chubby baby arms around her when she needed to feel loved—to hold a warm, living body close instead of the living death she’d endured the past year, always seeing her beautiful boy, cold in his tiny white coffin.
If helping Rosie—if having even a tiny chance of becoming this darling baby’s mother—meant going back to Jarndirri for now, so be it.
When Jared half turned from her with that signature shrug of his—why should he care if she needed Melanie or not? He wanted his own kids, not this stranger baby—she panicked and blurted, ‘If you do this, I’ll sign all rights to Jarndirri over to you, permanently. Just let me stay until Rosie makes her decision—or until the adoption goes through. Let the authorities think we were together when Rosie asked us to take her. Let her stay with us through one Wet season so she’ll be bonded to me by the time the adoption agency can get there. Then I’ll leave with her, come back here or disappear, whatever you want.’
‘Seems to me that what I want isn’t in this scenario at all, apart from Jarndirri.’
The understated sarcasm sent a new flash of fear through her. She saw the frown on his half-averted face, and the harsh breaths jerking into his chest. Terrified she hadn’t offered enough, she added anxiously, ‘I swear if you do this, I’ll give you whatever you want. I’ll set you free.’ she gulped hard and forced the words out ‘.to have the children you want with someone else. I’ll give you Jarndirri, and all the money. I don’t care. I don’t want any of it. All I want is Melanie.’
He wasn’t looking at her at all now. He’d wheeled right around, looking out the back window to the slow-brewing storm outside. ‘Thank you.’ Two words, cool irony.
The two words felt like an accusation. She flushed. ‘I’m just trying to be honest. If you’re honest with yourself, you know I’m right. You only wanted me because I was part of Dad’s marry-her-for-Jarndirri package. Well, I’m giving you what you always wanted, free of strings.’
‘That isn’t what I signed on for when I married you.’ He turned to the fridge, pulled out the milk. ‘I think you were right that day in the hospital. If you think Jarndirri is all I want, you don’t know me at all.’ He lifted the sugar bowl. ‘Still one sugar and milk, or has that changed about you, as well?’
‘Still the same,’ she sighed. Why did he have to make this so uncomfortable? She was what he’d always wanted her to be—sensible, unemotional, not putting her wants on him. Why was he changing the game on her now? ‘Look, Jared, can’t we deal with this as adults? You signed on for Dad’s dream; you love the life on Jarndirri. You’re willing to continue on there for the rest of your life. I’m the one walking away. You can have everything you wanted when you agreed to marry me … and I’ll set you free. You can find another woman to have your sons with.’
There, she’d said it, twice now, and even without a quiver. So why wasn’t he grateful? Surely she was letting him off lightly—but the silences were becoming unbearable. Jared looked outside as he poured coffee and stirred in the milk and sugar, his face expressionless, just as it had been the day her father had told them of his plans for them to marry and inherit Jarndirri together. She remembered the sick, sinking feeling, so scared he’d say yes, even more scared he’d say no …
Anna forced herself to stand still and quiet, giving him time and space to think.
Then he said the last thing she expected as he turned back to face her at last, pushing a mug toward her. ‘Bryce offered me the Jarndirri deal with Lea, you know.’
She almost choked on her coffee. ‘What?’
‘When you were fifteen and Lea was eighteen, he said if I took Lea off his hands so he didn’t have to worry about her any more, I could have everything.’
She frowned, forcing coffee down a tight throat. Thinking of it, it made perfect sense—Dad knew she’d be the good girl, accept his decision and take whatever was left. He had to get the rebel settled and safe before she did anything stupid to dishonour the Curran name. ‘And?’
He shrugged. ‘Predict it, Anna. You know Lea.’
She thought about it, and found herself grinning. ‘She exploded, told Dad to go to hell … and you too, if you thought she was going to be served on anyone’s platter.’
His brows lifted, fell. ‘That’s about it … you just missed one or two small things.’
‘Well?’ she prompted after a few moments.
His eyes met hers … deep, stormy grey-blue, his mouth curving in that half-smile of sensual intent, and she felt her body heating in response. She couldn’t tear her gaze away; her breaths came short and choppy. He didn’t move—he didn’t have to. Whenever he looked at her like that, she always came to him … came running.
How easy I made everything for him. A loving wife and Jarndirri, all neatly served on Dad’s platter. One kiss, one touch and I became his for the taking.
‘And?’ she croaked, forcing her feet to stay in place. Heart and mind fought a body that suddenly reminded her that, uterus or not, she was still a woman. Sort of.
‘And we had a good laugh later. From the day I moved in, we were like brother and sister. There was nothing there.’
‘Really?’ She tried to snort the word, but it came out breathless. ‘You two always got on so well.’
‘Every way but one.’ The smile slowly grew, and she felt her feet itching, trying to move. Her hands ached, screaming to touch him. She might not love him now, but, oh, he knew every way to arouse her, to give her satisfaction. ‘She didn’t want me either. We tried to kiss once, and ended up falling on the ground laughing.’ He grinned now. ‘She kept wiping her mouth and saying, “Ick, gross, it’s like kissing my brother.”’
‘Did you like it?’ she asked slowly, wishing she could keep the words locked inside, but so many years of wondering.
He took a step toward her, the predatory intent clear, and all the words she’d practised since asking him to come fled her mind. She watched him come, her body coming alive, hot and breathless, her breasts swelling and her hands lifting.
‘Kissing Lea was one of my life’s happier memories. It was then I knew I had a sister for life—and I knew I’d never hurt her.’
Interpreting everything he hadn’t said, as usual, she relaxed—until he took another step closer, body heat the oxygen fuelling her slow-burning body, and she gulped and breathed, trying to keep up with her galloping heart. ‘And then?’
‘I found you three weeks later in the haystack, hiding from Lea with the chocolate stash you stole,’ he murmured, eyes languorous with blatant sexuality, and his tinder sparked the slow flame in her.
Hiding from Lea, she’d whispered frantically to Jared to not give her away when he found her there. He’d looked at her in silence, asking without words what on earth she was doing. She’d lifted the chocolate in laughing offer, sharing her booty if he wouldn’t give her away. And he bent to her, saying she’d made a mess of her face, and took the chocolate smears from her mouth with his lips and tongue. She’d forgotten all about the chocolate, the hay in her hair and on her clothes; she wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back, crossing the unseen threshold from child to woman in an instant.
He hadn’t kissed her again for
