The Australian's Housekeeper Bride

by Armstrong, Lindsay

  It was an uncomfortable day otherwise.

  Somewhat ashamed of her childish behaviour but still possessed of that slow-burning fuse, Rhiannon kept out of Lee’s way. That wasn’t hard to do, he was out checking the estate and the new work of the equestrian centre most of the morning, then he got involved in the rescue of a car and its occupants from a nearby swollen creek that had flooded a bridge.

  She put his dinner in the oven and waited up for him for a while.

  He’d told her, before going out, to call him on his mobile if she needed him.

  ‘I’ll be fine. I’ve got another two weeks to go and Mary,’ she broke off and bit her lip then soldiered on, ‘is of the opinion I haven’t “dropped” sufficiently yet.’

  Something flickered in his eyes. ‘Just stay put and ring me if anything happens.’

  Nothing happened as the solid old house resisted the worst of the weather, making her feel warm and safe. And really sorry for those caught in the might of the storm and those who were rescuing them.

  And she did try to wait up for Lee, only to fall asleep on the settee in the den in front of the fire before he came home.

  She couldn’t identify what woke her but it was to see Lee sitting opposite her, watching her.

  He’d obviously showered and changed into clean clothes.

  ‘Oh,’ she sat up with her hand to her back, ‘did you rescue them? What’s it like out there?’

  ‘Yes, they’re safe and sound. But it’s wet and you can’t get in or out of Southall at the moment other than on foot or horseback. There are trees down everywhere and two creeks cutting the road.’ He stopped then swore quietly as the lights flickered and went out. ‘I was afraid that was on the cards so I’ve got some gas lamps and kerosene ones ready. The phone lines are also down.’

  Rhiannon grimaced then put her hand to her back again and thought—Braxton-Hicks? No, this feels different—oh, surely not!

  But surely yes—her waters broke right on cue.

  ‘Rhiannon?’ Lee got up and came to squat in front of her. ‘What is it?’ he asked urgently.

  ‘The baby’s coming,’ she breathed. ‘Oh, Lee, what a night for it. We won’t be able to go anywhere or—’

  ‘We’ll be fine.’ He took her hand and looked into her eyes steadily. ‘We can still get out by phone on the mobile so we can get in touch with emergency services. I’m going to do that right now; you just relax and time the contractions. We’ve probably got hours yet. Here.’ He took off his watch and handed it to her then he touched her cheek. ‘Hang in there, secretary-general.’

  The strangest thought flew through Rhiannon’s mind. It was the first time he’d referred to their honeymoon since she’d tried to run away. Did it mean…? What did it mean?

  Half an hour later, they’d learnt that a helicopter evacuation might be possible but not for a couple of hours; the weather was too wild to attempt it at the moment. But Lee had been patched through to a doctor, who gave it as his opinion that they did have quite a few hours up their sleeve, especially with a first baby, but they should be prepared for anything all the same.

  So Lee made some preparations. Because the den was warmest and had added light from its log fire, he brought in a bed and transferred Rhiannon to it. He helped her change into a loose, comfortable nightgown. Then he put on hand some clean towels, soap and a bowl of water and he boiled a pair of scissors on a portable gas stove he dug out, causing Rhiannon to thank her lucky stars that Southall did have everything that opened and shut.

  He also brewed them a cup of tea.

  He said with a faint smile, when all this was accomplished and the contractions were about ten minutes apart and quite bearable, ‘Thanks to all those excruciatingly embarrassing pre-natal classes you dragged me along to, I know what I’m doing to a certain extent.’

  ‘I didn’t drag you,’ she protested then smiled ruefully. ‘But yes, they were a bit hard to take in public.’

  ‘I’ve also done this before, if it comes to that.’

  ‘Done…?’ She raised her head and blinked at him.

  He laughed at her expression. ‘I’ve delivered a foal and two calves in my time, there have to be some similarities.’ He paused and grimaced. ‘You may not feel it was appropriate to mention that but—you can trust me not to fold under pressure.’

  ‘I do,’ she whispered.

  They listened to the rain and the wind in silence for a while.

  Then, looking into the fire, Lee said, ‘The only person who ever brought a distant shore and a bonfire to mind was you, Rhiannon. You did make me feel as if I was capturing you, you did—you had an elusive siren quality that frustrated me and teased at me and made me want you in spite of everything else.

  ‘It was just you, nothing else,’ he went on, ‘well, us, and I can’t tell you how much I’ve missed it. It was like a magic thread between us.’

  She stared at him and saw the pain in his eyes, the lines of strain beside his mouth, and she opened her mouth but tensed.

  ‘A bit stronger, that one?’ he hazarded.

  She let out a slow, shuddering breath as the pain subsided.

  He waited for a couple of minutes, holding her hand, then he said, ‘Can I tell you something? There’s nowhere else I would rather be than helping you through this, nowhere. There’s no one I’d rather be with. Yes, I did bump into Andrea after my father’s memorial service, and yes, for a moment, everything she’d once done to me came back. But you have no idea how fast that all changed.’

  ‘Lee?’ She stared at him again, frowning.

