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He needed time.
‘Wake up, Amy! Wake up!’
Amy felt small fingers trying to prise her eyelids apart.
‘It’s too early,’ she moaned, refusing to open her eyes.
She’d had a dreadful night, endlessly tossing and turning, and she felt as if she’d fallen into a deep sleep only five minutes ago. But a sudden knock at the door brought her smartly awake.
‘Man!’ Bella squealed, gleefully slipping from the bed. ‘Man at the door!’
With a groan, Amy pushed her bedclothes aside and swung her feet to the floor. She had no idea of the time, but daylight was streaming through the shutters.
Bella was banging on the door. ‘Hello, man!’
‘His name’s Seth,’ Amy grumbled. She couldn’t remember where she’d left her dressing gown and she grabbed up a silk wrap to throw around her shoulders to cover her nightgown. ‘Bella, you can’t keep calling him man. Say Seth.’
‘Sef.’
‘That’s better.’ Amy grimaced at her reflection. She looked a fright—hair everywhere, dark circles under her eyes.
There was another knock.
‘Hello, Sef man,’ Bella called through the door.
With one hand clasping the wrap modestly over her front, Amy ran frantic fingers through her hair, but she knew it wouldn’t improve her appearance. She opened the door.
Seth, freshly showered and shaved, was rather too much at such an early hour, but she didn’t have time to go weak at the knees. She was distracted by Bella’s shriek of joy.
‘Hello, Sef!’ the little girl shouted, and she beamed a gorgeous smile up at him, holding her arms up to be lifted.
For a moment, Amy thought he might resist the appeal of those little outstretched hands, but after only the briefest hesitation he bent down and scooped Bella high.
‘How are you this morning, possum?’
Giggling, Bella planted a wet kiss on his cheek and hugged him hard. Amy choked back her surprise. When had this pair become such firm friends?
She watched Seth’s ears redden, but with the typical fickleness of a two-year-old the little girl was soon wriggling to be set down again.
Seth’s smile was shy as he took in Amy’s dishevelled appearance. ‘I see I’m too early for you.’
‘I forgot you cattlemen get up at the crack of dawn.’
His eyes shimmered with mild amusement as he took in her nightgown and her efforts at modesty. He glanced at his wristwatch.
‘What’s the time?’ she asked.
‘Seven-forty.’
‘Oh…well…not exactly dawn, then.’
‘Breakfast’s at eight. Is that too early?’
‘No, that’s fine, thank you.’
She dropped her gaze, unsure what to say now. She wondered if Seth had adjusted to the news that he was Bella’s father. Even though he looked calm enough, he could be angry that she’d come to Serenity under false pretences. Last night she’d lain awake worrying and imagining that he’d send her packing this morning, straight after breakfast.
‘It’s stopped raining,’ Seth said. ‘So you might have an opportunity to take some photos after all.’
‘Really? That’s great.’ She felt her heart skip in relief. So, not straight after breakfast, at least.
Behind her, Bella began bouncing on her bed, treating it like a trampoline.
Amy whirled around. ‘Bella, stop that, or you’ll fall.’ She reached out to catch the little girl’s hand.
‘I was thinking it would be good if you could stay on for a bit longer than we’d planned,’ Seth said, ignoring the distraction.
Amy blinked at him from beneath tumbled hair.
‘You came here because you wanted me to get to know Bella,’ he said. ‘So it doesn’t really make sense that you should rush away too soon.’
‘I—I—’ Catching giggling Bella in midjump, Amy held her close to keep her still. ‘I’d have to change my flights.’
‘I’m sure we could arrange that.’
She rubbed at her forehead, trying to clear her sleep-fuzzed brain. ‘You were so upset last night. Are you sure you want us to stay?’
‘I’ve had time to think, to get used to everything. I’d like the chance to get to know Bella. I’d like her—both of you—to enjoy Serenity.’
‘Will your uncle mind?’
