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  He held her fast, although she pushed back against his arms. “So you’ve chosen to be forever on the run?” He stared accusingly into her face. “What I should’ve done was make you pregnant years ago. Then you’d never have been able to leave me. We would’ve been together—would’ve stayed together.”

  She turned her head away.

  “I could make you pregnant now.” He fought to block a powerful, near-violent flood of emotion. “God knows that’s what I want. You made a mess of my life, Sarah, not just yours. If I meant so little to you, why aren’t you married? Has what happened between us made you frigid? We were in love—it wasn’t a sin.”

  “Then why do you feel so guilty?” she asked tempestuously. What did he know of her pain? He’d been spared.

  He caught the back of her head. “Sarah, you’re a highly intelligent woman, a trained doctor, not a neurotic with sexual problems.” His tone was deliberately controlled, bone-dry. “You’ve always denied it, but I can only conclude my grandmother threw a scare into you and your mother.”

  “What would you have done had you known?” she asked, trying to speak more quietly. “How could you have helped? You were sixteen!”

  He studied her tormented, unsmiling face. “My grandmother has never ruled my life the way she has others. I’d almost become a man. Was a man after that night. I would’ve defended you, Sarah. You and your mother. You only had to tell me. My grandmother holds no terrors for me. Or mine. I could never in my heart believe what she told me—that you were ambitious. That you wanted an education above anything else. That you wanted to be a doctor and didn’t want the distraction of adolescent love.”

  “I had to start looking after myself, my future,” she responded bluntly, thinking she couldn’t bear his anger and bitter disillusionment.

  “This is a good time to ask. You weren’t pregnant, were you? I’ve tortured myself with that.”

  “Oh, Kyall…” It sounded like a lament. For lament it was.

  “All right, all right, I’m sorry.” His apology was swift. “I know you would’ve told me. But it seemed a real possibility, so I had to consider it.”

  “We only made love once.”

  He threw her a derisive glance. “Once is all it takes. You know that better than I do. Have you had other partners, Sarah? Other lovers?”

  “Fabulous ones!” She gave a short laugh and looked skyward. “No, I haven’t been able to form any long-term relationships, Kyall. Anyway, I’ve been too busy.”

  “Yet you’re a passionate woman. You wouldn’t have given up sex.”

  She shrugged. “Sex is great, but I couldn’t get serious about anyone. Consider that. I’m the victim of a forbidden love.” She laughed ironically. “In the grip of an obsession. I don’t know if I love you or hate you, Kyall McQueen, but I have to tell you this. I utterly and completely refuse to marry you.”

  He suppressed the urge to shake her. “Could it be that you’re emotionally stunted?” he demanded angrily. “If it were anyone else, I’d take it as a sign of immaturity. Poor Sarah,” he mocked. “Do you really think you can admit to loving me or hating me—what’s the difference?—and then run off again? What sort of crazy strategy is that? You’ll never be free of me. You’d better understand that.”

  “What about India Claydon?” she flung at him. “She’s madly in love with you.”

  “India is no match for you, Sarah.”

  “But you keep her around.”

  “My grandmother keeps her around,” he corrected. “India is one of the few people she approves of. God knows why.”

  “Because India will carry on the grand tradition and she’ll never be fool enough to cross your grandmother.”

  “Exactly. But I’m not going to marry India. I want you. That’s not about to change.”

  A cooling breeze came off the water and she turned her heated face toward it. “I dreaded coming back to town.”

  “It’s not the town you dread.” He spoke with a hard edge of disgust. “It’s me. Why? You or your mother didn’t sign some agreement with my grandmother, did you? Some legal document? If you did, tell me. I’ll fix it. This whole business is bizarre. Something wrong at the heart of it. Can’t you meet my eyes?” He took hold of her, communicating his urgency.

  She shook her head. “No need to get angry. I signed no agreement, Kyall.” In fact, unbeknownst to her, her mother had. She had found it among her mother’s papers. Agonized over it.

  “Well, that’s a relief,” he muttered with acid humor.

