The Australian

She glared at him. “You think I’m just a kid, too. Well, mister, I’m growing fast, so look out. When I come back home for good, you’re in trouble.”

His bushy eyebrows lifted over amused eyes. “I am?”

“I’ll have learned all about being a woman by then,” she told him smugly. “I’ll steal your heart right out of that rock you’ve got it embedded in.”

“You’re welcome to give it a go,” he told her with a grin. “Fair dinkum.”

She sighed. There he went again, humoring her. Couldn’t he see her heart was breaking?

“Well, I’d better get back,” she sighed. “I have to help Mom with lunch.” She peeked up at him, hoping against hope that he might offer to let her come up behind him on his horse. It would be all of heaven to sit close against that big body and feel its heat and strength. She’d been close to him so rarely, and every occasion was a precious memory. Now there wasn’t a lot of time left to store up memories. Her heart began to race. Maybe this time...

“Mind your feet,” he said, nodding toward them. “And look out for Joe Blakes.”

She frowned, then remembered the rhyming slang he liked to tease her with. “Snakes!” she produced. “You Bananabender!”

He threw back his blond head and laughed, deeply and heartily. “Yes, I’m a Queenslander, that’s the truth. Now on with you, little sheila, I’ve got work to do, even if you haven’t.”

“Yes, Your Worship,” she mocked, and jumped down from the fence to give him a sweeping curtsy. Her eyes twinkled as he made a face. “That’s called cutting tall poppies down to size!”

“I’m keeping score,” he warned softly.

“How exciting,” she replied tartly.

He laughed to himself and turned his mount. “Mind your feet!” he called again, amusement deepening his voice, and with a tip of his hat, he rode off as if he hadn’t a care in the world. Priss watched him until he was out of sight among the gum trees, and sighed wistfully. Oh, well, there was still a week before she left for Hawaii. If only he’d kiss her. She flushed, biting her lower lip as the intensity of emotion washed over her. He never had touched her, except to hold her hand occasionally to help her up and down from perilous places. And once, only once, he’d lifted her and carried her like a child over a huge mud puddle when it was raining. She’d clung to him, as if drowning in his sensuous strength. But those episodes were few and far between, and mostly she survived on memory. She had a snapshot of him that she’d begged from his mother, on the excuse of painting him from it. The painting had gone lacking, but she had the photograph tucked in her wallet, and she wove exquisite daydreams around it.

With a world-weary look on her face, she got down from the fence and began to walk slowly back across the paddock. Maybe a snake would bite her, and she’d be at death’s door, and John would rush to her bedside to weep bitter tears over her body. She shook herself. More likely, he’d pat the snake on the head and make a pet of it.

She wandered lazily back to the house and walked slowly up the steps to the cool front porch where she liked to sit and hope that John would ride by. In the distance were the softly rolling paddocks where John’s Hereford cattle and big Merino sheep grazed peacefully.

Her eyes grew sad as she realized that she would soon be far away from this dear, familiar scene. College. Several years of college in Hawaii—out of sight and sound and touch of John Sterling. And he didn’t even seem to mind. Not one bit.

Renée Johnson looked up as her daughter came into the house. She smiled a little as she bent her silver head again to her embroidery. She was in her late forties, but traces of beauty were still evident in her patrician face.

“Hello, darling; back already?” she teased.

“John was busy,” Priss sighed. She plopped down into a chair with a rueful smile. “He’s glad I’m leaving, you know.”

“Oh, I don’t think he is, really,” Renée said carelessly. “Friendship can survive a few absences, dear.”

Friendship. Priss almost wailed. She was dying of love for him!

“Dad should be back now, shouldn’t he?” she asked.

“He had to stop in Providence to pick up his new suit on the way back from Brisbane,” she reminded her daughter. “And Brisbane is a good drive from here.”

“All for a student he hardly knows,” Priss remarked. “Just because he needed a way to the airport. Dad’s all heart, isn’t he?”

“Yes, he is,” her mother agreed warmly. “That’s why I married him, you know.”

Priss got up and paced the room. “I wonder if I’m doing the right thing. Hawaii’s so far away...”

“The university there is one of the best,” she was reminded. “And your aunt will love having you close by. She’s your father’s favorite sister, you know.”

“Yes.” Priss stared out the window at the distant white cloud of moving sheep. John had cattle, too, but his primary interest was his big Merino sheep. She loved watching the jackeroos move them from paddock to paddock. She loved the sheepdogs, so deft and quick. But most of all she loved John. John!

“Set the table, dear, would you?” Renée asked. “I’ll be dishing up supper any minute.”

Chapter Three

Adam Johnson glanced curiously at his daughter over the dinner table. It wasn’t like Priscilla to pick at her food.

“Aren’t you hungry, darling?” he asked.

She lifted her face with a plaintive smile. “I’m just homesick already,” she confessed.

“Homesick? Don’t be silly, Hawaii’s not that far away,” he chuckled. “You can come home on holidays and vacation.”

She pushed her fork into her potatoes and stared at them. “I suppose so.”

Adam turned his head toward Renée, who was shaking her head.

“It’s just...well, do you suppose John really will miss me?” she asked her father, all eyes.

He laughed, misreading the situation. “Now, darling, I doubt that,” he chuckled as he concentrated on his food. “You do wear him out, you know.”

Priss got up from the table in tears and ran for her room. Her mother glared at her father.

“You animal,” she accused. “How could you do that to her? Don’t you realize she’s horribly infatuated with John?”

His eyebrows arched. “With John? But, my God, he’s ten years older than she is. And she’s just a child!”

“She’s eighteen,” she reminded him. “Not a child at all.”

“Well, John’s too experienced for her by far,” he said firmly. “Don’t get me wrong—I think the world of him. But she needs boys her own age. And you know how relentlessly she chases the poor man, Renée. I wonder that he tolerates it. You can see he isn’t interested in kids like Priss.”

“Yes, I know. But she’s so young, darling,” Renée said softly. “Don’t you remember how we felt at her age?”

His dark eyes softened. “Yes,” he said reluctantly, and sighed. “With everybody around telling us how young we were...poor Priss.”

“She’ll get over him,” Renée promised. “Once she’s with boys her own age, she’ll get over him.”

Priss, standing frozen in the hall, heard every word. It all came rushing at her like a tidal wave. Had she hounded John? Did he realize how desperately infatuated she was?

Her face flamed. She leaned back against the cool wall, almost shaking. Of course he did. Ten years, her father had said. John wouldn’t want a child like herself. She closed her eyes. It was far worse than she’d realized. And the worst thing of all was that she hadn’t realized how very noticeable her infatuation was. But it didn’t feel like infatuation. She loved John!

She turned and went back into her room, closing the door quietly. She felt more alone than she ever had in her life. Poor John. Poor her. Her father had said John was too experienced to want a teenager, and he was surely right. If John had felt anything for her, he wouldn’t have been able to hide it. She would have known. People always said you knew when love happened.

She tumbled onto her bed and slowly pulled out the crumpled photo of him that she kept in her wallet. She stared at it for a long time, at the rugged face, the bushy blond and brown eyebrows and hair, at the sensuous mouth and dimpled chin, at the pastel blue eyes. No, he wouldn’t miss her, she thought miserably.