Morgan's Law (17 page)

‘Should I have packed an overnight bag for this little road trip?' Sarah asked after a few miles of driving and no sign of Adam announcing they'd arrived at their destination.

‘Only if you want to stay the night.'

She wasn't sure if he was joking or not. ‘I snore.'

‘So do I,' he grinned.

They eventually pulled off the main road and turned onto a dirt track that wound its way up a slight rise. A sign informed her this was Dead Man's Drop lookout. ‘Now there's a name to inspire confidence in visitors to the area,' she said with a smile.

As far as lookouts went, Dead Man's Drop wasn't all that impressive in height. But considering the surrounding landscape was mostly flat, she figured it qualified and she pushed open her door to walk across to the timber railing, built some time ago judging from its slight lean.

In the distance Negallan shone like a beacon in the dark surrounds and a smile touched Sarah's lips. The strange little town had certainly stolen a bit of her heart in the short time she'd been here.

Resting his arms on the top of the fence next to her, Adam watched her silently.

‘Why did you bring me up here?'

‘I wanted to show you one of the highlights of Negallan. This used to be a favourite hangout when I was a teenager.'

‘Oh yeah? Some kind of lovers' lane? How long since you were last here?' she grinned.

‘Quite a while.'

Sarah laughed at his deadpan tone. ‘Oh come on, you're not that old. Is this why we're here then? So you can reminisce about your misspent youth?'

‘Maybe,' he said.

A gentle breeze lifted the strands of Sarah's hair that had fallen free of the ponytail she preferred over the hassle of straightening her hair into its former sleek style. It didn't seem necessary out here and she enjoyed the freedom of not having to spend an hour on her hair and makeup each morning, as had been her usual routine back in London.

‘You messed up all my good intentions, you know.'

Sarah raised an eyebrow. ‘And just how did I do that?'

‘I'd decided I was going to avoid you, then I walked into my kitchen and found you at my table,' he said.

Sarah tilted her face up to his. ‘Why were you going to avoid me?'

Adam didn't answer straightaway. ‘Because I was trying to save what's left of my pride.'

He wasn't making any sense. ‘What's your pride got to do with anything?'

‘I'm beginning to wonder that myself.'

‘Do you want to just tell me what you're talking about?'

‘That's what I'm trying to do.'

‘You're not doing a very good job of it.'

‘Well, if you'd just be quiet and let me finish.'

‘Fine. Finish already,' Sarah said with an exasperated sigh.

‘Jeez, woman, do you have to have the last word in every single conversation?'

‘Considering I'm the only one who's having a conversation while you keep talking in riddles—' She'd barely got the words out when his mouth effectively put a stop to her argument.

It shouldn't have come as any surprise, but the same electricity that had stolen her breath away the first time he'd kissed her had doubled and she thought perhaps something was wrong with her. Her heart was racing and she thought she might pass out; she was quite certain she could no longer feel her toes. Maybe it was a stroke?

When he eventually pulled away and stared down at her, she saw that he was not unaffected either.

‘
That's
why I've been staying away from you. I didn't want to complicate things more than they already were.'

‘Oh.' Oh? She worked with words for a living and had a
degree
, for God's sake, and
that
was the best she could manage?

‘I can't stop thinking about you, Sarah. I was intending to steer clear of you and keep my mouth shut about it after you made it painfully clear you wanted nothing to do with me the day your car broke down. I figured that would be that. Only . . .' His voice drifted off uncertainly.

‘Only what?' she said, unable to stop herself from asking, even though whatever he said could only complicate her already complicated life.

‘Only it's not working.'

‘Adam . . .'

‘I know all the reasons why it's a dumb idea. Trust me, I spend all day
every
day telling myself the same thing, but it's not doing any good.'

‘Nothing can come of this, Adam. I'll be leaving soon. And I live and work in London.'

‘I didn't say it made any sense, I'm just telling you how it is.' His voice held its own note of frustration as he took a step away from her and leaned against the railing.

‘I've just got out of a relationship. Men are definitely not on my list of favourite things at the moment. I don't think some . . .' She searched for a word to describe the kind of delicious, toe-curling sex Adam would no doubt be more than capable of delivering.

‘Mutually agreeable sex?' he supplied with a crooked grin.

‘Some cheap fling,' she corrected.

‘Hey! I am
not
cheap,' he cut in, feigning outrage.

Sarah rolled her eyes in exasperation. ‘Oh, whatever! See, you can't even take this seriously—why on earth would I bother?'

‘Because you know you can't deny you want to,' he said.

And she had to admit, he had her on a technicality.

Outside the hotel, Adam pulled on the handbrake and turned to face her in the cabin of his ute. ‘You know, if you end up staying longer and it gets too expensive here, there's plenty of room out at Gwandalan.' Seeing her eyebrow kink, he added calmly, ‘There's a spare room.'

‘Thank you for the offer, but I've got used to this old place. I'm here until the car gets fixed and then I have to get back home. I think the Morgans will definitely be glad to see the back of me.'

