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“You need to take care of that.”
“You need to stop and eat, but you’re not.” Pride drew her up straight. She was steel, too. “I don’t see any storm clouds, but I’d rather err on the side of caution. The least I can do is help you. We will get more work done together.”
“You have to be tired.”
“I’ve been tired before.”
“But it’s demanding work—”
“I don’t have time to argue with the likes of you, Mr. Lindsay. While I appreciate what you’re doing, I won’t be more beholden to you than I have to be.”
I’ll be darned. He had to admire her gumption. “Keep the wagon slow and steady. Too fast, and the grain hits the ground.”
She hitched up her skirts to climb aboard the wagon. She looked out of place with the rough leather gloves, which had to have been Kol’s, engulfing her hands. She sat daintily on the bench seat, as if taking tea.
She made him feel big and awkward. He was aware of his too large hands and feet. He was a rough man, he knew it. Growing up the way he had, he couldn’t be anything else. He wouldn’t be ashamed of it.
“Sure you can handle these big boys?”
“I know how to drive.” She held out her gloved hands, asking for the reins.
He knew plenty of men who couldn’t handle draft horses. He’d keep an eye on her while he worked; he wouldn’t want her to get hurt, that was all. He held out the reins and her hands gripped the thick straps ahead of his. Her touch tapped like a heartbeat through the lines.
Odd, how he felt a jolt deep inside.
Pay attention to the horses, Daniel. He didn’t like the way the big sorrels were testing the bit, rolling it around in their mouths. They were aware of the change in drivers.
“Keep a short rein on them. No, look.” He toed up on the foot rail and reached across her arms, catching the sweet scent of spring lilacs on her skin. “Like this. Not like you’re used to driving the buggy. Hold the reins two-handed, between your fingers for better control. Tight with no slack. Keep tension in the lines.”
She followed his example, moving those gentle hands of hers and leaning forward so the starched brim of her sunbonnet brushed the outside curve of his jaw.
He jerked away, releasing the reins. His chest was pounding. He was nervous about her safety, nothing more.
“More tension,” he told her. “You should feel the strain in your forearms.”
He caught the nearest gelding’s bridle and made sure the animal wasn’t nipping the bit. “That’s better.”
The muscles in her forearms burned, but Rayna held the lines. Her fourteen-year-old son could do this, so could she. She waited for an eternity, or shorter, sweat dampening the band of her sunbonnet. Daniel checked the equipment, readied his team pulling the harvesting machine, and called out.
She shook the reins, but it wasn’t enough to urge the animals on.
“Harder! They’ve got thicker hides. They have to be able to feel it.”
He was patient while she tried again. On the third attempt, the thwack of leather against those broad rumps got the horses’ attention and the gigantic animals lurched forward.
“Whoa, slow ’em down!”
Rayna hauled back on the reins and the team stopped. She waited, dreading his reaction. He was going to tell her to get in the house where she belonged, and she wouldn’t. “Let me try again.”
His jaw was tight, but he said nothing more.
She could do this. She had to. With all the strength left in her arms, she manhandled the thick reins. The geldings stepped out, moving slow enough to keep pace with the machine.
Hulled grain spit into the wagon bed. Her grain. For her children. This could work, she would make certain of it. She would help bring in this crop.
What if Dayton was right? What if there were bank loans to be paid?
Worry gathered like the clouds on the horizon, black and ominous.
Daniel was right. A storm was coming.
When the last of twilight was wrung from the shadows, Daniel looked up from his work. She was mostly a silhouette, but he could make out the harsh line of her back against the black void of the prairie.
Why was he drawn to her?
He felt sorry for her, he supposed. As sad as she had to be, he tried to imagine the strength of will she had. After a long day of work, she still perched pole-straight on the unforgiving wagon seat. Her arms visibly trembled from exhaustion.
She was a hard worker; he admired her for it. Her hands had to be bleeding again. Did she complain? Did she find a reason to shirk?
No. Not once. The few times they’d stopped for water, she’d been eager to get right back to work and quick to thank him again for his help.
It was wrong of the neighbors not to lend a helping hand. Where were the Daytons? They were harvesting their crops instead of the Ludgrin’s grain, which should have been started on at first light today.
It burned his gut that those men wouldn’t help Kol’s widow. Not unless there was something to be gained.
