‘Do you miss your family, living so far away?’ he asked.
Gemma thought of her father with his new wife and young family. He had remarried within four months of her mother’s death in an accident. She still hadn’t quite forgiven him for it. Her comfortable childhood home had been completely renovated and extended into an unrecognisable showpiece that had been featured in several home magazines. It was as if her stepmother had wanted every trace of Gemma’s mother eradicated. Gemma’s childhood bedroom had been knocked down to make room for a third bathroom no one ever used. ‘No, not really,’ she said. ‘We pretty much live our own lives. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll make a start on dinner while you settle in. There are fresh towels in the bathroom if you’d like to freshen up before we eat.’
Gemma darted back to her bedroom and changed into jeans and a cotton shirt, this time with a push-up bra underneath. She ran a brush through her hair before pulling it back into a ponytail rather than leaving it hanging limply around her shoulders. She put on some deodorant and some perfume. She plucked out a few strays from her eyebrows and then gave her lips a quick swipe with some lip gloss. She could hear the shower going in the guest bathroom and tried not to imagine Marc Di Angelo standing naked under the spray of water.
She gave herself a vigorous mental shake. He might be gorgeous-looking but he was a cop. Most cops had control and power issues as far as she was concerned. Sure, they did a good job and there was certainly honour in protecting others at the risk of your own life, but she was not going to even think about getting involved in any way with a guy from the force. Besides, he was there as a professional and so was she. How would she appear to the locals if she launched into a red-hot affair with the first man who came striding into town? Desperate and dateless, that’s how. She was already tired of the broad hints about her approaching thirtieth birthday and her single status. It seemed every patient thought it their mission to get her hitched before she hit the big three-oh. So far the candidates presented to her had done nothing for her. But Sergeant Marc Di Angelo was something else again, even if he was too attractive, too arrogant and too controlling for her liking.
She was in the kitchen, watching over the chicken pilaf she was cooking, when Marc Di Angelo came in. He had changed out of his shirt and was now wearing his blue denim jeans with a black T-shirt that clung to his perfectly formed biceps and pectoral muscles like a second skin. His abdomen was so flat she instantly sucked in hers. ‘Dinner’s not quite ready,’ she said. ‘Would you like a drink? I have wine, beer or soft drink and fruit juice.’
‘What are you having?’ he asked.
She gave the pilaf a good grind of black pepper. ‘I had a mineral water just before you arrived,’ she said. ‘I was thinking about having a glass of wine.’
‘Are you on call?’
Gemma met his gaze as she put the pepper grinder down on the bench. ‘I am always on call. That’s the way it is out here. I am the only doctor in a radius of about two hundred kilometres.’
‘Must be tough, not being able to let your hair down occasionally,’ he said.
She shifted her gaze from the piercing intensity of his. ‘I’m not much of a party girl in any case,’ she said. ‘I’ve seen the damage binge drinking does to young people. Lives can be changed in an instant and they can’t always be changed back.’
‘We see a lot of that in the city,’ he said. ‘I’m not a big drinker but I will join in you a single glass of wine.’
She chanced another glance at him. ‘So you’re not currently on duty, Sergeant?’
He gave her a quick movement of his lips that again was not quite a smile. ‘Not at the moment. I came a week early just to get a feel for the place.’
‘First time in the bush?’ she asked.
His dark eyes glinted. ‘Does it show?’
‘A bit,’ she said. ‘But, then, I can’t talk. It took me weeks to get used to everything. Time is slower out here. No one rushes unless they have to. It was frustrating at first but after a while you get used to it. Would you prefer red or white wine?’
‘Red if you have it, but white is fine if not.’
‘I’ll … er … get some from the cellar,’ she said, putting her wooden spoon down with a little thud.
‘You have a cellar?’
‘It’s not mine—I mean, I didn’t have it put in or anything,’ Gemma explained. ‘It’s been here since the house was first built. In a climate as hot as this, it’s too warm upstairs to keep good wines.’
‘Mind if I come with you?’ he asked.
Gemma would have refused his offer, except she absolutely loathed going down to the cellar. Gladys had always gone down there in the past, and then, when she had not been well enough to do so, Rob Foster, the handyman-cum-gardener, had always brought wine up for Gemma on the rare occasions she’d wanted it. The dark dank atmosphere of the cellar made her flesh crawl. It hadn’t helped that on the first and only occasion she had gone down there alone a mouse had scuttled across the earthen floor right in front of her feet.
‘Sure, why not?’ she said, carefully disguising her relief. ‘I might need your help in any case to lift up the trapdoor. It’s over here at the back of the kitchen.’
Sergeant Di Angelo took over the opening of the trapdoor, lifting it as if it was a sheet of cardboard instead of solid timber with iron hinges. Gemma found the light switch and then she hesitated.
‘Is something wrong?’ he asked after a moment.
‘Um—no,’ she said, taking a deep breath and fixing her gaze on the sandstone steps.
‘I’m happy to go first,’ he offered. ‘There might be spiders down there.’
Gemma felt her pride take a dive. ‘Actually, that would be great,’ she said with a tremulous smile. ‘I’m not all that fond of spiders.’
She stood at the top of the steps as he went down and then once he’d given the all-clear she followed, but she stayed on the last step. ‘I think the red stuff is over here,’ she said, pointing vaguely to the left-hand side of the cellar.
Marc Di Angelo looked at her. ‘Are you claustrophobic?’
Gemma rubbed her upper arms with her crossed-over hands. ‘A bit, I guess.’
‘You go back up,’ he said. ‘I’ll get the bottle of wine. Is there any one in particular I should or shouldn’t take?’
‘No, just whatever,’ she said, scooting back up the steps and hovering at the top. ‘I don’t think there’s any Grange Hermitage or Hill of Grace down there.’
‘You never know,’ he said dryly, and bent at the waist to check out the labels as he pulled out various bottles.
Gemma couldn’t stop looking at the way his jeans hugged his taut behind, or the way the muscles of his arms were so well formed. She was used to seeing wellused muscles out here in the Outback. The men were all toned from hard work on the land, but something about Marc Di Angelo’s body made her feminine senses switch into overload. He was so damned attractive. Those eyes of his, so dark, like rich chocolate,
