Beauty and the Wolf / Their Miracle Twins (25 page)

Belinda Rochester had no place in his family. It half killed him to watch her sit in Drew’s chair, knowing how they’d lost him to the Rochesters long before they’d lost him from life. Never mind that he had triggered Drew’s long journey away from them himself, the Rochesters had consumed him, just like they consumed cars and flash houses and copious amounts of liquor at their society bashes. A man like Drew was a waiting meal for people like that. If he wasn’t he never would have stayed away so long. Moved away.

Drifted away.

He’d fawned over Belinda’s petite sister that time they’d come to visit, not long after their surprise wedding on holiday in Corfu, after they’d robbed his mother of her opportunity to see her oldest boy—her favourite—get married. She’d hidden her heartbreak well but ten minutes in the company of Gwen Rochester and things were already strained. His brother said the quickie wedding was to keep things simple but Flynn had his suspicions—like his parents did—that Drew had been keen to avoid bringing the two sides of the family together. As if they couldn’t possibly mesh.

Yet here was a Rochester doing a bang-up job of ingratiating herself in the Bradley camp. How ironic.

Flynn slowed his steps thirty metres from the stream and gentled his breathing. Their sensitive bills wouldn’t miss the surge of electromagnetism that was him approaching, but platypus were touchy at the best of times, they really didn’t need him worked up and pumping out sparks like a neon sign.

And they brought him such peace, which he could use a whole heap of right now.

He sagged down onto the bank and closed his eyes, letting the silence resolve itself into the burbling stream, his steady breathing and the occasional shriek of a foraging bat overhead.

Lying because it was necessary was one thing. Turning it into a sport was quite another. And glittering with such glee … Well, that was altogether not on.

He’d never seen someone come alive like she had. The Belinda he knew was silent and pale and dead-eyed, in the hospital then a week later on the plane. To see her now with her hair freshly washed and flaming out behind her, touches of freshly applied colour on her lashes and lips, eyes sparkling and smile beaming … He’d been shocked at his own physical response at the dinner table when she’d teased him with alleged nicknames, stirred by the blatant challenge in her deep blue eyes. The snapping jaws of attraction came out of nowhere until he wrestled them to heel—made himself remember who she was—hence his haste in getting the hell out of the cosy family moment back in the dining room.

As if his family needed any more encouragement to meddle.

What moon there was showed itself from behind a shifting bank of cloud and illuminated the stream a little more. Enough that Flynn was able to make out the small sleek creature wiggling its way through the shallows upstream. This platypus and its mate nested just off the property but they foraged nightly within the rich pickings of Bunyip Reach’s streams. Because they ran ever-hungry trout in the Reach’s bigger waterways it meant the smaller ones were extra abundant with small fish,
worms, glassy six-legged wrigglers, and all manner of aquatic or mud-loving bugs. A platypus smorgasbord.

Which was good, because there were precious few places left in this country where the little brown fellows could eke out a decent existence.

‘Hey.’

The animal shot away faster than something with legs that short should be able to as Belinda appeared out of nowhere, waggling a large torch to light her way. So much for peace and quiet.

‘Your grandmother suggested I come down. See the platypus.’

Of course she did.

His nan had been beside herself when she realised the woman he’d appeared with wasn’t a lost tourist or an opportunistic chalet booking. She had a terrible poker face and her wide-eyed nonchalance was fooling no-one. Except possibly Belinda. She’d been pushing him for years to find a nice girl and settle down. And, because they didn’t know otherwise, Nan would be working on a plan right now to make sure he settled down with Belinda. The girl who laughed at Arthur Bradley’s corny, decades-old jokes would get a big fat tick in the
perfect granddaughter-in-law
box. Even on five minutes’ acquaintance.

Until she learned the truth, anyway. His conscience muttered, but he shoved it down deep the way he’d learned years before. It could complain all it wanted down there; he’d never hear it.

‘I think they just want to give us some alone time,’ Bel said.

‘No doubt.’

Silence descended.

After a few moments Bel said, ‘I was thinking that maybe we should create our own alone time. That way we can control it, rather than having it thrust upon us.’

An annoyingly good idea. He didn’t want her to be sensible
and quick to see things. He wanted her to be thoughtless and reactive and stupid. And he sure as heck didn’t want to spend much time alone with her.

