Top-Notch Doc, Outback Bride. Melanie Milburne

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      That he wasn’t similarly affected couldn’t have been more obvious. He simply returned to his book, turning the next page and reading on with unwavering concentration, and even though the flight attendant asked for everyone’s attention while she went through the mandatory safety procedure, he remained engrossed in whatever he was reading.

      Typical thinks-he-knows-it-all male, Kellie thought as she made a point of leaning forward with a totally absorbed expression on her face as the flight attendant rattled off her spiel, even though Kellie knew she herself was probably better qualified if an emergency were to occur given what had happened two years ago on another regional flight.

      But, then, after four years in a busy GP practice she felt she had enough experience to handle most emergencies, although she had to admit her confidence would be little on the dented side without her well-equipped doctor’s bag at hand. But at least it was safely packed in the baggage hold along with her four cases to tide her over for the six-month locum in the Queensland outback, she reassured herself.

      Once the flight attendant had instructed everyone to sit back and enjoy the one-and-a-half-hour flight to Culwulla Creek, Kellie took a couple of deep calming breaths as the plane began to head for the runway, the throb and choking roar of the engines doing nothing to allay her fears. She scrunched her eyes closed and in the absence of an available armrest clasped her hands in her lap.

      You can do this. She ran through her usual pep talk. You’ve flown hundreds of times, even across time zones. You know the statistics: you have more chance of being killed on the way to and from the airport than during the actual flight. One little engine failure in the past doesn’t mean it’s going to happen again. Lightning doesn’t strike in the same place twice, right?

      The plane rattled and rumbled down the runway, faster and faster, until finally putting its nose in the air and taking off, the heavy clunk of landing gear returning to its compartment making Kellie’s eyes suddenly spring open. ‘That was the landing gear, right?’ she asked the silent figure beside her. ‘Please, tell me that was the landing gear and not something else.’

      The bluer-than-blue eyes stared unblinkingly at her for a moment before he answered. ‘Yes,’ he said, but this time his tone contained more than a hint of sarcasm. ‘That was the landing gear. All planes have it, even ones as small as this.’

      ‘I knew that,’ Kellie said huffily. ‘It’s just it sounded as if…you know…something wasn’t quite right.’

      ‘If everything wasn’t quite right, we would have turned back by now,’ he pointed out in an I-am-so-bored-with-this-conversation tone as he returned his attention to his book.

      Kellie glanced surreptitiously at the book to see if she recognised the title but it wasn’t one she was familiar with. It had a boring sort of cover in any case, which probably meant he was a boring sort of person. Although he was a very good-looking boring person, she had to admit as she sneaked another little glance at his profile. He was in his early thirties, thirty-two or -three, she thought, and had a cleanly shaven chiselled jaw and a long straight nose. His lips were well shaped, but she couldn’t help thinking they looked as if they rarely made the effort to stretch into a smile.

      Her gaze slipped to his hands where he was holding his book. He had long fingers, dusted with dark hair, and his nails were short but clean, which she found a little unusual for a cattle farmer. Didn’t they always have dust or cattle feed or farm machinery grease embedded around their cuticles? But perhaps he had been away for a week or two, enjoying the comforts of a city hotel, she thought.

      Kellie shifted restlessly in her seat as the plane gained altitude, wondering how long it would be before the seat-belt sign went off so she could visit the lavatory. She mentally crossed her legs and looked down at her handbag wedged under the seat. She considered retrieving the magazine she had bought to read but just then the flight attendant announced that the captain had turned off the seat-belt sign so it was now safe to move about the cabin.

      Kellie unclipped her belt and got to her feet. ‘Excuse me,’ she said with a sheepish look at the man sitting beside her. ‘I have to go to the toilet.’

      His gaze collided with hers for another brief moment before he closed the book with exaggerated precision, unclipped his seat belt, unfolded himself from the seat and stood to one side, his expression now blank, although Kellie could again sense his irritation. She could feel it pushing against her, the invisible pressure making her want to shrink away from his presence.

      She squeezed past him, sucking in her stomach and her chest in case she touched him inadvertently. ‘Thank you,’ she said, feeling her face beginning to redden. ‘I’ll try not to be too long.’

      ‘Take all the time you need,’ he said with a touch of dryness.

      Kellie set her mouth and moved down the aisle, her back straight with pride, even though her face was feeling hot all over again. Get a grip, she told herself sternly. Don’t let him intimidate you. No doubt you’ll meet thousands…well, hundreds at least…of men just like him in the bush. Besides, wasn’t she some sort of expert on men?

      Well…apart from that brief and utterly painful and totally embarrassing and ego-crushing episode with Harley Edwards—yes, she was.

      When Kellie came back to her seat a few minutes later she felt more than a little relieved to find her co-passenger’s seat empty. She scanned the rest of the passenger rows to see if he had changed seats, but he was up at the front of the plane, bending down to talk to someone on the right-hand aisle.

      Kellie sat back down and looked out of the window, the shimmering heat haze of the drought-stricken outback making her think a little longingly of the bustling-with-activity beach-side home in Newcastle in NSW she had left behind, not to mention her father and five younger brothers.

      But it was well and truly time to move on; they needed to learn to stand on their own twelve feet, Kellie reminded herself. It was what her mother would have wanted her to do, to follow her own path, not to try and take up the achingly empty space her mother’s death had left behind six years ago.

      The man returned to his seat just as the refreshment trolley made its way up the aisle. He barely glanced at her as he sat back down, but his elbow brushed against hers as he tried to commandeer the armrest.

      Kellie gave him a sugar-sweet smile and kept her arm where it was. ‘You have one on the other side,’ she said.

      The space between his dark brows narrowed slightly. ‘What?’

      She pointed to the armrest on his right. ‘You have another armrest over there,’ she said.

      There was a tight little silence.

      ‘So do you.’ He nodded towards the vacant armrest against the window.

      ‘Yes, but I don’t see why you get to have the choice of two,’ she returned. ‘Isn’t that rather selfish of you to automatically assume every available armrest is yours?’

      ‘I am not assuming anything,’ he said in a clipped tone, and, shifting his gaze from hers, reached for his book in the seat pocket, opened it and added, ‘If you want the armrest, have it. It makes no difference to me.’

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