by Camryn Eyde
***
Strangers from the city came to the property, and while tolerant of those experienced and weathered in the art of existence on the land, Aimee’s ability to accept city folk was non-existent. People from the concrete jungle didn’t get life on the land. They didn’t understand how easily you could die. If venomous snakes or spiders didn’t get you, then dehydration and exposure would. That day, when the strangers decided to wander off for a hike and got themselves lost, she snapped.
They were found an hour after they were reported missing nearly five kilometres from their intended destination. Aimee discovered them, after hearing Joey had come off his motorbike while searching for them, and by the time she returned them to the homestead, her voice was raspy with overuse.
Complaints about her abusive words shocked both Sally and Joey. Since the accident that took their parents, Aimee had been a quiet, reserved child, moving about her day with very little intrusion. After asking the backpackers to leave the station, Sally and Joey found their kid sister in the stables crying in Kite’s stall. A blubbering apology fell from her lips before the truth came out about how she couldn’t save her parents. How her parting words were filled with spite and hate, and about cursing them as she watched them leave her behind. She told them how strangers from the city terrified her with the possibility of stealing away more family members to their graves. The twenty-seven-year old twins sat down with her in the hay and comforted her as much as they could, but knew there was nothing they could do to mend her sisters heart break.
Regret would always itch within Aimee, but over some things she had control. With the blessing of her siblings, never again would naïve city fools be allowed unrestricted access to the property. From that day forward, Aimee swore to protect her family from outsiders. If you weren’t from the land, then you weren’t welcome.
Chapter One
“Bimbos, the lot of them.”
“Aimee, shush.”
Aimee rolled her eyes as her older sister elbowed her in the arm. “Look at them!” Aimee said, gesturing at the three city chicks as if they were flies that needed swatting. “Can you see any of them surviving out here?” Cupping her hands to her mouth, she shouted, “No malls out here ladies. No fancy beauty parlours. No coffee shops to gossip at. Hell, there’s no freaking phone reception!”
Sally, shorter than Aimee by a couple of inches and wider by a good deal more, leaned into her sister and said with a growl, “Aimee, for Christ’s sake, they’ll hear you.”
“Good. Maybe they’ll turn their size-too-small lycra-clad arses around and leave.”
Sally made a noise of disgust.
“What?” Aimee said, hating the whine she could hear in her own voice.
“You’re a bloody pessimist.”
“At least I’m not pimping myself out like Joey is. What an idiot.”
“Shh…I want to hear this.” Sally rubbed her hands together before blowing warm air into them. The morning was bitter, but lacked the blanket of frost across the ground as the approaching spring slowly warmed the air.
Aimee rolled her eyes again but kept quiet to watch the circus unfold in front of her. Her brother, Joey, was finally released by some chick putting powder all over his face. To Aimee, he looked like one of those metro ponces on TV. The makeup woman relinquished control of him to another lady in a severe business suit who sent Aimee a dirty look.
“And why is that pain in my arse back here?” Aimee said, scowling at the woman whose name she was still yet to learn.
Sally sighed. “Because she’s the producer, remember?”
“All I remember is her swanning all over the property making pretty boy there look like a bigger ponce than he does now.”
“Seriously, Aimee? That was months ago now. Get over yourself.”
Aimee continued to scowl. Two months ago, a cameraman from the show and the producer had spent two days on the property filming stock images. Two days that Aimee had been blissfully busy elsewhere except for one incident that she tightened her scowl over. “She lost my best hat.”
Sally groaned.
“What? It was barely broken in, and she had it for what? A day before losing it in the top paddock somewhere. She owes me.”
“Will you hush,” Sally said.
Aimee crossed her arms. The producer was now leading Joey to the three contestants who were all looking up at the homestead as though they’d struck gold. On the surface, they probably had every reason to think that.
