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  “I mean a full beard and moustache.”

  “My dear, that would take years,” he drawled.

  “All right. It’s just that I keep seeing you with a beard. Very impressive. Very formidable. As though no one could hide from you. The cover of a book, maybe?”

  He exchanged a droll look with her. “You’re not even warm.” Which was far from the truth. He had put out a book on his trip to Antarctica—but the photograph had been on the back cover, beard and all. “But I’ll guarantee to give progress reports.”

  “Just a woman’s curiosity.” She settled in the rich burgundy armchair he had rolled out for her attention.

  “And here I was thinking you a mere babe,” he gently mocked.

  “I know.” It was true she didn’t carry her scars on her face, otherwise she would look awful.

  He couldn’t help smiling at the picture she made, curled up in the oversized but very comfortable chair.

  “But very bright. When you’re older and more sure of yourself you’ll be positively dangerous.” He turned to look around him. “We’ve walked all the aisles. What do you think?”

  “The armchair, definitely,” she decided. “It’s very cosy. I liked the circular table you were looking at. Good wood. Is it red cedar?”

  “It is. It’ll come up nicely.”

  “You mean you’re going to work on it?” she asked, sliding her long hair back behind her ear.

  “When I have the time. What else?”

  “The most expensive thing will be the new bedroom suite,” she said. “We can use the cedar table for when I invite you in. I’m not fussed on the chairs. They’re too—functional. Clean lines.” Her smile was strained.

  “You and the boyfriend got to discussing furnishings?” Instantly he picked up on her wavelength.

  “How do you know I’m not married?” She looked straight at him, loving his attention and the dazzling complexity of it, but somehow hoping he would guess her secret.

  “I don’t know,” he replied, studying her with his brilliant dark eyes. “You’d say, wouldn’t you? Then again I can’t remember when I last met a young woman who somehow struck me as being such an innocent abroad.”

  “I’m not. Maybe I’m playing at a character.”

  He didn’t speak for a few moments, considering what she’d just said. “I don’t think so. I think you’re a young woman who’s been cherished all your life and now you find yourself in a situation you can’t handle. Yet you’re someone who wants desperately to stand on your own two feet. You’re even prepared to take a risk to do it. Is the boyfriend someone who wants to dominate you?”

  “Very much so.” She couldn’t keep the quiver out of her voice.

  “Then it’s clear you can’t be happy together. Probably that’s why you’re comfortable with me. You are, aren’t you?”

  She flushed. “Yes.”

  He nodded. “You’re drawn to older men. No doubt because you deeply loved your father.”

  “Yes, again. Isn’t it a mercy that as well as being comfortable—which you’re not, strictly—you’re charming, obliging, with a good sense of humour, and investigative enough to be interesting? Shall I go on? You shouldn’t be worried I’ll take advantage of your kindness. I half hope we’ll be friends?”

  “Why half hope?” He lifted a quizzical brow.

  “I can’t expect more.”

  “You can as far as I’m concerned. The decision has been made. I’m big brother. You’re Laura next door. We’re well on our way towards becoming good friends. To put the whole thing simply, we’ve bonded. Both of us are living defensively and so forth. As for chairs—I have two at home that will do you nicely.”

  “Did you make them?” She looked up at him with open delight.

  “I did.”

  “Then I’m honoured. I heard you don’t charge a lot either.”

  “Laura they’re a house-warming present,” he said gently.

  “Oh I can’t—” she started, broke off, overwhelmed by his kindness and generosity.

  “Yes, you can. Now, there are a few other things you can have sent. That coffee table, for one. Cash cover it?” he asked in a laconic voice.

  “It does, and I like it.”

  “Those few little nicks can be ironed out. No problem at all to bring it back to its former glory. What about that coat-stand for the hall? I don’t think it will crowd it. I expect you’ll wear a lot of hats. You’ll need them to protect your skin. You won’t be needing a raincoat, however. I can’t even remember when it last rained. When do you think you will move in?”

  A smile curved her lips. “If it can be organised, why not tomorrow?”

  “I’m sure it can. I’ll be on hand to help out.”

