Driving Her Crazy by Amy Andrews

complication.
    Leo was complicated enough.
    She lounged back against the vehicle, ignoring Kent, who was doing the same. She looked out over the outback vista instead. It seemed flat all the way to the horizon, interrupted only by the odd clump of trees and the occasional fence. The only population appeared to be sheep and the odd passing car.
    There was something soothing about the isolation.
    In the distance she saw the beginning of something that looked like a brown dust cloud barrelling along close to the ground and parallel with the road. ‘What’s that?’ she asked.
    Kent squinted to where she was pointing. It was too far away to see properly but, given that it was travelling at a rate of knots, it wouldn’t be long before it was passing by. ‘Not sure,’ he said, reaching into the back passenger foot well and removing his camera bag.
    He pulled out his camera, clicked on the zoom lens and looked through it. He smiled as the cloud took form and shape.
    ‘Emus,’ he announced.
    Sadie stared as the cloud came closer and she could just make out individual figures. ‘So it is,’ she murmured. ‘Wow, look at them go!’
    A flock of about a dozen of the large, flightless birds was running helter-skelter, their powerful legs eating up the paddock, their feet kicking up dirt and dust, their soft feathers bouncing with each foot fall. As they got closer still Sadie counted ten of them.
    Even with them way out in the paddock when they passed by, they were a magnificent sight. ‘Where are they going?’ she mused out loud.
    ‘Who knows?’ Kent shrugged as he snapped off a series of pictures. ‘But they’re in a hurry.’
    They’d no sooner drawn nearer then they were past. ‘That was amazing,’ Sadie said, watching the cloud get smaller and smaller. ‘I’ve never seen emus in the wild.’
    He tisked. ‘City chick,’ he muttered as he continued to click away.
    Sadie watched him as he peered through the lens—focused, centred. It reminded her of the picture she’d seen of him in New York, where the camera had seemed an extension of him. He stood, his whole body engaged in the process, as if he’d been born with a camera.
    ‘When did you know you wanted to take pictures for a living?’
    Kent ignored her, snapping until the birds were no longer distinguishable. When he pulled the camera away from his face he looked down at Sadie. His first instinct was to shut her down, as he had been doing, but the camera felt good in his hand, the pictures he’d just taken felt right and he remembered the first time so vividly.
    ‘I was sixteen. My grandfather took me on a road trip to the Red Centre during the school holidays. His camera was ancient but it took amazing images.’
    Sadie thought how nice it would have been to have had a grandparent in her life. ‘That was nice of him,’ she mused.
    Kent snorted. ‘I think my mother was at the end of her tether and Grandad feared there would be bloodshed. I think he was just trying to save his daughter’s sanity.’
    He smiled, remembering that momentous trip. How it had changed his life.
    He put the camera to his face again and scanned the broad canvas before him. ‘There was something about the light out there,’ he said. ‘The contrasting colours. I was hooked.’
    Sadie watched him peering through his lens. ‘I bet your mother was relieved,’ she murmured.
    Kent gave a short sharp laugh as he lowered the camera. ‘Hell, yeah. She signed me up for a photography course as soon as I got back.’
    Sadie sucked in a breath at the smile that transformed the harsh planes of his face. He really ought to do it more often. ‘And you never gave her a spot of bother again?’ she predicted.
    He nodded. He had knuckled down. Once he’d found his calling he’d put his all into achieving his goal. ‘Essentially,’ he agreed as he returned his camera to its bag in the back of the car. ‘The war zone thing kind of freaked her out.’
    Sadie nodded. ‘Mums worry.