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Claim, where they milled around waiting for the luggage to come through. When it did, within moments a crush of bodies appeared at the conveyor belt, all eyes glued compulsively on the flap. As the luggage made its way around, it was seized triumphantly and hauled away.
    She couldn’t sight her matching Louis Vuitton bags, a going-away present from her grandmother years before. A young woman behind her suddenly rushed forward, nearly knocking her over, and heaved off a great canvas bag covered in travel stickers.
    â€œSorry!” A rueful grin.
    â€œNo problem.”
    After a while she began to get worried. Everyone else was picking up their stuff, so where was hers? Maybe someone had taken a liking to her expensive luggage. Absurd to spend so much money on luggage when it got treated so roughly, she thought wearily. Just as she was starting to feel this was no joke andher luggage had been left in Sydney, the first of her cases tumbled out onto the conveyor belt.
    Thank God! Still she’d have a battle to get two of the heavy suitcases onto the trolley. She moved forward, prepared to marshal her fading strength.
    Â 
    H IS DRIVER was a short round balding man who stepped forward to identify himself.
    â€œMr. McClelland?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œJim Dawkins,” the man said cheerfully. “I’m here to drive you on to Archerfield. Mr. Drummond sent me.”
    â€œYes, I know. I spoke to Harry last night.”
    â€œJust the one case, sir?”
    Drake nodded briefly. “It was only an overnight trip.”
    â€œI’m parked out front and down a bit.”
    â€œWe might as well get under way.”
    â€œRight, sir.” Dawkins took charge of the overnight bag.
    God knows what made Drake turn back to look around the airport terminal. And at that precise moment. But if he hadn’t, he’d have missed her. For a moment he stood immobilized by shock, feeling as if a hand had reached in and twisted his heart.
    Nicole Cavanagh. He could count the days since he’d last seen her. June, when she’d returned briefly as she always did for her grandmother Louise’s birthday. June and Christmas, like clockwork before she flew away again.
    She had her back to him, standing at the conveyor belt waiting for her luggage. He’d recognize her anywhere by that glorious mane. It was difficult to describe the color, but it always made him think of rubies. Today the familiar cascade of long curling hair was pulled into a loose knot. As she turned—a young woman keen on collecting her luggage surged forward and nearly knocked her down—he saw that flawless skin, milk-white with fatigue, large, blue-green eyes set at a faint slant. Even at that distance, he could see they were shadowed with exhaustion.
    Not that anything could dim her beauty and the aura she gave off, a mixture of cool refinement and an innate sexiness he knew she was almost totally unaware of. Every woman he met fell short of Nicole. She was wearing a sleeveless, high-neck top in a shimmery golden-beige, narrow black slacks, high heeled sandals, a tan leather belt with an ornate gold buckle resting on her hips. She looked what she was. A thoroughbred. High-stepping, high-strung and classy. No matter their dark history, he found it impossible to quietly disappear, to simply go on his way and ignore her. He’d heard Heath Cavanagh was back on Eden. Obviously Nicole was returning home to assess the situation.
    â€œWait for me, could you?” he asked Dawkins who, as an employee of an employee was obliged to do whatever he wanted, anyway. “I’ve just spotted a friend.”
    â€œRight, sir.”
    A friend? he asked himself, feeling his nerves tighten. These days they were more like veiled enemies. Too much history between them, old conflicts aired whenever they came face-to-face, but the magnetic attraction that had grown out of their childhoodbond somehow survived tragedy and loss. Probably