Cherish the Land (5 page)

“I’ll see if I can track him down,” Sam said. “Even if it just buys us a few weeks to get Devlin sorted a bit, it’s better than having to try to run Taylor Peak from here and keep an eye on Devlin too.”

“Thank you.” Jeremy’s voice cracked as he spoke, and Sam gave up trying to be discreet. Jeremy needed him. He pulled Jeremy into his arms and held on tight, relaying with his body what he couldn’t put into words. Whatever happened—with Devlin, with Taylor Peak, with anything—Sam wouldn’t leave him to face it alone.

S
ETH
SAT
with Chris and Jesse at dinner out of habit. He didn’t know any of the seasonal jackaroos yet and hadn’t managed to corner Caine and Macklin to ask about staying on, so he didn’t feel like he could go around introducing himself. Catching up with everyone he knew was more important than meeting the new men anyway.

Patrick joined them when he came in. “Welcome home, son. Carley tells me you’re hoping to stay.”

“I’m hoping you’ll let me back in the tractor shed,” Seth replied with a grin. “I know a bit more than I did ten years ago.”

“You knew enough to put more experienced men to shame then,” Patrick retorted. “You’re welcome in the tractor shed anytime.”

“Tell Caine and Macklin that,” Seth said. “I want to stay.”

“You know they wouldn’t turn you away. They’ve taken in complete strangers. They’ll always have a place for family.”

The words warmed Seth all the way through. He hadn’t had many constants in his life besides Chris, but Lang Downs was the one place he could always come back to—for comfort, to lick his wounds, or simply to come home. “I know.”

Neil climbed over the bench next to Seth with a frown on his face.

“No news from Sam?” Patrick asked.

Neil shook his head. “No, and the longer we go with no news, the worse it will be when we hear. They should have made it to Canberra now, so either he’s in surgery or he’s been moved on to Sydney.”

“If there’s anything we can do….”

“Same here,” Seth added when Patrick trailed off.

“Nothing we can do until we hear what’s going on,” Neil said. “Jeremy doesn’t have the authority to ask us to help without Taylor’s consent, assuming he wants to help the no-good—”

“Don’t finish that sentence, Neil Emery,” Molly, Neil’s wife, said as she sat down across from him. “Dani is around somewhere, and I won’t have her picking up your bad habits.”

Seth repressed a snicker. Neil was as henpecked as ever, and the worst was when it came to their daughter picking up what Molly considered Neil’s bad habits. It reassured him in an odd way. Nothing ever changed at Lang Downs.

“Welcome home, Seth,” Molly continued. “I didn’t get a chance to say that earlier. How long are you here for?”

“For as long as Caine and Macklin will let me stay,” Seth said. “I signed over my lease in Sydney. It was time to come home.”

“Then welcome home even more. We’ll be glad to have your hands around here.”

“Just my hands?” Seth teased.

“Of course not,” Molly said with a laugh. “But your hands will be particularly useful in all Caine’s projects. I think he’s been waiting for you to come home so he could get started.”

“I’ll talk to him after dinner or in the morning. I’m eager to get started on whatever he has planned.”

“You should head over to the bunkhouse after dinner and get to know the jackaroos,” Neil said. “Talking to Caine can wait until morning, and depending on what he has you doing, knowing the men will be good.”

“He’s not going to make me a crew boss, is he?” Seth asked. “I was nineteen when I left. I don’t know enough to be in charge of anything.”

“We aren’t short on crew bosses,” Neil assured him, “but if he has you putting in windmills or solar panels and running electrical wires, you’re going to need more hands than just your own. Molly wasn’t kidding about his plans. He wants to put a generator in each of the drover’s huts and he’s talked about trying to make the main buildings less dependent on outside power too. And that’s only the beginning.”

“It sounds like there’s plenty for me to do, then.” He hadn’t let himself worry Caine wouldn’t have any use for his degree. He’d told himself he could always work in the tractor shed maintaining the station’s equipment and be perfectly happy. But what Neil was describing was so much better.

