The Cattle King's Mistress (3 page)

“Make them.”

“I’m not quite as big as you, Nathan,” she retorted lightly.

He smiled. “But you do have a mind of your own, Miranda. And very interesting it is.”

“Thank you.”

“Oh, I should be thanking you. I’m sure you will take any boredom out of our trip together.”

Miranda’s breath caught in her throat. He didn’t mean the flight to the Bungle Bungle Range. She knew he didn’t. He meant the continuing journey of a close acquaintance spreading over the two years she was going to be here. And that was going to be very, very dangerous to any peace of mind.

“Well, don’t forget to be a tour guide, as well, Nathan,” Tommy drawled. “This is resort business.” Was there a touch of resentment in his voice. A flash of sibling rivalry? Miranda quickly switched her attention to the man whose interests she would be looking after. “I’ll make the most of the trip, Tommy,” she assured him. “I know how essential it is that I do.”
She mustn’t
—
not for one moment—forget her place.
He nodded.

“I’m sure you’ll find it an amazing experience,” Elizabeth King put in with an approving smile.

Miranda hoped so. She would need every amazing distraction she could get to keep holding Nathan King at a distance.

Needing
to push Nathan King out of her mind and gain a sense of control over her immediate environment, Miranda filled her first morning at King’s Eden with a staff meeting. Since the resort was only open from the beginning of April to the end of November, the full complement of employees was not yet in residence, but the maintenance crew and those in charge of each accommodation level and amenities rolled up to meet and assess their new manager.

Miranda was very aware of not having the firsthand knowledge of this area, while those facing her did. She’d had no experience of the Big Wet, the monsoonal rains that made much of the Top End of Australia inaccessible by road during the summer months, but the oppressive heat outside was enough to convince her the December to March period was not a good time to travel to this part of the outback for sightseeing, even by air. She blessed the fact the resort homestead was air-conditioned, or she’d be wilting in front of these people.

They had spread themselves around the large living area, which had been designed for the pleasure and comfort of top-paying guests. The slate floor in blue-green hues looked invitingly cool and the cane furniture with its brightly patterned cushions lent a relaxing, tropical feel to the room. Aboriginal artefacts and paintings were reminders of how close visitors were to an ancient heritage. A wall of glass gave a view of the resort pool and some of the outdoors chairs had been brought inside to accommodate everyone.

Miranda had deliberately chosen this normally exclusive leisure room as the gathering place, wanting to set the tone of a top team getting together. The resort restaurant was used for staff meetings when business was in full swing, but this was only the key group who would be answering directly to her and she needed to get them onside.

They all wore casual clothes, shorts and T-shirts, a different vision of staff for her, accustomed as she was to more formal uniforms. Miranda had donned a lime-green sleeveless shift, wanting the effect of both dignity and simplicity, and she’d wound her hair up for a look of neat efficiency, but she quickly decided that tailored safari shorts and shirt were more the style for this resort. Stupid to look out of place.

Apart from a couple of men on the maintenance crew, everyone else was younger than she was, very young in terms of managerial positions. Understandable in such a location, she quickly reasoned. A spirit of adventure had probably brought them here, wanting the outback experience while they were still footloose and fancy free, or at least not tied down with families. She spent most of the meeting asking questions, listening to reports, inviting suggestions for resolving problems, which were raised, keeping discussions open while she absorbed the easy camaraderie amongst the staff and made notes on the practicalities of getting things done in time for the beginning of the season.

Over and over again, mention was made of problems caused by cancelling the regular time-off for the transient service staff. They went stir-crazy, becoming careless and rude to guests. Breaks away from the isolation of the resort restored their good humour. It only raised trouble if too many bookings required the postponing of leave.

Miranda took on board that everyone was keen for her to understand this. Isolation was a very real social problem. Her mind drifted to the King family...a hundred years of living in isolation...Nathan running the cattle station... alone, unmarried. Did he ever feel stir-crazy? Would she, here at King’s Eden?

Paradise or hell?

Too late to change her decision to take this job on, Miranda sternly reminded herself. Whatever its difficulties, she
would
see it through. Nathan had been subtly challenging her on that last night. Her jaw tightened as she recalled his amused mockery. She would show him!

Having collected all the information she wanted from her staff, Miranda brought the meeting to a close with a personal policy statement, emphasising that good hospitality depended on good communication and she didn’t want any breakdowns in that area. Anticipation of guest requirements was her other main point and she would be instituting checks that would help to ensure this.

