To Love an Outlaw (Into the West #1) (A Wattpad Reading List Choice)

Chapter 3

 

“Dammit!”

Callie rose stiffly from the dirt where she’d been thrown once more, turning to observe Noah race on foot after the pure bred horse. It slowed down easily now that they were no longer shooting guns in its vicinity.

Cocking one hip and shading her eyes, the young widow shook her head in defeat as she watched the sixteen-year-old youth capture the horse and circle back toward her. Bending to retrieve her hat and slapping it against her thigh encased in the men’s pants she’d gone to wearing around her ranch, Callie muttered more curse words before facing the returning ranch hand and her prize stallion.

“This ain’t workin’, Missus West. No matter what we do, he just ain’t gonna accept gunshots around him!”

The youth and the horse stopped before Callie, both looking apologetic (if an animal could be described as such) as they gazed into the widow’s annoyed expression. Slamming the crumpled headpiece back onto her tangled golden hair, Callie met Noah’s eyes on a sigh and a shrug of the shoulders.

She reached out to pet the horse’s velvety nose as if to tell him it was alright; that he hadn’t angered his master, although Callie was at her wits’ end. It had been over two weeks and the animal remained just as skittish around gun fire as he’d been when she’d first brought him home. How was she ever going to sell her training skills to the Cavalry if the example horse ran at the first crack of a rifle?

Transferring her gaze to the sixteen-year-old, who looked as dusty and disappointed as she, Callie sighed again and took the horse’s reins from Noah. They headed back to the corral, Callie hobbling slightly after her third toss from the saddle while addressing the horse resignedly.

“I don’t know what to do with you, Chance. You’re supposed to be one of the most intelligent animals on the face of God’s green earth. I’m not shooting at you; you should know that by now. You’re my ticket to independence.”

The horse tossed his head as if in doubt of her assurances.

Noah glanced at his boss under his hat as he trailed beside the large equine, seconding her comment. After all, working for the Widow West was his second chance at a life, too. He needed this horse to succeed for his own future as well.

Knowing this, the sixteen-year-old ventured, “It ain’t too late to go get help from that gunfighter, Ma’am. He’s still hangin’ around town.”

Callie felt her face color at just the mention of that silver-eyed, rippling muscled, thoroughbred of a man! Lordy, the way he looked at her sent her insides a-quivering like a jar of jelly left out in the sun too long! This feminine response grated Callie’s nerves, especially since she’d sworn off men in the first place, causing her to snap waspishly at the innocent youth.

“I don’t need to teach the horse how to shoot, Noah, so why do I need that gunman?”

With an overly patient expression crossing his young, blond-whiskered face, the boy replied, giving his boss an arch look, “Quit bein’ funny, Miz Callie. You saw how that man rode. He knows horses, he does. I bet he could train this one around guns right fine.”

 Woman and youth held gazes, Noah refusing to look down until his boss heaved a sigh, taking her hat off her head and swiping back tendrils of hair from her forehead.

 Glancing away momentarily Callie replied, “I can’t afford to pay him, Noah, even if I wanted to, which I don’t.

  “No, it’s gonna have to be you and me, Noah Lawson. Now let me get back up on him, and this time you shoot behind us.”