Forget Me Not (27 page)

J.D. sidled closer to her, pinning her between the horses so he could hand her Peaches's reins. The mare shifted its weight, and Josephine worried about how she'd mount up. Her legs weren't long enough.

Leaning forward, J.D. dropped the reins into her hand. Peaches started walking, taking Josephine along.

“Quit that,” J.D. reprimanded the horse, taking the side of its bridle and putting an end to its motion. Then he gazed at Josephine, who stood mutely there holding the reins. “Mount up.”

“I've never gotten on this kind of saddle before.”

J.D. held Peaches at bay while instructing Josephine. “You're on the right side. You always mount up on her left. Put your left boot in the stirrup and swing yourself into the saddle.”

Josephine struggled with the reins and lifted her leg. She couldn't reach the stirrup. At the academy, they'd had mounting blocks.

J.D. jumped down so he could assist her. “Wrap those reins around the horn, and get them out of your way.”

She did so as he squatted down slightly so that he could grip her calf.

“Push up.”

She tried but lost her balance when J.D. picked her foot up to lead it toward the stirrup.

“Put your hand on my shoulder,” he ordered.

Her fingers fell on his collar, brushing the hair that curled softly.

“Push up,” he said again. Then she felt his hands on her derriere, and he was propelling her upward before she could react to the intimate contact and become flustered over it.

She would have sailed right over the saddle had he not caught her by her upper arm and held her in place. Fumbling for the saddle horn, she fervently clutched the hard tab of leather. Her legs were spread apart, and the hard leather of the saddle rubbed next to her inner thighs. This wasn't a position she was used to or felt comfortable in.

J.D. had his hand cupped over her knee. She hadn't been aware of it until he gave her upper leg a playful slap, then turned away while saying, “Get ahold of those reins.”

The heavy leather felt peculiar in her grasp without gloves. She correctly positioned them in her hand so they made a nice, even droop on either side of Peaches's neck. She couldn't get used to the dangle of
her legs against the mare's wide girth, but her feet seemed to fit all right in the stirrups.

“Keep to my right,” J.D. said, then kneed his white horse into motion.

She didn't have to knee Peaches. The mare followed along quite nicely in a trot that Josephine settled into, and she became more at ease.

Soon, they caught up to the men at the head of the cattle, and J.D. called for her to ride up to him and stop.

“We're going on to the banks,” J.D. informed Gus. “Start spreading them out. Lead cattle downstream, so the drags get clear water when they come in.”

“It's covered, boss.”

J.D. nodded and surged ahead, Josephine close behind. She was finding out that riding astride was easier than sidesaddle. She had a better grip, but in this position her behind didn't sit firmly on the leather, and she bounced a bit.

They came to a marginally wide river with sand sloping up the banks. Assorted pines fringed the area, a verdant canopy entirely different from the drab they'd left behind after breaking camp. There were several tiny pools made by impressions in the sparkling gray granite. They didn't appear to be deep, and, with the shallow depths, surely the water had to be warm. Sunlight glistened off the surface, so inviting that Josephine longed to get her feet wet.

J.D. turned left and followed the water downstream to a spacious meadow rich with grass.

Stopping, J.D. faced her. “We'll make bed ground here and camp where we came from.”

That was fine with Josephine.

“We'll go back, and I want you positioned upstream. When Gus starts bringing in the leads, don't let any of them get past you and try for the water at your back. You got that?”

“How do you propose I fend them off?”

“Ride in front of any strays, and get them going back in the right direction. Peaches is a good cutting horse. She knows how to head 'em off. You just have to tell her where to go.”

Josephine had no more opportunity for last-minute guidance. The chuck wagon approached, and directly behind it came the herd. The cows cried and hollered, most taking the grade at a run. The boys had their work cut out for them, dodging and chasing those animals that took it upon themselves to leave the mass and get out on their own to be the first ones to take a drink.

J.D. whistled between his teeth, and Toby shot from the pack in a black-and-white blur, ready to follow J.D. and pick up the slack. Josephine held her stance, Peaches pawing the soft earth. The mare was determined to do its job, and Josephine didn't have a moment to think about the situation before she was forced to react to it.

