Dude Ranch Bride

by Madeline Baker

  He spent the next few minutes pairing up horses and riders, saving his favorite mare for Cindy. But when he got to her, she shook her head. “That’s okay, I’ve decided not to ride today.”

  He should have been relieved, but he wasn’t. “Afraid to ride with me?”

  She lifted her chin and squared her shoulders. “Of course not. I just figured you’d already had enough of me for one day.”

  “Honey,” he said, his voice pitched low for her ears only, “I never had enough of you.”

  His words brought a warm flush to her whole body. Stunned, she could only stare at him.

  “So, you ridin’ this afternoon, or are you gonna run away again?”

  “I never. . .” She bit down on her lower lip. “I’m riding, Mr. Stormwalker.”

  It was to his credit that he didn’t look smug. Picking up the blanket draped over the saddle, he held it up.

  “All right, cowboys.” He nodded at Cindy. “And cowgirls. This is the way we saddle a horse. The blanket comes first. . . .” He placed it on the back of the horse he had chosen for Cindy. “Be sure to smooth it out flat. A wrinkle in the blanket is uncomfortable for the horse and can cause sores.”

  He walked down the line, making sure everyone did it right, before returning to Cindy’s mount. “All right, the saddle comes next. Make sure it’s centered properly, then cinch it up tight. You, in the red hat, you’ll need to give Freckles a little punch in the stomach, otherwise you can’t cinch him up tight enough.”

  Ethan cinched the saddle on Cindy’s mare, going slow so the others could follow.

  Afterward, he once again walked down the line, making sure all the cinches were fastened correctly.

  “All right, ladies and gents, take up the reins, put your left foot in the stirrup and pull yourselves up into the saddle. Hang on to the saddle horn if you have to. That’s right.”

  When they were all mounted, Ethan swung up on his own horse, a rawboned Appaloosa with a roached mane and a wispy tail. The gelding wasn’t much to look at, but he was the best trail horse on the ranch.

  Ethan glanced over his shoulder to make sure everyone was ready. ”If you want to go left, you pull on the left rein. If you want to go right, pull on the right one. Pulling back on both reins at the same time will bring your horse to a stop. Don’t jerk on the reins. Any questions?”

  “Will we see any wildlife?” This from a middle-aged man with a camera dangling on a cord around his neck.

  Ethan grinned. “That depends on the wildlife, but we usually see some deer this time of day.”

  “Does my horse have a name?” The question came from the female half of the twenty-something couple.

  “His name is Dandy.”

  The woman smiled. “Dandy. Thanks.”

  “Anything else?” Ethan asked. “All right. Everybody ready?”

  There were nods and thumbs-up interspersed with calls of “okay” and “let’s ride.” With a last glance at Cindy, Ethan clucked to Dakota and the big horse moved out. The other wrangler, Rudy Salazar, rode drag.

  The trail for beginning riders was an easy one. It followed the stream for about a mile, then came to a fork. The left branch led into the wilderness. The right one made a big loop that led back to the lodge. About a mile beyond the fork, the trail led up a gentle slope to a flat-topped ridge. Ethan usually stopped at the top so the riders could look out over the ranch and the countryside. From there, they went down the hill and rode through a meadow into a patch of woods. It was here that they generally saw deer. Squirrels and chipmunks were common sights along the trail. Now and then they saw a skunk, and on rare occasions a coyote. Eagles were often seen riding the air currents.

  Ethan felt some of the tension drain out of him as they left the ranch behind. His ancestors had once roamed this land. It was only here, away from civilization, that he truly felt at home. He thought of the days he had spent behind bars. He would still be there if his aunt hadn’t come to his rescue. She had put up the money to bail him out of jail, had given him a job and assured the judge it wouldn’t happen again. The days he had spent behind bars had been the worst of his life.

  He shook the memory from his mind.

  At the top of the ridge, he traded places with Rudy.

