Outback Boss, City Bride

There were a lot of things she wouldn’t be able to do in London, Meredith realised sadly. She wouldn’t be able to watch Hal walk across the yard with a thrill of possession, knowing that when everyone else had gone he would be all hers. She wouldn’t be able to slide her hands over him and kiss her way down the long, lean body. She wouldn’t be able to sleep curled into his solid back and wake with the safe weight of his arm across her.

Inside the office, Hal held the phone to his ear and watched Meredith reach up for a lemon. She pulled it from the tree, then held it to her nose to breathe in its freshness and its scent. She was wearing his old shirt, and the thought of the lush body beneath the soft material made his body tighten.

It was hard to remember now how brisk and unappealing she had seemed at first, before he knew her sweetness and her warmth and her strength. She moved more slowly now and she had a glow, a bloom, that hadn’t been there before. She didn’t look like a city girl any more. She looked as if she belonged here.

God, he was going to miss her.

With an effort, he dragged his attention back to the phone call.

‘So you see,’ Lucy was saying, ‘it’s really important that Meredith comes home as soon as possible.’ She hesitated. ‘Has she told you how she feels about Richard?’

‘A bit,’ said Hal.

‘She probably told you that she’s not in love with him any more,’ said Lucy. ‘She insists that she’s over it, but Meredith isn’t the kind of person who loves easily, and if she does love you, she doesn’t just stop. She’s just not like that. I know she comes across as a bit brisk sometimes, but underneath she’s the warmest and kindest person you could ever hope to meet.’

Hal looked at Meredith through the window. He didn’t need Lucy to tell him that. ‘I know,’ he said.

‘The thing is, I think Richard’s perfect for her and he’s been talking about her so much…Well, I’m sure that if she came home now she’d find that everything had changed. He keeps saying how much he misses talking to her.’

He would miss talking to her, Hal wanted to shout, and it hadn’t taken an accident to make him appreciate Meredith.

‘I know this might cause problems for you, Hal,’ Lucy was saying. ‘I’m really sorry to let you down.’ She hesitated. ‘It’s all a bit complicated, but…well, I don’t think I’ll be coming back after all. But if I tell Meredith that, she’ll insist on staying until you’ve found someone else and I really think she should come home now. I owe this to her. She’s the best person in the world and she deserves to be happy.’

‘Yes,’ said Hal slowly. ‘She does.’

Lucy seemed so determined to prove to him how perfect Richard was for Meredith and how Meredith would have her heart’s desire if only Hal would let her go, that in the end Hal could stand it no longer.

‘I’ll get Meredith for you, Lucy,’ he said. ‘You should really talk to her.’

He went out on to the veranda and called to Meredith, who was on her way back from the lemon tree. ‘It’s Lucy,’ he said, wondering if he looked as bleak as he felt. ‘For you.’

Meredith stiffened and Hal suddenly realised that he did look that bleak. She probably thought that Lucy had bad news. ‘Don’t worry,’ he reassured her. ‘Richard’s fine.’ He forced a smile. ‘It’s good news.’

Meredith hadn’t been thinking about Richard, in fact. One look at Hal’s face and she had known that the golden time was over and that everything was about to change.

Her heart was heavy as she picked up the phone. ‘Lucy? It’s me. What’s happened?’

It was some time before she finally managed to say goodbye to Lucy and, by the time she did, Meredith was feeling completely numb. Very carefully, she put the receiver back in its cradle and went along to the kitchen, where Hal was waiting for her.

His grey eyes sharpened with concern at her expression. ‘Are you OK?’

‘I think so…yes…’ But Meredith didn’t sound too sure.

Hal tried a hearty smile. ‘That was good news, wasn’t it?’

‘Lucy obviously told you.’

She needed to do something with her hands. For want of anything better, Meredith found the zester and started to zest the lemons she had picked.

‘She said that Richard has realised that it’s you he really wants.’

‘Not exactly,’ said Meredith quickly. ‘She said she thinks I’m the one he really wants to see, but she doesn’t know for sure. I gather Richard was quite embarrassed when he realised that Lucy had come all the way back from Australia for him. That was my fault,’ she said with an edge of bitterness, putting one lemon aside and starting on the next.

Hal didn’t know how to help her. ‘It wasn’t your fault, Meredith.’

‘It was,’ she insisted. ‘I just assumed that was what he wanted and I made it happen. You were right,’ she acknowledged dully. ‘I should just let people get on with their own lives.’

‘I’m glad you didn’t,’ he said. ‘I wouldn’t have met you otherwise.’

Meredith’s hands stilled on the lemon. She glanced at him and then away. ‘Lucy’s sure that I’m still in love with Richard,’ she confessed suddenly, ‘but I really don’t think I am.’

How could she be in love with Richard when she was in love with Hal?

She couldn’t tell Hal that, of course. It would sound as if she wanted him to ask her to stay. And, if she did, Hal might even say yes, even though they both knew that it would end in disaster, no matter how much they might want to stay together now. They had different lives, different expectations, different futures.

Meredith couldn’t even complain that this had come as a surprise. She had always known that this was going to happen sooner or later. The trouble was that she wasn’t ready for it to happen just yet.

Some time in the hazy future, but not yet.

‘Maybe when you see Richard again, you’ll realise why you loved him before,’ Hal suggested with difficulty.

‘I hope so,’ said Meredith, really wanting to believe it, but not quite convincing herself. She reached for another lemon and mustered a smile. ‘I mean, Richard’s perfect for me, isn’t he?’

‘You said once that he was everything you’d ever wanted.’

Everything he wasn’t, Hal reminded himself. Richard was sensitive and artistic and cultured. He was a city man and Meredith was a city girl. He could offer Meredith the kind of life she was used to, the kind of life she wanted.

Hal thought about what Lucy had said. She deserves to be happy. He wanted Meredith to be happy too, and the sick feeling in the pit of his stomach came from realising that Richard would make her happier than he could.

How could he promise her happiness when he knew how hard outback life could be, especially when he was- how was it she had put it?-a man with major commitment issues? Meredith was too important to him for him to start making promises that neither of them might be able to keep.

He swallowed. ‘I promised Lucy I wouldn’t stop you going home,’ he told her. ‘I told her I’d make sure you got the first flight possible.’

Meredith nodded without speaking. She was still zesting with a kind of desperation, but she stopped suddenly and stared from the lemon in her hand to the growing pile of bright yellow strips on the table before her.

‘Oh, God, I don’t need all this!’ she exclaimed, only to find her voice breaking.

Pressing her lips tightly together in a perfectly straight line to stop her mouth wobbling, she scowled ferociously and willed herself not to cry. She never cried. She hadn’t cried when her father had left her with Lucy all those years ago, and she wasn’t about to start crying now. Crying wouldn’t help.

Hal couldn’t bear the look on her face. Stepping forward, he pulled her hard into his arms, where he didn’t have to look into her eyes and he wasn’t tempted to beg her to stay and make things even more difficult for her than they were already.

‘Meredith,’ he said, his mouth in her hair, breathing in the fresh, clean scent of her. ‘Maybe this is for the best. You did love Richard,’ he reminded her. ‘Remember how you told me you were prepared to wait for someone perfect? You said you weren’t prepared to settle for anything less, and Richard was perfect once. He probably will be again when you get back, especially now that he’s come to his senses and realised what a special person you are.

‘He can make you happy,’ Hal went on raggedly, ‘and I…I don’t think I can.’

Meredith nodded wordlessly against his shoulder. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t do anything but hold on to