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“I know! Now I have to put it under my pillow and see what happens. So the Tooth Fairy will come. Right?”
“Umm. Sure. That’s what we’ll do. Want me to put it in my pocket? Keep it safe for you?”
“Yes, sir!” Zeke’s grin didn’t just warm his heart. It owned it. “Can we go show everyone? Cookie said they’ll all be so happy for me!”
For Zeke he’d do anything, even facing down those old regrets, but when they got to the house, Lizzie had gone back to the stables. When Zeke pestered to go see her, Corrie bent low. “I think she’s sleeping, little man. She had a long night and she was pretty tuckered out. How about if Dad takes a picture and you can show her in the morning?”
His lower lip thrust out. “But I really wanted her to see it tonight. Before the Tooth Fairy takes it away.”
“We could wait until tomorrow night to put it under your pillow,” suggested Heath. “Then you can show Lizzie in the morning.”
“The Tooth Fairy won’t mind?” That thought made his eyes go round. “She can come tomorrow night instead?”
“Absolutely, partner.”
“Then let’s do that.” Zeke thrust his hand into Heath’s. “I don’t mind waiting, Dad. Because I want Lizzie—”
Heath arched a brow.
“Miss Lizzie to be so happy for me, too,” he corrected himself. “Because that makes everything special.”
Corrie smiled. And Harve’s silence in the barn punctuated the air, making him wonder why they didn’t just come out and say what they were thinking.
Because you’ll get defensive and overreact.
He’d been doing both for too long. But with so many plates spinning in the air, he wasn’t sure how to stop. Take a breath. Be a nice guy again.
But if this many people were tiptoeing around him, he needed to wise up. And as soon as he could take a deep breath, he’d do just that.
* * *
“Liz?”
Lizzie scrunched her pillow into a tighter ball and rolled over, but the annoying voice sounded again.
“Liz? Are you awake? It’s Heath.”
Did he think she didn’t recognize his voice? She jammed the pillow over her face for a few seconds before tossing it aside and creeping to the door. “Of course I wasn’t awake,” she whispered when she opened the door. “It’s three thirty in the morning. No one is awake by choice at this hour, Heath. Except you.”
“Rosie is in labor,” he explained. “Harve wants me to wait with him at the hospital but I need someone to watch Zeke.”
“Zeke, who is sound asleep right now?” She yawned. “You woke me up to ask me to watch a sleeping child?”
“He’ll be up in a few hours, and I figured it was smarter to talk to someone rather than leave a note. Listen, never mind…” He began to back away. “I can wake the little guy and take him along.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. Of course I’ll watch him. What are you waiting for?” She motioned to the stairs. “Go keep your friends company as they welcome their child into the world.” She didn’t say what she was thinking, that she’d have given anything to have that kind of support from him twelve years ago.
She’d thought she’d dealt with that time of sadness. Maybe being here, with Heath, stirred a pot that had been simmering all these years.
“Thanks.” He started away, then turned back. “Rosie’s lost babies in the past so they’re both kind of scared. More than most, I expect.”
Oh, her heart.
To hear the emotion in his voice over someone else’s sadness—and nothing for their own. She had to tamp down an emotional surge before she said too much. “Go.”
He took the stairs quickly but quietly. The soft click of the stable door marked his exit.
She tiptoed back into the room, grabbed her laptop and slipped downstairs. She peeked into Girlie’s stall.
All was well.
She crossed the chilled grass and welcomed the warmth of the big house once she got inside. She made a quick cup of coffee, then curled up in a wide-backed chair, opened her laptop and tried to crunch figures.
Despite her efforts, all she could see was Heath’s focus and concentration as he labored to save a ewe’s life. One ewe, out of a few thousand.
Was the ewe that important? Clearly she was.
She opened a new doc file and began again, starting with the ewe’s mistaken trail ride, into the hills. And how a dedicated shepherd rode through the night to bring mother and children home. She didn’t make Heath the focus. She used Aldo for that, the small, tan-skinned shepherd, putting the needs of the animals foremost.
