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She dunked her brushes and began noisily sploshing them about.

‘You have to tell me, Daisy. I’m the big brother, remember? The one who taught you how to ride a bike, if I recall.’

‘Putting a five-year-old on a bike, pushing them down a hill, and yelling at them not to crash into Dad’s beehive, is not teaching.’

He smirked. ‘Worked though, didn’t it? Big brother knows best.’

She ran her brushes through an old rag to dry them, dropped them into the box of paint, palette knives and framing tools she’dbrought with her, then turned serious eyes to his. ‘Maybe once. But then you left, and we learned how to get along without you.’

‘Is this why you wouldn’t tell me what was wrong the other night? Because you’ve learned to get along without me?’

She shrugged a shoulder.

Meaning she didn’t want to share whatever it had been about. Maybe he’d lost more than his career and his home and his pride. Sometime over the last decade and a half, he’d lost his big brother status as well, and he’d been too busy commuting and chasing commissions to notice.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said, taking off his hat and lowering his head. ‘For my absence.’

She smiled. ‘You’re not absent now, Joey, and that’s what counts. Mum and Dad are loving these working bees.’

Yeah. He’d kinda worked that out the way they kept arriving, tools in hand.

‘Especially Mum. She’s so pleased you’re back.’

He narrowed his eyes. Patty had seemed to be the opposite of pleased. She’d been cagey, and suspiciously sweet. He decided to come straight out with it. ‘What’s really going on, Daisy? I know there’s something, but no-one’s telling me.’

‘I don’t know what you mean,’ Daisy said brightly. His lying radar started to make ding-a-ling noises. ‘The Bush Poetry Muster is on in a little over four weeks, and you know Mum. Always with the busy busy. But don’t try and distract me, Joey; before you so conveniently disrespected my art, I was about to ask you about your rouseabout.’

‘Kirsty,’ he said. He wasn’t sure why he had to say her name, he just liked saying it. He liked thinking it, he liked having her around. He had absolutely liked planting his lips on hers, even though it had knocked him sideways.

‘What’s her deal?’

He shrugged. A question he’d like an answer to as well. ‘She’s on holiday, doing some research on her family.’

‘That’s it? That’s all you know? She’s been here a month, and if you haven’t canoodled with her by now, my name’s Skippy the Kangaroo.’

‘She’s been a little less than forthcoming with chitter-chat about her life.’

‘Reeeeeally?’ said Daisy in a contemplative tone that did not bode well. ‘And where do you fit into this research holiday of hers?’

Well, there was an easy answer to that question. ‘I’m not part of her plan, so she tells me.’

‘Uhuh.’ There was that tone again.

He sighed. ‘Okay, smartypants, you dragged it out of me. I’ve got the hots for my rouseabout something bad.’

Daisy smirked. ‘Yeah, we worked that out.’

‘We?’

‘Me. Dad, Mum, Amy, Flick. Gus. Even our idiot brothers. Even poor oldDobbindidn’t know where to look when you were “helping” her tighten that fence wiring.’

He picked up one of her clean paintbrushes, dipped it into a coffee jar of water and flicked it at her. ‘That was one of my smoothest moves ever.’

She laughed and sauntered out into the sunlight. ‘Keep telling yourself that, Joey. Oh—I just remembered. Dad came by to say lunch was ready.’

Lunch was a typical Miles event. Loud, argumentative, funny, and long. Joey elbowed his way through the crush so he could sit besideKirsty on the bench seat someone had made using the paint trestle and two commercial tubs of antique white paint.

‘Are you all right?’ he murmured in her ear. ‘I think I upset you before.’

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