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“That’s the plan,” he explained. “She was bred as a show horse, but her owners didn’t have much use for her once she got injured. Best Boone or I can probably do is get her to a good home that cares more about her company than what she can actually do.”
As if knowing she was the current topic of conversation, Midnight carefully rose from where she reclined. She nudged Beth’s shoulder with her nose, and Beth laughed. Then, because the door was still open, the mare took another small step forward so she stood face-to-face with Eli.
He felt her warm breath on his cheek. He briefly squeezed his eyes shut before daring to glance at the white star between her eyes, the one that made her look so much like Fury.
He opened his eyes again, cautiously, waiting for his stomach to protest like it had earlier that day. But his body didn’t react. Not to Midnight at least. But he found a warm hand suddenly clasped in his and realized he’d either grabbed Beth’s hand without thinking or she’d grabbed his.
“I’m sorry, Eli,” she said softly. “I hope I didn’t overstep. You just looked like you needed it.”
That was when it hit him. He hadn’t raced to the barn because he was worried only about the horse. He’d blown out of Boone and Casey’s apartment without so much as a goodbye because he’d also been worried about her. Beth. A woman he’d only met that day. But for too many reasons to count, his worry could not go any further than this.
He gently freed his hand from hers.
He should have thanked her. He should have asked her how the hell she could read him so well. Instead, he told her a partial truth.
“I guess you’re more of an animal person than you knew. And you’ll be just as good with their respective humans. That—I guess—is why I hired you.” He clenched and unclenched the fist of the hand she’d been holding. “Sorry about that comment earlier about not understanding why I agreed to the whole working in the clinic situation. You’re obviously a natural at this, and I’m obviously a dick.”
The corner of her mouth twitched into a smile, but Eli swore he read a note of disappointment before it did. The same disappointment that he had already buried somewhere he hoped was deep enough not to find.
“Thank you,” Beth replied. She held out her hand to shake but seemingly thought better of it and dropped it back to her side. “Though I have a request…something I’d like to add to my position at the clinic.”
She wanted to do more work? After him being a bit of an ass about her qualifications, he certainly wasn’t going to argue with that.
He shrugged. “Sure. Why not?”
Beth squared her shoulders and crossed her arms. “I want to learn to ride a horse…with Midnight.”
“She still not talking to you?” Boone asked.
The two men stood at the threshold of the exam room hallway where it met the clinic waiting room.
Eli crossed his arms and nodded as he watched Beth smile at Trudy Davis and her ancient beagle, Frederick, as she checked them in.
“It’s been a week,” Eli told his brother. “She’s all smiles for the clients. Maybe a little standoffish to the animals, but me? I’m just the doctor. ‘The doctor will see you now,’ or ‘The doctor has your prescription ready,’ or even her handing me the phone and saying, ‘Of course, the doctor would love to talk to you about the new medications you think every veterinary clinic needs,’ regardless of me standing right next to the front desk, violently shaking my head no.”
Boone covered his mouth, but not before Eli heard him snort.
Beth’s head shot up as she glanced in their direction, and Eli yanked his brother into an empty exam room, slamming the door behind them.
Boone raised his brows. “Big brother, what did you do?”
Eli shoved his hands into the pockets of his white coat. “You mean other than giving her free room and board plus a job she’s wildly unqualified for?” Okay, the second part was a lie, and even Boone could see that. From the second she stepped behind the desk, the clinic was running more efficiently than it had in years.
Boone mirrored his brother’s stance, hands shoved into the front pockets of his jeans.
How different he and Boone were. But then Eli glanced down at the boots peeking out from the scrubs he wore beneath the coat, a shred of his former self that he still couldn’t abandon, and he wondered if his brother could still see it too, the man Eli used to be.
“Eli, you are full of more shit than Cirrus’s and Midnight’s stalls plus the entire chicken coop combined. So tell me what the hell you did to incur the wrath of Delaney’s sister, and then get your ass out to the barn and check up on our mare. You’re late for our appointment.”
Eli sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. When he squeezed his eyes shut, he could still see the mixture of shock and anger and sadness in Beth’s eyes.
“You’re not riding any horse on this property,” he’d told her that afternoon outside the mare’s stall. “Least of all Midnight.”
Her mouth fell open, but she regained her composure a second later.
“Did you just forbid me from riding this sweetheart of an animal?” She nodded her head in Midnight’s direction. “And let me clarify that that is the first and probably only time I’ve ever said that about something that walks on four legs.” Midnight nudged her shoulder softly. “See?” she added. “We’re, like, connected or something. She wants me to be the one to rehab her. She needs a rider, right? Why shouldn’t it be—”
“Dammit, Beth! It’s not happening!” Eli snapped, and a split second later, he saw it: Midnight shifting her weight to her hind legs, her head rearing back.
