Claiming His Family

Erin stared at him, shocked. Luke’s prolonged absences while he attended to the thousand and one jobs needed to run Warrapinya had been a major cause of their break-up.

When she’d lived on Warrapinya it hadn’t mattered how many employees Luke had—jackaroos, ringers or cooks—Luke had held himself responsible. He was the boss and the boss always went mustering, was always there for the tough work, the dirty work like fencing, dam building, branding, or breaking in horses. He’d maintained that he should take on the dangerous tasks rather than a worker.

If there was a wild scrub bull to be caught, it was the boss who led the way. Once a windmill’s blades had gone berserk in a gale and the entire top threatened to tear off. Nails, the station handyman, had been going to climb up and disconnect the sails, but Luke had insisted on attending to it.

He’d claimed that running Warrapinya was more than a hands-on job. It was a hearts-on job.

Now it was beyond disconcerting to hear that in five short years Luke had delegated someone else to run Warrapinya for him. Joey would have his father’s undivided attention. She should have been pleased, but instead she was fighting anger and hurt. ‘I—I couldn’t bear it if anything happened to Joey,’ she said quickly.

‘What’s going to happen? What the hell are you talking about?’

‘The Outback’s so dangerous.’

With a groan, Luke flung back his head and stared at the ceiling. When he looked at her again, his eyes were blistering. ‘You haven’t filled Joey’s head with that kind of bull, have you?’

‘No.’

‘I suppose you’ve told him that’s why you left—because you were terrified of the Outback?’

‘No!’

Jaw jutting belligerently, he stared at the toe of his riding boot and then flicked his gaze back to her. ‘But that was it, wasn’t it, Erin? It wasn’t so much that we couldn’t live together as that you couldn’t live in the bush.’

There was no point in having this conversation. It was ancient history; their divorce was a fait accompli.

When Erin refused to answer, Luke took an intimidating step towards her.

With her shoulders braced, she said, ‘You know it wasn’t just that.’

‘Okay…just to refresh my memory…what exactly was our problem?’

‘For heaven’s sake, it’s not worth dragging that up now.’

‘Come on, Erin, you can do better than that.’

‘How can you ask now? It’s too late.’ Through clenched teeth, she added, ‘It’s five years too late.’

‘I couldn’t ask you five years ago. You ran away.’

‘You didn’t try to contact me after I left, Luke. You could have asked questions then.’ Shaking with a deluge of anger and despair, she felt tears stand in her eyes. ‘When I left Warrapinya, you yelled after me to go to hell. ‘Good riddance’, you yelled. And then, you never once tried to telephone me. There wasn’t a word, Luke. You knew Joey was sick, but you never rang to find out how he was. Not once. You didn’t want to know.’

Until she’d written to Luke to request a meeting with Joey he’d been silent. For five years he’d worn his stubborn pride like a badge of courage. The only contact had been via his lawyer and his accountant who supervised the regular deposits into her bank account for Joey’s maintenance.

Now Luke stood facing her, his eyes bright with fury. A muscle clenched near his jaw line, but then he shook his head slowly. ‘You’re right,’ he said. ‘You’re tired and jet lagged and this is the wrong time to try to discuss this.’

Without another word, he turned and strode quickly out of the room.

The door closed behind him and an angry sob rose in Erin’s throat. She might have given way to tears, but there was a sound behind her and she turned to find Joey standing in the doorway of his bedroom, squinting into the light.

‘Oh, sweetie,’ she cried, arms outstretched as she hurried to him. ‘Did we wake you?’

‘You were shouting.’

‘Shouting?’

‘You and—and Dad.’ He peered up at her and looked frightened. ‘Are you crying, Mom?’

‘No.’ Hastily, she pulled Joey to her with a one-armed hug while she sniffed and used her other hand to swipe at her eyes. She kissed the top of his head. ‘Your dad and I were just talking. Sorry if we got a little loud.’

‘You sounded mad.’ Joey looked past her. ‘Where’s Dad now?’

‘He’s gone back to his room.’

‘Why?’

‘Because—because he needs to sleep. And so do I. So do you.’

‘I’m not tired any more.’

Erin’s heart sank to the floor. She was emotionally wrung out and dead on her feet. She couldn’t bear it if Joey was wakeful now.

‘I’ll get room service to bring us some hot chocolate and something to eat,’ she said. ‘We’ll have it together in my big bed and then you can snuggle up with me.’

The boy’s bottom lip protruded as he thought about this. ‘What can we have to eat?’

‘What would you like?’

‘Pancakes?’

‘Pancakes at this hour?’ Two seconds later, she shrugged. ‘Why not? I’m sure the hotel can fix them for us. And then the sooner you get to sleep the sooner you’ll see your dad in the morning.’

She was rewarded with a huge grin.

What exactly was our problem?

Why, Luke wondered, had he asked Erin that? After all, he’d had five years to come up with his own answers. He’d worked out exactly why their marriage had ended.

At the time, he hadn’t seen it coming. There’d been no lead up. No storm warning.

It was only later that he’d understood that he should have taken Erin’s concerns seriously. When she’d fretted about the baby he’d tried to jolly her out of it, had told her she worried too much.

When she’d got mad with him for spending too much time away working with cattle he hadn’t tried to explain the pressures of running the property, he’d simply tried to shrug and crack a joke. Which had been pretty damn thoughtless. But he hated conflict.

If there had been a problem—a little bickering—he’d tended to say, ‘Let’s forget it and have a cuddle.’ Erin, on the other hand, was a bit of a terrier. She was an up-front person. She wanted to push an issue through to the bitter end.

But tonight he’d been the terrier pushing her, goading her. Why the hell couldn’t he stay calm and play this game her way? Their marriage was over.

Why was that so hard to remember?