savagely vowed.
‘Evelyn was just telling me about your father…how he’d been clutching your mother’s photograph from the bedside table in his hand when you found him,’ he went on softly, sadly. ‘I guess—’
‘Yes.’ She cut him off, feeling tears welling up again. ‘I hope he’s with my mother now. He missed her very much.’ Fighting her way out of a storm of emotion, she waspishly added, ‘I wonder if you’ll ever know that kind of love, Johnny?’
His face tightened as though she had slapped him.
Evelyn gave a shocked gasp.
Acutely aware that the personal remark had slipped out of her previous thoughts and was totally inexcusable, Megan almost bit her tongue in chagrin. She had to deal with this man. That was best done by keeping as much impersonal distance from him as possible.
‘I think finding that kind of love is rather rare in today’s world,’ Johnny answered in a measured tone.
‘Especially yours,’ flew out of her mouth before she could stop it.
‘Miss Megan…’
Evelyn’s reproof faded into a heavy sigh.
Megan gritted her teeth, refusing to take back what she believed. She glared defiance at the man who’d probably slept with thousands of women without giving any one of them any serious commitment. Her words had clearly struck a nerve and she took fierce satisfaction in the way his eyes glittered at her. No sympathy now.
‘Rare in your world, too, Megan,’ he countered, using his voice like a silky whip. ‘Unless you’ve met the man of your dreams since Christmas.’
‘Too busy,’ she loftily retorted.
‘Which reminds me…’
‘We need to talk,’ she leapt in before he could take charge of their business meeting. ‘When you’ve finished your breakfast, perhaps you wouldn’t mind coming to the office.’
‘Whatever suits you,’ he returned obligingly.
‘That will be most appropriate. You’ll find me there.’
She quickly closed the door and strode outside, marching off a mountain of turbulent energy as she headed for the front entrance of the homestead and the steps leading up to the verandah which skirted the huge house—a verandah that welcomed people out of the sun that could too often be pitiless in the Australian Outback.
She hadn’t welcomed Johnny Ellis.
Couldn’t welcome him.
Having reached the top of the steps she turned, her gaze skating around all the outbuildings that made Gundamurra look like a small township from the air; the big maintenance and shearing sheds, the prize rams’ enclosure attached to the lab, the cottages for the long-term staff, the bunkhouse for jackaroos, the cook’s quarters, the supplies store, the schoolhouse.
She was twenty-eight years old and this was her life—the life she’d chosen—the life she loved.
She didn’t need a man.
Certainly not a man who peddled charm.
What she needed was this whole area to be an oasis of green again. Even the foliage on the pepper trees looked brown, coated with dust. All the land to the horizon was brown, and above it the sky was a blaze of blue, no clouds, no chance of rain.
If only the Big Wet had come this year, breaking the drought, her father might not have decided to write that will, making Johnny Ellis a permanent fixture in her life. The pressing question now was…how was she going to pry him out of it? Or at least, minimise his presence to next to nothing.
He didn’t belong here.
With this thought firmly entrenched in her mind, Megan went inside, passing through the great hall that bisected this section of the homestead, moving onto the verandah that skirted the inner quadrangle, heading straight for her father’s office.
Once there, she found herself drawn to the chess table by the window, remembering what Mitch had said, that her father thought through his strategies very carefully. The black and white pieces were set up ready to play, which had to mean his last game with Mitch—played by e-mail—had been completed.
Game over, she thought, and on a deep wave of sadness, laid the black king down. She stared at the white knight, fretting further over why her father had thought Johnny Ellis was the right man to ride in to the rescue, then gave up on trying to figure it out and moved on to sit in the large leather chair behind the desk.
It was a big chair made for a big man. Physically she didn’t fit it, never would, but at least her father had granted her the right to sit here in his place, and no way in the world was she going to let Johnny Ellis occupy it while they talked.
He was ten years her senior but that didn’t give him any authority over her or what was to be decided in this room. It was she who owned fifty-one percent of Gundamurra…she who had the whip hand…and all the millions he’d made as a pop-star could not change that!
CHAPTER THREE
DEAL kindly with her…
Ric’s admonition was playing through Johnny’s mind as he approached Patrick’s office, but Megan’s attitude towards him made it damned difficult to keep it fixed there. Icy politeness from her last night and the least possible amount of contact. This morning, rejecting his sympathy point-blank, actually turning it into one of her snide hits on him, not even caring that Evelyn heard it, too.
All the same, he shouldn’t have let himself be goaded into hitting back. Especially about the lack of any special love in her life. That was a low blow, especially when she’d just lost her father. Johnny grimaced over the insensitive lapse in his control. He had to do better in this meeting, not let Megan get under his skin. He was older than she was, had more people skills. It was up to him to…deal kindly with her.
At least he didn’t have to worry about Jessie’s and Emily’s feelings. The two older sisters had welcomed him warmly last night, making it clear that their only concern was Megan’s future on Gundamurra. The situation on the sheep station was grim. Like Patrick, they were counting on him to ensure there was a future here for her.
And he’d do it.
Even against Megan’s prickly opposition he’d do it.
Though he hoped she’d be reasonable.
The situation demanded she be reasonable.
He paused at the office door, took a deep, calming breath, gave a courtesy knock to warn of his imminent entry, allowed Megan a few seconds to get her mind into appropriate gear, then moved in with every intention of being at his diplomatic best.
But he wasn’t prepared for the scene Megan had set and his sense of rightness was instantly jolted. She was sitting in Patrick’s chair, taking Patrick’s place before he was even buried. It was too soon. It was…
Johnny checked himself, took stock of the woman he had to deal with.
The
