Outback Bachelor / The Cattleman's Adopted Family: Outback Bachelor / The Cattleman's Adopted Family

“You had concerns about what you might find?” Again the piercing regard.

Skye shook her head. “After all, my mother had a connection to you.” Though she didn’t expect to be answered, Skye prepared herself for whatever might come.

In vain. “I was very fond of her,” Lady McGovern said briefly, then changed the subject. “Your use of my name comes sweetly to my ear. Kindly continue to use it, no matter what. I’m fully aware my granddaughter has always been jealous of you. Jealous of Keefe’s affection for you. That is her nature. She’s going to find it very hard to find a husband if she’s expecting someone like Keefe to come along. It won’t happen.”

“No,” Skye agreed quietly. “Rachelle loves both her brothers, but she adores Keefe.”

“Exactly.” Lady McGovern brushed the topic aside. “I want you to know Cathy herself chose your father.”

“But of course!” Skye was startled. “She fell in love with him.” She knew she was supposed to hold her tongue but it got away from her. “But how did they find the opportunities to meet? She stayed at the house on her visits. My father at the time was a stockman. Times have changed somewhat, but there was a huge social divide.”

“Of course,” Lady McGovern acknowledged, as if the divide was still firmly in place. “Nevertheless, Cathy knew Jack McCory was the man for her. And a fine man he is too. He mourns your mother to this day. As do I. Let’s not talk any more about this, Skye. It upsets me. I don’t know if Jack ever told you, but Cathy knew the baby she was carrying was a girl. She had the name Skye already picked out for you. And doesn’t it suit you! Somehow she knew you would have her beautiful sky-blue eyes.”

Skye stayed a few minutes more talking to Lady McGovern, but it was obvious others wanted the opportunity to express a few words of sympathy to the McGovern matriarch. She no sooner moved away than Robert Sullivan made a beeline to her side.

“I don’t really know why but you and my great-aunt look more comfortable together than she and Rachelle,” he announced. “Why is that, do you suppose?”

“I have no idea, Robert,” she responded calmly.

“Neither do I. Just one of those quirky things.” Robert took her arm and began to lead her away. “Look, how long are you staying?” He stared down at her smooth honey-blonde head.

“No more than a week.” Actually, she had weeks of her leave left. “I only came for the funeral.”

“But we’ve got to meet up.” Robert spoke with extraordinary determination. “I’ve thought of asking Keefe if I can spend a little time here. I’m sure he won’t mind. The house is big enough to billet an army.”

“But won’t you be expected back home?” Robert worked for his father, a well-known pastoralist running both sheep and cattle on a large property on the Queensland/New South Wales border.

“I could do with a break. I’ll check it out with Dad. He was as impressed with you as Mother. I want you to come over and say hello. That’s if I can find them in this crush. Even in this huge house there’s hardly room to move. And just look at Keefe!”

Look at him! Skye couldn’t drag her eyes off him. Everything about him pierced her to the heart.

“The minute he enters the room, he’s the stand-out figure,” Robert said with undisguised envy. “And it’s not just his height. He really takes the eye. He’s a man with power. And money. Poor old Scott is still as jealous of him as he ever was. Scott really ought to go away and make a life for himself. Rachelle, too, though she spends plenty of time in Sydney and Melbourne.”

“I see Scott with Jemma Templeton,” Skye sidetracked. She didn’t want to discuss Rachelle. “What I remember of Jemma is good.”

“But isn’t she plain?” Robert groaned, with a pitying look in his eyes. “Talk about a face like a horse!”

“A particularly well-bred one.” Skye’s eyes were still on Keefe’s tall, commanding figure. He looked beyond handsome in his formal funeral attire. “I don’t consider Jemma plain at all. She has a look of breeding and intelligence.’

“I suppose. But I bet she’d love to be pretty. And you are being kind. I suppose a woman as beautiful as you can afford to be kind. Poor old Jemma must be nuts if she’s looking to land Scott. She’s mad about him, poor thing!” Robert rushed on with characteristic candour. “Who knows why. Doesn’t say much for her intelligence in my book. Scott is trouble. It’s the way he goes off like an out-of-control rocket from time to time.”

“Whatever, he’s always got a whole string of girls after him.”

“And Keefe?” Couldn’t she control her tongue?

Robert didn’t appear to notice the tautness of her tone. “Who knows what’s on Keefe’s mind?” he mused. “A couple of stayers are hanging in there. Fiona Fraser and Clemmie Cartwright. You remember them. My money’s on Fiona. She’s swanning around somewhere. She’s stylish, well connected, knows the score, sharp as a tack but beneath that she’s the worst of things—a snob.”

