Riding the River (The Westerners, Book One)

by Jeanne Harrell

When Sarah awoke the next morning, there were wildflowers in a pretty bouquet by her bedroll. She yawned, stretched and took a deep breath of fresh air before she noticed them. Picking them up, it made her smile and blush that he would do such a sweet thing.

  Matt’s bedroll was empty, so he was up already and doing whatever cowboys did first thing in the morning. She was hoping she could get a fresh shirt from the tent before going in to start breakfast. A quick glance at the closed tent told her she’d better wait a while, until the occupants were up and out of there.

  She went into their makeshift kitchen area, which was severely depleted now that Dale was gone. Coffee would be campfire coffee and that was fine… Sarah got to work putting together what breakfast she could. She’d grabbed a few boxes of cereal when they were hurriedly picking things to stay behind when Dale left. There was milk and fruit. Nothing was left from last night’s excellent fish dinner, so breakfast would be sparse. By the time other guests had roused and were moving around, Sarah had the coffee hot and breakfast was assembled on a picnic table. They could come get what they wanted.

  “Hey, Sarah,” Richie called out to her while crossing the campsite.

  She raised an eyebrow at him. “I need to get a clean shirt and my hairbrush, Richie.”

  He had the good grace to blush, before giving her a big grin.

  “Thanks for last night.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  “Your night out in the open couldn’t have been too bad, however.” He smiled at her. “Didn’t I see you and Matt getting cozy over by the stream?”

  It was Sarah’s turn to blush.

  “Breakfast is on the table.” She laughed and started for the tent and her clean shirt.

  By the time she got there, Tess was moving around and changing clothes. Sarah opened the flap and peered in.

  “Have a good night?”

  “Yes… Thanks to you. There’s definitely something sexy about cowboys,” Tess purred.

  “Could it be the sex?”

  “… Can’t be beat, Sarah.”

  Sarah laughed while changing into her clean shirt. “Come on. You need to help me make the lunch sandwiches.” She found her hairbrush and got her hair smoothed back into a ponytail.

  “What’ll we do about dinner tonight?”

  “I’m hoping like crazy that we’ll make it back to the ranch tonight. Otherwise, it’s fish and wild berries.”

  “There’s nothing left?”

  “Not lots, but I suppose we could make the fruit and bread stretch. It’s hard to be creative with food when you don’t have much to work with.”

  “You’ll make it work, I’m sure.”

  They went off together to get sandwiches made for lunch. All the foodstuffs left now had to be packed in saddlebags on their horses. It was going to severely limit their dining experience for the evening.

  It was the third day of the horse drive and everyone was getting sore and tired. It was hard riding fifteen to twenty miles a day in the saddle. They didn’t have to chase the strays any longer or keep the herd moving, but somehow they didn’t seem to go much faster than they had with the herd.

  The terrain could be difficult. Climbing up the side of one small mountain, there was another hill to go over before the rolling valley finally came into view. People had definitely grouped by now… The cowboys generally hung out together, the teenage girls were a group, several of the other guests stayed together and Cooper was by himself. Richie, Tess, Matt and Sarah made up the last group. They rode together for most of the day back to the ranch.

  Before the break for lunch, Sarah and Matt were riding off by themselves. She hadn’t had a chance to talk to him alone today.

  “Hey!”

  “Hey yourself.”

  “Thanks for the flowers. They were lovely…and my first.” Sarah tipped her cowboy hat at him, which made him laugh.

  “Oh, come on, cowgirl. A man’s never given you flowers before?”

  “No…”

  “Really?”

  She shook her head. “Honestly.”

  “Look, Sarah, I really don’t mean to pry, but…”

  “… But what?”

  “I thought you had a boyfriend in Baltimore.”

  “Well, yes, I had one, but I broke up with him before the trip.”

  “Wait a minute. First, I want to know why he never gave you flowers.”

  “Ben’s not a romantic guy. He’s a lawyer and a numbers person– political. Grandfather loves him.”

  “Okay, now the next part. Why did you break up with him?”

  “Apparently, you haven’t been listening. He’s an unromantic lawyer who would never have left me a pretty bouquet of wildflowers.”

  “Did you love him?”

  She thought about that for a minute.

  “I might have thought so early on, but I called him my absentee boyfriend for a reason. I never saw him. It was a strange relationship.”

  Matt shook his head. “I’d think so, if you never saw him. What a waste.”

  She knit her brows. “What was a waste?”

  Matt gave her a leisurely look from her feet to the top of her head. By the time he reached her face, she had blushed scarlet.

  “To have you and not want to spend any time with you. The guy was seriously nuts.”

  “I like to think so.”

  The lunch break came and went, and with it went many good moods. A quick look at the sky told everyone the same story: a storm was coming and fast. Cooper rode up to speak with Matt and Richie.

  “We’ve got the river coming up and we’d better make it across, if we want to get home tonight. What do you think?”

  Richie looked up at the darkening sky as Matt shook his head.

  “…Dunno, Cooper. It doesn’t look good. Maybe we should camp on this side for the night and wait the storm out. That river could get fast in a hurry.”

  Cooper took off his hat and ran a hand through his graying hair.

  “I don’t like the looks of the weather, but we’re almost out of food too. I’m thinking we should make a run for it.”

  “Our guests would probably prefer to starve than drown,” added Richie. Cooper gave him a dour look.

  “We’re going to go for it,” he decided. “Get your group ready to make a fast crossing. I’ll tell the others.”

