A small beam of joy spread through my chest for Ainsley, and suddenly I wanted to feel like I’d conquered something as well. Sure, I was helping with the silo remodel, but that was the type of work I was used to and I’d be proud when it was all completed. I’d wished on more than one occasion that Dad were working on it with me because he would think it was one of the most challenging and coolest projects ever, and we had done dozens together before he passed.
But this felt different, like doing something out of my comfort zone, something I was unfamiliar with that might help me…I didn’t know exactly what—grow in some way, shape, or form? Not that I hadn’t challenged myself in new ways by joining the service or by traveling all the way across the country to help Sienna. This was more about a deep, budding need inside me that I couldn’t quite place my finger on yet. Maybe it wasn’t so much about growing as it was about healing. It might take me a bit to unpack what the hell that entailed.
I must’ve totally zoned out because the next time I looked at Ainsley, her feet were firmly back on the ground again and George had brought Rocket and Mercy inside the paddock with him.
“Okay, I’m off to get some paperwork done in the office before I get emotional again,” Sienna said. “Catch up with you later.”
There was a moment of silence between Kerry and me as his elbow rested beside mine on the wooden slats.
“Guess we’re both saps,” Kerry said in a hesitant tone.
“Nah, got me choked up too, but I have yet to figure out why. Either it was from watching you two or because she looked so full of joy. Or both.”
“There’s a lot of joy in the little things.” His eyes crinkled with a smile. “Especially when it comes to animals. They can’t talk, which means you have to rely on your instincts, and there’s somethin’ deeply satisfying about that.”
I thought about how Kerry took care of Maisy’s needs in the mornings, let alone all the other animals he came in contact with, and how he seemed to get simple gratification from it. Sienna too. There was a situation just the other day where one of the goats got trapped in a plastic drainage pipe used for crop irrigation, and she’d sprung into action to relieve his discomfort. They were just good people through and through.
When George left the enclosure to attend to some stray cows in the pasture, I watched Mercy trail behind Rocket as they munched on some grassy patches that weren’t already worn away, near the fence. As Rocket edged closer, my pulse pounded, and I wondered how close they might get. Mercy slowed, seeming a bit more reserved than Rocket. His ears were back, and his tail swished side to side.
I held my breath as he stepped beside Rocket, who was directly in front of us, and I was suddenly glad that the fence was between us.
Kerry dug in his pocket and produced a withered carrot. “Leftover from this morning, but he won’t complain,” he quipped.
“Guess not,” I replied, wondering what the hell else he had in his pocket. There was a joke in there somewhere.
“You’ll get the hang of it.” He winked, and it went straight to my belly, warming it instantly.
I watched how easy it was for him to stretch his arm toward his horse, but he had been around animals his whole life. Still, I couldn’t understand why I felt so unsettled around these regal animals. Part of me felt this urgency to jump right in and stop being so cautious. My squad always called me a baller with explosives because I could normally spot them a mile away and was able to disable some before they detonated, which was freaking terrifying sometimes and really got my adrenaline pumping.
But that was before that fateful day. And ever since then, I pretty much second-guessed myself every step of the way. No way I wanted to make a misstep and…what? Get blown apart? That was a bit much, but somehow my brain wasn’t registering the incongruity, and instead, my fight-or-flight reaction would take over at a moment’s notice.
In this situation, nobody would get hurt. The horse was behind a fence, for Christ’s sake. What would he do, jump over and kick me in the head? Maybe it would help set my mind right, like in those stupid cartoons where the character’s head gets rung like a bell.
But it was more than some deep-seated fear of the unknown. It was about looking like a fool in front of someone I admired. That was what this was, this itch under my skin for Kerry—I admired him, hoped to be half the man he was. That was all. Right?
I mean, outside of my wild attraction to him. Ugh.
“Actually,” Kerry said, reaching back in his pocket, “I have a couple more, even if they’re a bit worse for wear. Want to feed Mercy?”
“I sort of do.” I stepped forward. “But I’m… I’m being ridiculous.”
As soon as Mercy spotted Kerry lifting the carrot in my direction he came closer, wanting a treat too.
“No, you’re not.” Kerry’s voice was soft, soothing. “Watch how easy it is. You don’t even have to make contact, unless you want to.”
Kerry broke the top off and threw it away from Rocket, so he’d step back to retrieve it, leaving only Mercy at the fence. Kerry held the very end of the carrot, and Mercy gently slid it from his grasp with his teeth, never making contact with his hand.
“Last one,” he said, holding up a miserable-looking carrot.
Jesus, I’d been a soldier and at war in a foreign land, but I couldn’t feed a damned horse? I squared my shoulders and fished the carrot from his grasp. I got this.
As soon as I stretched my hand forward, I quickly drew it back, chickening out at the last minute. Fuck.
I dipped my head as my cheeks heated, and was about to step away with some sort of flimsy excuse when I felt Kerry’s hand land on top of mine. My breath hitched as he guided my arm toward the horse, and it was the exact thing I needed—for someone to take over and help me overcome my stupid apprehension. And somehow, with the heat of his palm searing into my knuckles, I felt braver. My mind blanked out all the noise, and I just focused on the breathtaking animal in front of me.
