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The firelight on Beth’s face set her eyes aglow when she turned to Grayson, and he slid his hand over, wrapped her hand in his, and gave it a squeeze.
“This has been an amazing day.” She leaned in close, her breath sending fiery blazes down his neck. “Look at all these families—they’re having this experience because of us, because of you. This was your brilliant idea.”
He couldn’t help it. The way she looked at him, her confidence, her pride in him—it stirred an unfamiliar, expansive restfulness inside. Both settling and encouraging.
He was in no hurry for the night to end. Didn’t want to think about Vincent’s place or the Klamath horses or anything else.
He just wanted to live in this moment.
But when he finally laid his head against his sleeping bag, a roll of thunder rattled through his bones.
* * *
Oh boy,this had been a bad idea. Beth had never been so cold or wet in her life. She wasn’t sure when her tent had started leaking. All she knew was that she’d woken up to a lake inside of it—one that rivaled Mink Lake itself. She’d slid her feet off her air mattress and plunged them right into the icy surprise.
She’d scrambled to dry off and dress—while on her mat, her very own life raft.
Now, rain slicked off her face and down her neck despite every attempt to snug her poncho tighter. Her teeth chattered so hard she thought they might chip.
When she found Grayson saddling the horses, a hard line cut his brow.
“Sorry I’m late,” she said. “My tent leaked.”
“Yeah, I think they all did.” He gestured with his head. Nearly all the families were huddled under the tree line. “I’m wondering if we should turn back.”
Her heart sank. “Then my job is over—we won’t have funds to keep the camp running. If we push on, we can still make a go of this.”
“Push on to what? No one wants to ride in this, and their tents are soaked through.” Rain sluiced off his hat, punctuating his point.
Yeah, she was soaked through too. “We can shelter and wait for it to pass. I think our best bet is to proceed with riding up the north fork trail. There’s that picnic shelter. We can wait this out under a hard roof.” The shelter wasn’t well maintained, but it was the best they had. “And I sure hope the rain stops. This wasn’t in the forecast.”
“I don’t know, Beth.”
“We can do this. It’ll be fine. The sun’s going to shine and dry out all the tents while we’re gone.” She waved off the wrinkle in his brow and moved Rex forward. “The picnic shelter is closer than trying to ride all the way back. I used it with the camp kayakers last summer.”
He nodded. Opened his mouth to say something. Closed it with a grim press.
This was the real, bona fide ranch trail experience. Good thing they’d treated all the saddles at the beginning of the season to protect the leather.
After everyone had stuffed down their runny eggs and watery sausage, Beth and Grayson pulled lunch from the coolers Robin had left behind to pack into the panniers, then had everyone mount up.
An hour into their ride to the shelter and no part of her was dry yet.
“Is everyone good?” Beth shouted over the monsoon downpour. Head nods and weak thumbs-ups were the responses. Not a smile among them, though. Not even a fake one.
She swallowed, her heart sinking.
Grayson rode to the back of the line, where he took the lead line for his pack string from one of the guests.
Beth wasn’t sure if she’d picked up the pace or if Rex had done that all on his own, but they’d gone from a languid plod to a slow jog-trot. Not even the driving rain could drown out the sound of mud suctioning off hooves with each stride.
She twisted to look behind Rex when they rounded a curve on the trail. The line was spread out now, each rider hanging back to avoid the thick balls of mud kicking up from each horse in front.
So much for their scenic ride.
As if to punctuate her despair, a ball of hail thunked her hat and bounced to the ground, followed by another. And another.
Until they were being pelted by ice balls the size of asteroids.
