Snowy Mountains Cattleman, page 29
Goliath needed no encouragement to close the distance between him and Jindy. As they drew near, Rowan was glad to see Grace wore a riding helmet to protect her head. She also had on black jodhpurs that fitted like a second skin and a loose pink work shirt. When he reached her side, he didn’t waste time with words, just leaned over to cup her face and kiss her. She melted into him.
An impatient stomp of Goliath’s hard front hoof had Rowan lifting his head to search Grace’s face for all the answers he was hoping for. He’d never seen her smile so joyful or her eyes such a soft green-gold. He slid from the saddle to reach for her. Her hands settled on his shoulders and before her feet touched the ground her mouth had found his.
This time it was Goliath’s forceful nudge to Rowan’s back that ended their kiss. Hand in hand, they led the horses over to a low snow gum branch to secure their reins. Rowan wanted no further interruptions. Bundy flopped in the shade as if to say he wasn’t in any rush to go anywhere.
Rowan turned to Grace. She’d taken off her helmet and her dark hair fell loose down her back. He was again surrounded by the fragrance of honeysuckle.
He slipped his arms around her waist and pulled her close. ‘I was coming to Sydney.’
‘Aubrey told me … she always keeps such a cool head but she said she was panicking as she knew you wouldn’t listen to anything she said. Clancy’s plan if I got caught in traffic was to take your keys and blame them being missing on Monet and Primrose. Asking you to find Jindy was all her idea. Mine was to wait in the coach house.’
‘Clancy and her romantic heart.’
Grace’s lips curved before she lifted a hand to trace the line of his jaw. ‘Rowan … I couldn’t stay away any longer. Not talking to you, not seeing you, I felt so far away. I was also worried … especially when you went to the hut alone.’
‘I’m sorry if I gave the impression that I needed time out. I just went to fix the chimney. My running from my feelings days are over.’ He wrapped her fingers that toyed with the collar of his shirt in his and touched his mouth to the back of her hand. ‘I love you, Grace. I have from that first afternoon. It’s never been fake dates or a summer fling for me.’
‘It never has been for me either.’ Her palm pressed against his heart. ‘This is where I belong, with you. I love you too, Rowan. You are my real world.’
He kissed her again to let her know she wasn’t just his real world but his whole world too.
When they drew apart, she took his phone from out of his front pocket and checked the time with a sigh. ‘As much as I’d love to stay exactly where we are, we have to get back. It’s going to be a day for revelations. We have somewhere to be and someone to see. The final clue about the apartment has been there all along.’
CHAPTER
19
‘You’re not going to give me any hints?’ Rowan asked with a grin as they drove through the front gate of Crookwell Park.
Grace’s only answer was to smile and slide her fingers into the back of his tawny sun-bleached hair. She breathed in his fresh cedar scent. It had only been an hour since they’d spoken the truth to each other surrounded by the snow gums and mountains and she couldn’t get enough of him.
As if privy to her thoughts, when they parked beside her car—she’d left Aubrey’s at Ashcroft—Rowan turned to give her a tender kiss that stole her breath and promised a lifetime of such moments.
A loud bleat caused them both to smile and sit back in their seats. She’d said she needed to see the goats before they went where they had to go.
‘I won’t be long,’ she said as she left to see how much Lavender and Rebel had grown.
On the way to the old stables, she looked over to where a blue tarpaulin covered the right corner of the mansion. Apart from the crumbled wall and the scarred hillside there was no sign of any landslip. Rowan had organised for the mud and debris to be removed and for an engineer to inspect the site. Once his report arrived she’d implement the recommendations to ensure the hillside never gave way again.
Her attention lingered on the end room where she’d been trapped. As for her, she felt no anxiety or residual trauma. She’d only just regained consciousness when Rowan had called so hadn’t been lying there buried and alone with her fear for too long. When he’d taken the door off and she could see him through the gap between the table and the rubble, any feelings of claustrophobia had vanished. While they’d physically been separated, his care and concern and the way his focus had never wavered from her had given her the strength to stay calm and to wait until she was freed.
