‘You did.’ He was distracted, but his mind was on what she’d said. Manwillinbah Lodge as a health resort?

He looked at Glenda and he thought, It could work.

Maybe Rob would enjoy the challenge.

Maybe he’d enjoy the challenge, he thought fleetingly, but he stomped on that thought almost before it had a chance to reach the surface.

‘Maybe,’ he said, trying to sound dampening, but neither Tori nor Glenda would be dampened.

‘It’ll be lovely,’ Glenda said, smiling and smiling. ‘Doreen and I will come and stay all the time.’

‘He hasn’t said we can take Pickles yet,’ Rob reminded her

‘Are you allergic to cats?’ Glenda asked, suddenly frowning. ‘Like your stepmother?’

He knew nothing about his stepmother. ‘I’m not allergic,’ he said shortly.

‘Do you like cats?’

‘Yes, but-’

‘Then there’s no problem,’ Rob said.

‘You could buy a cat,’ Tori told him, and they all looked at her. She coloured a little but held her ground. ‘He… Jake said he couldn’t buy a puppy because he works fourteen hours a day.’

‘Do you, dear?’ Glenda demanded. ‘That’s far too long.’

‘Yes, but he could still have a cat,’ Tori said patiently. ‘Or better still, two cats. Cats are fiercely independent but they’re still there when you get home at night.’

‘You need someone,’ Glenda said, and glanced at Tori, who was still colouring, and amended her statement. ‘I mean…something.’

‘I think I know someone with a litter of kittens,’ Tori said.

‘No!’

‘No?’ Tori said cautiously, and he thought he heard laughter behind her tentative query.

‘If I want a cat I can get one in New York.’

‘Yes, but will you?’

‘No.’

‘No?’

‘I don’t have room in my life for anything.’

‘Or anyone?’ Glenda said, forgetting to be innocent, and she was looking from Tori to Jake and back again.

‘No,’ Jake said, steadier this time, and firmer. ‘And Mrs. Matheson will have dinner on. We need to get back.’ And he swung himself into the driver’s seat without another word.


She sat in the passenger seat holding her dogs, while Jake concentrated on driving. Rob and Glenda were chatting in the back seat. Jake was staring straight ahead and she thought there were things in this man’s past that were hurting now.

She’d noticed the way he’d watched the crazy little male pup as he did his round-ups. He’d looked…hungry. She saw the same expression when he glanced at her. As if he was looking at something he wanted but couldn’t have.

Fair enough, she thought. She felt a bit the same. Or, okay, she felt a lot the same.

They collected Pickles from the cattery. The ancient tabby purred with pleasure when Glenda collected him. He eyed the dogs with weary indifference through the bars of his cat cage, as if to say, If this is what I have to put up with to be free, then so be it.

But Tori’s dogs weren’t staying with Pickles at the lodge. She was taking them back to the relocatable tonight. Her new home.

She had an almost irresistible urge to stay at the lodge one more night, but she glanced across at Jake’s set face and she thought, No, one more night would be one night too many.

Maybe last night had been one night too many-but then neither of them had planned it. It had just happened, a primeval need that had shocked them both.

Mrs. Matheson was on the verandah. She walked down to meet them and added her voice to the chorus urging her to stay.

‘No,’ she said, sounding ungracious, suddenly close to tears. She thrust the dogs into Jake’s arms and disappeared inside to fetch her possessions. When she came back out Glenda and Mrs. Matheson and Rob had gone. There was only Jake, leaning against her car. He was holding Itsy, and Rusty was at his feet.

He didn’t look like a millionaire, she thought inconsequentially. He looked a bit rumpled, casual, nice.

Jake.

She had to go.

She thrust her stuff into the trunk and lifted Itsy from Jake’s arms before she got teary. She put the dogs in the crate in the back seat, and she was right to leave.

She was ready to walk away.

‘Jake…thank you,’ she whispered, holding out her hand in an absurdly formal gesture of farewell-but suddenly she couldn’t say anything more because he had her in his arms and he was kissing her, in a crazy way, in a way that said he wanted her, he needed her, she was his woman.

This had nothing to do with reality, she thought wildly, but she let herself be kissed. Of course she let herself be kissed.

And kissed and kissed.

This was still about last night. It was about the letting down of barriers-the beginning of her new life.

It had nothing to do with her wanting this man.

She couldn’t want him. She couldn’t.

