Marion Lennox: One Night With The Billionaire: Sparks Fly with the Billionaire / The Nanny Plan / Second Chance with the Billionaire

See, that was half the problem. He didn’t make her feel safe. Okay, maybe his piloting skills weren’t the issue. Flying above the Blue Mountains in a transparent bubble might make her feel unsafe with anyone, but she was settling, getting used to the machine, starting to be entranced by the landscape beneath—but underlying everything was the way this man made her feel.

Unsafe?

Just unsteady, she told herself and that was reasonable. He’d pulled the rug from under the circus she loved.

No. He hadn’t done that. Her grandfather had done it by taking out such a huge loan. Matt had every right to call it in.

And the unsafe bit wasn’t about the loan, either, she conceded. She sneaked a quick glance across at him. He was focused again on the country ahead. He looked calm, steady, in control, and she thought—that’s what the problem is.

He’s more in control of my world than I am.

Concentrate on the view, she told herself. On the scenery.

And on what was waiting to meet her?

‘Do … do these people know I’m coming?’

‘The park’s owners? Jack and Myra. Yes, they do. They’re good people.’

‘How do you know?’

‘We do thorough research before we foreclose,’ he said gently. ‘We wanted to know where our money was—whether there was any chance of us retrieving it. There’s not. Every cent your grandpa paid has been long spent. Jack and Myra are in trouble themselves, but not from mismanagement. It’s because they care too much.’

‘I’ll pay them back,’ she said tightly.

‘With a bookkeeper’s salary?’ He sounded amused and she winced. She thought about the amount she was likely to earn and the amount she owed and she could see why he was amused.

And she thought again … He’s more in control of my world than I am.

‘Don’t worry about it today,’ Matt said gently. ‘Today’s not for finance. Today’s for seeing your friends again.’

He focused on the machine again, on the myriad of instruments, on the scene ahead, and she thought—he’s letting me be. Like the picnic on the beach … he’s giving me space.

She felt, suddenly, stupidly, dangerously, close to tears.

This man was in control and she wasn’t. She had to be.

The majestic line of the Blue Mountains was receding now, opening to the vast tracts of grassland that grew inland for hundreds of miles, spreading until they gave way to the true Australian outback.

What a place to keep retired circus animals!

‘They keep all sorts,’ Matt said, and it seemed he was almost following her thoughts. ‘It started forty years ago when a grazier called Jack met a circus performer called Myra. Myra was a trapeze artist like you. Jack asked Myra to marry him but Myra wouldn’t leave the bear the circus had owned for ten years. So Jack married Myra and Jack’s farm has been home to aged circus animals ever since. They’ve fought to keep it going, but finally they’ve lost.’

So any thought of asking—begging—them to keep the elephants on for free was out of the question, Allie thought miserably, but, as she thought it, Matt’s hand closed over hers. Firm, warm and strong.

‘Friends today,’ he repeated softly. ‘Finance tomorrow.’

Surely only in Australia could such an area be one farm. Jack and Myra’s holding was vast. They circled before they landed. Allie saw a vast undulating landscape with scattered bushland, big dams, a creek running through its centre, beef cattle grazing lazily in the sun—and the odd giraffe and elephant.

It was so incongruous she had to blink to believe she was seeing it.

Jack came forward to greet them as the chopper landed, elderly, lean, weathered, taciturn. He gripped Allie’s hand. ‘Myra’s feeling a bit frail. Sorry, it’ll be only me doing the tour.’

She owed this man so much money. That Jack and Myra hadn’t been paid …

‘I’m so sorry,’ she started but Jack’s hand gripped hers and held.

‘You’re Allie,’ he said. ‘We know why your animals came to us. Myra’s loved you even though she’s never met you. Your animals have had ten years of good living, thanks to you. You tried your best, girl, as did your grandpa, and there’s no grudges. Want to meet them?’ He motioned towards an ancient mud-spattered truck. ‘Let’s go.’

‘Yes, please.’ Friends today, she thought as she glanced at Matt and he smiled and ushered her towards the truck. Problems tomorrow.

And two minutes later, there they were, beside the dusty dam where two elephants soaked up the morning sun.

They were together as they always had been, two elephants lazing by the bank of a vast man-made dam, half a mile from the homestead. Minnie was still smaller than her mother. She declined to rise from reclining on the mud bank, but Maisie started lumbering across to meet them.

Jack climbed out of the truck and called. Maisie reached Jack, touched him with her great trunk—and then her small eyes moved to see who was accompanying him.

Allie was out of the truck. Maisie and Minnie. Friends.

And Maisie reacted. Her trunk came out and touched Allie—just touched—a feather-touch on the face as though exploring, confirming what she’d suspected.

And it was all Allie could do not to burst into tears.

These guys had been her friends. She’d been the only kid in the circus, home schooled, isolated. Her dogs were with her always, but these two … She’d told them her problems and they’d listened; she thought they’d understood. At fifteen, sixteen, seventeen she hadn’t been able to bear the chains around their great stumps of legs. She’d made such a fuss that her grandfather had mortgaged everything.

It didn’t matter now. She leant all her weight against Maisie’s trunk and Maisie supported her and she thought she’d do it again. Whatever the cost. She’d have no choice.

‘The … the lions?’ she managed. ‘And the monkeys?’

‘They’re a bit more closely contained,’ Jack said ruefully. ‘I can’t give them a hundred miles to roam, much as we’d like to. They only have a couple of miles we can fence securely.’

A couple of miles. She thought back to the six foot by ten foot cages and she thought … she thought …

She thought she just might finally burst into tears.

He stood his distance and watched.

That these elephants knew this woman had never been in doubt. They seemed to be as pleased to see her as she was to see them—that was if he was reading elephant language right which, he had to admit, was a bit of a long call. But Allie surely knew them. She was between the two elephants, hugging as much as she could of them, looking close to tears.

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