by Margaret Way
Darcy brought herself upright. “All I saw was she was young and beautiful and that you loved her.” Her voice was strangled by tears.
“I think very fond of her will do. Darcy, she’s family. If only you’d shown me or my mother the photographs. The whole sorry mess could have been cleared up.”
“So my instincts were all wrong!” She was crying now but wiping away the tears with fierce determination. “I was so much in love I couldn’t think straight. All those hormones raging around in my system. Then the miscarriage. It was hard not to believe it was something I did wrong. But I swear I didn’t know, Curt. I didn’t.”
“Ah, Darcy!” He made no effort to hide his distress.
“Afterwards when you came back it was unspeakable. I know I said over and over again I didn’t want to see you any more but I was devastated beyond all healing. There seemed no future for us. I thought you were in another relationship you weren’t going to tell me about. I’d lost the baby. Dad didn’t know about that. He was cruel. Gloating. He was so jealous of you. What you stood for in my life. You were going to take me away and then he would have been truly on his own. His women meant nothing.”
The pain in her voice resounded in Curt’s heart. “That sonofabitch,” he said, his expression hard and condemning. “It all comes back to him.”
“I thought he was trying to protect me even if I hated the way he went about it.”
“He tried to ruin your life.”
“I see that, Curt. What do you want me to say? I’m sorry, so sorry. But I’ve suffered.” Her voice was stripped of all hope.
“That’s what I hate. You suffering.” With purposeful urgency he lifted her to him. Pulled her close. Held her fiercely. “I love you, Darcy,” he said. “You’re all I want on this earth. I won’t ever leave you again.” He bent and kissed her wet cheeks. “I always knew you had some unassailable secret. I knew your father played a part in it. I’d even considered the unimaginable but I knew it wasn’t so. Jock McIvor had crossed many boundaries but never that.”
“Oh no, no!” Darcy exclaimed in horror. “How could you think anything so monstrous?”
“I didn’t. But it was something powerful. You wouldn’t confide in me.”
“I’ve paid dearly for it,” she said, burrowing her head against him. “Forgive me, Curt, for ever doubting you.”
“I guess I will in time.” He pulled back her hair and stared into her beautiful drowned eyes. “And to think Jock called for me in his hour of need. Isn’t life just too strange? I had to see him in his grave before he’d let you go. All I’ve ever wanted Darcy is to love and protect you. Take care of you. But you had to suffer the loss of our child by yourself.”
“I see I deserved it now.” Her voice was full of sadness.
“No! Hush!” He hugged her tighter, emphatically shaking his head. “Never say that. These things happen. Your secret is out now. It had to come out some time.”
“I’d just as soon die than have Kath know the whole pitiful story,” she murmured.
“Mum doesn’t have to know,” he reassured her. “It’s our business. Mum can’t wait for us to be married. She can’t wait for grandchildren.”
Darcy met his eyes directly, thanking God it was so. “Doctor Sarah assured me I could have other children.”
“Of course you can. Of course you will.” He kissed her passionately. “But I need you to myself for a while. We’ve got an awful lot of loving to get in.”
“Then let’s go home,” she said.
The light caught the dazzle of her beautiful ring. She could have worn it years ago. But at that moment it seemed doubly precious.
The sun rose higher in a deepening blue sky, a great golden ball that flooded the bush with light. Flocks of birds having given their concert rose screeching and chattering above the trees in multicoloured waves. A dazzling sight in flight. The surface of the dark green lagoon crowded with the sacred blue lotus, was touched with sparkling points of light.
The beauty of it! A pair of mating blue brolgas seized that precise moment to make their appearance, touching down in the shallows with a series of quick running steps After a few moments like a wonderful omen they broke into their enchanting ballet.
Curt turned up her face to him, his green eyes lit by little flames. “We’re one, you and I, Darcy. Like the brolgas we mate for life.”
“My cup of joy is overflowing,” she said.
EPILOGUE
THAT Christmas proved to be the happiest period of the McIvor women’s lives. Darcy made no objection when Courtney asked if their mother and her husband Peter could join them on Murraree for the festive season.
Why not? There was no place in Darcy’s life now for insoluble problems. What she had learned from Curt was, problems had to be worked through to find a solution. From now on she had to go about reestablishing a new, loving relationship with her mother. In her utterly blissful state Darcy didn’t find it at all difficult to move on. Both Marian and Courtney had received the news of her engagement to Curt with unfeigned delight. On all the evidence both women’s view was this was a partnership that would last.
“I believe it with all my heart,” Marian told her elder daughter, compulsively hugging her.
