by Dahlia West
She hesitated and he waited for her to make up her mind. Then she finally slid across the seat and settled into the driver’s side. Austin reached down and pulled the lever, adjusting until she could reach all three pedals with ease. He jumped into the cab on the passenger side and put her hand on the gear shift. “Push in the clutch,” he told her.
“We’re going to die,” she half-joked.
He shook his head. “There’s no one here, no one around for miles and miles. Just let your foot off the clutch, real easy, while giving it gas. You can’t ask for a better straightaway than here. This is where my dad taught all of us. There won’t be any other cars. It’s just us.”
Leah surprised him, once again, by gripping the steering wheel, moving up to the edge of the seat and slowly inching the vehicle forward. The look of sheer determination on her face was awe-inspiring. She stripped a few gears and stalled it twice but all in all it was a valiant first effort, he thought. She managed to get them onto the service road and into camp before stomping nervously on the brake and bringing the rig shuddering to a stop.
“I did it!” she said in disbelief.
“Damn right you did.”
Off to the side, Austin saw Gabe, the foreman, headed toward the driver’s side window from the rear. “Hey, why’d you bring the truck? Are you—Oh. Oh, hi,” he said when he saw a woman in the front seat.
“Gabe, this is Leah,” said Austin while climbing down from the other side of the cab.
“Well, hey there, darlin’,” said the foreman, tugging at the brim of his hat. “Nice to put a face to the name.”
Leah hopped down from the cab as Gabe held the door for her. “Nice to meet you, too.” She smiled up at him politely but looked a little unsure of her surroundings. Austin suspected this might be as far from civilization as she’d ever been. “Just sit tight here at camp,” he told her. “I need to get some work done, then I’ll show you around the place, okay?”
“Is there anything I can do?”
“You don’t have to do anything,” he assured her.
“No, but I want to. I want to help. Surely there’s something…” she said looking around frowning. Gabe kept a neat camp and there was never much in the way of clean up or organization to be done.
“Well,” he said, glancing at the pen. “If you wanted to, you could feed the horses.”
“Sure, no problem.” She started to turn then paused. “What do they eat?”
Behind them Gabe laughed and Austin grinned from ear to ear. “You see the net hanging from the tree there?” Austin asked pointing. “Just take it down and sling it over the rope into the pen. They’ll take care of the rest.”
Leah put out hay for the horses while Austin and Gabe attached a solar powered pump to the watering trough.
“Must be serious,” said Gabe as he passed Austin a socket wrench.
“She’s carrying my baby, Gabe. Of course it’s serious.”
Gabe snorted. “Oh, anyone can have your kid. But you let her drive your truck and you brought her up here, to the Folly. Mmmmm. That’s love, man. That’s forever.”
Austin didn’t answer but smiled anyway. He waved to Leah who left the makeshift horse pen and headed over to them. After plucking his radio off his belt, he checked the batteries, and waved it at Gabe. “I’m taking Leah with me to the ridge.”
The foreman nodded. “All right, hermano.”
Leah’s brow furrowed as she looked back at the truck then to Austin. “Where are we going?”
“I’ve got more solar panels up here,” he said.
“More? Really?”
“Yep. It’s part of my plan for sustainable farming. Come on. I’ll give you a tour.”
They walked along the well-worn path away from camp and toward higher ground. “I’ve got panels to power the irrigators on the east side of the plateau and I’m going to put in some more for each watering station for the herd. It’ll take a while, several years, but eventually the Folly will be 100% self-sustaining. Rain, wind, and solar energy all harnessed to keep the land as fertile as possible and support almost twice the number of head.”
He gestured to the high ridge which was practically glowing orange in the sun’s rays. “The panels are up there, impossible to get to on foot but it’s the best placement for maximum efficiency. The path, though, winds all the way up over there,” he said, pointing beyond to another large outcropping of rock. Millennia of wind and rain had weathered the base so that it appeared to be teetering on the brink of collapse, the top portion far out-sizing its foundation. It would stand for another thousand years, though, like everything out here, durable and steadfast. Gabe and the camp were now a few hundred feet below them, their location growing more and more remote with each step.
