Outback Husband

by Jessica Hart

  She moistened her lips. ‘No, I don’t mind,’ she croaked.

  ‘That’s settled, then.’ Cal had to remind himself to breathe. She really did have extraordinary eyes, so deep and blue that you could easily get lost in them, eyes that made you disturbingly aware of the softness of her lips and the scent of her skin.

  There was a silence. It seemed to loop around them as they stood there and looked at each other, shortening the air and prickling over their skin. It should have been easy to break it, to move on or to leave, but somehow it wasn’t.

  ‘Dad! Juliet! Come and see this!’ Natalie’s peal of laughter from the verandah shattered the tension and they both jumped.

  Intensely grateful for the diversion, Cal followed Juliet outside. It was immediately obvious what had caused Natalie’s amusement. Kit and Andrew had found a couple of plastic buckets and were showing off, putting them over their heads and staggering around to make Natalie laugh. By the time Juliet and Cal came through the screen door they were getting cocky, and in the middle of clowning around with the buckets on their heads they managed to bump into each other with such an impact that they both sailed backwards to land with a thump on their bottoms.

  They looked so ridiculous that Cal and Juliet couldn’t help laughing. Belatedly realising that their audience had increased, Kit and Andrew lifted their buckets at exactly the same time and peeked out from beneath them. They were so obviously delighted with the reaction that Cal grinned and glanced at Juliet.

  The sight of her laughing stopped him dead. He had never seen her smile like that before, he realised with something of a shock. It transformed her, lighting the dark eyes with love, banishing the shadows, dazzling him with its warmth and beauty.

  As if sensing his stare, Juliet turned her head, still laughing, only to find her gaze locked with his once more. Something in his expression made her catch her breath, and her smile faltered. ‘What is it?’ she asked uncertainly.

  ‘Nothing.’ Cal’s eyes shuttered. ‘I’d better go and see how the men are getting on,’ he said, pulling himself together with an effort. ‘We’ll work out a plan of action tonight.’

  ‘OK.’ Juliet watched him turn towards the steps. ‘Cal?’ she said on an impulse.

  He looked over his shoulder, lifting an interrogative eyebrow.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said simply. It wasn’t much to express what it meant to her to know that he had taken charge, to know that from now on things were going to change, but she hoped that he would understand what she was trying to say.

  Cal didn’t answer directly. Instead he came back to her. ‘You’ve got flour on your cheek,’ was all he said. Very gently, he wiped it off with his thumb, barely grazing her skin, and then he turned once more, and was down the steps and into the harsh outback glare.

  Juliet stood there, her gaze unfocused and one hand to her cheek where he had touched her, looking out at the sunlight long after he had disappeared.

  They agreed that night that their first priority was to do up the manager’s house so that Maggie could take over the housework.

  Juliet was keeping herself under close control. She had been shaken by the way Cal had made her feel that morning, by the desire that had jolted through her at the mere thought of touching him, but more by the feeling that he had shouldered the burden that had been weighing her down for so long. The relief was acute, but it also left her feeling vaguely uneasy. She had forgotten what it was like to share her worries. Marriage to Hugo had taught her that the only person she could rely on was herself. It would be a mistake to start leaning on anyone else.

  It was just that Cal would be a very easy man to lean on, if she let herself.

  ‘If you can get someone to do the repairs, I can clean the house and give it all a coat of paint,’ she told Cal, keeping her voice deliberately cool and businesslike. ‘At least I can do that with the children.’

  Cal was glad to follow her lead and keep the discussion impersonal. He couldn’t satisfactorily explain to himself why he had acted as he had to help Juliet sort out the mess that was Wilparilla. All he knew was that something had changed last night, and when he had looked into her eyes this morning it had changed again. He wanted to go back to hating her, but he couldn’t, and now he didn’t know what he felt about her.

  He didn’t have to feel anything about her, Cal told himself. In fact, it would be better if he didn’t. Much easier to do as Juliet was doing and pretend that the air had never tightened between them that morning, that he had never stood looking foolishly into her eyes and remembering how it had felt to kiss her.

