Princes of the Outback Bundle Read online

  Compared to that hellish day, this would be sunshine and laughter.

  That didn’t stop her nerves skittering back to life when she heard the steady clip-clop of horses’ hooves. Two of them ambled into view, Nic riding one and leading the other.

  He stopped at the edge of the garden and raised his hat in a very cowboy way. “Mornin’, ma’am.”

  That phony western accent should have made her smile. It did steady her nerves somewhat, although her heart did a funny skip. How could she have known it harbored a secret cowboy fetish?

  “Must say I didn’t expect to see you up this early.”

  “Been up for hours,” she lied.

  “Couldn’t sleep?”

  “I need to get an early start. It’s a long drive back to Darwin.” And that was only the first leg of her trip back home. From that northern city she faced a four-and-a-half hour flight to Sydney. This truly was the middle of the outback, a long, long way from anywhere.

  Nic’s eyes were shaded by his broad-brimmed stockman’s hat, but she felt his gaze narrow on her face. “You’re kidding me, right?”

  “No.”

  For a second, nothing. He just sat there on his horse, quiet as the morning, studying her. Then, “I thought you had more sense.”

  Livvy stiffened. “I beg your pardon?”

  “You drove all the way from Darwin yesterday. Nine hours straight?”

  Reluctantly, she nodded.

  “You look like you slept about as good as me.”

  “I slept just—”

  “And now you’re going to turn around,” he said over the top of her, “and drive back.”

  “I have a ticket on tonight’s flight. I need to get home. To pack.”

  He eyed her silently another moment. “I can fly you back tomorrow. Direct, here to Sydney. No long drive to the Darwin airport. No check-in line. No airline food.”

  She was shaking her head before he finished. “Uh-uh, no way. You won’t get me up in one of your dinky little planes.”

  “The King Air’s neither dinky nor little. The Carlisles had it custom fitted. It’ll be like flying in your own private plane.”

  It would mean staying here, with you, an extra day and night. “I don’t think so.”

  “What about this talk we need to have? You want me to come up there and we can go at it right now?”

  Livvy’s stomach churned. Oh, God. I’m so not ready for this.

  “On the other hand, if you stayed, you could save it till tonight or tomorrow morning.” His voice was slow and reasonable and ever so tempting. “There’d be no rush at all.”

  Chapter Six

  Nic knew he had her, but he reined in the urge to grin and yee-haw like the cowboy he was decked out as. He didn’t want to get too cocky. Getting her to stay an extra day was only half the battle.

  “You want to go and get dressed?”

  “Why?” she asked, eyes narrow with suspicion.

  He bit back the instant answer: because the sight of you in pajamas is making sitting on a horse pretty damn uncomfortable. Even with the wild hair and the dark circles under her eyes, she made his insides tight just looking at her. “We’re taking you riding.”

  “We?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Me and Charlie here.” He lifted the reins on the lead horse. “He’ll be your steed for today.”

  “He appears to be asleep.”

  “Charlie can sleep just about anywhere. That’s half his charm.”

  After a little more cajoling, she dragged herself off. While he waited, Nic amused himself by picturing her getting dressed. Also not the comfortable thing to do while sitting in an unforgiving saddle.

  Half a lifetime later she sauntered back out wearing jeans and boots and a hat belonging to Maura Carlisle. She could have passed for a regular stockhand ready for a day’s muster, until she stood beside the horse and looked up. “That looks like a long way to fall.”

  “Trust me, you won’t fall.”

  Helping her denim-wrapped backside into the saddle was a treat in itself. As he adjusted her stirrups and showed her how to hold the reins, Nic congratulated himself on this inspired idea. Lying awake during the night he hadn’t come up with a lot more in the way of ideas.

  Oh, he’d thought about sabotaging her car so she couldn’t leave but that hadn’t sat right. Then he’d tried to imagine coming home from his contract stints overseas without having her waiting for him afterward. And, yeah, the sabotage idea had then sat a whole lot straighter.

