Margaret Way - Cattle Baron - Nanny Needed

“How’s it going, Tim?”

“Great, just great, Cal,” the young fellow responded, feeling mightily relieved to see his dynamic cousin who so emanated authority. “I was just about to ask this lady…”

Cal turned away from his hero worshipping young cousin to centre his gaze on the “loose cannon”.

A voice in his head spoke as loud and clear as any oracle: This, MacFarlane, is your kind of woman .

The realisation made his whole body tense. Wouldn’t that be one hell of a thing—to get involved with Ms Wyatt, a woman on the rebound? Yet he swore a leap of something extraordinary passed between them—something well outside an eroticized thrill. Recognition? Such things happened. Instantaneous connection? The wise man would do well to ignore the phenomenon. The wise woman too. The question remained. How in the world had Sinclair given up this goddess for Georgie, even if Georgie came draped in diamonds, rubies and pearls?

Cal held the goddess’s gaze for long measuring seconds, more entranced than he cared to be. Even his cynical old heart seemed to have gone into temporary meltdown. He reined himself in. The sweetest woman could suck the life out of a man, as his bolter mother had sucked the life out of his dad.

“Sorry I’m late. I got held up by a phone call.” He took her arm in a light grasp, disturbed to find she was trembling.

Yet she had the wit to reply smoothly, “No problem.” If that weren’t enough, she reached up and calmly kissed his cheek. “As you can see, I made it on my own.”

“You look wonderful!” He didn’t have to strain to say that.

“Thank you so much.” She gave him a smile that would have taken most men’s breath away.

Okay, so that smile affected him! Lucky for him he’d built up an immunity to beautiful women with smiles like the sunrise.

“So do you,” she returned the compliment. “I’ve rarely seen a man wear a morning suit so well.” She had no difficulty in acknowledging the simple truth. He was a very handsome man in a style that hitherto hadn’t been her cup of tea. She went for a gentler look. If Sean’s looks were often described as “boyish”, this guy was hard set handsome , with electricity crackling all around him. Strong cleft chin. Very tall, very lean with a strongly built frame. Not macho . Nothing as self-conscious or as swaggering as that. Here was a guy who was strong in every sense of the word. Maybe too aggressively male for her taste. And how exactly was he eyeing her?

“Shall we go in?” Cal suggested smoothly. Obviously they couldn’t go back down the steps. She had exquisite creamy skin and the nearest thing he’d seen to golden eyes. It was the oddest thing, but he wanted to sweep off that confounded hat so he could see her hair, which appeared to be a wonderful vibrant bright copper…no, amber, which no doubt accounted for her name.

“Just what I was thinking,” she agreed in a sweetly accommodating voice.

It didn’t fool him one bit. This was one beautiful woman laden with intent . She was here for one singular purpose. To create an almighty stir. So far she was doing extremely well. Little whispers were being passed from one wedding guest to another. There was a lot of compulsive head swivelling, short gasps. Some were staring openly, making no bones about their avid interest. Not that he altogether blamed her for doing this. It took a lot of nerve. But it was his job to stop her. It must have been appalling for Amber Wyatt, squarely in the public eye, to be so publicly humiliated. Sinclair must come from a long line of jackals.

“See you later on, Tim,” he called to his young cousin, aware that Tim was looking after them in wonderment as he swept this gutsy, downright foolhardy young woman inside the church.

Who is he? Amber, despite appearances, was only just managing to keep her nerve. She had to admit this guy was something to behold—and chock-a-block with surprises. She had fully expected to be exposed as a woman in the commission of a serious crime, yet he was acting as though they were a couple. Did he feel desperately sorry for her? Or was he someone who would bundle her out of a side door after a few chastening words? It took her roughly ten seconds to hit on the last option. He wouldn’t have much difficulty doing it. He was several inches over six feet and looked superbly fit. She could see the ripple of lean muscle beneath the close fit of his jacket. He was enormously self-assured. Probably had every reason to be. The unshakeable air of male supremacy that generally put her teeth on edge was well in evidence. It warned against any outrageous behaviour on her part. That and a certain glitter in his eyes. They were—well— lovely , though he would probably cringe to hear that. Shots of sparkling colour in his bronzed face—the cool green of one of her favourite gemstones, the peridot. She couldn’t help registering that not only was the colour remarkable, so too was the intensity.

One thing was certain. She had never seen him before in her life. She’d remember. She liked the fact that she had to tilt her head to look up at him. Not something she did every day. Sean had been forever asking her to wear low heels or even flatties, when she was a girl for whom high heels were not only a necessity but a passion.

Now that her eyes had adjusted to the cool interior of the church after the brilliant sunshine outside, she could see that it was beautifully decorated. She bit down hard on her lip lest a cry escape her.

Even so, it did. “Aah!”

“You’ll get through it,” he told her, his expression Byronic.

“How did I ever convince myself I loved him? Why did I choose him of all the men in the world to marry?” she wailed.

“Seemed like a good idea at the time? You couldn’t have been short of other offers.”

“So what does that say about me? I’m a very poor judge of character?” Zara, unfairly regarded by some as an airhead, had seen through him right from the beginning.

“Maybe love—or what passes for it—truly is blind.”

“It wasn’t love.” She shook her head. More being in love with love. The constant awareness that her biological clock was ticking away? She was twenty-six. She wanted kids. She loved children and they loved her. She had four godchildren at the last count. She was a real favourite with her friends. A marvellous, trustworthy babysitter.

Time to break off her philosophical meanderings with her new best friend.

Masses and masses of white and soft cream flowers shimmered before her distressed eyes. Roses, lilies, peonies, double cream lisianthus, carnations, gladiolus and the exquisitely delicate ivory-white petals of the Phalaenopsis orchids, all wonderfully and inventively arranged. And oh, the perfume! The rows of dark polished pews were lavishly beribboned in white and cream taffeta.

Amber just stood there, letting it all overwhelm her.

Her rescuer drew her to one side as the wedding guests continued to stream in. Amber watched dazedly as he acknowledged this one and that, giving what appeared to be a reassuring inclination of his head to a stony-faced society matron in a drop-dead ghastly misfit of a hat. If looks could annihilate, Amber was sure she would be gasping her last breath. But of course! It was the bride’s mother. As such, didn’t she have a right to demand Amber be thrown out? Mrs Rosemary Erskine in the flesh was an awesome sight.

It was all so unreal she might have been having an out of body experience. And who was this man who kept a light but secure rein on her? Obviously, he was well known. His thick crow-black hair, swept back from a high brow, had a decided deep wave that was clipped to control. The bronze of his skin wasn’t fake. That tan came from a life in the sun. The light grey morning suit, which a lot of men couldn’t successfully carry off, only served to accentuate his height, width of shoulder and the natural elegance of his body. A man of action? He wasn’t any man about town. Impossible to remain anonymous when you looked like that. He certainly wasn’t a friend of Sean’s—his friends tended to be much like himself—so he had to be from the bride’s side.