A chorus of goat bleats had her smile and walk faster. It was good to be home. Once she’d given all six goats enough pats and cuddles to make up for being away for a week, she returned to Rowan’s ute.
‘Okay, where to now?’ he asked after she slid into her seat and he laced his fingers with hers.
‘Our rendezvous point is where the boundary fence cuts the paddock in half.’
At Rowan’s intrigued look, she laughed. ‘No clues. There’s still a chance I’m wrong about all of this.’
As they drove up the hill to where the paddock had been legally divided, she bit her lip until she was certain that the person they were supposed to meet was there.
A familiar gator was parked beside the burial plot.
‘Frank.’ Rowan glanced at her. ‘I knew there was more to his story.’
They pulled up beside the small gate and walked into the cemetery to where Frank sat in a camp chair looking out over Crookwell Park. He’d brought somewhere to sit to take the weight off his bad leg as they were in for a long chat.
She kissed his lined cheek.
‘I’m glad you’re back,’ he said, voice low and solemn.
‘I am too.’
He nodded at Rowan who stood close by her side. ‘And I’m glad you’ve finally put the past behind you.’
The warm weight of Rowan’s arm settled around her waist.
Frank’s attention returned to Grace. ‘Before we start … how did you put it all together?’
‘Toy trains, rocking horses and the Pinocchios on the bookshelf in your living room.’
‘You have the perfect brain for chess. It’s our little secret that you only let Aubrey win because you know how much it means to her to always be in control.’ He paused to wave his cane around the Russell family cemetery. ‘Right, Rowan … what do you see?’
Rowan barely turned his head. ‘I finally see what I’ve been looking for. Over behind the closest headstone is a metal pole to which is attached a solar-powered CCTV camera that sits just above the top of the cross … which means, Frank, this is your land and the boundary line goes straight through this burial plot.’
Grace turned to look at the cross. Sure enough, there was a camera where Rowan said it was. It was so small and well hidden she’d never noticed it. She’d just thought the rusted pole had been to support the aged sandstone.
‘I can’t wait to teach your little ones chess.’ Frank dug into the front pocket of his shirt and took out a folded piece of paper. ‘The camera only picks up from the bend in the driveway so that’s why I never saw who left the goats.’
Frank handed the paper to Grace and she carefully opened the yellowed and fragile folds. She showed Rowan what appeared to be a hand-drawn map, except the faded drawing didn’t only depict the boundary fence. She glanced at Frank who watched her, expression sombre.
She looked back at the map but it wasn’t the off-centre boundary line drawn through the plot that carved off Lawrence Senior and Lawrence Junior’s graves from the others that drew her focus. Instead it was the small neat squares, some labelled with ink and others in pencil, that showed where each grave was. There were more plots on the map than there were headstones on the hillside.
She glanced sideways to count the gravestones in the staggered rows beside her. Seven more to be exact. According to the hand-drawn plan, there were three graves on Frank’s land on this side of Lawrence Senior’s cross. Then down the hill, again on Frank’s land, there were four graves next to Lawrence Russell Junior’s final resting place. He hadn’t been buried alone after all.
‘The missing graves,’ she whispered.
Frank slowly nodded. ‘The two secret families were buried here but on the land that Lawrence Senior gave to the woman he loved who lived in my cottage. Even in death he and Lawrence Junior wanted to protect their own.’
Grace looked down and then up from the map. ‘But …’
Frank’s face seemed to age. ‘I know … there are four graves beside Lawrence Junior and there only should be three. One is empty.’
When Rowan spoke, his quiet words told Grace he too had put most of the pieces together. ‘Which means the missing child from the apartment didn’t die and also that Lorraine was a little confused. Eduardo didn’t have another sister, did he? He had a brother.’
Frank’s gnarled hands clenched where they rested on his thighs as he stared at the mansion below.
