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  “Depends,” Keller said, giving her a sideways glance. “This is her first, so it’s hard to know.”

  Her brow furrowed. “Meaning?”

  “She’s at three hundred and eighteen days, on the cusp of being premature.”

  “Three hundred and…” She gave a shake of her head at the thought of being pregnant for nearly a year. “I suppose it takes longer to build something so magnificent.”

  That got her a smile, and she added it to the memories she knew she would always treasure.

  “It does,” he agreed. “Officially, normal gestation is three hundred forty-five days. In reality, each mare is different, and full gestation can be as short as three ten or as long as three seventy. So until she has that first one you have no idea what her ‘normal’ is.”

  “So…maybe her normal is three eighteen. Maybe she’s just a very efficient girl,” Sydney said.

  “Maybe. But if it’s not, she could be fifty or more days early.”

  She read the meaning of that in the grimness that darkened his green eyes. She glanced at Lucas, wondering if they should have brought the boy in on this, given that if the latter were true, she guessed from the way he’d said only that the mare would be fine, the foal would likely not survive. Her cousin had already faced more reality than most.

  “I made the call to the vet,” his mother said as she arrived at the door to the large brood stall. “He was at home, but if necessary, he’ll head here after you assess.”

  Keller nodded, and once more Sydney marveled at how he so calmly accepted the responsibility. She hoped he noted the faith and respect as well, although she doubted he thought about it much. He would simply do what had to be done. As he always did.

  Somewhere along the way Chance had arrived; she hadn’t even noticed, so intent was she on Keller. But as it began to happen, and without a word exchanged, the Raffertys went to work. Cody arrived with a large, heavy plastic case that he set down and opened like a suitcase. Maggie went to it and took out what looked like a liquid soap. Rylan set down a large bucket of water, and Maggie immediately began cleansing the area beneath the mare’s tail while Chance began to efficiently wrap that tail with some kind of elastic bandage, getting the long strands out of the way.

  “I don’t think it’s breech, and she doesn’t seem to be under unusual stress,” Keller murmured as he ran his hands over the mare’s bulging side.

  “Easy for you to say,” both Sydney and his mother said in unison. The two women looked at each other and laughed. Keller grinned, and something flashed in his eyes then that she filed away to wonder about later. Ry was smiling, as was Chance, and even Cody managed a smile, the most genuine Sydney had seen from him yet. And Lucas looked a little relieved, as though thinking if the grown-ups were laughing, things must be okay. And she felt another strong burst of regret that she had never known his parents.

  She’d seen creatures of varying types born all over the world, and yet nothing had ever moved her more than watching this small, long-legged creature emerge into the world. As with births anywhere, it was a messy miracle; she just hoped it wasn’t a fleeting one.

  “Should I move?” Lucas asked.

  “No. You’re one of the team now.” Keller said it without looking at the boy, but Sydney was looking at him, and saw the look of wonder and pride on his face. And she wanted throw her arms around Keller for that alone.

  Along with all the other things you want to do with him. Which could someday end up with you in the same condition as that horse.

  Sydney went utterly still. Shock rippled through her. All her life, any ponderings of parenthood she’d done had been limited to not being like her own. But now here she was, thinking about what it would be like with Keller. A man who knew what should be done, what had to be done, because he’d done it.

  A man who had already proven he would never, ever treat a child as she had been treated.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Keller pulled the earpieces of the stethoscope Ry had handed him out of his ears. “Heart sounds good.” He ran his hands over the newborn. “He’s not noticeably underweight, his ears and lips aren’t soft or droopy, and his coat feels normal. He’s not breathing right yet, though.”

  He began to gently move the foal from lying on its side to on its chest, with the forelegs stretched out in front of him. Then he reached over and picked up a clean piece of straw. He poked it into one of the foal’s nostrils. The foal shook its head and pulled back, then gave a little snort. Keller smiled. “There you go, little guy. Now you’ve got it.”

  The mare’s head came up, looking toward her baby. “Back off from her now, Lucas. With luck she’ll be getting up in a minute or two.” The boy obeyed quickly.

  “Delivery feet first is normal?” Sydney asked.

  “Yes.”

  Keller glanced at her. She was looking at the foal, an odd smile on her face, odd because it was one he’d never seen from her before. The wonder and delight were a frequent response to a birth. The sense of almost wistfulness was not. And it unsettled him, in ways he didn’t have time to analyze just now.

  “Okay,” he said quietly, “everybody, outside. This is Bonnie’s time to connect with him.”

  They all retreated through the stall door, although Keller stood in the still-open doorway. The new mom was on her feet now, and turning to nuzzle the tiny being she had created. His gaze went back to the little foal. He’d noticed when they’d cleaned him up that Buckshot had thrown true once more; this progeny of his had markings that were almost identical.

  “Even the blaze,” his mother whispered now, and Keller nodded. The white strip down the little creature’s head slid to the right just over his nose, just as Buckshot’s had done.

  Chance lowered his wrist, where he’d been watching his complex-looking watch, or as he called it, chronometer. “Respiration’s at sixty-two.”

  “Good,” Keller murmured.

