Matty reached for the blankets he’d tied onto the back of the mule and untangled them. With one hand, he patted the top of the horizontal tree and found it only slightly damp, so he set the blankets down on top.
“Let me help you stand,” Catherine said.
There was motion where her voice had come from, and Pop groaned. Matty stepped in that direction to assist, coming on the opposite side from Catherine. When he threaded his arm behind Pop’s back, his hand bumped Catherine’s. Together, they helped Pop hop the few steps to the mule.
Matty guided Pop’s hands to the harness, so he’d have something to grip. He bent over and threaded his fingers together, bracing himself to take the man’s weight.
Catherine’s palm rested on his back. “Your collarbone.”
“It’ll be all right. It’s just for a second. You help him so he doesn’t lose his balance.”
Pop’s booted foot rested in Matty’s cupped hands for a moment, and then the weight was gone as Pop swung his leg over the mule’s back.
Catherine steadied him, her shoulder brushing Matty’s chest as he straightened. His collarbone had protested the movement, but the pain hadn’t been nearly what it was before. For a moment, his heart beat in his throat. He had no excuse to stay when his brothers came back for him.
None except the way he felt about Catherine.
She said something soft to Pop while Matty turned back to the fallen tree. He grabbed one of the quilts and brought it to Pop.
“Here. Let’s wrap you up a little, keep you warm for the way home.” He tossed the blanket around Pop’s shoulders, and Catherine helped the older man tuck it under his armpits so it would stay on.
When she turned back to him, Matty let his hands rest on her shoulders. “I brought a quilt for you, too. Figured you might want to switch it out for your slicker.”
He sensed more than saw her looking up at him from the close proximity. He knew the kiss he’d bestowed on her earlier had confused her—he’d seen the panic in her face.
They were slightly behind Pop on the mule. He wouldn’t be able to see them unless he turned completely around. And in the dark, he would only be able to see their shadowy silhouettes anyway.
“Want me to help you off with your slicker?”
“All right,” she whispered, turning her back beneath his hands on her shoulders.
She was soaked, like him, and he held the slicker as she pulled her arms free. The wet material clung to her as if it never wanted to let go.
He could empathize.
Finally, she knocked free of the slicker. He tossed it on the back of the mule behind Pop and retrieved the quilt. He swung it around her shoulders, bringing the two corners to meet just beneath her chin.
She reached up and he dared to twine their fingers together even as he hung on to the quilt.
*
Catherine’s heart was pounding as she stood so near Matty. She couldn’t see his features in the darkness, but she could imagine those dancing eyes and the smile that had become dear to her.
“Thank you,” she whispered, allowing his clasp of her hands.
The simple words seemed so ineffective for everything he’d done for her today and through the night. Searching for Pop, scouting for danger and retrieving the mule, and then his thoughtfulness on top of everything.
He’d brought her a quilt. It was a simple act of kindness, but one she hadn’t expected. Since her mother’s death, she and Pop had become equals in caring for each other, sharing chores. And these past years, as Pop’s health and mind had begun to decline, she’d been forced to take on more and more.
When had she stopped expecting simple kindnesses altogether?
His breath brushed her forehead. They were so close that if he ducked his head, he could kiss her again.
Her mind had worried over that first kiss all day, but now she realized that she would welcome it if he kissed her again. Was that foolish, knowing he was leaving soon?
They were still connected through their hands. Maybe she tugged him closer, or maybe he leaned of his own accord, but suddenly, his breath was hot against her mouth, and then his lips touched hers.
This time, she didn’t freeze. She returned the sweet pressure of his lips, tilted her chin up. He exhaled sharply through his nose. As if her response pleased him.
The moment suspended between them.
“We gonna move anytime soon?”
Pop’s gruff voice was an intrusion. She was breathless from Matty’s kiss and the emotion swirling through her. Matty squeezed her hands once more, his forehead pressing against hers for a brief moment.
“Patience, old man,” Matty said. “Remember, you’d be stuck out here all night if we hadn’t come for you.”
But Pop was hurt. This wasn’t the time for kissing—no matter how much she might wish differently—so she clasped the quilt to keep it wrapped about her shoulders and moved toward the mule’s head.
“I’ll scout out ahead,” Matty murmured, brushing her elbow with his hand as he strode past.
Emotion swelled in her chest as they started off. Matty walked several yards ahead as she guided the mule over the dark ground. It was slow going with no moon out and what stars might’ve been visible covered with clouds.
But she wasn’t alone.
She’d never expected to come of something with Matty. Not knowing how he’d acted as a child, and not with her circumstances on the homestead and caring for Pop.
But something had changed between them, and she couldn’t bring herself to regret it.
There were still obstacles. She must find a way to tell him about her parentage. But surely if he cared enough to kiss her… She had hope that he would be understanding.
Also, she knew his place was with his family and back in Bear Creek. She couldn’t picture herself there. Or Pop.
Not to mention the troubles she was having around the homestead.
