Summer Down Under (20 page)

They rode further down, and sure enough, slap
bang in the middle of the creek, was a sheep bogged down in the
mud.

“Can you get it?” Sam asked, as she watched
Daniel take a length of rope from the back of his bike and
proceeded to tie some kind of slip knot.

“Should be able to,” Daniel replied, testing
the lasso he had created by tossing it over an old stump a few feet
from his bike. He swung his leg over the seat and walked over to
collect his rope, wrapping it back into a loop. Sam followed him
down to the edge of the muddy creek bed and kept her fingers
crossed as Daniel tossed it out towards the sheep. It wasn’t long
enough by several feet.

“Oh, well,” Mr. Miller said with a hitch of
his shoulder. “We tried.” He got back on his bike.

Daniel started to roll up his rope.

“What are you doing?” Sam said, horrified.
“You’re not going to leave that poor sheep there to die, are
you?”

“I can’t reach it,” Daniel replied. “I’m
certainly not going in after it. Do you have any idea how deep that
mud could be?”

Sam gave him the filthiest glare she could
muster and snatched his rope from him. Muttering that she couldn’t
believe they would just leave the poor thing there to die. She
puffed up her chest, as she always did when faced with a challenge.
“Right, then,” she said, with an air of indignation before she
leaned down to take off her boots and socks.

“Sam, you can’t go in there,” Daniel
said.

“Just watch me.” Sam squared her shoulders
and lifted her chin, defying him to say anything else. “If you
buggars won’t help, then at least have the decency to turn around
so I can take my jeans off and save this poor creature.”

The two men shot each other a nervous glance
then turned to look at the stubborn jillaroo with incredulity.

“Now, please!” Sam snapped.

Daniel and his father looked back at each
other and shrugged.

“Better do as the lady says.” Daniel said to
his father.

Once she was sure they weren’t looking, she
pulled off her boots and socks, shrugged out of her jeans and
stepped into the mud. It felt cool and squishy as it oozed through
her toes. She fleetingly thought that this was probably not one of
her brightest ideas, but being the animal lover she was, there was
no way that she could continue on home without at least trying to
do whatever she could to save poor thing.

“I hope you appreciate this,” Sam mumbled
towards the sheep that was still struggling to get out of the mud,
but only making matters worse for itself. If she didn’t get to it
soon, it would surely die.

The mud rose further and further up her
calves with each step forward that she made. It oozed up over her
knees the further she waded out towards the struggling ball of
wool. Sam took a deep, steadying breath before taking a few more
strides. By that time, it was half way up her thighs. She was
starting to get a little nervous. The mud was deeper than she
thought, but the sheep was only a few feet ahead of her now. She
was so close, she couldn’t give up when a successful rescue was
within her grasp.

By the time she reached the sheep, the mud
had stopped just below her panty line. She blew out a breath that
fanned her fringe. At least it didn’t look like she’d end up with
muddy knickers. She put the rope she’d snatched from Daniel around
the sheep’s head.

“I’m going to need you to help me,” Sam
whispered to the sheep, so as not to frighten it. The poor thing
looked exhausted.

She tightened the rope and encouraged the
sheep to move in her direction. Much to her relief, it obliged.
Slowly but surely, she inched their way back towards the bank. Sam
looked up to make sure the guys weren’t watching her leading the
sheep, wading up to her underwear in mud. Little Bo Peep she was
not.

“I’m okay,” Sam called, just to make sure
they didn’t start to get worried and look around to check on her.
“We’re nearly there...oh, buggar!”

The sheep had found its footing. Without
warning, it decided to get the heck out of Dodge rather more
quickly than Sam expected. She was still holding onto the rope when
it pulled forward, tugging her off balance. Sam fell face first in
the mud with a resounding splat.

Both Daniel and his father had turned around
at her exclamation and caught sight of her fateful fall. They were
greeted by Sam’s lily-white butt sticking up out of the mud. They
fell about laughing.

She groaned, there was nothing more she could
do. Sam pushed herself up onto all fours and dragged herself out of
the mud. Unable to see anything, she scraped what she could off her
face with her fingers.

