Her Outback Commander. Margaret Way

it was Mark’s decision. Amanda did everything he asked of her. She fell blindly in love with him. As you’ve guessed, things changed.”

      “And they’ve changed even more drastically now Mark’s dead,” he said, his expression sombre. “He can no longer dictate his widow’s actions. She’ll be given an opportunity to find out what Mark’s family is really like. As you’re so close, I’m hoping you’ll be able to persuade her, Sienna. And there is the money,” he added somewhat dryly. “What exactly does Amanda do? I’m assuming as she and Mark were childless she has a career?”

      She could hardly say, as was actually the case, that Amanda shared Mark’s aversion to work. “Mark didn’t want Amanda to take a job during their marriage. She had to be there for him at all times.”

      “I see.” He didn’t look surprised. “And what did Mark work at?”

      She took a deep breath. “This and that,” she said evasively. “He found jobs easily in the hospitality industry.

      That seemed to suit him. What does it matter now? Mark always had money. We assumed he had private means.”

      “He had a bottomless well,” Blaine announced in a very crisp voice. “His mother. The mother he didn’t want to see. But he was quite happy to take her money. As far as I’m aware—I could be wrong—my stepmother kept in fairly constant touch with Mark.”

      “She would have wanted to, as his mother. The whole situation defies belief! But it’s really none of my business.”

      He made a jeering sound. “Oh, I think it is. You’re here, aren’t you? You’re standing in for your cousin. You obviously protect her. If Amanda needs to be talked into coming back with me, I would say you’re the one to do it. You’d be very welcome to come too—as in Amanda’s case, with all expenses paid. You would be doing us a huge favour. The past has to be washed clean. All the things that were kept secret brought out into the open. Much healthier that way.”

      “I can’t work miracles,” she said, averting her head.

      Her profile was exquisite. She was a very beautiful woman. But there was nothing threatening in her style of beauty. She had been born with natural charm. “So much for the migraine!” he returned, very coolly.

      She felt hot blood flushing through her. “She’s in pain,” she burst out. “She did love him, you know.”

      He responded bluntly. “Only—very sadly for Amanda—he fell out of love with her. If indeed he was ever in love with her. Mark lost interest in most things very fast. He left behind him a young woman who believed he loved her. They were engaged to be married. Mark’s mother was convinced Joanne would be the ideal young woman to lend Mark much needed strength and support. He rejected it from the rest of us. Joanne is a fine young woman. Our pioneering families have always been close.”

      “So chances are Joanne will hate Amanda? If she comes to the funeral they will come face to face.”

      “Time has passed, Sienna,” he offered, with a spread of his elegant tanned hands.

      “Not enough time, I would think. A wounded heart can’t heal overnight.”

      He studied her wonderfully expressive face. “You sound very sure. Has anyone wounded your heart?”

      “Of course. A little,” she said lightly. “I’m twenty-six, but no real heartache to speak of. I’m prepared to wait for the right man to come along. And what about you, Blaine? You’re good with the questions. What about a few answers? You’re not married?”

      “Finding the right wife would be a whole lot easier if I had more time,” he said. “If you visit the station you’ll realize I have a big job on my hands. We all thought my father was going to live for ever. He was such a force! So strong and powerful. It was unbearable to see him struck down. It changed my life. It changed all our lives.”

      “Can you speak about it?” she asked gently.

      “Mark never did?”

      His light eyes really did glitter. He must have inherited those remarkable eyes from someone. Father? Or the mother who had died so young? “Not beyond the fact your father had died. He wasn’t forthcoming about how.”

      “I imagine not,” he said grimly. “It was Mark who found him lying crippled and unconscious out in the desert.” The vibrancy of his voice had been damped right down. “It was the big muster. Somehow Dad and Mark became separated from our group. We all thought Mark had packed it in. He had a habit of doing that. Dad had probably gone after him, to pull him back into line. Anyway, Mark galloped frenziedly into the lignum swamps, where we were flushing out unbranded cattle, yelling near incoherently that Dad was dead. Duchess, my father’s very special mare, had thrown him and then trampled him into the ground. Mark had taken his rifle and shot the mare in a fit of grief and rage.”

      He remembered how wave after wave of waterfowl had risen in fright and outrage at the racket Mark was making. How every last man had stood in a devastated gut-wrenching silence at the drastic news. Everyone had confidently expected Desmond Kilcullen to live for many more years, liked and respected by the entire Outback community.

      His pain was so palpable it stabbed at her. “How horrendous!” Sienna was about able to visualize the tragic scene.

      “Horrendous, indeed.” He underscored her comment. “I damn nearly dropped dead myself from shock. According to Mark, Duchess had kicked Dad in the head. Accidents always will happen around horses, but my father was a consummate horseman. And Duchess was a wonderful one man horse. Something unexplained must have freaked the mare out. If terrified she would have reacted convulsively, throwing my unprepared father. Mark shot the mare on the spot. Dad spent the few remaining years of his life in a wheelchair, his memory of that terrible day blasted from his mind.” He didn’t add that any semblance of family life had been shattered.

      Sienna sat horrified. “I’m so sorry Mark mistook your father’s condition.”

      “I don’t know how, but he did,” he told her bleakly. “He was in a massive panic.”

      “It’s such a terrible story.” She considered a moment. “Do you think it could have caused Mark’s subsequent behaviour? Could he have felt some measure of guilt? I mean in the sense that he was the one to find your father.

      He had to shoot the mare. Was the mare a very temperamental animal?”

      The handsome features visibly tightened, highlighting his fine bone structure. “Duchess was a very special horse, so of course she was a spirited animal. Something must have badly spooked her, as I’ve said. Mark was nearly off his head at the time. No one could get much sense out of him—especially me. He acted like I was accusing him of something. Dad could recall nothing of that day, although much of his past memory came back over time.”

      “So you never could piece the exact sequence of events together?”

      “No.” His expression grew darker.

      Two tragic accidents that had claimed father and now son. “When did Mark abandon his family and fiancée, exactly?”

      “Far too soon.” He didn’t tell her Mark had shied clear of visiting their father in hospital. Mark had been long gone before their father’s second unsuccessful back operation.

      “Mark must have been crushed, given what had happened,” she offered, as some sort of mitigating circumstance.

      “It was my father who was crushed.”

      “Sorry, sorry—wrong word,” she apologized. “But Mark could well have felt guilt. Would you have shot the mare?’ She waited, wanting his answer.

      “No.” His reply was emphatic. “My father wouldn’t have wanted it. I have to see it this way: something spooked the mare. An encounter with a camel in heat is a possible explanation. They can be ferocious. Male camels