Seth’s face seemed to cave in. Shadows darkened his eyes and his throat worked. ‘My uncle’s not here. He died a couple of years ago.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ she said, but it was hard to feel the appropriate depth of sympathy when she hadn’t known his uncle, especially when her stomach was fluttering madly at the possibility of staying on, alone with Seth.
Amy couldn’t think why she was hesitating. This invitation was exactly what she’d come north to achieve. Twenty-four hours ago, time on Serenity so that Bella could get to know her father had been her primary goal. Her dream.
Twenty-four hours ago, she hadn’t met Seth Reardon. She hadn’t developed a silly, useless and problematic crush that would only get worse if she spent more time with him. But there were other problems, too. There was every chance that Seth would fall for sweet Bella as swiftly and certainly as she had fallen. How would she cope if Seth wanted to keep Bella?
Part of Amy wanted very much to whisk the little girl safely back to Melbourne and to resume her life. She couldn’t give her little girl up.
She would have to make it clear that Bella couldn’t stay at Serenity permanently. That had never been her plan.
Amy knew how Rachel had felt about remote Cape York, and yesterday she’d seen for herself how far Seth’s home was from anywhere else. It was no place for a single dad to try to raise a sociable toddler.
‘Look, I’ll give you time to think about it,’ Seth said, backing down the hall. ‘We can talk about it at breakfast.’
‘No, it’s OK.’ Amy sent him an apologetic smile. ‘It’s a good idea and we’d love to stay. Thank you.’
‘Terrific.’ Seth smiled in a way that put creases in the suntanned skin around his bright blue eyes. ‘We’ll have breakfast on the front veranda at a little after eight. You just have to turn left at the end of the hallway.’
‘OK. Thanks.’
It was only after Seth had gone that Amy realised her wrap had fallen during their conversation—while she was trying to catch the bouncing Bella, no doubt. She’d been standing here, talking to Seth in her fine cotton nightgown, exposed in all its transparent glory.
A glance in the mirror showed her just how much of her Seth had seen, and a blushing river of heat flooded her.
At least he’d been too polite to stare at her breasts.
She wished she could take more comfort from that.
Chapter Four (#ulink_934bab99-e67e-57c9-b3bc-8e3602823e28)
HOLDING Bella’s hand, Amy went down the hallway, turned left, as Seth had directed, and walked into a stream of sunshine.
And an idyllic tropical paradise.
‘Goodness, Bella, where are we?’
Last night, entering by the back steps in the rainy dark, Amy had realised that Seth’s home was comfortable—but now she saw that not one thing about it came even close to her idea of a cattleman’s residence.
The veranda at the front of the house was so deep it formed large, outdoor rooms. She paused in the doorway to take it all in.
From here she could see a dining area and, beyond that, bamboo cane lounge chairs grouped around a coffee table, and, beyond that again, a desk with a telephone and a high-backed chair. Gently circling ceiling fans and huge potted palms gave the whole area an elegant, Oriental air.
She saw the garden beyond the veranda and gasped…Instead of hectares of dry, grassy paddocks, the Serenity homestead was fronted by terraces of smooth lawns and lush tropical gardens where delicate orchids grew side by side with bright bougainvillea and graceful palms. Heavens, there was even a swimming pool on one of the terraces.
The entire grounds were set in a haven of green on a densely wooded hillside, with views to white sandy beaches, a bright, glittering sea, and the dark emerald silhouettes of offshore islands.
It was gorgeous. Unreal. Amy felt as if she’d woken up at a resort and, at any minute, a waiter would appear to offer her a long, colourful drink with clinking ice cubes and a tiny paper umbrella.
Seth rose from the dining table and came towards them, smiling at the stunned expression on Amy’s face.
‘This is amazing,’ she said.
‘Glad you like it.’
‘But—’ She made a sweeping gesture that took in the gardens edged by rainforest and the view. ‘Where are your cattle?’
Seth laughed. ‘We passed through the grazing country yesterday. Over to the west. Not far away at all. There’s only a narrow fringe of this rainforest along the coastal mountains.’