  “Why are you being so nice?” All at once her heart was beating fast. All wrong, in the circumstances.

  “You’re a woman on your own, aren’t you?” he said reasonably. “I’m the kind of man who likes to lend a hand.”

  “Then I’m very grateful.”

  “Besides, I’ve had a good time.” He looked at her and gave that white melting smile that sat so piquantly with his dark, brooding good looks. “I was getting terribly dull. Terribly set in my ways.”

  “I wonder how long it will be before you’re ever that.”

  “Laura Graham, you scare me.” Before he could help himself he had touched her cheek lightly with his finger. It had the velvety texture of a magnolia.

  For a moment they stared into one another’s eyes. Laura felt oddly as if the air might explode.

  “Well, come on,” he said, making a brisk return to the role of big brother. “We really should visit the general store. You’ll be needing a few pots and pans, though you don’t look like you eat a whole lot.”

  “Don’t go thinking I have eating problems,” she chided him.

  “So why the feather weight?”

  He spoke lightly, but she couldn’t help herself going tense. “I don’t know really. It’s not easy to eat sometimes.”

  “When you’re unhappy and you’re sleeping badly?” His dark eyes rested on her for a second.

  “I’m going to deal with it.”

  “Good girl,” he said quietly.

  Together they began to walk back along the aisle. Laura felt so drawn to him, but she had no doubts that before he’d come to Koomera Crossing he’d been someone very different. He’d lived a high-powered life, running on adrenaline. Perhaps even in personal danger.

  Who was he? Unless he told her she could speculate for ever and never know. As for him she realized he saw an image of a vulnerable little rich girl on the run from some very smart, demanding boyfriend in her set. She wondered what he would think if she told him about Colin and the wreck of a marriage. He would be kind but he might secretly despise her for failing to stand up to the enemy.

  She told Sarah all about her day over the evening meal. Laura had prepared cashew nut and ginger chicken, served with Chinese noodles and a side dish of crisp green broccoli florets.

  “Mmm, this is great! I’m really going to miss you, Laura.” Sarah looked up from her plate to smile. “It’s lovely having a meal waiting for me when I get home from the hospital, and you’re such a good cook. You and Harriet ought to get together. She’s thinking of retiring from schoolteaching and starting up a restaurant.”

  “Here in the town?” Laura was intrigued.

  “Kyall convinced her we could do with a good restaurant. All we have are the two coffee shops. They only sell snacks. Harriet is a marvellous and adventurous chef. She loves everything to do with food. She’s collected stacks of recipes on her travels. Thailand. India. She goes for exotica. I believe she could make quite a success of it.”

  “How exciting for her.” Laura nodded her agreement quickly. “One career closes. Another opens.”

  “And what are you going to do with yourself while you’re here?” Sarah looked up to pin Laura’s green gaze.

  “Evan asked me exactly the same thing.”
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  “So what did you tell him?”

  “That I haven’t thought that far. I didn’t tell him I was married. Did I make a mistake, Sarah? I couldn’t, for some reason. He’s so intuitive he immediately cottoned onto the fact I was on the run. But he surmised a boyfriend.”

  Sarah studied Laura’s down-bent face. “You do have a certain look of—”

  “Innocent at large?” Laura asked dismally. “I must correct that.”

  “No one would know from looking at you the awful experiences you’ve been through. It’s the lovely gentle look, the white skin. I’m not surprised Evan jumped to the conclusion you’re unmarried. Evidently you brought out the protective streak in him.”

  “I must have.” Laura blushed. “From what I’d gathered I expected someone quite aloof, or at least with considerable reserve.”

  “He can be like that,” Sarah conceded thoughtfully. “He’s certainly disappointed a lot of women around here. They’re fascinated with his aura. He doesn’t smile often, which is a pity because—”

  “When he does it’s like the sun coming out,” Laura interjected. “He has a beautiful smile.”

  Sarah dimpled. “I’m so glad you got on well together. I didn’t think you’d take the cottage, actually. It’s so small. But I’m sure you can make it comfortable. It’s good to know Evan Thompson will be right next door. I wouldn’t care to tackle him if I were in the wrong. There’s one man who knows how to take care of himself.”