  Riding drag was a big mistake. Cindy was the last rider, and Ethan couldn’t take his eyes off her. She rode easy in the saddle, swaying with the movement of her horse. She had a natural seat and it was a pleasure to watch her, even from the back. Her hair was longer than he remembered. How many times had he buried his face in the wealth of her hair, breathed in the floral scent of it, ran his fingers through the soft silky strands?

  Damn! He wrenched his thoughts from Cindy. He had to stop thinking of her, had to stop tormenting himself with the past. It was over and done and there was no going back. He hadn’t been good enough for her before and nothing had changed.

  “Look!” someone called excitedly. “A deer!”

  Rudy reined his horse to a halt and the other riders pulled up behind him. The man with the camera quickly snapped a picture. The doe’s ears flicked back and forth, her body poised for flight.

  The dude with the camera was about to take another photo when one of the riders sneezed. That quick, the doe was gone.

  Cindy wished she had thought to buy a camera at the gift shop. The scenery was breathtaking—snow-capped mountains far off in the distance, jagged hills covered with spruce and pine, a winding stream, the verdant meadow. And over it all a sky so wide and so blue it almost hurt her eyes to look at it.

  And Ethan. Was there ever a man who looked as good on a horse as he did? He rode tall and easy in the saddle, his hat pulled low, alert yet relaxed as he pointed out a young buck in the distance.

  It pained her to be so close to him, to remember the way it had once been between them. Even now, she wasn’t sure just what had gone wrong. They’d had a silly disagreement that had somehow escalated into a full-blown argument. She had said things she hadn’t meant, things she regretted, though she couldn’t remember now exactly what they had argued about except that it had had something to do with Ethan leaving town to take part in a powwow in the Midwest. She realized now how foolish she had been to fight with him over something so stupid. Dancing in powwows was how he had made his living. But she had been so young and so desperately in love, she couldn’t bear the idea of being parted from him for more than a few hours, let alone a few months. He had accused her of being spoiled and selfish; she had accused him of being thoughtless and uncaring.

  What she did remember was the heavy silence between them when Ethan drove her home that night. He had pulled up to the front gate and stopped the car. She had sat there, on the verge of tears, wishing he would apologize, that he would take her in his arms and kiss her.

  Instead, he had said, “I’ll call you.”

  And she had replied, “Don’t bother.” She had been sorry as soon as she said the words, but she had been too young and too proud to take them back.

  Jumping out of the truck, she had punched in the code to open the gate, and ran up the long winding road to the house without looking back.

  She had cried all the next day, and then she had put her pride in her pocket and called him. His mother had answered the phone. “Ethan left for Kansas City early this morning,” Ellen Stormwalker had told her.

  Cindy had hung up the phone, devastated by the knowledge that he had been so anxious to get away from her he had left town a day earlier than planned. She had hurried home from school every day, hoping that Ethan had called and left a message, but he never did. After a week of her moping around the house, her parents had decided she needed a change of scene. After graduation, they had taken her to Europe for the summer.

  Cindy had called Sally Whitefeather as soon as she got back home, ostensibly to catch up on Sally’s life. In reality, she had wanted to know if her friend had heard from Ethan. When Sally had told her Ethan was engaged, Cindy felt sick to her stomach. Determined to put him o
ut of her mind, she had gone away to college. She had met Paul during her junior year; Paul had been a senior. He had come home with her over Christmas vacation to meet her parents. Paul and her father had hit it off immediately. Jordan had taken Paul golfing, and introduced him to the men at his club. Looking back, Cindy realized Paul had spent more time with her father than he had with her. Funny, it hadn’t bothered her at the time. Naturally, her father had been thrilled when she and Paul announced their engagement. Paul was everything Ethan wasn’t.

  And that, she thought, was the very reason why she had run away.

  Looking up, she saw an eagle floating gracefully on the air currents. They were beautiful birds. Seeing it reminded her of the eagle feather Ethan had given her. He had told her that the Lakota believed that eagles carried messages to the Great Spirit. The feather was the only thing he had given her that she hadn’t thrown away.

  “Ethan. . .”

  “You want something?”

