two weeks. Therefore I demand you accept your boss’s edict that it’s a boobook.’
‘I haven’t agreed to take the job yet.’
‘So you haven’t,’ he said equitably. ‘But you are still employed for four more days. So it’s boobook tonight.’ He pushed himself to his feet and held out his hand to help her up. ‘Come and see.’
She looked at his offered hand and thought...I shouldn’t.
And then she thought: Why not? There were all sorts of reasons, but Matt was smiling down at her and his hand was just there.
She shouldn’t take it—but she did.
* * *
What was he doing?
He was more than tired. By this stage in shearing he was operating on autopilot. He’d averaged about five hours of sleep a night for the past ten days and, apart from the tiny window of time on the veranda at night, every minute he was awake was crammed with imperatives. Most of those imperatives involved tough manual labour but he also had to be fine-tuned to the atmosphere in the shed. One flare-up could mess with a whole shear. Angry shearers usually meant sloppy shearing and the flock suffered.
So far the tension had been minimal. The shearers had worked through each run looking forward to Penny’s next meal, bantering about the last. This shear was amazing and it was pretty much thanks to the woman beside him. So surely he could take a few minutes to show her a boobook?
Besides, he wanted to.
He had a torch in his pocket. It was strong but it was small, casting a narrow band of light in front of them as they walked. They needed to go into the stand of gums behind the house. The ground was thick with leaf litter and fallen twigs so it was natural—even essential—that he keep hold of her hand. After all, she was a vital cog in his business empire. He needed to take care of her.
Even though it made him feel... How did he feel?
Good. That was too small a word but his mind wasn’t prepared to think of another. Her fingers were laced in his and her hand was half his size. His fingers were calloused and rough, too rough to be holding something as warm and...trusting?
That was what it felt like but that was dumb. He’d figured enough of Penny by now to know that she could look after herself. One move that she didn’t like would have her screeching the farm down, and an inkling of Penny in peril would have the entire shearing team out in force.
He grinned at the thought and Penny must have heard his smile. ‘What’s the joke?’
‘I just thought...if I tried a bit of seduction you’d have the team out here ready to defend you. Shears at the ready. Ron was watching you go back to the house yesterday and said you had a nice rear end. Margie told him where he could put his sexist comments and suddenly we had the whole shearing shed coming down on Ron like a ton of bricks. The poor guy had to bury himself packing fleeces into the wool press for the rest of the afternoon. You have an army at your disposal, Penelope Hindmarsh-Firth.’
‘Excellent,’ she said and smiled and was it his imagination or did her hold on his hand tighten a little? She paused for a moment as if she was thinking of something important—or trying to find the courage to say something—and finally out it came.
‘Do you think I have a nice...rear end?’
Whoa. ‘You have a very nice rear end,’ he admitted. Who could argue with the truth?
‘Thank you,’ she told him. ‘Yours isn’t so bad either.’
That set him back. A woman telling him he had a good butt?
‘But don’t let it go to your head,’ she told him. ‘And I’ll try and swallow my conceit too. Where did you say these owls are?’
The calls had ceased. That was because they were standing right under the trees the birds were nesting in.
It took him a moment to collect himself and direct his torchlight up. She disconcerted him. She was so close. She still smelled faintly yeasty, from the bread she’d set to rise. From something citrusy in her hair. From...being Penny?
What was he here for? He was looking for owls. Right.
‘There...’ Penny breathed—she’d caught sight of the first bird before he had. Even though he was holding the torch. Good one, Fraser, he told himself. Get a grip.
‘The other will be close,’ he managed.
‘The other?’
‘This is a nesting pair. They’ve been using the same nest for years, very successfully. Their young populate half this valley. Look, there’s the female. She’s a bit bigger than the male. They’re feeling a bit threatened now. See, they’re sitting bolt upright, but they’ve seen me so often I can’t imagine they think of me as a threat.’
He was concentrating on the birds rather than Penny.
‘Would the shearing team leap to their defence too?’ she asked mildly and he smiled.
‘They might. No one likes their quarters overrun by mice. These guys do us a favour. But I don’t think they’d come quite as fast as if you needed help. You’ve—deservedly—made some pretty fierce friends.’
‘Matt?’
‘Mmm?’
‘Stop it with the compliments. They don’t mean anything and I don’t want them.’
And the way she said it made him pause. It made him stop thinking of how she smelled and, instead, think about where she’d come from.
He got it, he thought. She’d just been through one messy relationship. He didn’t know this Brett guy who’d been such a toe-rag but he could imagine. Somehow, he had a pretty clear idea of her family dynamics by now. In some ways Penny was tough but in others...she was exposed, he thought, and Brett must have sensed that weakness. If he’d said great things to her she would have believed them. She’d believed them all the way to a calamitous engagement.
So now she thought compliments were a means of manipulation and he could understand why. He had to shut up. Except suddenly he couldn’t.
‘Right,’ he told her. ‘No more compliments. But there are a few truths—not compliments, truths, that I’m not taking back. Firstly, your cooking is awesome and I’m incredibly grateful. Second, I’d agree with Ron—you do have a nice rear end, even though it’s an entirely inappropriate comment for a boss to make about his employee. And finally there’s one more thing which I need to say and it’ll make you blush because it’s a ripper.’
‘A ripper?’ she said faintly. ‘A ripper of a compliment?’
‘Not a compliment,’ he told her, throwing caution to the wind. He took her other hand and tugged so she was facing him. ‘Just the truth. Penelope Hindmarsh-Firth, you smell of fresh baked bread and yeast and the aroma of a day spent in the kitchen, my kitchen, and if you think me telling you that you have a nice backside is an empty compliment then the world’s upside down. This is a gorgeous night and I’m holding the hands of a woman who’s saved my butt. She has a beautiful backside,
