Husband Stay (Husband #2) (27 page)

If my record sales
continued, I’d be okay. And there were months before the baby would show.
Plenty of promo time.

I nodded at Louella,
trying to convince her, but she was very still, her mouth turned down into that
I’m not happy
look that was her only display of emotional upset. Well,
except for when she’d broken down in my apartment. I still felt traumatized by
that.

“Why did Jack break
up with you?” she asked, dragging my attention back.

“It wasn’t lack of
sex,” I said straightaway, remembering Brittany’s attempt to sting me. Then I
shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“And there’s no
chance of a relationship?”

“I don’t think
so.”

He treated me like
an embarrassing one-night stand that he couldn’t wait to escape. He humiliated
me. You don’t come back from that.

“But,” I added, “I
will tell him about the baby. It wouldn’t be fair to say nothing.”

“Quite right. It’s
in your nature to be honest,” she pointed out. “And in times of upset, it’s
important to hold onto your values.”

Exactly the
opposite of the advice Jill had given me.

I hadn’t expected
a gush of emotion from Louella. But I had expected something—that she’d be
happy for me that my dream of motherhood was coming true. Was she jealous?
Uninterested? I couldn’t work it out.

Thankfully, Nick rapped
on the door again.

“Come!”

I glanced behind
him as he entered, but Fritha was nowhere to be seen.

“He was on a
flight to Emerald first thing this morning. Looks like he’s gone home to
Daven
Downs.
”

I frowned at
Louella. “I’d thought he’d gone off to do business.”

“His family
property is a business,” she reminded me, and when Nick had left again, she
added, “Does it matter where he is?”

I shook my head,
but I felt like I was missing something. Maybe he had a secret girlfriend
there. Although, why should that worry me? I wasn’t trying to catch him
cheating on me. We weren’t in a relationship. I just wanted to give him the
news and go.

Didn’t I
?

“I’m sorry. Are you
delivering something?” The man in his seventies looked me up and down, as if I
was exotic, and I suppose a woman who appeared Indian might be a strange sight
at a remote cattle station a thousand miles from Sydney.

But I wasn’t going
to embarrass myself by saying
I’m an Aussie. I was born here
.
My
parents are from Mumbai.
I’d stopped justifying my existence when I left
Dakaroo almost twenty years ago. Sydney was a melting pot of cultures where
diversity was appreciated and I’d been so grateful for that. The outback,
however, still had pockets of nostalgia for
the old country
where anyone
who wasn’t white didn’t belong.

This man had bigot
written all over him, and it was the last thing I needed. I’d just suffered
three flights—the last one with enough turbulence to make me throw up—and a four
hour drive in a rental car with bad suspension, all the while resisting the
urge to scratch the flaking skin that had been revealed when my cast had come
off.

My wrist
alternately ached and itched, I had a headache the size of Texas, and the jeans
and knit sweater combo that had suited the chill of air conditioning, was sticky-hot.

I wanted to find
Jack.
Now.
So I could get this over and done with.

“I’m here to see
Jack Davenworth,” I said again, firmly, not budging from the front door of his gigantic
historical sandstone bungalow with its wide shady verandas. It was a welcomed
respite from the relentless outback sun.

I hadn’t had a
drink in hours, so what I really needed was a glass of cold water and a lie
down, but the man in front of me with his pebble eyes and shock of white hair,
would be the last person to offer hospitality.

“Why?” he snapped,
blocking the doorway, as if he thought I was going to push past him.

Because I’m
having his baby!

I sucked in a
steadying breath. “I’m sorry that my visit is unexpected. But I’m not going
until I see Jack.”

There. That was as
rude as I could be.

The old man stared
back at me, his eyes narrowing as though he wanted to say something terrible,
but as I girded myself for an insult, a female voice that quavered with age
called out from behind him.

“Is that Caitlin?
Jack’s assistant?”

“How would I
know?” the old man snapped, still glaring at me. “She hasn’t introduced
herself.”

I swallowed down
the impulse to apologize. I deliberately hadn’t told them my name. If Jack knew
I was here, he might pretend to be absent.

“Are you Caitlin?”
the old lady asked, coming up beside the man and gently pushing him out of the
way. Then she looked me up and down while her faded grey eyes widened, “Oh. He
didn’t say you were colored.”

Colored?

What century were
these people living in? “My parents are from Mumbai,” I said softly, annoyed
with myself that I’d gone there.

She
tisked
,
as if she was sorry for me, and somehow I managed to smile while my teeth were
gritted.

Nobody said
anything until the old man huffed. “Well, she didn’t say she was Caitlin.”

