Stockman’s Showdown (The Stockmen #4)

Thirty-four

Hats on honeys were everywhere you looked, in assorted wide-brimmed hats brushed and bent just right, where dusty boots were even lucky enough to cop a polish. It was all part of a glorious parade of denim worn by men of various ages as they entered the grounds to the Elsie Creek Rodeo, with a line of utes filling the dusty paddock made into a car park.

‘We should have gotten here earlier,’ complained Charlie, in the front passenger seat of the Brookmere Green 1957 FJ Holden. It was Harry’s car, once stashed in the Stoneys, now fully restored.

‘You wanted me to drive Pandora.’ Bree had helped Charlie polish this beast of a vehicle that rarely left the shed. But both Charlie and Harry had nothing to hide anymore, and Charlie was returning to the rodeo he hadn’t set foot in over sixty years.

‘Harry would’ve wanted it to be used. Me and my big brother had plenty of good times in this car…’ The old stockman patted the dash like a trusty steed, his eyes distant as if picturing his brother in the car beside him.

Charlie sniffed, peering out the window. ‘Where are we parking?’

‘Ryder saved us a spot. Just look for his beastly vehicle.’ Ryder had offered to wait around for them to leave together, but he had a carload, excluding Cap and Mia, who had elected to stay home and babysit Mason. ‘We should have brought the Kombi van, then I would’ve had somewhere to crash, and I could’ve had a drink tonight.’

‘I like my bed, thank you.’

‘Are you still getting over boot scooting like a teenager last night?’

Charlie grinned in a way that shone brightly in his eyes. He looked truly happy. ‘It was a good night, and I won’t apologise for dancing. I don’t do it enough, you know. As a lad, I used to get so embarrassed about dancing. Not much call for dancing out here. But then I plucked up the courage to dance with the most beautiful woman who took my breath away. My beautiful Bea. Boy, she loved to dance.’

‘I remember.’ She remembered the times she’d catch them dancing in the kitchen, or out the back under candlelight. Her grandparents lived a truly beautiful romance that had lasted for over fifty years. ‘Does that mean you’ll dance with me tonight, Pop?’

‘And Harper, she said I had to.’ Charlie pointed. ‘There’s Ryder’s car. He got the good spots. But then they got here earlier.’

‘You made me drive slow.’

‘Because I didn’t want dust covering the car. Not after we’d cleaned it.’ He brushed some invisible dust off the dashboard. ‘Pandora looks good. You know, Harry would have liked the name.’

Bree turned off the engine and paused behind the large vintage steering wheel, with the car key still in her hand. ‘I’m sorry, Pop.’

‘For what?’

‘For naming this car for the wrong reasons, when I thought you were obsessed over Harry.’

‘I was obsessed, kid. And if my beautiful Bea was still alive, she’d tell me off, just like you did.’

‘I’m glad you didn’t listen to me, and that you never quit.’

‘No, I think fate had a hand in that, kid. How else would you have found Harry’s cave like that?’

Still, that nagging guilt lay heavily in that place between her shoulders, all for not supporting Charlie from the beginning. No matter what, Charlie had always sworn that Harry was innocent. And he’d been proven right.

Tonight, she hoped to finally put that guilt to bed, once and for all.

She climbed out, calling to her grandfather over the roof of the vintage car. ‘Don’t forget to lock it.’

‘Always forget that when I’m in town.’ Charlie pushed the heavy steel door shut. Using his shirt’s sleeve, he wiped some dust from the chrome. ‘Have you given any thought to what to do with that gold, kid?’

‘No. You?’

‘Lenny knows a gold broker to smelt it down.’

‘We could do that in the smithy’s shed.’ After all, she bent steel for a living.

‘But this fella gives you some smancy certificate to sell it, keep it, or spend it.’

Bree checked over the locks in the back of the vintage car, before hoisting her leather bag over her shoulder, so much lighter with no gin bottles to carry, which she’d normally supply at an event like this where all her regular customers were attending. But tonight was for Charlie, who was looking extra sharp with his hair neatly trimmed, shaved, and in his good town boots and belt. ‘What do you want to do with that gold?’

‘I want you to spend it on that holiday you’re always yakking on about. Then I want you to buy yourself a place. A home.’

Even though that had always been the plan when the caretaker’s caveat ended, it meant losing not only her home but also her grandfather. The thought alone felt like an invisible, frozen hand was squeezing her heart.

‘You’ll want something with a decent paddock for the stockhorses, and a vegetable garden you can watch grow from the kitchen window…’

‘Ah huh.’ Funny that. It’s exactly what she’d said to Charlie years ago, when Darcie first mentioned the caretaker’s caveat. And again, when the station went up for sale, and again when Leo’s men tried to strongarm Charlie into signing a waiver. But Charlie refused, determined to spend his last days at Elsie Creek Station, just like Darcie.

‘You’ll want to get yourself a pizza oven for baking bread in the mornings to not heat the house,’ he said, ‘and maybe a proper spa, instead of that watering trough you’ve got, to soak in at the end of a hot day on the tools.’

‘Are you saying you want me to stay on the tools, Pop?’ From a family of master brand makers, a tradition passed down from generation to generation, was she the last?

‘You love it. Don’t deny it, I saw you there yesterday. Me and Ryder were watching you, singing away as you made some new cattle brand. It’s art for you, like it’s always been for me.’

‘A trade I have no papers for.’ There were very few traditional blacksmiths around these days.

‘Most people wouldn’t understand, but back in the day you didn’t need pieces of paper to do a job. You just had to show a fella that you had a good set of hands willing to work, and a set of ears willing to listen and learn.’

‘Pity I did none of that.’ She grinned.

Charlie chuckled, then held out his bent elbow to her. ‘Stick with me, kid, and I’ll show you a good time.’

She happily hooked her arm through his. ‘You always have, Pop.’

From the day she’d arrived at Elsie Creek Station—homeless, motherless, fatherless, stepping off a bus in a strange town, with her name written on a paper luggage tag that was pinned to the same dress she’d been wearing when the police had found her—through everything, it was Charlie who’d helped her smile again. Seeing her grandfather smiling like this only made her smile more. It was like the rodeo champion was finally coming home.