The canteen door burst open and a crowd of jackaroos tumbled inside, laughing and carrying on. Seth shared a familiar eye roll with the others at his table at the ruckus. “It is Friday night,” Seth said.

“Then they should have gone to town as soon as they got in tonight,” Neil said. “That’s what we did.”

“Once or twice a season,” Patrick corrected. “Most weekend nights, you were partying in the bunkhouse just like those boys will be tonight.”

“As long as all the ones on duty tomorrow can do their jobs,” Neil grumbled.

“One or two of them might not be happy on horseback in the morning, but other than that, they’ll be fine. They don’t have enough booze in the bunkhouse to get so drunk they can’t work,” Jesse said.

Chris chortled while Patrick rolled his eyes and Neil covered his ears. Seth relaxed into the easy familiarity of it. Neil was Caine and Macklin’s staunchest supporter and wouldn’t tolerate even a hint of homophobic bullshit from the men under his command, but the thought of any of them having sex was the fastest way to send him running. Neil had stood up for Chris when the chips were down, though, and that put him at the top of Seth’s list of favorite people.

The sound of Jason’s laughter caught Seth’s ear. He looked around the canteen and found Jason sitting with the jackaroos who had just come in. That stung a little, but he pushed the hurt aside. They were Jason’s friends too. He didn’t have to drop everything because Seth had come home. One of the jackaroos slung an arm around Jason’s shoulder with what seemed like too much familiarity.

“Who’s that sitting with Jason?” he asked Jesse before he could think better of it.

“Cooper Samuels, one of the new seasonal staff,” Jesse said. “He’s mostly been on Kyle’s crew, but he seems like a solid worker. He and Jason have hit it off.”

It looked like a whole lot more than that from where Seth was sitting, especially when Cooper stood up and trailed his fingers across Jason’s nape as he walked away. Dinner soured in his stomach. “I’m going to bed. I’m still worn out from the trip.”

“Seth!”

He ignored Chris calling his name and stalked out of the canteen.

He wasn’t sure where he was going. It didn’t matter as long as it was far enough from the canteen to escape the vision of another man’s hands on Jason’s body and far enough from the bunkhouse that he wouldn’t have to hear whatever they got up to after dinner. He had no claim on Jason’s affections. They were friends, best friends even, but Jason had never given Seth the slightest hint it might go beyond that.

Seth had always known his feelings for Jason were hopeless. He’d figured that out when Jason went away to uni without a backward glance. They’d still been kids then, and Seth had tried to chalk his feelings up to youthful infatuation, but that only got him seven years of dating people he didn’t love, most recently Ilene. And if that didn’t sum up the sorry state of his life, he didn’t know what would. Hearing Jason had come home had made him hope again. He should have known better. He didn’t get good things in life. Those were reserved for people like Caine and Macklin. Seth just got the leftovers no one else wanted.

He’d thought Jason was different, but obviously not. He reached the tractor shed and punched the wall as hard as he could. The wood could withstand the abuse and maybe if he let out some of the turmoil inside him now, he could hide it from everyone tomorrow. Pain shot up his arm, but he reveled in it. It served him right, coveting something he couldn’t have. His mother hadn’t been strict about much of anything, but he’d learned one lesson while he and Chris lived with their stepfather. Taking things that belonged to his stepsiblings guaranteed retribution from both them and his stepfather. He’d learned how to get them back in ways his stepfather wouldn’t notice or couldn’t pin on him, but that wouldn’t help him now, because even if he managed to get Samuels back for stealing Jason, Jason would never forgive him for messing things up for him.

He slammed his fist into the wall again. The sickening crunch turned his stomach. He fought down the bile that rose in his throat. He had to stop or he’d hurt his hand too badly to hide it. He had to be able to work tomorrow. Neil had said as much at dinner. He cradled his hand to his chest and leaned against the wall, his breath sawing in and out of his lungs. He gulped down bile again and stared up at the darkening sky as he tried to control his body’s reactions to the pain in his hand and the turmoil in his mind. He focused on his hand, letting it ground him to physical reality rather than the nebulous muck in his head.

