Must Love Horses. Vicki Tharp

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СКАЧАТЬ Bryan, you coming?” Sidney asked.

      He tugged his hat down low before looking up, trying to hide the pain. Sidney hung from the corral, two rungs up so she could see over the top.

      “Be right there.” His words came out low and harsh, as if the demon had taken hold of his soul and growled them out.

      Sidney turned back to the horses.

      Mac stepped over to him. “You okay?” she said under her breath.

      “Yeah, sure.” He tried to smile, but the demon chomped down again and stole it away.

      “Bullshit. Sit down and take a load off.”

      The beast answered. “You know what I need? I need you to leave me the fuck alone.”

      Mac cracked her knuckles, prepping for a fight, and smiled—slow, salient, dangerous. “Sit your ass down, or I’ll take you down. Your choice.”

      Fat chance. “I’m not gonna sit in the dirt and cry over my boo-boo. I’m not a kid with a skinned knee.” Then another scorching wave of pain hit, sucking the oxygen from his lungs. He heaved in warm, dry air. “Corral,” he managed. “I’ll lean on it.”

      He reached into his pocket and pulled out a pain pill mixed in among the lint and horse treats and galvanized screws and popped the pill into his mouth, crunching it between his molars like a Tic Tac.

      Mac wrapped her arm around his waist and bore his weight as they trudged to the fence.

      At the rail, a few yards from where Hank and Sidney compared the horses’ conformation, the demon unhinged his jaws and released his leg. Boomer removed his hat and swiped the sweat from him brow. Sometimes he didn’t know what he’d do without Mac. When he spoke, he pushed the words past the emotion in his throat. “You’re an asshole, you know that?”

      She gave his waist a squeeze before letting go. “Am I the pot, or the kettle?”

      He latched onto the top rail, transferring his weight from Mac to his good leg. The burro spotted him, pushed through the herd, and trotted halfway over, his long, fuzzy ears quivering as he brayed.

      “A donkey?” Hank’s voice jumped from bass to soprano.

      “I—”

      “He’s bonded to the buckskin.” Sidney cut Boomer a look that screamed shut the hell up. He did, though the burro was his deal. Why was she protecting him?

      Sidney continued, “I couldn’t pass up the buckskin, and I figured that if your plan was to train and sell horses to the dude ranches, then a string that comes with a pack animal could add a lot of value.”

      Boomer tuned out as Hank asked her another question. Mac nudged his shoulder in a spill-the-beans kind of gesture. He leaned in and whispered, “No matter what she says,” he tilted his head toward Sidney, “the donkey’s on me. I couldn’t leave him behind.”

      Mac met his gaze. He didn’t find pity or concern there, just utter and complete understanding. “Of course not.”

      “See those two horses over there?” Hank said to Sidney. “That’s the mare and the colt the horse was pregnant with when Mac saved them from the kill buyer at auction a couple years ago. I’d sent her there to buy some saddle horses.”

      Hank had raised his voice to be heard by his wife and Boomer. After he was finished talking, Hank said to Mac, “If I hadn’t seen you two in action, I would think y’all were a couple a pushovers.”

      “Come closer and say that to my face, cowboy.” Mac’s eyes went dark, mischievous.

      Hank backed off, with a smile on his face. “Not in front of the children, dear.”

      Mac rolled her eyes. Sidney laughed. It was low and throaty, completely at odds from how Boomer had expected her laugh to sound. He shouldn’t have been surprised. In the two days he’d known her, she hadn’t once been what he’d expected.

      He looked at her then, really looked at her. He looked past the short red hair she’d moussed up from her scalp like tiny flames, past the flush on her cheeks from a day in the sun, past the sandy raspberry on her temple, past her firm breasts and exquisite ass. Past all that, he saw the woman beneath: tough, strong, intelligent, with a depth he suspected he could mine for an eon and still not hit bottom.

      “Burro or no burro, you picked a solid string, Sidney. Good job,” Hank said.

      It might have been Boomer’s imagination, but Sidney seemed to grow two inches right in front of his face.

      Hank didn’t give Sidney a chance to respond before adding, “I got a call today, from a potential buyer,” he said. “Coming up in a couple weeks to check out what we have. He’s a big fish. People see he’s buying stock from us, others will want to as well. A good impression is vital.”

      “Sure.” A smile. Tight. Forced. Sidney raised her chin. “I won’t let you down.”

      Hank looked Sidney in the eye.

      Did Hank see what Boomer saw? A woman determined to prove her abilities worthy and her detractors wrong?

      “No, I don’t believe you will,” Hank said.

      Hank and Mac turned toward the big house when Mac called over her shoulder. “Take care of that wound for her, Boomer.”

      * * * *

      At the barn, Bryan stopped Sidney with a hand to her arm and drew her around to face him. He lifted her chin and angled her wound toward the sun. With a light touch, he plucked a caked-on piece of hay from her forehead.

      Sand rained down from her hair. Sidney reached up. The abrasion was superficial, the sand ground in, stuck on with dried sweat and blood. The wound stung every time the wind blew.

      “Come on,” Bryan said. “I have a first aid kit at my cabin.”

      “It’s fine. I’ll clean it when I take a shower tonight.”

      “You know there’s manure in with all that sand.”

      “It’s a scratch. I was raised in a barn. I probably nibbled on a ball of manure by the time I’d learned to crawl. If nothing else, I have one freaking fantastic immune system.”

      “Humor me.” His blue eyes narrowed. He wasn’t taking no for an answer.

      She sighed for dramatic effect. “Okay, fine. But I need to get Eli settled first.”

      Bryan glanced over to where Eli was still saddled in the shade, his hay bag still partially full. “He can wait.”

      “Eli, then me.”

      He looked her up and down, measuring her resolve. He must have figured it was greater than his because he nodded and followed her over to Eli, his limp more profound.

      “I’ve got this, if you want to sit and wait for me.”

      “I can help.”

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