by A. J. Wynter
“You’re going to need those,” he said flatly and then turned and rode away. He heard her voice cry out, pushing Buttercup to follow, and he could hear the strong horse’s hooves digging up the earth behind him as he rode.
It was rare for him to meet a rider who could keep pace with him, and he had never met a woman who could do it. He felt his shoulders relax and for the five minutes it took them to reach Jimmi’s field, he allowed himself to relax into the gait of his horse and enjoy the company of a fellow horseman.
As they reached the field, Russ could see her almost white hair, the strands wild and rhythmic with the horse's gait, shining in the night sky, and he hated to admit it – she looked magical.
Floyd and the other ranch hands had beaten them to the field and were working the dogs to get the bison back on the proper side of the fence.
“So, how do I do this?” Sydney asked, examining the lasso in her hand.
Russ couldn’t bring himself to trick Sydney into lassoing a bison. He knew that it wouldn’t end well. Either she would be embarrassed in front of Floyd, or in the unlikely event that she actually managed to rope one of them, one of them was bound to get hurt – and it wasn’t likely to be the bison.
“Um. We’re just going to use the dogs tonight,” Russ said, tossing his lasso into the back of the pickup truck. Sydney followed suit. “We need to get behind the herd and I’ll direct Freckles and her pack, although she knows exactly what to do. We’re mostly here as their assistants.”
Sydney smiled at Russ for the first time since she’d moved to the ranch and he felt his heart swell. He caught himself and ripped his gaze from hers, “Freckles,” he shouted and whistled to the dog.
It took three hours, but the two of them managed to rein in the herd with the help of the dogs while Eddie, Carter, and Floyd worked feverishly to patch the fencing.
“Will this ever end?” Carter muttered under his breath.
“Nope,” Floyd said. The property is too big. By the time we get one section sorted out, the first section has gone to shit.” He slammed in a nail and tossed the hammer into the truck. “Get in, boys,” he said, clambering into the driver’s seat. Eddie and Carter hopped into the back of the truck and the trio zipped off in the darkness, the pack of dogs baying as they followed.
Russell pulled a flask out of his shirt pocket and offered it to Sydney, assuming that she would decline. She surprised him when she reached out and took a sip. He waited, and then smiled when it happened. She scrunched up her nose and then wafted her hand in front of her face and cleared her throat, her eyes watering.
“That’ll put some hair on your chest,” he said and took a swig himself. Jimmi and his family might be crazy, but they brew some good moonshine.
“That’s terrible,” Sydney cried out once she had caught her breath.
“It grows on you,” Russ said, pocketing the silver flask. “Good work tonight, by the way,” he said, mounting his horse. Sydney mounted hers and turned to head back to the barn.
“Thank you,” she replied, smiling. “It was actually a lot of fun. It reminded me of our fall fox hunts.”
Russ felt his heart start to thump against his chest, realizing that he had more fun tonight, working the bison with Sydney than he had in years. He knew that he would be back to fence detail in the morning, especially with tonight’s breach, but he didn’t want the evening to end.
“Hey, Sydney,” he said.
“Yeah?” she turned on her horse to face him.
He found himself lost for words again. “Nothing.” He said.
She looked at him questioningly, then urged Buttercup forward. “I mean, we’re going to have to teach you to relax a little when you ride. A little less pickle stuck up your ass if you know what I mean.”
Sydney lowered her eyes and didn’t say anything. Russell didn’t know why he was mean to her when all she did was make him nervous. “Wait, Syd,” he said. She stopped again. “Want to see something?”
She hesitated.
“I mean, I know that you must be tired,” he backtracked and started to ride with her, but she surprised him.
“Actually, I’m really wound up right now. I don’t know how I’m going to get sleep after all of that excitement.” Russ felt a drip of sweat loosen itself from his hair and make its way down his back and he shivered in the night heat. “What did you have in mind?”
Russell hadn’t planned it, but he knew the perfect place to take Sydney.