But why would God have brought him into her life if there wasn’t the possibility of more for them?
She wasn’t good at depending on others. On the homestead, nothing got done unless she took the initiative. Pop and Mama had taught her to rely on herself, to take care of herself.
But these past days, leaning on Matty…
What if they could be more than friends? Maybe in a few months or years, if things changed with Pop, Matty could come courting. She could find a place in his family…
Despite the obstacles, hope filtered in her heart like sunlight through trees in the woods. What if…?
*
She’d kissed him back.
Though he kept his ears and eyes attuned for anything out of place, Matty hardly registered the landscape passing.
Catherine had kissed him back in those stolen moments in the dark. And given him hope that his growing feelings weren’t one-sided.
He was going to force Ralph to stop accosting Catherine, and he was going to figure out a way to come calling.
Dawn was lighting the sky as they trekked through the offshoot of the creek. Catherine gasped, and he looked back to her. Thanks to the lightening sky he could see she was knee-deep in the stream. She pulled the mule out the opposite side and stopped. Pop looked as if he was dozing, even sitting bareback on the mule.
Matty moved back toward her. “What’s wrong?”
She handed over the mule’s halter lead to Matty and bent to swipe at her pant legs. “My feet had just started to dry,” she complained.
He gave her a sympathetic smile, unable to keep his eyes off the way her curls had gone wiry, probably thanks to the dampness. “We’ll get you home and dried out.”
And since they’d found Pop on their way home, they wouldn’t have to go back out after him. Matty was looking forward to doing what chores couldn’t be put off—like milking the cow—and rolling up in a quilt himself for a few hours’ sleep.
He kept the mule’s lead when Catherine would have taken it from him, instead taking her hand. It was light enough now they shou
ld be able to see danger.
She walked beside him, tilted her head up once to look at him, and he squeezed her hand. This. This was what he’d been looking for with Luella—or maybe what she’d realized he couldn’t give her.
Wanting to protect Catherine. Hoping to give her comfort just by being at her side. Getting through difficulties together.
He was paying more attention to the woman beside him and not enough to their surroundings, because he was caught off guard when she stiffened beside him and then froze.
His head came up, his opposite hand dropping the mule’s lead and automatically reaching for his weapon.
But it wasn’t a thief that her eyes were locked on.
“No!” she cried out.
The barn had collapsed. Or part of it had. On the side closest to the stream, the outside wall had fallen. The roof had separated from the supporting outside wall, which leaned precariously inward.
Catherine pulled free of his hand and started running toward the structure.
“Cath— Wait!”
But she didn’t. Matty vacillated between chasing her and helping Pop. Finally, he turned to the older man.
“Catherine, don’t go inside!” he called over his shoulder. He didn’t hold out much hope of her listening, but reached up to help Pop off the mule.
“It could come down on her head,” he muttered to himself.
Pop kicked his good leg over the mule’s side and slid to the ground, Matty steadying him once he was on his feet. “Go after her,” the older man ordered.
He’d seen the danger, too.
Matty rushed across the yard just as Catherine was squeezing inside, her back brushing against the post holding up the far side of the barn.
“Cath—”
He spared a glance around, noting that hens had nested in the branches of the nearest tree overhanging the stream. Had they all managed to get out? Likewise, the milk cow had squeezed out somehow. She grazed off in the distance, at an angle where he hadn’t been able to see her until he’d come even with the barn.
There was debris up against the corner where the collapse had happened. The stream was only inches from the barn. It must’ve risen from the lengthy driving rains they’d battled yesterday and then begun to lower again.
He could hear Catherine muttering to herself and ducked inside, clamping a hand on his hat when it brushed against the low roof and threatened to fall off. Dust sent him into a coughing spasm.
It took a long moment for his eyes to adjust to the dimness inside.
Light streamed through a hole where the back wall had come free and the roof had fallen inward. The stall walls had collapsed and hay was scattered over every surface. He couldn’t see the mismatched items or even the barn floor for the soil and wood pieces strewn about.
There was nothing here to salvage. But Catherine had her back to him, fumbling with a panel on the back wall, just beneath where sunlight streamed in.
He picked his way carefully toward her. They should get out of here. Wood creaked, as if the one wall that remained protested having to stand up alone.
“Catherine—”
She ignored him. “It can’t be gone,” she muttered.
“It’s not safe in here.” He reached for her, but when his hand closed over her shoulder she shrugged him off. Something was wrong.
“It looks like the cow and chickens got out all right. We can clear some of the beams and dig out your junk—”
She didn’t respond to his quip and his shoulders sank lower.
“It’s got to be here.” He heard the desperation in her voice even if she wouldn’t look at him.
“Cath. Catherine.”
The tenor of his voice must’ve finally gotten to her, because she went still, both palms pressing against the wood.
“What do you need me to do?”
She shot him a tight-lipped smile over her shoulder. “I have to see—I have to get into the wall. Can you lift that beam?”
