Australia Outback Fantasies

by Margaret Way

  At first he looked shocked, but then, with the practised skill of an experienced barrister, he smiled, said something to his companion and stood.

  ‘Well, well,’ he boomed sonorously as he strolled towards them. ‘Fancy seeing you here, Nell.’

  ‘Hello, Robert.’ She managed to smile very brightly as she held out her hand.

  Jacob was on his feet and she said, ‘You must meet an old friend of mine, Jacob Tucker.’

  Until that moment, when the two men shook hands, she hadn’t realised how much taller and more powerfully built Jacob was.

  ‘Jacob Tucker.’ Robert offered him a smile through gritted teeth. ‘Of course, I’ve heard of you.’

  ‘Likewise,’ said Jacob grimly.

  Robert sent Nell an eloquent roll of his eyes and there was no missing his message. So this is the man you could never forget?

  A split second later, he was once again the smooth barrister. ‘You have good taste, Mr Tucker.’ For a moment he left the ambiguous comment up in the air, but when Nell and Jacob looked suitably puzzled, he smiled. ‘The food here is excellent.’

  He turned back to his companion, indicating to her to come over. ‘You must meet Gabriella.’

  Nell was certain that Robert puffed out his chest.

  As she rose to meet the other woman, she noted with mild surprise that she didn’t have any pangs of jealousy. She could smile at Robert’s new girlfriend and wish her well without a qualm—with a marked sense of relief, actually.

  Gabriella seemed quite nice, but rather shy, and the introductions were brief. Robert turned to Jacob and said with a hint of condescension, ‘So you’re down from the bush to kick up your heels in the bright lights?’

  ‘Actually, I came to Melbourne to attend a funeral.’ Jacob spoke quietly, but with a hint of challenge. ‘And to deal with personal business.’

  ‘Ah.’ Robert took a step back. ‘Nice to have met you. Enjoy your meal, Nell.’ He looked, momentarily, as if he would have liked to keep on going, backing right out of the restaurant.

  Seated again, Jacob said to Nell, ‘Would you be happy to leave now, without dessert or coffee?’

  ‘Yes, please. I’ve had plenty to eat.’

  As he attended to the bill, she remembered that they hadn’t finished their discussion about Sam. What would happen now?

  On the footpath, Jacob said, ‘We’re going in opposite directions, so it makes sense to take separate taxis.’

  So this was the end of the evening? ‘You realise we haven’t settled anything about Sam?’ she said, feeling way too up in the air.

  ‘I think we’ve made enough progress for one night.’

  Had they? Jacob was being enigmatic when Nell wanted a black and white decision. She didn’t want to admit it, but Robert’s arrival had driven everything askew. It was so strange. She’d known every intimate thing about Robert—that he meticulously squeezed toothpaste tubes from the bottom up, that he liked to cut the corners off his toast and eat them first, that he always slept on his back with his mouth open.

  She knew none of those things about Jacob and yet they’d been parents, were now grandparents. And Jacob stirred her in ways Robert never had.

  The laughter of carefree diners floated around them as they walked back along the footpath to the taxi rank. The feeling that her discussion with Jacob hadn’t finished properly, hadn’t solved anything, bothered Nell, but there was a cab waiting. Jacob ushered her forward. ‘You grab this one.’

  The evening was over.

  ‘What about Sam?’ she said in sudden panic.

  ‘I’ll come with you to the Brownes’ tomorrow. We’ve plenty of time to work everything out.’

  ‘So we’re going to sleep on this decision after all?’

  An elusive emotion flickered in Jacob’s eyes. ‘I think you know how this will pan out, Nell.’

  Her heart leapt. What did he mean? She searched his face and saw a tenderness that set a thousand yearnings stirring inside her, spreading wings.

  Oh, Jacob, don’t look at me like that. I can’t risk breaking my heart over you again. I would never survive.

  But she said, ‘You’re probably right. Things often make better sense in the morning. Thanks again for a lovely dinner.’

  She got into the taxi and Jacob closed her door.