A brown-and-white painted cow came hurtling toward her, and she had to rein Peaches sharply to the left and hold on as the mare jumped into action. Her hat flew off her head, but she didn't give it a second's thought. As soon as Peaches had the cow back with the others, another slipped free, and the mare was after that one, too.

This went on for an undeterminable length of time. Josephine developed cramps in both her sides, and in tenderer spots of her anatomy she ached cruelly. When at last the herd was stretched out along the Reliance River farther than her eyes could see, J.D. came toward her on his horse.

Tipping his hat at her, he said, “You did all right, Jo.”

His compliment surprised her, but his calling her a nickname did so even more. She had never been addressed as Jo her entire life. Perhaps now J.D. considered her one of the boys since she hadn't fallen
off Peaches or ridden in the wrong direction. Regardless, she wasn't sure how she felt about being one of the boys in J.D.'s eyes. She rather liked it when he looked at her as a woman.

But in a sweeping gaze at her shirtfront and pants, she saw she was splattered with freckles of mud. And she wouldn't doubt some cow droppings were mixed in there somewhere.

She did look like a man, and she smelled like a cow. It was no wonder J.D. called her Jo.

Obligated to reply, Josephine murmured, “I just held on, and Peaches did the work.”

J.D. gave her a smile that would have caused several ladies to swoon in the finest salons. “Don't discredit yourself. You know how to stay in a saddle.”

Josephine glanced to the chuck wagon in the distance. Boots and Rio were in a conversation next to it while the wrangler held on to a shovel and dug out some pits for the fire. Wanting nothing better than to strip down to her underwear and sink into one of the pools, Josephine had to put that thought on hold and resign herself to standing and cooking for the next couple of hours.

As if J.D. could read her mind, he said, “We can have cold roast and biscuits for dinner. We're all going swimming as soon as the herd settles in. You can join us if you want.”

Without hesitation, Josephine replied, “I'll tell Rio not to chop the wood yet.”

J.D.'s soft laughter followed her as she steered Peaches in the direction of the wagon. His voice stayed with her and she replayed his earlier words.
You did all right, Jo.
Even if he had referred to her as one of the boys, at least he'd given her his approval. Josephine was immensely pleased with herself.

“Forget about the wood for a while,” Josephine said to Rio with a grin. “It's a cold dinner today. We're all going swimming.”

“What in the hell would we want to do that for?” Boots wanted to know.

“To clean up,” she replied, undaunted by his sour tone.

Josephine swung her leg over Peaches's rump and slid out of the saddle, her stomach pressed against the mare's belly. Both feet hit the ground, and a nerve-splitting current raced through her body. She was so stiff and numb that once she dismounted, she could barely move. She hobbled toward Rio with the reins in her hand, but each step was agony.

“You look a little sore there, cookie,” Boots said around the cigar in his mouth. “We got liniment in the cupboard for your fanny.”

She shot him an angled gaze. “I don't need any.”

Boots chuckled.

Josephine frowned. She hated it when he was right.

•  •  •

J.D. leaned his back against a rock with a smoke clamped between his lips, enjoying the pulse of spring water being parted by his long john-covered chest. No doubt about it, the water was damn cold; but near the surface, the temperature was warm enough to be tolerated, and these pools weren't all that deep. Besides, J.D. would have lain back in one even if ice was floating by. At least long enough to scrub up with a bar of soap—which he'd already done.

He'd washed his clothes, scrubbed his underwear with him in it, then lathered his body and face. He meant to shave once he got out.

Around him, the boys frolicked in the shallows, while some were submerged in the little pools like himself. The mood was considerably lighter than it had been in days. Even Birdie had gotten his feet wet up to his knees before taking a spot in the sun with the whiskey bottle. J.D. had seen no reason not to let the man have his due. Birdie had ridden hard today, and if he wanted to get drunk for his time, that was fine by
J.D. Under normal circumstances, liquor wouldn't have been tolerated, but with Birdie's broken arm there were allowances to make.

