An Outback Affair/Runaway Wife/Outback Bridegroom/Outback Surrender/Home To Eden

by Margaret Way

  “Love is what’s happened to me. Love at first sight.” He lay down beside her, instinct telling him it was important to her that he guide her into the tempestuous open sea of ecstasy. He pulled her close, whispered endearments into her ear.

  His voice possessed the flavour of rich black coffee. She felt his hand move over her cleavage, linger as he gently undid her bra, continuing to caress her all the time.

  No panic. Never any panic with Evan. Never any feelings of desperation that she couldn’t make things work. Evan didn’t lunge at her without warning. He was never violent. Though the response he aroused in her was so deeply passionate he might have been a highly skilled magician. He told her how lovely she was, how pretty were her hands and her feet as he kissed them. Colin had never done anything like that.

  Now Evan’s hands were moving over the whole naked length of her, gently separating her legs. The room was blurring around her, though she could see his face, expression intense, the muscles along his strong jawline taut with sexual urgency. Her body was crying out for him. She strained closer. She wanted him deep inside her. She wanted to reach the sweet, fierce, soaring climax she had never reached with Colin. She wanted release.

  His hands were beneath her, lifting her up onto his body, his mouth reaching for her pink nipple as he drew her down onto him, then up, her insides contracting with pleasure.

  A great tide of emotion came for her, gathering force. Spontaneously she arched her body as they established a rhythm, her head thrown back in rapture, hair flying around them like silk, all the warm juices in her body flowing like nectar. She had a sense of losing herself entirely, and then she heard Evan calling her name.

  Laura!

  So beautiful on his tongue.

  The ripples started in stealth, building until they began to rush over her in a huge tumbling liquid plume.

  “Do you want me?” he found himself muttering harshly maddened beyond endurance. He had never in his life felt like this. She was everything his body and mind sought.

  “I want everything about you,” Laura cried out, before sensation upon sensation overwhelmed her, reducing her to soft whimpers.

  When Laura reopened her eyes it was to a darkened room.

  “Evan?” She threw out an arm to affirm he was there.

  “I’m here.” He came in from the balcony, where he’d been standing, thinking, while looking out at the night.

  “What time is it?” She sat up.

  “Three. I never fail to wake around three.”

  “Have you something on your mind? Please come back to me.” He was the answer to her prayers. Still naked, she began to search for her robe. Evan was wearing the white towelling robe supplied by the hotel.

  “No, leave it. I love you naked,” he said in his low thrilling voice.

  “Is something worrying you?” She lifted her arms, wanting only to offer him comfort.

  “Not really, Laura.” He slipped into the bed beside her, one arm gathering her against him, her head tucked into the bow of his shoulder, the satiny warmth of her breasts against his heart. “But I think the time has come to be honest. You didn’t like what happened tonight with Sir David suddenly appearing out of the blue?”

  “Only that he knows all about you, which I clearly don’t. He knows your family, your mother, Marina. How you resemble the father you lost. He knows your name. Is it Kellerman?” She knew it was before he answered.

  He stroked her silky head. “You’re very good.”

  “I can put a puzzle together if I get a few clues. Your mother is Marina Kellerman, the concert cellist?”

  “Yes,” he admitted with pride. “My mother taught me to play. I told you that. My father was Christian Kellerman. He was a career diplomat. A very good one, like Sir David, but he was posted to dangerous places. He was killed in the Balkans some years back. It was a terrorist attack. The woman I thought I was in love with—”

  “Monika?” She felt a short painful stab of jealousy.

  “Monika, yes.” His tone hardened. “Monika betrayed his precise itinerary to a terrorist gang she was working undercover for. She had infiltrated the freedom fighters who trusted me and were keeping me informed. I am—or was—as you suspected a foreign correspondent. The great tragedy is, even with my experience, I trusted Monika—as did a lot of other people. It cost my father and his driver, a man called Thompson, their lives. I’ve never forgiven myself, though my mother told me constantly I was not to blame.”