  Automatically, she lifted her hand to wave, but touched the window instead. Jacob tapped the outside glass where her fingers touched and the not-quite contact sent tendrils of warmth up her arms.

  He smiled at her as the vehicle took off and she could see him standing on the edge of the footpath with his hands shoved deep in his pockets. Overhead lights caught the sheen on his dark hair, but she thought he looked very lonely as he watched her, as he waited until she turned the corner and was out of sight.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  I LET that turkey of a husband spoil our night.

  Jacob entered his hotel room and let out a long, deep sigh into its darkened interior. He’d taken one look at that smooth barrister, that expensively dressed, silver-tongued ex-husband of Nell’s, and his careful plans had flown out of the window.

  But, in all honesty, he had to admit that the encounter had upset him more than it had seemed to bother Nell.

  He showered, turning the taps on hard in an attempt to wash the tension from his body. Afterwards, he helped himself to whisky from the mini-bar in his room, tossing the fiery spirits down in two gulps.

  In a final bid to get Robert Ruthven from his thoughts, he crossed to his suitcase and carefully retrieved an envelope from an inside pocket. Then he flopped back on to the huge hotel bed, reached above and snapped on the reading light. He opened a letter written in a round, girlish hand on sky-blue stationery trimmed with white and yellow daisies.

  Lying in the pool of golden light, he read the words that he already knew by heart.

  Dear Mr Tucker,

  My name is Tegan Browne. I am nineteen years old and, shortly after my birth, I was adopted by the Browne family. My birth mother is Nell Ruthven, née Harrington, and I was recently given your name and told that you are my father.

  I have no idea how you felt when I was given away. For years I was angry with both you and Nell, but now I’m nineteen I think I understand that decisions like adoption are complicated. I realise you might not even know I exist, so I’m sorry if this letter is a total shock, but I’ve decided I need to know more about you.

  So here goes …

  Hi, Dad.

  Picture me smiling shyly as I say that, because it’s weird to say hello after all this time, isn’t it?

  On the night I was told your name, I couldn’t sleep. I kept saying your name over and over in my head … Jacob Tucker, Jacob Tucker, Jacob Tucker …

  I could have been Tegan Tucker.

  You have no idea how often I’ve tried to guess what you’re like. When I was a kid, I looked at men on the train and wondered if one of them was you. Sometimes I’d choose a nice-looking guy and pretend he was my real father. But don’t get me wrong, it’s not because I’ve been neglected or anything. Bill and Jean Browne have been wonderful parents.

  I searched for you on the Internet and I read that you’re a bachelor still, which is none of my business, I guess, but it made me kind of sad. I could only find one photo of you on a website about cattle. You were on a horse and your face was mostly shaded by a big Akubra hat, but you looked really great.

  You’re a cattleman. Like wow! How cool is that? And you live in Outback Queensland. I guess you ride horses and catch wild bulls and walk like a cowboy. I think that’s awesome.

  I know our shared DNA might mean little to you, but I thought I’d tell you a few details about me. I’m 167 cm tall and I have dark hair and blue eyes and I’m divinely beautiful (joke). I’m no great scholar, but at school I loved art and music. I used to think about training to be an art teacher, but I took a year off when I finished school and I kind of bummed around and now, well, something’s come up and I don’t know wh
at the future holds.

  I like messing about in Jean’s kitchen and I’m turning into a pretty starry cook. You should try my blueberry pancakes.

  Anyway, I’ve rattled on for long enough for a first letter. I hope you write back. I would truly love to meet you.

  Your very curious daughter,

  Tegan

  PS I think Jacob is a very nice name. It’s on my list of favourite boys’names. And I have some other important news, which I’ll tell you if you write back.

  Jacob set the letter on the bedside table, switched off the reading lamp and lay in the darkness on top of the bedspread. He hadn’t drawn the curtains so there was still a faint glow from the city lights outside and he could see red and blue flashes from a neon sign reflected on the ceiling.

  Tegan’s words played through his head.

  Picture me smiling shyly …

  … I read that you’re a bachelor still, which is none of my business, I guess, but it made me kind of sad.