“You probably
bamboozled her.” The old woman pushed on his arm until he moved out of the way.
“Ignore him,” she said to me. “And come inside. Jack is out checking on the
cattle. He’ll be back directly.”

Finally, some
good luck.
“Thank you, Mrs Davenworth.” I stepped over the threshold,
expecting her husband to step back.

When he didn’t,
she tapped on his arm. “Scat.”

He growled in
displeasure, but said, “I’ll check the girls,” and shuffled off down the
hallway.

Jack’s nieces?
Isabella’s children? I wondered if the whole family lived in this big old
house. Then I realized there was no point wondering anything. I wasn’t going to
interact with these people beyond today, so their living arrangements were
irrelevant.

“Cup of tea,” she
said, leading me down the hallway which was thankfully air conditioned and far
more comfortable than the outside air. I followed her into a big old country
kitchen with casement windows and a rough-hewn pine table monopolizing the
center of the room. With their money, they could have afforded the best of
everything, so it was a surprise to see the simple country furniture—possibly
generations old—still being used.

“You sit there,”
she pointed to a chair with a pine back and a gingham cushion.

I did as I was
told, waiting with my hands on the table in front of me, wondering at what
point I should admit that I wasn’t Caitlin. If my luck held, I’d be able to
make polite conversation until Jack arrived, then discharge my duty and leave.

His mother fussed
at the sink for several minutes, then returned to the table with a teapot,
covered in an orange hand-knitted tea cozy. “Good bush blend,” she said, going
back for cups and saucers. “None of your Earl Grey nonsense.”

“Thank you.”

The teapot was
followed by a plate of pumpkin scones with rosella jam and cream which made my
empty stomach wake up and take notice. Then sugar and a milk jug from a modern,
stainless steel fridge hidden behind a rustic looking cupboard door. Finally,
she sat, poured our tea and then looked at me expectantly.

I smiled and took
a sip of mine black, but she just sat there looking at me, as if she was
waiting for me to speak

At last I said, “I
love your home,” grasping for anything to keep awkwardness at bay.

She replied, “You’re
not Caitlin.”

Okay,
that
was
the last thing I expected her to say. I blinked in surprise, but as I looked
into her faded grey eyes, I suddenly realized how sharp they were. Like silver
lasers honing in on me.

“I’m not Caitlin,”
I admitted, and waited to hear what was next.

“Then are you a
gold digger, after my boy?”

“
No.
” Jack’s
money was the last thing on my radar. “I’ve got my own money,” I said, allowing
myself to step into the future I hoped was coming. “I’m a successful recording
artist.”

“I saw you on
Sunshine
with Jack.”

So…that was
embarrassing. If she saw
Sunshine,
she would know I was at the start of
my career. But still, it was promising or I wouldn’t have been on television.
So my exaggeration wasn’t huge.

It was also clear
that she hadn’t mistaken me for Caitlin in the beginning. She’d just said that
at the door to get rid of her husband so she could…what? Grill me in private?

Before I could
ask, she said, “There’s something between you and Jack—”

“We met at my
club.”

“—and I can hear
it in your voice when you say his name.” She raised both eyebrows below that
short-cropped white hair, daring me to contradict her, and when I didn’t, she
added, “And right when we need him here, he keeps going to Sydney and coming
back a mess.”

She stared at me
patiently while I digested her outburst, then she stirred sugar into her tea
and took a sip. I just sat there looking at her.
Coming back a mess?

I was the mess.

Not Jack.

“What sort of
mess?”

She gazed at me
calmly. “The sort of mess that a man would be…if he was in love.”

I shook my head,
slowly at first, and then more determinedly. Lust, sure. But love? No. There
was no way he could treat me the way he had if he was in love. No way.

She ignored my
reaction to say, “But that’s not what we need right at this moment. We need him
here with us. One hundred percent.”

I had a moment of
thinking his mother was as selfish as mine—thinking her needs were more
important than her child’s. But I kept that to myself and said, “I won’t be
here long—”

“Because if he
needs any woman…” she went on quietly, “…it wouldn’t be a city girl who expects
him to follow her around like a puppy. It would be someone who came to live here
with him, who put him first. Who cared about what
he
wanted, not just
what her career demanded.”

The silence at the
end of this speech was deafening, and my teacup clattered back into the saucer
abruptly before I rose. But I didn’t take my eyes off her. I wasn’t giving her
that satisfaction.

I might be
intimidated by the fact that I was in the middle of nowhere, with two people
who didn’t like me.
At all!
But I had my pride. I lifted my chin and
said, “Pity help the woman he
does
marry, if this is the level of
hospitality you show to a complete stranger.”

