They were twenty feet from each other, with the concrete hangar floor stretching out between them. Overhead was a glaring fluorescent light, harsh and almost surreal in the echoing hangar. Hardly the place for a proposal of marriage.
‘I’m saying how I feel about you,’ she told him. ‘That’s how I feel. Why not be honest? Marriage or not, you’re a part of me. But you haven’t the courage to see it.’
‘Jenna, it’s impossible.’
‘Why is it impossible?’
‘It won’t last.’
‘Will you stop it?’ She felt like stamping her foot in rage and, dammit, she did. ‘You’re saying our love can’t last so you’ll end it now. That’s terrific reasoning-I don’t think. That’s like looking at a table loaded with food and saying you’ll be hungry in the future so you won’t eat now.’
‘I-’
‘What’s the difference?’ she demanded and tilted her chin. ‘What’s the difference, Riley Jackson?’
‘I don’t want…’
‘To commit. No. I can see that.’
‘This is stupid.’
‘It is, and it’s not my fault that it’s stupid.’
‘Jenna, go to bed. I’ll not risk your happiness. Karli’s happiness.’
‘Our happiness depends on you, you dopey-’
‘Jenna, don’t.’
‘You’re telling me to go away.’
‘Yes.’
‘Maggie says you love me.’
‘Maggie doesn’t know.’
‘Doesn’t she?’ She walked a couple of steps forward and faced him square on. ‘So she’s wrong?’ she demanded. ‘You can stare straight into my eyes and say she’s wrong. That I’m mistaken? That it’s totally one-sided and you don’t love me.’
He bit his lip and stared at her. ‘I don’t…’
‘You don’t what? You don’t love me? Say it, Riley.’
‘Go to bed.’
‘Say it, Riley.’
‘Hell, will you get out of my hangar?’
‘You can’t say it, can you?’
‘It doesn’t make one whit of difference what I can or can’t say. I’m not in the market for another relationship. Please…say goodbye to Karli for me. Tell her I’ll write to her when you’re back in England.’
‘Big of you.’
‘It’s all I’m prepared to do, Jenna.’
She closed her eyes. Where could she go from here?
Nowhere. Not when he stared at her with eyes that were blank and cold.
Where was his warmth now? Where was the Riley she’d fallen in love with? Where were his chuckle, his smile, his caring?
He’d never given them to her.
So she’d lost, but at least she’d tried. She’d go back to England. She’d fought with everything she had. She could do no more.
‘Fine,’ she said again. ‘Break your heart. Break mine and break Karli’s. See if we care.’
And she turned and stalked out of the hangar with her head held high.
From the back she looked almost in control.
But only from the back.
He had to finish checking the engine. But not yet. For now he stood and gazed out into the night and pain echoed round and round in his head.
Coward.
He was, he thought. But…it wasn’t just him he was protecting.
He honestly didn’t know whether he was capable of giving what they wanted of him.
Husband to Jenna. Father to Karli. From self-containment to family man just like that.
The pup slunk into the hangar and sidled his way up to him and Riley found himself patting him before he knew what he was doing.
The pup. What was his name?
He didn’t name dogs. The men had dogs and this was the product of Max’s bitch and one of the itinerant drover’s dogs. The rest of the litter had been sold, but Max had decided to train this one. The only problem was that the pup had decided that Riley was the answer to a dog’s prayers and when Riley was around he’d go to no one else.
‘Leave it, mate,’ Riley said bleakly as Jenna disappeared into the darkness. He pushed the collie away. ‘I’m not worth loving.’
The pup whined and pushed his nose into the small of his hand.
Riley ignored him.
The pup whined again.
‘Enough.’ Riley grabbed the keys to the nearest Land Rover. Max could finish the plane. He’d only been using it as an excuse to stay away from the house and he suddenly wasn’t far enough away. ‘I’m going to check the cattle down south. I’ll radio in to let everyone know where I’m gone and I won’t be back until after they’ve left.’
He was talking to a dog?
The dog looked up at him, his head cocked to one side, and Riley could almost swear he understood.
It took him ten minutes to collect what he needed-a swag, and basic food-and write a note for Maggie. He thought of writing a note for Jenna but, hell, what was a man to say?
Nothing. There was nothing left to say.
He climbed into the truck and gunned the motor into gear. But he’d left the passenger window open. And as the truck started to move, a black and white shape launched itself upward, and the next moment the pup of no name was wriggling his joy on Riley’s knee.
He should throw him out.
The pup licked his hand.
‘All right,’ Riley said, goaded. ‘Okay. One dog. But nothing else. Nothing? You hear?’
The pup moved to his knees, slurped him from chin to eyelid, and settled back on the passenger seat with an air of absolute contentment.
Riley could have sworn that the dog grinned.
He didn’t do attachment.
He didn’t.
CHAPTER TEN
‘IT’LL be fine. We’ll be fine.’
Jenna held Karli as close as their seat belts allowed. Max was in front of them in the pilot’s seat and Riley’s home was a fast-receding scene below them. They were headed for Adelaide.
‘I won’t be fine,’ Karli said stubbornly. ‘I wanted to stay with Riley.’
‘You know we can’t do that.’ Heck, why was it so hard to make her voice work? All she felt like doing was crumpling into a small soggy ball.
She couldn’t. She had to be cheerful and optimistic and she had to plan some sort of future. Somehow.
‘We’ll catch a plane to Perth so that we can use our tickets back to England,’ she told Karli. ‘I’ll contact Nicole’s
