A Girl's Guide to the Outback

by Jessica Kate

  I don’t trust you. I don’t want you. You have no place here.

  He would never have intentionally hurt her, but every rebuff, every microexpression, every argument spoke more clearly than a megaphone. She’d suffered death by a thousand cuts over a period of three and a half years. And now Steph wanted her to “win him back.”

  Her mind paged through Dad’s creative collection of curses, yet none fully expressed this moment.

  Riiiiiiiing.

  Might as well get it over with.

  She tucked her legs beneath her, clenched her teeth, and pressed the Answer button. “Hello?”

  “I don’t expect you to say yes to this.” Sam launched into his sentence without so much as a “G’day.” “But my sister—Ow! Jules, cut it out.”

  What on earth was happening over there? Kimberly pressed the phone closer to her ear.

  “We wondered—” Sam stopped, like he was choking on the words. “Our farm’s having some cash-flow problems. Cash flow’s kinda your thing, so we wondered if we could get some . . . advice.”

  Kimberly blinked. He was calling to ask for her help?

  Sam must’ve taken her stunned silence the wrong way, because he started talking faster than a thirteen-year-old on Red Bull. “This is stupid. You don’t know anything about farming. I don’t expect you to do this—Ow, Jules, I will take away that crutch.”

  A jostle, a clatter, and a woman’s voice. “Hello? Kimberly?”

  “Um, yes?”

  “I’m Jules, Sam’s—”

  “Sister.” A smile spread over Kimberly’s face. She’d always dreamed of having a sibling herself and had forever been curious about Jules, the sister who ran the Payton farm by herself in Australia.

  She sounded like the kind of girl Kimberly would like to meet.

  “Is there anything we can offer you to get some of those great ideas that Sam loves to complain about?”

  A straight talker. Good.

  “Yes. Your brother.”

  A chortle. “I knew it.”

  * * *

  Jules leaned away from her brother’s grasp as he joined her on the worn leather couch, trying to listen to Kimberly’s proposal. This morning Jules had swapped to an Island Breeze pineapple-and-coconut candle that now flickered from its place on the bargain TV cabinet Mum had found at the dump shop. The delightful combination smelled of hope.

  And if Jules didn’t cling to her hope tighter than a baby koala to its mother, she’d implode.

  “Six weeks?” She eyed Sam, who leaned in her direction, obviously trying to eavesdrop. She palmed his face away. “I think that sounds fair.”

  He shook her hand off as his brow furrowed in her direction, the question clear in his expression. Six weeks of what? He edged closer and cocked his ear toward the phone. “Jules, what are you doing?”

  If she could jump up and run away with the phone, she would. The cast on her leg prevented that, so she used it to her advantage—Sam leaned closer, and she flinched like he’d bumped it. “Ow!”

  He leapt away, mouthed Sorry, and kept his distance. She scratched her lip to cover a smile and tuned back into Kimberly’s voice on the phone.

  “—we close down on the sixteenth for Christmas, and I can work long distance for several weeks before that. That’d give me a month.”

  Sam bounced in his seat. “What’s she saying?”

  Jules plugged her other ear. “That sounds fantastic.”

  Sam set his jaw. “What sounds fantastic?”

  She shooed him like a fly.

  He grabbed the phone from her and pressed it to his ear just as Kimberly said, “See you in a week.” The volume was high enough that Jules caught the words.

  Beep. Call ended.

  She snapped a mental picture of Sam’s face. Priceless.

  He put down the phone and glowered at her. “‘See you in a week’?”

  Jules struggled to her feet, the worn wooden floor more slippery than she’d like beneath her one socked foot and crutches. “Believe it or not, I’ve made a deal in the best interests of everybody.”

  “What deal?” Sam’s dark expression demonstrated a disturbing lack of trust in her sisterly wisdom as he stood to face her down.

  Jules set her jaw. He had to know she wasn’t negotiating on this. “Kimberly’s going to investigate our situation and help us get back on the right track. Guaranteed.” She poked a finger into his chest. “In exchange for you.”

