Breaking Free (Thoroughbred Legacy #10) Page 19

  It was the same age Megan had been when she’d lost her own parents, just two years older than Heidi was now.

  Megan’s eyes filled with emotion again as she read in greater detail, beginning, for the first time, to truly understand what life events had shaped her notorious great-aunt.

  And as the hours wore on to morning, and the howls of hunting dingoes reaching over the valley from the Koongorra wildlands grew closer, it was once again driven home to her that one could never really judge another human unless you had walked their road.

  Did Louisa’s past condone her present irascible behavior? Maybe not, but at least it allowed it to be understood.

  More than anything she wanted to talk to Louisa about this, but she couldn’t. Not unless Louisa broached it herself. Megan couldn’t possibly let her aunt know she’d gone and read all these letters like some underhanded snoop.

  She looked into the bottom of the box, and under some old newspaper cuttings she found a silver bracelet. It bore a single engraved charm—a little racing horse.

  Love, Kent.

  Megan clasped the bracelet in her hand, thinking of love lost. And choices made. And how she had her own thinking to do.

  She carefully placed the bracelet back into the box and removed the sheaf of newspaper cuttings.

  The top sheet had a story about Louisa’s first big win with Fortune’s Lady, the first Thoroughbred she’d bought on her own.

  Going against the grain, Louisa had picked a seemingly unpromising filly, but according to the article, she’d glimpsed something in the form of the horse that no one else had. And she’d noticed the gleam of defiant spirit in the filly’s eye. She’d picked that horse up for a song.

  And once again going against the tide of current thinking, she’d hired a brooding, quiet, and controversial loner to train Fortune’s Lady—Banner Mac—a man who listened to horses, not people.

  Megan smiled to herself.

  Her aunt had a thing for the underdog, for giving the downtrodden a chance to prove themselves and make good. It was the way she thought about this country she loved. She’d told Megan and Patrick when they’d first arrived at Fairchild that Australia’s history had bred tough people. Proud people. Folk who didn’t need the rest of the world to tell them what to do. The rest of the world like that Andrew Preston.

  But, whatever Louisa’s rationale, possibly forged long ago in that home for unwed mothers, her later gambles in life had paid off big-time. Banner Mac and Fortune’s Lady had taken the international circuit by shock and by storm. And after Fortune’s Lady, there had been more horses, more wins. The stables had grown, and after moving into the stud business, Fairchild Acres had overseen the breeding of a long line of champions.

  Fortune’s Lady had been just that—a mare who had brought Louisa real fortune. And fame.

  Smiling, Megan took the next newspaper cutting out of the box and her blood suddenly ran cold.

  It was a story about Banner Mac’s arrest for the sexual assault and murder of an eleven-year-old boy thirty years ago—Liam Smith.

  Megan’s heart quickened as she read, flipping over the page, utterly horrified by what came next.

  Mac had stood accused of luring three young boys, Henry Luddy and brothers DJ and Liam Smith, into the Koongorra wildlands, where he’d tied them up in a bush shack and sexually assaulted Liam.

  The other two boys managed to escape, making it back over the river to alert authorities.

  They hadn’t returned in time, however, to save Liam’s life.

  According to the yellowing articles from the Newcastle and Pepper Flats papers, Banner Mac had been arrested in connection with the crime. His night-time drinking habits, penchant for hiking the Koongorra trails alone, and his general isolation from other members of his community had made him a target of law-enforcement interest. He’d been charged when his footprints and blood type matched that found on the scene.

  But Henry Luddy and DJ Smith, both eight years old at the time, had failed to satisfactorily identify Banner Mac in a police lineup. Crown prosecutors had nevertheless taken the case to trial.

  Megan frowned, wondering why Louisa had kept these stories. Then when she began to read the next article, she saw why.

  Louisa Fairchild had personally retained Bob D’Angelo, Senior, Robert D’Angelo’s father, of D’Angelo, Fischer and Associates, to defend her trainer.

  D’Angelo’s team had decimated the Crown Prosecutor’s case, and since this was in the days before DNA technology could be used to match semen samples to the accused, Banner Mac had left the court a free man.

  Police never arrested anyone else, clearly believing Mac was their man. Banner Mac had left the country mere days after the verdict came down.

  Megan felt ill. The distant howl of dingoes reached her again, and she shivered.

  This must have been what Dylan was talking about when he said Louisa had bought justice, setting a criminal free. The Hastings family would have been living in the valley around the same time the Smith boys and Henry Luddy were abducted. Dylan probably went to the same school as these boys.

  His hatred made sense.

  But would her aunt have defended Banner Mac if she’d thought her trainer might actually have been guilty of this heinous crime? Megan would not believe it.

  But what did she honestly know?

  Disturbed after reading these pages, and by the haunting sound of the dingoes, Megan pulled on her kimono and made her way down to the kitchen in the dark in search of cocoa.

