Elizabeth Duke - The Marriage Pact

‘No. I won’t be leaving my son at home with a nanny or with my mother or with anyone else.’ His answer came easily. ‘I’ll be taking him with me to Australia. Assuming I can find someone to help me look after him for the next three months... possibly longer.’

‘Oh.’ She let that sink in, conscious that her heart was pounding like a wild jungle drum in her chest. If he meant what she thought he meant...

‘Your mother can’t fly to Australia with you?’ Find out all you can about him before you start even thinking about what he might be proposing.

‘Unfortunately not. She hates flying. Refuses to fly. And, anyway, she’ll have the farm to look after. She’s anxious to get back there.’

‘The farm? You mean...she doesn’t live in London?’

‘No. She’s only staying at my London apartment this week while she’s interviewing nannies and preparing Jamie for his trip to Australia. Normally she lives at our family farm in the Cotswolds. She’s helped me look after Jamie since...my wife died. With the help of various nannies.’

Claire inhaled slowly and deeply. So...he was a widower. Her heart softened a trifle. ‘You’re saying that Jamie has been living on a farm in the Cotswolds with your mother while you live and work in London?’ She couldn’t keep a note of censure from her voice.

‘I try to divide my time between both places. Jamie is a very active child and is happier living on the farm than in town. I spend as much of my time there as I can.’

But he wasn’t there all the time. Poor Jamie. No mother...and only a part-time father. But at least Adam intended taking his son to Australia with him. He must have some parental feeling.

‘Just what exactly do you want from me?’ she asked bluntly.

He put down his cup and smiled. Rather too complacently for her liking.

‘It seems we each have something to offer the other. I’m offering you a free flight back to Australia—hopefully within the next couple of days—and an extremely well-paid job within easy reach of Melbourne for the next three months or so. I’ll pay part of your salary up front to establish my bona fides. In return you’ll help me look after Jamie during the flight and afterwards at my sheep property in Victoria’s Western District.

‘And, since I know you’re a qualified accountant and that you wish to keep your hand in, I’ll ask you to do the farm accounts for me and possibly some auditing, for which I’ll pay you accordingly. Well?’

She flicked her tongue over her lips. ‘There’s just one thing...’ She hesitated. There were lots of things, actually, but one thing was uppermost in her mind right now.

‘And that is?’

‘The reason I’m so anxious to get back to Melbourne...’ She swallowed, sure that he’d withdraw his offer the moment he heard it.

‘You have...an attachment back in Melbourne?’ he assisted delicately. ‘A lover waiting for you?’

She recoiled. ‘I certainly do not!’ A spark of contempt turned the grey of her eyes to pure silver. ‘I have no...attachments, as you call them.’ Her tone was icy. ‘And I don’t intend to.’ She drew in a breath. ‘Ever again.’

Rather than looking shocked or surprised—or uttering the usual platitudes about possibly meeting someone else one day and changing her mind—his mouth twisted, almost in approval. Or...empathy? ‘You’re through with love and all that stuff, are you?’ he asked, looking more curious than concerned.

Her gaze fluttered away. ‘I can live without another man in my life... yes.’

Nigel’s betrayal, and the misery Ralph Bannister was putting her sister through, had been more than enough to make her vow never to get emotionally involved with any man ever again. Least of all with an Englishman. Love left you weak and vulnerable—at the mercy of your emotions. She never intended to lose control of her life and emotions the way poor Sally had lost control of hers. She’d come close to it with Nigel, and she didn’t intend to come close ever again.

He didn’t press her. ‘So if it’s not a man, why are you so anxious to get home?’

She sighed. ‘It’s...my sister.’

‘Your sister?’ Now he did look surprised.

‘My sister isn’t well. She’s pregnant. She’s been so sick she’s had to give up her work...as a model. And—and her husband isn’t any help. Financially or in any other way.’

Now that she’d started, the rest tumbled out. ‘Ralph—her husband—has no job. He gets involved in wild schemes that come to nothing. When he does make some money—usually with a win at the casino, or the races—he gambles it away again so they’re always struggling to pay off their debts. And—and now he’s actually urging her to get rid of the baby! It—it’s so unfair. All Sally’s ever wanted is a normal, happy home life. A husband, a home and babies. The poor thing’s at her wit’s end.’

She flushed as she stopped for breath, sure he must be regretting now that he’d ever offered her a job.

‘And you feel responsible for her?’ Rather than trying to back off, he actually leaned forward. ‘What about the rest of your family? Your parents? Other members of the family?’

‘There’s only Sally and me.’ She gulped, finding the dark, quizzical gaze disconcerting. To avoid it she concentrated on his mouth instead, her eyes tracing the firm sensual outline of his lips. Another mistake!

She let her gaze veer away altogether and reached for her coffee—even though the cup was already empty.

‘No one else?’ he pressed.

She snatched in a quick breath. ‘No. Our mother died when Sally was only three—I was eight—and our grandmother helped Dad bring us up. But Gran died before Sally was ten, and our father died while Sally was in her last year at school...I was at university. So I’ve really been a mother to Sally for most of her life—and I’ve had sole responsibility for her since Dad died.’

‘And you still feel responsible for her, even now that she’s married?’

She heaved a deep quivering sigh. ‘I’ve tried not to interfere but it’s been hard not to when I’ve seen what her husband’s been doing to her. He swept into her life like some shining knight and offered to lay the world at her feet. He had money then—a big win at the casino, I suppose—but. in fact—’

She stopped, sucking in a fraught breath. What was she doing, pouring out her troubles—worse, her sister’s private problems—to a man who for all she knew might be no better than Ralph or Nigel?

But—her chin came up—there was one big difference. This man was offering her the chance to get back to Australia within the next couple of days, and he was offering her a well-paid job once she was back in Victoria for at least three months. She’d be crazy to throw an offer like that back in his face.

‘I...I’ll need a couple of days in Melbourne first with my sister,’ she told him, wanting to be honest with him, even if it meant waving goodbye to a free flight home. ‘I want to make sure she’s all right...and do what I can to help her get back on her feet.’ She looked up at him expectantly. Hopefully.

‘Not a problem. I’ll be spending two or three days in Melbourne myself before this wedding I have to go to. I want to check up on the information technology centre I set up in Melbourne last year. It’s being run by Australians—very successfully. I’m in electronics,’ he explained, ‘with my brother, Luke, who’s based in London. Our business has been profitable enough to help finance our farming interests. So, Claire...’

His eyes were darkly persuasive as they caught and pinned hers. ‘Would three days in Melbourne be sufficient for you to sort things out with your sister? And remember, this property you’ll be going to—Yangalla—will only be a phone call away from her and less than three hours away from Melbourne by car. It’s not as if you’ll be going to the remote Outback.’