Mom, who was filming, made a choked up noise.
“And the one Emery is holding, he’s Emerson Russell.” Before my brother could ask, Luke turned to him and said, “Yes. We considered Emery, but we decided on Emerson.”
The way Emery’s eyes filled with tears and Mom’s camerawork became shaky made me sniffle.
Mom forgot all about filming, and the rest of us who were all watching the video on various phones chuckled.
“Those are some solid names,” Mal said, wiping his eyes.
The door to the waiting room opened and Bodhi stepped in. “Did I miss it?”
Since nobody but the parents were going to be able to see the babies once they were in the NICU, everyone but Emery left the hospital.
Mom needed to feed people—it was like therapy to her—and everyone else had work to do.
For the rest of the evening, there were plenty of messages in the group chat from everyone, and I sent a message to Luke,asking for a private message if anything big went on, because I was going to mute the conversation for now.
We had a quick dinner and then I went to check up on Ramona.
She was calmly eating her hay in her stall, and I wondered how things would go with her. She had a good solid build and she was smart. Suzanne had said she’d done really well being trained when younger, but the whole broodmare thing had changed their goals.
Right up until they got Cahill’s offer and they decided to let her go. And now she was my problem.
Not that I expected any actual issues. Theissuemight end up being her owner.
Cahill clearly didn’t like me, because I was in charge. He hadn’t understood it yet. There was a reason why I had the reputation I did, and part of that had come with not bowing to money or older men.
Now, I could admit that older men were my type. In another situation the fact that Cahill was about six feet tall and fit in that way that told me he lifted weights but hadn’t gotten to the annoying and impractical gym bro shape would’ve been interesting.
He wasn’t bad looking. He had the kind of classically handsome face that had probably gotten better as he aged with charming crow’s feet and all.
Well, at least he’d be nice to look at while I ignored the bullshit he would no likely spout at times. The rest of the time I hoped he’d just do as he was told and not talk.
There was no chance of that happening, but a guy could hope.
The next day, around nine in the morning, I was in the arena with one of our rescues. The gelding had been severely neglected and was very easily spooked by people he didn’t know and things that were new to him. He’d put on some weight in the month we’d had him, and we’d even gotten his hooves and teeth treated to a point where I was happy to work with him. He was nothing special on the outside. Just a dark bay with a spot of white on his nose that extended down to his bottom lip, as if he’d been dipped into a bucket of milk.
We were doing some basic leadwork. I walked and stopped. Jogged and stopped. Turned quickly. Then slowly. All the while staying in tune with him. He was doing great and responding to the pieces of apple I was giving him. He wasn’t much for carrots, but not all horses were. I preferred carrots because they didn’t get mushy in my pockets or the treat bag clipped to my belt, but whatever worked.
At one point, the gelding jerked his head sharply. I saw it in my peripheral, but thought nothing of it. I just continued to work, until I felt he was almost done for the day. Almost. That was the key word here. You never worked any animal until they were done. You stopped when they would still have a positive view of the whole experience.
It wasn’t until I stopped and led him into the middle of the arena and gave him the rest of my apples and let him go for a roll if he so wished, that I realized we were being watched.
Cahill stood at the gate. He didn’t seem impressed. I could only speculate what I’d done that pissed him off right then. Sighing, I gathered the lead rope, turned my ball cap the right way around to shield my face from the sun again and walked over to him.
“Morning.” There. That was a regular greeting. I could be civilized.
Chapter 4
Carter
Was I annoyed that my horse wasn’t in the arena? Yep. Harrington knew when I was coming. I’d been sure to make the appointment because he’d been insistent on it. So the fact that he had this…nothing-special horse trotting around when it should have been Ramona rankled.
I’d add that to the list of grievances I needed to work out with him. But first things first.
“Morning,” I greeted back, as civilized as he’d been. “How’s your sister and the baby?”
Harrington went still and blinked at me for a solid twenty seconds. He seemed shocked that I asked. But why? She’d interrupted our meet and greet yesterday, and it was only polite to ask. Besides, I knew all too well things could go so very wrong during delivery. Considering he was working, and hadn’tcanceled, I had to assume no tragedy had occurred. But I still wanted to know.
