That’s what it was. Lust. Nothing more, she told herself flatly. Nothing.
But Ryan must have thought it more than that. Today he’d sent Felicity away.
Poor Felicity.
Abbey looked over to where Jack was squeezing mud through his fingers. He was totally engrossed in the rich black mire, sliming through onto his bare knees. Abbey had provided him with a whole bucket of mud and it promised to keep him good for another hour or more. He was dressed only in a nappy and he was filthy.
One of the cows who’d already been milked had doubled back to watch the little boy. The cow hung over Jack’s play-pen, her kindly bovine face watching Jack with interest.
Jack reached up and put one grimy finger on her nose-and shouted with laughter at the black splodge on her brown velvety face.
This place-this lifestyle-was about as far from New York as life could possibly get.
But Ryan had just asked her to marry him.
Good grief! Abbey’s overwhelming sensation was shock. Sure, Ryan had kissed her last night. Sure, she was head over heels in love with the man. But… marriage?
Marriage to Ryan was so far out of the realm of possibility that Abbey had never dreamed of it. Or maybe she had dreamed, but in the way someone in New York would fantasise about life in a tropical paradise. A dream. Nothing more.
Marriage to Ryan meant life as a New York consultant’s wife. Life away from here.
No and no and no.
But… marriage to Ryan…
To be with Ryan was all she wanted, Abbey told herself bleakly. Marriage to Ryan was the fitting together of two halves of a whole. But…
No way! There was no way in the wide world she could marry Ryan. She wasn’t just Abbey Wittner any longer. She was Janet’s daughter-in-law and Jack’s mother, and also Sapphire Cove’s doctor. A lone and independent Abbey might marry Ryan and adjust to life at his side on the other side of the world. But Jack’s mum couldn’t. Janet’s daughter-in-law couldn’t. John’s widow, who still had debts to pay, couldn’t.
Sapphire Cove’s only doctor couldn’t
So Abbey blinked back tears of depression-and kept right on milking. Damn Ryan Henry. Why did he have to come back here in the first place?
‘Abbey, you must marry me.’
Abbey was hardly through the kitchen door before Ryan threw his line at her.
Abbey blanched.
Damn. Ryan bit his tongue in disgust as he saw her recoil. This wasn’t Ryan at his persuasive best. He was way out of line here-thrown right off balance. It seemed there was only one thought in his head.
Marriage to Abbey…
After his visit to the turtle eggs he’d gone back to Felicity, to find her pacing his father’s farmhouse.
‘Where the hell have you been?’
When he hadn’t answered she’d supplied the answer for him.
‘You’ve been with that girl, haven’t you?’
‘No, I-’
He’d got no further. Felicity had picked up his lap-top computer-his, mind, not her precious machine-and had hurled it straight at him. It had missed and slammed into the wall.
And had smashed.
‘You’ve wasted my time, Ryan Henry,’ she snarled. ‘I ought to sue you. Two damned weeks I’ve spent kicking my heels…’
‘Hey, half that time was spent in Hawaii.’
‘I could have stayed in Hawaii. Do you know how many meetings I’ve missed? All because of you.’
‘Felicity…’
‘Even if you weren’t with that girl, I’m still sick of it,’ she snapped. ‘I’ve been so patient I can’t believe it. I’ve sat here and waited while you ran round after your goddammed father and I haven’t said a word while you operated in this God-forsaken hospital and worried about that girl’s damned cows…
‘And then I rang the hospital, looking for you, and got someone called Ted who sounds like a morgue attendant and he said maybe you’d gone out and killed yourself on the road because it seemed to be in fashion to knock yourself off. And then he changed his mind and said it was more likely you were out making love to Abbey Wittner. And he even said that it was a shame if you weren’t feeling suicidal because he needs a good death to keep up the occupancy rate of his damned morgue…’
She stopped, exasperated, as Ryan’s mouth twitched into a smile. ‘No. Don’t you dare laugh, Ryan. I’ve had enough. Whether you were with her or not, I don’t care. I’m not staying. This whole place is crazy and if I stay one minute longer it’ll infect me.’ She paused for breath.
‘Ryan, there’s an urgent meeting tomorrow afternoon in New York. They’ve just e-mailed me and I must be there.’ She hesitated for a whole ten seconds-and then hauled the diamond from her left hand. ‘I’m going, but I don’t think you want me to take this with me-do you Ryan?’
‘Felicity…’
‘I don’t want to take it,’ she confided, softening a little and pressing it into his hand. ‘Ryan, I decided to marry you because you knew where you were going in life. Now… well, you’re vacillating, and I can’t stand it.’ She reached out and kissed his forehead. ‘Goodbye, Ryan.’ Then she stared down at his smashed computer and it was her turn to smile. ‘And I hope I crashed your hard disk.’
That was the end of Felicity.
And all Ryan could think of as he watched her pack and leave was that now he was free to talk to Abbey.
And now, here was Abbey, standing at the kitchen door in filthy overalls and gum boots and her toddler in her arms dripping mud.
His one thought kept echoing. ‘Abbey, you must marry me.’
Abbey didn’t answer. She simply held Jack out to him, and before he knew it Ryan had a splodge of muddy baby in his arms.
‘You bath him while I take a shower and then I’ll make us both an omelette,’ she said.
‘Abbey…’
‘I refuse to cope with perfectly ridiculous requests on an empty stomach.’
‘was not a perfectly ridiculous request.’
‘Wash my son and then we’ll talk about it.’
Washing Jack was not as easy as it looked. In fact, it took three rinses before the water ran clean. Jack thoroughly enjoyed the whole experience. The only part he didn’t enjoy was getting dressed again. Ryan finally gave up and came out into the kitchen, carrying a naked toddler in one arm and a nappy in the other.
‘OK. You win. I need a mother here.’
Abbey was clean herself. There was a cold shower on the back verandah. She’d thrown herself under it in the hope it might shake some sense into her head, and then hauled on jeans and a T-shirt.
She should be cool. Instead, she was as hot and flustered as she’d ever been in her life.
Keep it light, Abbey told herself. Keep it… keep it away from heartbreak.
‘You mean you can cope with the intricacies of microsurgery but not a piece of flannel?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Wuss!’
It was so hard to keep her voice light.
She had the makings of omelette on the table. Now she took her naked son from Ryan, and pointed to the eggs.
‘OK, if you can’t do nappies you’re on omelette duty.’
Ryan blinked.
‘Hell, Abbey, I can’t cook.’
‘Why not?’
‘I’ve never learned. I have a housekeeper.’
‘A housekeeper? Back in New York?’
‘Well, yes…’
‘And if I married you would I have a housekeeper?’ Abbey asked carefully.
‘I guess… Yeah, of course you would. Mrs O’Hara could look after Jack…’
‘While I went out to work?’
‘Abbey, I don’t know about registration in the States,’ Ryan admitted. ‘It’s been easier for me here because I have Australian citizenship. I’ll have to look into whether you need to retrain or not. Registration could take some time.’ He spread his hands. ‘But, hell, Abbey, you’ve worked so hard all your life… Why don’t you marry me and let me take care of you for a while?’
‘I wouldn’t know how to,’ Abbey confessed. ‘Ryan, just hold on here.’ She hugged her small naked son against her, as if he gave her strength. ‘This morning you were engaged to Felicity. Right?’