74

The car was already packed and the apartment was empty when Ashley knocked on the door the next morning.

Alex opened and smiled when he saw his sister "Ah, Ms Redstaff…where did you leave your boyfriend?"

"He has to work today. And it's Ashley!"

"Fine Ashley, come in! I'm Alex…"

Alex led her in the apartment where Tess, Claire and Charlotte were waiting to meet Ashley. Tess was very curious what Alex's sister looked like and although Claire had seen Ashley when she was in Bryce's office she hadn't known it was her sister-in-law then. If only they could tell her that…

"Ashley, this is my wife Claire and my daughter Charlotte and this is my sister-in-law Tess McLeod." Alex introduced them.

"Claire, nice to see you again! I see you've had your baby! She's beautiful! Nice to meet you Ms McLeod!"

"It's Tess…"

"Where's Bryce?" Alex asked after the introduction round was over. "Didn't he want to come, too?"

"Oh, he'll be here any minute, he was just parking the car." Ashley said and they heard a knock on the door. "There he is!"

Alex left the others in the living room to open the door and let his father in.
"Bryce…"

"Alex, what a nice surprise, huh? How are you today?"

"I'm fine, come in. We're all in the living room."

After Bryce had made his round and said hello to everybody they all sat down to sign the papers that he had brought with him and finalize the sale of the apartment.

"The money is already on the way to your account Alex, all you need to do is sign here and here…you wanna have a look at the papers first?" He handed them over to Alex.

"Just a quick read through, I hope you've been fair to me!" Alex said with a wink as he read through the paragraphs quickly. He was really glad that Bryce and Ashley were the buyers because he knew his father would be fair and get the money to him as quickly as he could.

When he was finished Alex took the pen that Bryce had put on the living room table and signed the papers where he had to.

"Well, this is yours now Ashley" he said "You'll like it here!" Alex handed her the keys and grinned as he saw the broad smile on her face.

"Thanks Alex…my first apartment…thank you Dad! I will pay you back!" She went to hug her father followed by Alex.

Bryce watched the scene between his daughter and his son. Alex looked so proud and so happy for his sister even though he knew she didn't know anything. He knew he wasn't being fair to both of them and his other two daughters for not telling the truth and maybe it was time to do something about it. Not now but very soon. He needed to tell his family about Alex if he wanted his granddaughter to know him as her grandfather. He wasn't sure how his daughters would react to the news but he knew his wife would leave him for good after that. Their marriage had been troubled for quite a while now and he was sure that Alex would be the last drop that would make the drum overflow. But that didn't matter, he wanted to accept Alex as his completely and if it meant losing his wife that was it.

"You all right?" Alex brought his father out of his thoughts.

"Yeah, I'm fine. I was wondering if I could hold your daughter for a while. She's so lovely!"

"Sure you can…" Claire said and handed Charlotte over to Bryce.

"Dad, I'll just go down to the car and get the first of my things to make this apartment fully mine, all right?" and when Bryce nodded Claire and Tess looked at each other and Tess said "Why don't Claire and I give you a hand so the men can have a little time to chat about men things…"

After the three women had left silence filled the room. Charlotte was looking at her grandfather with huge eyes and Bryce looked at her proudly and Alex watched the whole scene.

Finally Alex broke the silence "Thank you for bringing Edna down to the wedding! It really means a lot to Claire. Do you know when you'll be coming?"

"That's no problem, Alex. She's a lovely lady, how did Claire meet her? Anyway…we'll arrive in Fisher Thursday afternoon and are coming by plane. I've rented a car so you don't have to pick us up. We should be on Drovers Thursday evening. Liz and I are staying in Gungellan. We've already booked the rooms. Oh, by the way, the estate agent is taking care of, I did that yesterday. And I'm sure the money for the apartment is on you account already. What will you do with it?"

"Claire and I need it to get our training business back up and running but first I need it to buy Claire a wedding present. She never got one 10 years ago…"

"Oh, that's nice, what do you have in mind?"
"Promise not to tell her!" Alex said and when Bryce nodded he added "I'll be at a horse auction in Fisher Tuesday and Wednesday to get us some training contracts and I hope I can find Claire a new stallion there. You know, she wants to breed horses and it'll be so much easier if she owns her own stallion. Keep your fingers crossed I can find one! Because if not then I've run out of ideas…"

Just then they heard the chatting and laughing of the three women as they re-entered the apartment, each of them carrying a suitcase.