“God,” said Leah, shielding her eyes for a better view. “It might as well be the top of the world out here.”
He grinned. “It’s the top of my world. And I’d like to share it with you.”
She paused and glanced at him. “Oh, wait. I don’t know if—”
Austin cut her off before she could talk herself out of any more adventures today. “I’m a risk-taker, Leah. I always have been, but the thing is, I’ve always thought it would work out, that everything would be okay. It never occurred to me to think otherwise. I’ve never had to be afraid.”
He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a wrinkled piece of paper. He tried to smooth it as he opened it up. “We can check this one off now,” he told her, index finger resting underneath the hastily scrawled Learn to drive stick shift. Then he lifted his hand and pointed again to the high plateau rising above them, a point he’d trekked to many times in his exploration of the Folly, as his brothers called it. It had the most beautiful views of the Tetons that could be had on Barlow lands.
“So, how about it, Leah?” he asked, gazing at her sunlit face. “You drove a stick shift. Ready to climb a mountain?”
Chapter Twenty-Four
‡
Leah looked down at the list in his hands, lips parted in surprise. “I can’t believe you kept that!”
“It felt important,” he told her, holding onto it carefully. “So are you ready?”
She had to drag her gaze away from his hands and back up to the steep hill, looming before them. It wasn’t a real mountain, obviously. There was no snow-capped peak. But for her it might as well have been Denali. She’d never so much as gone hiking before. She chewed her lower lip and squinted against the bright blue sky.
“You can do this, Leah,” he said, apparently mistaking her aversion for indecision. “It’s not actually a bad climb. But it’s worth it. I promise. Once we get to the top, you’ll see. I’ve been up there before. There’s nothing like it on the whole ranch.”
As she looked into his eyes, she couldn’t help but think about Austin being ‘worth it.’ His lips, his hands, the way he made her wild with desire, it was all definitely worth it. Her legs were wobbly from the long walk just to get here, but Austin seemed determined to go, and Leah wanted to be anywhere he was, anywhere at all.
“Okay,” she said, absentmindedly reaching for her water. “I’ll do it.”
He smiled, making her knees weaker, and grabbed her hand.
Steep was an understatement and there was no path. Halfway up Leah was out of breath and Austin put his hands on her hips, pushing her over the harder spots, places where rocks, probably thousands of years old, jutted out from the earth like broken bones. She had to stop, a lot, probably too often. She hadn’t even been on so much as a long walk in years. Too much of her life was spent being shuttled back and forth between home and the treatment center. Simply staying upright was as much of a challenge as she’d faced up to this point.
Austin was patient with her, though, helping her every step of the way. He kept her from stumbling and encouraged her when her strength flagged. The last twenty or thirty feet were brutal with her legs and lungs on fire. She staggered to the top, the flattest part of the plateau, probably
not as gracefully as she would’ve liked, especially in Austin’s presence, but she had little time to feel badly about it because he gripped her shoulders, turned her, and the entire world, it seemed, opened up before her very eyes.
“Oh, my God,” she breathed. It was more than she could have imagined. “Austin, it really is the top of the world!” The view was a riot of color. The blue sky, the white clouds, the green trees that felt miles and miles below them. In the distance, large fields of wildflowers swayed in the breeze like waves of a colored sea.
“I’ve never seen anything more beautiful,” she murmured.
“I have.”
She tore her gaze from the landscape and turned to him. The black cowboy hat he wore shaded his face, making his eyes look even darker. He cupped her face in his hands and leaned in. She held her breath, as if any tiny movement might break the spell she was under. Austin held his lips just inches from hers. “Last night wasn’t a fluke, Leah, and it wasn’t a mistake. I told myself I’d stay away, give you space, but I can’t. I want you. I won’t hurt you,” he whispered over and over as his hands gripped her hips and he held her against him. “I swear I won’t hurt you.”