Chapter 17 – Sydney
Sydney thought that she had been letting loose with her riding style. It felt good to feel her hair whipping around in the hot Texas air as she rode Buttercup through the fields. The horse wasn’t a racing thoroughbred, but she had good stamina, and Sydney could tell that she liked keeping up with Russell and his horse.
The sound of the hooves clopping through the dirt was music to Sydney’s ears, and she realized that for the first time since coming to the ranch, she was enjoying herself. A bigger surprise was the fact that she was enjoying herself with Russell, the man who had given her the most grief since she arrived.
She had been nervous about roping the bison and felt her pounding heart start to ease up a little when Russell told her that they would be using the cattle dogs to round up the herd, rather than the ropes. Her hands swam in Russell’s well-worn suede gloves, but by the end of the night, she was thankful that he had given them to her. Between the aggressive riding and moving the fencing materials, her hands would’ve been a pulpy mess without them.
She had felt Russell’s hands. They were calloused, alligator-skin hands, and now she understood why. She stopped hating him as she watched him work his horse and command the dogs. He was in his element and she had never seen anything like it before. The animals were responding to his subtle cues, his body language, and lastly, his voice. His rich buttery voice. If Sydney didn’t hate him so much, she would’ve found Russell to be, bar none, the sexiest man she had ever seen in her life.
Eddie and Carter were cute, but next to Russell, they were boys. ‘If only he weren’t such an absolute asshole’ Sydney thought to herself, realizing that watching him was making her palms sweat and her heart race a bit too fast.
The spell was momentarily broken when Russ told her that she looked like she was riding with a pickle up her butt. She thought that she had been relaxed, in fact, she had been more relaxed on Buttercup than she had been in her life, and her spirit deflated when he criticized her riding. The man was like a yo-yo, just when he was being kind and thoughtful, he rocketed back down, and said something spiteful and mean.
When he asked her if she wanted to see something, she didn’t know who she was talking to. The considerate kind Russ, or the jerk ass Russell, so she hesitated for a second. When her eyes met his, he averted his gaze and she realized that he was nervous. She smiled at him and agreed to see whatever it was that he wanted to show her. Could he be leading her down a path to a mud bog filled with mosquitoes? Maybe, but she realized that she could handle anything that the cowboy threw at her.
“Follow me,” Russell said, but instead of bolting off at a racer's pace, he led his horse through the meadows at a nice slow lope, Sydney riding alongside. The pace afforded them the ability to talk to each other, and Sydney loved the free feeling of riding outside the show ring.
“See that tree stand over there?” Russell asked, pointing to a cluster of trees on the horizon glowing in the moonlight.
“I do,” Sydney said. The trees had to be a good two or three miles away.
“That’s where we’re headed,” Russell turned and smiled at her.
“What’s there?” Sydney asked. To her, it just looked like a tree island in the middle of the field.
“It’s what’s after there that’s important.”
“How cryptic,” Sydney replied, steeling her eyes on the tree stand.
“You’ll like it,” Russell said, looking straight ahead.
“Oh, really?” Sydney replied. “How do you
know that?”
Russell slowed his horse and turned to Sydney, “Buttercup likes it, and she likes you, so I just figured...”
Sydney’s heart melted. She had planned to give Russell a lecture about purporting to know something about someone, but his answer was so sweet and thoughtful, and right. She loved horses more than most people, and if Buttercup loved where they were headed, she was sure to as well.
“I can’t wait,” Sydney smiled and then Buttercup picked up her pace. “Apparently, Buttercup can’t either!” she giggled as Buttercup took off at her top speed toward the trees.
She heard Russ hot on her heels and pushed Buttercup faster until they burst into the darkness of the tree stand, its large canopy of leaves shading them from the moonlight.
“Whoa, girl,” Sydney said to her horse, a little unnerved that she couldn’t see where they were going.
“Don’t worry,” Russ said, coming up right behind her. “She knows where she’s going.”
