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The pillow thing and the blowing on the wound thing… God, why had he done that? It was all coincidence.
You like her! Tess’s voice teased in his head as if she was thrilled with the news.
Not that there was news. He’d just met the woman. He knew nothing about her other than she was dealing with a huge setback, and the last place she wanted to be was Meadow Valley, yet here she was.
Also, Beth didn’t hate bananas. Still, that was coincidence. Most people didn’t hate bananas.
Eli made it to the barn, heart hammering in his chest as he passed Cirrus’s stall and made his way to the one at the other end.
Midnight whinnied and took a step toward her stall door as soon as he approached, but when she attempted to put weight on her injured leg, she limped back, almost cowering against the wall.
Eli’s eyes locked on hers, and his stomach lurched. He had to brace himself against the door. Even for a logical man like himself, this was too much coincidence for one day.
With every hammering beat of his heart, he felt the pounding of hooves beneath the saddle, felt every muscle in his body working in tandem as he rose and fell in rhythm with her gallop. The stagnant summer air vanished, and instead the wind threatened to whip his cattleman from his head. Eli let go of the reins with one hand just in time to catch his hat as he whooped and hollered with an indescribable joy.
Not real, a voice inside his head whispered.
He squeezed his eyes shut, the sudden vertigo making down feel like up and up like down. He’d never experienced anything like it, and he was beginning to think that maybe, if there was some sort of universal higher power, it had chosen today to fuck with Eli Murphy.
When the room seemed to stop spinning, he finally looked up again and straight into the mare’s dark and frightened eyes, the familiar pattern of a white star on her black coat splitting the distance between them.
“Fury?” he muttered, his voice hoarse. Then he fell to his knees, emptying the contents of his stomach onto the dusty and gritty floor.
Chapter 5
Beth could see the clinic from the front door of the guesthouse, so she waited a full twenty minutes and then some before heading over. She didn’t want to seem eager by showing up early. This visit was simply a means to an end, a way to appease her sister and—fine—not stay holed up in a tiny apartment wallowing. She was talented enough in the art that she could wallow anywhere.
She found the entry door ajar, but the lights to the reception area were off as she stepped inside.
“Hello?” Beth called warily. In horror movies, this was the part where she got impaled by a pitchfork or some other farming tool. Or maybe because she was in a veterinary clinic, it would be something more like a scalpel. And the audience would of course roll their eyes because who would be clueless enough to enter a building that had its door ajar and no lights on in a place she’d never been, looking for a man she barely knew?
Apparently, Beth Spence was clueless enough, because instead of running back the way she came—or in her case limping—she continued exploring.
“Eli? Delaney told me twenty minutes. I waited twenty-five.” She let out a nervous laugh. “Performers like to make an entrance, right?” She ran her hand along the high wooden counter, behind which someone would sit to greet clients and their furry friends.
Oh god. Barring any unfortunate scalpel-related incidents resulting in her even more unfortunate murder, Beth would be the person behind that counter. Ugh. She wouldn’t have to hold any of those furry friends, right?
She continued with her hesitant exploration.
“If you’re, like, into pranks and stuff like that…” she called into what felt like an abyss, “I should warn you that I do not react kindly to surprises. See, my sister and I have this thing where we don’t wish each other happy birthday until it’s the actual time of our birth. I was born at 11:58 p.m., and there was this one night that I had a performance, and Delaney wanted to be the first to wish me happy birthday after the show and thought spraying me with confetti the second I walked into an elevator would be a good idea. My first reaction was to spray her right back. With pepper spray. Spoiler alert… It didn’t end well for either of us.”
Beth’s eyes, nose, and throat burned every time she thought of the incident. Even now, she had to fight the urge to cough.
She crept farther into the space, grateful for the natural light pouring in through the windows, especially since there wasn’t a light switch to be found. But as she neared the short hallway of exam rooms, the windows disappeared, as did most of the light.
“You know what? On the off chance that you are going to impale me with a pitchfork or a scalpel, I think I’ll head back to the guesthouse.” She put her weight on her right heel, ready to pivot and move as quickly as possible back the way she came, when she finally received a response.
“In here.” Eli’s voice sounded from a few feet deeper down the hall, hoarse and weary.
Oh no. Maybe she was the hero of the horror film rather than the victim?
“Eli, are you impaled by a pitchfork?” she called as she followed the sound and hoped the odds of this scenario not playing out like a slasher film were in her favor.
This earned her a laugh, though a bitter one if she was accurately reading his tone.
“No pitchfork. Promise. I just…needed a few minutes to myself.”
Sunlight shone through the crack in what she thought would be his office door, but when Beth pushed it open, she found Eli sprawled on his back on an exam table definitely meant for a creature slightly smaller than a human, one knee raised and his arm bent beneath his head.
