not, the decision had been made.

  He was listening. He was thinking of Thurstons.

  He was also thinking of Amy, of something Amy had said about her grandmother: ‘She left as a kid, sent away to school and never got back...’

  So many of the native kids were caught between two cultures, he thought. So many of them left.

  ‘Could we think outside the box?’ he heard himself say, and the suits stared at him with disapproval. But Amy was suddenly there, front and centre. Amy’s words.

  Amy’s people?

  With Amy in his head, he wasn’t about to be deflected by disapproval.

  ‘I’ve been thinking maybe we have the opportunity to do something fantastic here,’ he said, speaking to the elders and ignoring the stiffening of the suits. ‘Your kids are currently using School of the Air, right? Which is great, but wouldn’t a bricks and mortar school be better? But it’d need to be a school the kids would want to use. I’m thinking... What if we provide a school in payment for our lease of this further land? With the money we’re talking, we could provide a swimming pool, gym, music facilities... We could bring in some great teachers, train them to help with what’s important to you, make it wonderful.’

  ‘That’d cost us a lot more than just a payout.’ Thurstons’ chief accountant sounded appalled, but the elders were suddenly far more interested.

  ‘This is a long-term project,’ Hugo said, thinking of the figures he’d worked on over the last twenty-four hours. ‘But it’s sustainable. From the company’s point of view we’ll have a community with skilled workers coming up. If our employees have kids in school, we’ll have a more stable workforce. I can see long-term benefits all round.’

  He could almost hear Maud and James behind him as he spoke—and Amy was there as well. The drift of outback kids to the city was inexorable. If he could slow it...

  Amy would love this idea, he thought. He wanted to talk this through with her. She’d have suggestions. Maybe she could get involved.

  Maybe...maybe...

  The two days’ absence was weakening his resolve. Was it weak to think he could take a risk? Ask her to take a risk?

  She’d need the strength of Maud.

  Back at Natangarra, he’d seen her beside Maud. Maud was a big booming woman and Amy was petite and cute. He’d thought: no way.

  But did strength come in size or in heart?

  He thought of the women he’d worked beside in combat zones. Power wasn’t necessarily proportionate to size.

  She could throw a man. The memory still made him grin.

  So maybe...

  At the end of the day the elders left. They were deeply satisfied with what they’d achieved, and so was Hugo. The suits, not
so much, but they’d accepted it.

  They’d organised a corporate dinner. The plan was for the chopper to take him back to Natangarra the next morning—but he wanted to go home now.

  Home to Amy. To ask her to take a risk?

  He wasn’t sure. To ask her to be so exposed... Was it fair?

  He didn’t know but, fair or not, he was going home to find out.

  CHAPTER NINE

  AT DUSK Amy carted her swag to the edge of the waterhole. Buster joined her for a while but, as the heat of the day faded and the cold of the desert night took over, he was torn. Outside and Amy, or inside with Rachel? As the temperature dropped, Rachel won.

  ‘Wuss,’ Amy called after him as he disappeared, but she didn’t really mind. It was okay being alone. She snuggled into her swag and set herself to star watching.

  She gazed up at the constellations her grandmother had taught her, and wondered how Bess could have born leaving here for the city. City stars were a faint shadow of these. This was awesome.

  It was, however, cold. Her nose was icy.

  No matter, she told herself. She’d promised herself she’d sleep under the stars and that was what she was doing.

  A noise started, humming in from the south. A light...

  A helicopter.

  Hugo coming home? It had to be.

  It had nothing to do with her, she told herself. The chopper landed on the paddock on the far side of the house to where she’d set her swag. A light went on in the house. The chopper took off again and disappeared into the night sky.

  Hugo was home. So what?

  She’d been trying to sleep. Now, however, she was wide awake.

  Waiting?

  For what? He didn’t know she was here. It was midnight. He’d assume she’d be in the house, asleep.

  She wriggled further down in the swag and told herself she was warm enough. She tried counting stars. She tried not to think about Hugo.

  ‘Could you use a hot-water bottle?’

  Her heart did a back-flip.

  She hadn’t heard him come. Maybe she’d even become airborne—she surely felt as if she’d landed with a thud.

  ‘Do you...do you mind?’

  ‘Do I mind what?’ He was right beside her, squatting on his haunches, handing her a hot-water bottle. ‘I thought you might need this. And more.’ He had an armload of bedding. He draped it over the top of her swag without waiting for permission and then settled easily beside her, a man accustomed to settling in hard places.

  ‘You weren’t sleeping,’ he said and it wasn’t a question.

  ‘No thanks to you,’ she muttered. ‘You scared me into the middle of next week.’ It was a pretty efficient hot-water bottle, she thought. She was heating up really fast.

  ‘It’s a terrible spot for camping,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘In a hollow like this, anything could sneak up on you.’

  ‘I’m not in Afghanistan.’

  ‘No, you’re not,’ he said contentedly. ‘Would you like a Tim Tam?’

  He hauled open a packet of chocolate biscuits and handed one over. She was so disconcerted she took it without thinking.

  Actually, disconcerted was a mild description for what she was feeling right now.

  Hugo’s hot-water bottle was delicious. She wriggled it down to her toes and felt the heat rise further.