The response was nods and smiles of satisfaction. Having memorised names throughout the morning, Miranda made a point of using them as the dispersing staff made friendly parting comments. Samantha Connelly, the injured helicopter pilot, stayed behind, her sprained ankle propped on a footstool.

“Do you need help?” Miranda asked with a sympathetic smile.

“I’m here to help you,” was the dry reply. “Until I can throw away these wretched crutches.”

She leaned over the side of the armchair to pick up the resented aids to her disability. Sensing a fierce independence Miranda made no move to do it for her. She admired the head of burnished copper curls as it bobbed down and noticed the well-defined musculature in the young woman’s arms. Samantha Connelly was built on a smaller and more slender scale than Miranda herself, but she was certainly lithe and strong.

“I hate being hobbled,” she muttered as her face came up, though her expression was one of wry resignation as she added, “Stuck in an office instead of flying high.”

“I didn’t realise you did office work, as well,” Miranda said in surprise.

“Oh, I fill in, taking the resort bookings at the Kununurra Headquarters during the Wet. Not so much charter business then. I’ve loaded all the facts and figures into your computer here, so if you need a hand with anything until your clerical assistant clocks on...”

“I’d appreciate it,” Miranda said warmly.

“No problem.” Samantha slid her leg off the footstool and heaved herself out of the armchair.

Miranda had the impression of a pride that would always deny personal problems and minimise others as much as possible. The young pilot had a rather narrow, gamine face, her fair skin liberally freckled, yet an innate strength of character seemed to shine through its finely boned structure and her sky-blue eyes would undoubtedly scorn any suggestion of cuteness.

“How did you get into flying?” Miranda asked, as they set off towards the wide hallway that bisected the homestead and led to the administration and accommodation wings.

“I was born to it,” came the dismissive reply. “Since I’m currently grounded, I guess Tommy jumped in and offered to fly you around the regular tours.” She slanted Miranda a derisive look. “Only too eager to show you the sights, I’ll bet.”

Caution was instantly pricked. “Why should he be eager, Samantha?”

“Call me Sam. Everyone else does.” Another derisive look. “And if you didn’t notice Tommy’s tongue hanging out yesterday, I sure did. To put it bluntly, Miranda, you’re stacked in all the right places and gorgeous to boot. So don’t tell me he didn’t give you the rush.”

Jealousy? The acid little thread in Sam’s tone alerted Miranda to very sensitive ground here. “Well, I guess the rush got diverted,” she answered dryly. “In any event I’m not interested in a personal relationship with Tommy King.”

“You’re not?” Sam stopped, eyeing Miranda with sheer astonishment. “Most women fall for him like ninepins.”

She shrugged. “You can chalk up a miss as far as I’m concerned.”

A gleeful grin lit up Sam’s face. “I’ve never known Tommy strike out. What a lovely dent in his ego!”

“Do you know him very well?”

“Too well.” The grin turned into a grimace. “Like I’m the kid sister he never had. I’ve been working for the Kings for years, mustering cattle, even before the resort was built.”

Which explained the familiarity between Sam and Tommy, the teasing and her disrespectful responses yesterday. “Then you must know Nathan well, too.” The words slipped out before Miranda could bite on her tongue. She didn’t want to reveal any curiosity about him. She didn’t even want to think about him.

“I know all of them well,” Sam replied with feeling, sounding exasperated by them or their family attitudes.

She set off down the hall again and Miranda kept pace with her, grateful the subject was apparently dropped.

“Come to think of it,” Sam muttered. “It’s not like Tommy to give up.” She frowned at Miranda. “Didn’t he even line up one trip with you?”

Miranda stifled a sigh. No point in hiding what would soon be common knowledge. “Nathan is flying me to the Bungle Bungle Range tomorrow,” she stated flatly.

“Nathan?” Another dead halt as Sam stared wide-eyed at her. “Nathan’s taking you?”

“He’s going anyway,” Miranda explained, trying to keep a terse note out of her voice. “He plans to take some old diaries about the Aboriginal tribes to the park ranger there.”

Sam’s mouth twitched. Her eyes danced with inner hilarity. “Nothing to do with you, of course.”

“Just a ready opportunity,” Miranda said dismissively.

Sam laughed out loud. “Oh, I wish I could have seen Tommy’s face when Nathan beat him to the draw.”

She chuckled on and off, little bursts of private amusement, all the way to the main administration office. Miranda hid her vexation behind silence, disdaining any comment, yet the memory of Tommy’s face at the dinner table last night kept playing through her mind.