He called out—Rayna was so tired she didn’t comprehend his words at first. She startled into awareness, looking out in surprise at the few stars twinkling on the eastern horizon. Her shoulders slumped; she saw the fast-moving clouds, too.
By the time she hauled hard on the reins and the wagon creaked to a stop, the coming storm had blotted out the last stars. The black sheen of the night prairie became a fathomless void.
He hated the dark, but he took his time, fighting the fear in his chest. Swallowing against the coppery taste in his mouth, he pulled the match tin from the box beneath the thresher frame. He struck the flint, the flame flared and he hit the wick of the lantern.
“Are you stopping for the night?”
“No. Are you holding up?”
“If you stay, I stay.”
She couldn’t have gotten much sleep in the past few nights. The effects of it were etched like heartache into the corners of her eyes and around her soft mouth. She looked likely to topple from the seat and get hurt in the process.
“I guess I don’t need this anymore.” She untied the bow at her chin. Her sunbonnet came away and the glimmering cascade of her hair tumbled over her shoulders like water falling.
He handed her the ceramic jug. “The lady first.”
“Thank you.”
“Do you have it?” Her arms looked wobbly as she struggled to lift the heavy crock. He reached out to steady it. “Here. Let me help you.”
“I can get it.”
“Not without spilling.”
Her slender hands, lost in her husband’s big leather gloves, felt fragile under his. He held the container steady while she drank. Odd, how he could feel her life force like the bite of electricity from a telegraph, zinging from her fingers and into his where they touched.
The shadowed column of her delicate throat worked as she drank, and he tried not to look at the vulnerable hollow at the base between her collarbones, where she’d unbuttoned the lace-edged collar of her work dress to allow in a cooling breeze.
She’s a new widow, get a rein on your thoughts, man. Ashamed, he was grateful when he could take the jug from her. Water clung to her lush bottom lip.
He tossed back the jug and drank long and deep, letting the coolish water slide down his throat. What was the matter with him?
He was lonely—he couldn’t deny it. He’d sure like a wife as fine as Rayna, but how did a man find a woman he could trust? How could a man who’d grown up the way he had come to trust anyone that deeply?
“The wind is kicking up. Do you suppose we’ll get lightning?”
“That isn’t my worry.”
“Then we should hurry. We need to get as much of this crop harvested as we can.” She sat straighter on the bench seat, gathering the reins with renewed purpose.
He’d chosen this time to stop for a reason. He stowed the ceramic jug beneath the seat, behind her slim ankles and the dust-covered black shoes she wore. She wasn’t going to like what he had to say.
“The wind’s kicking up. My guess is that lightning’s gonna start anytime. So why don’t you climb down and help me move the team in? Can you hold the second set of reins for me?”
“You want to head in?” Rayna swept from the wagon seat in a blur of fabric and grace. “You’re going to quit?”
“No.” He watched her study the sky. He knew she was going to argue.
“You’re right. The storm’s coming in too fast. You can’t see it, but I can feel it. We have to save what wheat we can.”
As if to prove it, abrupt lightning snaked across the black void of sky to the southwest, giving brief light to a wall of gray skimming across the roll and draw of the plains. Coming fast. Coming right at them.
The tinny crash of thunder made the horses dance in their harnesses, and Daniel calmed them absently, counting. How far away was the oncoming rain?
Five miles. They had time enough, but not by much. He would save this load of wheat, but what about the rest? What about his crop?
All it would take was a gusting wind to ruin his future and Rayna’s livelihood.
Worry pinched in the corners of her eyes and it was the last thing he saw as he blew out the lantern. He took it with him, stowing it carefully on the wagon floorboards. The last thing either of them needed was a fire in the fields.
Rain burst overhead as if thrown from a spiteful sky. Big, fat dollops hit the dust in the path ahead of the wagon, leaving inch-wide stains. Could they make it to the shelter of the barn in time?
Rayna gripped the bouncing seat as Daniel laid on the reins. The teams of horses reached out, racing against the wind the rest of the way and into the wide mouth of the barn. The sky opened up and flooded the world with angry rain. Lightning sizzled across the zenith, chased by a rapid beat of thunder.
Daniel leaped off the seat, leaving her behind. Breathless and grateful her wheat was dry, Rayna tugged off Kol’s work gloves. The shape of his hands was worn into the seasoned leather.
