‘Sounds like a bit of a big production.’
‘Yeah, pretty big. Bit over twenty thousand acres spread over two properties.’
Jack pulled what Ewan assumed was an impressed kind of face, giving a slight nod. ‘Makes this place look like a hobby farm.’ Ewan shrugged. ‘You get to run this place the way you want without having to hire a whole fleet of people to work it. My old man hasn’t really left his desk in over a decade.’
‘Yeah, nah, that’s not for me,’ Jack agreed. ‘So, what about you? You think you’ll go back into farming?’
‘I’m not sure. I miss it—I guess it’s in my blood—but things are a little bit …’ He paused and glanced across at Poppy briefly, ‘… complicated, at the moment.’
‘Fair enough,’ Jack said easily.
‘What do you run here?’ he asked, turning the conversation back to cattle. At least he and Jack had found some common ground.
‘Angus.’
‘Jack’s been building up his stock after the fires,’ Kenzie threw in.
‘Did you lose much?’ Ewan asked.
‘Yeah, took a bit of a hit, but not as bad as some. We’re building up the bloodlines with a few new bulls. They’re turning out some great progeny.’
‘Sounds promising.’
‘I’m heading down there now, if you want to come for a look?’
He opened his mouth to agree, but then remembered he was here to spend time with his daughter, and running out on them to talk cattle would probably not endear him to Kenzie.
‘Poppy loves the cows, don’t you?’ Kenzie surprised him. ‘We could all go?’
‘Uh, yeah … if you’re sure?’
Kenzie gave an offhand shrug. ‘Doesn’t bother us. As long as you have the time?’
His gaze lingered on the little girl who had his eyes. ‘I’m not on a schedule.’
Eleven
Kenzie was glancing at the man in the front seat of the dual-cab ute, in deep conversation about cattle with her stepfather. She listened in from the back, baffled that this was the same man she’d met at the wedding venue appointment. That Ewan had been a confident, professional executive dressed in an expensive suit, who’d seemed perfectly at home in the life of a wealthy businessman.ThisEwan was different, and much more like the down-to-earth guy she’d briefly met five years ago.
‘That’s Lucy and that’s Fluffy,’ Poppy said, pointing to two of the cows after they’d pulled up and climbed out of the ute. ‘And that one is Rose,’ she joyfully informed Ewan from the fence post Jack had lifted her onto. They looked out over the paddock at the herd of Angus lazily grazing.
‘How can you tell them apart? They’re all black,’ Ewan said.
‘I just can,’ she told him seriously.
‘That one’s Rose?’ Jack asked, scratching his head. ‘I thought her name was T-bone?’
‘No, silly,’ the little girl said, rolling her eyes dramatically.
Kenzie loved the way Jack and Poppy interacted. He’d been such an important role model for her daughter. Her glance shifted to Ewan, who stood on the other side of the pair, and wondered what kind of role model he might turn out to be. In the short time she’d known the man, he did appear to have a number of things going for him. He was a man of his word, at least so far. He was polite and seemed to value honesty—even to his own detriment, since it had caused the breakdown of his pending marriage. And she had to admit he wasn’t too hard on the eyes …
She pulled herself up sharply. Not thatthathad anything to do with … well,anything.
She listened to the men talking farming, Ewan asking questions about the farm and various technical terms that she assumed had something to do with what Jack grew for feed and managing paddocks, but then she stopped listening and decided to just look at the countryside around her.
It was certainly a beautiful spot, lush and green, and she could hear the trickle of water nearby in the creek that ran through the property.
‘It must have been nice growing up here.’ Ewan’s voice sounded from close beside her, making her jump a little. She hadn’t realised Jack had taken Poppy through the fence to go and pat a cow. She trusted Jack indubitably, but the cattle were huge, the bull even more so, and part of her wantedto call out to be careful, despite Jack being the most careful person she knew.
