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“I thought you were helping with the move.”
“Sammy Boy called and said we had a ewe go into labor.”
Laura perked up, her eyebrows following suit. She looked from the woman to Todd, and she was clearly his sister. Neither of them offered to have her go out and take a look at the ewe. Sheep weren’t exactly large animals, but Laura had expertise with all ranch animals.
The woman switched out her boots, making plenty of noise in the process, and Todd said, “Call me if you need me.”
“Yep,” the woman said as she left the two of them alone again.
“That’s Sierra,” Todd said with a sigh. “She picks up all the slack around here, so I can’t complain.” He flashed the briefest of smiles, and Laura wondered what kind of light would radiate from his face when he unleashed a full grin.
She told herself to keep her composure, and she put the brakes on her crazy-train thoughts. “She seems nice.”
“She’s great, yeah,” he said. “Okay, so where were we?”
Laura put up both hands. “I have no idea.” She chuckled again, glad when Todd did too. He seemed to relax too, and she allowed her back to curve into the chair behind her.
“Experience,” he blurted out. “I didn’t see much of that on your application.”
“I just finished school a year ago,” she said. “I’ve been trying to find a place where I want to stay for a while.” She told herself not to fidget or clear her throat.
“You don’t want to open a practice?”
“No, sir,” she said, deciding she didn’t need to elaborate unless he asked specific questions.
“Do you—?” He cut off as his phone rang. His attention diverted to it, and he said, “This is Sierra. Sorry, I need to answer it.”
“It’s fine,” she said, though he didn’t need her permission to talk to his sister and take care of his ranch.
“What’s goin’ on?” he asked instead of hello. In the next moment, he got to his feet. “I’m on my way.” He shoved his phone in his back pocket and headed for the door. “We’ve got a sheep in trouble.”
Laura jumped to her feet too and followed behind him quickly. “What kind of trouble?”
“Too much blood, Sierra said.” Todd glanced at her as they gained the bigger room.
“Is the lamb out?”
“I didn’t get that information.” Todd burst out of the barn, and they walked quickly around it to the pens behind it. “Our lambing shed is just over here.” He started to jog, and Laura kept up with him. She hadn’t done much running in her life, and her lungs felt it. She managed to follow him into the lambing shed, the scent of blood heavy in the air.
She paused, her adrenaline firing on all cylinders. Sierra waved her hand above her head, clear panic on her face. Laura felt none of it moving through her, and she didn’t wait for Todd to move.
She went, and she went quickly, going right over the waist-high fence and into the pen where the sheep lay. The lamb wasn’t all the way out yet, and the mother looked at Laura with blank eyes.
“We’re going to lose them both,” she said, pressing on the shoulder of a man kneeling near the sheep. “I need gloves and lubricant.” She looked at the man there. “Now.”
She put her hands on the ewe’s face and leaned closer. “Hey, there, mama. You’re okay, okay?” She looked at another nearby cowboy. “How long has she been trying to deliver?”
“About forty-five minutes.”
“And nothing?”
“We’ve seen hooves,” he said. “The lamb is breech, we think.”
Laura swallowed and nodded. “A breech lamb is still a normal birth,” she said, taking the gloves as the first cowboy returned with them. She slid her hands into them, noting how big they were, then held her palms open for the lubricant. With that coating her gloves, she inched closer to the ewe.
She bleated, and Laura shushed her with a soft, continuous noise. “Help her hold up the hind-quarters,” she said, and the two cowboys did what she said. Then she slipped her hand inside the ewe, committing to helping with this birth. She indeed met front legs—and not just two. She said nothing about that but looked at one of the cowboys. “I need a couple of lambing ropes.”
They appeared at her side, and she slid one into her hand already in the lamb. She hooked it around one hoof, then repeated that with a second rope. “Okay,” she said. “Let’s see what we’ve got.”
