hands, and lifted her down from the buggy.
“I’ve…I’ve also discovered the detriment of
riding astride for three hours when one is not accustom to doing
so,” Briney explained as Bethanne and Mrs. Kelley continued to
stare at her, with mouths agape.
Briney watched as Bethanne and her mother
exchanged worried glances for a moment. But she was entirely
startled when, all at once, the two women burst into laughter.
“Oh, you poor dear thing!” Bethanne
commiserated through her giggles. “I’m so sorry…and I know exactly
how you feel.” She laughed a bit more and then added, “And I’m not
laughin’ because of your misery, Briney—just because, as I said,
I’ve done the same thing…more than once, in fact.”
“Oh, me too!” Mrs. Kelley added. “I don’t
know what gets into a body sometimes, that we lose track of what
circumstances might arise from gettin’ lost in the beauty of the
day.” She turned to Bethanne and asked, “Remember last summer, when
we had all that rain and the mosquitoes were so bad?”
“Mmm hmmm,” Bethanne affirmed, giggling as
she nodded.
Mrs. Kelley looked back to Briney and
explained, “Oh, it was a beautiful sunset one night, and I just
couldn’t resist sittin’ out on the back porch to watch it. But when
I woke up the next mornin’, I was covered in bites. I mean,
covered! I was so miserable—for days, I was miserable—and so
swollen with mosquito bites a body woulda thought I had one ghastly
disease or another.”
“Mama looked like she’d been covered in pink
polka dots, that’s for certain,” Bethanne said, smiling.
Mrs. Kelley stepped down from the front porch
of the boardinghouse. “So you don’t worry a bit, Briney,” she said.
“This isn’t anything that a warm bath and a bit of extra rest won’t
take care of. Isn’t that right, Gunner?”
“That’s right, Mrs. Kelley,” Gunner agreed.
Briney glanced up at Gunner, her stomach bursting with butterflies
as he smiled and winked at her. He was so handsome! So capable, so
strong, so the stuff of fantasy!
“You’ll be good as new soon enough, Miss
Thress,” he said. “And then you and me can see to Sassafras’s
official sale and change of ownership, all right?”
“All right,” Briney answered.
Gunner nodded and smiled at Briney. Then he
looked to Mrs. Kelley, saying, “I was hopin’ you might have some
peach pie just lyin’ around somewhere, Mrs. Kelley. I haven’t been
able to think of anythin’ else all mornin’ long.”
Sylvia Kelley’s eyes widened with the delight
of being flattered. “Of course I do, Gunner. You come on into the
kitchen with me and sit down for a piece.” She looked to her
daughter, adding, “Bethanne, why don’t you draw a tepid bath in the
bathhouse for Briney? Let her have a good long soak to ease those
weary muscles of hers, hmmm?”
“Of course, Mama,” Bethanne cheerfully
agreed. “It’ll give me and Briney a chance to catch up.” Bethanne
looked to Briney—who stood exactly where she’d been standing since
the moment Gunner lifted her down from the buggy. “Because it seems
you did, indeed, find a horse to your likin’, didn’t you?”
“Oh, I certainly did at that,” Briney said,
smiling with joy in knowing Gunner had promised Sassafras to her.
She could still imagine the way his hand had felt when he’d taken
hers in shaking it in assurance that he would sell Sassafras to her
and no one else. The memory caused goose pimples to race over her
arms.
Standing there looking up at him, Briney was
paralyzed in a state of awe. How could it be that the alluring
man’s voice that had so comforted her over the past week or more
belonged to the Horseman—the man who would fulfill her dreams of
owning her own horse? How could it be that this same man was so
uniquely handsome as well? How could it be that his simplest
touch—or even the thought of his touch—could send her heart racing
and turn her knees to syrup?
Oh, Briney well
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