by Rachel Lee
He started to turn from the window to get ready for bed, and for an instant he thought he heard the light bubble of Mary’s laugh. Just an instant.
And for an instant he almost felt her warmth. And even more strongly, he suspected that she would be laughing at him. Kindly laughing, but laughing nonetheless.
Mary had never been one to accept psychological bull. Nope. She’d gently argue until you could see how you were deluding yourself. And she’d been good at seeing through those delusions.
“Enjoying yourself, are you?” he asked her in the darkness. He got no answer of course, but he didn’t need one. She’d be laughing at him, all right.
But he still had to figure out what was going on with him. Bull or not.
And he didn’t like the feeling that it wasn’t bull at all.
Chapter 7
In the morning, with thin golden light creeping across a chilly world, the four of them set out on horseback, headed toward the mountains. Dom gave a long, piercing whistle, and a minute later three dogs trotted alongside them.
The twins enjoyed high spirits, talking and laughing. Dom led the way, leading their packhorse, Courtney followed, with the boys behind her. Kyle and Todd had been told to keep an eye on her, and Courtney didn’t mind even if they seemed to be more involved in their own conversation and teasing.
They soon entered the woods, fallen leaves and pine needles muffling the hoofbeats even more than the grassy ground. The boys seemed to grow quiet, maybe because they were tired of their verbal play, or maybe it was how the woods seemed to close in around them. Evergreens dominated, but here and there were patches of deciduous trees, still feathered with the colors of autumn, mostly brilliant yellows and dull reds.
With their passage from open meadows into thick trees, the atmosphere changed. Everything changed. The sun poured in beams through holes in the thick boughs, casting rays that revealed openings beyond what seemed like a thick wall of growth, but it no longer warmed them by striking their backs except every now and then.
The breeze that had nipped at them on open ground vanished and the air became perfectly still. For the first time Courtney felt comfortable enough on her mount to look farther ahead than Dom’s back and she noticed the trail they followed seemed awfully narrow, especially as they began to climb more steeply.
Inevitably she noticed his narrow hips and the easy way they swayed in the saddle. A pool of heat settled between her legs and she had to drag her eyes away and force herself to notice something else.
“Dom?”
He swiveled in his saddle, looking back her. “Yeah?”
“How are you going to bring the horses back down this trail? Isn’t it kind of narrow?”
“It’s a game trail,” Kyle or Todd—she still couldn’t identify their voices every time—said from behind her. “We don’t come back down this way.”
“Oh.”
“It’s just a prettier ride,” Dom said. “I thought you’d enjoy the scenery.”
“I am.” All of it, including the cowboy who rode in front of her, surely the best scenery she’d seen in a while. With effort, she corralled her thoughts and tried to damp down the heat that seemed to ratchet up with every movement of the horse beneath her. “It just suddenly occurred to me that it might be difficult to move twenty or so horses this way. If you had a secret for doing it, I wanted to know.”
He laughed. “No secret. Just putting some fun in a work-day.”
“Well, it is beautiful.”
So was the view she had of his broad shoulders as he swayed ever so gently with his mount’s movements. He wore a lined denim jacket that looked as if it had weathered many, many years, and a black cowboy hat. The whole image was so archetypal that she couldn’t help smiling at her own response to it.
Until she looked down and remembered that she was wearing someone else’s cowboy boots and someone else’s jacket. And that the someone else was probably Mary. She didn’t dare ask, and he hadn’t offered the information.
Or maybe they were someone else’s. Regardless, it was clear it hadn’t bothered him to offer them, so she shouldn’t be bothered by wearing them.
Except there was that old phrase, the one about stepping into someone else’s shoes. Maybe that old saw, at some psychological level, was what was bothering her. Especially in light of her attraction to Dom.
Hell, she thought with a quiet sigh, when did life get so damn complicated? Mary’s shoes, Mary’s husband, Mary’s life.
But they weren’t Mary’s anymore, were they?
