Free The Golden Stranger by Karen Wood Page A

before the wild goat race was announced as the next event.
    â€˜Shoulda brought your coloured hairspray,’ said Luke, and Jess punched him on the shoulder.
    They left the main arena and mingled with the crowds. There were trade booths filled with sumptuous leather horse gear and country clothing. Agricultural advisors had information tables, and produce companies spruiked their products. The friends strolled between rides and show–bag stalls until they came to a line of bunting flags fencing them off from the trucks and the animals. Men in black T-shirts stood, arms folded, at intervals along the barrier.
    Shara scanned the surrounds. ‘How are we going to get out the back?’
    â€˜Let’s come in from that park behind,’ said Luke. ‘Maybe we can find a section that they’ve left unguarded.’
    They slipped out of the arena perimeters and through some empty pavilions. The showgrounds were immense and the roping finals only filled a small corner of them. As they left the brightly lit commotion behind, trucks and vans formed strange shapes in the darkness, with the occasional human silhouette moving between them. It became quiet and creepy.
    â€˜You guys stay here while I try to find somewhere to get in,’ said Luke, staring up at the two-metre cyclone wire fence that stood between them and the competitors’ area.
    â€˜How about we check up this way?’ Shara pointed in the opposite direction.
    â€˜Okay, meet you back here in ten minutes.’ Luke slipped through some shrubs and darted off towards the back of the arena.
    Jess and Shara continued along the fence in the direction of a block of stables.
    â€˜Look through there!’ said Jess, stopping outside the huge open doorway. ‘There’s nothing to stop us walking straight through and out into the competitors’ area.’
    Shara stared in at the horses tied in the aisle and the riders sitting on buckets cleaning bridles. Jess was right; there was no barrier at all. She looked down at her red skirt and wished she’d worn her old riding jeans. ‘I’m not exactly dressed like a competitor. I’ll stand out like stallions’ balls.’
    â€˜Won’t matter if we’re quick.’
    â€˜Should we go and get Luke?’
    Jess looked at her watch. ‘He won’t be back yet. Let’s just have a quick squiz before we meet up with him.’
    They walked directly through the stable block, heads high, as if they owned the place. No one seemed to take much notice of them – they just carried on with brushing and watering and feeding horses.
    â€˜Now where?’ said Shara as they exited the rear of the building.
    â€˜This way,’ said Jess.
    Shara followed her across a small exercise arena and continued through dimly lit rows of vehicles, listening to the muffled voices and clinking of cutlery and plates from inside the caravans.
    â€˜Let’s keep it low-key,’ Jess breathed. ‘If we get busted out here without a pass, we’ll get kicked out and then we’ll never get the hair sample.’
    â€˜Is that the Connemans’ truck?’ Shara pointed to the outer rim of the car park, where the top of a semitrailer with livestock crates on the back loomed above the smaller trucks.
    â€˜Sure looks like it,’ said Jess. ‘Let’s go!’
    â€˜Oh, God,’ groaned Shara, uncertainty hitting her like a wave of cement. ‘I really don’t know if we should be doing this.’
    â€˜Bit late now,’ said Jess, and before Shara could voice any more doubts, she was being led through a dark labyrinth of trailers.
    â€˜Shara?’
    Shara froze. That was Corey’s voice! He walked towards them in his big black hat and a burgundy red shirt with a roping saddle and a tangle of leather straps in his arms.
    â€˜Hi!’ Shara plastered on a huge, nervous smile. ‘What are you doing here?’
    He gave her a shrewd look.