  Above their heads the branches of the bauhinias were whispering to one another. The Aboriginals considered them fairy trees. The fairies that lived in them were urging Sarah to confide in him. Only she wasn’t brave enough. She broke away blindly, making for the track, although the strength had gone out of her arms and legs.

  There was comfort in silence.

  ON THE RETURN JOURNEY Sarah confounded Kyall by telling him about Joe Randall’s proposal that she take over from him at the hospital.

  He’d been driving across the open plain, dodging the clumps of spinifex. Now he hit the brakes and drew the vehicle to a halt. “Sarah!” he exploded. “Why didn’t you tell me this before?”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “This is a very traumatic time for me, Kyall. I’ve settled into a kind of life. I have spells of being happy. My patients think I’m a good doctor and I do get results, so I must be doing something right. I deal with very sad things, but I try not to let my emotions get the better of me. Most doctors have to do that. But whenever I come back here, it all starts up again. The desperate memories…”

  “Memories I share, Sarah,” he told her. “You don’t want to love me. But don’t you think I’ve been through that? I’ve tried to stop loving you. I wanted to get on with my life, but so far it hasn’t worked. For either of us, obviously. But we can’t go on and on and never find a resolution. What did you think of Joe’s suggestion? He’s ill, isn’t he. He keeps putting me off when I ask him.”

  “He has a condition that’s very worrisome,” Sarah said evasively, Joe having sworn her to a secrecy of sorts.

  “Go on,” Kyall urged. “I should tell you I’d never expect you to give up your profession. Everything you’ve worked for.”

  “You mean you’d come to the city?” Her voice held disbelief. “A McQueen of Wunnamurra Station. Scion of the McQueen dynasty.”

  “Why not?”

  Sarah turned fully to stare into his eyes. “You, give up your heritage? Devastate your grandmother?” she asked incredulously.

  He laid a hand on her shoulder, his lean fingers automatically caressing. “Who said anything about giving up my heritage? My heritage is intact. Gran is only the custodian. She can’t disinherit me. She won’t even try. Legally she wouldn’t have a leg to stand on. I can administer our affairs from anywhere. We have a station overseer and there’s Mum and Dad. Gran’s never given Dad credit for all the hard work he’s done. He’s too much a gentleman of the old school—he should’ve put her straight long ago. My mother’s been too busy staying on Gran’s good side to support her own husband. It’s all too sad.” He flashed a sardonic smile. “We all live under one roof, but we’re not a proper family.”

  “Whose fault is that?” Sarah retorted. “It’s a tragedy that your grandfather, Ewan, died so early. He’d have kept your grandmother in line. She would never have been able to adopt the role of dictator. She seems to enjoy making everyone around her feel insecure.”

  Kyall acknowledged Sarah’s words with a grimace. “Still, she’s shown me nothing but affection.”

  “A bond that can’t be broken.” Sarah leaned her head back, her expression plainly unhappy.

  “If she’s ever hurt you, Sarah, she’d learn very quickly that her love—her kind of love—is not enough.”

  A curious expression rippled across her face. “You say all this, Kyall, but you don’t really want to cut your ties with the land. Your love for it has a spiritual dimension. I feel
it myself, although I’m not from an outback dynasty. My father just happened to be your top ringer.”

  He gazed at her, so beautiful, so desirable, so maddening, she made his head spin. “Your father knew everything there was to know about shearing. He had the reputation of being a great bloke. You have no reason to look down on your father.”

  “Who said I did?” Sarah burst out. “It’s your family and the likes of India Claydon who make judgments like that.”

  “She’s jealous, Sarah,” he said quietly. “What can anyone do about jealousy? It’s in her nature. India didn’t get to be top student at school. She didn’t go on to collect a medical degree. I’ve noticed that tendency in India. I don’t particularly like it. Mitch couldn’t be more different.”

  Thinking of their friend Mitchell Claydon, Sarah’s face relaxed into a smile. “Mitch spent almost as much time with Christine as you and I did together. We seemed to team up very early. You and I. Mitch and Chris. I know Christine cares about Mitchell Claydon to this day, only the struggle to be free of your mother’s domination took her away from him. Just like me. Both of us outcasts.”