Leah didn’t know why he was saying it, but for some reason she believed him. She lifted herself up to her toes and pressed her lips to his. It seemed to be exactly what he was waiting for because he picked her up, forcing her to wrap her arms around him, and ran his tongue along her lower lip.
She knew now what it meant when he did that, how it was Austin’s way of asking permission rather than charging at her like a bull. Leah opened her mouth to him, and, she supposed, her heart. It was a beautiful kiss, full of promise, and so far Austin had kept all his promises.
*
Back at Snake River, Leah whirled like a dervish in the kitchen, readying side dishes and pulling biscuits out of the oven with one hand while stirring a pot of baked beans with the other. Leah finally understood Snake River and her place in it. She could help with all the household chores. And Snake River apparently needed it, from what she’d seen so far.
Beside her Sofia carved the standing rib roast she’d been slow roasting all day and Seth helped her chop the salad. Together they brought all the utensils and napkins out to the dining room for the others. Leah fixed two plates, one for Austin and one for herself, and balanced them as she left the kitchen for the last time. She set his plate down in front of him and Austin looked up at her, pinning her with his gaze as surely as if he’d reached out and snatched her shoulders. She was rooted to the spot.
“Thank you, Leah,” he drawled and she couldn’t stop the smile that tugged at the corners of her mouth.
He smelled amazing from his recent shower and she paused to take a deep breath. It reminded her of the way he’d smelled that night, woodsy and fresh, a clean sort of scent that still brought up images of the Wyoming open country. She sat down beside him with what she was sure was a goofy grin on her face, but she hardly cared.
Across from her, Cassidy reached for a biscuit. She smelled it and sighed. “These are great.”
Sawyer laughed. “They’re actually edible.”
The former beauty queen cast him a look so sharp Leah nearly reached for a napkin to staunch the inevitable bleeding. Then she turned to Leah, as though she were now ignoring Sawyer’s presence entirely. “Did you like it up on the Folly?” she asked.
Leah nodded. “It was amazing. You could see for miles.”
All the way into her future.
Austin reached for her hand under the table and squeezed it.
“I drove, too. It was awesome!”
“Really? I can’t drive a stick,” Cassidy admitted.
“Sure you can, princess,” Sawyer countered.
Several people groaned and Cassidy elbowed the man. Hard.
“With no reasonable explanation I can give,” Cassidy said to Leah, “I’m still going to marry this stooge and I have to go to Jackson Hole to pick up my dress. Want to come? With me and Dakota?”
“Yeah, absolutely!”
“Returning to the scene of the crime, huh?” asked Austin. He brought her hand up to his lips and kissed it. “Just remember I’ll be waiting for you here.”
“Don’t worry,” said Cassidy. “I won’t keep her too long. I wouldn’t want her to end up tied to a bed in that falling down cabin in the woods on the east pasture.”
Leah nearly dropped her biscuit onto her plate. “What? Tied to a bed?”
Around her, most of the Barlow men laughed. Leah looked at Austin, more than slightly alarmed. “It’s an old family legend,” he told her.
“Except it’s not a legend,” said Dakota. “It’s true. A hundred years ago when Kit Barlow bought the land, he built that cabin for a beautiful Mexican girl named Rafaela. She loved him but her father wouldn’t let her marry him. So Kit rode up to the house one night, lassoed her, and took her to the cabin and held her for days. Until she was pregnant, and her father had to agree to the marriage or let his daughter and his family be forever shamed.”
“Wow,” Leah gasped.
“Yeah. People don’t love like that these days,” she said, shooting Walker a dark look. “Or at all, I guess.”
Walker didn’t even meet her gaze and Leah felt sick over it.
Austin broke the awkward silence by squeezing Leah’s hand. “So you spend too long in Jackson Hole and I’ll come after you,” he threatened.
“I might like that,” she whispered, feeling bold.
Austin grinned. “I bet you would, you little minx.”