  The colours on the ceiling blurred and he was forced to swipe at his eyes with the backs of his hands, but the damn tears wouldn’t stop. He’d read Tegan’s letter a thousand times and it always tore at his heart. The openness of her communication, the youthful informality choked him up every time.

  His little girl. The precious baby he’d made with Nell.

  Her letter, like the photos he’d seen at the Brownes’ today, was such a brief, tantalising glimpse into his daughter’s personality, her life.

  Jacob rolled onto his side and let out a painful sigh. Tegan hadn’t mentioned her pregnancy, but he was pretty certain that the extra news she had been going to tell him was about the baby. If there had been another letter, would she have given him the name of her child’s father?

  What about that guy? It didn’t seem possible that Tegan could write such a touching letter to her birth father and yet ignore the rights of her own baby’s father.

  Who was that young man? Where was he now?

  It was something Jacob had to find out, no matter what happened tomorrow when he went with Nell to collect Sam.

  Lying with his hands folded beneath his head, he found himself thinking about his own father and the photo that he kept hidden away in an old album.

  His father hadn’t been a cattleman, but he had loved the Outback and loved to ride horses and in the photo Jacob, aged two, was up in the saddle in front of him.

  As a boy, Jacob had stared at that photo so often it was imprinted on his brain. That unfamiliar masculine figure on horseback had been his hero.

  He could see the image now, could see his dad in a wide-brimmed hat that shaded his dark eyes, his straight nose and smiling mouth. His cotton shirt sleeves were rolled up, revealing strong, sinewy forearms. His hands were suntanned and long-fingered, one loosely holding the reins, the other curved protectively to hold the dark-haired little boy against him.

  There were times when Jacob was sure he could remember that photo being taken, could remember that strong arm holding him close, could feel the texture of the rough cotton shirt against his back, the smoothness of the leather saddle beneath him.

  He thought about Sam and felt an unbearable longing to have the boy in his life.

  Tomorrow …

  Jacob let out a soft groan. Had he ruined his chances?

  He’d handled this evening so badly. He’d allowed Nell’s ex to spoil their dinner and then he’d felt compelled to let the whole matter of Koomalong drop. Which meant he was no closer to his goal, and that was crazy.

  Tomorrow was his last chance.

  Nell dreamed of making love with Jacob, but she woke to a grim dawn, an empty bed and rain lashing against her bedroom window. She lay very still, enveloped by an overwhelming longing for her dream to continue, for Jacob’s lips on hers, his arms about her, his body covering her.

  Closing her eyes, she wished she could stay in the past. She wanted to be that reckless, careless girl again, longed for that time when her life had been focused on a single track, when her summer had been defined by her secret trysts with Jacob Tucker.

  How resourceful she’d been back then, finding a sheltered glade inside a grove of trees on the river bank for their ‘second date’, sending a carefully coded message to Jacob via his mother, their innocent go-between.

  She’d relished the danger and the secrecy.

  ‘You know your father will sack me if he finds us,’ Jacob said when he met her that second time. ‘He warned me you were coming home, said there’d be hell to pay if I went anywhere near you.’

  ‘Would you rather not come here, then?’ she asked, disappointed.

  He smiled shyly, pulled her in for a kiss. ‘I don’t think I can stay away.’

  ‘That’s settled, then.’ She tried to sound calm but inside she was doing cartwheels. Already she was mad about Jacob. ‘We should be OK at this time of the morning. My parents like to sleep in.’

  ‘Yeah. Your father’s the only cattleman I’ve worked for who isn’t up with the birds.’

  It was well-known in the district that her father was lazy, but Nell didn’t want to waste time talking about him. She and Jacob sat together on a shaded patch of grass, their backs against the broad base of a gum-tree. ‘It’s your turn today,’ she said. ‘You have to tell me all about yourself.’

  He grinned. ‘I bet my mum’s already told you everything you need to know about me.’

  ‘Maggie’s very proud of you,’ Nell agreed. ‘But in a nice way. She’s not boastful, although I can tell she really loves you.’ After a bit, she said, ‘I’ve been wondering about your father.’

