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Copper let out a sharp bark, interrupting whatever else Lena was going to say. “Okay, okay, buddy. We’ll stop yakking and get going.”
Heath took his cue and headed for the fence. Maybe he showed off a little bit, as he vaulted over it.
She followed him, climbing the fence without question, until her feet touched down. Copper wriggled through the rails, trailing his leash. “You’re sure it’s okay if we’re walking here?”
“Do it all the time. The place is vacant.” He needed to put distance between them. Start as you mean to go on, and all that. Only he wasn’t sure how he meant to go on, now he knew she wasn’t going home. Things could be different if she wasn’t a tourist—if she meant to stay. Except his life worked the way it was. He didn’t want anything different. He’d already told her more than he’d meant to.
“It’s so peaceful out here.”
“Yep.” He was tempted to leave it at that, but some part of him liked that she was trying to draw him out. “I do better out here. With peace and quiet.”
He could feel her eyes on his, but he walked faster, leaving her behind. He’d said too much, hekeptsaying too much. Except he hadn’t said enough. An insistent voice in his head kept telling him he owed Lena something. He’d been ignoring the thought ever since he’d woken up, long enough to know ignoring it wasn’t going to work. Better to be out with it. He slowed and let her catch up, her steps matching his.
“I want to apologise to you.” He kept his gaze trained on the dog, who was bounding through the tall grass, way ahead, thrilled to be off leash.
“Apologise? For what? Feeding me and giving me and Copper a place to sleep? Your bed was really comfy by the way.” She was making light, trying to ease the tension he was emanating, his every muscle tight. The more she tried to make him comfortable, the more he felt like a hand was clenching around his throat. He had to tell her.
The words didn’t want to come. He forced them. “Since Afghanistan, I—”
“You were in the military?” She was doing it again. Trying to draw him out. Taking the smallest crumb he offered and gathering more, as if she might make a meal of them.
“Yep. Army. Operation Okra.”
“Is that what your tattoo—”
“Listen.” His tone was clipped and he’d have to apologise for that and for interrupting her, too. He didn’t want to talk about his military service. Or his tattoo. He needed get the apology out now, before he lost his nerve. “I have panic attacks. So when you knocked, I…I’m sorry I reacted the way I did.”
She put a hand on his arm. She kept doing that. Her touch might as well have been a torch, the way it ignited every nerve in his body, like she was oxygen and every bit of him was aflame and hungry for more. “I’m sorry me showing up like that brought a panic attack on.” She let her hand linger for a heartbeat, two. “Pretty much everything about how yesterday went was a total cluster.” She was quiet for a moment, and then it was like she shook herself off. “Anyway. Enough of that.” She flashed a smile at him— the brightest thing he’d seen in he didn’t know how long. “Today’s a new day! I’m guessing odds are pretty good we can get through it without any heartbreak or panic attacks.”
“You always set the bar so high?”
She laughed, then waggled her eyebrows like some villain she could never possibly be. “Sometimes I even set it higher.”
They kept walking, paralleling the road and the fence, with nothing but the jingling of Copper’s tags, and the swish of their legs through the tall grass, until the air filled with a laughing, chattering call.
“What is that?” Lena’s eyes were wide, and he couldn’t tell if she was scared or filled with wonder. Both maybe. Even Copper had stopped, his head cocked in the direction of the sound.
“Kookaburra. It’s a bird. Little thing, for all the noise it makes.”
After that, the silence between them was easy. Like he’d known her longer than half a day. Except some new pent-up feeling was building inside him that had nothing to do with apologising.
“Oh wow!” They’d crested the low rise that overlooked the farm below and the ribbon of creek flashing beyond it. Whoever had built the place had chosen the site well. The old house was dilapidated, but had been a beauty once, with wattle trees surrounding it, offering shade and shelter. “I could do so much with a place like that.”
Lena wasn’t looking at the house. She was staring at the barns, a wistful expression clouding her eyes.
“The barns?”
“That’s what I do, back home. The job I kind of fell into. I ride racehorses. I miss it.”
“You’re a jockey?” That explained the muscles. He had no idea who this woman was, that much was obvious.
“A gallop girl and a jockey, yeah. But I kept coming in second place.” She frowned. “Kind of the story of my life. Part of why I thought a change—moving here—would be good. Thought I might have a chance to start over, maybe take on some horses in training, do things my way. Get some winners. Maybe come in first for once…” She trailed off and Heath got the sense she wasn’t just talking about the horses. That idea only strengthened when Copper appeared out of nowhere and pressed himself to her side.
“Pretty sure you come in first with him.” He hooked a thumb at the dog, but what he was wondering was what it would be like to make a woman like her feel like number one.
7
SWANS A’SWIMMING
