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Maybe it was because he’d “seen the light” or whatever, or because no matter how frosty she’d been, he’d always had a little spark of attraction in his chest for Nicole, but this whole place had suddenly morphed from some random farm in the middle of nowhere into something very precious. The farm didn’t need to berunor managed; it needed to be taken care of.
“There’s been a lot of death here, over the years,” said Nicole, breaking into his reverie. “Which is kind of morbid, I suppose.”
“Morbid is fine,” said Brendan, wishing that there was enough room on the swing to sit beside her.
“It’s just been a lot,” she said with a shrug.
Yeah, it sounded like a lot. There was nothing Brendan could say to that, so for another few minutes he said nothing at all.
“This position of yours,” he said eventually. “It doesn’t have an end date — you know that, right? If you wantto move on to bigger and better things, of course, but me having the keys doesn’t mean this isn’t your home anymore.”
Nicole smiled. Not a small tilt at the corner of her mouth, not a smirk or a satisfied grin. She smiled and it was a beautiful, peaceful thing.
“Thank you,” she said, the smile coloring her words warm as honey. “I appreciate it.”
“It’s true.”
“I know. For a businessman you’re not really someone who makes false promises. It’s weird.”
“Well, usually I’ve been able to keep my promises and come out on top. Nine times out of ten, at least.”
“Ah, that pesky one time, though.”
“It was quite the kicker, that one time,” he said with a sigh, thinking of himself lying on that boardroom floor. “But it brought me here, so it can’t be all that bad.”
Nicole’s smile was still hovering on her face, and Brendan desperately wanted to make it last as long as possible.
“It’s pretty good here, huh?”
“It is.ButI’m going to save up this salary you’re giving me and I’m going to buy a property all my own. And that will be pretty good too.”
With a nod she stood up from the swing, letting it drift around aimlessly, and made her way back to the ATVs.
“I’m hungry,” she said. “Let’s go.” And that, apparently, was the end of the conversation.
The swing being on the opposite side of the farm to the house, the drive back gave Brendan time to mull over everything he’d learned. First of all, no wonder Nicole had been more than a little cold towards him at first. This place had been in her family for generations. She’d lost both of her parents here, her mother far too young in particular. She’d worked herself half to death trying to keep it all running — and he’d swooped in and thrown some money at it without a clue of what he was doing. Yeah, he’d be acting pretty cold too, if he’d been in her shoes.
But she’d brought him there, to that secret little place, and told him everything, so that had to count for something — right? That maybe he wasn’t doing such a bad job after all, that he’d somehow started proving himself to her over the short time he’d been here?
CHAPTER12
NICOLE
When something life-changing happens, it seems that the world stops spinning and time comes to a grinding halt. Her mom’s death, her dad’s death, the night that Scott told her he was leaving… All of those times Nicole had felt paralyzed, frozen from head to foot, barely able to breathe. It had felt like nothing would ever move again, that there was no tomorrow around the corner, certainly no days or weeks beyond that.
Then there would come a day where you noticed that the clocks were still turning, that time hadn’t stopped at all, and that you were still living and breathing, even if it still felt slower than usual. That’s where she found herself now, in the slow-motion period where things were different but still moving forward, the world starting to spin again and the sun rising and falling like nothing had ever happened.
She never thought she’d admit it, she could barely admit it to herself, but she had come to enjoy her time spent with Brendan each day, especially their mornings as they walked out to the milking sheds together. She flicked on the lights, half the herd already waiting in the shed for their turn to be milked. Brendan walked straight up to one of the cows, making a beeline for her, and scratched the back of the animal’s ear.
“Diane!” Nicole heard him say. “Good morning. Sleep well?”
He continued scratching behind the cow’s ear, much to her delight, and Nicole watched as Brendan looked the animal over, checking her legs for bumps or scrapes, before giving her neck a solid pat and moving on through the herd. He handed out scratches and pats, soft words and greetings as he looked them all over, checking for injuries or sickness.
Nicole couldn’t help the smile on her face as she watched him. In just a couple of weeks his confidence around the animals had skyrocketed, and now he moved with an easy swagger around the shed, not needing to be given every small direction, and knowing for himself what needed doing. She had thought he was mad for naming the cows, for treating them like giant dogs, but he had proven her wrong. Again. Despite herself, she’d been referring to the cattle by name as well, which had left Brendan looking disgustingly smug with himself.
When it was time to herd the cattle out for their day of grazing, Brendan took the lead, whistling as they followed him happily, trusting this human man who gave them scratches and nice words in the mornings. Nicole hung back, letting him lead them into the paddock and collect the stragglers, giving him the space to put his new skills to the test while she watched from the seat of her ATV.
He really could do this, Nicole found herself thinking. He’d been as useless as a toddler when he’d first arrived, but now Brendan could hold himself confidently around a herd, and she wasn’t worried that he was going to get trampled or snap his leg in half by tripping over in the wrong sort of boots. He hadn’t had any more four a.m. excursions as far as she was aware, but he was constantly tapping notes into his phone, taking photos of different things in the creamery to know what settings to use, reading them back to himself multiple times a day to try and cement it all into his brain. He didn’t care about getting dirty and often ended the day looking more disheveled than Nicole, his hair curling in a million different directions and his facial hair no longer fashionably trimmed but growing out into a genuine beard. He certainly didn’t shy away from hard work.
