The queue seemed never-ending as she looked over at the yard of sheep yet to be wormed, despite the fact the other yard behind her was filling up.

It took a couple of hours to finish the job. Every now and then Elle had to run back down the other end of the lane and open the gate to let the dogs bring up some more sheep from outside when Geordie got stuck helping Stuart, and then run back to the other end of the race to let out the sheep that were waiting to be released. When the men eventually stopped, Elle wiped her brow and sent a proud and relieved smile across at Stuart. Despite the fact that the weather had been getting noticeably cooler each day since she’d arrived, she’d managed to work up a sweat.

‘We’ll make a farmhand out of you yet,’ he said, dropping a kiss on her lips as she came to a stop beside him.

‘I bet you say that to all your backpacker helpers,’ she scoffed.

‘Only the good-looking Australian ones.’

The light-hearted banter made the rest of the morning pass quickly, and Elle found herself truly enjoying the work. She took time to play with the dogs, rubbing their heads and cooing to them affectionately, before Stuart sent them back to work.

‘You’ve even made my dogs fall in love with you,’ he complained, then froze, sending her a startled look that made her own heartrate pause uncertainly. Time seemed to stop. Surely he hadn’t meant …

She quickly forced a grin to her face and brushed past the remark. ‘They’re so cute. Did you train them yourself?’

‘Yeah, it’s a bit of a passion of mine,’ he said with a smile that looked a little bashful. ‘My granddad used to have show-quality sheepdogs he took to compete in trials. As a kid, I had a couple of dogs I helped train and entered in a show here and there. I decided to get back into it.’

‘That’s so cool,’ she said, watching the dogs as they headed off to do their work. It was amazing to watch the communication between man and dog as they worked intuitively with one another.

Geordie walked past and muttered something, making Elle glance across at Stuart for a translation.

‘He’s going to head off and finish some other jobs.’

‘How on earth did you understand that?’

Stuart chuckled. ‘I’ve grown up around him. He does warm to you after a while.’

Later, as they ate lunch on a wall outside in the sun, Elle let her gaze roam across the busy farmyard. Chooks clucked and pecked as they scratched around the yard and garden, noisy sheep bleated, wanting out of the yards they were being held in, and the dogs lay by their feet, snoozing in the warm sun, their ears flicking the odd insect away as they rested between jobs.