Chase the Storm by V.m Waitt Read Free Book Online

allowing me to stay in the same room with him, I washed my hands and arms before going to his side. While he cooked, I chopped, stealingglances at himwhenever I could.
“How’s your hand?”
Blushing, I answered, “Fine.”
Dinner went about as well as it had the night before, almost silent and stillno signofOwen, or anyone else for that matter. Chase pushed his plate awayand sipped his beer.
Takinga chance, I spoke up. “Canyouteachme how to ride?”
He coughed, quickly covering his mouth with the back of his hand before draggingit across. “Excuse me?”he choked.
“I want to learnhow to ride.”
“Ride….”
“Yeah.” I nodded. “Something I’ve always wanted to learn since I was a kid, but there aren’t manyhorses inthe city.”
“Horses… right,”he murmured softly.
“So, willyouteachme?”
Sighing, he stood and brought his dishes to the sink, where he placed his hands and hung his head. When his shoulders hunched and his eyes closed, I worried I’d said something wrong and was trying his patience again. I was just about to get up and leave whenhe lifted his head.
“Ifwe get the work done bysix, I’llgive youlessons before dinner.” “Seriously?”
“Onlyifthe work is done,”he reminded me.
“Thanks,”I said, smiling.
“Whydon’t youwashup and go to bed. We’ve got a longdayinthe field tomorrow, about two hundred acres readyfor baling.”
Without doing the dishes, he walked out of the room and down the hall. I heard a door close at the end, and then it was still. I went upstairs and did as he suggested, taking a long, hot shower and scrubbing every inch of me. My back ached, my hands had more blisters than I could count, my entire upper body was sunburned, and my arms hurt so badly I couldn’t lift themto washmyhair, and it’d onlybeentwo days.
I’d never felt better.
After drying off, I returned to my room and put on a pair of underwear before laying back and covering myself with the thin blanket. Turning off the light, I let the sounds of nature outside my window lull me to sleep.
    P
ERCHED on the tractor he’d been working on the day before, Chase steered while looking behind him, his eyes trained on the hay baler he was pulling. I’d been up since four thirty, though it’d been even harder to drag my ass out of bed than the day before. After we’d fed the horses and put them out, he showed me how to drive the tractor and gave me a brief description on how baling hay worked. I listened carefully, but most of what he said went over myhead.
    The acres had already been cut and the hay had dried in the summer heat. Chase attached the baler to the back ofthe large tractor and had me walk behind it. As the baler spit out a bale of hay, I had to make sure it dropped all the way to the ground and the twine was tight. Droplets of sweat ran down my face and chest, and, having taken off my shirt long ago, hay stuck to me everywhere. He announced the next day would be spent going through the same field, loading the bales onto the trailer and theninto the loft. It was a never endingprocess.
    It was after eight at night bythe time we finished the horses and went inside. I was almost too tired to eat, but when he put a plate of steak and rice in front of me, I inhaled it. When he looked up, he found me grinning at himfromacross the island.
    “What’s the grinfor?”he asked roughlyand withno grinofhis own. “I made it past two days,”I announced proudly.
“Now let’s see ifyoucanmake it a week,”he challenged lowly. “I will,”I said confidently.
There was no wayI wouldn’t.
    The next two days were a blur ofhay, horses, sawdust, and manure. Chase gave me a longer to-do list every morning, and somehow I managed to finish it every night before collapsing onto my bed. Much to his entertainment, I’d even dozed off during dinner, waking up when he nudged me as he cleared the dishes. At least I hadn’t face-planted in the food.
T
HE first Sunday I was there, something strange happened. It