The homestead was a magnificent stone two-story structure with four distinct wings. It looked grand and straight out of Hollywood. It boasted numerous bedrooms, a commercial-sized kitchen, more formal rooms than they knew what to do with, and a conservatory that lead into a large courtyard complete with heated pool. The place was a testament to the success of their ancestors, and was impressive even to Aimee. To the women salivating at it, it also meant money. Lots and lots of money. If only they knew what running a station cost.
Hovering around the group were two guys with cameras and another with a long stick with a fluffy thing on the end.
“What’s with the skinned possum?” Aimee asked Sally.
“It’s a microphone. Shh.”
“Jeez!” Aimee had to quickly shield her eyes as another minion ran about with a reflective screen, managing to blind her with the sun. The producer gave her a tight-lipped glare. Aimee resisted the urge to poke out her tongue. One of the contestants looked over and Aimee gave her a little wave. Aimee’s eyes roamed the remarkable assets of the woman, and as a result flashed her teeth and gave her a wink. The woman blushed.
“Hey,” Sally whispered harshly in her ear. “No hitting on Joey’s girls.”
“Why not? You said they’re here to find love. Why can’t it be with me?”
Sally clucked her tongue. “The day you fall in love will be the day snow falls on Christmas day. Never going to happen.”
“Excuse me, but could you refrain from gossiping for a moment?” the producer said.
“Excuse me, but could you hurry this up. This is a working farm, not a bloody prop for some pre-war soap opera. We need your pin-up boy over there to actually pull his weight and not just fawn about these…desperates,” Aimee said back at her. The girls squeaked with offence. “There are men in the city, just so you know. They’re the ones with the deep voices, moisturised skin and fancied up hair.”
“Aims,” Joey warned.
“This is so stupid,” Aimee said. Turning her back on the entire production, she whistled for her four-legged companion and went to the stables to prepare her horse for the ride out to the west paddock.
“Hey, Aimsey, what’s happenin’?” Gav, Gavin Munroe, called over to her as she walked past the sheds. The man, hairy on every piece of visible skin, was sporting his usual coverage of oil to his elbows, a dark blue work shirt unbuttoned to his beer belly, and boots without laces at the bottom of his thick legs. “Joey picked himself a bride yet?”
“Ugh. No. The idiot needs his head read for signing up for this show.”
“The man wants some lovin’, Aims. Let him be.”
“He had plenty of loving with Tracey.”
“Yeah…he shoulda trapped that when he had a chance.”
“Hmm,” Aimee mumbled and continued on to the stables where she had penned her horse earlier. Tracey, a woman who used to fall at Joey’s feet, was the woman he should never have let go. Joey, the imbecile, decided he needed to sow some wild oats before getting tied down in family and the farm. He lasted three months in the city before crawling home to find Tracey had refused to sit around and wait for him. She was now working in the next town at the local vet and according to current rumour, dating the locum doctor.
It was his wild oats that started this mess, Aimee decided. Tracey broke his heart though he’d never admit it, and apparently the remedy to that was this brilliant scheme. Joey Turner, a contestant on the latest series of Romancing the Farmer. The thirty-four-year-old went into the
city last month, met a bunch of girls and chose three to return to their farm for two weeks. Sally had explained that he eliminated a girl each week, meaning the contestant count would at least go down. The problem was that it was nearly lambing season, they had shearers booked for three days starting tomorrow, and the sorghum fields needed attention for planting next month. August, the last of the winter months, was the busiest one on the station. Why Joey decided it was a good idea to bring a circus to the property was beyond Aimee’s understanding.
Aimee, busy shaking her head to herself, walked into the cool, crisp air inside the stables. The tallest building on the property, it provided a holding area with seven stalls at ground level, and on the mezzanine was an area converted into a loft space several years earlier. A loft space Aimee called home. Adjacent to a large paddock that let the horse stock they owned roam free when not being ridden, the stables had a series of stalls on either side of the centre run. Mainly used to pen horses they planned to ride in the near future, Aimee had coaxed her mare Kite from the paddocks at daybreak and put her in a stall. Across the run was River, a sedate horse her nephew Robbie wanted to ride that afternoon.
