Page 70 of Stockman's Sandstorm

She felt cool without his body heat. And embarrassed. ‘I’m sorry I laughed at Dex.’ She sat up, trying to straighten her hair, pulling out some leaves.

‘I’d say Dex is glad someone else is scared of them, too. Those bird spiders are big.’

‘How come you’re not scared of them?’

‘Oh, I am. Believe me. I jumped out of a moving vehicle once.’

‘Really?’

‘It was on one of my early musters.’ Tugging free a piece of grass, he twisted it into knots, while crossing his leg over his bent knee.

Harper leaned onto her side with her head cradled in her hand to listen, too embarrassed to face everyone else. Hiding was good.

‘Me and a mate had gone hunting to feed the stock camp. We were driving in the station’s Tojo, so focused on hunting, we drove straight through this spider’s web, we didn’t see what was on it.’

‘Oh, no.’ She went to sit up.

‘Ah …’ He pushed her back to lie on the grass beside him as he continued his story. ‘We were young, dumb, and loaded with an old twelve-gauge shotgun. Keen for a hunt, all I remember was we’d wiped off the web and kept hunting until …’ He paused for dramatic emphasis.

‘Until …’ She playfully shoved his shoulder.

‘My worst nightmare happened. It scared the kaka right out of me.’

‘Huh?’

‘Think about it …’

‘Oh. Right. Like I was just before.’ The rush of heat brushed her cheeks.

‘But this was worse.’

‘No way. How?’

‘It started climbing up the side of the Tojo with the thickest, biggest spider legs I’d ever seen. I swear you could’ve put a saddle on this thing and ridden it at the rodeo.’

‘So bigger than a dinner-plate-sized spider?’

‘Bigger.’ He spread his hands wide to the size of an inflated gym ball.

‘What did you do?’ Her voice was a whisper, with her eyes darting to the shadows between the blades of grass.

He grabbed her chin, dragging it to face him and not the scary wilderness. ‘I played my part of the hero, of course.’ He grinned with his dark eyes trapping hers. ‘I bailed, yelling, shoot it!’

A giggle escaped her. ‘What happened then?’

‘Well, I kissed the dirt, rolling across the ground, watching the Tojo drive away with my mate still sitting in the passenger seat.’

‘You were driving!’

‘At that stage, no one was. But the next thing I hear is this shotgun blast, and I watched my mate jump out of the Tojo. The only problem was the vehicle kept going.’

‘Let me guess, you started running after it.’

‘We were like Olympic sprinters, worried we’d never catch it. Until it hit this thick cluster of saplings and I was able to knock it out of gear.’

‘And that spider?’

‘Gone. And the Tojo had a new hole in the floor.’ His chuckle made her smile. ‘Of course, we checked the car a few times before we climbed back inside.’

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