Barbara Hannay - Miracle in Bellaroo Creek

She’d been mega careful with her diet, taking all the right vitamins and folates, and, although she’d been through a great deal of stress and a long flight from LA to Sydney, she’d made sure that her new lifestyle included a healthy balance of rest and exercise and fresh air.

And yet again, she’d failed. Fighting tears, Milla packed her toothbrush and wallet into the carryall she’d hastily filled when she’d left for the hospital.

It was time to go, and after one last look around the small white room she set off down the long hospital corridor.

The final years of her marriage to Harry Cavanaugh had been grim, but she’d never felt this low...or this lost...as if she’d been cast adrift in a vast and lonely sea.

Fleetingly, she wondered if she should let Harry know about the baby. But why bother? He wouldn’t care.

* * *

In his midtown Manhattan office, Ed Cavanaugh was absorbed in reading spreadsheets when his PA buzzed that he had an important call. Time was tight and the info on his computer screen was critical. Ed ignored the buzzer and continued scanning the lines of figures.

A minute later, he sensed his PA at the door.

‘Mr Cavanaugh?’

Without looking up, Ed raised a silencing hand as he took a note of the figures he’d been hunting. When he was finished, and not a millisecond before, he shot a glance over the top of his glasses. ‘What is it, Sarah?’

‘A call from Australia. It’s Gary Kemp and I was sure you’d want to speak to him.’

Gary Kemp was the Australian private detective Ed’s family had had hired to track down his escapee sister-in-law. An unexpected tension gripped Ed. Had Milla been found?

‘Put him through,’ he said, closing down the screen.

Scant seconds later, his line buzzed again and he snatched up the receiver. ‘Gary, any news?’

‘Plenty, Mr C.’

‘Have you found her? Is she still in Australia?’ They already knew that Milla had caught a flight from LA to Sydney.

‘She’s still in the country, but you’ll never guess where.’

Ed grimaced. This Aussie detective could be annoyingly cocky. Ed had no intention of playing guessing games, although in this case it would be dead easy to take a stab at Milla’s whereabouts. Her tastes were totally predictable. She would be holed up in a harbourside penthouse, or in a luxury resort at one of those famous Australian beaches.

‘Just tell me,’ he demanded with a spurt of irritation.

‘Try Bellaroo Creek.’

‘Bella-who what?’

‘Bellaroo Creek,’ Gary repeated with a chuckle. ‘Middle of nowhere. Dying town. Population three hundred and seventy-nine.’

Ed let out a huff of surprise. ‘Where exactly is this middle of nowhere?’

‘Little tinpot whistle-stop in western New South Wales, about five hours’ drive from Sydney.’

‘What are you telling me? My sister-in-law passed through this place?’

‘No, she’s still there, mate. Seems it’s her hometown.’

Just in time, Ed stopped himself from asking the obvious. Of course, his brother’s sophisticated socialite wife must have grown up in this Bellaroo Creek place, but he found the news hard to swallow.

‘Her family’s long gone,’ the detective went on. ‘So have most of the former residents. As I said, the place is on its last legs. These days it’s practically a ghost town.’

None of this made sense to Ed. ‘Are you sure you have the right Milla Cavanaugh?’

‘No doubt about it. It’s her all right, although she’s using her maiden name, Brady. Interesting. As far as I can tell, she’s barely touched her bank accounts.’

‘No way,’ retorted Ed. ‘You can’t have the right woman.’

‘Check your emails,’ Gary Kemp responded dryly. ‘This isn’t amateur hour, mate, as you’ll soon see from my invoice. I’ve sent you the photo I took yesterday in Bellaroo Creek’s main street.’

Frowning, Ed flicked to his emails, opened the link and there it was...a photo of a woman dressed in jeans and a roll-necked black cashmere sweater.

She was definitely Milla. Her delicate, high-cheek-boned beauty was in a class of its own. His younger brother had always won the best-looking women, no question.

Milla’s hair was different, though. Pale red-gold, with a tendency to curl, the way it had been when Ed had first met her, before she’d had it straightened and dyed blond to fit in with the other wives in Harry’s LA set.

‘OK,’ he growled, his throat unaccountably tight. ‘That’s helpful. I see you’ve sent an address, as well.’

‘Yeah. She’s staying at the Bellaroo pub. Booked in for a week, but I’m guessing she might think twice about staying that long. It’s so dead here, she could get jack of the place and shoot through any tick of the clock.’

‘Right. Thanks for the update. Keep an eye on her and keep me posted re her movements.’

‘No worries, Mr C.’

Ed hung up and went through to his PA’s desk. ‘We’ve found her.’

Sarah looked unexpectedly delighted. ‘That’s wonderful, Mr Cavanaugh. Does that mean Milla’s still in Australia? Is she OK?’

‘Yes on both counts. But it means I’m going to have to fly down there pronto. I’ll need you to reschedule the meetings with Cleaver Holdings.’

‘Yes, of course.’

‘Several people won’t be happy, but that’s too bad. Dan Brookes will have to handle their complaints and he can run any other meetings in my absence. I’ll brief him as soon as he’s free. Meantime, I want you to book me on the earliest possible flight to Sydney. And I’ll want a hire car ready to go.’

‘Of course.’

‘And can you ring Caro Marsden? Let her know I’ll be out of the country for a few days.’

To his surprise Sarah, his normally respectful PA, narrowed her eyes at him in an uncharacteristic challenge. ‘Ed,’ she said, which was a bad start. Sarah rarely used his given name. ‘You’ve been dating the poor woman for four months. Don’t you think you should—’

‘All right, all right,’ he snapped through gritted teeth. ‘I’ll call her.’

* * *

Sarah was watching him with a thoughtful frown. ‘I guess you’re going to break the news to Milla about your brother?’

‘Among other things.’ Ed eased the sudden tightness of his collar. His younger brother’s death in a plane crash and the subsequent funeral were still fresh and raw. The loss had hit him so much harder than he’d imagined possible.

‘The poor woman,’ Sarah said now.

‘Yeah,’ Ed responded softly...remembering...and wondering...

Almost immediately, he gave an irritated shrug, annoyed by the unwanted pull of his emotions. ‘Don’t forget, it was Milla who cut and ran,’ he said tersely.

Not only that. She kept her pregnancy a secret from the family. Which was the prime reason he had to find her now.

‘I know Milla’s persona non grata around here,’ Sarah said. ‘But I always thought she seemed very nice.’

Sure you did, Ed thought with a sigh. That was the problem. The woman had always been a total enigma.

* * *

It was weird to be back. It had been twelve long years...

Milla drove her little hire car over a bumpy wooden bridge and took the next turn left onto a dirt track. As she opened the farm gates she saw a large rustic letterbox with the owners’ names—BJ and HA Murray—painted in white.

She hadn’t seen her old school friends, Brad and Heidi, since she’d left town when she was twenty, dead eager to shake the district’s dust from her heels and to travel the world. Back then, she’d been determined to broaden her horizons and to discover her hidden potential, to work out what she really wanted from life.

Meanwhile Heidi, her best friend, had stayed here in this quiet old backwater. Worse, Heidi had made the deadly serious mistake of marrying a local boy, an error of judgement the girls had decreed in high school would be a fate worse than death.