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The Cattleman, The Baby and Me
Michelle Douglas
4th May, Newarra Cattle Station, the Outback…Dear Diary I came to the Outback to fulfil my sister’s wishes and find my little nephew’s father. But poor Harry no longer has a daddy, and I’m staying with his uncle. Liam’s an Outback cattleman through and through, and doesn’t seem happy about us landing on his doorstep.But, oh, my, he’s indescribably gorgeous! I’ve seen his tough edges soften when he’s seen adorable Harry smile…maybe I can make his heart melt too? Sapphie x
OUTBACK BABY TALES
Newborns, new arrivals, newlyweds
In a beautiful but isolated landscape, three sisters follow three very different routes to parenthood against all odds and find love with brooding men…
Discover the soft side of three rugged Outback cattlemen as they win over these feisty women and a handful of adorable babies!
Your journey through the tears and triumphs began last month:
ONE SMALL MIRACLEMelissa James
The pitter-patter of tiny feet continues this month with:
THE CATTLEMAN, THE BABY AND MEMichelle Douglas
And next month there’s a motherhood miracle in:
THEIR NEWBORN GIFTNikki Logan
The Cattleman, The Baby and Me
By
Michelle Douglas
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
At the age of eight, Michelle Douglas was asked what she wanted to be when she grew up. She answered, ‘A writer.’ Years later she read an article about romance-writing and thought, Ooh, that’ll be fun. She was right. When she’s not writing she can usually be found with her nose buried in a book. She is currently enrolled in an English Master’s programme for the sole purpose of indulging her reading and writing habits further. She lives in a leafy suburb of Newcastle, on Australia’s east coast, with her own romantic hero—husband Greg, who is the inspiration behind all her happy endings. Michelle would love you to visit her at her website www.michelle-douglas.com
Recent titles by this author:
BACHELOR DAD ON HER DOORSTEP
THE ARISTOCRAT AND THE SINGLE MUM
To Mum, with love.
Table of Contents
Cover Page (#uf665cfbf-ad88-5d62-86b2-3879f4dd4632)
Excerpt (#u63ef7f7a-91d4-50cc-b65d-96c8784b7b4a)
Title Page (#ucb34f657-8dcf-5624-87b3-2280489fe23f)
About the Author (#udb8cafad-8fbf-5b95-ac1f-eb985c45fd25)
Dedication (#ucd3f92e2-1310-5498-8943-2dc187cac15e)
Chapter One (#u09200f4d-fd65-59b8-a81c-68e68081449c)
Chapter Two (#ube5893f3-6ce5-5487-9c34-0fe9e609f54c)
Chapter Three (#u9d8d9cfd-8f3d-5dca-abd5-ad7df34763d4)
Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE
‘THAT’S the Jarndirri out station down there.’
At the pilot’s words Sapphie Thomas turned from the baby sleeping beside her to stare out of the mail plane’s window. Anna and Lea Curran—her best friends—had grown up on Jarndirri. Sapphie had spent a lot of time there herself. She’d deftly fed that piece of information to Sid, the pilot, earlier. Sapphie didn’t get into small planes with strange men without them knowing she had friends in high places—friends who could come to her aid in a flash if the need arose.
She stared down at the out station and longing and pain hit her in equal measure. Her chest tightened. ‘You’re not going to land, are you?’
Her chest tightened even more. She didn’t want Sid to land. She didn’t want to step foot on Jarndirri at the moment. For lots of reasons—not least being the letter she’d received two days ago.
She pushed that thought away. She didn’t have time to dwell on it. Instead, she thought how a landing might wake Harry, and she didn’t want that. Her twelve-month old nephew, it seemed, hated flying. He hated landings and take-offs. He hated the dust and the heat and the flies. He hated the glare of the sun in its cloudless sky, and hated Sapphie trying to change his nappy in the close confines of the plane. He hated it all—with a capital H—and he had the lungs to prove it. Sapphie had wanted to wail right alongside him.
