PART 2 — THE WIFE WHO DROVE THROUGH THE STORM

The first raindrop struck the wagon windshield just as I reached the northern trail.

Then another.

Within minutes, the sky above the Texas Panhandle had turned almost black.

I тιԍнтened my grip on the reins.

The young ranch hand who had ridden back to warn me was named Caleb. He had insisted on coming along, despite the fact that his left arm was bleeding and his horse was nearly exhausted.

“Mrs. Mercer, we should wait for the storm to pᴀss,” he shouted over the wind.

“And leave three injured men out there?”

He glanced toward the sky.

“Mr. Mercer wouldn’t want you risking yourself.”

I turned to him.

“Mr. Mercer can tell me what he wants when we find him.”

Caleb fell silent.

The trail narrowed as we approached the ravine. Rainwater was already rushing down the slopes, turning the red earth into slick mud. The wagon lurched over stones, and one wheel dropped into a rut so deep that I feared the axle would snap.

I pulled the reins and climbed down.

The wind nearly knocked me sideways.

“Stay with the horses,” I told Caleb.

“Where are you going?”

“To see what we’re dealing with.”

I walked ahead, studying the ground.

My father had taught me to read the land long before Wyatt Mercer ever learned my name. He had owned Willow Creek Valley for thirty years, and every spring he made me accompany him along the creek beds, the cattle paths, and the narrow crossings.

He used to say that land spoke to anyone patient enough to listen.

Now the ground was telling me something.

The usual trail was already flooding.

But twenty yards to the east, an old cattle path climbed toward a shelf of higher ground.

It was longer, rougher, and almost forgotten.

It was also the only route that might get us through.

“Caleb!” I called. “Bring the horses around. We’re taking the eastern path.”

He looked at the narrow track.

“That isn’t a wagon road!”

“It will be today.”

We moved slowly.

The wagon rocked so violently that the medicine chest slid against the sideboards. I caught it before it fell, then tied it down with a length of rope.

The storm grew louder.

By the time we reached the ravine, I could hear men shouting somewhere below.

“Over here!”

I stopped the horses.

A lantern flickered through the rain.

Then I saw them.

Two ranch hands were sheltering beneath a rocky overhang. One had a bandage wrapped around his forehead. The other was holding his injured shoulder.

And farther down the slope, beside a fallen steer, lay Wyatt Mercer.

His horse stood several yards away, trembling and riderless.

Wyatt’s right leg was pinned beneath the animal.

“Wyatt!”

His head turned.

For a moment, his expression showed something I had never seen before.

Relief.

Then his jaw тιԍнтened.

“Clara? What in God’s name are you doing here?”

“Bringing the medicine.”

“You shouldn’t have come.”

“I’ve noticed you have a habit of saying that.”

He tried to move, but pain crossed his face.

“Get these men back to the ranch. The creek is rising.”

I climbed down from the wagon.

“First, we’re getting you out.”

“Clara, listen to me—”

“No. You listen to me. You’ve spent eight days telling me what I cannot do. Today, you can either help me save you or keep talking until the water reaches your boots.”

One of the injured men coughed.

Despite everything, Caleb almost smiled.

Wyatt stared at me.

Then he looked toward the trapped steer.

“What do you need?”

I examined the situation.

The animal was alive but frightened, and the slope beneath it was beginning to soften. We could not simply pull Wyatt free without risking further movement.

“Caleb, bring the wagon rope. Thomas, keep the lantern away from the wet brush. And someone get that animal’s head turned toward the open ground.”

The men moved.

Wyatt watched me give instructions.

Perhaps he expected me to panic.

Perhaps he had imagined that a woman of my size would freeze at the sight of an injured man and a rising flood.

But I had spent fifteen years watching my father struggle through illness. I had learned that fear could wait until the work was finished.

We secured the rope around the steer and guided it away from Wyatt. The animal struggled once, nearly pulling Caleb off his feet, but finally stumbled toward higher ground.

