by Home Fires
“Near eleven,” he said. “That’s what makes this business work good as it does. They’re pregnant a long time.” His gaze swept down and rested on her belly for too long a time. “But you don’t want to leave them in the stalls past ten, ten and a half months. They drop those colts while they’re tied up, they’ll about tear the barn down to get at ’em.”
“They’re still tied up when they foal?” Her face was pale except for two flames of color on her cheeks.
He shrugged and pulled his gaze almost regretfully back to her face. “It happens.”
“And they can’t lie down?”
“They go down, it messes up the catheters.”
“You f—” Emily began, but Casie reached out to grip her arm in silent warning.
“Well …” she said, her tone as cheerful as she could possibly make it. “We’ll sure do what we can to help, won’t we, Em?”
“Count on it,” Emily said.
CHAPTER 21
“Who do you suppose that is?” Linette Hartman sat very upright on Maddy as the mare plodded patiently around the arena.
“I wouldn’t know,” Colt said. He tried to sound bored, but his mind was racing. Who was the guy in the muddy pickup truck? Why the hell was he there?
Linette gave him a glance out of the corner of her eye. He had told her during their first lesson to focus on the direction she wanted her mount to go. He didn’t have to tell her twice. Still, he had the feeling she could have picked the stranger out of a lineup without half trying.
“You telling me you don’t know your neighbors?” she asked.
“He’s not my neighbor.”
“What do you suppose he wants, then?”
“That’s none of my business.”
She shrugged. “Maybe he’s looking for something.”
Colt jerked his attention to her face, wondering what she suspected, but her expression was bland. He concentrated on keeping his the same.
“Keep your heels down. You want to come off that horse headfirst?”
“Not particularly,” she said, then returned doggedly to their previous discussion. “So you don’t recognize the truck? I thought everyone knew everyone around here.”
“Well, you were wrong.”
“You think he’s a suitor?”
“What!” He sputtered the word and she grinned.
Maddy plodded along, slow and steady in a circle around him.
“Suitor …” she said. “It’s an antiquated but quaint term for boyfriend.”
“I know what it means,” he said. The words sounded a little irritable to his own ears.
“So, do you?”
“Keep her moving,” he said and nodded to the mare.
“I’m trying.”
“Squeeze her up with your legs.”
She did so. “If he’s not a suitor, he must be Freedom’s former owner.”
“What?” He snapped his attention back toward her.
She shrugged. “He’s got kind of a malevolent look about him. I’d bet you my Social Security check there’s something in his past. Battery, maybe.” She narrowed her eyes in thought. “Or arson.”
“Holy hell, Lin, imagine much?”
“You dig deep enough you can find something on anyone.” Her voice was low and thoughtful.
“This job you used to have … did it involve handcuffs and a nightstick?”
She stared at him a second, then laughed out loud. “Now who’s imagining things? Listen, if you don’t want me inventing an entire criminal record for that man, you better keep me challenged. Are you really going to let me lope or were you just yanking Casie’s chain?”
He studied her with a frown. She was the approximate size of an eight-year-old. Then again, he knew some eight-year-olds who rode like seasoned jockeys.
“You just sat on a horse for the first time a few days ago.”
“Yeah, well, I don’t have a lot of time to waste. When’s it going to happen?”
“When I know you’re not going to kill yourself up there.”
She smiled. The expression was a little wistful, a little mischievous. “We’ve all got to die sometime.”
“Well, it would be best if it didn’t happen when you were on the Lazy,” he said and glanced toward the muddy pickup truck. Emily had joined them there. But Sophie and Ty were noticeably absent. Why?
“I don’t think you have to worry about her so much,” she said.
“What?”
“Casie,” she said. “She’s tougher than she seems. Although maybe abetting felons isn’t the best idea she’s ever had.”
Abetting felons? He felt his heart gallop in his chest, but tried to keep a stoic expression. “Sit back on your jeans pockets.”
“What?”
“You want to lope or not?”
“Well …” She looked nervous suddenly, but her tone was jaunty when she next spoke. “I didn’t travel a thousand miles to learn how to knit.”
But he’d feel better if she was safely ensconced on a couch somewhere. Purl one, knit two. Maybe Casie could join her. They could sip coffee and talk about whatever the hell women talked about. Holy crap! Who was that guy? “All right then,” he said, forcing himself to focus on the business at hand. “Her head’s going to come up a little when she transitions.”
“What?”
“Maddy,” he said, trying like hell to ignore the conversation by the truck. “She’s going to raise her head when she speeds up. What are you going to do to maintain control?”
“Shorten my reins?”
“Shorten your reins,” he said, “but not your legs.”
“My legs can’t get any shorter.”
“Just keep your heels down,” he said. “It lengthens your muscles.”
She nodded. “What else?”
“What lead do you want her in?”
“We’re tracking left. So the left lead.”
“How do you cue for that?” She hadn’t been wasting her riding time. She questioned everything and remembered just about as much.
“Body weight on my right sitting bone. Left leg off the horse, right heel behind the cinch, tilt her head inside.”
