Page 23 of A Home Among the Snow Gums
‘Superidiot, you mean,’ she said, pulling his hair.
Her brother’s ridiculous tactics were working. The nerves were settling enough for her to start taking notice of the other entrants. Men and women, some young, some middle-aged, the occasional senior citizen looking trim and wiry, all wearing what must be the unofficial uniform of campdrafting: jeans, plaid or floral shirt and a vest to keep out that vicious wind. The women’s jeans had elaborate white embroidery on the back pockets and while most of the boots people wore were scuffed and utilitarian, a few of the youngsters had fancy, American cowboy–style boots on, with turquoise patches and fringing.
Heavens above. Did she have to up her clothing game, too? This personal growth stuff sucked.
‘Hey, Josh,’ she said. ‘Check out the spurs on the boots. More people have them than don’t. You reckon it matters?’
‘Dunno. Why not ask some of the other entrants?’
Josh let go of her ankle to wave at someone behind her and she turned to smile. Kev must be back at last from spinning yarns. Only it wasn’t Kev striding through the assembled horses looking like he’d just stepped out of an action-adventure movie billboard.
Tom Krauss. Crap. And here she was, trapped with a horse, just like … just as though … She blew out a breath.
Just like The Incident.
She looked at her watch. Fourteen minutes to go, which meant she should be checking out the competitors ahead of her, seeing what was working and what wasn’t. She tried to drag her eyes away while Tom and Josh performed some complicated male greeting ritual which involved backslaps and insults, but her eyes wouldn’t be dragged.
Tom looked better than she’d remembered, if that were possible, because she’d been remembering him plenty in between every random encounter they’d had since that day, months ago now, at Ironbark Station.
His eyes met hers. Yep. Summer-lake blue. Eyelashes that trapped the sunlight. A face that was three parts wary and one part unreadable.
‘Hannah.’ He said it the way a bomb defusing expert might sayGently remove the inner screw and cut the third green wire or we all die.
She nodded. ‘Tom.’
‘Since when were you into campdrafting, brat?’
The old nickname underscored how weird she’d let this whole situation get. ‘Um. Just starting. And you’re here, too,’ she said, overcompensating with a fake jolly tone. ‘Whacko.’ She was embarrassing herself. He’d made a move on her, she’d made a scene, so what?
So you haven’t been able to stop obsessing about it since.
‘Dad’s catching up with some old mates.’
He was looking at her as though she was going to make another scene any second. Which she absolutely wasn’t. And, if she actually used her brain once in a while, she’d have remembered that Bruno Krauss was a campdrafting legend before multiple sclerosis claimed his legs. Half the horses here probably had Ironbark Station stamped in their stud book entry. It would have been odd if the Krauss familywasn’there.
She was scrabbling around for something normal to say when Josh leapt into the breach like the reliable bloke he was.
‘Haven’t seen you lately, Tom. We should grab a beer.’
‘I’d like that.’
‘You busy tonight? Vera’s using me as a guinea pig for the autumn menu she’s working on. Lamb shank pot pie and these little plum tarts for afters.’
‘Boasting’s not a good look on you, Cody.’
Tom was saying it to Josh, but for some reason his eyes were on her. She dug her heels into her horse and wheeled Skipjack away.
She couldn’t think about Tom and The Incident, not here, not now.
She couldn’t think about Tom and The Incident.
Damn it.Allshe could think about was Tom and that bloody Incident.
CHAPTER
8
Four and a bit months ago