I swallowed
tightly and pressed my trembling hands together at my waist. “I’ll wait in my
car. If you could ask him to see me there, I’d greatly appreciate it. I can’t
leave until I speak to him, and as you can imagine, I want that to be soon.”

Good day!

I didn’t say the
words out loud, but I thought them as I turned and walked out of their house
into the blazing sunshine.
Good day Mrs Horrible, Witchy, Mean, frumpily
dressed, dirty-fingernails and
over-boiled tea
Davenworth. I wish I’d
never walked into your house.

I marched back to
my car, stomping up dust on the drought-dried pathway that led to the visitors’
carpark. Then I wrenched open the door, setting off a fresh ache in my wrist as
captive hot air poured out over me.

Damn it. I’d
forgotten to ask for water.

No matter. I
clambered in and started the engine, cranking the air conditioning up to high.
Then I drove straight up to the front door—my version of
You haven’t scared
me away
—and sat in the idling car, waiting.

Ten minutes later,
I heard a whipping sound over the hum of the aircon, and I looked out through
the windscreen in time to see a small helicopter clearing the house and landing
behind it.

Was that Jack?
Checking the cattle in a chopper? How big was their property?

I swallowed in a
dry throat and told myself he’d be out in under a minute, because his mother
wanted me gone just as much as I wanted to go. Horrible people.

But it was half an
hour before the front door, which I’d been watching as I gnawed the edge of a
fingernail, swung open.

Jack came out
wearing jeans and buttoning a caramel shirt the same color as his eyes. His
hair was wet, so he’d clearly taken time to shower. But did that mean he was
making an effort to be presentable?

I was wondering
about that when a hot breeze caught his shirt and blew it open at the bottom, where
his hands hadn’t reached yet. A section of belly above his low slung jeans was
exposed, and in an instant, the sexual chemistry between us that I’d been so desperate
to forget, came flooding back.

I remembered
sliding my hands over that belly in the shower, feeling the muscles tighten as my
hand drifted down…

“Angela.”

He was standing
two paces out from my closed window, his expression watchful, his shoulders
stiff, as if he was girding himself for something.

I snapped out of
my sexual haze and wound down my window, confronted immediately by the
difference in air temperature. “Would you mind getting in for a moment? It’s
hot out there.”

I was starting to
feel light-headed, and knew that no matter how this went with Jack, I needed to
ask him for water before I left. I had a baby inside me. I couldn’t be stupid
and allow myself to get dehydrated.

He walked around
the car, but as I wound up the window, I realized a waft of aftershave had come
in, and it made me feel even dizzier.

He pulled open the
passenger door and slid his large frame into my rented sedan. When his door
closed again, I turned to face him.

“Thank you for
speaking to me.” I had a planned sequence of dialogue and that was the opening
line, however, my determination to make this fast and impersonal was completely
derailed by my body’s reaction to him.

Having him
enclosed in the car with me, close enough to smell and touch, to kiss, brought
back every tingling memory of the sex we’d shared, of the orgasms his clever
touch had so effortlessly ignited.

I have no idea how
I was looking at him, but I could see how he was looking at me. Hungry. As if
it would take only the slightest misstep/permission/demand to end up back in
his arms and then in his bed.

Only, his bed was
inside that house, and there was
no
way I was going back there. So I
racked my brains to remember the second line of dialogue I’d meant to present.

Before I could
find it, he reached across and touched my wrist with its paler, still sensitive
skin. “The bone is fixed.”

I couldn’t even
nod. His fingertip was sliding up and down the soft skin of my inner wrist, and
he may as well have been running a hand down my body. It brought
everything
to
life, throbbing, tingling, and even stinging behind my nipples.

His gaze dropped
momentarily to my breasts and I wondered if my nipples were up. But then he
withdrew his hand, sucked in a slow breath and brought his roving attention
back to my face.

“Why are you here?”
he asked, but before I could answer he said, “Do you have
any
idea how
hard this is for me?”

Hard?
My
thoughts drifted off to innuendo before I reined them back in. I needed to stay
on-task. “Do your parents suspect that we…”
Had the best sex of our lives.

He shook his head
again. “Whatever was happening between you and I—”

“Whatever
is
happening,
you mean.” The throbbing promise of what could ignite between us again was a
living entity inside the car. He couldn’t deny that. And as much as I’d come to
deliver my news and go, I now perversely wanted him to acknowledge this truth.

“—it’s over.” His
voice was low and determined. “I have responsibilities here, and—”