“I hope the desperates know the arse end of a sheep from its front,” Aimee muttered as she picked up a saddle from its resting place on the stable wall. Her border collie, Mitsy, cocked her head at her and whined. “Exactly,” Aimee muttered.
“Hey, my beautiful Kite,” she cooed to the big grey mare snuffling at her pockets the moment she entered her pen. Kite nudged at Aimee’s hands after glaring at the dog that marked its territory in her stall.
“Ah, crap. Sorry girl, the circus made me forget your sugar. I promise you double tonight, okay?”
Brushing down her horse, she felt at peace for the first time that day. Since daybreak, Joey had been pacing around the house like a nervous cat and Sally had managed to temper the usual boisterousness of her two children creating a strange, ominous atmosphere. A house Sally was being forced to share thanks to Joey and his suitors. The fact Aimee had to share a kitchen and amenities with three strangers didn’t sit well either and forced her to reconsider putting a bathroom in her loft above the stables like Joey had suggested countless times.
“Guess I’ll be using the emergency shower,” she said to Mitsy, thinking of the shower in the machinery shed primarily used for chemical spills.
“Okay, set up in here. Use this quaint rustic look for the video diaries,” said a loud voice that startled Kite, making the mare step on Aimee’s toes and Mitsy jump to her feet.
“See if you can stack up some hay bales for a backdrop. Have some saddles and bridles draping over them.”
“Oh, for the love of all things holy,” Aimee mumbled, her face scrunched in pain as she hopped to the door of Kite’s bay. “Do you mind?” she called out to the producer who was pointing at some hay bales stacked near the stable doors. Closing in on the petite woman, Aimee encroached on her personal space and crossed her arms with a glare.
The producer turned and rolled her eyes when she saw who had spoken to her. “Well, if it isn’t the antagonist. If you don’t mind, I’m on a schedule. I have a production to manage, and if you and your little horsey could stay out of my way, then I’m sure this will all be quick and painless.” She turned her back to Aimee and tried to saunter out of the stables.
Aimee wasn’t going to be so easily dismissed. Snatching the woman’s thin arm in her hand, she whipped the woman around. Not expecting her to be so light, Aimee’s strength from years of working the farm and managing horses came to the fore and the producer ended up crashing against her.
Both women gasped and stepped back, the producer’s amber eyes flashing like a cat. No, thought Aimee, a dragon.
After an awkward pause at the accidental body bump, Aimee remembered her annoyance and pointed her finger at the woman. “This is a business, not a playground. If you want to set your lights and fluffy sticks up somewhere, you need to ask for permission first.” Aimee put her hand down. “And you owe me a new hat.”
The producer narrowed her eyes. “For your information, farm girl, I have a document that says I have creative rights for this show and for where I choose to set up my scenes on this property. Your brother, who I must say, was raised with a darn sight more manners than you, agreed to the requisites for this show and signed accordingly. I don’t need to ask for permission because I already have it. As for your hat, buy a new one.”
“Typical city attitude. Just go buy a new one,” Aimee said with a great deal of petulance.
“It was a dusty piece of felt hardly worth three bucks.”
“It was just getting worn in.”
“It had a bloody great hole in the front of it.”
“That’s called a vent.”
“It’s called a moth hole.”
Aimee squinted and was about to defend her hat once more when she spotted Joey rushing across the yard over the producer’s shoulder, Aimee smirked. “We’ll see about this circus now, won’t we?”
The city woman crossed her arms and turned to the approaching party of production crew, farmer, and contestants. “I suppose we will. Enjoy being proved wrong. And that hat reeked of mouse urine.”
“Whatever,” Aimee mumbled to her. Joey reached hearing distance and Aimee called out. “What’s this about this lot getting the run of the place? This isn’t a doll house, Joe, it’s a bloody working station. Tell them to get stuffed.”
Joey glanced at the producer before zoning in on his sister. “Aimee, they’re only going to set up in a few places, and I already said they could have at it.”