"You two done talking?" Claire asked looking at Bryce and Alex. "Because I really think we should get going if we wanna get anywhere close to home today…"

Alex nodded and Bryce handed Charlotte back to him.

"Ok Alex, it was nice to get to see you again before you leave. We'll stay in touch, ok?"

They all said their goodbyes to each other and 15 minutes later Claire, Alex, Tess and Charlotte were on their way home to Drovers Run…

75

Since Charlotte was a good girl and only woke up when she was hungry the 3 adults decided to drive all the way home in one day. So when they arrived on Drovers late that night all 3 of them were exhausted. Only Charlotte seemed happy after the trip, she truly liked to be driven around.

The homestead was dark as they drove up since nobody had expected them back that day and the next day was a regular work day.

"Can we just unload the necessary things and do the rest tomorrow? I'm dead already!" Tess complained.

"I guess since nothing can get wet in the very unlikely case of a rainfall I guess we can do that. We'd only wake up the others if we unloaded the car anyway…" Alex agreed as he took BOM's car seat out and headed towards the house. Claire followed with the box that held her wedding dress and Tess had hers and Charlotte's bag and went back outside to get Alex's and Claire's. Everything else could wait in the car till the next day.

"I'm starving!" Tess announced while Alex and Claire were putting Charlotte to bed. "Shall I fix us all some sandwiches before we go to bed?"

"That would be nice Tess, we'll be right down as soon as this little girl here sleeps…" Claire said.

Ten minutes later they joined Tess in the kitchen who was just finished with fixing the sandwiches.

"Ah, this is good…" Alex sat down next to Claire and took a bite of his sandwich. "Thanks Tess, I was starving, too since my daughter was the only one who got her food regularly today…"
"Oh you poor man…you won't die just because you don't get fed." Claire teased him.

"If we didn't have Meg or Tess or Becky we'd all be starving…because neither you nor me can cook and I also doubt you can call it cooking what Jodi does…" Alex chuckled.

"Well, nobody ever really showed me how to do it and Meg was always here so there was no need to learn it…" Claire defended herself. "And I can make a great sandwich…we'd just have to live of that!"

"Well, I can make a salad and I can grill so I guess we wouldn't starve if we were alone…we'd just have to have a BBQ every night!"

Claire laughed "You'd like that, huh?"

"Sure would…" Alex replied moving closer to Claire. "Hey McLeod…what about a date tonight…just you and me…" he asked her totally forgetting about Tess who only smiled at her sister and brother-in-law.

"Date sounds fine Ryan…anything special planned?" Claire whispered and kissed him on the lips.

"I can think of something we haven't done in quite a while…" Alex kissed her back.

"Jeez you two…you have a room, you know?" Tess grinned. She liked to watch her sister and Alex be happy together but this was enough now. And she was glad she had her room downstairs now so she didn't have to hear whatever they were doing…

"That was our call Alex…" Claire said and got up. "Come on, I've waited long enough…" she added and was surprised at herself she had said those words in front of her sister. But she couldn't help it, she wanted Alex…NOW!

They left a laughing Tess in the kitchen while Claire pulled Alex up the stairs towards their bedroom. Once the door was closed behind them Claire pushed Alex against it and started kissing him passionately moving her hands up and down his chest.

"Whoa Claire…"Alex managed to say breathless between two kisses "Slow down or this won't last very long…"

"I don't want it to last long right now…" Claire said with a smirk and looked Alex in the eyes. He could see passion in them and groaned as Claire pulled his shirt out of his jeans and he felt her hands slip under it while she started kissing him again with even more passion. Alex pulled the shirt over his head quickly and took Claire back in his arms right after that kissing her again.

Claire fumbled with his belt but needed Alex's help to open it. They moved closer and closer to the bed kicking his shoes off Alex nearly stumbled as Claire unbuttoned the jeans and pulled them off him. Alex now only wore his boxers which didn't really hide his passion anymore and when he moved away from Claire's lips for a second to catch some breath he looked down at her and started laughing.

