I released some tension through a shaky breath, pulling my hands out from my pockets and shaking them. Reality settled back on its feet, and I dragged myself away from my memories with an effort. Of all the scenarios, I had to find her in this one.
The rancher clapped me between the shoulders with a jarring thump, chuckling. “Never seen anything like that. How’s that for a Christmas miracle?”
“Yeah,” I agreed unsteadily, my attention fixed entirely on the miracle worker herself. She had finished with her sutures and smeared a liberal amount of antibiotic ointment over the tidy line of stitches before divesting herself of her sodden medical gloves. Her hands were bright red, raw from the cold and however long she’d been helping this horse, but she didn’t seem to notice. She donned another pair, not even bothering to wash the blood off her arms, hooked the buds of her stethoscope in her ears, and checked her patient’s vitals.
Incredible. Watching Arabella at work was awe-inspiring. She didn’t have beeping machines or a team of skilled nurses to help her through a complicated procedure—she was on the straw-littered floor of a barn in twenty-degree weather with one unsurestudent and a baffled rancher at her disposal, and she made it look like child’s play.
I’d already been free-falling in love with her, but at that moment, I finished the plummet. I fell in love so hard, I’d have bruises from the impact.
Something fuzzy and warm heated my chest and made its way up to my head, filling me with helium-light delight. I leaned my head against the stall wall and watched her work, soaking in the ineffable charm of Arabella doing what she did best.
When Arabella had the mare in stable condition—pun intended? I still couldn’t believe she performed surgeries in hay—she made sure the rancher had instructions for post-surgery care, urging him to get them both to a heated barn when they could manage it and promising to return in two days. “Please call me if you suspect anything,” she urged him. “I think they’re both going to be up and recovering within hours, but if something seems off, you have my number.”
The rancher nodded. “Appreciate you, Dr. Rook. We’d been at it for hours before we realized something wasn’t right.”
She nodded, her hands so red, they were turning purple. “It’s more common than you’d think. I’m glad I made it in time.”
The assistant, Wendy, finished gathering her many bags and containers, and the rancher helped her bring everything to Arabella’s truck on the other side of the barn from where I’d parked. Arabella looked at me finally, her cheeks pink. She took a fortifying breath. “Sorry. I didn’t want to miss it, but—” She shrugged.
I took her hands in mine rubbing them to warm them up. They were actual blocks of ice. “I understand. The patient comes first.”
She nodded, sniffing and twitching her little, red nose. “Are you okay? I didn’t expect you to go pale at the sight of surgery.”
I ducked my head down, focusing on her hands. “I’m good. I just had a weird déjà vu kind of moment for a second.”
She bent to catch my gaze, analyzing my expression. Understanding lit her features. “Oh, Spence.”
“It’s fine,” I assured her, lifting my head. “You were so competent, I think you might have fixed it by proxy.”
“I’m sure whatever it was,” she replied gently, “you were just as competent.”
I nodded, but I couldn’t make myself agree with the words. “You might have a groupie now. I want to watch how you perform an emergency salpingectomy in the dirt.”
She poked my forehead with her icy finger. “Horses don’t have fallopian tubes. Not the way we think of them.”
“Then I’m doubly impressed you knew what the fuck I was saying,” I grinned.
“I’ll invite you to my ovariectomy,” she smirked. Her light eyes searched my face with a touch of worry. “Do you… want to talk about it?”
I took her hand in mine again, trying to imbue it with some warmth. “I’m not opposed to it, but let’s do it in the car so you can sit in front of the heater.”
Arabella glanced over her shoulder. “I have my student with me.”
“Can she drive the truck to the ranch?”
She turned back to me. “I guess so.”
“Good. Come on.” I shifted so I held one of her hands and led her back to my SUV. “You look like you need some coffee. And maybe a full-course meal.”
“On the side,” she agreed seriously.
She joined me in my car, shooting off a text to her vet student, and then I blasted the heat, filling the space with warmth before we had even left the ranch. We sat in comfortable silence for a bit, and then she rolled her head to study me, her pink wavesframing her face under a black knit hat with a pompom on top. “You lost a baby? Or a mom?”
“Baby,” I confirmed. “It… shouldn’t have been a surprise. She was so small—twenty-four weeks. It was a long shot to begin with, but I don’t know.” My fingers gripped the steering wheel, but the all-consuming anguish didn’t threaten to swallow me in its tidal wave this time. “It really got to me.”
“The vulnerable ones always do,” she agreed with a soft, scratchy voice. She looked out the windshield, and I felt the palpable waves of grief she was containing herself. “We want to save them all, and for whatever reason, as students, we really think we’re going to be the ones who do it. I believed I’d be the one pulling off miracles and defying the odds.”
I nodded, my throat tight. “The sobering reality gave me a full-on hangover as a resident.”