  Laura lifted her head to gaze at him. “Evan, how very terrible! Your pain shows.”

  “You can attribute that to the horror I’ve seen. In those days I was a risk-taker. Anything to get a good story. But I had the fear of God drummed into me. I lived through terrible times. Times it might take me for ever to talk about. After I got home, I guess you could say I had a breakdown. My mother held me together through the worst times. We’re very close. But there was so much conflict inside me. So much guilt, I had to get away. Far away. I worshipped my father. Finally I hit on here, to be near the desert. I thought I needed the desert to heal.”

  “You couldn’t tell anyone outside your mother? A counsellor? Some very insightful person?” Her own abuse seemed unremarkable in the light of this.

  “I couldn’t begin to speak of my experiences, much like a war veteran can’t. War is terrible. The loss, the fear, the large-scale slaughter, the inhumanity. I saw so much cruelty and death I just wanted to block it out. But I couldn’t block out thoughts of my father. And poor old Thompson, the innocent victim. Thompson was devoted to Dad. They ended their lives together.”

  “So you took his name. I’m so sorry, Evan.” She touched his face, his throat with a slow flowing hand full of sympathy and understanding.

  “I hated Monika.” He caught her hand and carried it passionately to his mouth. “I think I’d have killed her—only someone else did the job.”

  She swallowed hard. “If you had you wouldn’t have been here for me.” Laura hesitated. “How often do you think of her?”

  “I wasn’t in love with her, Laura. I didn’t even know her. The real Monika I hated. She used her beauty as a weapon. I didn’t know what love between a man and a woman was. Monika had courage, but she was evil. While I would have gone to the ends of the earth for a good story she would have done anything to gain power and influence for herself. Needless to say power went along with money.”

  “And I reminded you of her?” Laura was dismayed.

  “Momentarily. Until I looked into your beautiful eyes. Monika is part of the past. Gone for ever. I would trust you with my life.”

  Her heart clamped. Would he feel like that in the light of her own disclosures? “Do you think you have begun to heal?”

  “I know so.” He dropped a hungry kiss on her mouth. “You’ve brought back the beauty to my life. I really needed help but I didn’t know where to start looking. How was I to even dream help would come from the girl next door?” he asked with tender humour.

  “Then I’ve achieved something worthwhile in my life.” Even if things went badly in the future, if psychotic Colin should be the end of her, she would be left with the magical time she and Evan had spent together.

  “You could say that, love of mine. I feel incredibly blessed to have met you.”

  “Please don’t put me on a pedestal, Evan,” she warned.

  “As though you could betray me.” He stared down at her, wanting her desperately again. “I need you and you need me. You’re not cold?” he asked, as she shivered slightly.

  “A tiny bit.”

  “I’ll soon cure that. I’m burning away myself. Only for you.” He took her cool, slender body fully into his arms. “Do you think you could bear more lovemaking?”

  She let her arm encircle his beloved head as her lips formed the exquisite word. “Yes!”

  Those starved of love can’t get enough.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  KOOMERA Crossing was en fête. Today was the wedding day of two of the
town’s favourite people. Kyall McQueen, master of the historic station Wunnamurra, and Sarah Dempsey, head of Koomera Crossing Bush Hospital. Both had been born and bred in their beloved Channel Country, and now they were to be finally united as man and wife.

  The guest list numbered over three hundred. Those who hadn’t made it weren’t left out. A day-into-evening party had been organised for the townspeople in the main street. All traffic had been blocked off. Brightly coloured bunting flew from the shopfronts and crisscrossed the street. Long trestle tables and chairs had been set up. Piped music had been organized.

  Celebrations would start with a magnificent brunch, the beef, the veal, the lamb and the pork supplied by Wunnamurra Station. There were to be savoury dishes galore, with all the accompaniments. Mexican-style chilli, favourite pizzas, pies and pastas, salads. Jumbo desserts.

