I laughed, not wanting to explicitly say,I told you so, but still thinking it in my head. “Here, hand me one of your bags.”
She tilted her head as if assessing me, then gave aresigned sigh, dropping one of the heavy-ass duffles. Somehow it felt like they were even heavier than they were when we left Silver Creek.
“Did you go on some secret midnight shopping trip? Or did you collect more rocks while you were here?” I teased.
Sierra kept walking ahead of me, but that didn’t stop her from flipping me off and firing back, “I just couldn’t help it. The rocks here areso unique.”
I barked out a laugh and followed behind, throwing the bag over my shoulder.
“Do you think we’re going to make it through the storm?” Sierra studied the sky when we got outside, her brows pinching together.
“Hopefully,” I replied. “I don’t have a lot of hope for missing it entirely, but if we’re lucky, we’ll be on the edge of this weather, and the rain won’t be too heavy.”
“Best get on the road then,” she murmured, climbing into the passenger seat. “We still have to pick up the horses.”
I nodded in agreement, throwing the rest of the stuff in the back of the pickup and rolling out the cover over the bed.
By the time we got the horses loaded and our wheels pointed eastward on the highway, rain was beating down on us, the windshield wipers doing their best to keep up. Puddles accumulated in the middle of the road, water spraying up every time we plowed through one.
Headlights of the cars that met us were blurred by thetorrential downpour, and horns blared as if that was their way of letting us know they were nearby. It didn’t quell my anxiety. If anything, it made it worse.
“I think we’re going to need to pull over!” My declaration was nearly drowned out by the sound of droplets smacking against the windshield.
“That’s probably a good idea,” Sierra agreed, worry lines creasing her forehead as I white-knuckled the steering wheel, trying to maintain control of the truck and trailer.
Turning on my hazard lights, I navigated us off the road at the nearest pullout so we weren’t camping out on the shoulder in case, God forbid, the worst happened and someone ran off the path and hit us.
My phone screen lit up, and a slew of text messages came through from the group chat.
The Silver Creek Cowboys (And Ellison)
(Plus Isa and June)
Colter
Damn that rain is wild
Ellison
Everyone okay? Jake and Mikey? Hayden?
Mikey
*thumbs-up emoji*
We’re alright. We pulled over.
Isa
OMG! not the kind of texts i wanted to get at 10am
June
Hopefully the rain lets up soon. Keep us updated.
“Who was that?” Sierra’s gaze fell onto my phone screen.
“Our Silver Creek group chat,” I replied, the fact that Sierra wasn’t in it dawning on me. “I just realized you’re not in it. Let me add you.”