  Startled, she looked up, unaware she had spoken his name aloud. She stared at him blankly for a moment, then said the first thing that came into her mind. “Why were you in jail?”

  His eyes went flat and hard. “What difference does it make?”

  “None. I just wondered.”

  “You always were a nosy broad.”

  “I’m not a ‘broad.’”

  “Maybe not, but you’re still nosy,” he retorted, and urged his horse into a lope.

  She stared after him, grieving for what they had lost, wishing she could summon the nerve to ask him why he had never called.

  He was dancing again that night. Flo invited Cindy to go with her and her girls, but she declined. Being near Ethan, seeing him, talking to him, stirred too many memories—happy memories that were painful to recall because they reminded her of how much she had missed him. In college, she had spent far too many nights thinking of him, wondering who he was dating, if he was married. She had been swamped with jealousy for a woman she didn’t know, one who might not even exist. But in her mind’s eye, Cindy had pictured another woman watching him dance, going to the movies with him, taking walks, going for drives in the country. And always, in the back of her mind, was the knowledge that it could have been her if she hadn’t been so foolish, so immature.

  Standing outside her cottage, looking up at the stars, she heard the drum begin to beat. Closing her eyes, she imagined she could feel the beat of the drum rising up from the ground, surrounding her, enveloping her. Ethan had told her the drum was the heartbeat of the people.

  With a sigh, she looked up at the stars again. Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight, I wish I may, I wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight. Sooner or later she would have to go home and face her family and friends. She wasn’t sure which was worse, staying here and being tormented by Ethan’s nearness, or going back home and trying to explain why she had left Paul at the altar.

  The sound of applause rose on the air, and suddenly she was running across the yard toward the amphitheater. Breathless, she stopped at the entrance and then found a seat near the back, where Ethan wouldn’t be able to see her.

  As she watched him, the crowd seemed to fade into the distance, and all Cindy was aware of was Stormwalker. He was wearing a roach headdress, a beaded choker, a vest made of bones, a breechclout dyed red, a red-and-white bustle and moccasins. He wore bells around his ankles, a slash of red paint across one cheek.

  A thrill of excitement shot through her. He looked wild, primitive, dangerous, just the way she had always imagined Indians looked in the past. She had always loved Native American legends and the history of the Old West; it had been her major field of study in college.

  Her heart seemed to beat in time with the drum as she watched him dance. He was halfway through the next dance when he paused, his gaze searching the crowd. She knew the moment he saw her, felt the electricity flow between them, vital and alive.

  And when he resumed dancing, his steps were faster, more sensuous, and she knew he was dancing just for her, as he had so often in the past.

  As soon as he finished the last dance, she hurried out of the amphitheater and back to her cottage. Once inside, she paced from room to room, and then, too agitated to sleep, she went outside. For a moment she stood there, undecided, and then she turned and followed the path along the river, heading the opposite direction from his bungalow.

  It was a beautiful clear night. A gentle wind whispered through the cottonwood trees. Crickets chirped. She heard a horse whinny in the distance, the faint sounds of a country song from inside the lodge. Passing by, she looked in the window. Several couples were line dancing. With a sigh, Cindy moved on. She really was out of place here, she thought. It was all families or couples, except for her.

  She walked until the lights from the lodge were behind her, and then she walked down to the riverbank and sat down on a rock. Moonlight danced and shimmered on the water. A fish jumped.

  She stared into the slow moving river, wishing she could turn back time, wishing she could recall the words she had spoken so rashly. But it was too late.

  Chapter Six

  Cindy rose early after a restless night. Dressing quickly in a pair of jeans and a navy blue T-shirt, she pulled on her boots, put on her hat and went up to the lodge. The dining room wasn’t open yet, but she heard noise coming from the kitchen, and when she peeked inside, she saw the cook getting ready to fix breakfast. He was a tall man with close-cropped, dark brown hair and brown eyes. He wore a white apron over a white T-shirt and jeans. She thought he looked more like one of the wranglers than a cook.