  Good grief, she’d been blunt in those days.

  Jacob’s smile faded. ‘My father died when I was two.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ Nell could instantly tell how much this hurt him. ‘That’s so sad, Jacob. Do you mind—can I ask what happened?’

  He shrugged. ‘He was an engineer with the Main Roads and he was inspecting a work project on a road out near Longreach. There was motorist who didn’t slow down.’

  Jacob’s eyes grew dark and she could see that his father’s death had left an enormous hole in his life. Nell gave him a hug.

  Jacob repaid her with a kiss. Cupping her face in his hands, he kissed her sweetly, tenderly, making her insides swoop and drop, as if she were riding on a Ferris wheel.

  ‘What else do you want to know about me?’ he prompted, as he continued to hold her close.

  ‘Um—’ Nell’s head was still spinning. Where did you learn to kiss like that? ‘Um—have you always lived in the Outback?’

  ‘Pretty much. Mum and I have lived all over the place—Western Australia, the Northern Territory, Queensland.’

  ‘And I suppose you’ve had lots of girlfriends?’

  His face broke into a slow smile. ‘None you need to worry about.’ He cocked his head to one side and his eyes were breathtakingly serious as he sifted strands of her hair through his fingers. ‘You’re beautiful, Nell. I bet you’ve had hundreds of guys chasing you in Brisbane.’

  ‘Hardly hundreds. And no one as nice as you.’

  She was rewarded with another kiss and it wasn’t nearly as gentle as the first. The intensity of it stole her breath, thrilled her, sent her blood racing. She’d swear she’d never been kissed with so much passion.

  ‘About those college parties you were telling me about,’ Jacob murmured huskily, close to her ear. ‘What happens after the eight minutes of chit-chat?’

  ‘Um—’ Nell struggled to breathe normally. ‘If people decide to hook up, it’s—it’s up to them what happens next.’

  He wound a strand of her hair around his finger. ‘If we were in the city, I guess I’d take you to the movies or to dinner or something.’

  ‘Or something.’

  He smiled again and his eyes revealed an unguarded warmth and emotion that sent Nell’s heart thrumming. She longed for him to start kissing her again, knowing they were both burning up.

  ‘No chance of movies or dinner
for us.’ His voice sounded hoarse.

  ‘Then I guess that leaves us with or something,’ she said bravely.

  His smile turned shaky and his fingertips traced an electrifying line from her hairline down the side of her face to the little hollow at the base of her throat. Nell was on fire, almost bursting out of her skin.

  Please keep touching me—please.

  His fingers moved to the V at the neck of her blouse, and then to her first button, and Nell was drowning in a haze of heat. She willed him to undo that button, to undo all of them. She’d never offered herself to any man, but now she could think of nothing but how much she wanted Jacob, wanted his hands to touch her, to caress her intimately.

  Looking back now, twenty years later, Nell was still amazed by the force of her youthful impatience. She could remember the way she’d thrown her arms about Jacob’s neck, had kissed him hard, arching into him so that he could have no doubt what she wanted. And, in response, he’d attended to every one of her buttons and they’d made love.

  She supposed that first time must have been more about passion than finesse, but she could only remember how blissfully happy she’d been.

  There had only been one problem. They’d both been so carried away with the heady excitement of discovering each other that they hadn’t waited till Jacob made a trip to the pharmacy in Roma.

  ‘Morning, Nell.’

  Nell was putting out the rubbish when her neighbour’s cheery face popped over the fence.

  Rosie O’Donnell was grinning at her from beneath an unruly mop of brown curls. ‘I’m guessing you must be on top of the world.’

  Nell tried not to look too surprised. ‘Why would you think that?’

  Rosie rolled her eyes to the pale morning sky. ‘I’ve seen your visitor. Man, oh, man, Nell. Have you struck the jackpot, or what?’

  ‘Which visitor?’ Nell asked, playing dumb, as if she couldn’t guess who’d put that silly grin on Rosie’s face.

  ‘Who else but the six foot plus, deadly handsome guy who’s been calling on you?’