And what did it matter if they were? She was only borrowing a pair of boots, a jacket and a hat. Borrowing. No way it would ever be more than that.
The very temporariness of what she was doing eased the twinges of guilt.
Borrowing. Yeah, that’s all she was doing, and she’d leave everything just the way she found it.
Her mood lightened abruptly and she gave her attention over to the gorgeous autumn woods. Her mount, Marti, seemed to need no guidance at all. She just kept plodding along behind the packhorse, as if she were content to make this gentle climb forever.
After an hour so, just as they reached a clearing, Dom called a halt. Courtney watched him dismount, drop his reins to the ground, and wondered if she should climb down, too. The boys answered indirectly as they jumped off their own horses.
But before she could move, Dom was there at her side. He smiled up at her, his face shadowed from the sun by the brim of his hat. “Maybe you should let me help. You might be surprised.”
He took the reins from her hand, dropped them, then reached up, gripping her waist. She lifted her right leg to pull it from the stirrup and that’s when she noticed not everything was right. It felt at once leaden and shaky. She tried to swing it over and it didn’t come all the way up.
A quiet chuckle escaped Dom, his hands tightened on her waist and he lifted her down. As soon as her boots hit the ground, her legs almost buckled.
“Steady,” he said, keeping his grip on her. “You’ll be fine in just a minute or two.”
“What happened to my legs?”
“Well, different activity. I don’t know how much is fatigue, or how much might be nerves that got a little pinched, or blood flow that got interrupted. I’m not a doctor. I just know this often happens the first time after a long ride. Things’ll get back to normal in a minute, though. I promise.”
The boys, apparently accustomed to riding, had no trouble making the transition. They whipped around the glade like forces of nature that had been pent up too long, and the dogs tore around at their heels. Watching them, electrically aware of Dom’s hands on her waist, she started to smile.
“I take it that this break isn’t just for me,” she said.
“No way. Those kids can’t sit still for too long even on the back of a horse.”
“I can see that.” She rested a hand on his shoulder for balance, becoming instantly aware of the muscle beneath the denim. For a second, she felt as if everything inside her stopped in a moment of exquisite awareness, but then, looking down in hopes he wouldn’t see her warming cheeks, she shook first one leg and then the other, trying to get some strength back.
And there it was, she realized. If she could stand on one leg now, even for just a few seconds, she was okay. Which meant she no longer needed Dom’s support. Unfortunately, she didn’t want to relinquish it, either. His hands nearly spanned her entire waist, and for the first time she realized she could like that sensation. She’d never noticed it before with any man. But then had any man ever held her in quite this way?
Maybe not. And inevitably she wondered if Dom felt the snap and sparkle around her waist that she was feeling. Of course he didn’t. Why would he?
“Okay?” Dom asked.
“I think so.”
He let go of her carefully, not so quickly she’d fall if she didn’t have command of her legs back, but quickly enough that she felt he didn’t want to touch her. That it disturbed him.
And it proba
bly did. She’d seen the flare of attraction on his face, but she supposed it made him no happier than it made her. If they became partners in passion, they’d become partners in guilt, most likely.
“Thanks.” She took a step, then another. Still shaky, but she could walk. “I’m okay.”
“Thought you would be. Stroll around and loosen up. I’m going to check the horses.”
Kyle and Todd had started a game of tag, and dervishes had nothing on them. The dogs, however, settled in the sun on the grass, watching everything as their tongues lolled.
Courtney wandered around the glade, as feeling came back to her bottom and her legs recovered their strength. Meanwhile Dom checked every hoof on every horse, checked their saddle girths and their saddlebags. He only seemed to need to make a few minor adjustments. Meanwhile, when he wasn’t checking them out, the other horses grazed on drying grasses and even a few low bushes.
One thing that penetrated her awareness was how Wyoming was a whole lot dryer than Georgia or the Carolinas. The air held no detectable humidity at all, and somehow the feeling invigorated her. She stretched and turned her face up to the sun, and let go.