Daniel, who was still laughing, caught hold
of the rope and freed the sheep. It ran off without so much as a
backwards glance.

“You’re welcome!” Sam shouted as its muddy
tail disappeared over the embankment.

“Best thing you can do,” Mr. Miller said
between snorts of laughter, “is stand here for a while and let the
sun dry the mud. It will brush off and you’ll be ready to go. I’m
not hanging around, though. Daniel you best stay with the girl so
she doesn’t get lost coming home.” He started his bike and rode
off.

Sam’s shoulders slumped. She looked over at
Daniel who was trying very hard to stifle his giggles. “Well, you
saved the sheep,” he said.

***

A few days passed after Sam’s incident with
the sheep. It was now the evening before the cattle were supposed
to arrive. Daniel and Sam had been sent out to get the horses.

“I am so excited about tomorrow,” Sam told
Daniel. “I’ve never done a cattle drive before.” She was finding it
hard to keep her excitement contained as she threw a leg over the
four-wheeler.

“You’ll enjoy yourself,” Daniel agreed. “But
we need to catch us some horses first.”

They sped off across the paddocks in search
of the horses.

They’d gotten half way across the paddock
when Daniel signaled to Sam to stop and shut off her engine. She
shot him a confused glance but did as he said. Daniel got off his
bike, and much to Sam’s surprise, swung a leg over her four-wheeler
and nestled down behind her.

Sam had almost forgotten how her body reacted
to Daniel’s touch, but as his chest leaned against her back, she
had a pretty quick refresher course. Her skin tingled everywhere
their bodies touched. Sam wondered if it would give her away, but
Daniel seemed blissfully unaware of the effect he was having on
her. She dragged in a long calming breath to prevent her heart from
exploding out of her chest when he lowered his head and rested it
on her shoulder, casually wrapping one arm around her waist. The
other arm he held up in front of them and pointed to something in
the distance.

“Look,” he whispered, his warm breath fanning
her ear. “Brolgas.”

Sam followed where Daniel was pointing, even
though it was taking every ounce of self-control she possessed to
focus. Up ahead on the bank of a stream, stood a group of tall
crane-like birds.

“What are they doing?” Sam asked, watching as
the graceful birds weaved side to side lifting their wings and
ducking their heads.

“They’re dancing,” Daniel replied. “You, my
young jillaroo, are lucky enough to be witnessing a Brolga’s dance.
It’s not very often we get to see that.”

Sam could sense the awe in Daniel’s
voice.

“Why do they dance?” Sam asked, after
watching the beautiful spectacle unfold before them for a few
moments.

Daniel draped his other arm about Sam’s waist
and let it relax over her thigh, covering her hands with his.
Tingles shot up her arms. She couldn’t help but relax into his
caress.

“To mate,” he whispered.

Sam’s pulse quickened, but she said
nothing.

A few more moments passed as they soaked in
the spectacle, made even more beautiful by the colors of the
early-evening sun that was starting to dip behind the trees. Daniel
broke the silence with a sigh. “Well,” he said pushing himself up
from the four-wheeler. “This won’t get the horses rounded up.”

Despite the balmy evening air, Sam felt an
empty coldness cover her back with his departure.

It took another fifteen minutes of weaving
back and forth across the great sea of grass before they spotted
the horses.

“How many horses do you have?” Sam asked, as
they drew closer.

“Five now,” Daniel replied. “We don’t use
them much anymore. It’s so much more convenient to work the sheep
using the bikes nowadays. They do come in really handy for working
cattle, though, so we keep them around for occasions like the one
tomorrow.”

As they got closer, Sam could make out the
horses standing together, grazing on the lush grass. One by one,
they pulled their heads up to look and see what the noise was
heading in their direction.

“Will they run off when we get closer?”

“Shouldn’t,” Daniel replied. “They usually
know when we come out to get them that there’s work to be done.
They seem to enjoy the change in routine and make their way back to
the corral with no problems.”

Daniel turned out to be right. The horses
didn’t run as the bikes approached. They looked at Daniel and Sam
as though they were inconsequential, then put their heads back down
and carried on grazing.