"What?" Claire asked.

"Why is it I'm almost completely naked and you're still wearing all your clothes?"

"Well Mr Ryan…I guess I'm more passionate than you…but I wouldn't mind if you undressed me now…" Claire said with a seductive voice. "Wouldn't mind that at all…"

Alex smiled and said "Your wish is my command…" and pulled Claire's shirt out of her pants and over her head without unbuttoning. He touched her breasts that the pregnancy and the breastfeeding had done miracles to through her bra and then went to open the front lock.

"Careful Alex" Claire whispered "maybe I should leave it on…I might leak…"
Alex smiled "I don't really care if you leak Claire, I wanna touch you…" and with that he opened her bra and let it slip to the floor.

Placing little kisses on her body starting by Claire's neck Alex slowly made his way down to her tummy and he kneeled down in front of her to open her jeans and help her out of her boots.

They finally fell on the bed together kissing each other passionately while removing the remaining underwear.

After that there was no stopping them and they made love to each other for the first time since Charlotte was born…

Afterwards Alex rolled to the side and Claire nestled her head on his chest both of them still breathing heavily.

"You are amazing Claire…you know that? Just amazing!" Alex said and kissed her on the head.

"Well, you weren't too bad yourself Alex…thank you, I really needed that tonight."
"My pleasure, my pleasure Mrs McLeod-Ryan…you can't imagine how hard it was lying next to you every night and not being able to touch you…"

"Oh, I can Mr Ryan…believe me, I can…" Claire said kissing his chest as her hand slowly wandered down his stomach in little circles.

"Can't get enough of me, can ya?" Alex said with a wink and lifted Claire's head so he could kiss her.

"Never Alex, never…" Claire whispered and kissed him passionately…

They made love to each other till the sun was already starting to rise again, a few times interrupted by Charlotte who wanted to be fed or changed. They finally fell asleep in the early morning hours and for once Claire didn't care about taking care of the farm or the horses, she was just happy in her husbands arms as she faded off to sleep…

76

It was Tuesday and Alex was just getting ready to leave for the horse auction. He had half expected that Claire wanted to come with him but was quite surprised she hadn't said anything yet. She had even helped him pack without packing something for herself or Charlotte.

Alex planned to stay in Fisher over night because driving all the way back home would have just been a waste of time and money. This would mark their first night apart from each other ever since Claire had found Alex in Melbourne.

"You sure you'll be fine?" Alex asked once again and Claire rolled her eyes.

"For the 10th time…yes Alex, we'll manage! There's not much to do round the place this week so Becky and Jodi can manage alone and Tess and I can do the last preparations fro our wedding. Everything will be just fine now go and find us some good clients!" Claire pushed Alex out the door and towards his car.

"I'll miss you!" she said before wrapping her arms around his neck and kissing him passionately. "Now in you hop! The sooner you leave the more clients you'll get!" Claire then said and gave Alex's bum a slap. "And drive carefully! I don't want a half dead husband wrapped around a tree somewhere…I need you on Saturday looking your best!"

Alex laughed and said "I always drive careful!" which got him a questioning look from Claire. He climbed in his car and poked his head through the open window so Claire could kiss him once more, then he drove off.

What Claire didn't know was, that Alex would stop by on Killarney first to exchange his ute with one of Killarney's that had a horse trailer attached to it. He had talked to Harry about leaving the new horse for Claire on Killarney till the wedding and everything was arranged for that. Harry had liked the idea of giving Claire a horse for the wedding, it was a smart business move in his eyes. Alex smiled at the thought. That's all Harry could see. But Alex could already see Claire's eyes when she'd see the new horse…now he only needed to find one!

On Drovers Claire waved Alex goodbye till his ute had disappeared over the hills. Then she ran back inside the house and shouted for Tess.

"Tess? He's gone! Where are you?" Claire went looking for her sister and found her in the study on the phone. "Tess, come on! We need to get going if we wanna finish this before Alex comes back! There's a lot to do!"

"Hold on Nick…Claire, can I just finish this phone call? I'll be right with you then and if you're lucky Nick will kind enough to help us…" Then Tess turned her attention back to the phone.

