Chapter 12
Liv
With a yawn, I stretched, a sense of emptiness waking me. I rubbed my eyes and sat up, pushing the blanket back. Checking my watch, I was shocked to find it was already seven. I must have fallen asleep again, which was strange because I barely slept at home.
I looked around for Hudson, but the house was empty. With a peek out of the front curtains, I saw the lights on in the barn, confirming my thought that he’d gone out to check on the horses. Being out there with him, working side by side, had cracked my foundation, leaving me confused.
Mucking stalls. That was not something an Icinda did, and I could just hear my father berating me for it.
Perfection was what he strove for, and his children were a model of it.
There had never been a time when he had let us be children.
Only our mother had done that, letting us run in the sand and play with our toys outside of our rooms. Always when he was away, and if we left a single toy out, there were repercussions.
Not to Mama. She was the only one he had never hurt.
Not with words or hands, but he had hurt her even if he hadn’t realized it, by raising his hand to Gabe and aiming razor-sharp words at me. Words that had left their damage.
A boom of thunder broke the quiet, and I jumped.
I’d always hated thunderstorms, crawling into bed with Gabe when we were little until our father found out and left a bruise so big on Gabe that Mama had cried for days.
The words he had slung at me about what a baby I was, useless and weak, had left wounds that were not visible.
I was a typical girl afraid of stupid things that a boy would never fear.
I’d never let him see that fear again, staying in my bed when it stormed and throwing the blankets over my head, curled in a ball until the noise stopped.
When I met Hudson, he would fold me into his arms and hold me tight, counting between thunder strikes until the storm passed. He was the only one who ever knew thunderstorms still scared me.
I dropped the curtain, seeing that his boots and the raincoat that had hung on the rack were gone.
He was out there, and a sudden desire to be close to him overtook me.
I considered putting my new boots on, but didn’t want to ruin them—the rain was coming down heavy.
I ran to the back of the house, where he had put Jessie’s boots in the laundry room, and tugged them on.
Maybe being here was causing my sanity to tip because going into a rainstorm was not my idea of fun.
Getting messy was not either, and yet here I was inviting it.
I dug around in the drawer where the boots had been and found a yellow rain jacket with flowers on it.
Jessie. Damn, the woman had left her stuff everywhere like a claim on him.
Married or not, the remnants of her bothered me.
Knowing Hudson, he’d never thought about it and just stuffed the things away.
Or maybe she and her husband came over. He’d said she used the boots when she went riding.
I contemplated that idea, and how jealousy was the first emotion that had surfaced when, really, it may have been innocent.
Not her attempt to keep another woman away from him or anything intentional.
It was my mind that had made it something more.
Envy that he had belonged to someone else when he had once been mine.
I pulled the jacket on, unsure of why I had a sudden need to hurry out of the house and into the storm. Preservation should have been at the forefront of my mind, but it wasn’t. I opened the door, yanking the hood up over my hair, and ran into the rain.
It was coming down in sheets, stinging my face like pellets of ice.
I ducked my head down, questioning when I’d thrown caution to the wind.
Rain soaked into my pants, and my boots sank in muddy puddles.
Where the gravel driveway ended, water was streaming from the field like a river.
From where I stood, it was only about three feet wide, but as it traveled south, it widened.
Hopping over it, I landed firmly on my feet, laughing at how I must have looked.
Laughing? I didn’t laugh. Thunder roared, and I quickened my pace, forgetting the laughter.
By the time I reached the barn, my jeans were soaked, and the wind had torn my hood back so my hair hung in thick wet strands that stuck to my face.
“Olivia, what the hell are you doing out here?” Hudson turned on me the moment he saw me step into the barn.
What was I doing there? A whim to be nearer to him? It wasn’t something I would admit, so I said, “I thought I should help.”
A complete lie and another rumble of thunder made me jump again. He shook his head and sighed.
“I appreciate the offer, even if it is very unlike you.” I pouted, throwing my hands on my hips, a look he ignored as he continued, “But I’m finished. Go back inside.”
He tossed his gloves in the bucket across from the horses before returning to the one he called Honey and gently rubbing her muzzle. I shook the water off me, feeling like a wet dog, and went over to the other horse. She hesitated before she let me pet her.