  Cooper turned his horse away from them and rode quickly over to the rest of the guests and cowboys. Sarah and Tess had questioning looks for Matt and Richie who rode back to them wearing very serious looks.

  “What’s up?” asked Sarah.

  “The river’s ahead and Cooper wants to cross it tonight,” said Richie.

  “But the problem is that the river could get nasty pretty fast with this storm about to hit,” added Matt.

  As soon as he said that, lightning streaked across the sky. A few minutes later, the sound of thunder boomed overhead, spooking horses and riders.

  Matt reached into his saddlebag. “Everyone get on your ponchos. The rain will be coming pretty quickly now.” As soon as they all got on their rain ponchos, the rain started falling fast and hard.

  “Yow,” grimaced Tess. “I didn’t know that rain could hurt.”

  “Pull up your hoods,” yelled Matt. He reached over to pull Sarah’s up for her. “Let’s go!”

  Everyone started riding towards the river. The wind was blowing trees around and bushes back. A huge darkness came over them as the sky took on a menacing look. With the constant rain, the ground beneath the horses became slick and slippery. The horses were struggling to go forward.

  Suddenly lightning struck a tree close by Sarah, splitting it in half. Sparks flew. Part of the tree starting falling her way – Her frightened horse snorted and whinnied, but moved quickly out of the way. It happened so fast that all Matt could do was watch as Sarah’s horse pulled her to safety. They looked at each other in fear…

  Cooper’s group was in the river now, ab
out halfway across. The water was moving faster with the wind blowing it and rising fast with all the rain coming down. Matt rode down the bank first to make sure it was still all right to travel. He motioned for Richie, Tess and Sarah to follow. They went down the bank single file, while Matt’s horse cautiously stepped into the water.

  As they moved in deeper, the horses continued to struggle with the water rising on them. Everyone was in the river now and their legs dangled in the water. The horses kept moving.

  Cooper’s group had made it to the other side of the river, when all of a sudden, Tess slipped out of her saddle. Sarah saw her begin to slide and reached over to grab her. Both Tess and Sarah fell into the river. Their horses struggled forward without them.

  Matt had seen them both fall out of their saddles and had grabbed his rope. He started swinging it overhead and lassoed both Tess and Sarah on his first try. Then he tied the rope to the pommel of his saddle. Richie saw the whole thing as well and trudged back to Matt’s horse to steady him. Matt plunged into the water to grab both girls and hold them, as Richie walked Matt’s horse back to shore, the way they came…

  It was slow going with the rising river and its quickening pace. Tess and Sarah’s heads dipped in and out of the water time and again, scaring Matt. The freezing cold river with its loud roar showed no mercy as they all struggled in their long journey.

  Finally, Matt dragged them both onto the shore. Everyone was soaking wet, freezing and looked half drowned. Tess and Sarah were coughing and spitting out water and looking pretty bedraggled – Matt and Richie looked relieved. Richie waved at Cooper on the other side to let him know they’d made it to the bank. Cooper waved back.

  “Okay, Richie. Get that tent out,” yelled Matt as he tied up his horse. Richie nodded and soon they had the tent put together. Luckily, it had a floor to it and the inside was still dry. Matt and Richie got the girls into the tent and Matt yelled for them to strip out of their wet clothes.

  “Get your second set of clothes, Richie.” Both Richie and Matt grabbed their dry shirts and jeans out of their saddlebags and threw them inside the tent for Tess and Sarah to wear. They unhooked their bedrolls and threw them inside the tent as well. Then they waited in the pouring rain while the girls changed and dried off a bit.

  Tess was still crying and Sarah was patting her on the back when the guys opened the tent flap and came in. They dropped their soaking ponchos outside. Matt looked at Sarah wearing his clothes and grinned. She gave him a stern look.

  “What’s so funny? We nearly drowned.”

  “Yes, but you didn’t, and you look cute in my jeans and shirt.”

  “You’re soaked too,” said Sarah.

  “Yeah, but I’ll just take off my jeans when we go to bed.”

  Richie went over to comfort Tess who was hiccupping now, more than crying. Matt went to Sarah and spread out the bedroll by her feet.

  “Are you all right?”

  She nodded. “Yes, thanks to you. That was easily the scariest thing that’s ever happened to me.” He saw the uncertainty in her eyes.

  Matt sat on the bedroll and pulled Sarah down by him.

  “Get comfortable. That storm isn’t going to let up for a while.” He glanced over at Richie. “Let’s get some sleep, if we can.”

  Richie nodded and got Tess comfortable in his bedroll on the other side of the tent. Soon they had snuggled up together and were whispering.

  Matt and Sarah looked at one another and started to smile.

  “Let me get in first. I need to get rid of these wet jeans.” So he got in the bedroll and did just that. He threw them in a corner. “Get in, Sarah.”

  She didn’t hesitate a second. Sarah crawled in the bedroll with Matt and they stretched out together. Matt pulled her close.

  “Lay back against my chest – I’ll keep you warm.”

  “I was so afraid, Matt,” she whispered.

  “… Shh, honey. You’re okay now. Just relax against me -- I’ve got you.”

  “Thank God for that.”

  With his arms wrapped around her, Sarah’s eyes finally began to droop and her body relaxed. Matt kissed her hair and shoulders.

  “You called me Matt,” he whispered, smiling.

  “Yes,” she said as she drifted sleepily. “That’s your name, right?”

  Soon all four of them fell asleep with the steady staccato of the rain beating down on the tent.

  * * *

  CHAPTER TWENTY