Grace knelt beside him. ‘I thought you may have once had a baby girl as you reacted to the photograph of the doll in the trunk, so when I saw the Pinocchios in your living room I wondered why you also had boys’ toys. Then I remembered that Pinocchio was an Italian story and that there had been two toy trains in the trunk along with clothes that could have belonged to two boys if they had been the same size. Ned had been right; the rocking horses had been bought together. Frank … Eduardo wasn’t just your brother, he was your twin, wasn’t he?’
Frank took a moment to speak. ‘He was. He and I chose the doll in the trunk from a catalogue for Helena. Except when she was born she never cried.’
Grace moved to take Frank’s hand in hers.
Rowan clasped the older man’s shoulder. ‘Your name? Do you have an Italian one too?’
‘Francesco. They shortened our names in hospital.’
‘You and Eduardo both had polio?’ She’d always thought Frank limped from his arthritis.
‘Yes. Eduardo was able to go home but I wasn’t. I don’t know the whole story, I never will, but somehow my father believed I died. I can only guess that someone thought this had been the right thing to tell him, as for a long time they thought I wouldn’t survive, let alone walk.’ Frank rubbed at his brow. ‘As I didn’t have any proper paperwork to identify me, when I was moved to a new hospital it was assumed I’d been abandoned. There was a boy in the bed near mine. His father, a lawyer, would play chess with me and his mother read me books. When my friend died, they formally adopted me. I had a happy life even though I never forgot my real family.’
‘Did you look for them?’ Grace asked. Despite how hard it had been for Kathy to find any information, somehow Frank had discovered his origins.
‘I did, but as you know there’s no paper trail. About fifteen years ago a woman contacted me calling me by my birth name. She was my half-aunt, the baby in the pictures Taite found. My grandfather’s second family, who lived in the cottage, would come to visit us in the apartment so I remembered her. As my body had never been returned to them, she never gave up hope I was still alive. I think she searched every hospital and every adoption record she could find.’
Grace smiled. ‘She was the aunt who Ned restored the rocking horse for?’
Frank’s expression softened. ‘The golden one was mine and the grey one Eduardo’s. I was always trying to ride the fastest.’
‘Why didn’t you come forward when Crookwell Park was for sale?’ Rowan asked.
‘I don’t have any paperwork to prove who I am, even though a DNA test would, but there’s no one really left to compare it to. Besides, I wouldn’t ever want to live in the mansion again. It’s like going to town. I still associate Bundilla with the people we needed to hide from.’
‘Yet you kept watch over the house all these years,’ Grace said gently.
‘I did. While I can’t face going inside, it’s the only thing linking me to who I really am. Over the years I purchased whatever land had been sold off. Then when my half-aunt Clara passed away in the care residence we found near us in Canberra, she left me the cottage.’ Frank smiled at Grace. ‘I held on to the hope that one day someone would give this place another chance. Which is why I have a shed full of things you might like … including the golden rocking horse and the ballroom chandelier.’
‘So, you were the collector who made the previous owner an offer they couldn’t refuse.’
Frank gave a chuckle.
She met Rowan’s gaze and in his eyes she could read her own thoughts. Crookwell Park would have its second chance and the curse it had laboured under for generations would be lifted. No longer would couples be kept apart and their families be separated and hidden. The mansion would be a true home where children’s laughter would echo, along with their footsteps, down the many hallways.
Frank looked between the two of them. ‘Everything I’ve done has been worth it. You both are the future of Crookwell Park.’
Grace squeezed his hand and reached for Rowan’s. ‘No, Frank. We all are.’
EPILOGUE
A velvet darkness blanketed Crookwell Park’s ballroom. Grace stood still and silent in the expectant hush.
Even though she couldn’t see anyone, all around her were people she was lucky enough to call friends. She’d come to small-town Bundilla alone and grieving, only to be enfolded in the warm embrace of a tight-knit community. Close beside her she felt the brush of Rowan’s arm against hers. The summer might be drawing to a close but the man she loved was never far from her side.
