Outback Boss, City Bride

‘What’s that?’

In spite of her determination to stay aloof, Meredith couldn’t help catching Hal’s eye and she smothered a smile at his expression. ‘It’s been a very long time since anyone played records,’ she said. ‘Even I never had a record player. Don’t tell me you’ve never heard of CDs?’

‘Of course I have,’ said Hal. ‘But, in case you hadn’t noticed, music shops are few and far between out here. I just never got round to buying CDs or anything to play them on.’

‘Don’t you listen to music?’ asked Meredith, trying to imagine a life without music. ‘I always have it on in the background, even when I’m working.’

His mother had been the same, Hal remembered. There had always been music when she was around.

‘I listen to the night,’ he said.

Emma and Mickey exchanged a glance. Hal pushed back his chair and got to his feet, glad to get off the subject of music.

‘If you two are so bored, you can come and give me a hand with the washing-up,’ he said and watched their faces crumple in consternation.

‘Oh, that’s not fair!’

Meredith looked puzzled. ‘I was expecting to clear up,’ she said.

‘No, the cook doesn’t wash up the main meal,’ said Hal. ‘This is your time off. You can relax now and I’ll bring you a cup of coffee in a minute.’

He bore the children, still protesting, off to the kitchen and Meredith was left in sole possession of the table.

Well, it was a nice idea, but what did you do with time off in a place like this? Meredith wondered. If she were at home in London, she could stretch out on the sofa and watch telly, or ring a friend and go out for a drink. She could go to a film or catch an exhibition or see if she could get a ticket to the latest play everyone was talking about.

What was there to do here? A big, fat nothing.

Of course, she could do some work, but somehow the thought of going into that cheerless office- that was next on her list for a revamp!-and sitting at her laptop was too depressing to contemplate. Catching herself in the middle of a huge yawn as she got up from the table, Meredith reasoned that she was still suffering from jet lag and could therefore be excused from working this evening. She would get down to it tomorrow.

It was too early to go to bed, though. The children had portable DVD players, but Meredith didn’t rate her chances of being able to borrow one now that they were having to wash up, and besides, she didn’t think her eyes could cope with the tiny screen.

For want of anywhere else to go, she went to sit on the back veranda where she had seen that incredible sunset the day before. It was quite dark now, with no light to discourage the flying insects who hurled themselves at the blue light trap instead. Meredith was a bit disconcerted by the way it would spit and fizzle every few seconds as another insect was caught by its deadly lure.

She looked outwards instead. The night sky was quite different in the Southern Hemisphere, Meredith realised, and certainly very different from the starless yellow glow that hung above London. Here, the darkness wasn’t black or grey but a deep, dark blue and blurry with brilliant white stars.

Meredith thought about Lucy, who was up in that sky somewhere at thirty thousand feet, flying, flying, flying. The memory of that long journey made Meredith shudder. Then she thought about Richard, lying still in his hospital bed, but London seemed unimaginably distant, here in the vastness of the Australian outback. It was hard to remember exactly what Richard looked like.

Or why she had loved him so much.

Behind her, the screen door creaked, jolting her out of her thoughts, and through the dim light she saw Hal looming with two mugs.

‘So this is where you are,’ he said, an odd note in his voice.

‘Is it OK for me to be here?’

‘Of course. I was just surprised to find you here. This is where I like to sit at night too.’

‘Oh.’ Meredith felt as if she ought to move, but it seemed rude to leave the moment he had arrived and, besides, he had brought her coffee.

She took it with a murmur of thanks and after a second’s hesitation Hal sat down in the chair next to hers. There was a table between them where she could put down her mug, but he still felt overwhelmingly close and she was suddenly reminded of how she had felt when she had put his shirt on earlier that day. The thought brought a flush to her cheeks and she was very glad of the dim light that hid her expression.

‘You’re not working tonight?’ he asked after a moment.

‘I should be,’ she said, ‘but I can’t face it until I’ve cleared that desk.’

‘You’re entitled to sit down and do nothing for a bit. You’ve been working all day and it’s all strange to you.’

‘It’s certainly that,’ said Meredith ruefully.

Hal’s eyes rested on her profile. In the dim light he could see little more than the pearly gleam of her skin and the outline of that lush mouth, but he could still picture exactly how she had looked as she had walked into the veranda that night in those ridiculously unsuitable and sexy shoes and announced that supper was ready. Her chin had been up at its usual combative angle and her eyes had been sharp and bright, but the rest of her was all warm curves and soft lines.

Hal pushed the memory firmly aside.

‘I’m sorry, I was probably a bit abrupt with you earlier about the veranda,’ he apologised. ‘I’m not very good with change.’

‘I gathered that,’ she said dryly.

‘I’m only thirty-five, but I guess I’m set in my ways,’ he said, trying to explain. ‘I’ve lived here at Wirrindago all my life, and I’ve been running the station on my own for the last fifteen years. I’m used to things being a certain way.’ He shrugged. ‘That’s probably why I’m finding the kids a bit difficult.’

‘Where are they now?’

‘Playing some computer game in their rooms and recovering from drying up a few dishes. You’d think holding a tea towel was a form of torture.’ Hal sighed and swirled the coffee round in his mug. ‘I don’t understand them,’ he admitted. ‘I feel as if I’ve let them down, but I don’t know what to do with them. They seem to be bored the whole time. We were never bored when we were children.’

Meredith eyed him over the rim over her mug. ‘What did you used to do?’

‘We used to have to help around the station, for a start,’ said Hal, ‘but when we’d done our jobs, we’d ride or go fishing or mess around by the creek. We’d go off exploring on our own for hours.’

His voice trailed off as he realised how long it was since he’d let himself talk about his childhood. Since he’d let himself think about it.

‘That was you and Lydia?’

And Jack. Hal wasn’t ready to talk about Jack.

‘Yes,’ he said.

Meredith drank her coffee thoughtfully. ‘Maybe you should show Emma and Mickey what you used to do?’ she suggested. ‘After all, their mum grew up here. She must have talked about it.’

Lydia wouldn’t have talked about Jack.

‘Maybe,’ Hal agreed. But how could he show them the creek and the rocks and the water hole and not think about Jack?

A silence fell, but it wasn’t an uncomfortable one. The blue light fizzled and snapped, but above it Meredith could hear insects shrilling and the strange cracks and rustles of the darkness, and she thought about what Hal had said about listening to the night.

A creeper that looked much too exotic to survive in the British climate was climbing up the veranda post, its scent heady on the night air. In the starlight, she could see a frangipani tree, recognised from holidays in Greece, its fragrant white blooms almost glowing in the dark, but beyond that there was nothing, just an ancient, immense darkness crouching in the silence.

Meredith shivered and sipped her coffee, glad that Hal was there.