“She’s shaking,” I said, finally finding my voice.
“They don’t like the storm.”
“Will they be okay out here? There’s a lot of water out there.”
He looked over at me, his brows scrunching. “Already?”
“Yeah. I had to hop over a stream.”
Concern crossed his features. “We need to get you back inside. The house is up high enough, and the barn is on a raised foundation, so there shouldn’t be any flooding in here.”
“We could stay a little longer,” I said, rubbing my hand over the horse’s mane. There was something soothing about horses that had always calmed me.
“No, I need you inside where I know you’re safe.”
My head whipped to him, but he looked away, averting my eyes like he knew he’d slipped.
“I would have thought you’d leap at the chance to get rid of me,” I replied, focusing back on the horse.
“I never said that. Let’s go.”
He walked past me, and I nuzzled my face against the horse’s before I followed.
“Where did you get that rain jacket?”
“In your Jessie keepsake drawer,” I taunted.
He shot me a look over his shoulder, his eyes dark. “That’s not what that is.”
I shrugged as he opened the door. His curses had my alarms going off.
“I want you to run to the house. That water is rising and moving fast. If it catches you, I don’t know if I can grab you fast enough.”
“What?” I snapped, my eyes flying to his. “Grab me? Why would you need to grab me?”
I’d just crossed the water and been fine, but the stream had widened in the short time I’d been in the barn.
“Because water moves fast.”
“How is that an answer?” I asked as he pushed me through the door.
“Run, Olivia.”
“I don’t run, Hudson.” I had run partway to the barn, but I would never admit that.
He snatched my elbow and dragged me with him, my feet struggling to catch up with his long strides. The wind was vicious, biting at me as it sent my hair snapping like a live wire.
I tugged my arm away and took a step right into the stream, not realizing the water was moving so hard it had left a divot.
My balance tipped, and I went over, caught in a tide of water that sent me tumbling.
I screamed, a sound I had never heard from myself, right before I slid into a deeper tide of water that swept me down the property.
Fear collapsed on me, and I clawed at the ground, trying to gain purchase but failing as the water continued to push me further from Hudson, just as life had done.
“Olivia!” he yelled, running after me. I saw only flickers of him between the flashes of water and darkness. “You need to grab the tree to your left, but don’t hit it!”
What that meant, I didn't have the capacity to figure out as I struggled to keep the water from filling my mouth.
“Now, Olivia!” I heard him bellow. “To your left!”
I reached out, my hand smacking into the tree with a force that rattled my bones, but I ignored it as I fought to hold on to it.
Bark scraped at my arm where my sleeve had rolled up, but my head was above the water.
Right before my strength gave out, Hudson’s hand caught me.
He roared as he pulled me from the water and into his arms, where I clung to him, not caring what it looked like.
My body shook uncontrollably as he smoothed his hand over my drenched hair, saying, “I’ve got you. You’re safe.”
And the resounding truth of those words had me burying my head into his chest and letting him carry me back up the slope to his house.
I didn’t let go until he dropped my feet to the bathroom floor and unpeeled my arms from his.
I stood there shivering, my teeth chattering so hard the sound reverberated.
Hudson turned the water on and returned to me, tugging my jacket off.
He grabbed my face, his eyes scouring it. “Are you okay?”
I nodded, even though I wasn’t entirely sure I was.
“Is anything broken or hurt?”
This time, a headshake because my brain had yet to connect to my mouth. Not until he took the hem of my shirt and pulled it up.
“What are you doing?” I asked between convulsing shakes.
“You’re drenched and mud-caked.” He pulled a small branch from my hair to support his claim. “And I need to get you cleaned up before we can check for any injuries.”
“I’m fine,” I said, pushing the shirt down.
“You need to wash up, Olivia.” Holding my arm up, he brushed the mud away, and I winced, yanking it back. “You’re injured, and I need you clean to see where those wounds are so I can treat them.”
“I can wash up myself.” I went to remove my boot, but my legs were still too weak, and I tumbled. Hands caught me, and a frown greeted me when I looked up.
“Let me help.”
Huffing, I relented, letting him pull the boots off while I rested on his broad shoulders, trying not to picture what they looked like below his rain jacket and the shirt underneath it.