Love or Money Read Online Free PDF Page A

again, drawing her eyes to them.
    â€˜Well —’
    â€˜Go on. I’m all ears.’
    â€˜Actually, that battle’s pretty much won.’ He eased back in his chair. ‘I warn you. If I get started on Landcare, we’ll be here all night.’
    â€˜We have all night,’ she reminded him. ‘I need to know local stuff. Local heroes.’
    â€˜So you’ve decided to move in?’
    â€˜Well, no. I just got to own a bit of real estate for a moment in time. That hardly qualifies me as a local.’
    â€˜Such a pity you’re not moving in. I simply can’t understand it.’ She sneaked a look at his face. Anger glowed beneath the forced fake smile.
    â€˜Well, I have a job in the city, friends, my own little pad. And I told you about my sick mother.’
    â€˜If you have the tiniest smidgeon of your grandmother’s genes,’ Hamish said, ‘you’ll find you can’t bring yourself to sell it.’
    â€˜Mmm.’ Erin must tread carefully. ‘I remember the cliff-top walks we used to do. Grandma always carried a plastic sack and secateurs. When we came to a weed, she’d snip it and throw it into the sack. When I grew big enough, she promoted me to chief sack carrier. That sack got pretty heavy by the time we made it back to the cottage.’ She sneaked another look at him, saw his eyes caressing her as she talked. She needed a breather. ‘Tell me how a nice boy like you got mixed up with Grandma.’
    â€˜I grew up not ten kilometres from here.’ He waved towards the range. ‘My people raised beef cattle. Which is why I wanted to get into law school.’
    â€˜You didn’t like beef cattle?’
    â€˜I didn’t like what happens to your favourite cow when she reaches a certain weight. In other words, I was a misfit around these parts.’
    â€˜I must confess to enjoying a steak now and again,’ Erin admitted, remembering Hamish had ordered vegetarian. ‘But do go on.’
    â€˜It all began ten years ago,’ he began. ‘When Edna first heard about Landcare. She couldn’t wait to set up a local branch. Tore round town like a wild animal, sinking her fangs into anybody who wasn’t quick enough to run. I was one of her first victims. I spent summer holidays on the farm with my folks while I studied, and in my early years in the profession, with one of those big international law partnerships.
    â€˜Those huge firms with fancy names and hundreds of lawyers on their staff?’ Erin asked. ‘I thought they hired only the crème de la crème of law school graduates. And paid them squillions.’
    â€˜Well…I did do pretty well at my studies,’ he said. ‘I was the nerd from Central Casting.’ Erin mentally smacked herself for her gaffe. ‘They grabbed me, sent me to New York for a year. Told me I’d make it to partner — and zillions of dollars — in a few years. If I behaved myself.’
    â€˜So you misbehaved?’
    He took a bite from the tangle of noodles on his chopsticks. ‘When Edna showed me what was really going on around The Bay, I saw a huge disaster looming. I saw that if no one took a stand, the place where I was born would be a weedy jungle in a few years. Or a great big quarry. Or else, another slab of suburbia. The habitat for our beautiful Aussie wildlife would be gone forever.
    â€˜That would be terrible. But…’
    â€˜So I quit my city job and came home.’
    â€˜But —’
    â€˜I know, I know.’ He spread his hands. ‘If I’d stayed, I’d be a millionaire by now. Probably living in one of those glitzy high-rise apartment blocks on the harbour. Know the price of everything and the value of nothing, as the old saying goes.’ Erin cringed as she remembered her last dinner with Todd.
    â€˜Soon Edna told me I was the only one in The Bay who could take on the heavyweights — get a grip