  All in praise of the legendary McQueen family, whose financial generosity for well over a century had made the town what it was.

  Mrs Ruth McQueen, now dead, had fought for the town hospital—in the process saving many lives. Everyone acknowledged this freely. But no one wanted her back. So far as the town was concerned her grandson Kyall was the right candidate for taking over the many business concerns. Overnight he had become heir to the family fortune, with all the right talents to make his grand inheritance and the town grow. He deserved his beautiful bride.

  It came into Laura’s mind that this day, so blissful for Sarah and Kyall and their lovely daughter Fiona, so recently discovered, would have a different outcome for her.

  Nonetheless she dressed with excitement in the outfit she and Evan had settled on from a choice of three—Evan at the outset had said with such enthusiasm, “That’s exactly you!” and had made her and the saleswoman laugh.

  The dress, a lovely jacaranda into violet chiffon, was printed with deep pink full-blown roses and buds with sprays of silver-green leaves, its style paying homage to the graceful cocktail gowns of the 1920s. The sleeveless bodice dipped low. The ankle-length hem of the skirt was trimmed with fine silvery-green lace. There were violet silk and lace sandals to match; an exquisite pink silk rose for her hair. It was a very lyrical look, very feminine. A style that suited her better than any other.

  In the old ballroom of the homestead, that had been turned into a flower-decked chapel, Sarah and Kyall made their vows before the visiting Bishop.

  As the Bishop began the traditional words of the wedding ceremony, and the congregation of wedding guests dissolved into a reverent silence, Laura felt the tears rising to her eyes. She couldn’t fail to remember her own wedding day. Her ravishing white satin gown, miles of skirt, her cathedral-length veil held in place by an antique diamond and pearl diadem lent to her by her mother-in-law—to be returned the same day—her bouquet of white rosebuds… She had gone to her husband a virgin. He had done such things to her. Was it any wonder she felt shame? The man she now knew she loved, Evan, stood beside her, his height and powerful build making him look regal in his wedding finery, his dark head slightly bowed as if to say these were serious and solemn moments.

  God protect them, Laura thought as she rejoiced in the bride and groom’s happiness. They were already a family. Complete. To one side stood their young daughter in her wedding finery, a cream silk-tulle dress with crystal embroidery on the full floating skirt. Sarah, the bride, wore the palest shade of gold, a simple garland of yellow and cream roses in her magnificent golden hair. She looked heavenly.

  Did I look heavenly? Laura thought, falling into a sad little reverie. People said I did. Even Colin’s parents had beamed on her as a suitable bride for their son.

  What did they think of her now? She could imagine the lies Colin had fed them. No one could be more persuasive. Not that his parents would need much convincing. It would be far too painful, too grievous, for them to consider their only son was less than perfect, much less a wife-beater.

  The ceremony over, the walls of guests milled all over the house—the ballroom and reception rooms, the huge entrance hall that formed the heart of the house—spilling out onto the broad verandahs and down into the homestead’s grounds, a parkland manicured for the great occasion.

  Two giant white marquees had been set up for the sumptuous reception at which Kyall spoke so lovingly and movingly of his love for his bride, the magic of their wedding day, the miracle of being reunited with their child. Laura and Harriet, who sat at the same table, had difficulty holding back the tears.

  “This is what I’ve always wanted,” Harriet, resplendent in gold with big pearls around her neck, whispered to Laura. “For Sarah and Kyall to be happily married.”

  Mitchell Claydon, so very dashing, with an intriguing dimple in one cheek, made everyone laugh. Then Kyall’s beautiful sister, Christine, spoke in warm, honeyed tones that had more than a suggestion of an American accent about the childhood of all four, Sarah and Kyall, she and Mitch, and the applause overflowed.

  It was a time for high emotion for all. Sarah came to them and they all hugged her, hugged Sarah’s daughter, Fiona, so much the image of her mother it took the breath away.