In this moment it also was as though her parents were with her, just as they had been on long-ago Christmases when the living room had been dark while she and her mother had waited until her father switched on the Christmas tree decorations.
In about another five seconds the ballroom too would be filled with light. She’d only had power connected to one part of the mansion but for now that was all she needed. The original chandelier Frank had preserved in his shed had been reinstalled and tonight it would again shine like a thousand stars.
She took hold of Rowan’s hand and his strength and love wrapped around her.
In true Aubrey style, her best friend started the countdown in a clear and strident voice before she pulled the cord to turn on the chandelier.
‘Five, four, three, two, one!’
Brilliance flooded the room, followed by gasps.
Grace stared at the delicate prisms of glass that chased away every shadow in the room. The crystal chandelier was more beautiful than she could have imagined. It was as though Crookwell Park’s soul had been returned. She glanced at Rowan and found him looking at her instead of the ceiling. He pressed a kiss to her temple.
Aubrey crossed the ballroom to where Frank sat in a comfortable wingback chair that he’d also had stashed in his shed. As he touched a handkerchief to his eyes, Aubrey put her arm around him. Grace’s own eyes misted.
Frank now felt comfortable coming inside and his visits often unlocked precious memories such as of his father and grandfather playing chess in the billiards room and of his mother and father laughing and waltzing in the empty ballroom. The unmarked graves in the Russell burial plot would soon have headstones. On one of their now regular trips to town, she’d introduced Frank to Kathy and the three of them were looking into what could be done to put crosses on the other unmarked graves in the Bundilla cemetery.
Grace’s attention lingered on Aubrey. For a city girl who liked her comforts, she was becoming a regular visitor. After seeing Rowan on Goliath mustering cattle, she’d now taken to calling him Grace’s cattleman. Even though Aubrey had never taken up Trent’s offer of a local tour, Grace hoped one day she would.
She hid a smile as she glanced at the quilting ladies who were standing near the long table laden with an array of desserts. Every so often they’d look across at Aubrey and then bend their heads to whisper together. Millicent and Beatrice were also over near the table where they were talking to Mabel. Grace was yet to attend book club but when she did she’d made a mental note to take Brenna’s advice to never say that any story sucked.
From the corner of her eye, she glimpsed Taite make a hasty retreat through the French doors. Earlier everyone had congregated on the side veranda for a barbeque and he’d be either getting another beer from the esky or heading for his ute to make a getaway. Rowan exchanged a look with Heath before Heath followed the deer farmer outside. Grace had her fingers crossed that Taite, like Brenna, who stood on the far side of the room laughing with Clancy, would one day be off the quilting group’s matchmaking hit list.
Rowan’s thumb brushed across her hand in a silent message before he too left via the French doors. On his way past the dessert table he swiped a slice of vanilla cake. Bundy trotted behind him, knowing full well the treat would be for him. She’d moved out of Possum Cottage and into the coach house and Bundy so far had stayed with them. But the time would come when he’d leave to bring joy to someone else’s lives. When he did there’d be a Bundysized hole left to fill. Frank had offered Rowan the use of his land for his cattle which provided even more of a reason for Rowan to look for a kelpie of his own.
While Rowan would be busy with his Herefords and rebuilding the damaged mansion corner, she would continue to restore Crookwell Park. The plan was for them to move in by next summer. She’d sold her inner-city apartment and her colleague who was running her interior styling business had made an offer to buy it, which she would accept. Once Crookwell Park no longer consumed all her time, she’d start a new styling business. This one would be online and involve sourcing bespoke and special items so she would be able to stay in the mountains as much as possible.
She swapped smiles with Aubrey before she walked out to the grapevine-covered pergola. Her best friend knew what she and Rowan were doing. After she collected a small patchwork bag she’d left on an outdoor chair in the cobblestone walkway, she joined Rowan in the courtyard. He’d run an extension cord from the ballroom and fairy lights lit up the rectangular space that was the heart of Crookwell Park.
