“Can I follow and film it?” she asked.
Jessie snorted. “The murder or the sexy stuff right beforehand?”
“There’s not going to be either,” River told him, knowing she should say yes to the filming. But really, this time, she kind of wanted to say no.
“We have to go through this footage,” Jessie decided. He pressed the handheld at her. “Here. Get everything you can.”
River shook her head. “I’m only going for a ride. This doesn’t have anything to do with the movie.”
“The documentary.” Enunciating the word, Jessie rolled his eyes at her. “First rule of a documentary: you document.”
“Fine.” River accepted the camera. “But if I drop it, that’s on you.”
“If you drop it, the bill’s on you.”
When River returned to the paddock, Easton had pulled two saddles out of wherever they stored their tack, with worn leather bridles hanging ready on a nearby fence post. Chance, the handsome gray, was already saddled, and the second saddle was sitting on the fence rail next to the aging palomino.
“You’re putting me on Skip?”
“She’s a good horse,” Easton said. “Heck of an endurance mare back in her day.”
“I’d like to ride Sonny.” When Easton hesitated, River patted his arm. “Don’t worry. I can ride anything that moves.”
With a shrug, Easton did as she asked, saddling up the little bay instead. He looked even more handsome with his tack on, but River was an experienced enough hand to know a gleam in a horse’s eye when she saw it.
Easton frowned at the horse. “You might want to let me lunge him out a few circles before we go.”
“Nope, we’re good.”
And they were. At least they were for the first two steps around the yard while Sonny decided what he wanted to do about her being on his back.
“Don’t even think about it, buster,” River warned him.
Sonny snorted, decision made.
Boy, that guy could buck. There was no viciousness to his antics, more feeling his oats than anything particularly dangerous, and River was laughing breathlessly by the time the horse came to a stop.
“Are you all done?” she asked him. Sonny snorted again, stamping a rear hoof. Twisting around to grin at Easton, River called over, “I think that means he’s done.”
Standing there, Chance’s reins in his hand, Easton stared at her.
“What?”
“Nothing.” Easton shook his head. “Just never seen anyone enjoy a horse trying to pitch them off.”
“I like him. There’s nothing wrong with a little spunk.”
River wasn’t certain, but she could have sworn she heard Easton murmur something about redheads.
Once Sonny got all the extra energy out of his system, Easton swung up into the saddle and turned his far more laid-back mount toward a trailhead on the far side of the homestead. River squeezed her knees, encouraging Sonny to lengthen his stride and catch up with the pair. She expected the overcorrect as her mount happily broke into a faster gait.
“We’re going this way,” she told Easton as they trotted past, laughing at her gelding’s enthusiasm.
Leaning forward, Easton and Chance lunged ahead as if River and Sonny were standing still.
“Are you going to let them do that to you?” River asked as Sonny’s hindquarters skated to the right, his energy uncontainable.
The second she loosened the reins, her gelding was off like a shot. The pounding of hooves, real grass beneath her…how long had it been since the wind whistled through her ears until all she could hear was her horse’s snorts and her own racing heart? Sonny was a speedster, but Chance wasn’t a slowpoke by any means. By the time they caught up, the gray’s stride had lengthened out.
For several breathless seconds, the pair ran side by side until Easton signaled her to slow up. Rougher ground ahead would have been bad to race over, although River was surprised he’d indulged the run at all. Easton angled his gelding over, riding so close their stirrups bumped.
“You can ride.” He sounded impressed.
River patted Sonny’s neck. “Back home, they put you up on a horse before you can even walk.”
“How’d you end up…you know.”
“Acting?” She shrugged. “Same old story we’ve all heard a thousand times. Rancher’s daughter wants more than the country life and leaves home. Stuffs all her things in an old car, drives to Hollywood, and tries to make it big.”
“Did you?” he asked.
River winked at him. “You’ve never heard of me, so I must not have.”
Easton shot her an amused look.
“It took me a couple of years. I worked as an extra on set during the day, took acting classes and waited tables at night, and kept showing up for auditions. Then I got my break. Ten years, six movies, and one really bad miniseries later, I’ve finally improved in my craft enough to handle the parts I couldn’t handle eight years ago. Only no one wants to give them to an actress turning thirty. So here I am, about to climb Mount Veil to start all over again on the production side.”
His expression was one of disbelief and confusion. “I can’t image aging out of a career that young.”
“Trust me, I never imagined it either.”
They turned a corner, and River’s breath caught. Easton stopped, letting the reins lie loose on Chance’s neck.
In front of them, miles to the north, a pinnacle of rock and snow jutted into the sky. The numerous other mountains in the Chugach range had obscured the bulk of this peak from view, but from where they stood, on a rocky outcropping, they had an almost unfettered view of the mountain.
It rose so high above them, River had to crane her head back to take it all in. “That’s Mount Veil?”
“That’s Mount Veil.”
“Why do they call it that?”
“You’ll see when we get up there.” Easton glanced at her, watching River up at their destination. “You ready? It’s not too late to change mountains.”
“Are you trying to talk me out of going?”
“If I can talk you out of going, you shouldn’t be going in the first place.”
River looked over at him. There was a looseness in Easton’s shoulders, a calmness in his face as he gazed up at the mountain. She’d seen a man in love before. A hundred dollars down, she’d be willing to bet the love of Easton Lockett’s life was the majestic peak rising in front of them.