“But she came bursting in here and startled the horses. Is their welfare suddenly less important than getting laid?”
Joey blushed bright red and the contestants snickered among themselves. Hooking his younger sister by the arm, he dragged her into the stables. “Look, Aims, we’ve talked about this. They’re here for two weeks, it’s good marketing for the farm, and who knows, maybe I get to meet the right girl for me.”
“The right girl for you left because you wanted to dip your wick elsewhere.”
Joey clenched his jaw. “Drop it, Aimee.”
Hearing the warning in her brother’s tone, Aimee took a deep breath and noticed the producer glaring at her. “I don’t want them here,” she said, trying not to pout.
“Stop being a brat. This isn’t about you, it’s about me. It’s two weeks, for Christ’s sake, so deal with it already.” Joey swung around and walked back over to the producer offering apologies for his kid sister.
“I’m not a bloody kid!” Aimee yelled over to him, which garnered the producer’s attention again.
She raised her brow with a smirk. “Oh, farm girl, your horse is escaping.”
Aimee scoffed and turned back down the run to Kite’s stall. “My horse is so not—crap!” Kite’s grey backside rounded the doors at the other end. Doors that led to a different paddock. Doors Mike would have exited through a few minutes before she returned to the stables with a thoroughbred horse. Knowing exactly where Kite was going, Aimee broke into a full sprint through the stables with Mitsy hot on her heels. If the stallion caught a whiff of her, she’d be hard pressed keeping them apart. Emerging from the stables, her fears were answered. Trotting along the narrow fenced corridor, Kite was headed straight for the yard the niece’s pony was in to visit her favourite friend, Raincloud. Unfortunately, the stallion, Handsome Boy, was yarded adjacent to the ponies, and sure enough, he started trotting over to the Kite, dragging the farmhand along behind him. Having asked Mike to halter him to take him to the younger mares he was supposed to breed with fifteen minutes ago, the disaster was set up and ready to unfold.
“Damn it!” she shouted. “Close the gate!” she called out in vain as the stallion rushed the opening and mounted her horse.
Mike was too late.
Mitsy barked in agreement.
“Get him off!” Aimee yelled. It was a futile order. The stallion was strong, and Kite
had been through the breeding process before, so like a little hussy, she stood there and let herself be mounted.
Aimee growled to the clear skies in frustration. Damn that stupid woman and that stupid show.
Chapter Two
“Tell me again how you managed to mate your old mare with a million-dollar stud!” Joey yelled at her that afternoon.
Sally stood beside him with her arms crossed. Danny, Sally’s husband, was rubbing at his stubble with a grimace on his face. “He didn’t want a bar of the bay mares. He took one sniff and walked away,” Danny said, making Aimee cringe a little.
They had hired the stallion to breed from the younger mares they recently invested in. The hilly and rough nature of the property lent itself to horseback travel over four-wheel driving, and they had invested a significant amount of money to breed good stock.
“It was that producer’s fault,” Aimee said, defending herself. “She came in, yelled down the run, startled Kite, and she escaped.”
“Who left the stall open, Aimee? Who was the one that felt the need to confront the production manager? Huh? You did. Don’t you dare try and palm it off when you know fully well who’s at fault here.”
“They were—”
“Enough!” Joey yelled, effectively stilling the entire room. For a big man, he rarely raised his voice, but when he did, people listened. Broad and muscled from a lifetime of station work, he was the exact kind of man the city women were hoping to find. Dark, curly hair with dark eyes to match, a kind face with two-day stubble, and a heart of gold. She heard him called handsome before, and Aimee might be forced to agree, but right now, he was pissing her off. Apparently, Joey was just as irate.
“You’ve been acting like a spoiled brat all day. Get over yourself already, and grow up. These people are here for two weeks, and I expect you to be respectful and welcoming. In fact, it’s now your job to escort the film crew around. Get them familiar with the property and what we do. If you can’t do that, then maybe it’s time you went back to uni. Maybe getting out in the real world will make you grow up a little.”