presence seemed to calm her instantly. I felt the same way, for even only just having laid eyes on him, not even knowing his name, I knew without a doubt he was a kindhearted and helpful man who meant us no harm.
When Nellie writhed in a new wave of pain with a new set of contractions, I winced in a stomach-turning wave of my own agony.
I breathed through it and managed to say, “We need to help her; she’ll die if we don’t.”
He stood above me, pulling his hood off and tossing his cloak on the fence post nearby. As he did, I got my first good glimpse at his face. Burn scars disfigured his neck and one cheek.
He wore his dark hair tight and short, and a scar cut through his eyebrow, across his forehead, and into his hairline. His jaw was angular and square, strong like the rest of him. And his eyes…even his scars seemed to disappear when his eyes, the same blue-green as the sea on a summer’s day, looked into mine.
Oh, my goodness. I was shocked, not so much by his appearance, but by how much he must have suffered to come to look as he did.
He glanced down at me, and in his clear turquoise eyes I could see he was ashamed of how he looked, perhaps expecting me to gasp or recoil. But I would never have done either.
He squatted down beside me and grasped my hand. Then he began to wedge his elbow under Nellie’s flank to give me a little wiggle room to begin to free myself. His muscles bulged startlingly against the fabric of his shirt, and I was almost certain a thread snapped somewhere in the seams. But all my thoughts of his rippling body vanished from my mind when the pain from my leg roared up and through me, making me groan.
He turned to look at me and searched my face.
“Take it slow, now,” he said.
I swallowed hard and nodded.
Still though, he did not look away. What he searched my face for, I did not know. Horror, maybe. Or fear. But I felt neither.
Looking up into those kind, thoughtful eyes, I felt nothing but protected and safe. Much to my surprise, lying there in the muck and in such terrible pain, a blush warmed my cheeks.
He looked as though he could sense my growing panic. From the situation but also from having him this close to me.
“What’s your name?” His voice was low and even, calming me the same as he was doing for Nellie.
Breathless and tongue-tied, I managed somehow to stammer, “My name is Iris. Thank you for helping me.”
As he worked to get Nellie off of me, he told me his name was Randal and that he had just been passing when he heard me cry out in pain. In his every careful gesture, it was clear to me that he cared for me and Nellie both. He wasn’t impatient or annoyed by the mess that I’d gotten myself into, just concerned that neither of us got hurt more than we were already. Once I was out from under her, he offered me his hand.
I reached up to take it. My palm and fingers positively disappeared in his.
“Can you stand?” He asked me, looking down at my leg in concern.
Gulping down the pain, I nodded. But as soon as I tried to put weight on my left leg, it gave way beneath me. I braced myself for an ungraceful landing in the muck, but he had me safe in his strong arms. He scooped me up like I was weightless and carried me over to an old tree stump nearby.
Randal moved a massive stone from a few yards away—one that I had never been able to shift an inch—and placed it in front of me so I could elevate my leg.
“Now,” he said, “Tell me how to help the cow.”
I blinked at him. What had I done to deserve this kindness?
“You’ve done enough, really, I don’t want to take up anymore of your time. I’ll be able to help her.”
He wasn’t hearing of it. “Hell no. Tell me what to do and I’ll do it.”
I looked at Nellie, prone in the mud. The calf’s feet were out of the birth canal, as they had been for the last two hours.
“The calf is breached,” I said. “Do you know anything about cows?”
Randal drew back one side of his mouth in a grimace, and clicked his tongue against