Cowgirl Up ✔️

A liftle bit of Blayze...

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Thank you from the very bottom of my heart 💚 PalominoDreamtime 💚

-&-
Hi readers!
I won't rave on for too long because that tends to annoy me in a book, just thought I'd say thank you for taking the time to read, I hope you get as hooked as I did and see this story through to the end as it's now completed!
Votes and even comments are appreciated to let me know you are enjoying what you're experiencing but it's by no means demanded from you, I just wish you happy reading and thank you for taking the time to check out my work 😊

P.S - THANK YOU Mikayala7700 for the lovely cover!

-&- Blayze -&-

I leaned against the back of my Ford Ranger, my dogs Azlan (7yro Black and Tan Kelpie) and Zeus (4 yro American Staffy) sat in the Ute tub.
I held my iPhone 5 to my ear (I was due for an upgrade to the 6 and I would sort that out when I got home).
Kylie Harley, the lady who took me in when I was a troubled sixteen year old nobody could be bothered with, was on the other end of my conversation.
"Sorry honey I'm back."
She said a little breathless.
She'd had to run off to stop her young twins making a war zone of the house.
I couldn't help but laugh.
"All good."
I assured her.
The seven year old twins Izac and Jace definitely were a whirlwind of energy!
But being overseas for the last eleven months, I was even missing the little troublemaker's.
"Now...where was I?"
The poor woman sounded a bit frazzled.
"Fillin' me in..."
I explained.
I'm currently about ten hours from home now and should be hitting the road in the next day or so.
"Oh yes right! Well get this, like mother like daughter!"
Kylie gushed.
"Well ordinarily I'd ask which you're on about but I'm gonna hazard a guess it's Bailey."
I kicked at some gravel at my feet as I spoke.
"You got it in one!"
Now I couldn't help but smile as images of the blonde I'd left behind flashed in my mind.
When I left for America, Bailey was sixteen and a half.
Now, she was almost seventeen and a half.
"What's she done now?"
I asked.
"Apparently she's got it in her head she ain't goin' back to school next year!"
Kylie exclaimed.
Well that didn't exactly surprise me.
Since she was fourteen she was talking about ditching school.
"What's she gonna do instead?"
I asked, knowing the Harley's wouldn't let her leave school if she didn't have something worthwhile to do.
"I can't just let her drop out!"
Kylie insisted, the note of her voice going high.
"And why not? You did."
Was it fair to throw it back in her face?
Maybe not.
But I'm a bloke who 'says it like it is'.
"That- that's different!"
Kylie spluttered.
"Completely."
I nodded.
We both knew I was pretending to agree.
"Blayze you have to help me!"
Argh here we go.
Whenever Bailey Grace Harley has some 'loco' idea in her head, they think I'll be able to talk her out of it.
"And what exactly do you propose I do?"
I asked and turned to give my dogs a scratch behind the ears.
Bailey Grace Harley is a spitfire of a girl, with the stubborn and fierce bloodlines coming from not only her Mother, but also her Uncle Lukas (another of my boss' and a bloke I consider to be one of my best friends) and her Grandfather, Isaiah Harley, owner and head boss of the place I'm soon be headed home to, Harley Crest.
Bailey fairly quickly got under my skin when I was sixteen.
Her stubborn seven, almost eight year old self wouldn't tolerate the idea that I believed I'd sooner or later be kicked out.
She treated me like a part of the family from day one, prying me about my day and wanting to hang out and do what I was doing, even if it meant she was in fact annoying the hell out of me.
Within a couple of months I just gave in, realising that between Isaiah, his wife Grace, Lukas and his then fiancé Bridie, Kylie and Bailey, I wasn't going to win no matter how stubborn I continued to be.
The Harley's are a stubborn bunch and it turns out I needed their stubborn, love filled, generous family more than I was willing to admit.
Yet at sixteen and towing a closet full of baggage, I struggled to understand that.
I was just lucky they never gave up on me.
Kylie groaned.
"Help me convince her to stay at school!"
Like hell any of us will be able to force Bailey to stay at school.
It had been a hard enough chore trying to make her do her homework even when she was still in Primary School.
She'd even volunteer to clean troughs or sweep the shearing shed if it meant she got to avoid the house and her books.
"Is she workin' over the summer?"
I asked.
The way I saw it, that was the only psych filled way any of us could get her to change her mind.
I know plenty of people who wished they stayed at school, because when they got in the working world they realised just what a giant pain in the arse it was!
"Dad and I have discussed it with her. She's not decided on where she'll work but she agrees she needs to."
Kylie explained.
"Well that's a good start. Workin' is the only way to know."
I voiced my thoughts.
"If she doesn't work somewhere else will you help us when she's on the farm?"
Kylie begged.
I laughed.
"Won't that be my job anyway?"
"Yeah I guess."
Kylie said after a moment thought.
Smiling I shook my head.
Isaiah, Kylie and Lukas were all insisting my job as Overseer was still there waiting for me, as was my small 2 bedroom cottage that Grace, Bridie and Kylie had touched up almost a decade ago.
"So what exactly do you want me to do? Work her ass off so she's beggin' to go back to school or just show her what real life's about?"
With any of the boys, I was more than happy to ride their arse and make them earn their keep.
Something told me that doing the same to Bailey wouldn't be quite so easy.
"I'd like to say my answer is no to both, but we both know the truth. But would you be able to do it? I mean it's you and Bailey..."
How the hell can she read my mind?
I rolled my eyes.
"I know how to do my job. If my job is to scare her back to school, I'll do it. She may hate me for it, but if my job description says so..."
Kylie sighed.
"There's no way I'd jeopardise you guys. I guess over the summer we'll see if she's cut out for it, but I think we all already know the answer."
"Yeah probably."
I nodded even though she couldn't see me.
"Well, I'll let ya go honey. When can we be expecting ya?"
"I'll be hittin' the road tomorrow, so maybe Saturday night but probably sometime Sunday."
I kicked at some more gravel that lay by my tyres.
"Okay well you drive safely and don't push it. Give yourself the time ya need."
Kylie cautioned.
She's always so worrisome.
"Don't worry I will."
I promised.
I might be keen as to get home, but I wasn't stupid enough to push it too hard.
More than that, I have my dogs and my prize winning horses on board too.
"Okay bye honey see ya soon!"
Kylie bade.
"Bye Kylie."
I hung up, slipped the phone into my pocket and turned back to my dogs.
"Ready to hit the hay boys?"
Both wagged their tails eagerly.