But for just a moment, well, maybe for just several moments, she surrendered to him, and she felt her body light from within. She felt beautiful. She felt wanted. Jake was kissing her, holding her, her breasts were moulding to his chest, her feet were hardly touching the ground-and she felt all woman.

And when finally he let her go, when finally he put her away from him and held her at arm’s length, she felt as if her world was shifting.

She felt breathless and bruised…and like she couldn’t bear to walk away.

And it seemed that neither could he. ‘Come to Manhattan with me,’ he said, and her world didn’t just shift; it threatened to roll right over.

‘Come to Manhattan?’

‘Tori, this thing between us…’

‘What…thing?’

‘The thing that says I want you,’ he said simply.

Simple? There was nothing simple about this. What was he asking? She stared up at him, dazed beyond belief.

‘Tori, I don’t understand this,’ he said softly, tugging her close again, kissing her hair. ‘I’ve never felt like this. I’ve never expected to feel like this. But now… I’m due to start work back in Manhattan next week and how can I leave? How can I walk away from you?’

‘I guess…you don’t have to leave,’ she whispered, trying to make sense of what he was saying. ‘You own two houses here.’

‘This is my father’s world, not my world,’ he said, and suddenly he sounded more sure of his ground. He sounded forceful, determined, even a little angry that she could make such a suggestion. ‘I’m an anaesthetist in a large teaching hospital. I’m good at what I do. I’ve worked hard to get there. But you and I…’

‘You and I.’ She said the words slowly. ‘You and I? There’s a “we”? Jake, you don’t have room in your life for a puppy. Yet you ask me…’

‘Plenty of doctors have wives.’

Wives. The word hung between them. It felt like a threat, Tori thought, suddenly bleak beyond description. Plenty of doctors have wives.

Was he asking her to marry him? What a thought. What a way to bring it up if he was.

‘So…these doctor’s wives…they don’t need big yards?’

His brow snapped downwards. ‘What the… That’s not what I’m saying.’

‘So what are you saying? You’re asking me to marry you?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said explosively. ‘I hadn’t even thought of marriage. But the way you make me feel… You just do something to me.’

‘You’re saying it’s my fault?’

‘I’m not talking about fault.’

‘No,’ she said bleakly. ‘But you don’t want this. To feel like this.’

‘I can’t pretend. I never intended to…’

‘Of course you didn’t, and I won’t be proposed to against your better judgement,’ she said, suddenly angry. ‘To be slotted into your life in the few minutes you’re home between work and sleep? In a place where there’s no one I love? How can you ask that of me?’

‘We could take Itsy and Rusty back with us. We could get a larger apartment.’ He raked his hair and she thought, He really hasn’t thought this through. He hadn’t even known he was going to ask her to join him until the words were out of his mouth. Now he was trying to figure out how he could make it work. ‘We could make arrangements,’ he said.

‘I don’t want to make arrangements,’ she snapped. Anger had arrived now, coming to her aid in a red hot mist. He thought he was attracted to her, so he’d take her home, like a puppy from a pet shop, without even doing the groundwork. Plenty of doctors have wives. What sort of statement was that?

‘I’d take up space in your life, Jake Hunter, and you don’t have space to give,’ she told him, knowing she was right, even if it hurt like crazy to say it. ‘My community is here. My work is here. My life is here. It’s not sitting in some drab New York apartment waiting for you to get home at night.’

‘It’s not drab.’

‘What colour is it?’

‘Grey, but-’

‘I rest my case.’

‘Tori, this is stupid.’

‘It is, isn’t it,’ she said, and suddenly, inexplicably, the anger died. For somehow she knew where he was coming from. He was as confused as she was, and as blown away by the unexpectedness of it. ‘I know,’ she said, much more mildly. ‘You’re feeling about me the way I’m feeling about you, like we have something special. But honestly, we don’t. We had a…a frisson. Like a lightning bolt or something that shocked us and made us think we were special. Only you know what happens after lightning hits? You run in case it hits again. You don’t want to be a part of my life, Jake, and I can’t think I could possibly be part of yours. So let’s just get over it.’

There was a long silence while anger dissipated. While sense prevailed.

‘If that’s what you want…’ he said at last.

It’s not what I want, she thought. But what did she want?

She wanted him to sweep her into his arms and carry her off into some magical happy ever after-only he didn’t even have a yard for a dog. Where was the happy ever after in that?

‘We need to say goodbye,’ she said, struggling with her dignity, and Jake looked down into her eyes for a long, long moment and then finally he nodded.