It didn’t matter that she wore borrowed clothing, didn’t matter that tomorrow or the next day she’d have to continue her investigation or move on. For a few wonderful, marvelous minutes, she neither looked ahead nor looked behind. All that mattered was the present moment.
Another thing she could get addicted to here: no intrusions. No cell phone, no computer, no files to pore over. Nothing could reach her here and that meant for once in her life she could live in the here and now.
She heard Dom approach her through the drying grass and opened her eyes. “Do you always feel this way?”
“What way?”
“Like there’s no tomorrow, no yesterday. Just right now.”
“Often enough.” A smile creased the corners of his eyes. “I won’t tell you reality never intrudes. Of course it does. But when I’m doing something like this, or working with the horses, I can usually let go of just about everything else. Or when I’m playing with the boys.”
One of whom was hurtling his way right now from behind. Dom’s smile deepened a bit. Without even looking, his arm unexpectedly shot out in a flash, and he caught Kyle around his waist, lifting him right off his feet.
A shrieking giggle escaped Kyle, followed by a protest. “Dad, put me down before Todd catches me.”
Courtney laughed as Dom let the boy slip to his feet. “How did you do that?” she asked as Kyle went tearing off.
“Practice.”
Before she could say another word, she was nudged between her shoulder blades so hard from behind that she stumbled forward a step. Dom caught her by her forearm.
“What was that?” she demanded and turned to find Marti right there. “She did that?”
“She has certain expectations.” Dom shoved a hand into his jacket pocket and came up with a cube of sugar. “She expects a reward when we take a break. Hold out your hand.”
“Me?” Courtney looked at Marti. “She has awfully big teeth.”
“She’s also very gentle. You rode her, so you should reward her. Just hold your hand flat so she can feel the cube with her lips.”
Courtney hesitated, but only briefly. She held out the cube on her palm, hand flat, and then giggled a bit as she felt both velvety lips and the tickling prickle of hairs. Marti took the cube as gently as Dom had promised and Courtney felt thrilled.
“Can I give her another?”
“At the next break. Marti develops habits fast. If you give her two now, she’ll start expecting two every time, and that’s not really good for her. But she’d probably like a pat or two.”
That was easy enough. Standing beside the horse, Courtney stroked her neck, and patted gently. Before long, she laid her cheek against the mare’s neck, feeling heat and coarse hair, and hearing the horse’s strong, steady heartbeat. Closing her eyes, she soaked it in, listening to the boys grow quieter as they wore down a bit.
This, she thought, could definitely become addictive.
A short while later, they mounted up again and resumed their climb along the narrow trail. Every so often, another surprise greeted her: a gorgeous ravine, a sparkling waterfall, a copse of brilliantly colored trees. Although as they climbed higher, the trees began to grow barer.
When they finally halted at a log cabin, she could smell snow on the breeze that blew down the mountain. The cabin stood on the edge of woods at the bottom of a huge meadow that rose even higher up the mountain. To one side were a shed and a separate lean-to. A distance away, a pen had been built from pine trunks. Everything looked weathered and old, but still sturdy.
She could see horses scattered along the distant upper edge near more trees and, as if they had been anticipating this visit, they began to slowly move down the meadow toward the people. The dogs whined almost impatiently, but Dom told them to “settle” and they did exactly that, though not without an occasional whimper of protest.
Even though the sun was higher now, the air had definitely grown colder. She helped as much as she could with unloading the horses and carrying things into the cabin with the boys, then Dom put their mounts in the pen to graze and drink. The horses from higher in the pasture were still slowly moving their way, pausing to graze, but moving ever closer.
The cabin itself was minimalist to the extreme: a rough-hewn wooden table with four equally rough-looking chairs, a sink with an old-fashioned handle pump for water, four cots already made up. Only two windows let in light, and they needed a cleaning. They looked as old as the cabin.