  ‘It started when I went looking for you and found your pearls on your pillow, and your note. One minute I was looking into the past, the next minute, virtually, I was seeing an empty, desolate shore. I couldn’t believe what a catalyst that turned out to be. The thought of losing you suddenly hit me for six. Hold hard, my darling, beloved, Rhiannon,’ he added as she tensed again.

  ‘Try to breathe as they showed you—there, it’s going.’ But he looked at his watch on the pillow with a little frown.

  ‘That was a bit closer together,’ she breathed.

  ‘Yes, but still eight minutes. Are you comfortable now?’

  She nodded then sat up incredulously. ‘Tell me—tell me about this catalyst.’

  ‘It was as if the Andrea I once thought I’d loved went away, as if she wasn’t real, and never had been. All that remained were her…machinations and the fact that she may have lost me you—my true reality, so warm-hearted, so generous, so genuine, so sane but also so desirable.’ He paused and shook his head. ‘I suddenly knew she had no power over me any more, it was over, and over because of you.’

  ‘You didn’t tell me this when—when you caught up with me, Lee,’ Rhiannon said with an effort.

  ‘No. I was going to,’ he said quietly, ‘but would you have believed me?’

  Rhiannon looked back down the nearly nine months that had intervened, to her iron-clad certainty that Lee still loved Andrea, and she said on a long, slow breath, ‘No.’

  ‘I couldn’t blame you. I wasn’t even sure I could explain it properly, but what really slew me and took the wind right out of my sails,’ he looked down at her hand in his, ‘was that you seemed so sure, on your side anyway, that what was between us was suitable rather than soul-mate stuff, a bargain, that’s all. And you usually mean what you say. So I decided to take another tack. I thought, OK, I’ll show her that we are soul mates. But you resisted me every step of the way.

  ‘And,’ he went on, ‘I got my own medical advice. In light of what had happened before and all the emotional turmoil you’d suffered at the time, it seemed certain that you’d be very vulnerable to any stress. So I decided to bide my time, I decided that the most important thing was to get you safely through this pregnancy in the way you seemed to be able to handle best.’

  Rhiannon swallowed. ‘Oh, Lee—’ She broke off and started to sweat.

  ‘Here we go again,’ he murmured and wiped her face wi
th a hand towel.

  ‘Breathe—breathe in time with me, sweetheart, we can do this together.’

  And somehow, as he concentrated on breathing with her, somehow they became one and she knew he was passing confidence and strength through to her and she clung to it and used it to fend off the worst of the pain.

  This time, when the contraction passed, Rhiannon discovered there were tears on her cheeks, but not tears of pain and sadness as she thought that perhaps no other scenario would have made her believe what Lee was telling her but this one.

  Because no man who didn’t love her could infuse his strength, his compassion for her into her heart the way he did.

  ‘I did—it did seem the only way I could handle it but that was…’ She stopped and gripped his hand. ‘I may not have wanted to let you see it but I’ve—loved you for a long time, almost from the beginning. That’s why I wanted to run away, because I was hurting so badly. This—this is nothing in comparison.’

  There, I’ve said it at last, she thought.

  ‘Do you mean that, Rhiannon?’

  ‘Oh, yes, yes!’ she whispered intensely.

  ‘What a bloody fool I’ve been,’ he marvelled and she saw the lines of strain leave his face, saw the relaxation of his muscles. ‘But you did seem to be holding me at arm’s length.’

  ‘Only as self-protection. If you must know,’ she smiled shakily, ‘I’ve wept oceans of tears over you in secret.’

  He closed his eyes then cupped her face and kissed her gently. But suddenly a new concern came to his eyes. ‘Only yesterday—only this morning you looked as if you hated me.’

  ‘I did a little,’ she confessed. ‘But I was tired of being pregnant, I was tired of thinking I was the one in love, not you, I was—I thought you were so definite about the christening because of Andrea.’

  ‘No. I’m simply not a fan of those kind of overrated dos.’ He grimaced. ‘Sorry, Mary.’ He lifted Rhiannon’s hand and kissed her knuckles. ‘I love you, I—love you.’

  ‘I love you too,’ she whispered, and went into his arms, where she could hear his heart beating heavily, as if his anguish still hadn’t quite left him.

  ‘Believe me, Lee,’ she said. ‘I know I was—I’ve been difficult—’

  ‘Pregnant, actually,’ he said into her hair.

  ‘Maybe.’ She sniffed. ‘But the stupid part of it was, whilst I guessed you stopped trying to get through to me because it upset me, and it did, it also hurt when you stopped. I’ve been a mass of contradictions!’

  ‘So what makes you believe me now?’ he queried.

  ‘The way you’re doing this. It makes me feel as if I’m your north and south, as if you’re my tower of strength, as if we’re one.’

  ‘Thank God,’ he said with a heartfelt sigh, and he held her as if he’d never let her go.

  But unborn babies on the move make no concessions even for such heart-stopping events as these, and when they drew apart it was to deal with another contraction.

  ‘Is it my imagination or are things really speeding up?’ she asked raggedly.

  ‘Yes, they are.’ He got up. ‘I’m going to have a look and talk to the doctor.

  Try to relax.’

