It made him so homesick he wanted to slam the phone back on the receiver in disgust, but he held on, soaking up every ounce of the contact that he could. And then he took his bad temper out on the futures market, and his fortune increased like it never had before because he personally was so angry he had to take it out some way. On something…
And his secretary tiptoed around him and watched him with eyes that were concerned. The middle-aged lady liked her boss, and she wasn’t stupid. She could guess what was doing this, but there was nothing she could do to help. So she protected him as much as she could and worried in private until…
The phone call came mid-morning New York time, and it wasn’t the normal sort of business call Luke received. The lady on the end sounded young and distressed and a little…desperate?
‘Is this the right number for Luke Grey-the Australian share broker?’
‘Futures broker,’ Maria corrected gently, and then softened. ‘Yes, dear, it is.’
‘This is Shanni Daniels. I’m…I’m a friend of a friend of Luke’s. The…the mutual friend is in trouble and I really, really need to speak to him.’
Maria thought of her boss, up to his ears in paperwork and she thought of her instructions. ‘Don’t put anyone through until after lunch. No one, Maria. Is that clear?’
It was perfectly clear. But… ‘Are you ringing from Australia?’ she asked, and couldn’t quite keep the note of hope from her voice.
‘That’s right.’ Shanni’s breath came out in a rush. ‘I hope the time isn’t too awful over there. I waited until really late. Nick says it’s none of my business, but, please, it’s really important.’
‘Is the mutual friend a lady?’
Silence. And then, ‘Yes,’ Shanni said flatly. ‘Yes, she is.’
‘I’m putting you through now, dear,’ Maria said calmly and flicked the switch.
Hell, this column didn’t make sense. He’d entered the figures into his spreadsheet three times and it wasn’t working. This is moron stuff, Luke told himself. Get a grip, Grey.
And then the phone went and he glared at it as if it was his personal enemy. He’d told Maria he wasn’t to be disturbed…
‘Maria!’ he roared.
No answer.
Balked, he stalked over to the door and flung it open. Maria’s desk was empty. She must have gone to the bathroom and switched the phone through to his office first-which wasn’t like her.
So let it ring!
The figures still wouldn’t add up…
The phone kept ringing.
Finally, he lifted the receiver and yelled, as if it was Maria he was yelling at.
‘Luke?’ The voice at the end of the line was so faint that he didn’t recognise it.
‘Yes?’ He lowered his tone a notch-but not so much that you’d notice.
‘It’s Shanni. You know, Wendy’s friend.’
‘Oh, God.’ Half a world away from her, his heart lurched into his boots and stayed. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘It’s Gabbie,’ she told him. ‘Luke, I thought you needed to know. Gabbie’s mother’s coming to take her away again.’
He couldn’t bear it, he thought, and it was a measure of his love for his whole new little family that his thoughts went first not to Wendy but to Gabbie. After what Wendy had said about her mother, to have her dragged away…
And after that, how must Wendy be feeling? Watching the child she loved being taken away to horror…
‘Can anyone do anything about it?’ Did he sound as sick as he felt?
‘Tom says not.’ His sickness was matched in Shanni’s tone. ‘Tom’s the head of the Home system here, and he’s feeling as bad as everyone about it, but she’s been through the courts. It’s supervised-our workers will be able to go in and check, but her cruelty in the past has been…not the kind that gets a kid taken away.’
‘Hell.’
‘Yes.’ Shanni’s bleakness reached him down the phone and he thought if this woman was feeling bad, how much more so must Wendy be feeling?
‘Does her mother really want Gabbie?’ he asked.
‘Wendy still thinks it’s a power thing,’ Shanni told him. ‘Sonia never tries to make any contact, but then she gets bored and angry and she feels like getting her own back on life, so she moves in on her daughter. If she knew Gabbie was living at the farm in almost permanent care…’
‘She doesn’t know that?’
‘No, and she mustn’t. Wendy’s bringing her into the Home office on Wednesday morning, so as far as Sonia knows she’s still living in a foster home. Otherwise Wendy will never get her back. Sonia will see to that. Oh, but Luke…’
There was worse to come. He could hear it.
‘Yes?’
‘Sonia’s talking about taking Gabbie to Perth-in Western Australia.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘It means if she’s placed in foster care again she’ll go into the Western Australian system. Wendy…Wendy won’t get her back.’
More silence. Luke’s mind, which had stalled into a dead halt, suddenly started up in overdrive.
‘Wednesday morning, you say?’
‘That’s right.’
It was Monday evening Australian time now. That gave him thirty-six hours.
‘Can you get me this-who did you say was in charge?-Tom’s home phone number?’
‘I…’
‘Do it, Shanni,’ he told her. ‘I’d imagine Erin will have it. Don’t tell Wendy, but let’s see if we can start some wheels spinning. I may not be able to help but-’
‘But you’ll try?’
‘With everything I have,’ he said, and he meant it.
He just wished he had more.
It was a bleak little ceremony. How could it be anything else? Wendy wondered. For most of the kids she’d cared for, a parent coming to claim them was a time of joy. For Gabbie, it meant a white face, fiercely expressionless eyes and a hand that clung to Wendy’s as if she was drowning. Her bag was packed, she was staring across the Home administration’s front desk at her mother, and her fingers pleaded with Wendy to keep her more than she’d ever wanted anything in her life.
But Wendy had to let her go.
‘Do you regard this as a long-term arrangement?’ Tom was asking Sonia Rolands. Tom Burrows, the head of Social Services for the district, was in his sixties, he’d been in this game for a long, long time but even he wasn’t case-hardened against Gabbie’s appalled face.
‘It might be,’ Sonia said airily. ‘I’ve met this new bloke over in Perth. We thought we might, you know, have a shot at a new life. The kid can come with us for a while and we’ll see how it goes. He thinks he might like a kid.’
You mean you can disrupt your child’s life with little bother to you, Wendy thought grimly. The woman had hardly even acknowledged Gabbie’s presence. She’d simply walked into the office and waited for the handover.
‘Wouldn’t it be better for you to settle into living over there first?’ Wendy suggested quietly. ‘Find a place to live, settle with your new man and have us send Gabbie to you then?’ She took a deep breath. ‘I’d cover the plane fare.’
