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Was that a hand on her leg? Oh yes, it was, which meant it was definitely time for the kettle and stale tea bags. As a general rule, she had nothing against a random fling, but with a heartsore bloke who’d had one too many?
No thanks.
She pushed the cover of her swag open, shifted the journal onto her milk-crate table so it didn’t get trodden on, and climbed out. Joe had ditched his boots somewhere between his back verandah and the Station Cottage steps, because his legs were stretched out alongside her swag, and his feet were wearing ridiculous socks.
‘Is thatGus?’
He lifted a foot to admire the apricot dogheads spotting the aqua cotton. ‘Yep. A present from my ex-girlfriend in happier times. I’d have burned them, but it would have been like burning Gus, and he’s just an innocent pup at the heart of a long and bitter custody dispute. Besides … the more socks I own, the less often I have to do my laundry.’
She snorted. ‘Yeah, next time someone gives you grief for riding an aqua moped, you can tell them from me, your laundry skills make you a real bloke.’
He was silent while she moved into the open door of the cottage and flipped the switch on the kettle. ‘You know, we do this a lot.’
She dunked tea bags into two mugs from the new crockery set that lived in the kitchen cabinetry she’d installed, poured boiling water over them and carried the mugs outside. ‘Do what?’
‘Start talking about something that really matters, then get all jokey, and before we know it, no-one’s said anything at all.’
True. Not getting involved was one of her special skills. ‘Maybe there’s a reason for that … like, I’m not going to be here long enough to get into serious stuff.’
‘You think you’ll ever get tired of moving on?’
She plonked herself back down on her swag, tugging at the elastic band holding her ponytail together so it didn’t dig into her where it rested against the wall of the cottage. Moving on was what she did. Sticking around to get Bill’s legacy sorted was a one-off, not a change in plan. ‘Moving on every few years is fun. It’s adventurous.’
‘Or it’s an excuse.’ One of his doghead socks inched over her way a little and tapped the lump in her swag that corresponded with her foot. ‘And it’s a tough way to make friends. Have a family.’
She took a sip of the too-hot liquid in her mug and winced. ‘Thanks for the life advice,’ she said. ‘You don’t know my mum, butshe’s all the family I can handle. And I do make friends; I just move on and make more every few years.’
‘Casual friendships are one thing, sure. Fun and whatever. But lifelong friendships are something else entirely.’
‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘So great you ditched yours for twenty years, or so I hear.’
He raised his eyebrows at her. ‘Ouch.’
She shouldn’t have said that. Whatever Joe’s past, it was no concern of hers, and he’d had a hell of a day.
‘You’re right,’ he said. ‘I did ditch them. I hadn’t realised until today how that had made everyone feel.’
Crap, now she felt doubly bad. ‘I’m sure your family will come around.’
He took a sip from his mug and grimaced. ‘Crikey, what sort of muck is this?’
‘Dunno. The tea bag strings were all tangled up and most of the paper tags are missing.’
He tossed the contents into the garden bed and turned to look at her, and his eyes had lost their sadness. He was smiling a little, and a dimple came and went in the stubble on his cheek. ‘I’ve got the makings of hot chocolate in the house,’ he said, with a waggle of an eyebrow. ‘There used to be beer, too, but I seem to have drunk it all.’
Innocuous words … and now that she was really looking, she could see her farmer was drunk as a loon … but for some reason his hot chocolate invite had her blood sugar thinkingithad just been shoved into a kettle and boiled. ‘Was that invite’—she cleared her throat—‘a line?’
‘One of my best.’
She wasn’t sure if he was joking. He gave her a lazy grin, so yeah, probably joking, but there was something in that rusty gaze that said different.
‘Problem is,’ he said, leaning in and whispering as though whatever he was about to say wasn’t suitable for Gus or the fruit bats to hear, ‘I keep tryingnotto throw lines in your direction.’
‘Why is that?’ And why had her voice come out of her mouth in that idiot breathy way?
‘Because you keep telling me you’re leaving. And I can’t fall in love with a woman who’s leaving. I’ve got that written up on myIdeal Wifespreadsheet.’ He snickered a little, which was oddly adorable. ‘Those matchmakers on the committee would have a field day with that.’
In love? Spreadsheet? Committee?Woah there. Joe needed to back the truck up a little. ‘Joe, I think maybe you’ve had a couple of beers and—’