  Juliet worked all week on the house. Every morning the boys rode their tricycles round and round in the yard while Natalie did her lessons sitting at the radio. Juliet had to throw out boxes and boxes of rubbish before she could even start cleaning, but there was something therapeutic about clearing everything out and then setting to with a scrubbing brush. For Juliet, restoring the house to a pristine state became a challenge, her way of proving to Cal that she could work as hard as he could.

  He found her there one afternoon, on her knees in one of the bedrooms. She was wearing a grubby T-shirt and faded shorts, and her face was scarlet from heat and effort. When he called her name from the hall, she sat back on her heels and wiped her face with the back of her forearm, leaving smears of damp dust and dirt.

  Cal stopped in the doorway. Unbidden came the memory of Juliet that first fateful night, cool and elegant in her turquoise dress. The Juliet he saw now might be a different woman, with her dirty face and damp hair clinging to her neck, and her hands wrinkled from a week of dipping a scrubbing brush in water.

  She was certainly a woman he liked much better.

  In spite of an aching back every night, Juliet was happier than she had been for a long, long time. The shadowed look had gone from her eyes, and the brittle tension was slowly seeping from her muscles. No longer did her shoulders feel rigid as boards when she woke every morning.

  In the evenings, after the children had gone to bed, they would share a beer on the verandah and talk about plans for the next day. Over supper, they worked out an action plan for the next few months. The mechanic had arrived and was already getting the machinery back in working order—or so Juliet heard. Sam was so shy that he had just muttered a greeting and stumped off, and she hadn’t seen him since, but Cal seemed to think that was quite normal. He explained what Sam was doing, and told her about the yearly routine on the station and Juliet learnt to make sense of the accounts, but that was all they talked about, and when the meal was over they would say goodnight politely and separate in the corridor.

  By tacit agreement, they kept the conversation strictly impersonal. Juliet was very aware of Cal as he sat across the table from her, and she would watch his face as he talked. She grew to know his gestures, the way he narrowed his eyes when considering a difficult question, the way he rubbed his chin as he thought, the deft movements of his hands.

  Part of her longed to know him better. She wanted to ask him about growing up in the outback, she wanted him to tell her about his wife and what he had really felt about all those housekeepers Natalie had said used to fall in love with him. But Cal never offered any information about himself, and she was chary about letting herself get too close.

  Juliet didn’t want to spoil what she had. It was such bliss to have someone to talk to at last, to feel that she had a real role to play at Wilparilla after all. If she thought too much about the lean length of his body, or the crease in his cheek when he smiled, she knew that the carefully impersonal atmosphere they had created would crumble.

  It was hard enough to preserve it as it was. Every night Cal helped her wash up after supper, and every night they studiously avoided thinking about the kiss they had shared. It was never mentioned between them, but for Juliet it still shimmered dangerously in the air between them, ready to leap into life at the slightest brush of Cal’s arm against hers.

  Each time he laid the tea-towel down her hear
t would leap, remembering how he had crossed over to her and calmly pulled her arms aside so that he could put his hands at her waist. Each time she wondered if he would do the same thing again, but he never did, and Juliet would say goodnight and go to bed alone, hating herself for being disappointed.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  IT WAS much easier when they could spend their days working, but by the time the next weekend came round Juliet realised guiltily that Cal hadn’t yet had any time off. ‘Tomorrow’s Sunday,’ she reminded him on the Saturday evening. ‘I think we could all do with a day off.’

  ‘I was planning to catch some of those old scrubber bulls,’ Cal protested, but Juliet overrode him.

  ‘The bulls can wait,’ she said. ‘And that’s an order!’ She passed him the dish of roast pumpkin to forestall any further argument. ‘Natalie needs to spend some time alone with you,’ she reminded him, and the angry look that had sprung into Cal’s eyes at the reminder of his subservient position faded.

  ‘You’re right,’ he said slowly. ‘Thanks…boss.’

  He had been so busy recently that he was guiltily aware that he hadn’t been spending as much time with his daughter as he would normally do. On some days he had only finished in time to kiss her goodnight.

