Page 41 of Doubting Hearts

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EARLY THE following morning, Rain left to go back to his house for a change of clothing. He said with a smirk it was one of the perks of being your own boss. No one to report in to when you needed some personal time. We stood outside in the courtyard for a minute, mouths locked together, hands cupped on each other’s arses. There was a soft cough behind us. We pulled apart to see the ruddy face of the farmer, Dave Beddington, staring at us curiously. I flushed beet red at being caught making out with my boyfriend in front of a man who’d once given me a job. Rain sniggered at my obvious discomfort, and I ignored him. My lover opened the car door and made to get into the car, but Dave waved a large, meaty paw. Rain stopped.

“No you don’t, young man,” Dave growled. “I want to talk to the pair of you.”

Rain looked surprised at that comment, but he closed the car door and leaned against it, waiting for Dave to carry on. I tried a morning greeting.

“Morning, Dave. This is early to see you here. What’s up?”

The big, burly man moved toward us with a fierce scowl. “Fucking sheep thieves.”

My jaw gaped, and Rain’s did the same. We stared as Dave planted his very sizeable and meaty body in front of our gobsmacked faces.

“Sorry?” Rain managed to get out finally. “We’re sheep thieves? I don’t even like bloody sheep—”

The farmer waved an impatient hand. “Not you two, you idiots. But I want you to find them.” He frowned at Rain. “Where are you from, then? Foreign lad, are we?”

I wanted to giggle at the put-out expression of Rain being declared a foreigner after eighteen years of living here, but I thought better of it. I felt like Alice down the rabbit hole. “Find who?” I squeaked. Rain moved closer to me, as if together we’d form some sort of wall against this obviously angry bundle of fun in front of us. I was touched that my lover was trying to protect me until I noticed he was standing slightly behind me, as if I was to be the first one in the firing line.

“Bloody sheep thief. I want you two to find out who’s stealing my fucking sheep from my field.”

I didn’t recall having “sheep thief detective” on my CV, so I was a little taken aback by the request. “Dave, you’ve lost me. Why would we be able to find out who’s stealing your sheep? I don’t think we have the expertise—”

Dave glared at me and gave a loud, explosive snort. “Don’t need no special talents, boy. Just a pair of eyes and a bit of patience.” His eyes narrowed. “And you two owe me for what you got up to in my field.”

He smiled slyly. “That thing you did on my bloody haystack.”

Rain tensed beside me, and my stomach sank into the ground.

Dave grinned. “I was out walking the dogs late one night, and I heard some really funny noises. I thought a badger might be caught in one of the poacher’s snares. But it weren’t no bloody badger, were it? It were you two going at it like stoats.”

I wanted the ground to open up and swallow me whole. My face must have been flaming red. I swear they could have seen its glow from the space shuttle millions of miles away. Rain’s jaw was still hanging open. For a change, he was speechless. The farmer laughed, his jowls wobbling and his hands gripping his tree trunk thighs. “It was quite a sight, it was. I’ve seen it on the special telly channels but never in real life.”

I assimilated the words, but I couldn’t make sense of the fact that Dave watched gay-man porn. He was married, for God’s sake—to a woman. The farmer laughed harder.

“If you two could see your bloody faces, classic it is. I like a little bit of man-on-man action. But don’t tell my wife. I got a real hard-on watching you two on top of that stack. What I could see looked very interesting.”

Rain stepped forward, having found his voice. “We’re sorry if we offended you. It was a momentary aberration. We won’t do it again on your haystack.” I looked at him in amazement. He sounded so contrite, using big words like “aberration.” His face was pink too, and he looked very uncomfortable.

Dave chuckled. “Don’t matter. I enjoyed it, so you carry on whenever the urge takes you.” He leaned in threateningly. “But it means I want a favor from you both. I want you to stake out my field and see who’s pinching my sheep. I’ve had three go missing in the last six days, and I can’t afford to lose any more. My old bones won’t take lurking in the bushes all night. The snap, crackle, and pop will warn the thief. But you two young’uns—you’ll manage it all right.”