‘But it’s beautiful.’ She could so easily imagine Rachel living here, soaking up the exotic atmosphere.
That thought brought Amy straight back to earth.
Which was just as well. She knew she couldn’t allow herself to be carried away by the beauty of Seth’s home.
It would be prudent to keep Rachel at the forefront of her thoughts. She had to remember that it was right here, in this setting, that Rachel and Seth had been swept away by a passionate liaison.
Bella was tugging at her hand. ‘Look, look! A swimming pool!’ She tried to pull Amy towards the sparkling blue water. ‘My go swimming.’
‘Not now,’ Amy told her. ‘We’re going to have breakfast.’
Bending quickly, she picked the little girl up and hugged her, and as they took their places at the dining table she wished she didn’t feel so unaccountably afraid.
Her desire for Bella to know her father had been driven purely by emotion. Families were important to Amy. Her own family was big and noisy and loving and she hated that Bella knew no one who was related to her by blood. Now, suddenly, Amy was looking at this gorgeous property, and was forced to accept practical realities that outweighed emotion.
Seth Reardon was seriously wealthy. He didn’t merely own vast tracts of land and mobs of valuable cattle. His home was beautiful and comfortable and he had domestic help, and an aeroplane, for heaven’s sake.
Bella was his daughter, his potential heiress, and if Seth wanted to he could hire a nanny for her and she could live here with him quite happily and safely.
Last night, when he’d been stunned and shocked, Seth had agreed that Amy could take Bella back to Melbourne. Naively, she’d had no doubt that she was the very best person to raise the little girl. She’d even broken up with Dominic because she believed that so vehemently.
But already, less than a day after arriving at Serenity, she was having deep misgivings about her right to make such demands.
Had Rachel felt similar doubts? Was that why she’d kept her pregnancy secret?
‘Let’s eat,’ Seth said, watching her with a puzzled smile, and she turned her attention to the food.
Clearly Ming was a genius, and their breakfast was a meal of stunning simplicity. A beautiful fruit platter of passionfruit, vividly hued pawpaw and mango, and a star-shaped fruit Amy had never seen before, was followed by perfectly delicious, lightly spiced mushrooms and tomatoes on toasted homemade bread.
Bella ate a banana cut up in a bowl of yoghurt with golden circles of honey drizzled on top.
‘That’s one of her favourite breakfasts,’ Amy told Seth as she watched the little girl eagerly wielding her spoon.
‘I took a guess when I suggested fruit and yoghurt to Ming. He’s not used to cooking for a two-year-old.’
‘Are you?’ she couldn’t help asking. ‘Have you had much experience with children?’
‘Only what I’ve observed with other people’s kids.’
Which meant he was more observant than most bachelors, she decided unhappily. Again, she felt an anxious swoop in her chest at the possibility of giving up Bella.
‘I’m guessing that Bella might enjoy a play in the pool before it gets too hot,’ Seth said when they’d finished their meal.
‘I’m sure she would. She loves the water.’ Amy was grateful that she’d included their bathers when she’d packed, but she’d expected to be swimming in an Outback creek or a river, not a beautifully tiled, sparkling, manmade pool.
‘Go swimming,’ Bella announced, pulling at Amy’s hand.
Amy gave her a wistful smile. ‘When your breakfast’s gone down.’
But it wasn’t very long before she gave in and Bella was racing ahead of her down the smooth stone steps to greet Seth at the edge of the pool.
‘Look, Sef!’ the little girl announced with great excitement. ‘I’m a ballerdina!’ She spun around, so he could admire her red and white spotted swimsuit edged with cute frills.
‘You’re a beautiful ballerina,’ he assured her. ‘Bella the water-baby ballerina.’
His smiling gaze flickered to Amy and she was glad she’d splurged on a new swimsuit for herself. She knew she was no real beauty, but she’d always been told she had decent legs, and the swimsuit was dark green and perfectly cut to flatter her figure. Even though she wasn’t trying to impress this man, she was quietly pleased that she looked OK.