Feeling emboldened, Leah could hardly wait for dinner to be over. She sped into the kitchen to drop off her plates and then, finding both the living room and the dining room now empty, went straight to Austin’s door and found it open. She stepped inside and closed it softly behind her. When her eyes adjusted to the dark, she found that room empty as well. With a frustrated sigh, she was about to turn when suddenly, two powerful arms grabbed her from behind. He spun her and planted a rough kiss on her lips before pushing her backward to the bed. He rolled onto her, pinning her to the mattress, and took his hand away just long enough to replace it with his mouth. After a long, slow kiss he finally gave her just enough space to breathe.
“Leah,” he whispered. “You have no idea how much I’ve wanted you to come across that hallway. Every God damn night I just lay here thinking about it, hoping for it. Then last night…” He ran his hands down her body, making her shiver.
“I can’t stop thinking about it, either,” she confessed.
He laughed and pulled his t-shirt off over his head. “I don’t have my boots on.”
“I don’t care,” she replied, reaching for him again in the dark.
Chapter Twenty-Five
‡
Austin hated leaving her in the morning because damn, he did enjoy sleeping next to her. Leah had pressed against him all night long and he was surprised that it hadn’t bothered him at all, in fact, he slept better than he could remember, better than he could’ve hoped. He kissed her goodbye because she was half-awake anyway, but didn’t feel like breakfast.
“Just make sure you eat something,” he told her as he got dressed beside the bed.
“I will.”
“I’ll be back in three days,” he told her. She nodded, smiling, though her eyes were a bit pained. Austin was getting better at reading her expressions. He was sure it was daunting to be left alone with a bunch of people she barely knew and he was sorry it had to be that way. “Just three days,” he told her again with a kiss.
“Thanks for making it a short trip,” she told him.
Normally each of them went out to camp for a least a week, but Leah’s presence was an unforeseen factor they were all trying to work around. He gave her one final kiss and headed downstairs. He and Sawyer met in the barn, tacked their horses, and set off toward the Folly over the eastern valley. No sooner had they left than he already wanted to be back home, which had never happened in Austin’s entire memory.
Never in his life had he cared about anything—anyone—more than his family’s land and it was only the knowledge that if he didn’t get his ass to the Folly and work as hard as he possibly could, there would be no piece of land to leave to his child. He would’ve rather stayed with Leah, but working for Leah had to suffice.
When they arrived at camp, Gabe didn’t look happy and that was cause for concern. Austin nudged Colter toward him and crossed the distance between them. “What’s wrong?” he asked by way of a greeting.
“More tracks,” said Gabe. “ATV this time, but high up on the road. I wouldn’t have noticed except I was riding the fence line to check for storm damage. They’re far away from camp. They came down from the service road on foot, the same size ten Carhartts,” said Gabe pointing to the left.
Austin headed over for a quick look. “Hiked in so we wouldn’t hear him. Fuck. I’ll call about the dogs.”
Gabe nodded as Austin dug into his pocket and retrieved his cell phone.
A few hours later, a truck Austin actually recognized rattled down the service road and Austin left his irrigation line to greet it. “Hey, Mac!” he called as the Ford rolled to a stop.
Mac sounded the horn in two short blasts and the pack of white, furry, Great Pyrenees dogs riding in the back barked joyfully as they jumped out, kicking up dust with their huge paws. “Go on!” said Mac with a gesture of his arm. “Check it out!”
The three dogs set off in a loose formation, starting to the right, keen eyes on the tree line ahead as they patrolled.
“They’ll come on back,” Mac told him. “Once they’ve got a feel for their boundaries. They’ll sniff out the predator line and that’ll be their piece of land to guard.”
Austin reached out a hand and shook with the grizzled man before him. “Thank you, Mac. It sure makes me feel better. Thanks for helping us out.”
“Hell, you’re helping me out,” the man countered. “And them. Ain’t got but one calf and one lamb to guard these past two weeks with your herd on rotation. Pretty soon they were going to go looking for trouble.”
