“And to think I didn’t believe Jamie when he warned me you might try this,” he said, striking a match and lighting the lantern he carried in one hand.

Bliss swallowed hard. “I was only planning to get something to eat,” she said.

Reeve shook his head in mock amazement. “He said you’d lie as well,” he marveled. Then his eyes narrowed and he leaned a little closer to Bliss. “Listen to me, love. Jamie probably wouldn’t lay a hand on you, being your husband and all, but I regard myself as your brother, and I’ve got no qualms at all about turning you across my knee and paddling you just as I would Elisabeth, should the situation warrant it. Is that clear?”

Bliss climbed a step higher on the stairs, trying to decide whether or not Reeve was bluffing. She was certain that he was, but taking the chance seemed highly inadvisable, and anyway, he was as impassable as a mountain.

For the moment.

Meekly, Bliss turned and went back to her room, where she lay tossing and turning all the rest of the night.

If only Jamie hadn’t left without her. She almost hated him for doing that, she thought, drying her eyes on a corner of the sheet. Almost.

In the morning, Peony prepared to depart for Brisbane with Reeve and Maggie’s neighbor, Duncan Kirk, and a half dozen of his men for an escort.

She called Bliss to her in the parlor, and said, “I can’t leave with you thinking that Jamie and I have ever been anything more than friends.”

Bliss lowered her eyes. She’d been giving the matter a lot of thought of late. “I’m sorry for the way I acted, Peony. I guess I just love Jamie so much that I can’t imagine another woman not wanting him, too.”

Peony smiled. “Take care of him, Bliss. There’s never been another man like Jamie, and there never will be.”

Bliss nodded, her throat thick, and the two women embraced.

Everyone watched Bliss when she came forward to say another good-bye an hour later, as though they expected her to bolt and run. Of course, it wouldn’t have taken any genius to guess that she was waiting and watching for her chance.

The rest of the morning passed before the opportunity arose. For once, there was no one watching her except Elisabeth, who was sitting quietly on the floor of the parlor, sketching.

“That’s a ’roo,” she said proudly, holding up a drawing Bliss would have been glad to claim as her own.

Bliss gave the kangaroo only a cursory glance, since she was occupied in checking names off a mental list. Reeve, in the stables, where a valuable mare was foaling. Maggie, that turncoat, upstairs feeding the baby. Kala, the housekeeper, down the path, in the cookhouse... .

Bliss rose cautiously to her feet. Elisabeth’s aquamarine gaze shifted to her face in an instant, suspicious and accusing.

“You’d better not go anywhere,” the child warned with the authority of one who had had disciplinary dealings with Reeve McKenna before. “It’s bad to run away. There are snakes in the ’cane and bushrangers on the roads.”