The Cattle King's Mistress Read Free

while he might be a shrewd businessman and definitely no lightweight for a man only in his early thirties, he had playboy looks; a riot of black curly hair that bobbed endearingly over his forehead, dark dancing eyes inviting flirtatious fun, a face as handsome as sin, and a lean, athletic body exuding charismatic energy and sex appeal.
    She’d been in his company since he’d collected her from Kununurra airport this morning and as an informative guide he was excellent, but she was determined on keeping a very firm personal distance between them. The likes of Tommy King could not tempt her into mixing business with pleasure. She hoped he was getting that message because she certainly didn’t want an awkward situation developing between them.
    “This place is getting to be like a white elephant now,” he commented as he brought the Jeep to a halt. “Wasted...” He shook his head over the wicked shame of it. “Guests would probably give their eye-teeth to stay here, but Nathan just won’t hear of it.” He grimaced, though his dark eyes twinkled cheerfully at her as he added, “Like a brick wall, my brother.”
    Nathan...oldest son of Elizabeth and Lachlan. Just as well she had studied the family tree in the book on King’s Eden. The people she’d met so far assumed she knew these details about the Kings as well as they did.
    “It’s understandable that he prefers privacy for his family,” Miranda said, thinking some things came ahead of turning everything into dollars.
    “If he ever got himself married and had a family, I’d agree,” Tommy shot back at her. “As it is, he’s here by himself most of the time, and that doesn’t look like changing.”
    He alighted from the Jeep, quickly striding around it to open Miranda’s door for her. She had little time to digest this new information. The invitation to dine with the family at the old homestead tonight had seemed to encompass more than the actual reality of one man. Two, counting Tommy.
    “I thought Mrs King lived here, too,” she said as she stepped out of the Jeep.
    “Not on any regular basis. Mum’s fairly tied up in Broome, managing the pearl farm...”
    Pearls...
    He grinned, “...but she flew in yesterday to be on hand to greet you and make sure everything is to your satisfaction.”
    Her inner tension eased. She wouldn’t be the only woman at the dinner table. Elizabeth King would undoubtedly direct the conversation tonight and provide a comfort zone. Miranda smiled. “How kind of her!”
    Tommy laughed. “Mum is a diplomat from way back.”
    They proceeded up the steps, Miranda wondering just how different the two brothers were and how much their mother had to work at welding their separate interests into a reasonably harmonious unit. “Isn’t there a third son?” she asked tentatively, her mind seeing three names listed in print—Nathan, Thomas, Jared.
    But the book on King’s Eden had been written some years ago. She had assumed marriages would have taken place since then. Having been wrong on that score with Tommy and Nathan, and with no mention being made of a younger brother from Tommy, she wondered if something had happened to the third son.
    “Oh, Jared flits around the mining operations and oversees what’s done with the pearls. He’s hardly ever here,” came the offhand reply. “You’ll probably meet him some time or other but not tonight. I think he’s in Hong Kong at the moment.”
    Mining operations...
    Miranda did a very quick mental readjustment about the King family. What she was meeting here was very serious wealth, on a similar scale, if not higher, than the Hewson family. All three of the King brothers would be used to getting what they wanted, just as Bobby was. When they married, it would undoubtedly be into a family who had connections to their business interests and could probably broaden and enhance them. That was the way their kind of world worked.
    She was an outsider, an employee who had her uses.