Australian Affairs: Claimed: Dr Chandler's Sleeping Beauty / Countering His Claim / Australia's Maverick Millionaire

He looked preoccupied. There was a frown between his brows and his jaw looked as if it had been carved from stone. He didn’t even see her until she was practically under his nose.

‘Dr Chandler?’

Her softly spoken greeting didn’t even register, so she reached out and touched him on the bare tanned skin of his forearm with her fingertips.

‘Jake?’

He jumped as if she had probed him with an electrode. ‘Oh,’ he said, absently rubbing at his arm. ‘It’s you.’

‘Yes…’ Kitty shifted her weight from foot to foot. ‘Are you OK?’

His marble mask stayed in place. ‘Sure. Why wouldn’t I be?’

‘I just thought you might like to…talk.’

Something moved across his gaze, leaving in its wake a layer of ice. ‘About what?’

‘Gwen told me you were having some trouble with your brother and I thought—’

‘You thought what, Dr Cargill?’ he asked with a mocking look. ‘That you’d offer your sweet little shoulder for me to cry on?’

Kitty held his glacial gaze for a beat or two before giving up. ‘I’ve obviously caught you at a bad time,’ she said, stepping away from him. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to interfere.’

She had walked past three shopfronts before he caught up with her. He didn’t touch her. He walked alongside her, shoulder to shoulder—well, not exactly shoulder to shoulder, given he was so much taller. Kitty was wearing ballet flats, which put the top of her head in line with the top of his shoulder. She felt the warmth of his body. She had to fight to keep walking in a straight line in case her body betrayed her with its traitorous, shameless desires.

‘Don’t let me keep you,’ she said, sending him a sideways glance that made her loose hair momentarily brush against his arm. She grabbed at the wayward strands and fixed them firmly behind her ear.

‘Sorry,’ he said in a gruff tone. ‘That was uncalled-for.’

‘It’s OK,’ she said, only marginally mollified.

They walked a few more paces in silence. Kitty wasn’t sure what to say, so said nothing. She figured if he wanted to talk to her he would. Every time she sneaked a glance at him he was frowning broodingly. His shoulders looked tight and were hunched forward slightly, as if he was carrying an invisible weight that was incredibly burdensome.

‘Have you got any siblings?’ he finally asked.

‘No, there’s just me,’ Kitty said.

‘Happy childhood?’

‘Mostly.’

‘Are your parents still married to each other?’ he asked.

Kitty gave him another sideways glance, trying to ignore the way her heart kicked in her chest when she encountered the unfathomable darkness of his sapphire-blue gaze. ‘My parents didn’t get married in the first place,’ she said. ‘They met at a free love commune. They’re still together, more or less. They occasionally have other partners. They have what they call an “open” relationship.’

His eyebrows lifted. ‘I wouldn’t have picked you as a hippy couple’s kid,’ he said. ‘Did the stork get the wrong address or something?’

Kitty couldn’t hold back a little rueful smile. ‘My parents have spent a great deal of the last twenty-six years looking at each other in a kind of dumbfounded way,’ she said. ‘They were hoping for a free-spirited indie child much like themselves. I constantly embarrass them.’

His mouth kicked up at the corners. ‘I just bet you do.’

Kitty caught a whiff of his cologne as he raised a hand to brush his hair back off his forehead. The faint hint of hard-working male was like a potent elixir to her nostrils. She even felt herself leaning closer to catch more of his alluring scent.

He met her gaze again, holding it with the dark intensity of his. ‘I lost my mother when I was sixteen,’ he said. ‘And my father…’ He paused, a frown cutting his forehead in two, and the lines and planes of his face clouding. ‘My father left us before my brother was born. My two sisters can barely remember him. None of us have seen or heard of him since he left. Not even when Mum died.’

‘I’m very sorry,’ Kitty said. ‘Life can be pretty brutal at times. You must have had a hard time of it.’

‘Yeah, you could say that,’ he said, stepping aside for a group of teenagers carrying bodyboards to pass between them.

‘What about your sisters?’ Kitty asked when he didn’t offer anything else once they had resumed walking side by side. ‘What do they do?’

‘Jen’s a hairdresser,’ he said. ‘She’s saving up to buy her own salon. Rosie works part-time as a teacher’s aide. She’s studying to be a teacher.’

A small silence passed.

‘And your brother?’ Kitty asked.

His gaze cut to hers. ‘Didn’t Gwen tell you during your little heart-to-heart session? I’m sure she along with everyone else at the hospital has a theory or two on why Robbie’s running amok.’

‘I didn’t probe her for information,’ she said. ‘She didn’t know much in any case. She simply told me she sensed that your brother seemed to have some…issues.’

‘Issues.’ He gave a harsh laugh. ‘That’s how everyone makes excuses for any sort of bad behaviour today. They’ve got issues. Do you know what bugs me about that? It’s always someone else’s fault. It’s a get out of jail free card. No one has to take responsibility for their own actions any more. There’s always someone else to blame. Bad childhood or bad parenting. Or in my case practically no parenting. I hate that victim mentality that everyone adopts these days. It achieves nothing. You just have to get on with life. There’s no point wishing things were different. You get what you get and you damn well have to deal with it.’

Kitty walked with him for a few more paces. ‘I guess different people cope with things in different ways,’ she said after a moment. ‘What makes one person stronger makes another one crumble.’

‘Yeah, well, I just wish my brother would snap out of this phase of his,’ he said. ‘I’m sick and tired of cleaning up his mess.’

‘You sound just like a concerned parent,’ she said. ‘At least you’ll have had plenty of practice when it comes to having your own kids.’

His expression became even more dark and brooding. ‘No way,’ he said. ‘I’m not making that mistake.’

‘You don’t want kids?’

‘Why would I want kids when I’ve already brought up three?’ he asked.

‘Helping to rear your siblings is not the same as having your own children,’ Kitty said.

He gave a grunt. ‘It is for me,’ he said. ‘I’ve made enough packed lunches to last me a lifetime.’

‘Having children is much more than just packed lunches,’ she said.

‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘And don’t I know it. The cute chubby cheeks stage is over before you know it. Then it’s suddenly all about spending hours awake at night wondering where they are and who they’re with and what they’re doing. I’m not putting myself through that again. No way.’

‘What about marriage?’ she asked. ‘Are you against that too?’

‘I’m not against it in principle,’ he said. ‘I have plenty of friends who are married and it seems to work for them. I just don’t think I’m cut out for it. I think I’d get bored with the same person.’

‘Maybe you haven’t met the right person yet.’