Holding my hand out to him, I murmured, “Come on, baby. Let’s go for a ride.”
He gave me a little smile and took my hand, then followed me to the lush pastureland that covered most of the area behind the barns that were separated by enough space that our walk through those pastures to the stock barn took a long while. We walked hand in hand, outside of having to go through gates or climb over a fence.
It was… peaceful.
There were sounds of the horses and even some machinery in the distance. The cows were making noise on occasion, too, but they were far enough that it didn’t really carry much.
The light breeze ruffled Emery’s curls, and when he looked up at me and smiled, he was breathtaking.
“What?” he asked, puzzled at my dumbstruck expression.
“Uh, nothing.” It was the first time I’d lied to him. “I wish we’d remembered hats. It’s pretty warm today even with the breeze.”
He shrugged easily. “There’s some caps in the tack room.”
“Okay.” We continued the last bit to get to the barn.
“Hey, you two!” Wyanne said brightly.
“Hi. I dragged this one away from the old ladies who wanted his medical expertise. Do we have horses to borrow?”
Wyanne smiled knowingly. “Yes, I think Niko and Arrow are free. Feel free to grab them.”
I gave her a little salute, then tugged Emery to the tack room for those caps first.
There were some new ones with the ranch’s logo on them, so I took one and gave another to him. “Don’t you have your own cap?”
“Yeah, but I have no idea where it is. It’s not like I wear one for work,” he answered dryly.
“That’s a good point,” I said, using his exact tone.
We grinned at each other as we adjusted the ball caps, then went to get the horses.
Twenty minutes later, we were riding on the cow pasture. There was so damn much space.
I’d grabbed the bottles of water and a blanket from the tack room, rolling the former inside the latter. The blanket was secured behind Niko’s saddle now, and when Emery had noticed what I was doing, there’d been this exhale that relaxed him a bit more. It was as if he wanted away from the people but needed to be taken, almost as if he wouldn’t do it by himself.
Whether it was the polite man or the doctor in him that made him be so selfless in the moment, I didn’t know.
“Your mom told me to take you out of the house, by the way,” I told him after we’d been plodding along for about ten minutes.
He smiled and chuckled, shaking his head. “Of course she did.”
I guided Niko closer to Arrow, then reached for Emery. He smiled as he squeezed my hand.
“You doing okay?” I tried to read him more than I usually would.
“Yeah. I’m fine. It’s mostly the extra socializing. I know Mom will be fine.”
“I thought that might be it.” He grinned. “The perk of knowing your shit but also the situation calls for explaining it over and over again.”
He nodded, the tiredness falling over his features again for a moment. “Exactly that, but also, I wish I could just tell everyone that if their sister’s husband’s nephew’s partner needs to know if they have gout or not, they can come to the clinic. That I won’t even speculate on diagnosis because that’s a slippery slope.”
I hummed with understanding. “There can’t be a situation where someone says ‘but Doctor Emery said’ about anything.”
“Uh-huh.” He shook his shoulders a little, squeezed my fingers, and let go. “Let’s pick up the speed?”
“Sure.” If a good gallop was what he needed to air his brain, I was here for it.