  Not that Natalie seemed to mind. She was always full of chatter about what Kit and Andrew had been doing, or how Juliet had allowed her to help with the cleaning. She had blossomed since he had brought her back to Wilparilla, and however much Cal tried to tell himself that it was being away from the city that had made the difference, he knew deep down that much of Natalie’s happiness was due to Juliet and the twins.

  Natalie was thrilled at breakfast the next morning when Cal asked her if she would like to go riding. ‘There’s a pony in the paddock that should be just about right for you,’ he told her as she threw her arms around his neck in excitement.

  As she danced off to put on her oldest jeans, Cal looked across the table at Juliet. ‘I hope you’re going to have a day off as well,’ he said with a touch of awkwardness. It wasn’t up to him to tell her what to do, but he wouldn’t enjoy his day much knowing that she was in the office slaving over paperwork or down at the house painting. She looked as if she needed to relax more than he did.

  ‘I shall sit on the verandah with a book, if Kit and Andrew let me read any of it,’ Juliet told him, determinedly bright.

  The prospect of a quiet day alone with her small sons should have been a tempting one, but somehow Juliet couldn’t help feeling rather forlorn as she stood on the verandah with her book and saw Cal walk off towards the paddock with that easy, deliberate stride of his, his daughter skipping happily along beside him, their hats sitting at exactly the same angle. In spite of the difference in their height, they looked absolutely right together.

  As Juliet watched, Natalie tucked her hand confidingly into Cal’s and he turned his head to smile down at her. She had worried that Cal wasn’t spending enough time with his daughter, but the bond between them was such an obviously loving one that Juliet felt absurd tears prick her eyes.

  The homestead felt very empty when they had gone. Kit, who had wanted to go with Natalie and Cal, was cross, and Andrew soon picked up on his fretful mood. Juliet sighed, and was just abandoning her attempt to open the book when Andrew cried out in delight.

  ‘Horses!’

  Riding towards them were Natalie and Cal, leading a solid-looking bay mare behind them. They stopped at the bottom of the verandah steps. ‘Natalie’s been telling me the boys have never been on a horse,’ said Cal.

  Juliet stood at the top of the steps, holding Kit and Andrew by the hand. Her chest felt tight, but she was smiling giddily at the realisation that they had not been forgotten after all. ‘No,’ she managed to say. ‘I’ve never been able to hold two of them on at the same time.’

  Cal wished she wouldn’t smile like that. It wasn’t good for his breathing. ‘If you think you can manage to hold one up before you, I’ll take the other, and they can have their first ride. Would you like that, boys?’

  ‘Yes! Yes! Ride!’ they shouted as he dismounted easily, and Juliet let go of their small hands so that they could run down the steps and jump up and down beside him, clamouring to be allowed on first.

  Cal was laughing as he tried to quell their excitement, and Juliet, watching him with her sons, felt something twist painfully inside her. If only Kit and Andrew could have had a father like Cal. ‘I’ll get their hats,’ she muttered, and went inside before Cal could notice the tears stinging her eyes.

  ‘Have you been on a horse before?’ he asked when she reappeared and had jammed a hat on each of the boys.

  ‘Once or twice,’ said Juliet, who had at one time thought seriously about a professional show-jumping career.

  Cal missed the dryness in her voice. He took hold of the bay’s bridle and led it forward. ‘We’ll take it very easy,’ he reassured her. ‘She’s a lazy old girl, so she won’t do anything alarming.’

  ‘Good,’ said Juliet, thinking it would be sensible to start the boys off on a quiet horse. She would reserve the pleasure of showing Cal how well she could ride for a later occasion.

  Keeping hold of the horse’s bridle with one hand, Cal moved to give her a leg up, but, to his approval, she had already mounted and was sitting demurely in the saddle. ‘OK, who’s going with Mum?’ he asked, and without waiting for an answer scooped up Andrew, who squealed with excitement at finding himself so high.

  ‘Me! Me!’ shouted Kit, as Juliet settled Andrew in the saddle in front of her.

  ‘Come on then, you,’ said Cal, throwing him up onto his horse and mounting himself in one fluid movement.