  ‘For the moment, I feel as if I’m on cloud nine.’

  ‘That may change but we’ll get back there, never fear.’

  It did change as the contractions speeded up and intensified, and she heard through her fog of pain this time Lee telling the doctor that she appeared to be fully dilated, and he left the line open.

  ‘OK, we could be on the last lap.’ He came back to her side. ‘The doctor reckons you’ve just about broken all the records for a first birth! But now you need to do what I tell you—it’s going to either be pant or push. OK? Think you can cope?’

  ‘Yes,’ she gasped, and they held hands tightly for a moment.

  Three contractions later, the baby girl who was to be named Reese Margaret Richardson after her grandmothers made her entry into the world.

  ‘Another girl!’ Lee told her. ‘Blonde, too, I’d say, like her mum, and a real little tiger about getting born anyway.’

  ‘Is she—is she all right?’ Rhiannon asked, echoing every mother’s first query.

  ‘Looks fine to me—Rhiannon, I’m going to give you the phone, darling, so you can relay the doctor’s instructions on to me. Oh,’ he said, as an infant wail rose, ‘she’s done that bit herself—an intelligent baby obviously, but why wouldn’t she be with the parents she has?’

  Rhiannon smiled joyfully then lifted the phone to her ear and spoke to the doctor on the other end.

  ‘Well done, Rhiannon!’ he congratulated her. ‘Now, here’s what Lee needs to do.’

  Not many minutes later, Lee presented her with baby Reese wrapped in a towel. He washed his hands again and he collapsed into the chair beside the bed. ‘I need a drink. I don’t think I’ve ever needed a drink as much as I do now. Hang on,’ he ran a hand through his hair and a smile grew in his eyes. ‘Well, look at you two,’ he said softly, as Rhiannon cuddled her baby with her heart in her eyes.

  She put out her hand and he put his into it.

  ‘We three,’ she said. ‘Thank you so much. For loving me, for everything you did, but for loving me back.’

  ‘Always, Rhiannon.’ He closed his eyes.

  ‘Lee!’ Rhiannon said a year later to the day. ‘It’s not my birthday.’

  ‘No,’ he agreed, ‘but it was quite a day last year. Not only, between us, did we deliver our baby but it was also the first day of the rest of our lives, wouldn’t you agree?’

  They were in bed, having not long ago woken to Reese’s first birthday.

  They were naked but deliciously warm beneath a goose-feather duvet—it was a wet, cold day again—and he’d just handed her another black leather box tooled with gold.

  Rhiannon clicked the catch and drew a breath as a pair of earrings was revealed.

  South Sea pearls again, beautifully set in a gold and pave-set diamond rim to match the clasp on her strand of pearls—which she just happened to be wearing.

  ‘Oh, they’re beautiful and they match so well, the pearls! How did you manage that?’

  ‘I bought them at the same time and kept them in reserve for just such an occasion. You know,’ he lay back and rubbed his forehead with the back of his hand, ‘since that’s how we first made love, I became really addicted to you in earrings and a necklace—and nothing else.’

  ‘Ah.’ She tucked her hair behind her ears and put the earrings on. ‘There. I suppose I could say I’m—well-dressed for the occasion now.’

  ‘Mmm…’ He traced the line of her necklace down to her breasts with his fingers and let them stray.

  ‘If there’s one thing I’m addicted to about you,’ she said and stopped to study him, his dishevelled dark hair, the stubble on his jaw, the heavy-lidded way he was looking at her, the strength of his shoulders and chest.

  ‘Go on. Only one?’

  ‘Well,’ her lips curved, ‘one of them. You’re divine with designer stubble.’

  He rubbed his jaw ruefully. ‘There’s nothing designer about it, it just happens.’

  ‘Maybe, but it does strange things to me.’ She leant lightly on his chest. ‘So,’ she looked into the deep blue of his eyes, ‘here I am, feeling all siren again.

  I think it must have something to do with all these South Sea pearls,’ she told him gravely. ‘Want me to do anything about it? It would be a lovely way to say thank you. Last night, after all, was about eight hours ago.’

  He took a tortured breath and growled something indecipherable in his throat.

  But as his hands curved on her breasts, a piping little voice made itself heard from the room next door.

  Both Lee and Rhiannon closed their eyes in comic frustration.

  ‘There’s always tonight,’ he said after giving her a quick, hard kiss. ‘Put your nightgown on…I’ll get her. Just one thing.’ He got out of bed and pulled on pyjama bottoms. ‘
Has the Siren’s Union really given this marriage its seal of approval, Rhiannon?’

  She paused with her nightgown in her hands. ‘It’s given it ten out of ten, five stars, cum laude—didn’t you know?’ she asked, her eyes alight with love and laughter.

  He gave her another kiss. ‘Just like to check now and then.’

  Rhiannon pulled her nightgown on and lay back, more contented, more in love than she’d ever thought possible.

  Then she started to smile as she heard the conversation coming from the nursery, and really felt as if her cup was running over.

  ‘Hi, tiger! Sleep well?’ Lee’s deep voice filled with teasing affection.

  ‘Daddy, Daddy, Daddy!’ Reese’s little voice, filled with pure joy.