  Lucky he hadn’t needed to resort to that. Postponing their talk had been enough. That and the lure of a ride back to Sydney in one of the Carlisles’ private planes.

  “This isn’t so hard.”

  Nic turned to find her smiling, delighted at her achievement of staying on board. “You look like you were born to it, Annie Oakley.”

  “Yeah?”

  Man, she was something when she smiled. Pure sunshine and, hell, the emotion just kind of welled up from his chest. He couldn’t find any words to describe it—nothing but, “Christ, I’ve missed you, Liv.”

  And, of course, the clouds came over her smile and he kicked himself all the way to purgatory and back again.

  They rode up to the Barakoolie ridge with its commanding view of the station. Either the startling vista, the relaxing cadence of horseback or the breathtaking combination of sky and earth and ranges chased the clouds away again. Side by side they sat and took it all in, and Nic felt that same chest-full feeling as when Liv’d smiled.

  The same as when he’d landed yesterday, only more so because of the woman at his side.

  As if feeling the gravity of his gaze on her face, Liv turned in her saddle and met his eyes. They were so close that when his horse fidgeted their knees brushed. So close that she leaned across and touched his hand when she said, “Thank you for bringing me up here. For this alone, I’m glad I stayed.”

  Nic couldn’t think of anything to say to that. So he turned her hand over, trapping it in his. There was nowhere for her to go, no way she could escape, and as soon as his mind latched on to that fact, he couldn’t help himself.

  He leaned across and kissed her.

  Chapter Seven

  There was a moment before their lips met when Olivia could have ducked away. A hint of hesitation as their gazes linked and she read the question in his eyes.

  Your choice, Livvy: yes or no?

  Perhaps, she could have resisted if that was all. But beyond the simple, she read the complex—a dark yearning, a fierce heat, a watershed of emotion that washed through her from head to toe.

  And then the moment was gone, engulfed in sensation as he closed that last inch. His lips were warm, his touch restrained, as if he were savoring that first contact as much as she.

  She drew a breath, and her senses filled with the scent of leather and earth and Nic. As his lips moved against hers, touching, retreating, returning, her eyes drifted shut and she let herself drift, too.

  Back to the day they met, here at Kameruka Downs, at her sister’s wedding to Tomas Carlisle. She’d been with Grant at the time, but she’d seen Nic watching her. They’d danced—one long, slow, up-close number—and at the end he’d kissed her hand. One brief, glancing lick of heat and her knees had almost given out. She’d known then that his kisses would change her world.

  They didn’t hook up until two years later, but holy Toledo, she had been right about his kissing!

  One of the horses snorted and she felt his mouth kick into a smile even as he deepened the kiss. One of his hands slid around her neck, holding her still, drawing her closer, while he slowly—oh, so slowly—tasted his way into her mouth.

  He started to retreat. She followed. Wanting more, not nearly ready for the kiss to finish. It would be their last, she reasoned, and how fitting it should be here, at Kameruka, where it all began.

  Around the edges of her senses a noise intruded—a vague rumble that sounded like a vehicle. Then her horse shifted beneath her and she s
tarted to tip sideways. Nic rescued her, his hand sliding from her neck to her arm, holding her steady until she’d regained her balance.

  “Okay?”

  She nodded, unsure which had rocked her more—the threat of tumbling from the side-stepping horse or Nic’s kiss. Or could it be the fact she’d succumbed so easily and completely to his move?

  His hand slid away from her arm and she realized that his attention had also shifted.

  Following the direction of his narrowed gaze, she saw a vehicle stopped at the end of the track and recognized it as the sound that had disturbed their kiss.

  “It’s Jeremy.” Nic frowned. “One of the jackaroos. I’d better see what he wants.”

  Nic urged his horse forward and then into a canter. Olivia followed at her own pace, which was slow. Her heart, however, had started to gallop. Even from this distance she could see the serious expression on the young stockman’s face, could sense the tension in Nic as he dismounted.