  “You’ll both return,” Kyall answered somberly. “Would you consider Joe’s proposition? It would bring you back to me.”

  Sarah wondered yet again what Ruth McQueen would make of that. “It’s too weighty a decision to be made quickly. It would bring me back to you, certainly. It would also bring me a lot of stress.”

  “As in work?” He picked up on that swiftly. “If you accepted, I’d do everything in my power to find another doctor, although as you’d know, it’s not easy when we’re so remote.”

  Part of her wanted to answer now. Part of her couldn’t. “I can’t say just yet, Kyall. I’m feeling far more vulnerable than I’d like. Going it alone—being separated from my mother—I had to develop a whole set of barriers or be overwhelmed. Can you understand that?”

  He answered decisively. “I understand that, Sarah. What isn’t clear to me is why you were ever separated in the first place.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  KYALL HAD DECIDED at some point in the evening to raise the subject of Sarah’s taking over from Joe Randall. He expected outright, bitter hostility from his grandmother and mother, a quiet, reasoned response from his father. He loved his father. He only regretted that his father had married into this family. Of course, he wouldn’t have been born otherwise, but his father had missed out on a chance at happiness. Or was he finding it with the delicately beautiful Carol Lu, the artist? Kyall didn’t have a lot to go on, except the magnetic current he sensed passing between them whenever they met. The last time was at a concert given by the Matheson String Quartet at the Endeavour theater. No mediocre affair. Alex Matheson, strangely afflicted with periods of near-blindness, was a brilliant violinist, who under better circumstances could have had a career on the international concert platform. Three other gifted people of the town made up the quartet. The redoubtable Harriet Crompton, a woman of many talents, on viola; Lottie Harris, dressmaker extraordinaire, second violin; the newcomer, Evan Thompson, a dark horse if ever there was one, on cello.

  Kyall had found it a deeply moving occasion. No one in the immediate family was musical or loved music outside of him and his father. Of course they had played the sort of music with wide appeal: Dvořák, Tchaikovsky, Borodin. The “love” music in the Borodin, so captivating and lyrical inevitably put him in mind of Sarah, piercing him to the heart. Afterward he and his father (his mother hadn’t come, labeling such an evening a “dead bore”) had run into Carol in the foyer. The townspeople reveled in these evenings that so enriched their lives; consequently the theater had been packed. Carol, an exotic mix of European and Asian blood, had been delighted to see them, smiling eagerly, holding out her pretty hands, first to his father, then to him.

  God, poor Dad! At this point in his life Kyall didn’t blame the man one bit for going after some happiness and comfort. He had often thought his father’s best way out of his predicament was divorce, but McQueens didn’t countenance divorce even when a marriage was hardly more than in name only. His parents occupied separate quarters. Not something all that unusual in this family. The only thing was, Kyall was fairly certain neither of them went “visiting.” Not that he would really know. He had the whole west wing to himself.

  Now he looked around the dining table. Not circular. No way. Too democratic. That would mean his grandmother couldn’t sit at the head. His allotted chair was at the opposite end. His father had never taken it, despite his protests. Nothing more he could do. If this was an informal dining room and what they were eating was an informal meal, most people’s minds would boggle at what formal might be. The table was elaborately set with the best china, sterling silverware and crystal goblets for the red wine they were drinking from their well-stocked cellar. A mass of yellow roses in a large silver bowl stood in the center, flanked by Regency silver candelabra. He counted the tapering candles. Seven. Thank God it was a quiet family gathering, otherwise he might’ve been expected to wear black tie. As it was, they were all dressed a whole lot more smartly than most people would be for an ordinary evening dinner. Not that he minded. He was prepared to keep up with tradition. Within limits.

  His grandmother, as usual, was impeccably groomed. He didn’t think anyone had ever seen her less. Not even a dawn raid would have caught her without her makeup on and her copious silver-black hair brushed and styled. Around her neck she wore a single strand of pearls so large the average person might think them costume jewelry, but his grandmother had never worn costume jewelry in her life. Neither had his mother, for that matter, but Enid lacked both Ruth’s style and extraordinary presence. For good or bad, his grandmother was a personage. And those eyes! A lot of girls had told him they’d remember him for his eyes alone. But his eyes couldn’t compare with his grandmother’s for impact. His eyes mirrored his feelings. His grandmother’s were obsidian. Completely opaque.