  “So he’s okay?” Lucas asked, sounding as if he’d been quiet for as long as he could stand it. “They both are?”

  Keller looked at him. “The best I can say is so far, so good. What happens when he tries to stand will be crucial.”

  Moments ticked by, and Keller watched. Waited. Hoped. Just at the moment he was starting to worry, the foal awkwardly but determinedly scrambled to his feet. He went down almost immediately, but also immediately did it again. Third time he figured it out and stayed up. Keller talked softly to the mare as he walked over and quickly ran his hands over the long, gangly legs.

  “They feel solid, and straight. Knees feel solid, too. We’ll have the vet check for infection, and we’ll need to watch them both for a few hours, but it’s looking like she might just be efficient.” He glanced at Sydney when he used her word. The smile she gave him nearly turned him inside out.

  “I’ll stay with them,” Lucas said instantly. “All night.”

  “Not a bad idea,” Keller said. “But I think we can get you some relief in a few hours.” Lucas looked inordinately pleased, so he added, “In the meantime, maybe Sydney can help you stay awake.”

  She looked startled, but quickly said, “I’d love to.”

  Lucas glanced at her, gave a half shrug, and said, “Sure.”

  A little later, after the foal had nursed, a further indication he was all right and also getting some necessary colostrum into his system, and they did some cleanup, there wasn’t much left to do but watch. Chance and Ry said good-night, and Cody headed back to his quarters to do as Keller had asked and route the feed from the cam in the stall to his laptop while Keller and his mother walked back toward the house.

  “That was rather pointed,” she said neutrally. “As it has been for two weeks now.”

  Keller didn’t pretend not to know what she was talking about. “They need to spend time together if this is going to work, for both of them.”

  It was a moment after they stepped inside that she turned to him and said quietly, “Have I told you lately how proud I am
of you? How utterly proud your father would be of you?”

  He had no idea what to say, how to put into words how that made him feel, so he resorted to his usual fierce hug.

  “He would also give you his blessing,” his mother said.

  He went still. “Blessing?”

  “He would see what you see in her. Her spirit, her intelligence, her determination, her warm heart despite how she was brought up.”

  Keller let out a long breath. “I’ve never been able to hide from you, have I?”

  She grinned at him then. “Not even when you thought you had, like when you put that ding in the wall of your room kicking that football around.”

  He blinked. “You knew about that?”

  “I didn’t think you’d moved that chest of drawers because you wanted it in the way of your closet door.”

  “I love you, Mom,” he said suddenly.

  In answer she reached up—way up, given the foot difference in their heights—and cupped his cheek. Sometimes it seemed impossible that this tiny woman had birthed them all.

  “I’d give him until midnight,” she advised. “He still has to get to school in the morning.” He nodded. She turned to go, then looked back. “You deserve a chance at what your father and I had, Keller. More than deserve it. Don’t let it slip away.”

  He stared after her. His mother never, ever inserted herself into whatever relationships her sons had. She only said she and his father had given the best example they could, and now it was up to them. That she had now was the final kick he’d needed.

  And so at midnight, after trying to nap a bit but not succeeding very well because a certain female of the human persuasion kept disturbing his dreams—and his body—in ways he’d learned to expect, he got up and headed for the barn.

  He found Sydney sitting on the straw inside the stall, leaning against the wall as Lucas leaned against her. Her arm was around the boy, and he was asleep. Or at least dozing, since he stirred the moment Keller stepped inside. He quickly checked on mom and baby and, satisfied, turned back.

  “He’s nursed twice, and been on his feet a lot,” Lucas reported.

  “Good job, buddy. You’re officially relieved. Go to bed, school’s going to seem really early.”

  Lucas rubbed at his eyes and didn’t argue. He got up and started toward the stall door, then stopped and looked back. “Thanks, Sydney,” he said.

  “Absolutely my pleasure,” she said, so sincerely it made the boy smile.

  Keller dropped down beside her. “Sounds like it went well.” How did she spend the night in a barn and still smell like roses?

  “It did,” she said, sounding quite happy about it.

  “You and Lucas are getting along.”

  “Yes.” She looked at him then, her eyes that amber gold and right now gleaming suspiciously. “Quite well, actually. Enough to build on, I think. Which leaves me with only two things to be sad about.”

  He blinked. “What?”

  “One, that I never had the chance to know his parents. The parents who gave him such a good, solid start in life.” She took in an audible breath. “The way your parents did.”

  Her words made his throat tighten. “They did,” he agreed when he could get the words out. “It took me a long time to appreciate that as much as I should have.” He wanted to smooth away her troubled smile, but instead asked, “What’s the second thing you’re sad about?”

  Something quite different came into her eyes then, and he had the strangest feeling she—this woman who was tough, capable, and had seen more of the world than he ever would—was afraid. But being Sydney, she plunged ahead anyway.

  “That you never kissed me again.”

  She sounded so forlorn, so genuinely sad that something knotted up inside him. And the next thing he knew the truth was out.

  “I didn’t dare.”

  Her eyes widened. And then, with that very Sydney-like honesty, she said, “Kissing you was like nothing I’ve ever felt in my life.”