  Was it bad news from the hospital? About Mr. Carlisle?

  Clinging to the saddle with hands, knees and willpower, she clicked Charlie up a gear and somehow made it to the men without falling off. “What’s happened?”

  “A rollover on the Boolah road,” Nic said shortly. “A family. They need help, urgently.”

  “What kind of help? Is there a flying doctor available?”

  The Royal Flying Doctor Service operated all over the outback, as far as she knew. They flew in to provide medical care in isolated communities and took the injured and ill to hospital.

  “They’re on their way but at least an hour away, maybe more.” Nic didn’t waste time with instructions on dismounting—he just hauled her body from the saddle and handed the reins over to Jeremy. Nic began to sprint toward the vehicle, so she followed. “We can get there in half that time.”

  “In the truck?”

  He cut her a quick look as she slid into the passenger seat. “By plane. That’s why Jeremy came to fetch me. The other pilots are out on muster. I’m it.”

  “But how can you help?” Her voice came out croaky, husky with fear. She should have stayed with Jeremy, helped with the horses, but already they were tearing across the plain, heading straight for the airstrip. “What can you do when you get there?”

  “Mark out a landing strip for the doc’s plane, then do whatever I can. There’s kids, Liv. Whether they’re hurt or not, they’ll be scared. Are you coming with me?”

  Chapter Eight

  The accident could have been a lot worse. A family on holiday, driving too fast in a four-by-four loaded with camping gear, got into trouble on a rutted dirt road and tipped the top-heavy vehicle over. The result: an unconscious mother, two kids with broken bones, and a helluvalot of pain and anxiety.

  But with the medical care they were now receiving, they’d be all right. The Royal Flying Doctor Service aircraft had taken off ten minutes earlier with the whole family on board, leaving Nic and Olivia alone again.

  Hands on hips, Nic squinted into the distance where he could just make out Olivia’s slight figure. She’d walked off once the children she’d been comforting were in the hands of the medical team. He’d let her go, knowing she needed to compose herself.

  At least a dozen times he’d wished he hadn’t asked her to come. The first was back at the Kameruka airstrip, when he saw her grow pale and almost rigid with fear as he buckled her into the station plane. And he remembered her words from that morning: You won’t get me up in one of your dinky little planes.

  “You don’t have to do this,” he’d said, suddenly struck by the extent of her fear.

  “I want to,” she said, gritting her teeth. “Now stop wasting time. Get this thing off the ground before I lose my courage…and/or my breakfast!”

  For a second he’d closed his hand over her white-knuckled grip on the seat, and once airborne he’d tried to distract her with a running commentary on the landmarks. Maybe it helped a little.

  Their hairy landing at the accident site hadn’t.

  Nic slapped a hand against the Cessna’s fuselage. Considering the lack of a formed strip, he’d done a decent enough job putting them down. But they’d hit a couple of deep ruts in the road—much the same as the tourists in their vehicle—and he wasn’t taking the plane up again until she’d been thoroughly checked out.

  Now he had to break that news to Olivia.

  “Please don’t tell me I have to get back into that thing,” she said as soon as he was within hearing distance. “Not yet.”

  “Okay. I won’t. And you don’t.”

  Exhaling long and loud with relief, she turned to look at him. Thank God she’d gotten some color back in her face. But deep in her eyes he could see the remnant strain, from both the flight and the chaos they found at the accident site.

  Later they would talk about that…and other things. Like why she’d let him kiss her earlier and why she’d kissed him back. In his mind, that changed everything. But for now—

  “Are you up for a walk?”

  Her eyes narrowed a fraction. “Where to?”

  “Boolah stock camp.” Nic tilted his head toward the south. “It’s a few miles thataway.”

  Her gaze shifted in the direction he indicated. “What‘s there?”