  He stared at her, silent, for a full three seconds. “Slavery’s not legal, you know.” His answer was glib, but the set of his jaw—anything but.

  Good thing she’d turned stubbornness into an art form. “You go back to Wildfire for six weeks and help her find and train your replacement. Apparently she’s had some trouble filling your shoes. Six weeks, then you can come home or gallivant around the world or whatever tickles your fancy.” She paused and let the news sink in. Six weeks, yes, but hopefully longer. As much as she loved having Sam here, she’d never seen her brother so happy as when he was spreading God’s love to teens at Wildfire. He’d been born for it. And he was in a rut here.

  So maybe some sisterly meddling could get him back on track.

  “There has to be another way.”

  “One that doesn’t cost money? No.” She folded her arms and watched him. You could practically see the cogs whirring in his brain, searching for some way—any way—out of this. But he’d have to reach the same conclusion she had: this was their best shot.

  He ran a hand over his hair, expression resigned. “Six weeks? And I only recruit and train? I don’t run Wildfire or her expansion or anything crazy?”

  “Cross my heart.”

  “Why did she say, ‘See you in a week’?”

  “Wildfire closes down for two weeks over Christmas. I suggested Kimberly spend those two weeks here, give us a hand while she works out how to free up some more cash.”

  Sam’s expression looked as though she’d invited the Grinch himself.

  She added the kicker. “And then she said that up until their Christmas break starts, she can work for Wildfire remotely. So just over a month, all up. That’ll give her time to really dig into our situation.”

  Sam’s eyebrows couldn’t go any higher. “Why would you suggest that? The plane ticket alone would’ve paid those wages. And it’s still money we don’t have.”

  “I pitched it as a ‘Come and see the real Australia’ holiday and left it up to her. She agreed in about five seconds. She’s paying for her ticket.”

  He rubbed his hand over his face. “Oh boy.”

  She tutted at his doubt and used her crutches to hobble into the kitchen so that Sam didn’t see the change in her expression. She could only maintain the cheerful facade for so long. This was one hurdle cleared. Only a few hundred thousand more to go.

  This girl had better live up to all of Sam’s complaining or they were doomed.

  Chapter 6

  Jules hopped down the house’s front stairs after Sam returned to the paddocks and hustled toward the four-wheeled motorbike that sparkled in the morning sun like a golden chariot to freedom. She’d completed one hard task this morning, and now she needed an hour without her overbearing brother to do another.

  She glanced around one last time to see if she’d escaped undetected. Kilometers of farmland sizzled before her in late November’s annual attempt to give every living creature a cracking case of sunburn. Cows mooed. Chickens buuuurGERKed. And no sound from Sam. Thank goodness.

  Because he really wouldn’t like what she was about to do.

  With eleven hundred acres to roam on, she’d never felt more trapped than the week since she’d busted her foot. And Sam had been all “Don’t overexert yourself” and “Put down that sledgehammer.” Who needed that?

  She shoved her crutches onto the black metal rack on the back of the bike and managed to swing her casted leg over the seat. Okay, hardest part over. She settled down. The black plastic seat, heated by the sun’s over-
enthusiastic rays, scorched the backs of her thighs. Denim shorts were great for being easy to pull on over her bad leg but bad for hot-seat protection. She hissed her breath between her teeth, flicked the key over, and hit the electric start button.

  Nothing. Flippin’ fantastic.

  Jules maneuvered back off the bike, stood on her good leg, and gave the pull-start cord an aggressive yank. Too aggressive. She wobbled and grasped the handlebars for support as the engine kicked over. Phew. That had been close. But at least the engine started.

  Movement toward the dairy caught her gaze. Sam. Headed this way.

  She leapt onto the bike with all the grace of a three-legged wombat, used her hand to yank up the gear pedal—unfortunately located on the side of her bad leg—and shoved her thumb forward on the accelerator. Kinda hard to see, leaning down with a hand on the gear pedal, but there wouldn’t be anything in her way on the driveway. Probably.