She’d wanted to wail because Harry hated her too.
During the long, hot five hours they’d so far endured on the plane he’d only stopped crying when she’d given him his bottle—most of the contents of which he had then thrown up all over her shirt. Finally, through sheer exhaustion, he’d fallen asleep. She didn’t want him woken for any reason whatsoever. So not landing at Jarndirri would suit her perfectly. She waited for Sid’s answer.
‘Nah,’ Sid drawled. ‘They radioed through earlier. They don’t have anything for me to collect. And as I don’t have anything for them…’
Sapphie gulped back a sigh of relief. In the next instant her shoulders went all tight again. ‘What about the main Jarndirri station? Will you be landing there?’ The Jarndirri homestead was several hundred kilometres northeast of the out station, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t on Sid’s mail route.
Don’t be an idiot, she chided herself. You’re not going to accidentally bump into Anna or Lea out here. Neither was currently in residence at Jarndirri. Anna was in Broome with Jared, and Lea was at Yurraji—the property in the far north that her grandfather had left her.
And Bryce had died six years ago. She wasn’t going to run into him.
The plane bounced as it hit a pocket of turbulence. Sapphie’s stomach churned and bile rose up to burn her throat. Normally she was a good flyer.
Normally? Ha! Normally she wouldn’t be flying over the northwestern corner of the Australian continent—one of the most remote regions in the world—without any form of invitation. And if she did it would be to see Anna or Lea, not to track down some man she’d never met in her life before.
There was nothing normal about the turn her life had taken in the last two days.
‘The main Jarndirri station is on a different mail run,’ Sid said. ‘Mail delivery to this part of the Kimberley’s on a Thursday. Mail delivery to that part of the Kimberley’s on a Tuesday.’
Sapphie closed her eyes for a moment, beyond grateful that she’d arrived in Broome yesterday. If she’d left it another day then she would have had to wait an entire week to catch the mail plane to Newarra. Broome was small. Anna would have heard that Sapphie was in town, and…
And that didn’t bear thinking about.
Beside her, Harry stirred. Sapphie held her breath. When he didn’t wake, she let it out in one long, slow exhalation. Please, please, please let him sleep for a bit.
He needed the rest.
He needed the peace.
And she needed to think.
What a mess! She’d have dropped her face to her hands, only she didn’t want Sid to see how desperate she was.
‘You’re looking a bit peaky,’ he said anyway.
She had a feeling that as far as descriptions went ‘peaky’ was being kind. She wrestled for a smile. Sid had been kind. ‘Perhaps because I’m feeling kind of peaky.’
He jerked his head in Harry’s direction. ‘Hardly surprising.’
A surge of protectiveness washed over her. Harry might hate her, but she’d fallen in love with him from the first moment she’d clapped eyes on him. ‘He’s not a good flyer,’ she murmured.
‘Lots of kiddies aren’t.’
‘I’m sorry, Sid. This must have been the flight from hell for you, and—’
‘There’s nothing to apologise for,’ the pilot said gruffly.
Yes, there was. There was a wealth of things to apologise for.
Sapphie’s eyes burned. She closed her hand gently around Harry’s foot. How could she make up to him for everything that had happened? How could she help him feel loved and secure again? There weren’t enough apologies in the world to make up for the fact that Harry had been lumped with her instead of someone who would know what to do, who would know how to comfort him properly and ease his fears…someone who deserved the right to look after him. That person wasn’t her.
There was no one else.
‘Oh, Harry,’ she whispered, bending over him and pushing the sweat-soaked hair from his forehead. ‘I’m sorry.’
She’d found out about Harry’s existence two days ago, when her nineteen-year-old sister, Emmy, had been arrested on drug charges. Two days ago…The day Sapphie had turned twenty-five. The same day she’d discovered Bryce Curran was her biological father.
She pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes. She’d spent the last three years searching high and low for Emmy. With no success. When Emmy had rung two days ago Sapphie had thought it the best birthday present she’d ever received.