Claire leaned on the doorframe, her foot impatiently moving to a silent beat. When Tess had finally finished her phone call and hung up Claire let out a huge sigh and said "You finally finished? Come on move! We only have 2 days…"

"Will you slow down Claire? We won't get anything done if you keep pushing like a bulldozer!"

"Yeah yeah…" Claire ignored her sister's comment and headed for the cellar door.

This was all about Alex's wedding present. While Claire and Tess had been at the bridal shop in Melbourne the other day they had talked about what Claire wanted to give to Alex on their wedding day. Claire hadn't had a single idea what she could give her husband. She had had some things in mind but they had all been too expensive for her bank account. They had talked about how happy Claire was to have Alex back and living on Drovers and Claire had shared that she knew Alex wasn't truly happy with their living arrangement because he still felt kind of like a visitor that just stayed a little longer. Finally Tess had come up with the idea of giving Alex his own spot on Drovers Run, something that was his and his alone. The thought of a party room had crossed Claire's mind right away but there had always been the room problem. After thinking about it for quite a while Claire had remembered the unused cellar room behind the storage room they used under the main house. It would need a lot of work but she knew it could work out…

So when Claire had heard that Alex wanted to go to the horse auction in Fisher the week before their wedding and stay there over night she had arranged everything so they could turn the cellar room into a party room.

"Are you sure that's really a good idea?" Tess asked as she followed her sister down the stairs into the cellar. "It's so dark down here…"

"Tess, that's what the electrician will come for any minute now…to give us some proper light and electricity down here…Did Nick get the floor boards I asked him to buy for me?"

"Yes, he'll be here once he's finished with work on Wilgul. Shouldn't be too long, there's not much to do there either…what do we do till the electrician comes?"

"Well, clean up the whole place…" Claire said and smiled as she took a look around the room. This was big enough to hold the pool table and set up a place to play darts along with some benches to sit on. The only problem was getting everything down here through the small cellar door…

"Hello?" they heard a voice from upstairs "Mrs McLeod-Ryan?" The electrician had arrived.

In the next hours the cellar room was filled with light and electricity which proved to be more challenging than originally thought. But in the end it worked and the room was lit and had sockets so you could plug in a stereo system and a fridge.

After the electrician had left Nick helped to even the floor and put the new floorboards in and by the end of the day the room already looked like you could spend some time in it…

Alex had reached Fisher faster than he had thought so he decided to check out the auction ground first before he'd check into the hotel. He wanted to have a good look at all the horses that would be up for auction and hoped he could find one that was right for Claire.

After seeing some beautiful mares Alex finally came to a box that had a beautiful dark brown stallion in it. The animal looked wild and feisty but Alex knew this was the horse for Claire. He looked at the name and then looked it up in the auction schedule. The horse wouldn't be up till tomorrow which would give him enough time today to find new clients for their training business. And with the stallion being untamed the price would probably not go all that high so if he was lucky the extra $30,000 would be enough.

Smiling and whistling a song Alex went back to his car and drove to the hotel to check in…this was going to be some good days. He could feel it!

77

The next day Alex was on his way back to Killarney in the late afternoon. He had gotten the stallion he had looked at the day before and the price had been fairly cheap for such a beautiful animal. The horses name was Thor, God of Thunder or Thunder for short. Alex liked the correlation with Claire's horse she had had ten years ago, Lighting. Thunder had one of the best bloodlines you could find and he had only been that cheap because he was still untamed. But Alex was sure Claire would be able to break him in. She had this feeling about horses like Thunder that he could only admire. He wasn't a too bad himself but he had to admit when it came to breaking in horses nobody was better than Claire. Not that he'd ever admit that to her.

Once Alex reached Killarney Harry and Sandra walked out of the house to take a look at the new horse Alex had bought for his wife. The paddock he was supposed to stay in till Saturday was already waiting for him, all they had to do was get him in there.

"Ready to get him out of the trailer, Alex?" Harry asked as he and Sandra walked closer.

"Stay out of the way Dad." Alex said "He's pretty wild…" and started to open the back of the trailer.

"Why did you buy Claire a wild horse Alex? I thought this was meant for your breeding programme!"

"You'll see Dad, he's the best horse that was for sale there and I got him fairly cheap because he's not broken in." Alex smiled "And besides…Claire will love to do just that!"