She pointed to where a heavy crossbeam leaned against the top of the board she was attempting to remove. He shoved a shoulder beneath it, praying that what remained of the ceiling wouldn’t come down on his head.
He pushed up, biting back a grunt when his collarbone twinged. He managed to lift it enough for her to wiggle a board free from where she’d created the false wall. Then another.
She gasped.
“I can’t hold it—” he bit out.
She shook her head, backing away a half step.
He released the beam and it settled back into place, sending a rain of dust on top of his head.
“It’s gone.”
He barely heard her words, she’d spoken so softly.
He moved to where she’d stood and looked into the space that had been revealed when she’d removed the planks.
He had a clear view out to the risen stream. The spot where she’d hidden her grain stockpile must’ve been swept away by the floodwaters.
The structure creaked ominously again. Another rain of dust fell on his head and sent him coughing into his elbow again.
“We’ve got to go.” He turned back to Catherine, who stood stock-still. One hand covered her mouth. She’d gone pale and he didn’t like the bleak expression in her eyes.
“C’mon.”
She let him take her arm and guide her back outside. Her compliance worried him even more.
He took both her elbows in his hands. Unlike during the dark part of morning, she didn’t lean toward him. She only clutched her midsection tighter, as if she was barely holding herself together.
“Catherine, talk to me.”
Chapter Nineteen
The seed wheat was gone.
Catherine felt numb from the inside out.
She couldn’t believe it. How could this have happened?
After the flooding had destroyed their crop, the seed wheat had been her only hope for them to make it through the winter months. Without the grain and hay the wheat would produce, she and Pop wouldn’t have flour. And there would be no hay for the animals to subsist on during the long winter months when they couldn’t graze from the fields.
They had no cash. Nothing to trade.
How would they make it through?
Matty was speaking, but she couldn’t focus on his words. She felt the weight of his hands at her elbows. More, she felt the weight of expectation.
So much that she couldn’t bear it.
She stepped away and watched his arms fall back to his sides.
He sighed. “I know you’re upset, but—”
Upset. The word didn’t begin to reach through her numbness to the bitter devastation she felt.
“That wheat was going to get us through the winter,” she whispered.
“I’ll help you figure something out. I’ll fix this—”
She let her eyes slide away from the cowboy. Pop stood next to the mule where they’d left him, but she could see the pinched lines of his face. Her stomach constricted.
How could she depend on Matty when he was going to leave? She’d been foolish to believe that there could be anything between them. They were too different.
Even now, when she knew what this devastating loss meant, he wanted to look on the bright side.
“This isn’t your problem to fix,” she said. “I have Pop to think of, and you’ll soon be returning home.”
“Cath—” The cowboy’s face darkened.
She couldn’t bear his presence, not in the face of this loss.
“I need to care for Pop,” she said. She turned and walked away, leaving the cowboy near the barn.
*
Two days later, Matty still couldn’t get Catherine to open up to him.
She’d avoided him yesterday. He’d spent the day attempting to dig out the barn, salvaging what wood he could and unearthing Catherine’s junk piece by piece.
It was backbreaking work, and he was sore today. But he wouldn’t take it back.
Maybe she thought he was going to wal
k away because she’d had this setback. He didn’t know what she was thinking because she’d shut him out. And that was starting to frustrate him.
He finished washing up the breakfast dishes—earlier she’d stuffed her mouth full of bacon and rushed out the door with two biscuits in hand—and dumped the dishwater outside.
Pop had stayed in bed with his leg propped up and was grumbling to himself when Matty brought the tub back indoors.
“I thought I’d go out and check on Catherine.”
“Yes,” Pop agreed.
“Any advice?”
Pop looked at him long enough to make Matty uncomfortable.
“I only want to help her,” Matty said. He didn’t know how much Pop had figured out about their kiss during the early morning, or if Pop could tell how much he’d grown to care for Catherine over these past weeks.
“Catherine’s mama was an independent spirit. She had to be.”
The cryptic words brought to mind something Catherine had said days ago. That it had been the three of them.
“It ain’t easy for Catherine to lean on somebody. She ain’t had much practice.”
He nodded. He knew that. He just needed her to trust him long enough so he could prove he was strong enough to carry her. That leaning on someone didn’t mean she was weak.
He straightened his shoulders and pushed out of the dugout. Where would Catherine hide today?
*
Catherine loitered at the edge of the plowed wheat field. The loss of the seed wheat had finally sunk in.
This would be a hard winter. They’d find a way to get through, whether it was trading the mule or possibly her finding work. She’d already thought of asking Harold Elliott if he’d take her on as a hand.
It was the death of the germ of a dream that had just begun that she grieved more. With Matty at her side as they’d found and rescued Pop, she’d begun to think things she never should have thought.
What it might be like to have someone to depend on.
Friends.
Maybe even learn to read.
Not to have to work through Pop’s declining health on her own.
But those were all the silly dreams of a child. The only thing she had to look forward to was a long year—years—of work.
Love Inspired Historical October 2015 Box Set Page 16
