Page 16 of A Cowboy in the Streets

“For Belle to decide she wants to start our grooming session.” She waved the rubber curry comb she was holding in one hand. “She got distracted by clover.”

“It might have been easier to put her in crossties in the barn. Why here?”

It was curiosity, not an accusation. I noted the lead rope dangling from the fence. If James had wanted to keep Belle in place, she could have made do with the rope clipped to her halter. James was a hell of a trainer, according to her references. I figured she must have her reasons for being out here, and I wanted to know what they were.

She smiled, because of course she did. “Disruption. Her groom—Jesse?” I nodded, and she continued, “Jesse told me he puts her in crossties to groom her every morning before Blaine works with her. Blaine works with her on the longe line, gets her exercise in, and then if he’s feeling brave, he’ll saddle her after that.”

I nodded again.

“Jesse says she hates being groomed. Fusses up a storm when he puts her in crossties before Blaine works her.”

“You think something’s hurting her? Or he’s being too rough?” It was hard to imagine. He’d only been with us for a year, but he seemed like a nice kid.

She shook her head, her dark hair gleaming like polished mahogany in the morning sun. Why the hell was I noticing that? “Nah. We chatted while he worked. He’s good. Loves the animals. Takes time to give them a good scratch where they like it, and he knows all their ticklish spots. He said with Belle, it’s hard to tell if something is hurting her. She starts getting ornery the second she sees him.”

I mulled that over. “Maybe she hates him.” Animals were like people in that respect. Took a shine to one person, would kick another in the teeth just for spite. No rhyme or reason to it at all.

“That’s the question, isn’t it? Does Belle hate Jesse, or does she hate being brushed?” She cocked her head. “Maybe it’s neither of those things. She knows she’s going to get worked after Jesse grooms her, but she doesn’t know if someone’s going to ride her. So I figured, let’s find out.”

My gaze flicked to Belle, who was now watching us curiously, her ears forward as though to catch our conversation. “Disruption,” I mused.

“Exactly. Belle and I are starting from scratch. We’re going to spend the week getting to know each other. No longing. No riding. Then we’ll see where we’re at.”

I rubbed my thumb along the braided leather reins resting idly in my fist. There it was again, that egoless curiosity. James wasn’t the first trainer to disrupt Belle’s routine. One after another, they watched Blaine work her, decided they knew better, and smugly implemented their own way, which ended in resounding failure, and pissed Blaine off in the process.

Plenty of those trainers asked questions, but then they went ahead and provided their own answers. James was the first to ask questions without feeling some kind of way about the answers. She was the first one to roll Belle’s training all the way back to the beginning so Belle could answer those questions for herself.

“Do you mind if I get some chores done while you’re out here? Is that too much of a distraction for Belle?”

James lifted her shoulders in a lazy shrug before once again offering her face to the sun, her dark hair spilling over her shoulders and back. “Do what you gotta do. We’re in no rush.”

I dismounted, loosened Devil’s girth, then removed his bridle and replaced it with a halter and lead rope, tying it loosely to the fence rail. This might take a while, and I didn’t want him to be uncomfortable while I worked. Grabbing my bag of tools, I headed for the water trough along the short side of the rectangular paddock, pausing to give Belle’s forelock a scratch along the way.

The trough was self-watering—in theory, anyway. Troughs could get nasty pretty quick if they weren’t looked after regularly. Slimy with algae, toxic with mosquitoes. Especially now with the last frost long behind us. We were short staffed, so I had added this responsibility to my growing list. What was one more chore, anyway?

I had noticed the trough was dry last Friday during my weekly trough scrub, but with our breeding program at a standstill, the paddock was rarely used, so fixing it wasn’t high on my list of priorities. If James was going to make use of it, however, she’d want clean, fresh water available for Belle.

All of our troughs were self-watering, powered by a solar pump. The system was generally low maintenance and had the further benefit of sparing me from lugging huge canteens to all the troughs. Last week, I’d only had time for a cursory glance at it, but I was pretty sure the problem was the float valve. At least, I hoped so. We couldn’t afford a costly fix.

I tested the pump manually, relieved when water spurted out. That was a good sign that the issue was localized to the float valve. I just needed to shut off the pump, replace the float valve, and—

James stretched her arms overhead, reaching for the sun. Her tee shirt rose with the motion, revealing a mouth-watering expanse of toned, tanned belly. Her waist would fit easily in my hands. It would be no trouble at all to hoist her onto the top rung of the fence. Put my mouth right there and—

“Dad.”

I jerked to attention, rising so fast I felt light-headed. Fucking hell, what was wrong with me?

“Hey, Ben.” I ruffled his hair and tried not to take it personally when he ducked away from my touch. He wasn’t a little kid anymore. It was normal for him to pull away, right? “What are you doing out here?” It was the first day of summer break. I had figured he’d sleep in.

“I wanted to see how Belle was doing.” His eyes were glued to James. Not the same way I had been looking at her. At least, I sincerely hoped not, because I wasn’t ready for that stage of parenting yet. More like he was curious. “What are you doing?”

I blinked at the trough. Shit, what was I doing? “The float valve is broken, so the pump thinks the trough is full, even though it’s empty. Gotta fix that. Can you hand me the wrench?”

It was a quick fix. The new float valve did its job. Water immediately gushed from the pump, splattering into the empty metal trough, soaking my face and arms with cool water—because, like a dumbass teenager, I had been too busy salivating over James to focus on turning off the pump before replacing the float valve.

Judging from the peal of laughter that floated across the paddock, James saw the whole thing.

Fuck my life.

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