  “Hi,” Cindy called. “I’d like to go for a walk. Would it be possible for me to get a cup of coffee and a sweet roll to eat on the way?”

  Looking up, the cook wiped his hands on his apron. “Sure thing.”

  A few minutes later, Cindy left the lodge. She turned down the path that led to the trail alongside the river. The coffee was rich and wonderful, the roll freshly made. Dropping the paper cup into a trash can, she was about to continue on down the trail when she heard a horse whinny. Veering off the trail, she walked up to the barn.

  A teenage boy wearing an Elk Valley Ranch T-shirt was saddling a string of horses.

  “Hi,” Cindy said.

  “Mornin’,” he replied. “You’re up early.”

  “Would it be all right if I took one of the horses out for a little while?”

  “I can’t go with you until Rudy or Ethan gets here.”

  “That’s all right. I just want to ride around the lodge. I don’t think I’ll get lost.”

  He frowned. “I don’t know. . . .”

  She smiled at him. “I won’t go far.”

  “All right. Here, take Jilly. She doesn’t look like much, but she’s easygoing and has a nice gait.”

  “Thank you.”

  The wrangler was right. Jilly didn’t look like much. The mare had a mousy-brown coat and a scraggly mane and tail, but she had wide intelligent eyes, a smooth rocking-chair gait and a soft mouth.

  Yesterday was the first time in years since Cindy had been on a horse. Like many young preteen girls, she had been horse happy, and because her parents had rarely denied her anything, they had given her riding lessons.

  She rode the mare at a walk and a trot around the outskirts of the ranch yard, but quickly grew bored with that. She was about to go back to the stable when she saw the marker for the trail they had ridden the day before. It had been an easy ride, as she recalled, the trail wide and well-defined. She hesitated only a moment, then urged Jilly forward. Surely there could be no harm in riding a short distance from the ranch. The trail was for beginners, after all.

  It was quiet this time of the morning, peaceful, with nothing but birdsong and the muffled clop-clop of the mare’s hooves to break the stillness. Cindy thought briefly of home, but thinking about all that waited for her there was just too depressing, so she put it out of her mind, determined to enjoy her ride. The sky was blue, the air was cris
p and clear, and, like Scarlett, she would worry about her troubles tomorrow.

  She smiled at the squirrels and chipmunks she saw, urging Jilly into a lope when she saw a skunk nosing around near the edge of the trail.

  When she came to the fork in the road, she paused. Yesterday, they had gone to the right. “What do you say, Jilly?” she remarked, reining the horse to the left. “Shall we go see something new?”

  Riding on, she lost track of the time, her mind shying away from everything but the beauty of the world around her and the rolling gait of the mare. The trail twisted back and forth, cutting through the woods, climbing small hills, crossing back and forth across the river, then straightening out and rising sharply.

  Gradually, Ethan made his way into her thoughts. Cindy wished she had asked Sally for more information about what he had been doing the past few years, but when Sally had told her Ethan was engaged, the news had come as such a shock that Cindy had mumbled some hasty excuse and hung up the phone. Belatedly, it occurred to her that he might be divorced. The fact that he wasn’t married now didn’t mean he had never married at all. Just thinking of it made her burn with jealousy. But surely if he’d been married before, he would have mentioned it. Then again, maybe not. He didn’t seem inclined to talk about his past. She wondered again why he had been in jail.

  With some surprise, Cindy noticed it was getting dark. She couldn’t have been gone that long, she thought. Looking up, she saw dark gray thunderheads rolling across the sky, heard the distant sound of thunder. Lightning scored the clouds, followed by a crash of thunder, louder this time.

  She was about to turn Jilly back toward the ranch when she realized that, while she had been daydreaming about Ethan, she had somehow left the trail. Reining the mare to a halt, she glanced around, looking for a familiar landmark, only to realize that she was hopelessly lost.

  The clouds swirled overhead, growing darker by the moment, and then the sky unleashed a torrent of rain. In less than a minute, she was soaked to the skin.