stopped at the first stall, where a pretty sorrel mare was nosing at the sad remnants of yesterday’s grain. “Didn’t they feed you?”
“I’m trying,” said a voice from the end of the alley. She squinted into the sunshine streaming in the doorway at the far end of the barn. She could barely make out the silhouette of a hunched figure in a wheelchair struggling to maneuver with a bucket of grain in his lap. Trevor was dragging a hose behind him, but as she approached, he dropped it. The handle on the nozzle struck the floor and squirted a column of water into the air, flipping away from him like a snake.
“Dammit.”
Sarah ducked and grabbed the hose, jerking the handle to shut off the water. She held it awkwardly in front of her, staring at Trevor. Should she give the hose back to him, or help him? She never knew how to behave with disabled people. Did he want assistance, or would he take her help as an insult?
“If you want to give that mare some water, that would help,” he said. “She’s not going out with the others today. She got a good kick from somebody yesterday and her leg swole up.”
Sarah hauled the hose over and looked in at the mare. She did indeed have a swelling on her right front cannon bone. Filling the bucket that hung next to the door, she turned to Trevor. “Does she get grain?”
“Three scoops. Then a couple flakes of hay.”
“What about the others?”
He spun to a stop in front of the next stall, which held a grey gelding who was a little on the thin side. “Blue gets grain too, but only two scoops. And we mix in a cup of sweet feed. He’s a poor keeper, has trouble keeping weight on.”
Sarah reached up to stroke a red dun nose that had poked out of the third stall on the right.
“Cinn,” she said. “Good boy.”
“That’s not Cinn. That’s Blue,” Trevor said. “Another son of Flash.”
“How many are there?”
“Just the two.” He angled her a hopeful glance. “You taking the job?”
“No, but I won’t let the horses starve.” She cussed herself mentally even as the words flew out of her mouth. The guy was doing his best, and he clearly wasn’t neglecting the horses. He just couldn’t move fast enough to get the job done, and it seemed like he’d started kind of late.
“We usually have help, but she called in at the last minute. Could you do it just for today?” He gave his legs a rueful glance. “I can do just about anything, but it takes a while and these guys don’t like waiting.”
“Who would call in and let this happen?”
“Somebody who likes their job at the diner better than working with horses.”
Sarah remembered him mentioning a high school girl who’d come to clean the cabin. “Emmy?” she asked.
“That’s her. She’s a good kid, really. She’s just young. Doesn’t think.”
“She waited on me this morning.”
He flashed her a smile. “You went back to Suze’s?”
“Sure did.”
“Always knew you had spunk. How’d it go?”
“Better.”
“Good. It’ll keep on getting better, too.” He sobered. “You ought to stay, Sarah. Quit that job with Carrigan and work for us. We’ve got to find somebody, and frankly, not everybody can handle Lane.”
Apparently he didn’t know she’d been fired. “Yeah, well, I can’t handle Lane either.”
“I heard different.” The grin was back. “But seriously, we need some help. Emmy won’t do it, because she doesn’t want to do ranch work. Only reason she took the part-time position was to make money. I think she’s kind of scared of the horses, and let me tell you, that girl is clumsy with a capital C. She manages to feed the horses a little grain, but mostly she spills it.”
Sarah smiled.
“It is kind of funny sometimes, but not today. I guess she thought Lane was still going to be here, because I can’t imagine she’d leave me to this on purpose.” He gestured toward the chair, the hose, the grain. “I thought he was going to be around too. He said he was getting off the road for a week or two, and then he left first thing this morning.”
So Lane hadn’t planned on leaving. He’d done it for her, and now Trevor had to deal with the fallout.
“Well, I’ll help for today,” she said, scooping grain into the gray’s feed bucket. “Where’s the sweet feed?”
***
Sarah stabbed the manure fork into the ground and watched the horses milling in the