She hoped the two King brothers were not going to make her the meat in their sandwich. Would they respect her choice not to get personally involved with either of them? It could become very unpleasant if they didn’t.

Miranda’s stomach was churning by the time she and Sam finally settled in the office, both of them in chairs, facing the computer on her desk. She needed to get her thoughts focused on business again. Tomorrow morning she would face what she had to with Nathan King. Until then...

“He’s free,” Sam said with a sidelong look at her.

“I beg your pardon?” Miranda answered distractedly, watching the monitor screen as the computer went through its start procedure.

“Nathan...he’s unattached right now. The woman he was seeing got married. He hasn’t started up with anyone else yet.”

“Well, I guess he’s feeling rejected,” Miranda commented, hoping she sounded careless, though she was amazed that Nathan King had been turned down for some other man.

“Oh, she didn’t reject him. It wasn’t that kind of relationship. Just casual lovers, really, though it did go on for a few years.”

Miranda gritted her teeth as anger blazed through her.
Casual lovers!
More like a convenient mistress who finally wised up and got herself a man who really loved her. If Nathan King was harbouring the idea that
she
could now fall into that convenient slot, he could think again. One way or another she would make her position very clear to him tomorrow.

“Shall we get down to business?” she said coldly, drawing a startled glance from Sam.

“Sure! Just thought you might like to know about Nathan.”

“I know all I need to know, Sam. He’s a member of the King family. Okay?”

Wide blue eyes met green ice and curiosity was instantly quenched. “Fine!” Sam’s gaze snapped to the monitor screen. “The bookings are listed in time sequence and...” Finally... business!

Miranda savagely recalled Tommy King saying Nathan was a brick wall. She vowed that the cattle King would meet a steel wall tomorrow, with barbed wire on top to deter any attempt at scaling it.

Miranda
was already at the resort helipad when Nathan pulled up in his Jeep. She had arrived five minutes before the arranged time of meeting, driving one of the luggage buggies, which she’d commandeered for her use. Being early made her feel more prepared, more on top of the situation.

Even so, Nathan swung himself out of the Jeep and Miranda’s breath caught in her throat. Regardless of her mental shields, his physical impact got to her, a big blast of strong maleness that instantly set everything female in her aquiver. Like herself, he was dressed in shorts, shirt, walking boots, a hat in one hand, a backpack dangling from his shoulder, but he emanated purposeful vitality while she felt hopelessly paralysed.

“Good morning,” he said, shooting a smile at her that jump-started her heart again. “We’ve struck it lucky with a cloudless sky. A clear sunrise makes the colours more vivid.”

“Yes, it is a good morning,” she agreed, though it promised a hot, hot day to come. In more ways than one, given her instinctive response to him.

He waved her towards the helicopter on the pad and she fell into step beside him, concentrating on injecting more steel into her spine.

“Have you read anything about the Bungle Bungle Range?” he asked.

“Only what was in the tour pamphlet.”

“Well, seeing says it all.”

Clearly he was not interested in lecturing or showing off his local knowledge, but his interest in her was twinkling from his eyes and playing havoc with Miranda’s nerves.

“Having trouble sleeping?” he asked. “No,” she instantly denied, wondering if she looked tired from last night’s tossing and turning over this meeting. “Why should I?” she challenged, wanting to pin-point the reason for his speculation.

“Oh, the quiet sometimes gets to city people. They miss the background noise, and other things they’re used to.”

Like sex?

Miranda found her jaw clenching and mentally berated herself for being ultra-sensitive. On the surface his comment was perfectly reasonable. On the surface he wasn’t saying or doing anything she could take objection to. But under the surface she felt the buzz of possibilities that were far from innocent.

“The last two days have been so busy, I guess the quiet hasn’t impressed itself on me yet,” she answered. “It will,” he said matter-of-factly. “You’ll come to like it or hate it. One thing can be said definitively about the outback. It very quickly sorts out the visitors and the stayers.”

“So I understand. I’ve been told there can be a stir-crazy problem with some of the staff if they don’t get regular leave.” That moved the conversation to a more impersonal level!

“Not just with staff,” he returned drily. “Most women I’ve known.”

He slanted her a look that seemed to be weighing if she had the grit to be a stayer. It set Miranda wondering about the woman who’d chosen to marry someone else...a woman who didn’t want to spend her life on a cattle station? But why would Nathan King keep the relationship going for years if it hadn’t suited him?