He turned to me. “You know I’ve got a few fields being used for different crops, Toby. You know where the sheep live. I want you both out there tonight and every night until you find out who’s behind it. When you do, you tell me, and I’ll deal with him. I’ll teach him not to steal an old man’s livelihood. It’s bad enough not having the bloody rain to water the fields, and the irrigation is costing me an arm and a leg. But pinching my fucking sheep?”

His face was red with fury, and I pitied whoever it was if they were found. He turned to leave, and Rain and I breathed a sigh of relief, moving apart a little. He turned back to face us, and we moved together again instinctively. His face was less angry now and more amused. “And if you’d like to invite me to the next little floor show you have planned on one of my haystacks, feel free. Live action certainly beats the telly.” He gave a wicked chuckle and sauntered across the car park, whistling jauntily. Both Rain and I watched him go.

“Oh my fucking God.” I finally expelled the words I’d felt building. “That was the most surreal experience I’ve ever had. How many more closet gay men are there in Stamford we should know about that want to invite us to perform for them? And why am I not meeting them?” I saw Rain’s flinty stare at me and hastened to correct my statement. “I mean, why didn’t I meet them. Do you think he really meant it—about watching us, I mean? And the sheep thing, how the hell are we going to do that? You’re bloody scared of sheep, so that won’t help—” I stopped as Rain regarded me with narrowed eyes.

“Toby, you’re blabbering. Shut up and let me think.”

I shut up and let him think. Finally, he turned to me with a sigh. “I think he was serious about the whole voyeurism thing, but he’s damned well not getting another show. And on the sheep thing… he’s deadly serious. He wants us to be the bloody sheep police.”

I giggled at that but stopped when he looked at me with gimlet eyes. “I am not bloody going anywhere near those bloody things. I don’t even like seeing them on TV, let alone watching them in a field.” He shivered, a full-body shiver that really showed his phobia of the woolly mammals.

“Well, you’ll have to get over it,” I said firmly. “I’m not going out in the field on my own to watch for sheep stealers. We’ll figure something out. You can sit outside the field and keep watch on the road, and I’ll watch the sheep themselves.”

Rain looked at me in horror. “You can’t really be serious about doing this? Let’s just tell him no way. He can find his own bloody thieves.”

I laid a hand on his arm. “Rain, Dave was really good to me when I first came here. He gave me work, he fed me, and he even let me sleep in his shed and gave me blankets and clothes until I got myself sorted with this job. I do owe him something. If this is it, so be it.” I swallowed. “If you really don’t want to do it, that’s fine. But I’m going to see if I can help him.”

Rain regarded me steadily. I gave him puppy-dog eyes back. It worked. He heaved a resigned sigh. “Fine, I’ll come with you. But, Toby, I am not going anywhere near a fucking sheep. That bit’s all yours.”

“What the hell is it with you and sheep?” I was honestly intrigued. “Did a little sheepy weepy hurt you, then?”

He growled at my tone, reaching out and pulling me into his arms. “I’ll sheepy weepy you if you don’t stop teasing,” he whispered angrily in my ear. “It’s a proper phobia, so stop making fun of it. It’s bad enough I have it in the first place.”

I immediately felt bad and reached up to cup his face in my hands. “I’m sorry. I guess I just don’t understand it. I’ll stop teasing you. But we need to make a plan for tonight. We need some warm gear, torches, and a flask of coffee.” I was getting quite excited at the thought of camping out in a field under a bush trying to investigate a sheep-rustling crime. “Leave it with me. We can meet here after work, around eight, and make a start.”

Rain was looking at me as if I was crazy.

I sniggered. “If we have to do it, we might as well do it properly. You know me. I like to organize stuff.” I patted his rump and squeezed it. “Now I have a job to go to. I’ll see you later.”

He got in the car and wound down the window.

I leaned in and kissed him good-bye. “Now don’t fall asheep at the wheel on the way home,” I managed to get in before he engaged the gear and drove off in a snarl of dust. But I saw the smile on his face in the rearview mirror as I watched him go.