was hard to believe that Mal could make love to her like that without feeling anything, and she saw no need to force a commitment out of him that he was not ready to give. He had three years to fall in love with her, after all, and if the nights passed as the last ten had done, then he must surely find it hard to resist. Copper was still tingling with the memory of the previous night and her mouth curved in a reminiscent smile as she set Megan down.
'You look very pleased with yourself,' said Mal with mock suspicion. 'What are you thinking about?'
Copper's eyes shone warm and green as she smiled at him. 'Tonight,' she said honestly, and rejoiced to see the blaze of response in his face.
'You're a bad woman,' he said softly, but he smiled too as he drew her towards him for a kiss that was warm and sweet with promise.
It was such a natural gesture that Copper's heart cracked with love for him. Could he be coming to love her already? She felt almost giddy with happiness. Everything was working out perfectly. Mal might not love her yet, but he would, and Megan was blooming into a happy, loving child.
Even Georgia was enjoying her new life. The resentment that Copper had felt at the other girl's arrival had been quickly replaced by real liking. Georgia was natural and friendly and a hard worker. She cheerfully took on the cooking and the more humdrum household tasks, which left Copper more time to spend with Megan or working in the office. She still had plenty to do on the project, but she was waiting for the contractors to set a date, and in the meantime she had taken on more and more of Mal's paperwork. Her business experience stood her in good stead and at least she felt that she was being useful.
Only Brett seemed discontented. Oddly, he had made no attempt to flirt with Georgia, and even seemed to actively dislike her. 'She's too perfect,' he told Copper a few days later when she found him sitting moodily alone on the verandah.
'I thought you'd like her,' said Copper, trying to cajole him out of his mood. 'We're worried about you, Brett! A pretty girl with no attachments and you've hardly said a word to her!'
Brett hunched a shoulder. 'She's not that pretty,' he said sullenly. 'I don't like those cool, competent types.'
'Georgia may be competent, but nobody could call her cool,' Copper objected. 'She's a nice, warm, friendly girl, and I wouldn't blame her if she felt hurt at the way you ignore her. It's not as if there are lots of other people out here for her to talk to.'
'She's the one who's ignoring me,' said Brett. 'She always makes me feel as if I've crawled out from under a stone.' He brooded silently for a moment. 'I don't want her approval anyway,' he went on unconvincingly, but with a flicker of his old self. 'She's not nearly as much fun as you, Copper. And have you noticed how chummy she and Mal are?'
After that, of course, Copper did notice. Georgia behaved quite naturally, but Copper's jealous eye discerned rather too much approval in Mal's expression when he looked at the other girl. Georgia's knowledge of station life meant that she always knew what Mal was talking about, too, and she could discuss station matters and breaking horses. She knew about musters and how to make billy tea. She could castrate a calf and rope a cow as easily as she could cook a perfect roast, and it wasn't long before Copper began to feel excluded from their conversations. All she could talk about was settling invoices and checking accounts, and nobody was interested in that.
Unable to compete when it came to discussing the day, Copper turned more and more to Brett, who kept pointedly aloof from such station conversation and was more than willing to flirt outrageously with Copper instead. Once or twice Copper caught him watching Georgia with an expression that made her suspect that he had been protesting too much about his dislike of the other girl. She was pretty sure that Brett was harder hit than he wanted to admit. His flirting had a desperate edge that she recognised from her own doomed attempts to disguise how she felt about Mal, and a sense of fellow feeling drew them increasingly together.
Mal didn't say anything at first, but as the evenings passed, and the division between the conversations grew more and more obvious, his jaw acquired a set look, and whenever he glanced at Brett and Copper his mouth turned disapprovingly down at the corners. Copper pretended not to notice. Who was Mal to complain about the way she laughed with Brett, when he spent his whole time monopolising Georgia?
Copper could never put her finger on the moment when the warmth and the fire in her relationship with Mal faded. One day it seemed as if they fell laughing into bed together every night, and the next that the following three years would be spent undressing in tense silence.
'Why are you encouraging Brett to make such a fool of himself over you?' Mal asked one night, after Brett had been particularly obstreperous. They were lying stiffly apart in the dark and the words sounded as if they had been forced out of him.
'I'm not encouraging him,' said Copper. 'I'm just talking to him, which is more than you and Georgia ever do.'
Mal snorted. 'You call that display 'just talking'', do you? It doesn't look much like talking to me!'
'I'm surprised you notice,' Copper snapped back. 'You're always nose to nose with Georgia. I thought you'd forgotten who you were married to!'
'I'm not the one who seems to have forgotten,' he said grimly. 'You and Brett are the ones who have decided that you needn't bother about a little thing like a wedding ring!'
Exasperated by his obtuseness, Copper struggled up into a sitting position and snapped on the bedside light. If they were going to argue-as they obviously were- they might as well be able to see each other! 'Brett's not interested in me,' she said. 'It's perfectly obvious that he's in love with Georgia.'
'Brett?' Mal sat up too, at that, and turned to her incredulously. 'Brett's never been in love in his life!'
She gritted her teeth and tried not to let the sight of his bare chest distract her. 'I think he is now.'
'And I suppose being in love with Georgia explains why he spends his whole time hanging over you?' he said, not bothering to hide his sarcasm.
'Of course it does,' said Copper impatiently. 'Georgia hasn't shown any interest in him, so Brett doesn't want her to think that he cares about her, that's all.'
'All this amateur psychology doesn't sound very convincing to me,' sneered Mal. 'What makes you such an expert on love suddenly?'
'I know more than you, anyway,' she retorted. 'You wouldn't recognise love if it got up and punched you in the face!'
'Whereas you have all your experience with Glyn to go on!' he snapped back.
'Yes, I do,' said Copper defiantly. 'It's more than you have, anyway! Glyn and I loved each other.'
'Some love when he couldn't wait to dump you for someone else!'
'At least Glyn was honest about what he felt,' she said furiously. 'He's kind and he cares about me, which is more than I can say for you!'
'Why didn't you fight for him if he was so great?' sneered Mal, and Copper's green eyes flashed.
'I wish I had!'
'Just think,' he taunted her, 'if you'd waited a few more weeks, you could have had him back!'
'It's not too late,' Copper pointed out, so angry by now that she hardly knew or cared what she was saying. 'Ellie's still with her husband.'
Mal's brows snapped together. 'How do you know that?'
'There is a world outside Birraminda, you know,' she said sarcastically, 'and I still communicate with it occasionally!'
'You've been in touch with Glyn?' Mal shot out a hand to grasp Copper's arm and pull her round, but she jerked herself out of his grip, terrified in case the mere touch of his fingers against her skin should be enough to defuse her anger. After the numb misery of those endless tense, silent nights, it was oddly invigorating to feel the fury churning through her.
'What if I have? It's none of your business, anyway!'
'None of my business if my wife rings up her ex-lover for cosy little chats? Of course it's my business!'
'We agreed what sort of marriage we were going to have,' she said with a resentful glance, ostentatiously rubbing her arm where he had gripped her with his hard fingers. 'It was to be a purely practical arrangement. There was nothing in the contract about giving up all contact with the outside world!'
'We agreed that we would do our best to make sure that everyone thought that we were genuinely married,' said Mal savagely. 'You married me, Copper, and I think it's time you did a better job of acting like my wife than you've done so far-and for a start you can forget all about Glyn until your three years is up!'
