Page 25 of Wild and Wanted

His pulse thudding like a gong in his chest as her eyes had fluttered closed and she’d rubbed her cheek into his palm. Having to stop himself from leaning in and kissing all her hurts better.

Giving her something else to think about if only for a moment.

So preoccupied with the memory, Clay didn’t hear the guitar at first but as it filtered past his feverish thoughts, he stopped dead in the middle of the central thoroughfare.

Stevie.

Frowning, Clay tried to locate the direction of the music but with his heart thumping loudly through his ears it was like trying to identify the sound under water. She started to sing then and even though it was quiet and soft, the words were so familiar they cut through the noise, drawing him like a siren singing from the rocks.

It was her Grammy song. He’d heard it from his radio dozens of times but there was something much more raw about it up this close.

His boots crunched on the dirt and grit underfoot as he walked towards the singing, his head swivelling left and right, homing in on it, pinpointing a stall. When he realised which one, his pulse spiked in alarm, urgency quickening his steps.

Electra’s stall. Hell…

The filly may be considerably calmer now but that didn’t mean she was 100 per cent predicable, particularly if she was around people she didn’t know. She could be devilishly edgy still and mistrustful of anyone other than Clay.

His pulse hammering at his neck, Clay took the last remaining steps at a clip, reaching for the stall door to wrench it open. But, to his surprise, he found Electra standing passively, ears pricked as if she too could hear the underlying ache in the song.

Stevie startled at his sudden appearance causing Electra to toss her head. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said from her position on the floor, her denim-clad legs extended out and crossed at the ankles, her guitar held across her front, her back to the cinder block of the stall. Her cheeks were wet, as if she’d been crying. ‘I thought Electra might appreciate some soothing music. I hope that’s okay? I know music is used a lot in equine therapy.’

Clay ignored her explanation. None of that mattered right now as he spotted the tear tracks glistening on her cheeks. ‘It’s fine.’ He shoved a hand through his hair, wishing he hadn’t reacted so badly and ruined the ambience for horse and woman. ‘She can just be a bit unpredictable still, I didn’t want you to get hurt.’

Glancing at the horse, Stevie dashed away the tears. ‘She’s been really well behaved.’

With his heart rate still recovering from the adrenaline injection, Clay unlatched the door with hands that weren’t quite steady. ‘Good girl, Electra,’ he crooned as he approached, giving Stevie time to collect herself. Deliberately, he relaxed his posture to reassure the horse everything was okay as he reached out his hand to stroke her nose. ‘You’re lucky, getting your own one-woman show from none other than Miss Stephanie Everhart.’

She laughed and Clay glanced at her, those misty mountain eyes almost silvery now but the tears were gone even if she still seemed unbearably sad. Electra nuzzled his hand as if she too was concerned about Stevie. It should have been no surprise – in his experience, horses keenly sensed emotional shifts in people. He just hadn’t expected it from this cantankerous, skittish filly.

Electra was clearly a big softie under all that taut, powerful horse flesh.

‘You okay?’

Nodding, she cleared her throat. ‘Yes. Sorry. Sometimes it hits harder than others.’

Of course it would. Clay wasn’t exactly the most emotionally evolved of men but even he knew that grief wasn’t a linear process. He remembered when he was a kid, stumbling across his mother crying over the death of her father years before and her saying something similar.

And, although it wasn’t comparable, his sorrow over the sudden ending of his career had also followed a rollercoaster trajectory.

‘You picked the right audience. Horses are good listeners.’

Smiling softly, she said, ‘I’ll remember that.’

Clay pointed to the instrument. ‘You brought your guitar.’

She tapped the wood, the sound resonating around the hollow centre. ‘Never go anywhere without it.’ She strummed the strings then as if it was second nature to do so. ‘Never know when inspiration might strike.’ Another strum. ‘Do you play?’

‘God no.’ Clay huffed out a laugh. ‘I’m not remotely musical.’

Her brows drew together into a tiny pleat. ‘You don’t like music?’

‘Oh… no. I like it. Very much. I’m just more of a listener.’

‘So you don’t go off riding into the sunset with a guitar strapped to your back?’

Another laugh slid from his throat. ‘Definitely no Roy Rogers.’ She smiled and hell if Clay didn’t feel the impact of it from across the stall.

‘What do you like? What do you listen to?’