Emily was doing most of the talking. He could tell that much from the corner of his eye. Where on earth had she gotten those ridiculous overalls?
“What do you do with your hands?” he asked.
“Keep them low and steady.”
“Upper body?”
“A little more forward, maintaining it over the center of gravity.”
“Motion,” he said. “Over the center of motion.”
“Right,” she said and licked her lips.
“You nervous?”
“Never been an idiot,” she said. Her gaze was now firmly set on Maddy’s slowly bobbing head.
“Look up. Between her ears,” he said, and losing his battle with himself, glanced at the trio by the truck again.
“I’d like to console you with tales of second chances and happily-ever-afters,” she said, “but right now I’m a little bit scared of dying.”
“You’re not going to die.”
“You hope.”
“I hope. Don’t drop your chin.”
“Wouldn’t think of it.”
“Thumbs up. Shoulders back. Look where you want her to go and throw her a kiss for the lope.”
“Now?” She shot him a glance.
“You’re not getting any younger,” he said, and she took the bait like a cutthroat trout.
Narrowing her eyes, she nodded once, squeezed her legs, and made a kissing sound.
Despite her advancing years, Maddy responded like a trooper. Picking up her left lead, she rocked into the lope.
Linette said something. Colt wasn’t sure what it was, but it sounded a little bit like a prayer. Even so, her lips were canted up in a childish grin.
“There you go,” he said, raising his voice a little so as to be heard. “You’re doing great. Just let your hips roll with the motion. Keep your ha
nds in front of the saddle horn. Snug up your knees and don’t look—”
But suddenly everything went wrong. He would never be sure what it was. Maybe she lost a stirrup. Maybe she lost her nerve. Maybe Madeline stopped with no provocation at all. But suddenly her rider was falling, tumbling past the mare’s shoulder like an autumn apple.
“Linette!” He lunged forward, then dropped down to squat beside her. “Are you all right?”
She was lying facedown in the dirt, left leg half bent, right sprawled out to the side.
“Linette?” he said, and touched her arm. “You okay?”
She rolled slowly onto her back, eyes glazed, dirt smudged across her nose. “Well, my heels are down,” she said.
He skimmed her body. Nothing seemed to be drastically out of place. “A little lower than I had in mind.”
“Linny!” Casie said, and suddenly she was rushing across the arena. “What happened?”
His student stared at her with narrow eyes. Either she was analyzing the situation or she was concussed. He rather hoped for the former.
“Who was the guy with the pickup truck?” she asked.
“What?” Casie skimmed her crumpled form before skipping her worried gaze to Colt and then back to Linette.
“The guy in the truck.” Her voice was extremely patient. “Who was he?”
“Oh … Ah … just a neighbor.”
Linette stared at her for a second, then snorted. “I’ve heard better lies from priests,” she said and sat up, but Casie leaned in quickly, placing a hand on her shoulder.
“Just take it easy. No rush,” she said.
“I don’t have …”
“A lot of time, I know,” Casie said. “But just relax for a second.”
Linette did so for approximately that long, then pushed resolutely to her feet. Casie rose with her. “Can you make it to the house?”
“I imagine I could if I wanted to, but Mr. Dickenson promised to teach me to lope.”
“I’m sure he’d be willing to do that later.”
“Good to know,” she said, and shaking her head, creaked painfully past them. “But if I’ve learned one thing in the last millennium or so, it’s to keep punching. Hold Maddy for me, will you?” she asked and hobbled toward the mare.
“Linette …” Casie hurried after her. “Listen, you can ride after dinner or something. I really think you should—”
But Colt interrupted. He’d always gotten a kick out of doing so. “She’s right, Case,” he said. “It’s all about the number of times you get back up.”
She opened her mouth to argue, but Linette was already grasping the reins in one stubborn hand. She tilted her head once in each direction as if to get the kinks out, then turned to look over her shoulder at him.
“What did I do wrong?” she asked. Her expression was almost comical with that streak of dirt firmly set across her nose.
“You fell off,” he said.
Her face softened a little, her expression equal parts humor and exasperation. “Could you be a little more specific?”
“I’d really rather you came into the house for a few minutes,” Casie said, but Linette just smiled.
“I would think if there was anyone who understood getting back on the horse, it’d be you,” she said and nodded toward where all three teenagers had gathered on the front porch. “Don’t worry about me. Your kids need you.”
Casie glanced at the trio, brows beetled. “You know they’re not really mine, don’t you?”
The older woman narrowed her eyes. “Your first family maybe didn’t turn out exactly like you hoped. Maybe your folks were a little more …” She shrugged, seeming to feel her way along. “More tempestuous than you’re comfortable with. But nobody’s perfect, Casie, and I’ve got a good feeling about this family.”
“They’re not my—” she began again, but Linette had already moved on.
“How do I get back up there?” she asked, and Colt smiled as Casie turned thoughtfully toward the house.
CHAPTER 22
“Case. Hey, Case.”
“Yeah.” The single word sounded groggy and misshapen. Since she’d returned to the Lazy six months earlier, sleep had become not only scarce but rather sacred. She lay now in her favorite sleeping position, arms flung out to the side, face squashed against the pillow. She raised her head the slightest degree. “What?”
