Their paths met under the portico. The man paused to let her precede him. She automatically flashed him a commiserating smile. A comment about the heat was on the tip of her tongue when recognition froze it there. Something more than recognition halted her feet.
She had the oddest sense of deja vu as their eyes met. Her mind reasoned that of course she had seen him before. The media coverage on the family tragedy that had brought this man to Alice Springs was still intense, and Suzanne had watched him being interviewed on television several times.
Nevertheless, that did not explain such an eerie impact at meeting him in person, almost as though they had always been meant to meet, to connect in some important way.
He was staring into her darkly lashed violet eyes, an intense, searching look, as though he also felt some inexplicable inner jolt.
Leith Carew.
Suzanne turned his name over in her mind, reviewing what she knew of him. He was the eldest son of the legendary Carew family of the Barossa Valley, winemakers for five generations, owning and adding to a vineyard that was famous not only in South Australia, but around the wine-drinking nations in the world. Leith Carew was the business manager, running the head office in the capital city of Adelaide.
It was his sister who had died out in the desert, his sister, Ilana, and her husband, Hans Bergen, the master vintner. The lost child was their two-year-old daughter, the first and only child of the sixth generation. Leith Carew was unmarried, and his twin half-brothers were in their early teens.
Suzanne had thought him impressive on television, a man in command of himself and those around him, using the media to get across the message he wanted and deftly turning away any attempt to sensationalise his role as the representative and driving force of the Carew family.
He was quite strikingly handsome, the combination of dark blond hair and green eyes lending an unusual attraction to what was essentially a hard face. His smoothly tanned skin seemed to be stretched tightly over prominent cheekbones and the angular cut of his jawline. There were few lines to indicate age, but the maturity of his features and the position of responsibility he held placed him in his early to mid-thirties. A slight bump on his strong nose suggested a break he hadn’t bothered to have straightened out. Probably playing football in younger days, Suzanne thought, considering his well above average height and muscular physique.
The light tropical suit he wore was as classy as the rest of him, quality fabric, restrained style. He didn’t need ostentation to stand out from a crowd. He had the air of being master of any hand he wanted to play.
Suzanne sensed he had been tipped slightly off balance in the last few moments. As she was. By some odd link between them.
Psychic?
Sexual?
As Suzanne hastily rejected this last thought she saw a sceptical gleam emerge in the piercing green eyes, mocking either her or himself. It evoked a wave of prickling heat that owed nothing to the high temperature of the day. She was suddenly and embarrassingly conscious of acting like a morbid gawker in the face of a man who had been forced into the public limelight by tragic circumstances.
“Can I help you, Mr. Carew?” she asked in a sympathetic rush.
His grimace expressed a weary resignation at her ready identification of him. His gaze flicked to her nurse’s uniform, making another assessment of her before he replied.
“You work here?”
“Yes. Most of the time.”
“It’s a fine service you people give to the outback community,” he remarked appreciatively.
Suzanne smiled. The medical centre was attached to the Royal Flying Doctor Base that served the remote outback cattle stations and the aboriginal settlements of inland Australia. It was a unique medical service that always impressed visitors.
“Someone has to do it,” she said with a touch of pride in what was achieved here, despite the difficulties that had to be overcome.
“Few would volunteer.”
“It depends on what kind of life you want.”
“Is it the life you want?” he asked curiously.
Suzanne considered for a moment before answering the question seriously. “It has more personal rewards than working in a big city hospital.”
“What about your private life?”
“It’s all I want.”
“Is it?” The soft challenge in his voice was reinforced by a suggestive simmer in his eyes.
Jolted by the overt sexual interest he was showing, Suzanne instantly retreated into formality. “Is there any way I can help you, Mr. Carew?”
The reminder of his business at the medical centre drew a grim mask over his expression. “I’m here to see a Dr. Forbes. Could you show me where to go?”
“I’ll take you straight to him,” Suzanne offered, unnerved at finding herself uncomfortably conscious of being a woman in the presence of this man.
He exuded a powerful masculinity that he was at ease with, and was apparently well aware of its effect. “Thank you,” he said with a knowing look that increased Suzanne’s disquiet.
He was used to women going out of their way for him, she thought with another hot feeling of mortification. She turned quickly, welcoming the cool air of the lobby as the entrance doors slid open automatically. She half wished she had only offered directions to Brendan’s office, but it was petty to let Leith Carew’s attraction sway her from a more sympathetic course.
It was bad enough that he had to suffer being in the public eye at a time of private grief. His mission here this morning certainly had nothing to do with capitalising on his good looks. Nevertheless, Suzanne felt a distinct unease as she led the way down the corridor to the administration offices.
Her initial response to Leith Carew should have been one of instinctive compassion. Why had a more personal feeling blocked that out? Even now she was far more tuned to the vitality of the man walking beside her than to the dreadful sense of loss that must be eating at him. It put Suzanne completely out of sorts with herself.
Her rap on the chief medical officer’s door was unnecessarily sharp. With an assurance that no-one at the centre would question, Suzanne did not wait for an answer. She opened the door and poked her head around it. Brendan lifted his attention from the stack of paperwork on his desk and shot her a warm welcoming smile.
It should have made her feel happy and secure. This was the man she loved for a host of good reasons. But quite unreasonably Suzanne was more aware of the man waiting behind her in the corridor, and somehow that awareness stopped her from returning Brendan’s smile.
“I’ve brought Mr. Leith Carew to see you,” she said bluntly.
Brendan was instantly all business, the smile wiped from his face as he rose from his chair to come and greet the visitor. Suzanne opened the door wide and ushered in the man who was still profoundly disturbing her.
“Mr. Carew.” Brendan offered his hand in sympathetic respect.
“Dr. Forbes.”
Suzanne watched them size each other up as they went through the formalities of establishing a professional rapport. They were approximately the same age, but Leith Carew was the taller, bigger man, his wider and more worldly experience of life somehow dominating this encounter.
Suzanne felt a stab of disloyalty at the comparison. Leith Carew’s harder edge did not diminish Brendan’s quiet assurance. Besides, it was the heart of a man that mattered more than anything else. There were always kindness and compassion in Brendan’s soft brown eyes, and while he might not be so handsome as to turn women’s heads, he had the type of face that inspired trust and confidence.
Brendan Forbes was a good man with a big heart. As big as Zachary Lee’s. And any man who measured