drove up and parked near the barns. Lily stepped out of the car, which he couldn’t help noticing was nearly as cute as she was. Dressed in jeans and a pink T-shirt, she looked nothing like the well-dressed woman he’d seen up to this point. As a matter of fact, he liked this look much better.
Growling at himself for thinking of her that way, he shook off the impression and took his time strolling over to meet her. The slow pace gave him a chance to remind himself that it was his own fault she was here, and he had no choice but to make the best of it.
Before he got there, Abby came flying down the back porch steps and made a beeline for their visitor.
More excited than usual, she stopped and stared up at her teacher with obvious heroine worship shining in her eyes. “Hi, Miss St. George. Are you ready for your lesson?”
“I think so.” She turned to Mike, eyes twinkling in amusement. “I guess we’ll find out.”
Being a fairly intelligent guy, he recognized that she was punting his own words back at him. Her version was much brighter than his had been, and he got the feeling she was daring him to match her. He managed not to smile, but it wasn’t easy in the face of all that perkiness.
Eyeing her sneakers, he frowned. “That’s the only pair of flat shoes you own?”
“Obviously,” she retorted, tilting her head in a chiding gesture that brought to mind his sassy younger sister.
“Well, you’re gonna need some riding boots to grab on to the stirrups. Come on in and I’ll see what I’ve got.”
Eager to get her lesson over with, he wasn’t crazy about having to go through the extra hoop. It wasn’t that he didn’t want her in the stable, he told himself as Abby took Lily’s hand and tugged her forward. He just wasn’t keen about sharing his turf with someone who made him so...jittery.
Inside the sliding door, she fell out of step with him, and he glanced down the rubber aisleway, thinking something must be out of place. The dividing walls between the stalls were made of age-darkened oak, with wrought iron rising from chest height up to the ceiling. Lights and fans dotted the interior, keeping the horses cool on even the hottest days.
It all looked fine to him, and he asked, “Something wrong?”
Eyes wide, she slowly shook her head. “This is incredible. How many spaces are there?”
“Twenty in this barn,” he answered proudly, lifting Abby up to sit on a sturdy shelf normally reserved for spare equipment parts. It was currently empty, one more reminder of how close to the bone Dad’s beloved Gallimore was operating these days. “The stable for boarders has another fifteen.”
“You take care of thirty-five horses here?”
“Well, me and my brothers, Drew and Josh, along with a couple of Dad’s old grooms who wanted to stay on after he died.”
Peeking into a vacant stall, she looked down the line with obvious disappointment. “They’re all outside? I was hoping to meet some of them.”
“I saw Gideon waiting in the front paddock for you,” Abby piped up helpfully. “First, you need some boots.”
“All right, then. Let’s find me a pair and get started.”
To Mike’s ear, the excited pitch of Lily’s voice nearly matched his daughter’s, and he found himself grinning. In his experience, adults didn’t get jazzed about new things the way kids did. Maybe it was being around children all day, he thought, or maybe that was Lily’s natural way of viewing the world. Whichever it was, even a reserved guy like him was having a tough time resisting all that enthusiasm.
Stopping outside the tack room, he motioned his prospective student ahead of him. Most folks moved tentatively through the barn during their first visit, but not Lily. She confidently strode past him and into the large storage area. Along one wall were three rows of saddles, some English for dressage and jumping, some Western complete with lassos coiled neatly around their horns. On the other wall, dozens of bridles hung from their padded holders, reins left dangling to avoid straining the leather.
Standing in the middle of it all, Lily spun slowly until she came back to Mike. The look on her face was impossible for him to read, and he waited for her to say something.
“What a great office you have,” she commented with a smile. “You must love working here every day.”
“Except when it rains. Then it’s kinda the pits.”
“I guess so,” she replied with a laugh. In the corner, something moaned quietly, and she took a hesitant step back. “Did I wake someone up?”
“That’s just Sarge,” Abby explained. Right on cue, a scruffy blend of several breeds of terrier emerged from the shadows and yawned. “He likes to sleep in here.”
Blinking at Lily, the small dog trotted over and sat in front of her, tail wagging politely. Laughing again, she hunkered down and held out her hand for him to sniff. When he was satisfied, he offered a paw that she shook as if he was a small person. “Hello, Sarge. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
With a quick yip, he went back toward his spot, glancing over his shoulder in an unspoken request for her to follow him. Which, to Mike’s amazement, she did. When she saw the filthy old horse blanket he had there, she turned to Mike with a curious expression. “Is that really where he sleeps?”
“I know it looks bad, but he likes it that way.”
“Why?”
“It’s kind of a long story.”
“That’s okay,” she said, sitting down on the scuffed plank floor to pet the dog. “I like stories.”
Mike had planned on getting through her lesson as quickly and painlessly as possible. Since he didn’t want to seem rude, he put aside his impatience and carefully balanced himself on a three-legged stool. “Well, his owner was an older lady who lived in the area. She had a horse named Captain that she’d owned since he was a foal, and he was getting on in years himself. When his stablemate died, she was afraid he’d be lonely, so she got him a dog.”
“Sarge.” Lily smiled down at the mutt, who seemed to be listening intently to his story. “What a nice thing for her to do.”
“Last year, she got really sick and had to move into a nursing home. She asked me to take the two of them and make sure they stayed together. One of Captain’s blankets dropped off the side of the stall one day, and Sarge took to sleeping on it while he kept his friend company. Now Captain’s gone, and this little guy refuses to sleep anywhere else.”
“That is so touching,” she murmured in a voice filled with sympathy. Smiling down at the dog, she cooed, “If we all had such faithful friends who’d stick by us no matter what, our lives would be so much better.”
Even though she wasn’t speaking to him, Mike caught the wistfulness in her tone. At some point, someone had disappointed this bright, engaging woman. While it had absolutely nothing to do with him, just the thought of it made him angry.
“What’s this?” she asked, fingering a label sewn to the corner of the blanket. Giving Mike a knowing grin, she said, “It says ‘do not wash.’”
“My
