Under the Open Sky (Montana Heritage Series) (14 page)

             
Cade chuckled, “You may be right. Come on, it’s getting dark fast; I can’t leave you sitting here in the dark.”

             
“Fine, I’ll come downstairs, but I’m through talking to my brother,” Amanda conceded.

             
“Fair enough,” Cade nodded.

             
Amanda reentered the main room of the cabin and settled onto her chair, her knees drawn to her chest.

             
“I’m sorry,” Trent offered.

             
“Me too,” she admitted.

             
They sat quietly as the storm gained strength and lashed at the cabin. Amanda shuddered and glanced to the window where it was nearly pitch black now. She wasn’t exactly scared of storms but she had to admit that this one was particularly rough. Several minutes later, the storm finally seemed to be waning and the sky no longer seemed quite as black. A few minutes more and only a gentle rain tapped on the roof.

             
“You still there?” Sterling’s voice made Amanda jump.

             
“We’re here,” Trent responded.

             
“Looks like there’s a break but there’s more behind this. You need to come on now and move quickly.”

             
“We’re on our way,” Trent was already standing and gathering the lanterns. They wasted no time mounting and riding down the old lane toward the ranch. Amanda shivered in the rain cooled air and knew that a lecture awaited her when she got home. Her father had a hard and fast rule about monitoring the weather and she hadn’t even glanced at the forecast before leaving the house.

______________________________________________

             
Amanda woke the next morning to a beautiful cerulean sky. The storms of the night before had since moved on and left everything fresh and new. Her father hadn’t lectured her quite as severely as she had feared; he had seemed more relieved that she was okay than anything. She had, none the less, spent the evening avoiding both her father and her brother and had taken refuge instead in the pages of a new book. This morning she felt restless, as though she needed to somehow break free of the monotony of another day spent meandering around the ranch. It was after breakfast that a rescue arrived.

             
“Hey, Jenny, what brings you here?” Amanda asked with a wide smile as she bounded down the front porch steps.

             
“I was bored and thought I would come see you. I also brought a few things I thought your brother might want,” she lifted a box she had tucked under one arm.

             
“Come on in,” Amanda invited as she led the way into the house.

             
“Is someone here?” Naomi, wiping her hands on her apron, came from the kitchen.

             
“Naomi, this is Jenny Brown, Angela’s younger sister. Jenny, my Aunt Naomi.”

             
“It’s nice to meet you, Miss. Jennings,” Jenny offered politely.

             
“Nice to meet you, dear, I’m sorry about your sister. Is there anything I can get you girls?”

             
“No thanks, Aunt Naomi, we’re just going up stairs,” Amanda kissed her aunt’s cheek before leading Jenny to her brother’s room. “I’ll leave the box here; Trent and Cade are working on the fence line,” Amanda explained.

             
“I like your house,” Jenny commented as she followed Amanda across the hall and into her room.

             
“Thanks, my great, great, great, great grandfather built it for his wife and their family. There’s an old cabin on the property that was their first home.”

             
“Wow. My family’s only been here for two generations.” Jenny was wandering around the room, picking up items and glancing at them before setting them back down.

             
“My Daddy says the land is in our blood at this point,” Amanda sank on to the edge of her bed and watched her friend.

             
“I can see why. Our land is nice but yours is breathtaking,” Jenny turned to lean against Amanda’s desk and offered a smile.

             
“You want a tour of it, well, not all of it, but the best parts. I can saddle a couple of horses and we can go riding.”

             
“Sure,” Jenny, her smile widening, shrugged.

             
Amanda changed her shoes, checked on the weather, she wasn’t anxious of a repeat of the day before, and led Jenny to the barn.

             
“Hey, Benjamin, Jenny and I are going to ride around through the north pasture and swing by the cabin then loop around the south boundary; I checked the weather,” she informed the foreman.

             
“You girls be careful,” he nodded.

             
“You can ride Buttermilk, she’s a sweetheart and a smooth ride,” Amanda led the cream colored mare from her stall. Jenny helped her saddle Buttermilk and then Dandelion before they mounted and rode out

             
“My Dad won’t let me ride by myself. Not after I got turned around and lost one day,” Jenny admitted. “Angela was the better horsewoman.”

             
“I scared everyone yesterday,” Amanda admitted and shared her adventure with the older girl. “Fortunately, my father was so relieved that I was okay that he didn’t come down on me too hard.”

             
“Your dad seems like a nice man; well, at least to hear you talk. My dad is so over protective it isn’t funny.”

             
“Don’t think mine isn’t,” Amanda laughed. She led Jenny to the cabin and gave her a tour before they continued their ride, making a wide loop back toward the barn. They topped a rise and found Trent and Cade hard at work on a damaged fence, their shirts long since abandoned.

             
Beside Amanda, Jenny sighed and leaned forward as she pulled her mount to a stop. “I am telling you, Mandy, those two are temptation walking.”

