Breakaway Creek. Heather GarsideЧитать онлайн книгу.

      BLURB

      Two city women - a century apart - find love and adventure with rugged men in the Queensland outback.

      Two love stories; two parallel lives; two destinies.

      Set in the 19th and 21st centuries, Heather Garside's debut novel is a passionate rural romance of love and its consequences.

      Shelley and Emma are separated by time but bound by a dark secret to a place called Breakaway Creek.

      Betrayed by her long-term boyfriend, Shelley Blake has fled the city to return to her home town. Her interest in a photograph of her great-great-grandparents is piqued by her family's reticence about the mystery couple, and a search for answers takes her to the cattle station Breakaway Creek.

      Here she meets Luke Sherman, a man embroiled in the bitter ending of his marriage and a heart-breaking separation from his two small boys.

      Shelley resists an instant attraction to Luke, as neither is ready for a new relationship.

      And, while Luke struggles to reclaim his children, Shelley uncovers the truth about her ancestors, Alex and Emma.

      A story of racial bigotry and a love that transcends all obstacles takes the reader back to the pioneering days of the 1890s.

      Acknowledgements

      I would like to thank the team at Clan Destine Press - my publisher, Lindy Cameron, and editors Ruth Wykes and Samantha Christie - for having faith in this novel and for their assistance in making it the best it can be.

      I am indebted to the past and present members of Claytons Critique from whom I've learnt so much. Members of the Central Highlands Writers' Group have also taken the time to read my chapters and offer valuable insight.

      Lastly I am grateful to my husband Allan for tolerating the many hours spent in the writing process.

      Breakaway Creek

      Prologue

      Central Queensland, 1871

      'It shouldn't be long now.'

      Sarah wiped the woman's sweating brow with a damp washcloth and hoped to God she was right. They were eighty miles from the nearest doctor with only an Aboriginal midwife and herself, newly married and ignorant. Things were looking desperate. After twenty-four hours in labour, Eliza was exhausted. The hot sun pounded on the tin roof of the maid's tiny room and the heat from the kitchen next door exacerbated the stifling conditions. Sarah fleetingly pressed a hand to her own stomach and vowed her baby would be born in Clermont.

      She flinched when Eliza screamed and threw her head back, dusky features clenched in agony as she writhed with another spasm. Sarah watched helplessly as the Aboriginal midwife made an exclamation in her own language and bent between the patient's legs.

      'Is it coming, Mary?' The woman didn't answer, but Sarah heard the first tiny cry and her heart leapt in dizzy relief as the baby slid free. She moved closer to check. 'You have a little boy, Eliza. Well done!'

      For a moment euphoria pushed aside Sarah's revulsion. She hadn't realised what a messy, terrible business childbirth could be. The midwife grasped the wailing infant and cut the cord with the kitchen knife Sarah had provided, before wrapping him in a blanket and laying him against his mother's breast. Weakly, Eliza fumbled with her nightgown, so Sarah helped her open it and guide the nipple into the child's nuzzling mouth. Then she stiffened. For the first time she noticed the baby's skin through the coating of blood and mucus. Her stomach cramped.

      'Missus!'

      Her gaze jerked up to the black midwife's frightened face.

      'What's wrong, Mary?'

      Mary pointed and Sarah stepped cautiously closer, nostrils twitching at the metallic smell; blood. It gushed from the birth canal, staining the bed linen in an ever-widening tide. She grabbed some towels and pressed them against Eliza's body, but they did little to staunch the flow. Mary ran to the doorway and grabbed her dilly-bag, then moved the towels aside to pack handfuls of leaves in their stead. Sarah watched in dismay, wondering if the woman had any idea what she was doing. But who was she to stop her?

      A touch on her arm made her look down at Eliza's greying face.

      'Missus, will you look after my baby?'

      The voice was reduced to a whisper, the dark eyes dull. Eliza was slipping away as surely as the blood poured from her body. Sarah glanced at the suckling infant.

      'Who is the father, Eliza?'

      Eliza's lips moved and Sarah bent closer to hear the whispered words. She froze, all her suspicions crystallising into grim knowledge. Wave on wave of pain and disillusionment lashed her like the sting of the stock whip her husband used on unruly cattle.

      Could she possibly take responsibility for this child? She wondered if she had a choice. Sarah straightened, drew her breath in deep, and said the words - God help her - she knew the dying woman needed to hear.

      'Yes, I'll take him for you, Eliza.'

      Chapter One

      Clermont, Present Day

      Shelley parked her car in front of the Clermont courthouse and stared at the heat shimmering off the bitumen in desolate waves. The street was empty and the entire town seemed lifeless, as if everyone had holed up to escape the burning sun.

      She was probably mad coming here just because of an old photograph.

      Her grandmother would be livid if she knew. Not that she really cared what Nanna Audrey thought. Shelley's mother, Noela, was okay with anything that took Shelley's mind off Jason, but it was her Great-Aunt Edie who'd suggested she come to Clermont.

      'Now, there's a puzzle,' Aunt Edie had said. 'Audrey has to know something I don't. All I know is, Grandma was estranged from her own family and Grandpa didn't seem to have much contact with his. Audrey ended up with all the family papers.'

      Shelley surveyed the low weatherboard building as she walked up the path and mounted the timber steps. It looked old enough to have existed in her ancestors' day. Perhaps they'd once trod these same boards. She wondered how they'd coped with the blistering temperatures in those long, layered clothes they used to wear.

      'I'm trying to trace my great-great grandparents,' she told the young woman behind the counter. 'I was told they were married here in Clermont.'

      The girl flicked her long fringe out of her eyes and smiled apologetically.

      'I'm sorry, but with current privacy laws the public can't access our records. If you know the dates involved, I can look it up for you, though.'

      Shelley dug in her handbag for the photograph. She'd found it last week in one of her mother's old photo albums, and looking at it now still made her scalp tingle. She held it out to show the girl.

      'Their names are on the back - Alexander and Emma Baxter. It's dated 1898.'

      'Was that when they were married?'

      'I assume so.'

      'That's a starting point, anyway. I'll see what I can find.'

      She disappeared into the adjoining room, leaving Shelley to wander restlessly, studying the posters and sample birth certificates on the shabby walls. It was a depressing place. She swung around as the girl returned with a sheet of paper, her face beaming with satisfaction.

      'I found the entry. They were married here in Clermont on February 25, 1898. She was Emma Watson. There are also records