  The bike zoomed along, and she pushed the throttle till the engine revved. Vroom. She yanked the gear pedal up again. Click. Second gear. Vroom. Click. Vroom. Click. Vroom. Click. She risked a glance back as she cleared the first row of paddocks in top gear. All clear. Sam must’ve been headed into one of the sheds. Though her Kelpie cattle dog, Meg, raced from the dairy toward her with increasing speed.

  She turned her face back into the wind, her old Billabong tank top flapping against her torso, and grinned. Eye-watering speed had never felt so good. The three-kilometer driveway gave her space to open up the engine and take her first deep breath in eight days. And the pleasure of having pulled one over on Sam almost negated the sour taste her present task left on her tongue.

  Saying thank you to Mick.

  Technically she also owed Mick a “You were right,” but Psycho would lactate half-soy extra-foam lattes before that would happen. But she did have to thank him for dragging her unconscious self out of that pen—putting himself within range of Psycho’s 560 kilograms of angry cow in the process.

  She slowed down at the farm gateway, scooted along the edge of the road for another four kilometers, and headed down the Carrigans’ drive with her dog now running alongside her. Hmmm. No need to rush. She eased off her speed as she passed a boom irrigator spraying water onto a sorghum paddock. A mini rainbow emerged from the droplets. She paused to admire it and the sprawling river flats that surrounded her. A thousand shades of brown and green—and even the green had a dirty tinge to it. Dad—technically her stepfather, but the only dad she’d known—used to say he’d never realized how many types of brown there were till he left the US to backpack around Australia. Ironic from a man of his skin tone. But he’d landed a job on their farm as a casual milker, married his lady farmer boss, and spent the next twenty years painting every shade of brown onto his unconventional landscape canvases—sheds, water tanks, gates.

  He’d be admonishing her now, if he were here, to quit stalling and get on with it.

  A squark to her left snapped her attention upward. A cranky-looking magpie eyed her as it perched atop a power line. Jules hit the accelerator. Those black-and-white devil birds could swoop at any moment, especially in spring. She still had a scar on her temple to prove it.

  A few minutes later she pulled up in front of the Carrigan family home, a 1960s-era brick affair that she’d practically lived in growing up. A dog yapped inside, probably Mick’s ridiculous toy poodle. Meg shot off in that direction.

  Clang. The sound came from the direction of the machinery shed. Jules skipped the house and rolled that way. Had Mick returned yet, or was it his dad in the shed? Mick had been temporarily called back to the Gold Coast while she was in hospital. But the grapevine had informed her that he planned to return and keep helping his parents clean up their property before its auction. His father wanted to retire, and with Mick on a different career path, that meant selling.

  Another clatter sounded from the shed. Sounded like Mick was fixing something.

  Bang.

  Or trying to. He’d never been much use with machinery.

  “Mick?”

  A mumbled curse, then, “Yeah?”

  She shuffled around the edge of the shed and viewed the carcass of his old YZ250 motorbike. Yikes. What had he done to it?

  “Yes?” His testy tone brought her attention back to where he perched on an upturned bucket, both grease and a sour expression on his face. Almost enough to make his blue eyes, faun hair, and boyish freckles unattractive.

  Almost.

  She summoned all the humility she could from every molecule of her body. Hopefully it’d be enough. “I just came to thank you. For last week. You know, pulling me out of the pen.”

  He glared at her and attacked the bike again with a socket drive. “I hope it was worth it.”

  She blinked. His tone seethed. Tension stiffened her muscles as she snapped out a “What?”

  “Your stinking pride or independence or whatever else it was that made you climb into that pen.” He rubbed a hand through close-cropped curls, smearing another streak of grease.

  Her temperature climbed a notch, but he’d come to her rescue, so a jab to the nose wouldn’t be good form. However tempting it might be. She set her jaw. “My pride is the only thing that keeps the bank away from my property. I had my best milker to save.”

  Mick tossed the socket drive aside. The clank of metal on concrete reverberated in the corrugated-iron shed. “And instead you got a busted leg. Like I said, hope it was worth it.”

  The thud of her heartbeat pounded in her ears. “You wouldn’t say that to any man who made the decision I did.”

