Chapter 25
CHAPTER
Next morning, Justin didn’t bother waking Ben.
He went for a run and when he returned, he glanced in at his brother.
Ben was lying on top of his bunk, one leg dangling over the side.
He hadn’t undressed the night before, and the room smelled like a pub.
Which was fine for a pub, but not what Justin wanted first thing in the morning.
Ben was going to feel pretty awful when he woke up.
While Justin ate breakfast and checked his emails, Anna’s words of the night before ran through his mind. Was he enabling Ben in his drinking? Instead of helping, was his tendency to protect his little brother actually hurting him? Stopping him from becoming his own man?
Maybe. But the habit was too ingrained to shake. The night they had walked out of their mother’s home, they had both been seventeen and angry. Left alone, the kid would probably have been homeless or in jail within a month. So he’d gone too and looked after his little brother as he always had.
But what if he hadn’t? What if he had stayed with their mother that night? Would Ben have gone alone? And what if Justin had brought him back the next day? Would Ben and their mother have found a way to make their peace then? How different all their lives would have been.
It was far too late now to change what had happened in the past. But he might be able to change the future. Maybe Anna was right and it was time he stopped being Ben’s ‘big brother’ and instead became his friend.
He collected his car keys and was about to scribble a note for Ben, but he changed his mind.
Ben was a grown man. He could nurse his hangover by himself.
And if he wondered where Justin was, well, they both had phones.
If he was going to stop mollycoddling his brother, this was as good a time as any to start.
The bag of silk show ribbons was still in his car from the night before. It had slipped his mind the moment he’d seen Anna at the store. He got behind the wheel and headed out of town.
He saw her as he pulled up. She was standing beside a yard fenced with good, solid timber. He didn’t have to guess who was in that yard. He grabbed the bundle of brightly coloured fabric from the seat next to him.
As he approached, he could see Anna’s hand clenched on the top rail of the yard. In her other hand, she held a bucket of feed. The bull was standing still in the middle of the yard, his head hung low. He looked far more docile than dangerous. Despite that, the tension in Anna’s body was obvious.
‘Good morning,’ Justin said.
Anna started then turned to face him. ‘Oh. Hi. You’re up and about early.’
‘I wanted to catch you before you got busy.’
‘About what?’
‘I just wanted to apologise for my brother one more time. He was drunk last night, but that doesn’t excuse his rudeness.’
‘Thank you for the thought, but any apology should come from him and it’s all right.’ She held up a hand against his protest. ‘I am not expecting him to even remember, far less apologise.’
‘I think you were right last night. I do excuse his behaviour too often.’
‘Like coming here to apologise for him?’ She raised an eyebrow as she spoke. Only one. Justin imagined the scar prevented her from moving both. But that one eyebrow told him that they were all right, and that was everything he needed to know.
‘I left him to deal with his own hangover. Thought I’d see how the patient was doing.’
‘He’s going to be fine. Right now, though, he’s a sad and sorry boy.’
‘He looks it.’
‘I was about to feed him.’ Anna hefted the bucket and looked into the yard.
Justin could almost hear what she was thinking.
Yesterday, she’d done what she’d had to do to help an animal that was suffering and to keep a promise to an injured man she didn’t even know.
Going into that yard now to feed the animal was a different thing altogether.
While part of him wanted to offer to do it for her, her words of last night applied to her too.
Anna’s hand shook a little as she lifted the latch and opened the gate.
She stepped through. Justin pulled the gate closed behind her, but didn’t latch it.
Instead, he kept a hand on the top rail.
It could be opened in a second, if needed.
And he could be through that gate to help her a second later.
Calmly and with no sign of the inner turmoil she must have been feeling, Anna walked across the yard to empty the contents of the bucket in the feed bin.
With lowered head, the bull watched her do it.
He took a couple of steps closer. Anna took one step back.
The bull took another few steps until he reached the feed bin.
Slowly, and with obvious pain, he put his muzzle into the bin and began eating.
Anna stayed still for a few moments, then crouched to get a better look at the wound on the beast’s side.
Nodding to herself, she stood and began to back away from the bull.
She kept her eyes fixed on the animal until she was almost at the fence.
Only then did she turn her back on him and step through the gate that Justin was holding open for her.
Justin shut the gate firmly, and Anna dropped the bucket to the ground.
‘Why was that so much harder than climbing up on that wreck yesterday?’ Her voice was soft as she asked the question, not of him, but of the world around her.
‘Adrenaline,’ he answered.
‘I guess so.’ Anna took a deep breath and looked at him and smiled, a long, slow smile that had a hint of triumph in it.
‘So does this mean you’ll be taking cattle in the practice now?’
‘We’ll see. He’s going to be here for a couple more days. I may know at the end of that.’
‘Oh. That reminds me, I rescued these from the truck before it was towed.’ Justin held up the bag of show ribbons. ‘The owners might like to have them.’
‘I imagine they would. I’m expecting to see someone from the stud later today. I’ll give the ribbons to them.’
‘Thanks.’
They stood in silence for a couple of minutes.
