by JC Grey
It was a direct hit, intentional or not, and Blaze’s bravado wobbled. But it held. ‘Exactly,’ she said.
He muttered something she couldn’t make out, and when she snuck another glance, his jaw was rigid. But he held his silence for the remaining fifteen minutes of the journey to Sweet Springs.
The land became greener and more fertile the further they drove towards her grandparents’ place. Blaze remembered from what her grandfather had told her decades before that a system of underground springs fed the earth. Small waterholes dotted the landscape, shaded by willows, with a larger one close to the house that Blaze had played in as a child.
‘My land,’ she whispered once under her breath as they turned off the road on to the track that led to the homestead.
Macauley Black just grunted.
The old place loomed ahead. Blaze closed her eyes. From deep in her memory, she dragged out the gleam of the hardwood floors and sparkling windows, the smell of fresh lemon polish, Gram’s deep, cool larder and the old range that conjured up mountains of mouth-watering food.
As a little girl, she’d sit on the kitchen bench and watch Gram bake, or wander into Gramps’s study, where she’d stroke a finger down the spines of old books and play with his calculator until he gave up pretending to ignore her and lifted her up on his knee to ask her about her day or tell her about his.
At night, after hot chocolate in front of the open fire in winter or lemonade on the wide, deep veranda at other times of the year, Gram would take her up to the bedroom under the eaves, with its pink bedspread and the cane chair where Raggedy Ann held court amid a circle of favourite toys, and tuck her into bed.
In her mind’s eye she could see it all, feel the security of the visits to Sweet Springs like a warm blanket. Then, aware that the car was slowing to a halt, she opened her eyes, and let out a gasp at the ruin that lay before her.
Macauley Black’s gaze was on her, but she didn’t look at him as she climbed out of the ute and went to stand in front of what was left of Sweet Springs. The front door hung off its hinges, half open. Great jagged wounds in the window glass gave the place a soulless appearance as though the life had leached out of it. The distinctive cream and dark green paintwork had bleached to a sickly yellow, and sections of the decorative fretwork had crumbled to nothing.
Only vaguely aware of the crunch of boots on small stones behind her, she whirled round when Macauley placed his hat on her head.
‘The sun still burns even at this hour,’ he said in that low, raspy voice of his.
She smelt leather and sweat and horse, though from him or his hat, she wasn’t sure. The gesture was small, but coming just after seeing what Sweet Springs had been reduced to made Blaze want to tip her head forward to his shoulder and let the tears flow. It had been so long since anyone had done anything nice for her, even lending her a sweaty old cowboy hat. But showing any hint of vulnerability to Macauley Black would be akin to petting a shark.
She pulled the hat off her head and slammed it against his chest, tossing back her hair.
‘Do you know how much it costs me to keep my hair looking this good?’
Mac took his hat and placed it back on his head. Those black eyes bored into hers. ‘I could hazard a guess. But if the point is to remind me you look like a million dollars, don’t waste your time. I don’t give a shit.’
He looked towards the west where the sun’s rays lit up the land, then back to her with another of those insolent, raking, full-body scans that she’d experienced this morning.
‘That wasn’t —’
‘As you’re such an expensive piece to keep groomed and clothed, I’ve got a suggestion for a way you could make some easy money,’ he continued.
Blaze’s jaw dropped at what he was suggesting. Even if he’d read all those lurid magazine articles about her, did he really think she would —? With him?
He smiled as though he considered her mind as easy as the rest of her.
‘Sell me your land.’
It took Blaze a moment to catch up, so she did what she always did when caught off guard and looked down to screen her eyes with her lashes. Sliding as easily into the mantle of composure as she would a movie costume, she flicked him an amused look.
‘You want to buy Sweet Springs?’
A brusque nod. ‘Get an independent valuation. I’ll meet it, plus ten per cent.’
‘Generous.’
‘It’s good land.’