Sure enough, Buttercup expertly navigated her way through the tree trunks, and Sydney gasped when they emerged into the moonlight. A narrow, well-worn pathway switch backed down a hill to a river eddy filled with a small babbling waterfall, the river snaking away as far her eye could see. The idyllic scene was the last thing she expected to see in rural Texas; it was lush and gorgeous, more like the small hot springs she had experienced in Oregon. Some blinking lights caught her eye, and as a girl, she would’ve thought they were faeries, but as a woman, knew that they were fireflies, but that didn’t make them any less magical.
As though on autopilot, Buttercup made her way down the pathway and paused to take a drink.
“It’s beautiful,” Sydney gushed, turning to face Russell.
“See, I knew that you would like it,” he said, grinning.
Sydney found herself smiling in response to his grin, and she noticed his eyes glinting in the moonlight, almost as though they were made with the same water from the spring. She held his gaze, but when the butterflies started flapping their wings in her belly, she looked away. She stole another glance at Russ and noticed that he was still smiling.
“How was this for...” Sydney started to ask about the formation of the spring when Buttercup lunged forward and leapt into the pool of ice-cold water. Unprepared, Sydney keeled off the side of the horse and squealed as her body hit the ice-cold water. She looked back to Russ and saw him standing at the rocky shore, doubled over in laughter.
“She... she... she took way longer to jump in than I expected,” Russ said through his laughter, wiping the tears from his eyes.
“So, that’s what you were grinning at,” Sydney yelled and splashed water up at Russ. He jumped out of the way of her splashes, pulled off his shirt and boots, and then dove into the pool. He surfaced in front of Sydney and gave her a splash of his own. She giggled and tried to splash him again, but between treading water and trying to splash, she was having a hard time staying afloat, her riding boots full of water.
Russ reached out and grabbed Sydney’s hands, “You can touch,” he said quietly.
Sydney stopped kicking her feet and allowed them to relax, the toes of her boots scratching the rocky bottom. She stood, caught her breath, and then used both of her hands and all her might to create a huge tidal wave of a splash that caught Russ off guard. He sputtered and coughed out the water and smiled. “I bring Buttercup here to cool off. She loves the water more than any horse I’ve ever met.” He gestured to the horse who continued to do laps around them in the pool.
“How is it so cold?” Sydney asked, her teeth chattering.
“It’s spring fed, comes from an underground source deep down. It’s cold year-round, no matter how hot it gets.”
“It actually feels really good,” Syd chattered.
“Your lips are telling me otherwise.” Russell reached out for Sydney’s hand. She wasn’t anticipating his touch, and her breath hitched when his fingers embraced hers. He led her out of the pool of water and they sat down on a big flat rock. Buttercup followed them and took her place beside Russ’s horse, who had only gone in ankle deep.
Syd reached to undo her boots, struggling with the wet zipper. Russ leapt to his feet and knelt in front of Sydney to help her remove her waterlogged leather boots that had doubled as anchors. Even though the night was close to one hundred degrees, Sydney felt goosebumps prickling her skin as she watched Russell work the boots from her feet. Licks of his blonde hair, wavy with the humidity, brushed his ears and eyebrows. His chest was tanned, and Syd watched a trail of water making its way down his neck before trickling over the top of his well-defined pecs. His was the chest of a rider, not someone who spent countless hours in the gym. Plus, the man didn’t have an ounce of fat on him. He had a six-pack leading to the waistband of his jeans, along with the muscles over his hip bones that Syd’s friends liked to call ‘sex muscles’.
With her feet freed from her boots, Syd reclined on the rock and stared up at the sky. “It’s so beautiful here. You are so lucky,” she murmured, half to herself and half to Russ.
“Lucky?” Russ scoffed, then quickly changed his tone, “I mean, yes, it’s beautiful here, but it’s really all I’ve ever known,” he said, taking a seat beside Syd. He wrapped his arms around his knees, watching the horses.
“What do you mean? All you’ve ever known? Have you never left the ranch?” Syd returned her gaze to Russ.