Justin knew Anna had to go back to work, but it seemed neither of them were in any hurry to say goodbye.
Instead, they looked over the dry paddocks where the earth was beginning to crack.
The air was still and the birds were silent.
It was almost as if the world was waiting for something.
Then Justin remembered his other reason for wanting to see Anna. ‘We got a call from HQ. Our time here is done. They’re moving us back to Tamworth.’ He watched her face as he spoke, and was absurdly pleased to see her look of disappointment.
‘Oh.’
‘Yes. It’s been so dry, there’s an expectation there will be pretty widespread fires. Most of the Hunter Valley looks like this. They want us at base, ready to be deployed.’
‘That makes sense. I … Well, I hope we’ll see each other again.’
‘I was hoping to come back for the town dance that everyone has been talking about. I was wondering if—’
A harsh ringtone interrupted him and Justin pulled the phone from his pocket and grimaced. ‘Always on call. Sorry.’
***
Anna watched him as he spoke into the phone.
Had he been about to ask her to the dance?
Her heart leaped at the thought. She didn’t want to say goodbye to Justin.
No man had looked at her the way Justin did, not since the accident.
In fact, even before her face was ruined, no man had ever looked at her quite the way Justin did. She didn’t want him to walk away.
She turned away to give him more privacy and watched the injured bull eating his breakfast. She was absurdly proud of herself for walking into that yard and pouring feed into a metal bin.
It seemed such a small thing, but for her, it had been like climbing a mountain—a mountain that Justin had helped her climb.
Having him standing by the gate meant she wasn’t alone and vulnerable if something went wrong.
But it was more than that. His belief in her was stronger than her own had been.
She had taken some of that belief into herself and she knew now that next time, she would walk into that yard without hesitation.
Behind her, Justin laughed at something his caller said. It was a joyful sound, open and carefree. The sort of laugh everyone should have.
When he replied, there was an intimacy to his voice. ‘Next couple of days. This is a really nice town, but it will be good to be back home.’
The words took her by surprise, as did the look on his face.
Of course there were other people in his life.
People she knew nothing about. Maybe even a girlfriend, although Justin seemed too honourable to have asked her out if he was seeing someone else.
But he had a life of his own in another place.
He wouldn’t give all that up for a woman with a face out of a nightmare.
A car turned into the driveway at high speed and skidded to a stop in a shower of small stones. A woman leaped out.
‘Help me. Please.’
Anna was at her side in a flash. On the back seat of the car, a medium-sized dog lay wrapped in a blanket. The cloth was dark with blood and blood stained the white paw that protruded from the blanket.
‘He was hit by a car,’ the frantic woman said. ‘Please help him.’
The dog whined pitifully. Anna’s heart clenched. ‘I’ll do my best. First we need to get him inside without making any of the injuries worse.’
‘I brought him straight here. We’ve just moved in up the road and I saw your sign.’ The woman was hovering so close to the door, it was all Anna could do not to push her aside. She wasn’t helping.
She was trying to figure out the best way to get the animal out, when Justin appeared beside her.
‘Can I help?’
‘Please. I’m going to pull him towards me. Can you take his body and hindquarters as he comes? Carefully. He’s got some broken bones and he’s in a lot of pain.’
The dog’s owner sobbed loudly.
‘What’s his name?’ Anna asked.
‘Olaf. My daughter named him after the character in the Disney film.’
‘And you are?’ Justin’s voice was gentle.
‘I’m Tania.’
‘All right, Tania. Try not to panic. You’ve got the best vet in the Hunter Valley helping out. Just give us some room.’
The woman seemed to take some comfort from Justin’s words. She stepped back, but only a little.
‘Come on, Olaf.’ Anna stroked the injured dog’s nose. ‘Let’s get you inside so we can have a good look at you. Ready, Justin?’
‘Ready.’
Anna pulled the blanket towards her and cradled the dog’s head and shoulders in her arms. As she stepped back, Justin squeezed in beside her to support his body and hind legs.
‘I’ve got him. I can take all of him now.’ Justin adjusted his hold to take the full weight of the dog. Anna laid the animal’s head carefully on Justin’s strong arm.
‘This way.’
She led them across the driveway to the clinic, opened the door and stood back as Justin carried the dog in. Tania followed close behind.
In the treatment room, Anna said, ‘Put him down on the table.’
With the greatest of care, Justin did.
The door at the rear of the surgery opened and Anna’s nurse Shea appeared. The girl took one look at the animal and the people, and swung into action. ‘Let’s give Anna room to get to work,’ she said.
Anna cast a glance at Justin. Their eyes met briefly and he nodded. Then he turned to the distraught woman.
‘Let me take you outside and find you somewhere to sit down.’
‘This may take a while,’ Anna said. ‘Give your details to Liz, my receptionist. Then you can go home, if you like.’
‘No. No. I can’t go home until I know. My daughter Matilda. She’s only ten. She loves this dog so much. I need to be able to tell her he’ll be all right when she comes home from school.’
‘I’ll do everything I can.’