‘What is it, Ruby?’ he asked her now.
‘It’s just…I’m so confused. I so wanted you to have a proper family.’
He gave a rueful smile. ‘I do.’
It nearly killed him to admit even that much, Ruby thought. And family? Ha. ‘One baby you’re hiring a housekeeper to look after? You won’t even let me near.’
‘It’s not as if this child’s mine, and you’ve done enough. I can’t let you.’
‘But I want to.’
‘No, you don’t.’ Pierce was a professional in charge of his world and she was a frail old lady who didn’t know any better. Beloved but past her use-by date. ‘You need to rest.’
‘I’ve got all the time in the world to rest,’ she whispered. ‘But now…all I want is to live.’
She looked again along the line of her boys. Her outstanding men.
Not one of them knew how to live, she thought sadly. Not one.
She’d failed.
CHAPTER ONE
SHE’D psyched herself for farm terrors-but not for this.
Shanni steered her car onto the verge, but she didn’t drive in the gate. No way.
Shanni wasn’t a farm girl-in fact her best friend had burst out laughing when she’d divulged her destination. But Jules had grown up on a farm, so she’d talked Shanni through what she might face.
‘Cows will ignore you as long as you don’t interfere with their calves. Calves are curious but harmless, and most modern farms employ test tubes instead of bulls. Check if a cow has a dangly bit, and if it does don’t go near it. Horses…Big doesn’t mean scary. Say boo to a horse and it’ll take itself off. Most farm dogs are all bluster. Look them in the eye and shout “sit.” Oh, and watch for cow pats. They’re murder on stilettos.’
So she’d left her stilettos at Jules’s chic Sydney bedsit. She’d rehearsed her ‘sit’ command and she was ready for anything.
Anything but this.
There were kids sitting on the gate. Multiple kids. One, two, three, four.