“That was a bit dramatic,” he said, smiling, still staring at the horses. “I’ve traveled all through the southern United States, but it’s always been horses, ranches, and rodeos.”
“That sounds like a dream,” Syd said, imagining traveling and riding horses on a permanent basis.
“It was,” Russ replied. “I mean, I loved it, but I always wondered if there was more out there for me.”
“More? Like what?” Sydney asked.
“You know, I don’t really know,” Russ replied and then looked back to Sydney, saying, “I’m sure that you’ve seen the world.” Syd had. She had traveled extensively since she was a young girl, but nothing in her travels had compared to this spot, right here, with Russ.
“I have, but I don’t think it matters,” she sighed. “You can travel and see the world and still feel like you’re alone, or that you’re not in the right place,” she said, surprised that she was able to put into words, the discontent she had been feeling for the past few years. “I’ve always done the ‘right’ thing, gone to school, studied, traveled abroad, but I never felt like I was being me,” she said sitting up so that she was shoulder to shoulder with Russ, watching the horses. “Actually, that’s not totally true,” she said, adding, “when I’m riding. I’m me.”
Russ turned to Syd, whispering as green eyes met blue, “Me too.”
Syd felt a surge of warmth rush through her body and longed for the courage to lean forward the short distance that it would take for her lips to meet Russ’s, but she couldn’t summon it. Her body started to shake beyond her control and she could feel Russ’s warm breath on her face. Russ leaned closer to Syd and she parted her lips in anticipation of meeting his, but instead of meeting her lips, he pressed his cheek into her cheek, the same way that she saw him embrace his horse. It was better than a kiss and she felt her entire body come alive with the sensation of his skin against hers. Syd didn’t know how long their faces remained touching... it could’ve been two seconds or twenty minutes as time seemed to stand still. She felt like she could’ve stayed there, like that, until morning. Her heart sunk a touch when Russ peeled his face from hers, but instead of pulling back, he let his lips linger on her cheek, his breathing rapid and hot, and he traced his lips lightly across her cheek finally meeting hers.
The kiss was out of this world. Syd had never experienced a moment where everything around her disappeared, until the moment Russ’s lips met hers. It wasn’t a hungry kiss. It was tender and lingering, their tongues meeting lightly before Russell pulled back and cleared his throat, “Dawn’s coming, and we shoul
d get back, so you can get at least an hour of sleep before work.”
Syd nodded, unable to speak, the kiss rendering her mute.
Russ slid off the rock, the wetness from his jeans leaving a perfect damp imprint of his ass. He offered his hand to help Sydney up.
“Sorry about the boots,” he said, handing them to her. “I should’ve told you that Buttercup is a sea otter in a horse’s body.”
Syd didn’t care. She would’ve jumped into a bucket of ice cubes if she could experience another kiss like the one they had just shared.
“Do we really have to work so early this morning, if we were up all night with the herd?” she asked, realizing that the continuous shots of adrenaline that had coursed through her body all night had left her feeling exhausted.
“Oh, princess,” Russ smiled. “You have a lot to learn.”
Chapter 18 – Russell
Watching her ride, Russ forgot that she was a spoiled city girl. He was looking at a bonafide cowgirl. The sexiest one that he had seen in his life. He could’ve been looking at the next contender for the barrel racing podium. He loved the way her hair flicked out behind her and shone in the moonlight as she expertly, yet respectfully, got Buttercup to do everything that she wanted.
Eddie and Carter were hacks when it came to riding, and whenever they had roundups, he always ended up doing the lion’s share of the work. With Sydney, they had been a team, not only did she listen to his instructions, the girl had intuition. Russell could catch her eye and nod his head, and she would nod and do exactly what his eyes asked of her.
And that ass.
He wouldn’t be a red-blooded man if he didn’t notice the way her tight ass looked as she rode. He wasn’t kidding about the loosening up though, she sat far too upright and rigid, but her hips had all the action of a western rider.