‘You have a right to your grandmother's share of that place and there's nothing they can do about it. You need to sort that out.'

‘I don't want to stir up that kind of trouble. I've existed just fine without Burrapine Station or the Morgans up until now, and I'll be fine without them in the future. I don't need the legal nightmare that would go along with trying to claim a share of the property. Anyway, from the impression I'm getting, there isn't a lot to claim—they seem to be doing it as tough as everyone else.'

‘It's still wrong.'

‘Adam, they have nothing I want.'

‘What
do
you want?'

Sarah shrugged. ‘I've pretty much got everything I want.'

‘You've got a job and a place to live, but that's not all there is to life, Sarah.'

His dismissal of the sacrifices she'd made to achieve what she had was the slap of reason she'd needed. ‘Well, it's enough for right now. I've worked too damn hard to throw it all away.' Did he have any clue how hard she'd worked over the last ten years to make it as far as she had? Sure, she had practically no social life and, right now, no personal life either; but the truth was, relationships took too much effort to maintain when you were working fourteen-hour days.

‘Just so you know,' he said, leaning closer and kissing her lightly, ‘I'm not giving up.'

She went to protest, but he shook his head and cut her off. ‘You get one chance to get out of this car alone, Sarah, and then I take your sitting here as an invitation to follow you up to your room.'

That spurred her into action, although she did consider lingering, just for one brief moment. ‘Thanks for the . . . drive,' she said as she opened the car door.

‘Sweet dreams, Sarah,' he taunted lightly.

Her pulse still seemed a little fast and her lips slightly raw. The memory of Adam's stubble against her skin sent a flame of renewed heat through her body and she gave a small sigh of regret that she hadn't called him on his offer to spend the night.

It would have been easier if she were able to dismiss him as a parochial hick, but he was an intelligent, hardworking, sexy country boy with a butt that would make a male model green with envy. Shaking her head to rid herself of the image of Adam's denim-clad backside, she pushed open the pub's heavy front door. ‘It's just hormonal,' she muttered under her breath as she climbed the staircase to her room. Nothing a good dose of reality wouldn't cure in the morning.

Things moved quickly after the first community meeting. It was like watching a torrent of floodwater engulfing a narrow creek. Tash went into a frenzy of organisation. Phone call after phone call resulted in more connections and more meetings. The original twelve volunteers for the progress committee was reduced to nine as it became clear that this was not going to be a simple cake stall and raffle event and some of the volunteers realised they were not willing or able to take on so much responsibility.

The next problem was naming the project. A request to the wider community for suggestions resulted in such heated debate that in the end the committee decided to pull the request and the name was decided upon by committee vote.

Cott & Co would be the gin's operating name if the project ever got off the ground. And deciding on a name seemed to give the whole thing an identity and life of its own. People began using the name around town in general conversation, and talking about it made it seem real—and, better yet, possible.

Things might have been going well for the committee, but it wasn't quite the same for Sarah. Celeste, her boss, had taken to sending through emails with files attached for her to ‘look at when she had a moment'. The first time Sarah didn't think twice about it. The client was one of her favourites and she was happy to handle the details of their project herself, but over the next few days more and more emails began coming through and she was beginning to get annoyed. So much for taking time off work.

She thought about simply ignoring them, but Celeste knew she'd never let a client down and Sarah cursed the blatant way the woman played on her professionalism.

How had she let herself become such a martyr? she admonished herself silently as she collected her handbag and room key and headed for the door.
Because you're
biding your time until Celeste's job is up for grabs and then
you know you'll get that promotion they've been promis
ing you for the last two years.

Lately the little voice inside her head had begun to warn her that she was losing touch with her priorities. She'd managed to ignore it up until now but the longer she stayed in town, the more urgent the voice became and it was getting harder to pretend she couldn't hear it. With each day she was becoming increasingly torn between her obligations to her gran and the worry that she was neglecting her career by being out of the office for so long.

Putting on her sunglasses she stepped out into the bright sunshine and made a decision. Any day now the car would be ready. If nothing else surfaced about Gran's tree by then, she'd scatter the ashes at Burrapine and leave it at that.

Happy that her inner control freak was back at the wheel, she crossed the street confident she was once more in charge of her destiny.

Sixteen

‘You have got to be kidding me, Bruce!' Sarah glared at the mechanic standing behind his oil-smeared service desk.

‘I'm sorry, Miss Murphy, I gave them the right part number—I double-checked and made sure. Buggered if I know how they managed to send the wrong one.'

‘What are we supposed to do now?'

‘Wait for them to resend the right part,' he told her with a shrug.

‘Up to another two weeks? Are you serious?'

‘'Fraid so.'

‘You're telling me in the whole of Australia there's not one single water pump? Not
one
?'

‘That's what they reckon.'

Sarah gave an impatient growl and began to pace the concrete floor. ‘What a load of sh—'