I sat on the tailgate of my Ute, can of beer in one hand and a lit smoke in the other, contemplating my life.
It was well and truly time I went home.
The circuit over in America was a blast, but the dirt road that led into the township of Riverston was calling me.
Even more so was the dirt road that led out of the town.
The paddocks became huge again as farm land took over and Harley Crest, the Station I was headed for, was one of the biggest in the South East.
My cottage with the tri coloured arrangement of stone's, was calling to me, along with my queen sized bed which I'd brought a mattress for $1500 for about six months before my knack for the Rodeo granted me a trip into the United States with almost all of my expenses paid for.
Hopefully nobody's been sleeping in my bed and doing anything nasty...
As crazy as it sounds, I even miss the 83 Series 2.8 litre Turbo Diesel Hilux.
It was so caked in dirt that it's blue colour looked like worn denim the last time I seen it, almost a year ago.
Scratches and dents lined the body, from many a trip bounding across the pastures checking and chasing stock and especially Pig and Roo hunting.
Countless times we lost a side mirror or guard and that was always a trip for me to find the replacement parts at the wreckers.
I missed the barbecue spread Isaiah and Grace Harley would put on, the family and us hired help not being allowed to skip out.
All in all, I missed the place I'd learned to call home from the time I was sixteen, because Isaiah, Grace, Lukas and Kylie refused to give up on me.
And the midget that was back then known as Bailey would give me an arse whooping every time I so much as looked like I might leave, or stuffed up badly enough to potentially be kicked out.
They're the true essence of Country people.
The kind of people who don't give up on you.
That I miss.
It was one thing to walk around Rodeo Ground after Rodeo Ground and have people recognise my face or my name.
It was a whole other to know there was actually people somewhere who care about me and are waiting for me.
Skyping the family members over the last eleven months had been nice, but it was about damn time my dogs, horses and I got home.

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Edited 31/12/2016