But her little sister hadn’t rung to wish her a happy birthday. She hadn’t even remembered it was Sapphie’s birthday. She’d rung from Perth Central Police Station—‘I need help.’ When Sapphie had arrived, Emmy had pushed Harry into her arms with a fierce, ‘Promise me you’ll find his father.’
Sapphie had promised. What else could she do? Somehow she’d let her little sister down in every way that counted. She would not fail her on this. She would find Harry’s father.
She knew what it was like to grow up without a father, always wondering who he was, never knowing his identity. She would not let that happen to Harry.
Unbidden, a ripple of relief speared through her. There was someone other than her who could take responsibility for Harry, and she thanked God for it. Emmy had given her dates, locations…and a name. ‘Liam Stapleton—a cattleman in the Kimberley. You’re familiar with the area. Anna and Lea Curran will help you if you ask them.’
Sapphie had to wrestle with the bile that rose through her. She couldn’t ask them. Not now. Not knowing what she knew. If Anna and Lea ever discovered that Bryce had been unfaithful to their dying mother…and that Sapphie was the result of that infidelity…
‘You going to be sick?’
Sapphie started, pulled in a breath and shook her head. She fought to find another smile. And won. ‘No, I’m just a bit worn out, that’s all.’
‘Why don’t you get some shut-eye like that littlie of yours? Do you the world of good.’
Littlie of hers? She swallowed back the hysteria that threatened to swamp her. She didn’t have the energy to correct him. If she’d made a different decision seven years ago she might have a littlie now, but…
She shied away from the thought. She couldn’t follow it. Not today. Not for as long as she was responsible for Harry.
A weight slammed down on her so hard she half expected the plane to lose altitude. She gazed at Harry and a lump lodged in her throat. At eighteen she’d lacked her little sister’s courage. I’m sorry, Harry. I wish there was someone better to step up to the plate for you. I wish…
‘It’ll be another forty minutes before we reach Newarra.’
Newarra—Liam Stapleton’s cattle station. Sapphie closed her eyes. ‘Thanks, Sid, a catnap might be just the thing.’ She had to save her energy. She’d need it all once they landed if she was to fulfil the promise she’d made to Emmy—to see that this Liam Stapleton accepted responsibility for his son.
A wave of exhaustion hit her. It would be no easy task. Not when Liam Stapleton was as ignorant of Harry’s existence as Sapphie had been two days ago.
‘You did say Liam was expecting you, like—right?’
‘That’s right.’ Sapphie kept her eyes closed in case they betrayed her lie.
‘Looks like he’s waiting for you.’
Her eyes flew open. They were flying over Newarra right now? She pressed her face to the window and took in the golden-green grasses and low scrub below, a stand of boab trees and the glint of a river in the distance. An enormous homestead emerged beneath them, the cool white of its weatherboards and the greenness of its surrounding gardens crisp and inviting in the harsh sunlight.
And then the airstrip came into view. Waiting to one side was a white four-wheel drive ute. The air left her lungs on a whoosh. Emmy hadn’t lied. It appeared that Harry’s father was in charge of a cattle dynasty that rivalled Jarndirri’s in size and scope.
The plane descended. She stared at the white ute and her stomach started to churn. She hadn’t rung Liam Stapleton. She hadn’t sent a telegram or an e-mail or anything. She hadn’t wanted to give him a chance to surround himself with lawyers, to fob her off—to fob Harry off.
The plane touched down and she fought back the panic scratching at her throat. Staring down at a sleeping Harry, she squared her shoulders. She was doing the right thing. Harry belonged with his father. After his initial shock, Liam Stapleton would see that too. He would do the right thing by Harry. She’d make sure of it.
Sid jumped out of the plane the moment he brought it to a halt. Sapphie glanced at Harry, who’d remained sleeping. She bit her lip and then glanced back outside. She wouldn’t be far away. If Harry woke, she’d hear him. Filling her lungs with air, she scrambled out of the plane after Sid.
