Red Dirt Heart 3 Read Free Page A

once-frightened kid, had helped her find her feet. He had convinced Bacon and Trudy they should be honest with me about their relationship, which truthfully probably saved me from losing one or two of the best workers I’d ever known. He’d also saved the lives of two little critters I’d probably have left to die. First it was Matilda the kangaroo and now Nugget the wombat. Right or wrong, I’d have kept on my ignorant and selfish way and left them to fend for themselves, whereas he stopped and saved them.
    He saved me.
    Right now he was outside sorting out roofing iron with George and Bacon, and I was inside, supposed to be going through the mail and emails. I had been out there after breakfast, sayin’ hello to Shelby. A week away in horse-counting-days was too long apparently, because she nipped at me and nudged me into the fence. I rubbed her neck and whispered sweet nothings, just soothing like, and promised her a ride soon enough.
    When Bacon had pushed Travis’s shoulder and asked him if I talked to him like that, I told them both to fuck the fuck off, left them laughing even louder, and went inside.
    Where I would spend the entire day doing paperwork.
    I guessed bein’ away for a week let it build up, but it was frustrating that more time was spent doin’ bookwork than bein’ outside doing what I really loved.
    But I wanted to be a farmer that Travis would be proud of, and if that meant I needed to make my way through invoices, receipts, accounts, statements and emails, then that’s what I’d do.
    Plus, it helped keep my mind off this meeting with the supermarket buyer tomorrow.
    By the next morning, I was itching to take the chopper up and go collect Blake. I wasn’t nervous, I just wanted to get it over with. I didn’t doubt this station’s capabilities or my own to give this buyer what he needed.
    I just needed to get him here. He could see the rest for himself.
    George and I went over the chopper, fully fuelled and serviced. I checked the weather station for wind direction and speed, slotted in Melville’s coordinates into my GPS, and off I went.
    I’d asked the boys not to make a start on re-roofing the house today. I didn’t know what Blake was going to ask of us—whether he’d need one or two of the guys to be in a holding yard with him—and I didn’t particularly want to bring him here, trying to make an impression on him, only for him to find the homestead roof bein’ pulled apart. There wasn’t anything strictly wrong with the roof; it had just seen a decade of desert seasons too many.
    Right on time, I landed the chopper a safe distance from the cluster of homes, sheds and livestock on Melville’s property. The man was an arse, but I respected the farming life and would never give the man reason to hate me any more than he probably already did. Not without good reason, anyway.
    There were several guys standing around some four-wheelers, so I naturally walked toward them. My presence was greeted with silence and cold stares. I, on the other hand, smiled widely and spoke cheerfully. “Someone call a cab?”
    Blake laughed. “I’m just finishing up and I’ll be with you.”
    “No problem,” I said. Then I looked at Jack Melville and gave him a nod. “Mr Melville.”
    His greeting was more of a grunt than a hello. “Sutton.”
    I tipped my hat to the other men, his station hands, and bid them good day. When I was walking back to the chopper, I heard Melville say he’d have his accountant forward sales reports to Blake as soon as he could. I smiled, knowing Blake had mine already. A simple email was all it took, and I wondered idly if old Melville even knew what email was.
    I had no clue whether Blake had told them it was me coming to collect him, but they sure as hell knew now that he was considering putting Sutton Station on his sellers list. If Melville didn’t dislike me before, he certainly did now.
    I smiled all the way back to the chopper.
    Blake was no more than five