  “Well, I haven’t been there in ten years but I’m hoping there’s water and supplies from the last muster.”

  “Supplies as in food?”

  “Yup.”

  Breakfast had been a long time ago and they’d missed lunch. He could tell by the look on her face that Liv liked the idea of lunch. And that she was putting together the rest of the story.

  “Did that landing damage the plane?” she asked.

  “Maybe. Maybe not. But I’m not risking taking her up on a maybe call.”

  Something sharpened in her gaze, an emotion, an agreement, then was gone. She moistened her lips. “Are you telling me we’re stranded out here?”

  “Only until someone comes looking for us.”

  He didn’t tell her that a search party wouldn’t leave until the morning. Or that he’d radioed Kameruka from the grounded plane and made sure of that.

  Chapter Nine

  Considering the alternatives—getting back in that devil-monster-with-wings or sitting on a rock in the middle of nowhere until they were rescued—Olivia didn’t mind the long walk. For the first mile or two she appreciated the slow pace and Nic’s silence. Both helped unwind the knots of tension that had twisted tighter and tighter over the past few hours.

  When he did talk, it wasn’t about the accident or their postponed we-have-to-talk talk. It was snippets about growing up here at Kameruka Downs with his brother Carlo and sister Angie and the three Carlisle brothers. Light, amusing stuff that kept her from dwelling on dark, unamusing thoughts.

  She walked. She even managed an occasional smile, and degree by degree, mile by mile, she found herself relaxing. Perhaps, it would be all right. Perhaps, given all that had happened since, he would let the kiss slide. Perhaps, he wouldn’t press her to explain the unexplainable.

  The hut, she soon discovered, came with primitive plumbing, shelter and storage for the stockmen’s supplies, and that was the whole caboodle. Since those supplies included food, she didn’t complain too much.

  After they wolfed down a very basic, very late lunch, Nic dragged two bedrolls out from the hut. Olivia frowned. “What are those?”

  “You’ve never seen a swag before, city gal?”

  Frowning, she watched him unroll the first to reveal a thin foam mattress inside blanket-lined canvas.

  “Outback bedding,” he explained. “Perfect for sleeping under the stars.”

  “Don’t you think someone will find us before then?”

  He looked up sharply, and something in his dark gaze caused her pulse to trip. Then he smiled, the slow charmer’s grin that didn’t help calm her elevated heart rate. “Probably. But in the meantime, why don’t you take a nap? You look bushed.”

  Ridiculou
sly conscious of his presence, of their isolation, of all the days and nights they’d shared a bed—of her body’s reaction to that smile—she hauled her swag into the sheltering shadow cast by the hut. She closed her eyes and she worried.

  This was the perfect opportunity to talk, but she couldn’t bring herself to take that first step. There would be fireworks, drama, distress, and after the hours at that accident she wanted some respite from anguish. Later, they would talk. After she’d rested her eyes, her mind and her raw emotions.

  Surprisingly, she slept; right up until Nic roused her to watch the sunset. At the time she had mumbled and moaned. Now she was glad.

  “That was worth waking up for.” Stretched out on her swag, significantly cleaner after a bushman’s bath and significantly more relaxed after her nap, she was watching Nic tend to the campfire. And trying not to notice how damn much she enjoyed watching him. Much like the sunset, she couldn’t look away.

  He cut her a sideways look. “The beans or the coffee?”

  “The sunset. They were one of the few things Brooke liked about the outback. She tried to describe the colors to me, but they don’t translate into words.”

  Like love, like grief, like all emotions. She’d discovered that while trying to compose that letter. While thinking about what she had to tell him that night.

  “Brooke didn’t like the outback?”

  “She hated the isolation and the lack of amenities. She would have hated this!”

  Even as she said it, an inner voice whispered liar. Brooke wouldn’t have hated everything about camping if she’d been with Tomas. She would have loved watching him in the firelight. She would have felt the same for Tomas as Olivia was feeling for Nic right now…