“Wake up.”
“I am awake.” That might have been an out-and-out lie. She rather hoped it was. “Emily? Is that you?”
“Yeah.”
“What time is it?”
“I don’t know.” Casie could hear her shuffling her feet. “Three, maybe.”
“Three in the morning?”
“Looks like it.”
Casie closed her eyes. “Why do you think people keep waking me up at three in the morning?”
“I don’t know. Could just be bad luck. Or maybe it’s the fact that some of us are going to have a baby.”
“Yeah, that’s—What!” She would never remember sitting up, but suddenly she was blinking against the light that dimly backlit Emily’s ponderous form. She was standing in the doorway, half in, half out, hand resting on her belly.
“You’re going to have a baby?”
“I thought you knew.” Emily’s face was mostly shadowed, but her dry tone said it all.
“Holy shorts!” Casie breathed. She was out of bed in a second, turning an awkward circle, searching for something she couldn’t quite remember the name of. “Where’s your thing?”
“What thing?”
“Your …” She blinked hazily at the girl. “Are you all right?”
“Kind of tired.”
“Get in the truck. Maybe you can sleep on the way. They said you should rest as much as you can until the pain gets too intense.”
“Am I supposed to sleep when every horse goes into labor or just Freedom?”
Casie stumbled to a halt. “What?”
They stared at each other.
“Oh.” Emily narrowed her eyes a little. “You didn’t think I was in labor, did you?”
There was a pause that stretched out a bit as Casie stared at the girl. “Things are a little blurry.” She said the words slowly. It would be wrong to strike a pregnant woman. “But I’m pretty sure I just asked if you were going to have the baby.”
“Did you mean right now?”
Casie put her hand to her heart. It was still there; in fact, it was pretty active. “I don’t know why you hate me, Emily,” she said, and plopped bonelessly onto the mattress behind her.
Emily laughed at the drama. “Geez, Case, I’m not due for a couple weeks yet. But Sophie thinks Freedom is ready to pop any minute.”
“A couple weeks! Holy Hannah, Em. The baby’s not on a time clock. He could come anytime.”
“She.”
“What?”
“I’ve decided it’s a girl.”
“Really? What makes you think—”
“Casie!” Sophie’s voice boomed through the house like a cannon volley.
Casie didn’t even jump at the sound and wondered if it was a bad sign that these early-morning adventures didn’t faze her anymore. “I’m coming,” she said, raising her voice a little before lowering it again as she pushed herself to her feet. “What makes you think it’s a girl?”
“Girls are nice.”
“What are you doing?” Sophie stormed into the doorway, expression mad enough to burn rubber.
“Sometimes,” Emily added, noting Sophie’s irritable expression.
“How’s she doing?” Casie asked, checking a grin as she turned her attention toward the youngest member of their little trio.
“How’s she doing? How’s she doing!” Judging by the sound of Sophie’s voice, the mare was probably doing considerably better than Sophie was. “She’s in shock from the move, she’s physically exhausted, and she probably has kidney damage from dehydration.”
“Sometimes girls are a little bit drama
tic, though,” Emily noted.
“Just relax a little,” Casie said. “Take a breath.”
“Take a … Just hurry your ass up,” Sophie hissed.
“My ass is hurrying,” Casie said and turned another groggy circle, searching for who knows what. “It’s my mind that’s having a little trouble deciding …” She shook her head, trying to clear it. “Okay, I’m coming.”
The barn was mostly dark. Mostly quiet. Angel thrust her head over the half door, ears pricked forward. Beside her, Freedom circled her stall with restless uncertainty.
Casie scowled, trying to mentally engage. “How long has she been agitated like this?”
“Probably her whole life,” Emily said, then, “Oh, were you talking about the horse?”
Sophie glared at her before turning her attention back to Casie.
“I first checked her at three twenty-five. She’s lain down and gotten back up at least five times since then.”
“Any other signs?”
“She’s been dripping milk for about twenty-four hours.”
“Join the club,” Emily said.
“TMI,” Sophie said distractedly and quietly approached the mare’s stall.
Emily shrugged.
“What about her water bag?” Casie asked.
“I think it already broke, but I’m not sure.”
Casie glanced at her watch. “So we think she’s been in labor for at least a half an hour.”
“What’s the norm?” Emily asked.
“Start to finish …” Casie paused, thinking back to her Horse Bowl days when she could recall this kind of information with lightning speed. “Three hours. Maybe four. About the same as a cow. Prey animals need to get the job done quick and move on.”
“So flippin’ unfair,” Emily said. She was rubbing her belly. There was a lot of that lately.
“Yeah, well, you just have to push out about nine pounds,” Sophie said. “Freedom has to eject practically a hundred pounds of legs and—”
“Nine pounds!” They were keeping their voices very low. The mare circled again before plopping roughly onto her side with her spine toward them. “If she weighs in over seven, she’s staying in there indefinitely.”
“I don’t think that’s physically possible,” Sophie said. She was scowling as the mare started straining. “I think this is it. Case—”