  But as she pushed open the kitchen door, she bumped into Marie, a knife glinting in her hand in the eerily dim nightlights. Megan stifled a scream. “Oh, God, Marie, you scared me,” she said, pressing her hand to her chest and laughing nervously as she looked at the sharp butcher knife. “I…came down for some cocoa. I didn’t expect to see anyone here at this hour.”

  “I forgot to start the bread maker,” Marie said, setting the knife down next to some sausage. “And I thought I’d have a quick snack before going back to the staff cottages.” She looked embarrassed. “Would you like me to make you the cocoa?”

  “Oh, goodness, no. Thank you.” Megan pulled her kimono closer, opening the fridge and reaching for the milk. “Can I make you some?”

  Marie hesitated, then smiled. “Sure, I’d love that.”

  They sat for a while at the kitchen table, nursing cups of cocoa as dry wind rattled at the windows.

  “Did you speak to that lawyer again today?” Marie asked as she sipped from her mug. “Do you think he’ll have Louisa home soon?”

  Megan hesitated, thinking of her altercation with D’Angelo earlier that morning. “You worry about Louisa a lot, don’t you, Marie? You’re growing fond of her.”

  Marie shrugged. “Louisa’s been alone a long time.”

  Marie was right. In spite of her fortune, Louisa seemed to lead a very lonely life, and Marie appeared to have taken a special interest in the older woman.

  Megan knew that Marie had lost her own mother shortly before coming to work in the Hunter Valley. She wondered if caring for Louisa was a way for Marie to hold on to something she’d lost.

  Then she thought of Dylan’s concern over Marie’s uncle Reynard Lafayette, and possibly Marie herself. Dylan had noted they both had access to the gun cabinet. And to Lochlain.

  “You never did tell me what made you decide to come to Fairchild, Marie,” Megan said, raising her mug of cocoa to her lips. “It’s an awfully long way from Darwin.”

  Something in Marie’s jewel-green eyes flickered and her shoulders tensed. She hooked a strand of blond hair behind her ear. She seemed nervous. And Megan noted once again how similar she and Marie were to each other in coloring, although Marie was smaller in stature, delicate almost.

  “I needed a change after my mother, Colette, died,” Marie said cautiously. “Her brother, my uncle Reynard, was here in the valley, and he’d heard about the job at Fairchild. He put in a word in with Mrs. Lipton, who interviewed me over
the phone.”

  Megan knew this from Mrs. Lipton.

  “You have the same surname as your uncle,” Megan prompted, feeling guilty. But she was asking for Dylan. He needed any help he could get right now, and he wasn’t able to talk to Marie himself without a warrant.

  “My mother never married,” said Marie. “She and her brother were both adopted by the Lafayettes and went by the same name.”

  Megan filed that information away. “You don’t have any other family?”

  Marie looked long and hard at Megan. “No. Just us.”

  Megan didn’t press further, couldn’t. She felt bad enough as it was. “I also lost my mum…when I was sixteen.”

  “It’s never easy,” Marie said softly, “when you love someone. Even if they made mistakes, you know?”

  Megan nodded, thinking of Louisa’s letters and past mistakes.

  Marie looked up suddenly. “My uncle’s a good guy, Megan. I know the cops have been questioning him, and he’s fickle, a drifter, a bit of a renegade, but he’s a good man. To me. He’s my family.”

  Megan studied her, thinking how important that was, the need for a sense of home. Of family.

  Belonging.

  And what lengths people went to find it.

  Chapter Thirteen

  It was Monday morning, almost lunch, and the clock was ticking. Megan was getting tense. After visiting Louisa, she’d tried to call Dylan from the Aston Martin’s car phone. She wanted to tell him she’d learned that Marie’s mother was Colette Lafayette, that Colette had never married, and that both she and her brother Reynard had been adopted. It might give him something to go on.

  But the station admin assistant said Dylan wasn’t at the station. He wasn’t answering his mobile, either.

  Megan turned up the radio as she drove towards his house instead. The ABC rural news was reporting the Koongoora fires had flared again in deep inaccessible gullies, and that the low-pressure cell in the north was continuing to build.

  She glanced to the eastern ridge, saw the haze of smoke was indeed thicker. Tension whispered through her.

  She switched to another station where announcers were talking about rural fire service volunteers attempting a risky backburn ahead of possible lightning strikes if the cell moved south.

  Megan turned off onto a side road, and into the Hastings driveway.

  But when June Hastings opened the door, Megan found the woman in utter distress, and Heidi on the lounge carpet in her school uniform, knees hugged tight into her chest, weeping inconsolably. There was no sign of Dylan.

  Through convulsive sobs Heidi managed to tell Megan she’d finally received a reply from her mother. Sally had outright rejected her, saying she was too busy to have her daughter visit, and that it was not a good idea altogether.

  A fierce protective anger welled in Megan’s chest as she held tightly the daughter Sally should have been here to comfort and nurture through the last ten years. Heidi clung to her like a small child, body racked with grief, desperate for the love of a mother.

  And all the while, June stood wringing her hands and rocking on her feet, features drawn while Muttley yipped and scratched at the screen door to come in as if he was missing out on the high drama.