Kerry turned my hand over, palm up, his fingers ghosting mine from beneath as we offered the treat to Mercy. Mercy seemed to hesitate, then stepped forward, and I watched as he snuffled and angled his head in the carrot’s direction. The gentle way he slid the carrot out of my trembling hand told me he was as vigilant about me as I was about him.
“Good boy,” Kerry said, and I swallowed thickly, still watching Mercy intently while also not wanting to make any sudden movements like Mom had taught me so many years ago. As he stood chewing his treat, I zeroed in on details I hadn’t had the opportunity to notice before, like his long eyelashes and deep-set brown eyes. He also had a small white patch of hair on his muzzle in the shape of a triangle, and I wondered about its texture.
“Thanks,” I mumbled, feeling a bit absurd. And still neither of us moved as our forearms rested on top of the enclosure. I could feel Kerry’s soft pants against the side of my neck and smell his earthy scent, and I didn’t know which situation made me feel more vulnerable in front of him—this or the nightmare.
“Don’t be embarrassed. You did good,” he said, and I liked the soft yet assuring tone of his voice. “Mercy likes you.”
“How can you tell?” I angled my head to glance at him.
“Just can.” When he added slight pressure to my hand, my palm tingled. But he didn’t seem to realize the effect he was having on me. “You can pet him. He’d probably let you.”
“Will you…um…” I winced, trailing off. God, I felt like I was five years old, but Kerry didn’t question me or poke fun, simply stretched our joined hands out again toward his muzzle. And before I could freak out, my fingers met soft, sleek hair. Mercy seemed to enjoy the attention because he slanted closer, and we stood petting him for another long moment.
Until Rocket encroached in his space, apparently wanting in on the action, so Kerry disengaged our fingers to attend to his horse.
When I finally drew my hand back, Kerry smiled. “Well, now you’ve made a friend for life.”
I sn
ickered. “I feel like I accomplished something, and all I did was pet a horse.”
He shrugged. “Like I said, it’s the little things.”
And then there was another one of those moments where our gazes clashed for entirely too long, and fuck if his eyes didn’t soften a fraction, which made me feel all melted inside. From a damned look.
I realized right then that Kerry was right. Sometimes it was the simplest gesture that took up the most room in your heart. And Kerry’s kindness was something I wouldn’t soon forget.
Kerry’s breath hitched, and he took a step back, as if grasping for the first time how close we’d been standing—and staring. “I, uh, should go talk to Dr. Barnes.”
I blinked a few times, watching him head away from me, then averted my eyes like I’d been caught gawking too long. I felt dumbfounded for an instant longer, then finally got moving. I walked my ass back to work on the silo, wondering the entire time if this tension between us would come to a head for either of us—one way or another.
14
Kerry
“Ainsley will be ready to ride her before we know it,” Dr. Barnes said as I walked her to her car. “But we never want to rush it. Let’s see what next session feels like.”
“Sounds good.” I waved to her as she drove away.
Afterward, Ainsley helped me feed the chickens, and as she was intent on the task, I couldn’t stop my brain from rolling back thirty minutes to when Julian had stopped to watch Ainsley with Dr. Barnes again. He was obviously curious about the sessions, the horses, or both, and in the process had inadvertently witnessed a proud parent moment between Sienna and me when Ainsley finally mounted her horse. She had been so patient in her work with Dr. Barnes, and soon enough, we’d be riding as a family again. I didn’t realize until right then how much I’d missed it.
Ainsley had been raised on horses just like Sienna and me. But her recent fears had kept her from enjoying them again. When Piper had come to us as a rescue and Ainsley had immediately taken to her, we knew it was the right time to get Dr. Barnes involved.
And now look how far we’d come.
I cracked a smile as Ainsley squealed and chased after Cookie, her favorite chicken.
I glanced back toward the paddock. That moment between Julian and me…what had that been about?
It certainly wasn’t the first time that same sort of transcendent feeling had passed between us. It was as if the tendrils of my attraction were weaving themselves around the tender and bruised places inside me, and I wanted to…what? Hold him? Spend more time with him in a different way? That could only end in disaster.
And what was I thinking? What if Sienna had returned to the paddock and saw us standing so close together? Or Ainsley had finished with Dr. Barnes and ran up on us?
And so what if they did? I was simply helping him get over his trepidation around horses. He was thrumming with the same raw energy as the night of his bad dream, and I wanted to assist him in bridging that gap between his irrational fears and his curiosity.
Why did a badass soldier—an explosives guy, no less—feel uncomfortable around horses in the first place? His mom had been raised around them, though that wasn’t always a good predictor of interest; look at me and my family’s ranch. Besides, Aunt Melinda hadn’t stuck around in Wyoming and didn’t visit all that often, so maybe that had something to do with it.
I also wondered if Julian’s fears stemmed from the same reasons my daughter was struggling so much. The aftereffects of a traumatic event. We certainly would’ve never guessed that Ainsley would develop the kind of anxiety she did after such an ordeal. So maybe these animals seemed as uncertain to Julian as some things did for Ainsley. Julian also had nightmares, and it seemed to me that he worked himself to the bone on the silo every day just to keep moving.
