The Renegades: Cole by Dellin Genell

Author:Dellin, Genell [Dellin, Genell]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780062250056
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2012-10-30T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 10

The next afternoon when they headed north to find Cookie and send the chuck wagon on to make camp, the wind rose in a sudden, whistling gale. It made the horses dance sideways and Aurora grab her hat to tighten its strings beneath her chin before it finally, gradually lowered to the boisterous force it had been all day, blowing steadily against every step they made. Scattered drops of rain slapped their faces.

“That’s all we need—a downpour for camp tonight,” Aurora said wearily.

“Ah, now, what’s a little rain? I’d think you’d like that better than a gunfight.”

“I would. I’d get more sleep, even in a flood, than I did last night,” she said.

“Nobody’s fault but your own,” he said. “I was on guard right outside your wagon.”

“It wasn’t that,” she said. “I wasn’t scared. I was just …”

Thinking about you. Remembering your kiss. Wishing for the feel of your hands …

“Just what?”

“Thinking about the advice you gave me. Remembering I can do anything I think I can.”

But he wasn’t listening to her, wasn’t even looking at her anymore.

“That storm’s coming on fast,” he said, raising his voice as the wind picked up again.

She followed his gaze to the west, to the tops of the mountains forming that side of the Raton Pass.

“Welcome to New Mexico Territory,” she said wryly.

The scudding clouds were mixing and gathering, their gray and dark blue mixing with the purple and red rays of the lowering sun. Lightning flashed low, not far above the green pines.

“This could be a wild one,” he said thoughtfully.

“Maybe we should hold the herd north of the pass,” she said, although he was already lifting his horse into a lope, and she knew he’d had the same thought.

“Yeah. Out here they’ve got too much room to run.”

The wind rose again in a shrieking rush and howled a warning into her ear. A small, cold knot she’d discovered newly formed in her stomach grew larger.

They pushed the horses faster.

“Thank God we changed horses this afternoon,” she called to him, and Cole nodded, pulling his hat down harder on his head.

So he felt it, too. Tired as the cattle were, this storm was going to be bad enough to make them run.

They picked up the pace, but they were too late. Border Crossing pointed his nose at the sky and whinnied long and loud to the remuda, coming out of the pass at that very moment right behind Cookie’s wagon, then Nate’s.

Aurora and Cole moved as one person, going into a long lope at the same moment, looking constantly west at the rising storm. But there was no time.

The whole southwestern sky went black while they looked at it, the lightning cracked faster and faster, breaking like gunshots through the noise of the wind. They were closer now, within a half mile, maybe, coming closer to the end of the pass, but then Brindle and Lead Steer burst into view at a quick, hard trot, leading the whole herd south as if their very lives depended on getting out into the wide-open spaces.

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