  “Oh, goodness,” June whispered. “Is Timmy going to be okay? Is Timmy ever going to come home?”

  Megan couldn’t bear it anymore, and she took control of the household.

  She ushered June into the kitchen and set her to making lemon squash, just to keep her busy. June was easily distracted, and seemed pleased to have a clearly defined role.

  Megan then opened the door to let Muttley in, and he bounded over to Heidi, pouncing on her with his front feet, knocking her flat onto the carpet, his whole body wagging and slobbery tongue lolling as he rolled onto her.

  “Oh, geez, Muttley, you smelly drover! Get off me! He’s been rolling in kangaroo poop again, Megs, get him out of here.”

  Megan stood there bemused for a moment, and she began to laugh. And laugh. And laugh.

  Heidi looked absolutely horrified, before a hesitant smile began to creep over her lips, and she began to laugh, too, through her tears. Megan’s knees buckled under her, and she sank to the floor beside Heidi, where they rolled around cackling and chortling and being bombarded by a smelly hound who was overjoyed by their sudden camaraderie on the carpet.

  Megan sat up, wiping tears from her eyes and pushing her hair back from her face. “Oh, Lord, do I ever stink. We need to clean up here, Heidi. Does Muttley have some kind of tub, something we can wash him in? Do you have any clothes I can borrow?”

  Heidi studied Megan a moment, then leaned forward suddenly and gave her a quick kiss on her cheek. Megan’s heart crumpled.

  “Thank you, Megs, for always being there. I wish you were my mother.”

  She touched the child’s face. “Remember, Heidi, that you are an incredibly special person,” she said softly. “And never, ever feel inferior because someone unworthy has rejected you. For whatever reason.”

  Heidi tightened her mouth, eyes glinting with fierce determination, and she nodded fast.

  “Come,” said Megan. “We can talk about it some more while we scrub Muttley outside. And boy, are we going to give that dog the bath of his life. He needed one before the poo, ugly old Mutt.”

  Heidi chuckled, and wiped the tears from her face.

  And that’s how Dylan found them that afternoon—full of soapsuds in his garden, near the pool, trying to wrestle a wet, soapy and hairy mutt back into the tub, the pooch in question shaking a spray of droplets into the late-afternoon sun that caught the light like sparkling jewels. His mother was happily busy in the kitchen baking. The scent of warm scones was something Dylan hadn’t smelled in years.

  The sound of laughter, the scents, the peace—they caught him by the throat.

  He stood, transfixed, unable to move lest the magic pop like one of those glistening oily rainbows on the floating soap bubbles.

  Smiling, his mother came up to his side and handed him a glass of fresh lemon squash. “Did you have a good day, Timmy?

  He grinned at her, his heart suddenly warm, expansive. “Yeah, I did.” Truth be told, his day had sucked, but this made up for it all.

  Nothing could match the sounds of happiness filling his home and garden. Nothing could match his woman—because there was no doubt in his mind he wanted Megan now, completely. She was wearing his shorts, rolled up on tanned, lean soap-slicked legs, his oversized T-shirt plastered over her wet breasts, her hair tangled and damp, her eyes gleaming.

  She fit: right into his life, his clothes, his family—everything.

  She looked up, saw him and stilled.

  His pulse quickened.

  Heidi glanced up, too, caught the exchange between him and Megan, and swallowed nervously. She hadn’t gone to school today, and she didn’t want him to be mad. Slowly, she got to her feet, walked up to her dad, and wrapped her arms tight around his waist.

  “Hey, Daddy. Megs is helping wash Muttley.”

  “I can see that.” Helping in so many ways.

  “My mother e-mailed me,” she blurted out, eyes blinking fast, waiting for him to yell, to ground her for a week, tell her the dance was off, ask how and why she’d contacted Sally.

  Dylan’s chest tightened, but he held it all in. “And?”

  Heidi’s eyes darted up to his. “You’re…not mad?”

  He smoothed down her tangle of soaped hair. “What did Sally say, Heidi?”

  “She doesn’t want me, Dad.” She glanced down at her bare feet on the grass, her blue nail polish. “She never did.”

  “Oh, chook.” He crouched down to eye level, grasped her shoulders, looked into her eyes. “You okay with this, Heidi?”

  “No.” She bit her lip. “Not really.” She rubbed her toes on the grass. “I always thought Mum would be there if I ever did pick up the phone. That she was, like, some angel in the distance, always watching me from far away, but just too bus
y, too special to be here right now.”

  Dylan was almost afraid to speak. This was the most in-depth conversation he’d had with his kid in a long, long time, and he was afraid if he opened his big clumsy mouth, the fragile moment would crumble to dust at his boots.

  “Heidi,” he said softly. “I know you saw the divorce papers.”

  Her mouth tightened, and she cast her eyes down. His heart picked up a notch, worried she’d clam up. “I wanted to talk to you about them.”

  She looked up again, surprise showing that he wasn’t going to berate her for going into his study, opening an envelope clearly marked for someone else.