A jay swooped past, and J.D. followed it with his gaze toward the section of stream that was around a bend and secluded. That was where Josephine had gone off to. After everyone had eaten a plate of dinner, she'd walked on shaky legs, with a blanket over her arm, her valise, and a bar of soap in her hand.

J.D. had watched her walk with such a favor to her stride that he'd felt bad for her. Because she'd be feeling a lot worse come tomorrow morning when all the soreness really set in.

But if he'd had to do it again, he would have had her on Peaches once more. He'd needed the extra hand, and this time there weren't any casualties when the herd had gone for water. She'd been a real asset.

“Y'all don't get me started on them Yankee bastards.”

Boots's exclamation drew J.D.'s attention. Once Boots got on the subject of Yankees, there was no stopping him.

“I saw one coming down the road at our place, and I met that damn blue-bellied abolitionist with a shot straight in his fat paunch. He laid in the brush and bawled like a steer for three days before he died in a fit. The yellow-striped scum.”

J.D. knew of no such incident. It was a span of time neither he nor Boots ever talked about. J.D. hadn't filled him in on what he'd done with the Confederacy, nor had Boots told him what had happened to the plantation while he was gone. J.D. knew some from Eugenia. His mother had told him Boots was never without a pistol strapped to his waist when he went out to watch his cotton fields go fallow from neglect.

“Them gawddamn Texans is full of it when it comes to knowing what happened in the war. Cowards, every last one of them good-for-nothing Rawhides.”
Boots had dragged his rickety crate near the shore and was whittling. The shavings scattered across his lap.

Rawhide
was a derogatory term for the Texas cowhands who had a habit of mending whatever broke down or fell apart on the trail—from a bridle to a wagon tongue—by tying it up with strips of rawhide. J.D. saw no call to be labeling the hands from other regions; he'd done enough fighting in the war, and it had gotten him nowhere.

“Did you really shoot a man in the gut, Boots?” Ace asked, scooping up handfuls of water and rinsing off the soap from his shoulders.

“Yes. And I could shoot a sidewinder going backwards.” Boots laid the whittling in his lap, drew the gun from his holster, and took aim.
Click.
The empty chamber sounded like a stick snapping in two. “Gawddammit all to hell.” J.D. was the recipient of a disgusted snort. “How am I supposed to show these boys some fine shooting when I don't have any bullets?”

“Don't need any bullets, Boots. There are no blue-bellies out here.”

Without a retort, Boots rammed the revolver back into his holster and took up with his whittling. A frown as deep as a canyon stretched across his weathered forehead.

J.D. slathered the bar of soap across his fabric-clad chest, took another puff of his cigarette nub, then tossed it downriver. Working up a good lather in his hands, he washed his hair, then slid below the water's surface to rinse. He came up feeling better than he had in days.

Standing, he got out of the river. He sludged through the murky shallows and went past Boots, who looked up and began to laugh.

“What in the hell do you call that?”

J.D. knew without asking what Boots was referring to. He'd left his hat on the shore, along with the clean clothes he'd washed.

“Y'all've sprouted a flower garden.”

J.D. glared at the cowboys and dared them to make a comment. Grabbing a blanket, he wrapped it around his middle to ward off the chill seeping through his skin to his bones. Then he decided to check on Josephine.

Not that he had any intentions of spying on her.

He believed a man, or a woman, was due some privacy when the need called. And in this case, Josephine was due some to herself. In three days' time, she'd proved she could hold up. J.D. merely wanted to make sure she was where she was headed and not halfway downstream into the Utah Territory.

With Josephine, he could never tell what was on her mind. Or Rio's, for that matter. He'd slowly inched his way toward Josephine's little spot in the trees around the bend, until J.D. had lost sight of him some minutes back.

So it wasn't spying on J.D.'s mind; it was putting together where Rio had gone and making sure he wasn't where he shouldn't be.

Skirting a patch of larkspur, J.D. came upon a thicket of birches dense enough to give a man cover but thin enough to view through. Rio Cibolo had positioned himself so as not to be seen on the other side and was peeking between the young branches.