  Completely at home on her pony, Natalie circled round them as they rode slowly along the creek. Overhead, the birds wheeled and screeched in the trees and the horses blew softly through their noses, shaking their manes against the flies. Kit and Andrew were entranced. Juliet could feel the rigid excitement in Andrew’s body settled securely against hers, and when she looked across at Kit his eyes were like saucers and his smile was wide with delight.

  ‘Does Andrew look that happy?’ she asked, catching Cal’s eye, and he nodded and smiled.

  ‘As a pig in pooh.’

  Juliet laughed. Their gazes held a fraction longer than necessary, and then both looked away. Cal kept his eyes on the horizon and reminded himself of all the reasons he should never think about kissing her again. Juliet concentrated on watching the birds while Cal’s smile shimmered still before her eyes. Even without looking at him, she could picture him with absolute clarity, his face shadowed by his hat, the line of his jaw, the easy way he sat on the horse, one hand resting on his thigh, the other holding the reins while Kit nestled into the hard security of his body.

  Lucky Kit, thought Juliet, before she could help herself.

  They stopped by a shallow pool shaded by a gnarled, leaning gum. The horses waited patiently, tails flicking, as Natalie and the boys took off their jeans and splashed happily together in the dappled water. Juliet and Cal sat carefully apart on a rock and kept their eyes on the children so they couldn’t look at each other.

  The water was limpid with silence, and on the far side of the creek the trees admired their unwavering reflection beneath a deep blue sky. ‘It’s beautiful,’ sighed Juliet after a while.

  ‘Haven’t you been here before?’

  ‘No.’ She shook her head rather sadly. ‘You’ve only been here a couple of weeks and already you know Wilparilla better than I do.’

  Cal didn’t answer immediately. The knowledge of how greatly he was deceiving Juliet was making him increasingly uncomfortable, but he wasn’t prepared to give up his dream of buying Wilparilla back yet. Natalie’s happiness was at stake as much as his own. Even her initial disappointment at finding that the homestead had changed completely and that she couldn’t remember any of it had disappeared, and she loved it all.

  ‘I wanted to thank you for what you’ve done for Natalie,’ he said,
deliberately changing the subject.

  Surprised, Juliet glanced at him, only to find that he had risked a glance at her at the same time. She jerked her gaze sternly back to the children. ‘I haven’t done anything for Natalie,’ she said. ‘It’s the other way round, if anything. She’s such a happy, helpful little girl.’

  ‘She is now,’ said Cal, watching his daughter shrieking in the water. ‘It’s not that long since I had a battle to get her to school every morning. She wouldn’t talk to anyone or do anything.’

  ‘Really?’ Juliet’s eyes rested on Natalie as well. ‘It seems hard to believe, looking at her now. What was the matter?’

  ‘She was unhappy,’ he said simply. ‘I kept asking her if anything was wrong and she’d say no, and then one day I caught her in tears and everything came out.’ He stopped, remembering how guilty he had felt for not realising sooner how miserable his daughter had been.

  ‘It was my fault,’ he went on slowly. ‘I should have realised how much she hated her school. She never fitted in, and children can be cruel sometimes to outsiders.’

  ‘Was she being bullied?’ asked Juliet in concern.

  ‘Oh, I don’t think it was as bad as that. She just never felt as if she belonged. I think she was homesick.’ Cal grimaced. ‘She was only five when we moved to Brisbane, but her whole life had been spent in the outback, and she didn’t adapt as I’d hoped she would. I didn’t adapt that well either,’ he admitted. ‘I missed the bush, but I pretended I didn’t to make it easier for Natalie. I could see that she wasn’t happy, but if I asked her what was wrong, she would always say everything was OK.’

  Juliet risked another glance at him. ‘If Natalie was happy in the outback, why did you move?’

  She thought for a moment that Cal wouldn’t answer, but he did. ‘Because it was what Sara would have wanted,’ he said. ‘I’d grown up on a station, but Sara was from Brisbane. She was the sister of one of my schoolfriends. I met her when she was sixteen, so we’d known each other for five years before we were married, and she’d been to visit plenty of times, but it was still hard for her when we were first married. Being a visitor is fine, but it’s different when you suddenly find yourself left alone all day, hundreds of miles from the nearest shop when you’re used to living in a city.’