truth. He didn’t like it any more than she did, she thought suddenly. And at least…at least the eyes she was looking into were totally frank.
How could she have called him those names?
Riley Jackson was a man she could trust. Among all the fear and disillusion of the last few days-of her whole life, if she was honest-this stood out as an absolute truth. Whatever else Riley was, he was a man who was ruthlessly honest.
Riley’s honesty didn’t make what he was telling her one bit more palatable. She bit her lip.
‘Which means Karli…’
‘Karli will face cameras and reporters as soon as you board.’
‘Which will be awful,’ she said. ‘It’s the last thing she needs. I never should have got off.’
‘If Brian’s as bad as he sounds, you hardly had a choice.’
‘At least I won’t have to have anything to do with him again,’ she whispered, thinking it through. ‘If Karli had inherited, then Brian would want her. This way, he thinks he’s won and he’ll go away with the money and leave us alone.’
Riley stayed silent.
‘But what will I do?’
‘Get back on the train,’ he suggested. ‘Face the music. Shield Karli as much as you can, but explain to her that there’ll be couple of awful days before you get on with the rest of your life. Hit Perth in a blaze of publicity and make life very, very unpleasant for Brian.’
‘Why?’
‘Because he deserves it,’ he said flatly. ‘For all Brian knows, you’re dead of thirst by now. If Enid hadn’t contacted the police there’d have been no search party, no enquiries, nothing.’
‘He mustn’t realise…’
‘He’ll have realised. Either that or the man’s a fool.’
Jenna swallowed. No. Brian wasn’t a fool. And this was his daughter he’d put at risk.
She could bring him down, she thought. She could denounce him to the gutter press and they’d have a field- day. But…
‘He’s Karli’s father,’ she whispered. ‘What sort of legacy does that leave her?’ She gazed at him for a long minute, searching for answers.
There were none.
‘If you’ll excuse me,’ she faltered. ‘I need to go to bed.’
‘To face unpleasant facts in the morning?’
She shrugged. ‘They might seem less hopeless then,’ she admitted.
‘Jenna…’
Riley stood looking down at her in the flickering lamplight. What was it with this man? Jenna felt small and lonely and utterly bereft-sensations she hadn’t felt since childhood. She’d decided early on that feeling small and lonely and bereft wasn’t the way to survive. She’d learned tough.
So where was tough when she needed it most? She needed tough right now.
And when his hands came out and caught hers in a gesture that seemed almost unconscious, she felt the tough layer she’d so carefully built up slip away even further. He made her feel… He made her feel…
She didn’t know how he made her feel. Just different. Alive. And very, very vulnerable.
Something of how she was feeling must have got through to the man before her. He was a fool if he couldn’t see how confused she was-and if there was one thing she’d learned by now it was that Riley Jackson was no fool.
‘It’ll seem better in the morning,’ he told her and there was something in his voice that told her he was as unsure as she was. He was entering unchartered territory as well. The territory of caring. ‘You’ll get through this.’
‘I know I will,’ she whispered. ‘I always have. But I don’t see how I can shield Karli.’
His hold on her hands tightened. He stood staring down at her, his mouth twisting into an expression that Jenna couldn’t define. She looked up into his eyes-and then she looked away. She didn’t trust…herself?
He was so close. So strong. So… So Riley. She stood in her bare feet with her soft pastel dress seeming somehow too insubstantial. It was no barrier. Not when she wanted to sink against him. To feel his strength. To have him hold her.
He was so close to her heart.
The silence went on and on. Absolute silence. The world stopped.
And something within Jenna’s heart formed and grew-bud to flower almost instantaneously. It grew so fast that it threatened to overwhelm her.
What was it? Need? Desire?
Whatever it was, her overwhelming compulsion was to lay her head against this man’s chest and claim it as her home. The home she’d never had was suddenly right here.
Right here in this man’s heart.
Only it wasn’t. Of course it wasn’t. This man had nothing to do with her. He was a stranger. He was an Australian dust farmer of whom she knew nothing, except that he lived in the most barren place in the earth and he wanted nothing to do with any woman.
But he was holding her. And she was feeling…what? What was this sensation that was swelling beneath her breast, so much that she thought she must surely burst? Or cry. Or do something even more stupid, like falling against him and holding him hard against her and raising her face to his and…
No!
Somehow she made herself push away, so that Riley was holding her at arm’s length, his face grave and troubled, and the weariness in his eyes replaced by concern.
‘I’m sorry,’ she managed. ‘You have enough troubles of your own without landing you with mine.’
‘Maybe I can help.’
‘You already have. But from now on I’m on my own. Mr Jackson…’
‘Riley.’
‘Riley, then,’ she whispered, and the word sounded wrong on her lips. It was as if it were the embrace she so desperately wanted to give him. Wanted him to give her.
‘What’s your biggest worry?’
‘Karli,’ she admitted. ‘To make her face reporters. If there’s media on the train and we’re stuck on board for two days…’
‘I can fly you out of here.’
‘You said you couldn’t.’
‘I said I couldn’t immediately,’ he told her. ‘Which was true. My job here is to get the bores operational and to make the house habitable enough for a couple of men to use as a base for muster.’
‘Muster?’
‘We’ll bring in trucks and take the surviving herd south where they can graze on some decent feed. These poor beasts won’t know themselves. But getting men to stay here before the place was liveable was impossible. You’ve saved me a couple of days’ work. I’ve fixed the most urgent water problems. If I spend tomorrow making your repairs permanent-putting wood where you’ve stuffed newspapers-and spend another day south of here doing a head count, then I can fly out. That makes it Tuesday. You’re welcome to come with me.’
‘But…where will you go?’ She gave a futile tug to her hands.
‘Munyering. My home farm.’
‘Another farm?’ She forced her emotions to one side-sort of-and made herself concentrate. ‘Like this one?’
He smiled at that. ‘No, Jenna, not like this one. Munyering’s isolated, but we have decent bore water and it’s in much better condition.’
It’d have to be, she thought, but it was hard to think it. Hard to think anything, really, with this man’s hands holding hers.
‘Then…how could I reach civilisation from Munyering?’
‘I’ll take you.’ And his fingers moved through hers in a gesture of reassurance.
It was strange, Jenna thought desperately. Riley was talking-he was touching her-as if he was unaware of the
