not waiting for an answer.
It was a dirty job, but the horses needed a clean area in which they could sleep and stay warm at night so mucking out the stalls just had to be done. They stayed in the pasture as much as possible so they could get exercise and freedom, but they came into the stables overnight. She enjoyed the worked because it was hard and made her muscles sore. But more to the point, Jim was a good guy with lots of funny quips about working with horse manure and pitchforks and he made her laugh, forgetting for the time her conversation with Rais down by the creek.
She was on her third stall when she heard an angry voice in the doorway. “What the hell are you doing?” Rais demanded, hands on his hips as he watched her with furious eyes.
Rachel spun around to looked up at him, trying to hide the shaking she instantly felt when he was close not to mention that the man’s anger was more than a little intimidating. Pretending that she wasn’t affected, she shrugged and turned away from him. “I’m making toast,” she replied with a ridiculous sense of humor. She didn’t bother to answer him honestly because what she was doing was obvious. “And you’re in my way,” she said as she bent to pick up a dark pile of something unnamed from the corner before turning to load it into the wheelbarrow, only to find him standing in front of it, looking like he might explode with fury at any moment.
“You will not be doing this kind of labor,” he growled out. He took the pitchfork from her hands and dropped it onto the dirt floor. Grabbing her wrist, he pulled her out of the stall. “You there!” he called out to Jim who was just pushing another wheelbarrow out of a stall several down from where they stood. “Finish up in here and make sure this woman doesn’t do any kind of work like this again!”
Jim was in his twenties and had only been working on the farm for about two years. So he didn’t have the kind of tenure that the other stable hands had with Rais and was terrified. He nodded his head quickly then hurried into the stall and took over the pitchfork.
She was so angry at Rais for scaring the younger employee that she spun around to confront him, yanking her wrist out of his grip. Or tried to. He wasn’t letting her go so she just glared up at him. “That was unnecessary and the work has to be done, Rais. You’re being silly because I can do the work just as easily as he can.”
“Enough,” he snapped and pulled her along to one of the recently cleaned stalls. He pulled her inside and slammed the door. At least he released her hand and she rubbed the skin where he’d held her wrist while he paced back and forth in the small confines of the stall, running his hand over his face and hair. “You won’t be doing that kind of work Rachel. Don’t ever let me catch you doing that again.”
She leaned against the wall, crossing her arms over her stomach. “Why shouldn’t I? I’m no better than they are.”
“You are….” He stopped, his black eyes looking down at her accusingly before he said, “you!”
She laughed softly at his reply. “Well, I’m certainly glad we cleared that up.”
He sighed heavily and came over to her. Putting an arm on either side of her head, he bent down low. “Rachel, you and I are going to….” He stopped and shook his head. “You just can’t do that kind of work. I won’t allow it.”
She rolled her eyes, trying to pretend that she wasn’t nervous with him this close. “Rais, I need to go.”
He looked down at her lips and she panicked. She certainly didn’t want a repeat of their embrace by the creek. So in order to avoid that, to avoid kissing him like she wanted to do, to feel his lips move against hers once again, she quickly ducked and stepped out of his embrace. It was only because the move was so unexpected that it actually worked.
She skipped over to the opposite side of the stall and smiled over at him. “Rais, this has to stop.”
“What does?” he asked, stalking her slowly, but not relenting.
Rachel looked at the shrinking distance between them, then towards the door. “This…kissing me and doing things