When he could do more than just hold himself together by force of will alone, he looked down at his hand. The skin of his knuckles was broken and bleeding. He flexed his fist until the pain subsided a little. He could move all his fingers and make a fist, so hopefully he hadn’t broken anything. He’d wrap it so it wouldn’t get dirt in it, and he’d get to the shed early in the morning. Mechanics always had scrapes and bruises on their hands. He’d tell everyone he’d fought with a stuck bolt and lost. No one would know about the meltdown, and if things got to be too much, he’d press on the sore spots until his mind settled again. He didn’t know what he’d do when they healed, but he’d worry about that later. For now, he could cope.

He had to.

C
HRIS
’
S
VOICE
caught Jason’s attention in time to see Seth barrel out of the canteen and into the deepening twilight. He waited the space of two heartbeats to see if Chris would go after his brother, but when he didn’t, Jason excused himself from the table. He’d hear it from Kami later about letting his food get cold, but Seth mattered more. Whatever had upset him, Jason needed to set it right.

He looked up and down the road from the veranda outside the canteen, but he couldn’t see Seth in either direction. He frowned as he considered where Seth might have gone.

“Looking for me?”

Jason focused on the voice to his left. Cooper lounged against the veranda support, an unlit cigarette between his full lips.

“I was looking for Seth,” Jason said honestly. Cooper’s face fell, reminding Jason of Thorne’s comment earlier in the day. He pushed his concern for Seth aside. Seth had Chris and Jesse to look out for him if something was really wrong. “But finding you is even better.”

Cooper’s expression brightened. He pulled the cigarette from his mouth. “And what are you going to do now that you’ve found me?”

“Depends on what you’re offering.” Jason relaxed into the easy flirting, reminiscent of their first night together. He had the next day off, specifically arranged so he could spend the day with Seth. Cooper had to work. Jason could spend the evening with his lover and the next day with his best friend. Even Seth couldn’t blame him for that.

N
OT
LOOKING
good. Bleeding in the brain. Probable brain damage. Even if he lives, he may never work the station again.

Neil stared down at Sam’s text. Bloody fucking hell. He didn’t need that kind of news, even about a no-good son of a bitch like Devlin Taylor. He excused himself from the table. He had to tell Caine and Macklin.

“Got a few minutes, boss?” Neil asked as he approached the table where they were sitting.

“Of course,” Caine said. “What’s going on?”

“Sam just texted me.” He handed the phone to Caine and Macklin so they could read the message. “I haven’t talked to him, so I don’t know what Jeremy’s planning, if he’s even gotten that far, but this is a game changer.”

“So it is,” Caine replied. “We can move people around, maybe promote one of the jackaroos who’s been here more than one season. I can pick up the slack in the office until we can hire a new office manager.”

“Are you firing Sam?” Neil asked sharply.

“You know I’d never do that.” Neil flinched at the gentle reproof in Caine’s voice. He hated letting Caine down in even the smallest ways.

“Sorry,” Neil said. “This has thrown me off.”

“I know. I don’t have a brother, but it’s unsettling for all of us. If Jeremy goes to Taylor Peak to help his brother, or to run the station if Taylor dies, Sam will go with him, and we’d be selfish to expect anything else. Sam could potentially come here a couple of times a week to keep up with some of the business side of things, but Jeremy will need help on Taylor Peak too, and his degree is in animal husbandry, not in business. It wouldn’t be fair to Sam to have to juggle both stations. I may spend most of my time outdoors these days, but I do have a business degree. I can manage the office until we find someone new.”

“And if Taylor won’t let them help?” Neil asked.

“Then we’ll go on as we always have,” Macklin said. “What happens on Taylor Peak is only our business as it affects Jeremy or if they try to start something again. Taylor’s personal opinions aside, things have been peaceful for the past few years. We won’t be the ones to rock that boat.”