River Lady Read online

  While Leah cleaned up from the meal, Kim announced that it was time for Leah to ride with Steven and from now on she’d be Wesley’s fiancée and Leah his cousin. She seemed to think there’d be some protest, but there was none.

  Leah climbed onto the wagon beside Steven. He made one comment about how he’d be glad to replace Wes if she felt any urges, but when he got no response from Leah, he took the reins and shut up.

  At night, while Leah prepared supper, Wes rode to the nearest inn, and when he returned he reported that the place was too filthy to inhabit and they’d camp with the wagons. Kim sniffed about how she needed a bath, so Wes hauled buckets of water, heated them, hung a blanket screen, and prepared a bath for Kim. She conveniently lit a lamp behind the blanket so everyone around was treated to a silhouette of Kim’s languorous bath.

  “No screams of jealousy?” Steven said to Leah under his breath as Wes watched Kim in obvious rapture.

  Leah didn’t bother to answer as she cleared the supper dishes.

  The next morning dawned hot, and Leah unbuttoned the top of her dress.

  “Is that for me or him?” Steven asked. “If it’s for Stanford you may as well close it. All he’s interested in is my sister and she’s an expert at keeping a man tailing after her. You ought to learn something from her. Never be too honest, at least not with gentlemen like Stanford. He’d rather look at a woman from behind a blanket. But you and me,” he said with a chuckle, “we like skin.”

  He clucked to the horses and they were off.

  Leah tried to still her trembling. She prayed she was not like Steven Shaw.

  Toward noon they had to ford a river. The water, heavy with spring melts, was over the hub of the wheels.

  “If we take it slowly we’ll be able to make it,” Wes informed Steven as they all stood on the bank.

  “I’m frightened, Wesley,” Kim said, clutching his arm.

  “Don’t be.” He smiled. “We’ll come through this. What about you, Leah, scared?”

  “No,” she said flatly. “I think we’ll make it. Others have before us.”

  “I knew you’d feel that way,” Wes said before turning away.

  “Hallo!” came a man’s voice from across the water. A tall, slim man in buckskins similar to Wesley’s waved at them.

  “It’s Justin Stark,” Wes said, smiling. “He’ll be traveling with us.”

  Leah paid no attention to the man waiting on the far side but turned back to the wagons.

  Wesley eased his wagon and horses into the water with utmost care. The horses shied, but Wes controlled them.

  “He’s afraid!” Steven said contemptuously. “He’s scared to risk his hide. Hiyah!” he called to the horses, cracking his whip over their heads.

  “No!” Leah said. “Wait until they’re across.”

  “I’m not spendin’ all day here and I’ll not let that Stark fellow think I’m a coward.”

  Steven whipped the horses forward into the deep water.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Wesley bellowed back at them.

  “Not eatin’ your mud,” Steven called as he pulled alongside Wes’s wagon.

  “Keep to the right! Keep to the right!” the man on the land shouted at them.

  Leah, hanging onto the seat with both hands, repeated the man’s instructions to Steven, but Steven ignored her as he cracked the whip again.

  The right front horse stepped into an underwater nothingness, screamed, and pulled the other horses after him. The heavy wagon tipped to one side and Steven went flying into the water. Leah released her hold on the seat and grabbed two flying reins as Steven released them. The others fell to the side.

  “Keep a tight rein!” the man on land shouted. “Control that horse!”

  Leah tried to obey him, wrapping the reins around her arm while trying to ease down far enough in the seat to get the dangling reins.

  “Help her, Wes!” the man shouted. “Let that woman drive and help the redhead!”

  Leah barely heard the man’s shouts as her fingers inched toward the reins. She screamed once, when the frightened horses pulled until her arm nearly came off.

  “Leah!” she heard Wesley shout but couldn’t understand what he was saying because Kimberly had started to scream hysterically.

  Quick tears of relief blinded Leah for just a second when her fingers tightened over the loose reins. Using every ounce of her strength she managed to control the frightened horses, pull the wagon to the right past the deepest part of the hole, and inch them toward the far bank.

  The stranger from the shore swam toward her. “Good girl. Now hold them steady.”

  “Steven!” Leah yelled down at him as the horses touched land. Even while the back of the wagon was still in the water, Leah was pulling off her shoes. She’d always been a strong swimmer and now she wondered if the others realized Steven had fallen into the river.

  “Here!” Leah gasped, tossing the man the reins just before she jumped down from the wagon and into the water.

  “What the hell—!” the man began and then gave his attention to the horses.

  “Where’s Leah going?” Wesley demanded of the man.

  “She yelled something about Steven.”

  “He’s not here?” Wes said, but was in the water after Leah in seconds.

  Leah dived for what seemed to her like hours, but there was no sign of Steven. Wesley and the stranger joined her after a few minutes, and when she surfaced she told them where she’d already looked.

  Near dusk they found him, lying at the bottom at the edge of the river, the side of his head dented from his fall. Wesley pulled him onto land.

  Leah stood over him, panting, exhausted from the afternoon’s search. After the first hour she’d discarded her dress, since the long skirt hampered her. Now, in her dripping underwear, she was too cold, too tired to care about proprieties.

  Wesley, seeing Justin looking at Leah, removed his shirt and slipped it over her, concealing her almost to her knees.

  “No! No! No!” screamed Kimberly as she came toward them, her eyes on her brother’s body.

  Wesley moved away from Leah to comfort Kim in her grief and, if possible, Leah’s shoulders drooped even more. Kim and Wes walked away into the growing darkness, Kim’s sobs breaking the nighttime stillness.

  For a moment neither the stranger nor Leah spoke.

  “You ought to get into some dry clothes,” the man said softly, watching her.

  Leah merely nodded once and stood there, shivering.

  The man moved closer to her. “I’m Justin Stark and you’re—?”

  Leah couldn’t even answer him as she stared down at Steven’s cold, lifeless body. Tears began to roll down her cheeks.

  Without another word, Justin swept Leah into his arms.

  She tried to pull away, but she was too weak, or perhaps she needed comfort, even from a stranger.

  “Go ahead and cry, little girl,” Justin whispered. “Anybody as brave as you deserves to cry.”

  Leah wasn’t sure where all the tears came from—or why they came—but she began to cry as she’d never cried before. It was so good to be close to someone, to be held in a man’s strong arms.

  When the man unbuckled a blanket from his horse, Leah was hardly aware of it. Even when he gently removed her wet clothing she didn’t protest. He wrapped her nude, wet body in the blanket, snuggled her against him, and sat with her on a fallen log. At some time he began to rock her and Leah gradually stopped crying, but she clung to him. Even when she fell into a deep sleep, she still clung to him.

  “Is she asleep?” Wesley whispered to Justin.

  Justin nodded. “You have a bed made up for her?”

  Wes glanced at his boot toe. “I only made one for Kim. Leah usually makes her own bed.” Justin didn’t say another word and Wes disappeared for several minutes. “It’s ready,” he said when he returned.

  Very carefully Justin stood while holding the sleeping Leah, and as if she were a fragile piece