  “I don’t think that’s his real name, do you?”

  Sarah tipped her head to the side. “A great deal of speculation goes on about Evan. Even Kyall is thoroughly intrigued. The two of them get on well. Obviously Evan’s not what he purports to be—a wood worker. Though I believe his pieces are simply beautiful. I intend to follow that up.”

  “He’s promised me two chairs.”

  “Gracious, it could be the start of a collection,” Sarah teased. “Evan must have treated you very nicely. You’re looking so much more relaxed.”

  “I’m starting to feel it.” Laura spoke softly, gratefully.

  “That’s good. When you feel strong enough you’ll have to address the problem of Colin, though I know it won’t be easy.”

  “No. A year of his cruelty has left me with many self-doubts and fear.”

  Sarah reached out and gripped her hand. “You have friends. There are ways of protecting you. Now there’s Evan. A man like Colin would have to be very brave to mess around with him.”

  “What if he finds out I have a violent husband?”

  Sarah studied Laura’s face, knowing full well the terrible psychological damage victims of abuse suffered. “The right moment will come to alert him.”

  “Yes.” Laura’s answer was hopeful. “I suspect Colin is already looking for me. Probably he thinks I’m hiding out somewhere in New Zealand. He’ll have contacted my mother to see if she knows where I am.”

  “And does she?” Sarah hoped not, for both women’s sake.

  “No.” Laura shook her gleaming dark head. “It will be a lot better for Mum if she doesn’t know. I wrote her a long letter before I left, trying to explain how unhappy I was. I didn’t paint Colin as the villain he is. I’m too ashamed.”

  “You did nothing wrong, Laura,” Sarah consoled her, aware this was a common reaction.

  Laura looked away. “I should have made a run for freedom long before this. I took a year of fear, degradation and punishment. You wouldn’t have taken it, Sarah. You have such confidence and purpose about you.”

  Sarah’s expression changed. “I’m not the strong, problem-confronting woman you think I am, Laura. I’m no more invincible than you. I find being a doctor deeply satisfying, but I’ve made lots of mistakes in my emotional life. I’ve lived with unresolved issues for far too long. I’ve always made the excuse that I’ve been uncertain of the outcome if I tackled them. I’m still learning about my own self. I don’t suppose we ever stop.”

  Laura looked across the table. Saw a beautiful blonde woman with velvety dark eyes. There was nothing weak or ineffectual about Sarah Dempsey. She looked strong. In control of her life. Laura deeply envied her. “You wouldn’t allow a man to physically and sexually abuse you, Sarah. You have an inner self-assurance I don’t have.”

  “You’re so young, Laura. Even now.” Sarah endeavoured to comfort her. “Abusers—men like Colin—pick their mark. They’re drawn to gentle, sensitive women and they like to get them young. Had you been a few years older he mightn’t have found it quite so easy, but circumstances played right into his hands. At that time you needed support—not just emotional. You’d lost your father, your mother had remarried and gone away, and then your husband cut you off from your friends. He did enormous damage. What a cruel man he must be. All those times we met at functions and I never suspected for a minute he could possibly be violent with you. He behaved as though he adored you while behind the scenes he made you suffer.” Sarah shook her head in disbelief.

  “Even my mother was fooled. I’m sure she doesn’t know what to think even now. Colin will have told her such lies. Colin the ruthless manipulator. He’s so convincing. You’ve seen that. He’ll make my mother think I have problems handling the role of wife to a very successful cardiologist. A man who saves lives. Colin always used to sneer at me. Say I’d been over-protected. Wrapped in cotton wool. The classic Daddy’s Little Girl, as he said. I loved both my parents. Losing my father has only made me love him more.”

  “Of course, Laura. Coming from such a happy, stable home you were ill-prepared to take on Colin’s aberrant behaviour. But I too know all about powerlessness and humiliation. I’ll tell you about it some time. Meanwhile, you’ve got enough on your plate.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  IT WAS mid-morning when the furniture van arrived.