“There must be women who were born and bred to the outback like you,” she said pertinently. “Like Sam Connelly.”

“Ah, Sam,” he said in a tone of fond indulgence. He slid her an ironic look. “There aren’t many like Sam, believe me, and she only has eyes for Tommy. One of these days he might stop chasing glitter and see the gold right under his nose.”

Was that true about Sam? Miranda tucked the information away for future reference and targeted the man who was criticising his brother. “Perhaps he’s not inclined to look. Some men don’t want real commitment to a woman.”

“Is that personal experience speaking?’’

Bitterly personal.
Miranda barely stemmed a burning rush of blood as she fought those memories, determined not to reveal her humiliation to a man who’d spent two years pleasuring himself with a woman he must have considered
unsuitable
for marriage. Why else would he have let her go to another man? With cool deliberation Miranda turned the question back on him.

“I was just wondering why
you
haven’t found gold somewhere in this vast Kimberly region.”

His mouth quirked, drawing her attention to its sensual promise. “Funny thing about gold. It has certain chemical properties. If they’re missing it’s just fool’s gold.”

“Maybe they’re missing for Tommy,” she argued, all too aware of the chemistry Nathan tapped in her.

“No. He covers it with teasing. Sam covers it with aggression. And Tommy’s damned fool ego gets in the way. He’d add you to his pride list if he could.”

They’d crossed the ground to the helicopter. Nathan opened the door for her. Miranda didn’t immediately step up to the passenger seat. She stood stock-still, her mind whirling back over her evening with the Kings... Nathan, stand-offish, watching, only inserting himself when Tommy was considering taking her on tour trips. Had she got Nathan’s purpose with her entirely wrong? Nothing to do with sexual attraction?

She eyed him directly. “Is this what today is about, Nathan? Putting yourself between me and Tommy to save Sam’s feelings?”

He returned a look that simmered with appreciative warmth, liking her bluntness. “From what I observed, you’re not particularly drawn to him, Miranda. But Tommy doesn’t give up easily...”

Sam’s words!

“...and as time goes on, you might find yourself getting bored enough to play with his interest. Proximity and availability tend to overcome other shortcomings.”

“I see. You’re warning me off.”

“No. It’s your choice. I don’t believe in interfering with people’s choices. I’d be sorry to see Sam hurt, though. It’s one thing knowing Tommy drifts in and out of affairs, quite another watching one at close quarters.”

“I take your point,” she conceded, knowing she wasn’t interested in getting involved with Tommy King anyway.

Nathan nodded, then suddenly grinned at her, his blue eyes dancing with more than appreciation. “Besides, I’d much prefer you to relieve your boredom with me.”

“What?” Her mouth fell open and stayed open in surprise at the abrupt switch from do-gooding friend of Sam to man making a move on her.

Miranda barely had time to register his words, let alone his intent as he stepped closer, cupped her cheek, tilted her chin, and with his eyes blazing into hers, wickedly inviting, teasing, wanting, he murmured, “Let’s try it, shall we?”

Then he was
kissing
her, soft, seductive pressures that kept her shocked in stillness. She hadn’t been expecting it, wasn’t prepared for it, and his very gentleness was both confusing and tantalising. It was a take, but there was nothing really offensive about...about the way his mouth was loving hers. Yet he really had no right to just do it like this. She should stop it. Where would it lead? Where
could
it lead?

She lifted her hands. They clamped onto his chest, but instead of pushing, they found a magnetic attraction to the heat and muscle behind his shirt, and somehow they couldn’t stop sliding up to the big, broad shoulders that were on a higher level than hers, which was a new experience...reaching up to a man...and it sparked a swarm of previously thwarted female feelings...a man whose physique more than complemented her own too generous body length.

The temptation to feel what it was like with such a man as Nathan King—just this once—dissolved all the reasons why she shouldn’t. It was only a kiss, which he was delicately deepening, inviting her active participation, promising a pleasurable exploration that would satisfy her curiosity. No force involved. No danger attached to it. She could back out any time she liked, dismissing the impulse to taste as inconsequential.

He knew how to kiss. He was very good at it. So distraclingly good she was barely aware of his hands sliding around her waist, though her whole body was instantly and acutely conscious of his when he hauled her against him. But by then that was what she wanted, to feel more of him, revelling in the dominant maleness he emitted and incredibly excited by it.