The weekend before Christmas had been set aside for the engagement festivities which took place on Murraree. The festivities lasted right through the weekend, starting with a picnic race meeting, followed by a banquet in Murraree’s newly refurbished formal dining room, with a magnificent barbecue the following day to which everyone on both stations, Murraree and Sunset was invited.
Hundreds and hundreds of photographs were taken. Everyone wanted a record of that marvellous weekend. The wedding was planned for June when the weather would be crisp and beautiful. It also allowed time to decide on Murraree’s future. Courtney had made it known she was well content to stay. But everyone was in agreement she couldn’t stay on her own.
“I don’t believe she’ll be on her own for long,” was another one of Curt’s cryptic comments which he made smiling knowingly to himself.
Darcy knew he meant Adam but she couldn’t for the life of her see how that was going to happen. Courtney’s and Adam’s relationship was really complicated. Both drew a strong response from the other. Anyone could see that, but it appeared beneath the perverse attraction and the good manners, lay an inherent sensitivity that Darcy thought could pretty well be described as antagonism. Nevertheless Adam who had a powerful position in their lives was invited to everything as a matter of course. Shaky as the relationship was between Courtney and Adam, Adam got on famously with Marian who took to him on sight.
“So charming. So clever. Such a gentleman!” she purred.
Courtney took care to make her barbed retorts to Darcy when their mother was safely out of earshot.
No, thought Darcy, somewhat regretfully, for she really liked Adam, Courtney and Adam were not a perfect match. Her beloved was dreaming.
As Destiny would have it they were all assembled on the verandah enjoying a cold drink when more unresolved business literally landed on their doorstep. Marian and Peter were staying on for a few more days, but Adam was due back at work the following Monday. He was scheduled to leave in the morning with Curt and Darcy who were taking a trip to Brisbane to buy Murraree’s new helicopter.
It was getting on to late afternoon and they were idly discussing recent events when a dust covered, badly battered four-wheel drive swept into view. Puzzled Darcy stood up. “Who’s that? We’re not expecting anyone, are we?” Between Christmas and New Year Murraree had enjoyed a stream of visitors and well wishers. Nothing was ever said, but Murraree was judged to be a good place to visit now that Big Jock McIvor had gone to his reward.
“Whoever it is, they’re in one hell of a hurry.” Curt joined Darcy at the balustrade, putting his arm around her shoulder. “You’d swear there was a posse in pursuit.”
“Could be he wants to arrive before his vehicle falls apart,” Adam commented
. “It looks like it belongs on the scrapheap.”
“Well we’re going to find out soon enough.” Courtney, too stood up. For some reason her nerves were twitching and it wasn’t just Adam’s half thrilling, half satirical presence.
The driver of the four-wheel drive not content to park off the circular drive brought the noisy vehicle to a shuddering halt a few feet from the base of the front steps.
“It’s not a man,” Courtney said, clutching her throat.
Adam shot her a quick glance. “What’s wrong?” He rose to standing, frowning at her vaguely fatalistic expression.
“I have a feeling this is serious,” Courtney said.
It was Curt who called: “Hello there! Who are you? What do you want?” He didn’t demand it. He spoke in a completely nonthreatening voice.
The driver stepped out of the vehicle and slammed the door so hard they all expected it to fall off. She—for it was a she—scanned these rich, handsome people, ranged together on the verandah of the heritage listed homestead.
“Which one of you is Darcy?” she responded, in a bone dry, sarcastic voice. She didn’t back off but moved further towards them, pausing only to sweep off her wide brimmed hat. The movement released a long silken bolt of glorious copper hair.
“My God!” Recognition came from a deep place inside Darcy. It flowed over her like hot oil. The resemblance was so stunning it left little room for doubt. There was the height. She was taller than Darcy—maybe 5-11—and had whipcord grace. She wore a khaki bush shirt and skin tight jeans. High boots. Her legs went on forever. The leonine mane was a dazzling red-gold. Sapphire eyes blazed up at them with familiar aggression. She even had a dimple in her chin. Her appearance couldn’t have been more unnerving.
Darcy didn’t have the slightest doubt this was one of McIvor’s chickens come home to roost. Hadn’t she always known it in her bones? This was Jock’s daughter. A McIvor. A knot formed itself in her stomach. Worked up to her throat.
A few feet from Darcy, Courtney stood like a marble figurine, remembering how her father had looked when she was a child. Marian’s eyes too had widened in disbelief.
“Cat caught your tongue?” The sapphire gaze honed in on Darcy like her antennae had made the choice. She gave Darcy a bright challenging smile. “Hi, I’m Casey. Jock McIvor was my dad. Now are you going to let me up?”
ISBN: 978-1-4268-8215-9
THE OUTBACK ENGAGEMENT
First North American Publication 2005.
Copyright © 2005 by Margaret Way, Pty., Ltd.
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.
All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
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