Standing Strong Read Online Free PDF

up and wagged his tail slowly.
    â€˜Well, lots to do,’ Damien said, forcing his tone to be upbeat. He owed it to Jacqueline – and himself – to not fall apart. She didn’t need to feel guilty for him losing his way again. With a heavy heart, Damien turned the key in the ignition and drove off.
    He paused before exiting the car park and shook his head slowly, wondering how she of all people could have made such a big oversight. God, she must have really been shaken up by the events of the past few weeks. He felt a fresh wave of hatred towards Jacob Bolton rush through him. And of course Jacqueline’s sudden immersion into the realities of summer in rural South Australia hadn’t helped. The poor girl. He liked the idea of protecting her from more stuff, but he couldn’t now. That made him feel even sadder than the thought of not sharing a bed with her for the next two years.
    He got a fright and waved self-consciously as a white car drove around him to exit the car park on the wrong side of the driveway. He didn’t recognise the driver – or the car – about two in three vehicles were white around here. He smiled to himself. In the city the person might have sat behind him and honked and got all hot under the collar. He watched the news and had seen the reports of road rage. Not out here. The only time you’d see two blokes stopped on the road was for a yarn. God, he loved the place, with or without Jacqueline Havelock in his bed or arms.
    *
    Damien managed to keep himself busy pondering his new venture, and adding notes to his growing Esperance Animal Welfare Farm operational folders. It had struck him on the way home from town that since the joey would never be able to be released into the wild, she really should have a name. He loved the name Jemima. But better than him naming her would be running a competition, which would generate interest and raise the farm’s profile. Better yet, if he could somehow raise some funds in the process …
    He really should pull his finger out and get into Facebook properly, set up an Esperance page – see if he could get word of mouth going beyond the district. He’d had a Facebook account for ages, but he didn’t go on it much. He’d quickly got tired of seeing people writing boring, stupid stuff like what they were having for dinner and where they were at any given time of the day. Who gave a shit if you’d just checked into Maccas at Port Augusta – how was that anything worth writing about?
    But if he wanted to get word out about Esperance, he’d have to get on board; he couldn’t rely on Auntie Ethel and the people in town to do everything for him. He’d accepted all the friend requests he’d received, and had quite a healthy number – another good thing about a district of fifteen hundred people all knowing each other and taking up a new fad like sheep. It might be quite useful for Esperance. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t thought about it right at the start. He wondered about a website. He knew he needed one – what legitimate organisation in the twenty-first century didn’t have a website? – but he’d avoided looking into it. He didn’t much play well with computers. What he needed was a twelve-year-old he could pay peanuts to, but the Facebook page would be a start. He got out his new laptop and opened Facebook.
    At nine-thirty when it was time for bed – well, for a few hours until the next joey feed – Damien was tired and distracted. He hadn’t done the page – he’d decided he’d wait until he’d taken some decent photos to put up before launching and bothering everyone with asking them to ‘like’ it. With a sigh, Damien made himself a Milo.
    â€˜Well, guys, it’s back to the box for entertainment for us,’ he said. Squish took it as a cue to stretch out beside him on the bed and get more comfortable, and