The Prince's Outback Bride

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‘Avert your eyes.’

‘Shall I tell Claire and Sophie and Marc to avert their eyes as well?’

There was a moment’s baffled silence. Then: ‘Never mind.’ There was a moment’s pause while he obviously tugged on her gym pants and then the door opened.

Whoa.

Well-brought-up young ladies didn’t stare, but there were moments in a woman’s life when it was far too hard to be well brought up. Pippa not only stared—she gaped.

He looked like a body builder, she thought. He was tanned and muscled and rippling in all the right places. He was wearing her pants and they were as stretched on him as they were loose on her. Which was pretty much stretched. His chest was bare.

He should look ridiculous.

He looked stunning.

‘You can’t be a prince,’ she said before she could stop herself and the corners of his mouth turned down in an expression of distaste.

‘I’m not.’ The rebuttal was hard and sharp and it left no room for argument.

‘What are you, then?’

He didn’t reply. He was carrying his bundle of wet clothes in one hand and the blanket in the other. He was meant to put the blanket round his shoulders, she thought. He wasn’t supposed to be bare from the waist up.

He was bare from the waist up and it left her discomforted.

She was so discomforted she could scarcely breathe.

‘What do you mean, what am I?’ he demanded at last. ‘You mean like in, “Are you an encyclopaedia salesman?”?’

‘You’re not an encyclopaedia salesman.’

‘I’m a builder.’

‘A builder.’ The thought took her aback. ‘How can you be a builder?’

He sighed. ‘The same way you get to be an encyclopaedia salesman, I imagine. You find someone who’s a builder and you say, “Please, sir, can you teach me what you know about building?”’

‘That’s what you did.’

‘Yes.’

‘What do you build?’

‘Buildings. Did you say the fish and chips have arrived?’

‘They’re in the kitchen,’ she said with another long look at his bare chest.

‘Will you stop it?’

‘Stop what?’

‘Staring at my chest. Men aren’t supposed to look at women’s chests. I’d appreciate it if you didn’t look at mine.’

‘It’s a very nice chest.’

Whoops.

She’d been out of circulation for too long, she thought in the ensuing silence. Maybe complimenting a man on his chest wasn’t something nicely brought-up women did. He was staring at her as if he’d never experienced such a thing. ‘Sorry,’ she managed at last. ‘Don’t look at me like I’m a porriwiggle. I shouldn’t have said that.’

‘It was a very nice compliment,’ he said cautiously. ‘What’s a porriwiggle?’

‘A tadpole and it’s not a compliment.’ She hesitated and then thought maybe it was. But it was also the truth. ‘Anyway, it’s not what I should be saying. I should be saying thank you for the food.’

‘Why are you destitute?’ He smiled. ‘Tadpoles don’t have money?’

She tugged the door open to the rest of the house, trying frantically to pull herself back into line. ‘We’re not destitute,’ she managed. ‘Just momentarily tight, and if we don’t hurry there’ll be no chips left.’

‘I can always buy more.’

‘Then you’ll get wet all over again. That’s the very last garment in this house that you might just possibly almost fit into, so let’s stop playing in the rain and go eat.’

He sat by the fire in Pippa’s gym pants, eating fish and chips, drinking hot chocolate, staying silent while the life of the farm went on around him.

It was almost as if Pippa didn’t know where to start with the questions, he thought, and that was okay as he was having trouble with the answers. Any minute now he’d have to tell them why he was here, but for now it just seemed too hard.

Pippa had taken one look at the meat and the pile of vegetables he’d brought and said, ‘Pies.’ So now a concoction on the stove was already smelling fantastic. Meanwhile she was rolling pastry and Sophie and Claire were helping.

Marc was hanging wet clothes round the kitchen, on the backs of chairs, over something the kids called a clothes horse, over every available surface.

‘You can’t hang that over me,’ Max said as Marc approached him with a damp windcheater and Marc smiled shyly but proceeded to hang it over the arm of his chair.

‘The fire’s hot. Pippa says the clothes dryer costs money to run.’

‘I’ll pay,’ Max growled and Pippa looked up from her pastry-making and grimaced.

‘That’s enough. You’ve been very generous but there are limits. We’re very grateful for the dryer and we will use it, but only when we must.’

He stared at her, bemused. She had a streak of flour across her face. The girls were making plaits of pastry to put on the pies. They were surrounded by a sea of flour and she didn’t seem to mind. Had he ever met a woman who worried how much it cost to dry clothes? Had he ever met a woman who looked like she did and was just…unaware?

She was knocking him sideways, he thought, dazed. Which was dumb. He’d had girlfriends in his life—of course he had. He was thirty-five. He’d grown pretty damned selective over the years, and the last woman he’d dated had almost rated a ring. Not quite though. She’d been maybe a bit too interested in the royal connection.

So what was he thinking? He hated the royal connection, so any attraction to Pippa would be disastrous. It was only this weird domesticity that was making him feel like this, he decided. Here were echoes of his childhood at his grandparents’ farm. Time out from royalty. Family…

A boy who looked like Thiérry. Cute-as-a-button twins. A snoring old dog.

Pippa.

Pippa had flour on her nose. He had the weirdest desire to kiss…

‘Will you stay for dinner?’ Marc asked, and he thought no, he needed to say what needed to be said and go. Fast. But he just wanted to…

He bit back his stupid wants. What was he thinking? Launching himself across the kitchen past kids and dog and kissing her? You’re losing your mind, boyo.

‘I…Pippa, I need to talk to you.’

But she was focused on pies. ‘These are ready to put together as soon as I come in from the dairy.’ She wiped her hands on her windcheater and smiled ruefully at her floury fingerprints. ‘What a mess. No matter. The cows won’t mind. But they’ll be waiting. I need to start milking.’

‘I’ll bring the cows in for you,’ Marc said, but Pippa shook her head.

‘I’ll do them myself. Marc, can you look after the girls?’ Then she turned to Max, worry behind her eyes. ‘I need to go,’ she said. ‘I assume you’ll be leaving as soon as your clothes dry? I…I’ll leave Dolores here.’

She was torn, he thought. She needed to milk, but she didn’t want to leave the children alone with him. And she couldn’t kick him out until his clothes dried. He looked down at Dolores, who was sleeping off one steak and dreaming of another.

‘She’s a great watchdog.’

Pippa flushed. ‘I didn’t mean…’

‘I know you didn’t,’ he said gently. ‘Do you always milk alone?’

‘Marc helps me a bit. We have a place in the shed where the girls can play and I can watch them. But Marc’s just got over bronchitis and I don’t want him wet again.’

‘I can help,’ Marc protested, but Pippa shook her head.

‘I know you can but I don’t want you to. I want you and the girls to stay dry.’

‘Are they safe here alone?’ Max asked, and then as he saw Marc’s look of indignation he thought maybe it was an inappropriate question.

‘Marc’s more than capable,’ Pippa said, hurriedly before Marc could protest. ‘He’s had to be. But I do have an intercom. I listen in and Marc calls me if there’s a problem.’

‘There’s never a problem,’ Marc said stolidly and Max smiled at him. The more he saw of this kid, the more he liked him.