Blaze scanned the surroundings. At the moment it looked forlorn. Fences were down, and from what she could see of the barn that stood off to the side, one end was listing and part of the roof sagged. But the faults were superficial, easily fixed with money and hard work. The value lay in the underground springs, which kept the ground fertile when others in these parts were slowly dying from drought.
It was beautiful, too, with its little willow-screened oases and gently rolling hills instead of the dust bowls that many other properties had become. It wasn’t a big parcel of land – Blaze’s grandparents had bought it as a place to live rather than farm, although they’d had chickens and a couple of horses – but it was top drawer.
‘It is, isn’t it?’
‘Needs to be properly managed, though.’ He gave her slim shoulders and slender arms a long look. ‘Don’t take this the wrong way, but it needs a hardy type to transform it, not some exotic hothouse flower. This land deserves the best. Do the right thing and let me buy it.’
Blaze put up a hand to shade her eyes. The sun’s glow lit up the far horizon. As far as the eye could see there was earth, water and the vast blue sky. The land didn’t care about movie-set malice and ugly gossip. It didn’t give a toss about image or headlines or designer clothes. It was just here and it was hers. It felt right.
‘So we have a deal?’ Mac asked.
She didn’t take her eyes off the horizon. ‘This is Gillespie land, Mr Black, and it’s staying Gillespie land. So . . . no deal. Ever.’
Mac was still fuming when he wrenched the handbrake on and slammed his way into his house. Out of habit he slapped his hat against his thigh to remove the worst of the dust and pushed open the back door with so much force that it hit the wall behind it.
‘Fuck!’
It wasn’t often that he gave his temper free rein. He’d learnt the hard way that it paid to keep your cards close to your chest. And he certainly hadn’t given Blaze Gillespie any indication that he was pissed off, or just how much Sweet Springs meant to him. But now that he was alone in his own home, he could express his frustration. Mac was a man used to getting what he wanted, and he wanted that land. More than that, he wanted Blaze off it. And he wanted —
He wasn’t going there. In the kitchen he grabbed a beer from the fridge and took a generous slug before stalking into his office. From there he could see the stables and the bunkhouse. The boys had gone into town tonight, including Lewis, although Amos was probably there, holding the fort, playing his harmonica or watching some soap on TV.
Mac thought about wandering over with a six-pack and the chicken dish Peg had left for dinner, but he wasn’t in the mood. He thought about phoning Tanya Boone in town and inviting himself over. Maybe his mood was down to not having been laid in a while. When he’d bumped into Tanya in Meriwether a while back she’d made it pretty damned obvious that she wouldn’t mind a romp between the sheets any time he chose. But even an easy lay had no appeal right now. Uttering a self-deprecating laugh at the thought, he wondered if he was getting old, or just more discriminating.
On automatic pilot, he returned to the kitchen and turned on the oven to reheat the chicken. As he cracked open another beer, he wondered if Blaze Gillespie had found the little cool bag he’d placed with the Louis whoever luggage he’d taken inside for her and placed by the stairs. No pizza delivery way out here, so he’d packed some food and a couple of bottles of water before they’d left Rosmerta, knowing that otherwise she’d go hungry tonight.
She’d had been too busy wandering
from room to derelict room to notice. He’d come up behind her in her grandfather’s old study where papers lay strewn across the desk, untouched in nearly a decade since Paddy had died and his widow, Flo, had gone into a nursing home for the last two years of her life. In the evening light, he’d noticed that an abandoned animal nest of twigs and leaves was tucked into one corner, and a large water stain darkened the ceiling.
Mac had made one last attempt to make her see sense and let him take her to town for the night. But those slim shoulders had squared before she’d turned to look at him with defiance written all over her face. There was at least water because he’d turned it on at the mains, but the power had still been off.
Well, maybe a night in a dark wreck of a house would be what it took to send her scurrying back to civilisation. He’d ride over or send one of his men out tomorrow or the day after to make sure she was safe, but otherwise she’d damn well made her bed – that’s if there was a bed left standing in that demolition job – so she could damn well lie in it!
