She frowned. ‘I appreciate your confidence in my interior decorating skills but I don’t need amusement, Max, I need to rebuild my life so I can regain my independence.’
He knew she expected them to part after the twelve months, she’d told him so several times, and he’d deliberately put no pressure at all on her about his own growing feelings.
Perhaps if he spent more time with her she’d decide he was the catch of the season. What a joke. She’d confirm what he had always known that he didn’t have much to offer her.
He couldn’t have children and she was a great mother and should have lots of children.
He wasn’t used to such negative thoughts and lack of self-confidence and if this was what falling in love did, he wasn’t impressed.
He’d just have to put up with the agony in the slim chance that she’d realise they would deal very well together in the long term.
‘Why don’t we go for a drive on Sunday in the Hummer?’ he said to change the subject. ‘My poor baby hasn’t had a rough-up for a few months now and Mrs White has offered to mind Elsa for a few hours.’
She glanced at him quickly and then away. ‘Fine,’ she replied, though she sounded surprised.
It wasn’t roaring enthusiasm. She’d said fine, so he’d work on it from there.
He hadn’t been out for a while and it would be interesting to see whether Georgia was a bushbashing girl or not. Tayla certainly hadn’t been.
‘What are you smiling at?’
He looked up at her. ‘I was thinking about the one time I took Tayla out in the Hummer and she had hysterics as soon as I turned off the main highway. She liked sitting up above all the other cars with people watching on the main road.’
‘That would be the part I’d hate most.’
‘Wait until you see what she can do.’
‘Should I regret agreeing?’
He raised his eyebrows suggestively. ‘We’ll see.’
Max loved having Georgia beside him in the Hummer. They took a short drive into the hills that first day and the rough fire trail he’d chosen carried them deeper into the forest in a slow incline towards the trig point at the top of the hill.
The overhanging branches slapped the side of the vehicle and Georgia laughed with delight as they bumped and crashed their way through the bush.
‘I’m impressed, Max,’ she said, laughing at him as another huge frond of prickly lantana swished down the side of the paintwork. ‘You really do take your baby offroad and rough her up. You’re not just a show pony.’
‘I’ll give you show pony,’ he threatened, and turned down another trail that seemed even more overgrown than the last but then cleared and opened out to a rocky outcrop overlooking the valley floor.
When Max turned off the engine, bellbirds pinged their songs in the scrub and the rustle of lizards could be heard, scuttling away from the now invaded open ground.
‘You were lucky this wasn’t a dead end.’ Georgia gazed around in delight.
‘Technically it is. But call me lucky,’ he said, and then pulled the map from the door. ‘Actually, I cheated.’
‘Pretty cool navigating anyway,’ she said and, undid her seat belt. ‘Can I get out?’
‘Absolutely. Do you want a hand to climb down?’
‘No.’ She pretended to frown at him. ‘Thank you. I’m a big girl.’ Max watched her jump from the cab and he climbed out himself with a grin.
This was another side he hadn’t seen of Georgia. She glowed with vitality and enthusiasm as she crunched her way across short grass and small boulders to lean, a little recklessly, he thought, over the edge.
On the other side of the canyon a waterfall fell hundreds of metres to the valley floor and the twisting sliver of a silver river at the bottom.
Max came up next to her, ostensibly to share the view but really to grab her if she overbalanced, and when she looked across at him her eyes sparkled as she took in the magnificent views.
Max smiled back indulgently at her. He was falling deeper and deeper in love with this woman every minute and he was beginning to think she wasn’t as immune to him as he’d thought.
‘There’s nobody within miles and miles of us, is there, Max?’
‘Nope,’ he said. ‘All this within an hour from home.’
‘Elsa would love it.’
‘We’ll bring her next time.’ Max looked forward to more days like this. His family—if only it were really so. ‘No doubt she has her mother’s adventurous heart.’
‘I love it. I love the Hummer. I love the bush.’ She looked around eagerly. ‘Thank you for bringing me today, Max. I needed a total change and this is wonderful.’ She spread her arms and in doing so shifted a collection of rocks from under her foot that threw her off balance for a moment.
Max pulled her back against him before she could really grasp that she had been in danger and then she didn’t know whether the thumping in her heart was from the near fall or…from being in Max’s arms against his delicious chest.
Thankfully he made light of it as he righted her and shifted her to a safer position. ‘Falling for me, are you, Georgia?’ he said.
She could do that—despite all the reasons she shouldn’t. Why wouldn’t she? She felt so connected to him at this moment. Two consenting adults in the wild with no one to see what they did. Deep inside a little voice cried plaintively. Why hadn’t he kissed her?
‘You’re a safer place to fall than over the edge,’ she said lightly, hoping he’d put the breathlessness in her voice down to her near miss when, in fact, it had come from her own unexpected erotic thoughts that wouldn’t go away.
‘Glad you think of me as safe,’ Max said dryly, but Georgia was busy with her own thoughts.
Fairly explicit, unexpected thoughts. Nymphs and satires. Naked in the bush. Max’s chest.
Ants and rocks in your back… Her sensible side brought her back to earth, and Georgia turned away to hide her flaming cheeks.
What on earth had those fantasies come from? She pushed the graphic pictures from the front of her mind and searched for diversion in other appetites. ‘Let’s picnic here.’
‘Fine.’ Max’s answer was short and she glanced at him. He was watching her and she could feel the blush steal up her cheeks just from looking at him so she turned away again to find Mrs White’s picnic basket.
‘I’ll get it.’ Max had the other door open. ‘You find a spot to put the rug. I don’t want ants in my pants.’
She laughed. They both had ants on the brain. Max came across with the basket and suddenly she was ravenous.
After the first Sunday trip when Max discovered Georgia enjoyed an adventure as much as he did, a whole new facet of their relationship opened up.
They began to take Elsa with them for excursions in the Hummer as well. They travelled along old fire trails and explored deserted gullies lined with lush tropical greenery and soaring gumtrees.
Elsa had her feet dangled in tiny tumbling streams and Max taught Georgia how to winch logs that had fallen during storms and the best way to chainsaw the heavier timber that often blocked the trails.
Max promised more trips when they moved north and the tenure at Murwillumbah grew closer.
The Byron Bay house overlooked the ocean across rolling green hills, and