Hot Heifers
Nina found Blair leaning over a red quad bike in the stables. ‘Have you finished that job already?’
‘Afraid not,’ he responded without so much as a glance in her direction, as if he’d expected she’d show up. ‘Tyre trouble. All fixed now.’
‘Well, good, because you know they say it’s a woman’s prerogative to change her mind?’
‘So I’ve heard.’
‘I’ve come all this way so I might as well have the full service stay. I mean, the Iron Pot Hill Retreat experience, as in the tour and the cattle. This is a farmstay and I can ride.’ She’d ridden a horse once, one of those trail ride birthday parties for a friend’s sixteenth where the horses barely walk until their noses are turned towards home. The half-dozen old nags she’d spotted roaming freely around the property seemed docile enough. A couple must have been so ancient Nina thought she’d be able to run faster than they could. ‘So, where are the horses?’ She scanned the dilapidated quarters. ‘This looks like stables.’
‘How are you with a throbbing thirty-five horse-power engine under the saddle?’ Blair yelled, over the sound of the air compressor. ‘We rarely use the horses for working cattle, these days.’ He replaced the tyre’s air valve cap. ‘I have a nice-looking blue bike ready to go and a helmet to match your eyes.’
‘And colour coordination is important to cows?’ She smiled, remembering two weeks on two wheels in Italy – a Vespa in bumper-to-bumper traffic in Florence. A quad bike? In an open paddock? Hat hair? ‘I won’t need a helmet, Blair.’
‘You will at Iron Pot Hill Farmstay Retreat. It’s safe and it’s meeting my public liability responsibilities. And you’ll need those sunglasses – the paddocks are pretty dry. Come on, I’ll get you ready.’
Blair took her through each feature on the cobalt-blue quad bike, pointing out the ignition, thumb throttle and reverse.
‘Reverse?’ She looked around in exaggerated amusement. ‘You do a lot of reverse parking out this way?’
‘You’ll want to know reverse if you get stuck. Things like branches hidden in the long grass.’ He swung one leg over his quad bike, as if mounting a horse. ‘Follow me, stay close, and you’ll be fine,’ he yelled.
Nina’s mounting was less showy. ‘Oh, I’ll follow you, all right,’ she muttered, while appreciating the toned thighs and butt squeezed into tight-fitting jeans.
As Blair’s bike took off towards the private road she’d driven down yesterday, the dust quick to consume him, Nina’s fingers gripped the handlebars. She squinted, clamped her mouth shut, and the bike jerked forward until she got the feel of the throttle. Unfortunately, the late-afternoon glare and dust played havoc on her sunglasses and made following Blair difficult. Almost missing the left turn after the cattle grid, she jerked on the handlebars to change course and…
No response. Nothing.
The next thing she knew Blair was crouched beside her, his face gripped with concern. ‘Jeez, Nina, are you okay?’
‘Yes, I’m fine.’ And she was, except for a stinging graze on her forearm, which she ignored. ‘Not sure about the bike.’
‘The bike’s tough.’
‘No, I mean the steering on that bike is definitely broken. It wouldn’t respond. That’s how I ended up in the ditch. The sudden stop unbalanced me.’
‘Not broken,’ he said, extending a hand to lift Nina off the ground. ‘These machines don’t manoeuvre the same way as two wheels.’
‘You don’t say!’
‘I usually mention it to guests. Sorry, Nina, something or someone must have distracted me… in a good way.’
Nina had started dusting herself off when she felt Blair’s hand doing the same on her bottom. ‘Hey, are you all right there?’
‘You’ve got some dirt on your, ah…’
‘Well, thanks, but this distraction can take care of her own derrière.’ She grinned. ‘Shall we get back in the saddle?’
‘Only if you’re sure.’
‘Bruised pride is all, and the urge to prove I can do it.’
‘Of course.’ He laughed and helped Nina settle back on the bike.
They rode through two paddocks, with Blair stopping to open and close gates to allow Nina to catch up. As her bike bounced over the bumpy pastures, she could not have been more grateful for a supportive bra and the small boobs genetics had provided. When they reached the mob that Blair had said numbered around eighty, he indicated she should stay to the rear.
‘Keep an eye on the herd from behind and keep pushing,’ he yelled over the roar of the engine.
‘Where are you going?’
‘If I stay up front the girls mostly follow me.’
‘I bet they do.’
He rode in a circle towards her, throttling down until the engine was idling. ‘Sorry, what did you say?’
‘Um, I said I can’t hear you.’ Nina bit back her grin. ‘How come the bikes don’t scare the cattle?’
‘We gentle the herd when they’re young. Handling them and teaching them to accept bikes and dogs is important. Dad taught me how and his granddad taught him. Time-consuming, but it pays in the long run and makes rotating the mobs through the different paddocks easier and less stressful for everyone.’ He went on to tell her she’d need to keep an eye out for stragglers or for calves that might be lying down amid the long grasses. Then he revved the bike. ‘Let’s go, girls. Follow me, moooove on up, moooove up.’
As Blair scooted ahead, Nina had to wonder how the ferociously bumpy ride over unbending tufts of grass, and at such speed, didn’t throw him off. When he raised himself on two legs, like a jockey riding a horse, she followed suit, finding the semi-standing position not only more comfortable but that the added height allowed her to spot one wayward heifer intent on straying. The small calf tucked under the side of its mother’s belly looked as if it might have been tiring, and while Nina felt for them both, the last thing she needed was for the calf to collapse. With Blair now a hundred metres ahead, her seventy kilos would never be enough to shift a calf that didn’t want to budge, especially with the mother’s stare warning her off.
‘Whoa there, Mama Cow, I come in peace. I also swear it’s been weeks since I enjoyed a good…’ She couldn’t bring herself to say the word steak. ‘Come on, girl, moooove up, moooove up,’ she called, imitating Blair as best she could. When the two rebellious animals stood their ground, four beautiful brown eyes staring back, Nina tried again, this time with a little more gusto in her command, a wild wave of both arms, and a few bursts of throttle. ‘Let’s go! Get up! Move on up! Moosh! Moosh!’ Mother and calf started to move and moo. ‘Oh, my gosh!’ She was actually doing it.
She was still smiling when the back of the line caught up with Blair, all her charges now milling with the herd and cornered in one section of the paddock.
‘What a ride.’ She joined him in the shade of a mandarin tree. It looked a lot like the thorny one in their backyard that, as a child, she’d watched growing, impatient for the juicy fruit to get big enough to pick.
Desperate to wash the dust out of her mouth with a sweet, juicy mandarin, Nina picked one and pierced the skin with her thumbnail sending a spray of citrus oil into the air. She peeled it, broke the small fruit into four and popped a piece into her mouth anticipating the sweet explosion she remembered.
‘Pfft!’ She spat, shuddered and grabbed her throat. ‘What the hell kind of mandarin is that?’
‘African lime tree, but well done.’ Blair looked amused, offering her his flask. ‘Some locals never acquire a taste for them.’
‘Very funny.’ She snatched the bottle and smiled back. ‘It is water?’
‘Yes, direct from the heavens and that’s all, I promise. Come on, drink up. I’ll race you back and buy you a beer.’