Then we lifted the fallen timber that had trapped Wyatt’s leg.

“On three!” I called.

The men pushed.

Wyatt gritted his teeth.

“One!”

The rain battered our backs.

“Two!”

The timber shifted.

“Three!”

With one final effort, we moved it enough for Wyatt to pull his leg free.

He fell back against the wet earth.

I knelt beside him.

“Can you move your toes?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Any pain in your back?”

“Mostly my pride.”

“That can be treated later.”

I opened the medicine chest and examined his leg. It was badly bruised, and he could not put weight on it. I wrapped it carefully and gave him water.

The other two injured men needed attention as well. One had a deep cut across his forehead; the other had injured his shoulder in the fall.

I cleaned their wounds, secured the bandages, and gave them blankets.

Then a distant rumble rolled across the valley.

Caleb looked toward the ravine.

“Mrs. Mercer…”

The creek had broken its banks.

A wall of muddy water was rushing toward the lower trail.

Our wagon stood on the higher shelf, but the road behind us was disappearing.

“We have to leave,” I said.

Wyatt attempted to stand.

His leg buckled.

I caught his arm.

“Don’t be foolish.”

He looked down at my hand.

“You can’t carry me.”

“I never said I could. That’s what the wagon is for.”

With the men’s help, we got Wyatt onto a blanket and lifted him into the back. The injured ranch hands climbed beside him.

I took the driver’s seat.

Caleb climbed up beside me.

“Which way?” he asked.

I pointed toward the eastern ridge.

“Keep watching the left wheel. If it starts sinking, tell me immediately.”

The wagon moved forward.

The rain was so thick I could barely see the horses’ heads.

Twice, the wheels slipped.

Once, the rear axle struck a buried rock hard enough to make the entire wagon jump.

But the old cattle path held.

We reached the ridge just as the flood swallowed the trail behind us.

For a moment, nobody spoke.

Then Wyatt’s voice came from the back.

“Clara.”

I turned slightly.

“Yes?”

He looked at the water rushing through the ravine.

“You knew that path was there.”

“My father showed it to me.”

“You’ve been here four days.”

“And in those four days, I have learned more about your ranch than you seem to know about your wife.”

He said nothing.

The storm continued for another hour before weakening.

By the time we reached the ranch, the injured men were shivering, Wyatt was pale with pain, and my hands were aching from holding the reins.

But we were alive.

Old Hollis ran from the barn when he saw the wagon.

“Lord above! What happened?”

“Get the doctor,” I said. “And bring H๏τ water, clean sheets, and every blanket you can find.”

Then I looked toward the kitchen.

The food I had prepared that morning was still waiting.

The stew was warm.

The biscuits were covered.

And for the first time since I had entered Wyatt Mercer’s house, nobody questioned whether I belonged there.

That evening, after the doctor had examined the injured men and settled Wyatt in his bedroom, I returned to the kitchen.

I was washing the mud from my hands when I heard footsteps behind me.

Wyatt stood in the doorway, leaning heavily on a crutch.

“You should be resting,” I said.

“So should you.”

“I’ll rest when the kitchen is finished.”

He looked at the stove, the clean counters, and the covered pots.

Then he said something that surprised me.

“I was wrong.”

I turned.

“About what?”

“About you.”

I dried my hands.

“That is a beginning, Mr. Mercer. Not an apology.”

His eyes lowered.

Before he could answer, someone knocked at the front door.

Hollis opened it.

A stranger stood on the porch, soaked from the rain and holding a leather document case.

“I’m looking for Wyatt Mercer,” he announced. “I have papers concerning the ownership of Willow Creek Valley.”

Wyatt’s face changed.

The stranger stepped inside and placed a folded document on the table.

“I’m afraid there’s been a development,” he said. “A claim has been filed against the valley.”

I recognized the handwriting on the envelope.

It belonged to my father’s old attorney.

And the name written beneath the seal made my blood run cold.

Elias Vane.

The man who had tried to buy my father’s land before he died.