Blaze’s bravado vanished the second Macauley Black stepped off the front porch, though she maintained the façade just long enough for him to send the ute in a wide circle, spraying grit as he bumped back over the rutted track towards the road.
Shit. Shit. Shit!
When he was out of sight, she wrapped her arms tight around her waist and gave in, letting her shoulders slump in despair. He was right. She was a hothouse flower: looked good, smelled good, absolutely no good to anyone.
Even before the pampered life of a Hollywood starlet had fallen in her lap, she’d been an over-indulged only child and grandchild. She’d never had to pick up after herself, let alone learn to shop or cook or maintain a home. And right now she had absolutely no idea of what to do with this ramshackle old homestead. Or even where to start. She didn’t even know if the homestead was salvageable. If a strong wind blew tonight, it might all just come crashing down around her ears.
Well, that would solve multiple problems, she thought with a burst of dark humour. It was ironic that over the past few hellish days, the one pinprick of light had been the thought of Sweet Springs waiting – a cosy sanctuary where she could lock the door and keep the world at bay while she licked her wounds. The reality was that the front door didn’t close properly, let alone lock. And far from being a sanctuary, Sweet Springs was – as Macauley Black had said – a wreck. In fact, it probably needed her more than she needed it.
It was the slight but clear tilt of the sun towards the west that put an end to her wallowing. With perhaps just an hour or so before sunset, she needed to either find some source of light, or get ready for bed while there was still some light. She wasn’t too keen on entering the dim kitchen. Leaves and twigs crunched underfoot, the walls and counters were filthy and stained, and the stale air reeked of wild animal. Please let there not be rats.
If there were candles and matches, they were most likely to be there. But a hunt through the drawers turned up only some elegant if dull silver cutlery, yellowing linen tablecloths and tin foil that had rusted with age. She wasn’t game to grope on the high shelves, not knowing what might be lurking there, so she opted for an early night.
At the bottom of the stairs, she reached down to pick up the Louis Vuitton, and noticed two items placed on top that definitely weren’t hers. One of them was a slim torch with three brightness options. The second was a small cool pack containing food and water. Her stomach rumbled at the sight, and she remembered she hadn’t eaten since picking at an in-flight meal the previous day.
Maybe Macauley Black wasn’t a complete bastard. He just liked people to think he was.
Taking the cool pack into the kitchen, she rinsed one of her grandmother’s bone china plates and dried it on her shirt in the absence of towels. Brushing off a square of table and one of the old chairs, she sat down to eat in the mellowing light. The food was simple but delicious: a generous slice of meat and vegetable pie plus a banana and a mango. Ravenous, she wolfed down the pie. It tasted better than anything she’d had recently in the best LA hotels.
Sighing, she took a slug of water from the bottle and munched slowly on the banana, unable to relax despite the calm quiet. It took her a few moments to work out that it was the silence itself that was so strange.
Opening the doors, she took her chair on to the back veranda, propping her boot heels on the timber rail, and watched the sun tumble into a breathtaking swirl of gold and magenta. A flock of birds flew screeching across the sky, heading for some unknown destination, and frogs set up a chirping chorus somewhere in the dusky beyond. Blaze smiled as the tension began to melt away, and her eyelids drooped. A few moments longer and she’d turn in . . .
Something hooted and she came awake to a clear navy sky and a couple of early stars. Yawning, she tilted her watch until she could make out the time. Lord! After nine. She’d been asleep more than two hours.
Sluggishly, she rinsed off her plate, placed the mango on it ready for breakfast, and closed the back door. Upstairs, she found her way to the old attic bedroom that had been hers as a child. The pink patchwork quilt was gone, so too the Raggedy Ann. But the sturdy timber-framed bed remained, together with her old bedside table and chair. And the room seemed comparatively clean and dry. The bathroom was another matter, so Blaze settled for splashing her face with water and cleaning her teeth.
By torchlight, she pulled musty-smelling sheets from the old dresser and made the bed. It was too warm to need a quilt, but she pulled her robe from her bag and tossed it across the sheet in case the temperature dropped during the night. Feeling as if she could sleep forever, she stripped – letting her clothes fall in a pile on the floor – and slipped beneath the cool sheets. Reaching out, she switched off the torch.