  “Isn’t this the most marvellous day?” Fiona cried exuberantly, her arm around her mother’s waist, clinging to her. “And I’m going on the honeymoon!”

  “We couldn’t bear to leave her.” Sarah smiled radiantly at everyone, embracing her daughter. Then Sarah in turn was surrounded by other groups of people who wanted to wish her all the happiness in the world.

  The sun was a great golden ball, the sky a cloudless imperial royal blue. As Laura and Evan strolled down to the green crystal creek that wound its way lazily through the home gardens Evan laid a gentle hand on Laura’s arm, slowing her progress.

  “What is it, sweetheart? Are those tears of joy, or what?” He couldn’t help but be aware she was very emotional.

  “It’s been an amazing experience,” she sighed. “There’s so much love between them.”

  “There is, and it’s wonderful, but why so sad?”

  “You know me too well.” She turned to walk a few feet.

  “Sometimes, my love, I think I don’t know you at all,” he said wryly.

  “But you like what you do know?” She stopped beneath a shade tree covered with purple buds.

  “I love what I do know.” His tone held astonishing warmth. “I’ve waited quite a while for you to confide in me. I guess I can hang on a bit longer.”

  “You must!” Her voice broke a little with emotion. Colin couldn’t be allowed to threaten them. “Evan, I love you so much.” He was her strength, her security.

  “So why are we wasting time?” He turned her to face him. Flames flared in his dark eyes. “I want a future together. I want a loving, stable relationship. I want marriage. Children. Do you want children, Laura?”

  She caught a blossom as it fell, inhaling its sweet perfume. “I love children. The sweetest thing in the world is a baby.”

  “You never mention your doctor any more.”

  “So don’t remind me.”

  “Not on this festive day, but clearly he’s an issue that has to be settled.”

  “I know that, Evan.”

  “Your feelings for him drove you out here. I saw how unhappy you were. I can feel the sadness in you today.”

  “Then I’m going to make up my mind to be happy,” she promised him. “I am happy.” She lifted her glossy, rose-adorned head to meet his ardent gaze. “You’re so very, very, important to me. I long more than anything in the world for us to be together.”

  “Then we will.”

  “No matter what?” She felt her heart crack.

  “No matter what.”

  “Promise?” she begged, putting a hand to the lapel of his pearl-grey jacket, fancying she could hear the beat of his heart.

  He was mad to kiss her.

  In full view of the strolling guests he bent his head, muttering, “I do,” into her sweet open mouth.

  “Then that’s that!”

  Evan wanted
just two things. To love her. To look after her. Whatever involvement she had with her ex-lover, he was going to bring it to an end.

  He knew he only had to pick up the phone to track the man down. After all the news stories he’d broken, finding Laura’s mystery doctor would be a piece of cake. No difficulty either finding out Laura’s true identity. Her background.

  Only love for her and the feeling he would be intruding on her right to privacy held him in check. He had been talking about their trip to the Red Centre a week later. She would have her chance to confide in him then.

  To Laura’s mind the beauty of the mighty monolith Uluru was most fully appreciated at sunset, when the sun moving down over the horizon created the most spectacular colour effects on the western wall.

  She watched entranced as the immense rock with its wonderfully sculptured contours went through its phenomenal colour display. This was truly one of the great wonders of the natural world, she thought with fascination, unchanged in form for an awesome forty million years. Uluru dominated the great desert of Spinifex and sand that stretched as far as the eye could see.

  They had watched the Rock at sunrise too, when the vast shadowy outline slowly became illuminated. Its sheer size, its strength and aura of great antiquity, held the watcher spellbound. When the sun first appeared on the horizon the crest began to glow a gentle pink that turned to rose. As the sun rose further into the sky the entire dome turned golden-red, at which point Laura had not only felt like cheering but she had, to Evan’s pleasure and amusement.

  The wonderful bird-life that so characterized the Outback and offered its own fascination had suddenly taken wing, as if to salute it, and by noon the Rock had begun to blend with the fiery sand.