Home To Eden

“Indeed you would, but I’ve survived so far.” She straightened her shoulders.

“At this point I doubt much further.” He put a supportive hand under her elbow. “Let’s call a truce. We can go back to being sparring partners after I land you on Eden.”

CHAPTER THREE

NOTHING HAD CHANGED.

From the air Eden looked timeless. Primordial. Majestic. The homestead and its satellite buildings nestled in the shadow of the ragged escarpment that commanded the empty landscape. The colors were incredible. They reminded her of the ancient pottery she’d seen in museums. Orange and yellow, fiery red, molten cinnabar, indigo, the silvery blue of the mirage that danced over the spinifex plains. Vast areas that in the Dry resembled great fields of golden wheat. In the shimmering heat of the afternoon, the lawns and gardens that surrounded the homestead, fed by bores, were an oasis in the desert terrain.

“Eden!” All her love for it was revealed in the one word.

“Home of the Cavanaghs for one hundred and fifty years,” Drake said with a glance at her proud yet poignant expression. “No time at all compared to the Old World.”

“But plenty of time to put down roots.” She stared down at her desert home, knowing it might be already under siege from the very man who sat beside her at the Beech Baron’s controls. “Eden is our castle and we guard it from all comers.” Her voice was charged with emotion and more than a hint of warning. “The ruined tower…” Her voice faltered. That was a slip. She never mentioned the tower.

“Is a relic from the bad old days when it was used as a lookout and fortress against the marauding tribes.” He wouldn’t force her to bring up the personal significance of the tower. “That’s the story, anyway. Personally I think the Aborigines were only trying to defend themselves or cut out a beast for food.”

“We don’t really know. There were mistakes on both sides. Eden and Kooltar suffered several incidents in the same years, the mid 1860s. So did the McQueens farther to our north. A member of my own family and two of the station hands were speared to death barely a hundred yards from the tower door.”

“With the expected reprisals afterward.” His tone suggested the reprisals had been too severe. “Didn’t a tribal sorcerer put a curse on the Cavanaghs?”

A faint shudder passed through her body. “Thanks for reminding me. No one took it lightly. We still don’t.” After the tragedy, hadn’t her grandfather said repeatedly the family was cursed?

He glanced at her sharply. God she was beautiful, and in the way that most moved him. Yet everything about her was dangerous to him. Danger to his self-assurance, his assumption he was in control of his own life.

“It all happened, Drake.” She paused a moment, twisting her fingers. “They went to the ruined tower to make love. My mother and your uncle.”

“There, you’ve said it.” His eyes flashed triumph. “Uncle. That’s it. My uncle. My blood relation. Not yours.”

“Whether I believe it or not is another thing,” she answered, knowing the subject always led to a fierce row.

Just to prove it, he snapped back, “I’m not your cousin, Nicole.” His voice that could sound so attractive suddenly grated. “I have no cousinly feelings whatsoever toward you.”

“Maybe not, but where did the affection we had for each other go? Remember how we used to roam? We’d ride miles into the desert. Come back overheated by the sun to dive into a cool lagoon. You used to let me ride your palomino, Solera, now and again. Even Granddad liked to see you, despite the troubles. He always said you had a great future.”

“Not everything disappeared in a puff of smoke,” Drake mused. “I’m building very successfully on the inheritance Dad left me. The McClelland Pastoral Company is doing well. Making money isn’t hard. Sustaining relationships is a lot harder.”

“So how do you regard me now?” It wasn’t said provocatively, but very quietly.

“The truth?”

“I don’t want you to lie.”

“As your mother’s daughter.” The words came out in an involuntary rush.

She gave him a sad look. “In your eyes, then, a huge flaw. I am my mother’s daughter, Drake, but I’m proud of it. She wasn’t the only one who committed the unforgivable. Your uncle was her lover.”

His remarkable eyes flared. “A very dangerous thing to be. Fiancée, then mistress. It brought their lives to an untimely end.”

“All because they wanted each other. No one really believes it was an accident.”

“Well, if someone else’s responsible, they’re still out there.”

“Supposedly dying.” Her tone was flat.

“I don’t think your father had anything to do with it,” he confounded her by saying. “For all his faults he was far too much in love with your mother to kill her. My uncle maybe. Not her.”

The great shift in his thinking confused her. “What are you trying to do? Rewrite history? Why are you saying this, and why now?”

He shrugged, but kept his eyes on the landscape below. “When were we ever able to discuss the subject without anger? You’ve had five years away to think. So have I.”

“But you believed Heath was responsible somehow?” she protested. “Your whole family did. No one more than your aunt Callista. She was the loudest in her condemnation.”

“That isn’t surprising. She adored her younger brother.”

“So did your father, but he was never cruel. He and your mother simply withdrew into a shell. I heard your mother remarried?”

“Hardy Ingram, the M.P. We’ve known him for years and years. He’s a good man. He’ll look after my mother well, but he’s no substitute for Dad. He was a one-off. He died too young. These past couple of years without him have been sad. My mother couldn’t stay on Kooltar.”

“I can understand that.” She didn’t say that having her difficult sister-in-law around all the time would make things hard, but instead asked, “Is your aunt still living with you?”

“Kooltar is her home.” Clipped, ready to defend.

“She should have married. Gone away.” Nicole sat in sober judgment.

“None of your business, Nicole. We couldn’t all run.”

That stung. “Now, that was cruel.”

His hands on the controls clenched, knuckles whitening. “Yes, it was. Bloody cruel. I apologize. You suffered more than any of us.”

“I found them. How many hundreds of times have I been back over that horrible day? It’s like a video you don’t know how to stop.”

“I can understand that. The shock and the grief killed your grandfather. My own father was never the same after. The way the investigation ended! It as good as left everything up in the air.”

She looked down at her locked hands. Didn’t she live her own life on the brink, just waiting for someone to shove her off? “I’m sorry, too, Drake. But it was never my fault.”

“Of course it wasn’t!” He gave a grimace of dismay. “At the end of the day we were all betrayed. I’ve thought hard about this. As I said, I believe your father had nothing to do with what happened.”

“Then you’re the only one.” She sighed. “If you’re right, that leaves the glaring question of who did. What about Heath’s alibi? What if the stockman was lying? He left the station not long after and conveniently got killed when his ute ran off an Outback track. That’s like having a two-car crash in the middle of the Simpson Desert.”

“It was reported, as well, he’d been drinking heavily for days.”

“Probably had one hell of a guilty conscience. Does your aunt still hate me?”

Drake’s features tightened. “She doesn’t hate you, Nicole.”

“Don’t be daft. Of course she does! When it comes to intuition, men aren’t half as smart as women.”