With that Alex slowly went into the trailer to lead Thunder outside. The horse was still sedated so he didn't have too much trouble getting him into the paddock.

Even in this state Harry could see what a beautiful horse Thunder was and he had to admit Alex had made a good choice. He only hoped his son was right and Claire was able to tame the horse so they could use him for breeding…

Meanwhile on Drovers Nick, Tess and Claire put the finishing touches on Alex's party room. Earlier that day Claire and Tess had taken Charlotte into Gungellan to look for a stereo system and darts equipment while Nick was building benches with the help of Becky. After they had finished they had dismantled the pool table that Becky had once stolen out of the Gungellan pub and that was still in sheering shed and had brought it into the party room bit by bit to put it back together. Now everything was finished and Claire took a look around.

"What do you think Nick? Is this the right thing for Alex?"

"Claire, don't be so worried! Alex will love that! The only thing he might miss down here is a TV to watch footie…"
"Right, I should have thought about that…"

"It wasn't possible in such a short time and he'll know"

Tess stroked Claire's shoulders and added "Look at it this way…it could be your next birthday or Christmas present for him…"

Claire smiled. Tess and Nick were right. The party room looked great and it would give Alex his own space on Drovers if he ever felt he needed to get away from his wife and daughter for a while.

They filled the fridge with beer and loaded copies of Alex's favourite CDs into the stereo system. Claire was glad she didn't have to be down here when he played that music and hoped she wouldn't hear too much of it upstairs. The cellar walls were thick and there was a massive ceiling as well so she was hopeful.

"Come on, let's get put of here and lock the door…Alex should be back any minute now…"

Just as they closed the cellar door and Nick and Tess went upstairs to clean themselves, Alex's ute rolled up to the homestead.

Claire hurried outside to meet her husband. She had really missed him that last night. So when she reached his car Claire jumped in his arms and kissed him passionately.

"Easy Claire! You would think we haven't seen each other for a week instead of a day!" Alex laughed as their lips parted again. "One could think you missed me last night…" he placed another kiss on her lips.

Claire smiled at him "Yeah, I missed you last night…I had to take all of BOM's night calls alone!" she said because she didn't want to sound too sentimental. They had talked on the phone for quite a while in the evening but it had been strange to not have Alex by her side after the 3 month they were now sharing a bed.

"Is that all?" Alex wanted to know as they walked back to the house arm in arm.

"Sure, why else should I miss you?" Claire replied with the most innocent tone she could come up with.

"Come on McLeod, admit it…you can't resist me and you missed me warming your bed!"

"I do admit it was a little cold in bed last night…" Claire gave Alex a little slap on the bum and ran towards the house. Alex laughed and followed her.

They nearly knocked Meg over as they ran into the kitchen.

"Careful you two or you won't get anything for dinner!"

"Sorry Meg…but Claire won't admit she missed me!" Alex kissed Meg on the cheek "Whatever you have in those pots…it smells gorgeous!"

Meg smiled. She could understand Tess and Claire, both Ryan boys had that little something about them that made a woman feel good…

"Come on Alex, let's go in the study and see what you got for me…" Claire said and after Alex seductively wiggled his eyebrows she added "business wise!"

Alex laughed and followed his wife into the study.

Once inside Claire closed the door behind them and pushed Alex against the door pressing her lips hard against his. Alex was surprised but didn't complain. When they came up for air he smiled and said "So you did miss me that way…"

"Never said anything else…" Claire smiled at him "But now tell me, did you get any more contracts today?"

They sat down on the chair behind the desk together and talked about what contracts Alex had gotten in the last two days. He had gotten four horses for training with the option for another three once those four were successfully trained. The horses would start arriving the next week.

"This will bring us right back up Claire. You should have seen them when I told them I was back and we would start our business again. I don't think there was anybody around here that was training horses while I was gone! This will be great Claire!"

Claire smiled at Alex's enthusiasm. She knew he was happy working on Killarney again but the training business would be theirs and theirs alone. No interfering from Harry or anybody else.

"I know Alex…and maybe one day we'll have enough money for breeding as well…"

"We will Claire, I promise you we will…" and in his thoughts he added 'Sooner than you think!'