Read Online Dark Horse by Honey Brown - Free Book Online

insects as they sought shelter and dry ground, just like she had. The damp areas remained bug free. Sarah kept to the wet sanctuaries. Island hopping, she went to Tansy and shone the beam around her horse’s feet. The more it rained, the wetter the shed floor was becoming. A damp patch by the end wall had seeped across to Tansy. The horse was standing in a thin layer of mud. At least there were no insects on her. Some had made it to the shed walls though, a few climbing as high as the roof and clambering along the metal beams, threatening to drop from the ceiling.
    Tansy was aware of how gross the situation was. She was unimpressed, head down and occasionally kicking her hind leg, revulsion rippling down her flank and spasming along her neck and shoulders. Tansy’s hearing was more acute than Sarah’s, and if Sarah could hear the slimy, masticating sound of the teeming insects, it would be surround-sound stereo to Tansy. The mare’s ears were pitched down and off to either side, the best position to block the noise.
    Heath had left the van door open. Sarah figured she should knock anyway. She did. It remained quiet inside. Sarah stood on the step and leaned in through the doorway.
    ‘Heath . . . I have to come in, I’m sorry, but we have visitors.’
    Sarah knocked a little firmer. He didn’t stir. She kept the flashlight pointed down and entered the van. The light reflected back up off the pale lino and illuminated the interior enough for Sarah to get an outline of the bed and the blankets. Heath wasn’t in the bed. Sarah shone the torch over the mattress. His absence levelled Sarah’s thoughts a moment, it drained her head and she was an empty vessel standing there, a zombie with a long face and vacant gaze. She snapped out of it. His wet clothes were on the seat. His boots were missing. She couldn’t see the headlamp anywhere. He must have gone out to the toilet.
    Sarah dodged the insects, climbed the tow bar and went around to the far side of the van. Down this end of the shed the floor was completely wet, puddles forming in places. With the ground offbounds to critters, the pallet of mortar and cement had become an insect metropolis, a mound of squirming black and brown. She frowned. Glossy brochures of the ranges never contained pictures like this. ‘Beautiful wilderness’ never came with this kind of slant. Rain began teeming down even harder. It was a downpour like the one she’d ridden through on her way up there. Sarah shone the torch along the open shed bay. Heath wasn’t standing on the edge of the wet taking a leak, he was somewhere out in the weather. Sarah couldn’t think why he would do that, some reasons came to mind and she pushed them aside. Her mind went to the gun.
    Sarah had stopped well back from the pallet, and she didn’t want to get any closer. From where she was she used the torch to see if the gun was where she’d left it.
    ‘Oh God . . .’
    There was a snake sheltering under there and now being swallowed, wriggling, struggling and dying under the carpet of crawling life. Sarah squatted and pulled a face of disbelief. She shone the torch to see if she could see beyond the gruesome scene. She couldn’t. If the gun was gone, she couldn’t tell. If it was there, it was, ironically enough, extremely well hidden and safe. There was no way Sarah was going to be retrieving it any time soon. A noise behind Sarah had her straightening and turning.
    Headlamp shining, Heath had walked in out of the rain. He stood, dripping and pale, within the shed perimeter. There was a pained and apologetic look in his eye, it was clear he hadn’t ducked out to go to the toilet – he’d walked somewhere. He’d been away and he hadn’t necessarily planned on coming back.
    Sarah’s brow wrinkled with confusion, and, much to her frustration, it tightened with hurt. She rubbed it away with her fingertips. She had no right to be hurt, or confused. They were two strangers under one shed roof. So