If Kol were here, he would have done as Daniel did. He, too, would have been helpless to hold back the lightning and rain and stop the fierce gale that tore ripe kernels from the chaff, pushing the sea of gold like waves in the ocean. Rayna closed her eyes against old childhood memories, crossing on the steamer from Sweden to America, lost and alone.
That’s how she felt now. She was no longer that child in a strange new world, but she had lost her anchor. Kol. Her strong, life’s companion who had made her feel safe and protected. No matter what happened, she’d known they would see it through together.
I’ve lost your crop, Kol. When she most wanted to feel his arm around her, pulling her near, there was only a cool gust of wind at her nape. She shivered and set the gloves aside.
Daniel stood in the wide threshold of the barn, shoulders squared, feet planted, a dark, solitary man outlined by the white flash of lightning and the black void of sky and prairie. He had to be thinking of his fields and of his future.
He could have been harvesting his wheat instead of hers. He would have been better off if he had been. Rayna eased off the wagon seat, ignoring the sting and burn of her overused muscles, moving toward that lone silhouette.
How could she ever return in kind what he’d sacrificed for her family?
She curled her fingers around the wet wood of the door frame and cool rain sluiced down her skin. She shivered. The icy wind drilled into her bones. She felt as if the marrow were bleeding out of her. She didn’t know what to say to Daniel.
Lightning split the world of night and storm into pieces, giving a quick glimpse of the wind battering the sea of grain, now only reeds of straw.
“Rayna?” A steely hand clasped her shoulder, a strange grip. “Are you all right? You look ready to faint. Maybe you ought to sit down.”
Daniel guided her to a hay bale for her to rest on. He seemed distant and tentative as he ran his hand down the length of her arm, his touch foreign and yet gentle. He cradled her hand in his.
“You’re bleeding.” He traced the edge of her bandage with his large thumb. “I can’t do anything about your wheat. I’m sorry. But I can take care of this.”
“You lost your wheat, too. Everyone around here—” Her throat tightened and she fell silent. It was too much to manage. She would think about the effects of the storm tomorrow. “Where’s Kirk? I ought to be helping him. I need my gloves, so I can shovel—”
“No.” He released her hands and, when he rose, she shivered. He’d been blocking the wind. It hit her full-force, bringing mist from the rain to wet her face like tears.
The next time she saw him, he was carrying her oldest son against his chest like a child. Fast asleep, the boy’s white-blond hair was tousled and sweaty, his rangy form slack with exhaustion. Daniel carried him to the house without a word.
Gratitude broke inside her like ice shattering and leaving nothing but emptiness in its wake. She was grateful for the man’s kindness. His hard work.
Kirk had worked himself past his endurance today. Is this what lay ahead for him? Being forced to do the work of a man, when what he deserved was the rest of his childhood?
I’ll simply have to rent out the land, she realized. Daniel had certainly earned the right to that. With the rental income, would it be enough to cover her living expenses?
She had no idea; Kol had insisted on handling all their finances. He hadn’t wanted her to worry, he’d said, and since calculating the profit to be made in planting an extra field of corn instead of wheat was his decision to make, she’d left it to him.
She’d had that much faith in him.
A movement caught her attention. Daniel had returned, ambling through the shadows in the depth of the barn. The hammer strikes of rain on the roof, echoing through the night, hid the sound of his approach. The cloying darkness of the storm hid the bulk of what he gripped in one hand. He knelt before her and the razor’s edge of lightning flashed white across his granite features.
“You had a lot depending on this harvest,” she guessed.
He said nothing as he reached for her hand. The chilly whisper of metal whisked along her skin.
Raw pain made her eyes tear. The bandage fell away.
There was a clink as Daniel let go of the scissors. “Do you even have any skin left? You need a doctor to look at this.”
How much did a house visit cost? She had no notion. Or if she could pay. “It’s not bad. Just a little blistering.”
“The same way there’s just a little breeze outside.” Instead of scolding her, he uncapped a tin he’d found on a kitchen shelf. “This may sting a bit.”
He bent to his work, ignoring the woman-and-rain scent of her. Ignoring the way soft wisps of her hair danced against his cheek and the satin warmth of her hand in his.
Respect for her expanded inside his chest. Or maybe it was tenderness he felt as he laid a fresh square of clean cotton on her wounds. Tenderness he dared not give thought to as the rain turned to hail, shattering the night.