After delivering a basket of fresh eggs to Marta, and while Ainsley chilled out with a favorite show in the family room, I hopped on a four-wheeler and headed toward the silo. It was midafternoon, and I really had no business interrupting him like this, but I wanted to tell him that I didn’t mean to take off like that on him. He might’ve thought I regretted our time by the fence, and it wasn’t that at all. But I absolutely didn’t want to give Julian the wrong idea about what happened either. So maybe a talk was in order. To lay all the cards on the table.
Julian had kept the door propped wide open, likely to let the air and sunshine in while he took a broom to the floor. And who could blame him. The last of the boxes had been moved out—George and I had helped him relocate them either to the trash bin or the appropriate barn—and he probably wanted everything looking and smelling clean and fresh before he decided what needed to be built with the lumber that had recently been delivered. Inhaling all that dust wasn’t good for anyone, and given his time in the service—as well as the brief glances inside his room—he was definitely a tidy person. Not that you could bounce a quarter off his bed, or whatever the folklore was about new recruits in the military, but he undeniably appeared to be much neater than me.
Sienna had also been checking in with him along the way to make sure their visions still matched, and the way they’d chattered away excitedly about the floor plans at the dinner table or some evenings on the porch was infectious. I had confidence in Julian, and so did Sienna. She’d invited him clear across the country to help us, after all, and thought he was up for the job. Though my ex-mother-in-law and Aunt Melinda no doubt had a lot to do with the decision.
I gave the door a light rap with my knuckles so as not to startle him. “Hey there.”
He paused with the broom near where one of the metal ladders still remained. They’d decided to incorporate them into the design, which would be a cross between industrial and country chic. Not that I really understood what that meant.
“What’s the occasion?”
It wasn’t that strange for me to show up, but it was normally when he needed help with something.
“Just wanted to see how you were comin’ along,” I said in the most nonchalant voice I could muster.
“Yeah?” he asked pointedly, and my cheeks heated from the lie.
“Honestly, I came here to say that I…” I stepped farther into the room, looking behind me to make sure we were alone. “Well, I didn’t want to give you the wrong idea…earlier.”
He propped the broom against the wall. “By the fence with Mercy?”
“Yeah. I sort of took off, and it’s just that…I should be more careful around here.” I lifted my hat and ran my fingers through my hair in frustration. “If someone saw us…”
“Feeding a horse?” He arched an eyebrow.
“Suppose that sounds dumb.” I kicked at a small stone on the floor. “But I think you know what I mean.”
His jaw was tight as he shrugged. “Maybe I don’t.”
“It’s…nothing, never mind.” I replied as my stomach roiled. “It was stupid to bring it up.”
I mentally kicked myself as I turned for the exit, my hat practically crushed in the tight grip of my hand. I knew what they said about making assumptions. Why did I think he’d get what I was referring to or that he’d want to discuss it? Had it all been one-sided? The looks, the touches, the conversations…
Fuck, I could not get out of there fast enough.
“I see how you look at me.” When Julian’s voice rang out in the hollow space, I froze in place.
When he didn’t expound, I whirled around to glare at him. “And how is that?”
He folded his arms. “The same way I look at you.”
I motioned between us. “Are we playing games here?”
“Guess so, since you hightailed it down here, then never actually said what was on your mind.”
“I just…” My shoulders slumped. “I wasn’t sure if you…”
“If I was attracted to you too?”
My head dipped, and suddenly I was looking at my toes like some shy kid. “Yeah, that.”
“You’re not imagining it, Kerry,” h
e said in a soothing tone, but it did nothing to calm the butterflies beating a steady rhythm in my stomach. “I know this is tricky. You’re letting me stay on your farm while I remodel this silo, and I don’t want to overstep or make you feel uncomfortable.”
“Oh, I’m uncomfortable all right.” I shifted on my feet, avoiding shifting that other part of me that was suddenly making my jeans uncomfortable. “For all the reasons you could imagine.”
When he smirked, I fleetingly returned his smile before I sobered again.
“It’s just that I can’t…” I briefly screwed my eyes shut. “I can’t hurt her again.”
“By being with a guy?” he asked, confusion lining his features.
“That ship has sailed.” I shook my head. “By being with family.”
He took a step toward me. “We’re not family, not by blood or marriage.”
“You know what I mean.” My eyes landed on his. “Sienna is your cousin, and I was married to her, and hell if that doesn’t suck because if I had met you someplace else, anywhere else…”
He arched a brow. “We’d already be banging each other?”
“Maybe.” I couldn’t help grinning at the idea even as my cheeks heated up. “Have you ever… I assume you’ve been with other…”
“Men?” He nodded. “You could only imagine the shit we got up to on long nights in the desert. Competitions, for example. The one where you deep throat bananas always gave them away, and then before you knew it, one of you was on your knees somewhere away from the barracks or sometimes meeting up during a weekend pass.”
“Fuck,” I said in a hoarse voice. “The visual alone is killing me.”
We did more of that staring thing, and then I forced my legs to move to the door. I came here to say my piece, so it was time for me to go before this turned into something else.
Have Mercy Page 11