‘You can come down to my place. Hang out down there when I’m out working. They’ll assume we’re together.’

‘Is there not something I can do—to be helpful?’

‘You can stay out of the way. That’s helpful.’

She took it on the chin, flicking her eyes out to the still-empty waterway before bringing them, carefully schooled, back to him. ‘I’m going to get bored with nothing to do. And when I’m bored I get restless. And when I’m restless I get annoying.’

She smiled brightly. The threat was implied. He could so imagine a ‘restless’ Belinda. And ‘annoying’ he’d already seen. It killed him that he wanted to echo her smile, but he managed to keep his face neutral. ‘I would have thought doing nothing would be a Rochester specialty.’

Her eyes narrowed and hardened, even in the dim gloom as the clouds moved back over the moon. But she didn’t bite. ‘Why? Didn’t Gwen help out when she was here?’

‘Nope. And she kept Drew busy so he wasn’t much use either.’

She frowned. ‘It’s not surprising. They were practically on their honeymoon.’

‘So are we. Technically.’

‘Ha ha. There must be something I can help with. I don’t like to freeload.’

‘You don’t have a job.’

‘Because I don’t need one to live on. That doesn’t mean I don’t make a contribution. Or want to.’

‘Helping out on a farm isn’t the same as knitting quilt-squares for Africa or …’ he searched his limited knowledge of what rich people did to pass the time ‘… hosting fund-raisers.’

She looked at him as if he were mad. Which he must be
to have started all of this in the first place. ‘Lucky. Because I can’t knit and I loathe crowds.’

He sighed. ‘Have a word with Nan. She’s always got something happening. I’m sure she’d be delighted to have more opportunities to grill you on the finer details of our acquaintance.’

‘Oh. Well, that’s not a good idea, is it?’

He shrugged. ‘You seemed to enjoy it tonight.’

She stared at him. ‘You deserved tonight. Leaving me to swing in the breeze like you did. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you want me to fail abysmally.’

She shot straight. Just like Drew. But it didn’t appeal to him any more now than when Golden Boy used to do it when they were kids. ‘I don’t want you to fail. But I don’t want any games either.’

She considered him. ‘Then don’t make it such fun. Honestly, sitting there looking like a giant black thundercloud. How are they going to buy for a moment that you care enough about me to marry me when all you do is glare?’

Something occurred to him. ‘You seem very comfortable with putting on an act. Almost a natural at it.’

She shrugged. ‘Practice makes perfect.’

‘What does that mean?’

She glanced at her hands while she composed her thoughts. ‘My family was in the veneer business. The glossier and happier the better. How many glossy, happy teenagers do you know? I learned early how to create it on demand.’

Didn’t she think this moment demanded it? The poorly hidden sorrow on her face hit him low in his chest. He knew all about faking it. He’d been doing it for years. ‘Your sister, too?’

She frowned. ‘Gwen was different. She fitted the mould better. She didn’t need to try so hard.’

Was she finally admitting Gwen really was the society heiress they’d met? ‘I’m surprised you two got along, if you were that different,’ he said. Although the jury was still out on how different they truly were. Belinda still had debutante written
all over her, regardless of how many fights with Mummy and Daddy she’d had.

‘It was Gwen or no one. But she was easy to love. I think that was why Drew and I got on so well together. We had that in common.’

Easy for them, maybe. ‘And now?’

She stared into the tumbling stream. Then glanced down at her belly. ‘And now I have the next generation of Rochesters to worry about. If I can bring them up to be the same sort of people as their parents then I’ll be really happy with that.’

Assuming she got to bring them up at all. Which was a big call now she had some competition. ‘In their image, not in your own?’

She lifted her head. ‘Never in my image. That’s not what this is about.’

He turned more fully towards her. ‘What is it about, Belinda? Why are you doing this?’

‘Because they have a right to stay in the family. To stay together. They’re Rochesters.’

‘And Bradleys.’

Her face creased. ‘Yes. But until a week ago I had no idea what that meant. As far as we knew, Drew was estranged from his family.’

Flynn shifted uncomfortably. He pressed his lips together.

‘What happened with you guys?’ she risked. ‘Why would he just … opt out?’