  Full of secrets? He was determined to find out.

  “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Joe Randall looks far from well,” he announced to the table.

  His mother frowned. “I’ve asked him, you know, darling. I have a responsibility as mayor. I see him every fortnight. All he says is, he’s growing old, or some such thing.”

  “Must we discuss Joe Randall at the table?” Ruth McQueen interjected, regarding her grandson with what would have been, in anyone else, a look of appeal.

  “I’m sorry, Gran, we must. Joe is the town’s doctor. He’s been a good one. We must do something to show our respect and appreciation—Joe’s days are numbered.”

  “Has he spoken to you, Kyall?” his father asked, folding his napkin.

  “Not to me, to Sarah Dempsey.”

  As expected, all movement at the table stopped.

  “To what purpose?” his grandmother asked sharply, black eyes glittering.

  “It appears he thinks Sarah, if she’s prepared to take the job on, would be an excellent choice as his successor.”

  “Oh, Kyall!” his mother wailed. “We simply can’t have that wretched girl here.”

  “What wretched girl?” Kyall poured a little more wine into his goblet, his face taut.

  “You know what I mean.” Enid backed off. “Sarah’s done wonderfully well and I wish her the very best but she caused a lot of trouble for this family.”

  “What on earth are you talking about, Enid?” Ruth snapped.

  “Mother, you know very well.” Enid’s face worked. “She was never an ordinary girl. For one thing, she was much too beautiful. God knows how. Her parents weren’t all that good-looking. Poor Muriel, at any rate.”

  “Jock Dempsey was an extremely handsome man, dear,” Max said. “Have you forgotten? When the men tried to rile him they called him ‘Golden Boy.’” Max twisted his own handsome head toward his wife.

  “Good grief, Max, I never took the slightest notice of his appearance!”

  “Then you were the only woman for hun
dreds of miles around who didn’t.”

  “Oh, for God’s sake, Max!” Enid said in exasperation.

  “Maybe we can get back to Sarah,” Kyall intervened.

  Ruth’s eyes were veiled quickly. “Kyall, darling, I don’t see Sarah Dempsey as having a future here. I can’t imagine she’d want to bury herself in an outback town.”

  “She wouldn’t exactly be burying herself, Gran,” he said smoothly. “Joe Randall’s gained wide experience here. There’s plenty of challenge for a good doctor. You know that.”

  “Not a woman,” Ruth answered in a resolute tone.

  “You’re a woman, Gran. You ran a huge sheep station—with my parents’ help.”

  To everyone’s utter surprise Max began laughing. “It’s not often I get credit.”

  Enid stared at her husband. “Of course you do, dear. You’ve always been very much involved.”

  “Thank you, Enid. I hadn’t thought you’d noticed.”

  Ruth was very still now, a slight but regal figure in her carver chair. “It’s true I did a man’s job, but there would be a great deal of opposition in the town to a woman’s taking over Joe’s position. Joe can deal with anyone, the roughest stockman. I don’t think a woman doctor would work at all in Koomera Crossing.”

  “Joe seems to think so.” Kyall looked down the length of the gleaming table at his grandmother. “Why don’t we put it to the town?”

  “Do you mean to tell me Sarah Dempsey actually wants the job?” Ruth’s eyes narrowed.

  “I don’t know.” Kyall gave a sardonic smile.

  “What does that mean?” His mother’s voice was keen.

  “It means, dearest Mother, that Sarah’s going to think long and hard about it.”

  “She’d come back in a flash if it meant landing you.”

  “Landing me? She’s taken a lot of years if that’s what she’s after. Sarah’s become practically a stranger to me.”

  “Then what’s changed, Kyall?” his father asked quietly.

  “There was something very wrong about the way Sarah was shunted off. I know what I was told. I know what she told me. Same story virtually. The thing is, I’ve never quite been able to believe it. Whenever I tried to speak to her mother, Muriel wouldn’t meet my eyes. She never looked happy. She died young.”