Hungry, urgent kisses, a gathering passion for them, and her hands climbing, clutching his head, pulling him down to her, her body arching into his, pinned there by his hands, engulfed by a sweet storm of sensation, riding with it until the growing hardness of his wanting sparked some shred of sanity in her mind, and the shock of her susceptibility to Nathan King’s attraction took hold.

She grabbed his ears and forced his head up. He stared at her, his eyes hot and glazed, steaming with rampant desire. She stared back, panic clutching her stomach where he was pressed so explicitly against her, panic screeching through her mind at having let this...this foolish experiment...go so far.

“You’re right,” he muttered gruffly. “Not the time or place.”

Before she had wits to make any reply, he collected himself and moved, scooping her off her feet and lifting her onto the passenger seat of the helicopter as effortlessly as though she were some lightweight doll. “Throw your hat and bag on the back seat,” he instructed, and closed the door, sealing her into position. Miranda was a trembling mess, her mind stuck in a maze of incredulity... unanswerable questions about herself and her totally inappropriate and shamingly intimate response to a man she barely knew and didn’t want to know. Even now, her body was in revolt at having been deprived of what it had wanted from him. Chemistry!

How did one switch it off?

One solution zipped through her squirming confusion. Get out of the helicopter! She didn’t have to go with him or even be with him. She found the handle to open the door. Then a surge of pride insisted running away was not the most effective move to deal with this. She had a choice to make here and she had to make Nathan King respect her choice. Her contract at King’s Eden ran two years and there was no way of avoiding him for two years. A stand had to be taken. Words said. He had to be convinced there was never going to be a
right
time or place for what he wanted from her. No way was she going to fall into the Bobby Hewson trap again.

She’d barely remembered to toss her hat and bag onto the back seat before Nathan King hauled himself into the space beside her, triggering an awful sense of vulnerability. She fastened her seat-belt and did her utmost to ignore his impact on her senses as he settled himself.

“Have to get moving if we’re to catch the sunrise,” he said, handing her a set of headphones and linking up the electronics.

Thankfully he switched on the ignition and busied himself with getting them off the ground. Miranda donned the headphones, which drowned out the noise and allowed her to speak to him but decided any talking was best done later. After she had calmed down. When she could choose her words carefully, not in heat. And when being in the wretchedly small space of this helicopter didn’t make her feel so
crowded
by him.

Determined on shutting him out for the duration of the flight, Miranda resolved to keep her gaze trained strictly on the view. Which was what she was here for... firsthand knowledge of tourist territory... and which she proceeded to do, once they were in the air.

All the same, even as she watched a seemingly endless vista of beige grass dotted by the grey-green foliage of the universally small outback trees, her nerves were strung taut, waiting for Nathan to say something. As time dragged by, she began to hate the thought he was simply sitting tight, congratulating himself on having sparked a positive response from her, and anticipating more of the same.

“You’ll miss the approach if you keep looking out of the side window, Miranda.”

The advice boomed into her ears, jolting her out of her dark brooding.

“That’s the start of the Bungle Bungle Range straight ahead of us.”

Relief poured through her at his matter-of-fact tone, and the moment she looked where he directed, his domination of her thoughts faded, her mind filling with the wonder of what lay before her.

She had seen photographs of Ayer’s Rock, a huge monolith rising with stunning effect from a vista of flat land as far as the eye could see. The Bungle Bungle Range gave the same weird sense of not belonging to the general landscape, but it was much more than a monumental rock. It looked like some ancient remnant of a lost civilisation, embodying mysteries that no one knew the answers to any more.

The photographs in the pamphlet hadn’t captured what she was seeing, couldn’t capture the size and fascination of it. It seemed to rise out of nowhere, unconnected to anything else, a huge amalgamation of massive beehive structures, horizontally striped in orange and black. The rising sun vividly illuminated the orange sections and made the black more stark.

Miranda knew there were geological explanations for the colours—layers of silica and lichen—and the shapes. She’d read them in the pamphlet. Yet the stripes seemed so evenly spaced, as though to some deliberate, artistic plan, and the striations in the rock of some of the massive domes on the outskirts of the range gave her the impression of buildings built of bricks, like pyramids with the sharp edges having crumbled away over thousands and thousands of years.

She knew it was fanciful to ignore expert knowledge—this was all solid sandstone, and the formation was actually dated back three hundred and fifty million years—but she couldn’t help envisaging ancient rulers being buried inside those time-worn domes.

“Had enough or do you want to see more?” Nathan asked evenly, not pushing either way.