The two rounded behind the horses and
encouraged them in the direction of the house. The horses gave them
the occasional look of contempt for disturbing their dinner, but
moved at a fair pace in front of the bikes, not once attempting to
break ranks and make a run for it.

After stopping every now and then for a quick
bite of grass, they made it back to the corral in good time. With
the horses safely penned in until the morning, Sam and Daniel got
off their bikes. Sam climbed up on the pipe fence to watch them for
a moment. She loved horses, but very rarely had the opportunity to
get close to them before now.

Riding lessons and horses were not within her
family’s budget when she was growing up. The thought of being able
to sit on one all the next day was starting to bubble under the
surface as uncontrollable excitement.

Sam was mesmerized by the sheer beauty of the
creatures ambling about in the corral in front of her. She gave
Daniel a big grin as he climbed up and sat next to her. He put a
hand on the small of her back, as if to steady her balance on the
fence. If only he knew that his touch sent her almost off balance,
anyway.

“I had better do some introductions,” Daniel
said, pointing towards the horses.

“That mare over there...” He pointed to a
beautiful dark bay mare with a striking white blaze down her nose.
“Her name is Brolga. She will be your mount for tomorrow.”

“Like the bird?” Sam asked

“Yep, just like the bird,” Daniel replied.
“Beautiful, isn’t she? That’s why we named her that and because she
is graceful under saddle. She’s is also the most ridden out of the
bunch, and as you have no experience, she is the safest one to
ride. I have no doubt that she will look after you.”

“Who are you going to ride?”

Daniel pointed to a handsome jet-black
gelding with a flowing mane and tail. “I’m riding Humphrey.”

Sam’s eyebrows shot up. “Humphrey?” she
chuckled. “My horse gets a beautiful name like Brolga. What did
your horse do to deserve Humphrey?”

He looked at her and chuckled. “I know, bless
him. We bought him with that name, and, well, he just looks like a
Humphrey, so we kept it.”

Sam laughed again and shook her head. “How
can you say that? He’s absolutely gorgeous?”

“What, and something named Humphrey can’t be
gorgeous? That’s a bit ‘namist’, don’t you think?”

Sam gave him a shrug.

Daniel introduced the other horses one by one
and pointed to the one that Mr. Miller would be riding.

They sat in silence for the next few minutes
watching the sun go down, which turned the scattered clouds from
bright white to burning red, then to gray as the sun disappeared
over the horizon to brighten someone else’s day on another part of
the planet.

“Well, we better be getting back. Dinner
should be ready soon.” Daniel held a hand out for Sam as she
climbed down the fence. As soon as his fingers connected with her
skin, electricity shot up her arm sending a charge to her
heart.

Once Sam had planted her feet on the ground
she looked up into his heated eyes. “Thank you,” she whispered.

“No worries.” He dipped his head and smiled.
“Shall we?” He gestured in the direction of their bikes. They took
a leisurely ride around to the front of the house and put the bikes
in their usual resting place, next to the fuel pump.

Daniel, as usual, held the door open for Sam
when they got to the entrance of the house.

“I’m going to take a shower,” he said before
wandering off to his room.

Sam had taken one earlier so she walked into
her room and pulled off her boots, dusted off her jeans and went to
check if her face was dusty in the bathroom mirror. Daniel appeared
in the doorway, a towel around his waist.

“Sorry,” Sam said, suddenly feeling awkward.
She averted her gaze that was threatening to linger on his
perfectly formed torso. “I’ll leave you to your shower.” As she
started to walk by him he put out his hand to catch her arm,
sending more volts of electricity into her body.

“You don’t need to,” he murmured. “Stay and
talk for a while...if you like.”

Sam smiled, the awkwardness receding a
little.

“I’ll go grab a chair, then.” she said,
leaving the room to get the chair, while Daniel got in the
shower.

When Sam came back, chair in hand, she
announced her presence. The two friends fell into easy
conversation, like all the other times before. Sam was so engrossed
in their conversation, she almost didn’t notice the squeak of the
taps and the water stop. She slipped out of the bathroom before
Daniel pulled open the shower curtain and made her way to the
kitchen in time for dinner.