  Mick emitted a short, humorless Ha! “That’s not what this is about. This is a Julia-Payton-values-her-cows-more-than-her-life thing.”

  Heat flooded Jules’s chest, neck, face, and hands. What would he know about fighting for his family’s heritage? Persisting through the droughts, floods, fires, loneliness, and bad internet speeds? Mick wasn’t going to preserve his father’s meticulous fence lines, prized breeders, or the back-paddock tree with a carving of his and Jules’s initials. No, he’d chosen his easy life at the coast over his dad’s farm, and over her. Just as she’d chosen her lifestyle over him. “You’re just mad because I picked them instead of you.” She spat the words out.

  Oh no. Mistake.

  “I’m what?” A series of expressions flashed across his features. Eyebrows up, surprise. Eyes crinkled, scorn. Relaxed back to neutrality. Dismissal.

  Something pierced the bubble of emotion inside her. His concern, while annoying, had also been . . . comforting. He’d been worried. Her rigid posture drained away, and she scoured her brain for words that could fix this.

  Mick sat back on his bucket and picked up a screwdriver. “Go back to your cows, Jules. Unlike me, they’ll be happy to see you.”

  Chapter 7

  This was a terrible plan.

  Kimberly twisted the strap of her handbag as she stood by a park bench and flickering streetlight and watched the bus that had deposited her here roar off into the night. Though maybe the old diesel engine’s struggle into third gear only sounded like a roar compared to the utter lack of other noise. The town of Burradoo at 3:00 a.m. had about as much life in it as the lump of pungent roadkill that lay next to the town’s welcome sign.

  She scanned the main street in both directions. Lit by a full moon, Burradoo appeared to consist of single-story tin-roofed buildings scattered along both sides of a minor highway, with two notable exceptions: the sprawling two-story pub in the center of town and the twenty-foot-tall fiberglass orange located opposite.

  Kimberly blinked at the gigantic fruit.

  Yep. It really was a massive orange, topped by a short stem and one leaf. It rested beside a dilapidated shack with the optimistic sign Tourist Information Centre. Yikes. Could there be any explanation for this phenomenon besides an abundance of spare time, a lack of amusement, and possibly something nefarious in the water?

  A rustle stirred in a bush nearby. Kimberly dragged her eyes from th
e orange and scanned the park behind her. She’d made the mistake of watching Wolf Creek last week as part of her learn-Aussie-culture-via-movies initiative and now had a phobia of strangers who offered to help stranded travelers.

  No further rustles. Probably just a bird, not a deranged serial killer. Or a lunatic obsessed with oranges.

  She wiped wet palms on the legs of her jeans. Even at this hour she was sweating. But surely Sam wouldn’t leave her stranded here till morning. She’d sent her estimated arrival time when she boarded the first bus back in Brisbane twelve hours and two transfers ago.

  But who was she kidding? Sam would probably love nothing more than to leave her perspiring on a chewing-gum-covered bench for a few hours. He certainly hadn’t sounded enthusiastic about her arrival. But whatever. She should be immune to his jabs by now.

  She huffed and wiped her hands again. It had to be at least eighty degrees, and every breath she took carried the weight of humidity. This kind of weather in the final days of November was obscene.

  She checked her phone. The Australian SIM card she’d purchased in the airport had worked earlier, so that couldn’t be the issue. No service. Terrific. She was in the middle of town, for goodness’ sake. She dropped the phone back into her bag.

  Headlights swung onto the road a hundred yards away. Kimberly’s stomach performed a triple pirouette. Maybe her overactive sweat glands had more to do with a disgruntled Australian preacher than this un-Christmassy weather. She fought the urge to sprint after the long-gone bus.

  Eighty yards.

  There was no way this could work. Sam had made his feelings pretty clear by resigning. Apparently leaving the ministry he founded was preferable to working with her and her expansion plan. Maybe she should have taken that hint.

  No. Think positive.

  Fifty yards.

  Perhaps in a different setting, such as his home turf, she could figure out what it was that made them clash so much. Maybe they’d work out a permanent truce. Maybe he’d remember everything awesome about Wildfire and come back to where he belonged.