“And you’re not?” Skye gave him a sweetly sarcastic smile.

“Of course I’m not!” He denied the charge. “Mum is, maybe. Clemmie is nicer, totally different, but I don’t believe she can fit the bill.’

“Surely it’s all up to Keefe?”

“Maybe he hasn’t found the woman to measure up?” Robert pondered. “He’s a great guy, don’t get me wrong. I admire him enormously. I’m not in his league. None of us are, for that matter. The guy’s a prince!”

He’s always been a prince. My prince.

By late afternoon everyone, with the exception of a few relatives who were staying overnight, had made their way home in the private planes and the charter planes that had been dotted all over the airfield, the half-dozen helicopters, bright yellow like bumblebees, and the convoys of vehicles that would make the return journey overland. Skye, who had returned to Lady McGovern’s side as requested, found herself one of the last to leave. She had made her way to the entrance hall when Rachelle suddenly confronted her, a smile on her lips, her eyes cold and flat.

“So, Skye! Sorry I didn’t get a minute to speak to you earlier. How are you?”

“I’m well, thank you, Rachelle.” Skye spoke gently. “Please accept my condolences. The manner of your father’s premature death was terrible. I know you will miss him greatly.”

“Of course. He was a great man,” Rachelle said stiffly. “How long exactly are you staying?” As usual she was talking down to Skye.

“A few days.”

“I’m sure Gran asked you to come up to the house,” Rachelle challenged. “To stay, I mean.”

“Both Lady Margaret and Keefe invited me but I’m quite happy staying with my father. I won’t get in your way, Rachelle, if that’s what’s bothering you.”

Rachelle’s face took on an expression of extreme hauteur. “You couldn’t bother me if you tried. And I certainly don’t like the way you refer to my grandmother as Lady Margaret. She’s Lady McGovern to you.”

“Why don’t you check with your grandmother?” Skye said quietly, preparing to move on. “It was she who asked me to call her that.”

Rachelle’s dark eyes held a wild glare. “I don’t believe you.”

Skye ignored her, continuing on her way. On this day of days Rachelle, incredibly, was looking for a fight.

She hadn’t been at the bungalow ten minutes before she heard footsteps resounding on the short flight of timber stairs. They didn’t sound like her father’s. Not at all. They sounded like…She hurried to the front door, gripped by tension. The door wasn’t shut. She had left it open to catch a breeze. The bungalow had ceiling fans, but no air-conditioning.

To her complete shock, Keefe stood there, his brilliant eyes stormy. He had changed out of his funeral attire into riding gear. “I tried to catch you at the house,” he bit off, almost accusingly, ‘but you were pretty quick to get away.”

A flicker of temper, born of high emotion, flashed over her face. It had been the most dreadful day. “Let me stop you there, Keefe. I was one of the last to leave. Your grandmother didn’t want me to stray too far from her side. I don’t really know why.” She broke off, her eyes filling with apprehension. “Is something the matter?” she asked quickly. “Surely not her?” Lady McGovern was eighty years old.

“No, no.” Swiftly he reassured her. “She’s retired, of course. Losing Dad has robbed her of all vigour. She was in fine form up until then. But God knows what will happen now! She’s lost two sons. And a husband.”

“I know,” Skye said sadly. “In one way she has lived a life of privilege, but she has suffered a lot. Losing a child must be the greatest loss a woman can ever know.” Her head was aching so much she ripped at the pins in her hair, pulling them out one by one and setting them down on the small table by the door. Afterwards she shook her hair free with a sigh of relief, letting it settle into shining masses around her face and shoulders.

“Sometimes you’re so beautiful I can hardly endure looking at you,” Keefe said abruptly. He reached out suddenly for a handful of her hair, twining it around his hand, pulling on it slightly to draw her closer to him.

“You haven’t had to endure me of late,” she reminded him with a flare of bitterness.

“Your decision.” His tone was just as harsh. He released the silky swathe of her hair. “Can you do something for me, Skye?”

She relented. She had to on this day of days. “Of course I can.” She could see the pressure that had been building in him all day. There was a faint pallor beneath his tan. Another sign of his anguish.

“Then get out of that dress.” His tone was so short it sounded like an order. “I have the most desperate need to get away from the house. Put your riding gear on. Don’t tell me you didn’t bring it. I need to ride off some of this torment. It’s all been such a nightmare. Dad gone. The memory of that last morning. So businesslike, so matter-of-fact. I never got a chance to tell him how much I loved him, admired and respected him. He was my role model.”