  “Careful, Snowy!” Zack warned his young offsider as they tried to manoeuvre a sofa through the small doorway.

  It was clear Snowy wasn’t listening, or he had no aptitude for these activities.

  “Steady on, boy!” Zack shouted the caution. “Miss Laura here ain’t gunna be happy if you knock a chunk out of the front door.”

  “Won’t go in, Zack. The bloody doorway’s too narrow,” Snowy offered miserably.

  “Language, son. No need to swear.” Zack cast an embarrassed glance at Laura as though she had never heard a single swear-word in her life.

  “Sorry, miss.” Snowy made a distraught movement of his ash-blond head.

  “Put it down for a minute,” Zack said crossly, his temper still simmering from yesterday. Snowy was always breaking something—forcing it. He still had a lump on his head the size of a plum from yesterday’s mishap with a wardrobe—but Snowy was the wife’s nephew. A more than usually stubborn boy, with not all the cards in the pack. Took after his dad’s side of the family, of course…

  “Having problems?” Evan Thompson appeared on the open verandah of the colonial next door, looking the very picture of the legendary alpha man.

  “You could say that!” Zack replied with sarcasm.

  “Give me a minute; I’ll be there.”

  “Thanks, mate!” Zack called back more cheerfully. A smart guy like Evan would make this manoeuvre the easiest thing imaginable.

  Evan waved a response then went back to the phone, finishing off his progress report to the agent who was eager to market his book.

  Moments later he pushed the little picket gate of the cottage. It needed to be open. Who had closed it? Laura was standing on the tiny porch wearing a little ruffled yellow sundress that made a pool of light. Her long silky hair was drawn back into a knot, exposing her pretty ears, delicate bone structure and the long lovely line of her throat.

  “Good morning!” A day and already he was far too involved with this young woman. Certainly his eyes had fallen in love with her beauty. The fatal flaw in him: his susceptibility to beauty.

  “Good morning, Evan,” she responded, so happily it touched his iron-clad heart. “It’
s so nice of you to come.”

  “I’d have been here earlier, only I had to field a few calls. So what’s the problem, Zack?”

  Zack gave him a frustrated look. “Snowy here don’t seem capable of negotiating the front door.”

  “Yah’d better believe it!” said Snowy, treading backwards and bumping into the planter’s chair he had already placed on the porch.

  “I’d be real grateful if yah could take his end, Evan.” Zack snorted his disgust.

  “No problem.” Evan had solved it on sight.

  “Not my idea to be a removalist,” Snowy defended himself, relinquishing his end without argument. “I told Mum but she called me a lazy bum. That’s exactly what she said, ‘Snowy, you’re a lazy bum.’”

  Evan laughed. “And you’re saying that’s not the case?”

  “I wish she’d listen.” Snowy’s voice dropped dolefully as he watched the two men make short work of getting the sofa through the narrow doorway.

  “Make yahself useful, Snowy.” Zack took a couple of beats to yell at him. “Go get the little stuff.”

  “I’ll help you, Snowy,” Laura said, anxious to be useful herself, and sorry for the unfortunate young man.

  “That’s okay, miss.” Snowy lost his gloomy look, going a bright pink under his freckled tan. “I don’t want you doin’ nuthin’. Besides, Zack is takin’ yah money.”

  “Well, well, you made quite a conquest with Snowy,” Evan observed some thirty minutes later as the furniture van pulled away. “He’s got a giant crush on you already.”

  “I think I believe you!” Laura paused in her rearranging to smile. “He doesn’t seem at all suited to help Zack out in the business.”

  “From what Zack told me he’s been responsible for some major damage,” Evan answered dryly. “As a removalist Snowy seems a complete incompetent. I wonder if he could find work on one of the outlying stations. From all accounts he’s very good around horses. He told me he loves to be outdoors. I might have a word with Mitch Claydon. The Claydons—you’ll be meeting them—own Marjimba cattle station. The McQueens have always stuck to sheep—Australia produces the world’s finest wool—but Wunnamurra is only a small part of their business interests these days. They’re big. I can tell you that. You’ve heard about the McQueens from Sarah?”