Page 6 of Just Say When

“Another goat?”

“A horse.”

Mom’s eyes narrowed. Then she sighed. “You have the biggest heart in the world, Essie.”

I knew she figured I had picked up a rescue from the auction pen, one of the poor animals intended for slaughter in Canada or Mexico, and I didn’t disabuse her of that notion. Brax wasn’t the only one who knew how to withhold.

But I had a good reason. It was one thing to steal a man’s horse. It was another thing altogether to make my mother, the woman who had birthed twins when she was still a kid herself and sacrificed her own dreams to support mine, an accessory to a felony. Hell, no.

“I’ll go get him settled and give Buckley his hay. Give me forty minutes?” I asked. “You should relax a little before dinner. Sit down, have a glass of wine.”

“Maybe I will.” She patted my arm. “Go take care of your boys.”

Maybe it was odd for a thirty-two-year-old to still live at home with her mother, but it worked out well for us.Mom liked having me home, and she had tagged along to rodeos and shows to help out right up until the end. With both of us on the road together so much, it didn’t make sense for me to move out and waste all that money on rent or a mortgage for a place I rarely slept in.

Now that I had retired, maybe it was time to find a place of my own. But I wasn’t in any hurry. I didn’t mind living with Mom and, anyway, my horse was here.

Coaxing Pirate into the trailer had been a piece of cake and backing him out again was just as smooth. For a three-year-old still in possession of his balls, he was surprisingly well-mannered. Of course, that might have been because he was weak and malnourished from his years of neglect with Gaffney. He didn’t have any fight left in him.

But he had heart.

I saw it in the way he lifted his head as I introduced him to his new home and the flare of his nostrils as he caught Buckley’s scent. He was still interested in the world around him.

I gave Pirate and Buckley a moment to sniff each other before I put Pirate in crossties and got to work. He needed a thorough grooming, but that would take at least an hour of hard labor that neither of us were up for tonight. It would have to wait until tomorrow morning. Tonight, I needed to get a better understanding of his feet.

His front hoofs were in decent shape. Overgrownand unshod, but sound. When I propped his left hind between my knees, however, my suspicions were confirmed. A black, smelly, tar-like substance oozed from his frog. Thrush.

Luckily, I was prepared. I had been planning for Pirate’s arrival for a week now, so the empty stall was clean and ready for him. Thrush was a common enough problem in horses that the medication was available at any feed store, and I had some on hand. It was absolutely fixable, but if left untreated, it could cause permanent lameness. After cleaning off the mud and ooze, I doused both hind feet with medicine.

“Colorado State Code title thirty-five, section forty-three,” a deep voice rumbled behind me.

I damn near jumped out of my skin. Whirling around, my hand on my throat, I found Brax leaning in the doorway. That flat tire hadn’t slowed him down as much as I’d hoped. Damn his competent ass.

“Any person who commits theft of, or knowingly kills, sells, drives, leads, transports, or rides away, or in any manner deprives the owner of the immediate possession of anyhorses, commits a class four felony and shall be punished.” He smirked, like he relished the thought of it. “Do you know what the punishment is, hellion?”

“Brax,” I gritted out.

“Yes?”

“Shut the fuck up.”

He did not. “Two to four years imprisonment and a two thousand dollar fine,” he supplied. “That’s the punishment for horse theft. Plus return of the horse to the owner, of course.”

I growled.

“Fortunately for you, I don’t think the owner intends to press charges. Maybe he’s as crazy as you are.” His hard blue gaze latched onto mine like a tractor pull. “What the hell were you thinking with this goddamn Gadarene quest? Did you stop to think for even a second what you were going to do with Pirate once you had him? You can’t show a stolen horse.”

Gadarene. I didn’t know that one. I tugged my phone out of my back pocket and typed it in.

“It means disastrous.” Brax knew exactly what I was up to. “Fucking foolish. Like in the Bible, where the pigs of Gadara run themselves off a cliff.”

“I hate you,” I said, but there was no heat in my tone.

The truth was I loved his big words and lawyer vocabulary. Got a nice little spark every time he gave me a new one. A quick hit of adrenaline. You spent your whole life hearing the same words over and over again. Him, her, apple, no, because. It got boring. I had never been a big reader, which meant the opportunities were few and far between, but damn, did I love being hit with an unfamiliar word when I wasn’t expecting it. The strange sound of it jerking me to attention. And then thethrill of using it myself for the first time, of making it mine.

It made his lectures almost tolerable.

Almost.

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