‘Because of your sister.’ The answer came way too easily. Way too loaded. He flexed his clenched fingers.

‘But she met him in London. He’d already left here.’

Left you.
She might as well have said it. ‘There’s not a lot of calling for merchant bankers in Oberon.’

‘Sydney’s not that far away. Why go to the other side of the planet?’

‘Spirit of adventure?’

‘Maybe. But there had to be more to it. Gwen was a wonderful
person but she wasn’t the sort of girl you give up a kingdom for.’

‘Kingdom?’

She looked around her. At the green, rolling fields. The tumbling brook. ‘All of this. Your family.’

Was that what she equated a loving family with? Riches? He battled the hint of softening deep inside. ‘Maybe you didn’t see her the way others did?’

‘I looked at your family tonight and I couldn’t imagine them not accepting her. What did she do that was so awful?’

‘She took him from us.’

‘Everyone grows up. Leaves home.’

‘Not everyone wipes their family from existence. As soon as he entered your family he exited mine. It was like we barely existed. His trip home with your sister was like a farewell tour.’

Her brows folded down over eyes that wanted to understand. ‘And you blame Gwen?’

‘We blame all of you. The lifestyle that your family offered. The connections you represented. The money. Everything our family couldn’t offer.’

She frowned again. ‘But look at what your family does offer, Flynn. I’ve never had a meal like it.’

The image of his father’s god-awful food spray filled his vision. He hoped she wasn’t actually expecting him to buy that she’d enjoyed it. ‘I’ll bet.’

‘It would have been foreign to Gwen, but I can’t imagine her not embracing it. They’re good people.’

What could he say to that? They absolutely were. Which was why what Drew did stank so much.

‘That makes it even harder to do what you’ve asked me,’ she went on. ‘Can we not change our approach? Tell them? Your mother has heaps of support. She’ll get through.’

‘You weren’t here. You didn’t see what she was like. How low she sank. Drew was the light of her life.’

Yet he’d still rejected her and the whole family in favour of his own life.

Both their heads snapped around as two platypus emerged onto the rocks a few metres from where they sat quietly talking.

‘Oh, my goodness …’ Belinda managed to scream in whisper. That took some talent. ‘Look at them! They’re amazing …’ She scrunched forward and wrapped her arms around her knees, as if making herself smaller would make them larger.

‘It’s like someone swept up all the bits left over from nature’s workshop floor and said,
Waste not, want not …’
she said, laughing.

Duck’s bill, beaver’s tail, otter’s body, cat’s paws, living in the water but laying eggs like a bird. ‘Yeah, Frankenstein’s pet.’

‘Oh, I’m definitely going to send a photo home. The centre will want to see this.’

He dragged his eyes off the stream entertainment. ‘Centre?’

She wasn’t shifting her focus for anything and her wide-eyed wonder made her look more like she had on that hospital table. Young. Naïve. Hopelessly out of her depth.

‘I work for SOS Hedgehog. Helping out.’

‘You’re kidding!’ She was a volunteer? And a wildlife volunteer, at that. Possibly the last thing he’d expected to discover. No, correction,
exactly
the last thing he’d expected. ‘Why hedgehogs?’

It pained her to drag her eyes away from the animals in front of her, but she did—briefly. ‘Why not hedgehogs? They’re as special as any other creature. We rehabilitate nearly six thousand a year. I was worried about leaving them, about missing them, but …’ her smile broadened as she turned her face back to the stream ‘… I think I’m going to be just fine. These guys are going to be very good hedgehog substitutes.’

He stared at her beaming smile. What kind of a life did she have back in England—she’d left her city and family and
friends and the only things she was going to miss were a few hedgehogs?

It was hard enough reconciling her physical appearance with being a Rochester—Belinda’s Amazonian redhead to Gwen’s diminutive blonde—but then to discover she’d give up her youth and her body to save two unborn children, and that her family background wasn’t everything the Internet had led him to believe, and that instead of being a latte-drinking, trust fund debutante she gave up most of her week to help wipe hedgehog backsides …

‘You’re nothing like your sister, you know.’ That brought her attention back around. ‘Screw you, too.’ His breath caught. ‘You’re as touchy as her, though. I meant that as a compliment.’