  He swallowed. “It was…what I never quite believed it could be.”

  “Are you sure?”

  He blinked. “What?”

  “I think we should be sure.”

  He got there, finally. “You mean like…try again?”

  “I’m big on…research.”

  “Wise,” he murmured, but he was already lowering his head. And when their lips met, and that heat shot through him again, he wondered vaguely if they would set the barn on fire.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Considering she’d spent the night on the floor of a barn, Sydney thought she’d never felt better.

  “I’ll take you back to the inn,” Keller said after checking once more on the new arrival and pronouncing him fine. “You’ve spent enough on transport.”

  She opened her mouth to make a typical polite demurral, but somehow it changed to a simple “Thank you.”

  He coughed. Cleared his throat, as if he were a man about to make a speech. “I was thinking…you might as well pack up your things and come back here. It’s silly for you to have to hire a ride every day.”

  She froze at this startling pronouncement. And stupidly, all she could say, with a sort of squeak was, “You mean stay here?”

  “Well…yeah. I mean, not in the barn, in the house,” he added, as if he thought that was her question.

  It took all the breath she had left in her to get out one more word. “Where?”

  And suddenly his expression changed. Became a hot, wanting thing that wiped everything else out of her mind. In that moment all she could think of was that searing, hot, pulse-pounding kiss, and a night spent here in a barn with a man who demanded nothing more than to hold her through the quiet hours. Not that she didn’t know he wanted more, not when she’d been pressed so close to him his arousal was obvious. And it hadn’t been until dawn was streaking the sky and she lay with his arms around her, feeling a safety and warmth that she’d never known, that it had hit her that he wouldn’t demand. He was a gentleman. An honorable man. Like few she’d ever met, in all her travels.

  “That’s up to you,” he said now, sounding as if it were costing him everything to say it. But he didn’t push, didn’t even ask.

  She couldn’t doubt his wanting.

  But the asking would be up to her.

  She was silent during the entire drive to the inn, because she was afraid to speak. Afraid to believe. Afraid to trust.

  It was what I never quite believed it could be.

  His words, uttered in that tone of wonder, would stay with her forever. Would haunt her forever, if she could not find the nerve.

  The asking would be up to her.

  He did, of course, insist on seeing her to her door. As if anything would happen to her here, in Ranger Buckley’s domain.

  Ranger Buckley, who happened to be going out the back door onto the deck as they came in. He saw them, waved, and kept going. But not before those wise eyes had taken in what he’d seen.

  “You know what he thought,” Sydney said, almost amused as they headed upstairs.

  “That I’m bringing you home after a night spent together in a barn?” Keller suggested, his voice a little too neutral. “Yeah, I’d say so. This helped,” he added, as he reached out and tugged a piece of straw out of her hair.

  She laughed, but it was a little ragged.

  She opened the door to her room, then stopped. Drew in a deep breath. Felt as she once had before taking a bungee jump off the bridge where the sport had originated. No, more, because as amazing as that had been, it would not be as life-changing as what she wanted to do now.

  She turned to face him, and put a palm flat on his broad chest. The heat of him conversely sent a shiver through her. The leap of her pulse and the tingling of every nerve spurred her on.

  “Are we going to spark gossip?” she began, her voice coming out low and husky.

  “It’s a small town,” Keller said, and he sounded as if his throat were as tight as her own. His arm
moved, and for a moment she feared he would remove her hand from where it was quite content against his chest. But he just put his own over hers, and the heat seared her. And decided her.

  “Then maybe…” She had to swallow again. “Maybe we should give them something to gossip about.”

  “Sydney…”

  His eyes closed for a moment. When he opened them again, and those green eyes were staring down at her, she remembered again. This was up to her. And she marshaled her forces as if she were trying to persuade one of her more recalcitrant artists.

  “I’m sure. And safe. And prepared—I get the birth control shots since I travel to some sketchy parts of the world.” She felt that solid muscle contract beneath her fingers, and this sign that he was no more calm than she was kicked her pulse rate up another notch. “Please, Keller. I want this. I want you.”

  He broke then. He didn’t so much as push her through the open door as sweep her through with the power and heat of his body. In almost the same movement his mouth came down on hers. It was fierce, demanding, giving her a hint of what she’d unleashed. She heard the door slam shut. Knew he must have done it with his foot because his arms never left her.

  And then he deepened the kiss, tasting her as if she were the only thing keeping him alive. A sweet, hot haze seemed to have enveloped her and she couldn’t think of anything beyond the feel of this, the way he tasted, and that she had to have more.

  When he pulled away she nearly moaned in frustration. And then she opened her eyes and looked at him, and what she saw blazing in those deep green eyes quashed everything she was feeling except a gnawing, aching need.

  “Fair warning,” he said, and it came out nothing less than a growl. “It’s been a long time, and you rev me up like no one ever has.”

  In that moment Sydney realized what she’d unleashed. The gentleman who apologized for an accidental touch was gone, and in his place was a fierce, fiery lover, having needed only her certainty to let loose. More stunningly, she realized how that transformation excited her, sending bursts of sensation through her along every nerve.