Barely a few minutes had passed before she felt herself dozing off. In that no-man’s-land between slumber and waking, she thought she heard a soft scraping. Something animalistic howled not far away, followed by a scrabbling. Then the heavy sound of silence. Her ears attuned, Blaze listened for endless minutes, and when she could stay awake no longer, she let the tide of sleep swallow her.
The next morning, it wasn’t the heat that woke Blaze, nor a nightmare. In fact, she wasn’t sure what caused her eyes to suddenly pop open; maybe she had just slept as much as her body needed. Certainly, when she rolled lazily over, she felt surprisingly together. Probably the best she’d felt in weeks. The tension in her shoulders was gone, and she’d had a whole night without a bad dream.
Groping for her watch, she tilted it up so the light fell across it. Five past seven. She’d been out of it for nearly ten hours, which was a miracle in itself. Even prior to her life going down the toilet, she’d been a poor sleeper. Parties and openings and late or early shoots quickly screwed up the body clock; there was something to be said for rising and retiring with the birds.
Right at that moment, a pair of them – cockatoos from the raucous sound – were having their own party, right outside her window. She smiled at the squawking, thrust back the sheet and stood naked on the bare floorboards. Lifting her arms above her head, she ran through a few yoga stretches, rolled her shoulders and tugged on her robe.
After a brief bathroom stop, she secured her hair on top of her head and went downstairs. Sipping at the remaining water in the bottle, she strolled out on to the back veranda to inspect the new day. Even at this early hour, the dew was long gone, but a hint of freshness lingered.
Half a kilometre away at the waterhole, birds dive-bombed the smooth surface of the water, creating a cacophony of sound that said, like nothing else: this is the Australian bush. Ants made a lazy line across the old timbers of the porch, and an early bee droned through the struggling honeysuckle that still retained its hold on the old lattice-work.
Blaze grinned, letting her head tip back on her shoulders and she took a lungful of the sweet air. It smelled good enough to eat, partly the honeysuckle and partly . . . mango! How long had it been since she’d enjoyed a Queenslan
d mango, dripping with juice?
Getting up, she retrieved the fruit, rummaged in the kitchen drawer until she found a paring knife, and cut off the two cheeks and edges, scoring the flesh into squares the traditional way.
Dragging out her grandmother’s old rocker on to the veranda, Blaze dusted it off and sat down slowly to enjoy her breakfast. Her eyes almost rolled back in her head at the first sensuous taste. If any food could give a woman an orgasm, it would be mango, she thought, letting the juice run down her chin and between her breasts.
Letting the new day wash over her, she closed her eyes and set the chair to rock as Gram used to do when she was shelling peas or crocheting. Even when relaxing, Gram’s hands were never idle. Blaze’s eyes misted.
Everyone she’d ever cared about was gone, even Mitch, whom she’d loved as a friend and trusted confidante. Thinking back, she realised they’d been brought together by their insecurities, as well as their successes. Briefly, he’d kicked his drug habit, and she’d found the confidence to test for some more demanding roles, winning one of them. He was hearty and boisterous, generous to a fault, and she’d hoped he was winning his war against his demons, but then someone with death in mind and a sharp blade in hand had ended it for Mitch.
A soft snarl from beneath her feet had her sitting upright in the chair. Blood pumping, bottle of water still in hand, she looked wildly around. She was alone, except for the ants; even the bee had disappeared. The sound came again, more of a snuffle this time, followed by the scrambling sound she’d heard last night.
She caught movement on the steps, and then a black nose and two grey paws appeared. Tawny eyes stared back at her from the face of a dog with the distinctive coat of a blue heeler. He didn’t come any further, just observed her with those cautious, intelligent eyes. When she made no move, he inched forward until he was standing on the veranda, one of his back legs held off the ground as though he were in pain. He made a little sound, and then lay down, panting heavily.