Page 28 of His Eighth Ride

“Yeah,” he said. “Opal told them.”

“It’s going well?”

“Yes,” he said, the word a bit more clipped. “I think it is.” He swung his attention to Gerty. “She told me this would be okay. That she’d talked to her parents about us, and that they can’t hound me to death tonight. She didn’t warn me about you.” The left corner of his mouth twitched up, and Gerty relaxed slightly.

“You’re not really mad,” she said.

“I’m just not talking about this for the next eight hours. Or even the next eight minutes.”

“Give me eight seconds then,” Gerty said. “Of what you’re worried about.”

“Eating dinner with your family,” he said. “There. That’s it. Five words.”

“You’ve met Mike and Opal’s parents before,” she said.

“Different capacity,” he said. “We’ve also never taken a trip together before.” He reached for his coffee, and the conversation stalled as he took a long drink. “Maybe I’m a little nervous about that.” A gust of wind shook the truck, and Gerty gripped the wheel and immediately checked her rearview mirror to make sure the trailer wasn’t going to pull them off the road.

“And the wind is worrying me,” he said.

“Me too,” Gerty murmured. They’d hardly cut into the trip at all. Gerty hadn’t even made it to the main highway that would take them north to the Wyoming border. “Would you drive?”

“Yeah,” he said easily.

Gerty eased off to the shoulder and put the truck in park. “Thanks,” she said. “I could do it, but?—”

“I know you could,” Tag said. He quickly unbuckled his seatbelt and switched places with her. “This doesn’t mean you can question me relentlessly about Opal.”

Gerty grinned at him and mimed zipping her lips. “No more questions about Opal.”

“What you can do is talk about how I should avoid making a fool of myself at dinner tonight.”

“What do you mean?”

“Oh, come on. Topics to avoid, things to bring up to impress Opal’s daddy. Give me something.”

Gerty grinned, because Tag was always so sure of himself. So calm and cool. So capable. “They’re just people, Tag,” she said. “What we really need to talk about is how Steele is going to fare with us at the farm.”

Tag looked over to her, displaying his confidence as he kept driving without freaking out when another round of wind battered them from the west. “Steele is going to be great,” he said.

“You’ve worked with him for two days.”

“He’s a quick learner,” Tag said. “He doesn’t say much, but neither do we.” He grinned at Gerty. “He’s going to be fine.”

“Sometimes it’s the quiet ones you have to be careful of,” she said thoughtfully. Steele came with great recommendations, and of course Gerty had known Travis and Poppy—his parents—for decades now. She wasn’t that much older than Steele, and she didn’t know all of his struggles.

Uncle Matt had said he was “ready for a new challenge,” and that a change of scenery would be good for him. Gerty wanted to help Steele, but she also needed a trustworthy employee she could count on to get the job done.

Don’t second guess yourself, she thought, and she strengthened her shoulders and set her sights out the windshield. “Have you ever done something you didn’t understand?” she asked. “Because God told you you should?”

Tag looked at her again. “Yes,” he said slowly.

“That’s how I feel about Steele,” she said. “I don’t know why he’s supposed to be at the farm, but he is. I need you to be honest with him. Teach him. Correct him. Tell me how he’s really doing.” Nerves ran through Gerty again, much the way the wind whistled across the front of the truck. “Okay?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Tag said. “Thanks for telling me.”

Gerty nodded, the unrest inside her finally leaking out. They drove along in silence for a bit, and then Tag put on the radio. He had a nice singing voice, and Gerty even found herself humming along to a tune or two.

When they stopped for lunch, Gerty got out and stretched her arms above her head. Then she met Tag and together, they went into the little diner in a little town she didn’t know the name of.

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