             
Amanda grinned; she was shaking her head. “Trouble is what they are. Come on,” Amanda urged her horse in the men’s direction. Trent and Cade stopped their work and watched them approach.

             
“Did you let someone know where you’re going?” Trent demanded as soon as Amanda came within hearing.

             
“I did and I checked the weather,” she assured him.

             
“Good,” he nodded. “How are you, Jenny?”

             
“I’m fine; you?” she offered with a smile.

             
“I’m fine.”

             
“You have a windmill well; Daddy has been talking about putting one in,” Jenny noted as she dismounted. “Does it work well?” Jenny, her head cocked with interest, waited.

             
“Come on and I’ll show you,” Trent nodded in the windmill’s direction. Amanda watched them leave before turning her attention to Cade.

             
“How are you today, Cade?” she greeted.

             
“Good. You not going to follow?”

             
“No, I know how the windmill works as if I cared or like she does,” Amanda grinned down at him.

             
“Didn’t think she did,” Cade admitted his smile wide. “You two really seem to have hit off.”

             
“We have.”

             
“I’m with your brother, I don’t know if that’s a good thing,” Cade leaned against the farm truck and crossed his arms.

             
“Why not?” Amanda challenged.

             
“She’s a little wild and you don’t need any encouragement,” Cade’s eyes were lit with mischief and his smile crooked.

             
Amanda sighed inwardly.

             
“Do you amuse yourself?” Amanda demanded.

             
“Sometimes.”

             
“Humph,” Amanda grunted as she swung to the ground. “I’m sure you are my brother’s voice of reason and he yours,” she offered with a saccharine smile.

             
“Of course,” Cade, his smile saying differently, nodded. Trent and Jenny were moving back their way and Amanda found herself watching them with a sad smile.

             
“She likes him doesn’t she?” Cade’s voice was sad.

             
“Yeah.”

             
“He sees her…”

             
“As Angie’s little sister and is reminded of what he lost when he sees her; I know. It’s good that he’s leaving.”

             
“You don’t miss much do you, Manny?” Cade was studying her.

             
“Not much,” she admitted.

             
“She’ll find someone this coming school year and forget all about him,” Cade predicted.

             
“She’d settle for you,” Amanda teased and watched his surprised gaze meet hers.

             
“Yeah, okay then; like I said she’ll meet someone.” Cade, grabbing his gloves and yanking them back on, pushed off the truck.
              Amanda was laughing now.

             
“You don’t think she’s pretty?”

             
“She’s young. Too young; that’s what I think.”

             
“Sorry, Cade, I don’t think she’s seriously interested; she just admitted that she thinks you’re…good looking,” Amanda opted not to use the word hot as she almost had. She was afraid that she would somehow give away that she shared the sentiment.

             
“Good looking? I don’t see Jenny using a word that mild,” Cade guessed correctly. “I’m going to miss you, Manny; you never fail to amuse me or shock me as the case may be.”

             
“I’ll miss you too,” she admitted.

             
“Thanks for explaining the well to me,” Jenny was saying as she and Trent neared.

             
“You’re welcome.”

             
“We should let these two get back to work,” Amanda suggested.

             
“I guess we should,” Jenny agreed.

             
Amanda swung easily into Dandelion’s saddle and watched as Jenny struggled to make it up on the uneven terrain. Trent finally had to give her a hand up for her to mount.

             
“I guess I should ride more often,” Jenny’s cheeks were stained pink.

             
“See you at dinner, Trent; probably you too, Cade,” Amanda called as she tugged Dandelion’s reigns and urged her forward. She didn’t wait for their response or Jenny’s parting, letting her friend catch up with her a moment later.

             
“Dang those two are fun to look at!” Jenny announced as she brought her mount up beside Amanda’s.

Ten

              Amanda and Jenny sat on Amanda’s bed, a magazine open to an article about a new actor and the new movie they had seen the night before. They had already changed into their pajamas, both wearing tank tops and sleep pants.

             
“He’s alright, but he isn’t as cute as your brother and Cade,” Jenny finally announced.

             
“I can’t say I actually think about my brother that way,” Amanda’s nose crinkled at the thought.

             
“I would hope not,” Jenny stood and moved to look out the window onto the yard below. “It looks like they have Cade’s things loaded,” she noted.

             
Trent and Cade were leaving for college the next morning, though Amanda was trying not to think on it too much. That was why she had invited Jenny to stay the night.

             
“I don’t know how I’m going to stand having Trent gone,” Amanda announced miserably. “And I’ll miss Cade too,” she added.

             
“They’ll be back,” Jenny reminded her.

             
“I know,” Amanda sighed. “Me and Trent fight, more so lately than usual, but I’ve never been away from him for more than a week at a time.”

             
“I think it will be good for him to get away. Maybe he’ll finally be able to move on,” Jenny mused as she rejoined Amanda on the bed.

             
“And if he comes back engaged? Will you still be happy?” Amanda asked pointedly. Jenny never made more than passing comments about how cute Trent was but Amanda knew she had feelings for him.