  She was holding a Tim Tam.

  She ate it while she thought of what to say.

  ‘How did you know I was out here?’ she managed at last.

  ‘Buster came out to greet me. He then raced out to the veranda, looked towards here and whined. Like he was torn. He obviously wasn’t torn much, though, because he beetled straight back to Rachel’s room. So I put my mighty powers of deduction to use and figured Rachel was in bed and you were here. Then I figured maybe I could do what Buster wouldn’t do. I’d join you but I’d come prepared.’

  ‘I...I quite like being by myself.’ She swallowed her last mouthful of Tim Tam with an effort.

  ‘But I find I don’t,’ he said gently. ‘That’s what this is about. I wanted you to be out here, so it was handy that you were in dire need.’

  ‘I was not in dire need,’ she said, trying to sound indignant, trying to ignore the first part of what he’d said. Surely it was a mistake. ‘I...I was warm enough.’

  ‘Liar. I’ve slept out here. I know how cold it gets.’

  ‘I’m warm now,’ she said, toasting her toes with sensual pleasure, and then, because it was only polite, she ventured further. ‘Did you have a good couple of days?’

  ‘Excellent,’ he told her. ‘There’s hot chocolate in this Thermos. You want some?’

  ‘Is this a picnic?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Can I tell you what I’ve been doing?’

  ‘Um...great,’ she said because no other response seemed possible. She pushed herself up to sitting and draped one of the blankets Hugo had brought around her shoulders. Hugo poured chocolate.

  They drank their hot chocolate and she felt...as if this night was taking her somewhere she’d never been before.

  This man sitting beside her under a starlit sky.

  She thought suddenly of her grandma, Bess, telling her about her love of the desert nights. Telling her of her love for her people.

  Her people.

  Bess would like Hugo, she thought, and then she thought: what are you thinking?

  And then she decided it was too hard to think. She could just be. She could sit under the desert stars and let the night take her where it willed.

  ‘I’d love you to tell me what you’ve been doing,’ she said simply, and he did.

  * * *

  Many times Hugo had sat in the desert and watched the stars. Never with Amy.

  If he had company he’d clam. He was known in the forces as a loner and he liked it that way.

  He’d never felt the need to talk things through; could never see the point. But here, tonight, with Amy... Somehow talking to this woman seemed an extension of talking to himself.

  Telling people your problems... He’d never understood it. It didn’t make problems go away. Only tonight it sort of did. For two days he’d been thinking of Amy. He’d worked with her in his head. He’d made decisions and she’d been there in the process.

  He wanted to talk to her now, of Thurston Holdings—of his company—how quickly it was feeling like that. He wanted to tell her of his meeting with the guys on the job, his awe at the organisation his grandfather had formed, his meeting with the tribal elders, his pride at what Thurstons could achieve. So yes, he’d wanted her to be awake when he got back.

  She’d understand, he thought. She’d get what he was giving up; what he was moving into.

  She’d made the same decision herself, only her future was more uncertain.

  ‘That’s great, Hugo,’ she said when he’d talked himself out. ‘I’m so glad it’s working out for you.’

  ‘I never wanted this,’ he said simply. ‘I ran from it. Now it’s dragging me back and I’m thinking I can get real satisfaction from it.’

  ‘And you’ll do good things.’

  ‘Part of it’s from you,’ he said simply. ‘When we were sitting talking about the future of this place, suddenly...you were there. You and Rachel and your grandma. You helped.’

  She stared at him in the moonlight, searching his face. ‘Us...’ she said at last.

  ‘Your grandma belonged here,’ he said softly. ‘That�
�s what I thought that maybe I could achieve. For the people who live here.’ He hesitated. ‘And even for myself. Maybe in her way, your grandma has helped me.’

  There was a long and breathless silence. She didn’t know where to take what he’d just said, he thought—and neither did he.

  ‘So what will you do?’ he asked finally into the silence. ‘Where do you belong, now that you’ve turned your back on the world you loved?’

  ‘I’ll teach.’

  He frowned. ‘Why? You could find another dance company. There are lots of companies out there without creeps like Ramón in them.’

  She stilled. ‘This...my future has nothing to do with Ramón.’

  ‘Hasn’t it?’

  ‘I had to retire.’

  ‘Hogwash,’ he said crudely. ‘I’ve watched you around Rachel. You wince and you move slowly, and you commiserate with Maud’s aches and pains as if you have them as well. But you kept up with me at the Olgas. You rescued our joey—that leap left me stunned. You’re no more arthritic than I am.’

  ‘Hugo...’

  ‘I’ve figured it,’ he said. ‘And I’ve done some research. You took time off when your sister first had the accident. Then you came back but in minor roles. I’m guessing Rachel needed you. But Ramón had been hurt, too, not much, but enough to stop him being leading man. Three months ago he blasted back and the arts media was full of him. I can only imagine how that felt—to dance behind him, to watch him when you know what he did to your sister... I read one interview when he even said the accident had been a good thing; it had forced him to concentrate on building his upper body strength. It had given him a break, he said, and he was glad it had happened. I can’t imagine how that made you feel.’

  She didn’t respond. She gazed into the darkness. He could feel the tension in her, the anger.

  And finally, finally, she said it like it was.