Dom lit a fire in an old woodstove. It caught quickly, and soon heat was radiating throughout the cabin.
“This is cozy,” Courtney said. And very different from anything she’d known in her life. Even with all her travels, even having been to places where people lived very poor lives, she’d never spent any time in a cabin like this. And she liked it.
“It’s our old line shack,” he said. “We use it and a couple of others a number of times through the summers. Not a lot of extra room, but nobody usually has to spend more than a night or two here. We come up here to check the fence and make sure all the horses are okay.”
“Where is the fence?”
The boys giggled. “Way out there,” Kyle said, waving an arm grandly.
“It’s a big ranch,” Dom agreed. “I don’t fence it all, though. Part of it is unfenced for a migration corridor.”
“What’s that?”
Todd answered. “It’s for moose and elk and other stuff, so they can migrate.”
“Wait. Hold it. I’m a city girl here.”
Dom spoke. “It’s simple, really. A lot of animals, just like birds, have seasonal migrations to follow the best grazing. Fencing in so much land has interrupted that. So a few years back when the idea of opening migration corridors got some attention, we signed on. We don’t want nature to lose to fencing.”
Courtney viewed him with new admiration, because she didn’t have any trouble imagining a lot of valid economic reasons to not want to turn over part of your land to grazing by wild animals. “I want to learn more about that. I think that’s fantastic.”
Dom shrugged. “Not all my neighbors agree, especially since we got a wolf pack on Thunder Mountain. They’re probably out of Yellowstone up north, and apparently some of the wolves followed the moose and elk herds, and set up a territory here.”
“Now that’s something I’ve heard about.”
“We have some pretty fiery meetings about it from time to time.”
“But it doesn’t bother you?”
“Oh, it bothers me that I might occasionally lose a youngster, but on the other hand, the wilderness, including wolves, need to be protected, too. In the long run, it’s better for us all.”
He looked at the boys.
“Okay,” he announced, pulling off his leather gloves. “We’re ready. But how about some lunch first?”
&nb
sp; The boys liked that idea. Smiling at their eagerness, Courtney helped as best she could as Dom unpacked sandwiches and bottled water.
They sat together at the table on wooden chairs that creaked and squeaked, eating off the waxed paper that had wrapped the sandwiches. Thick sandwiches, full of ham and cheese.
“How come,” she asked, “you have to pen the horses? Couldn’t you just gather them up in the morning? It doesn’t seem to take you long.”
“I want to check them out before I make them take a long walk. Make sure none of them is injured, they don’t have stones caught in their hooves, that kind of thing. And it’s easier to check them once they’re penned than while they’re wandering all over hell and gone.”
“And we get to count,” Kyle said. “Make sure they’re all there.”
Dom favored them with a smile. “That’s right. And you make sure I don’t miss one.”
The boys seemed rather proud of that assignment.
“And what else do you do?” she asked them.
“We help gather them,” Todd answered. Even though he said it offhandedly, she could tell he was proud of that.
“These two are becoming great wranglers,” Dom said. Both boys grinned at that.
“It’s fun,” Kyle said.
“Anything I can do to help?” She expected to be told to stay out of the way, but she got a surprise.
Kyle and Todd exchanged looks. “Marti,” said Kyle, “pretty much knows what to do.”
“Yeah.” Todd looked at her. “Just don’t get in the way of your horse.”
Courtney looked from one to the other, then at Dom. “Meaning?”
“Marti’s a good cutter and herder. She’ll do all the work for you, really. The question is whether you can keep your seat if she suddenly cuts or takes off after a recalcitrant horse.”
She blinked. “I didn’t think you had any recalcitrant horses.”
Dom laughed and the boys joined him. “That depends,” he said when his laughter eased. “They have moods, too.”
“Then maybe it’s best if I keep my feet on the ground.”
Then Kyle said something that punctured the mood. “Mom never did this with you, did she, Dad?”
