his hand into its mouth to clear the mucous gathered there. “Looks pretty worn out, but alive. Thank God.”
Josie scrambled to her feet to untie the cow who strained against the rope to get to her new baby. “Hold on mama. Hold on. Just one second.”
Once free of the knot, the cow spun around to take over for Seth. She vigorously licked the calf’s face—nose, eyes, ears.
Seth fell back onto his haunches. He tugged one glove from his arm, pulling it inside out, then did the same with the other. “I don’t love that they’re out in this wet weather, but I don’t think she’s got the energy to make it back to the barn tonight.” He wadded the gloves into a ball. “At least it’s not supposed to be too cold. Mainly just wet.”
It was up to the cow, now, Josie supposed. They’d done all the good they could.
Josie could still feel her adrenaline pumping frantically through her veins when they got back to the barn. She had to rally several intentional breaths before her heart steadied into a slower pace, one that matched the methodic saunter of the horse beneath her.
There was an eerie quality to the ranch that she couldn’t pinpoint, and it wasn’t until they’d untacked their horses and sent them to their stalls with a flake of hay for the night that she realized they’d done it all in near darkness.
“Power’s out.” Seth glanced up at the barn lights that remained dark even when he flicked the switch up and down on the wall. “Must be from the storm.”
“Well, there go my plans to take a hot shower and sit by the heater to thaw for the rest of the evening,” she grumbled, only half kidding. “Any chance you have a generator I can borrow? As luck would have it, my old one broke.” Which was one of the reasons she had been so happy Seth had an electric hookup for her trailer at the ranch.
“We do, but ten bucks says my dad’s got it hooked up to the beef freezers. Last time we had an outage, we lost over a hundred pounds of meat.”
“Shoot. I imagine that must’ve been costly.”
“More frustrating than anything. But let me give Dad a call and see what I can work out. He might have an extra around here somewhere.”
Josie shook her head swiftly. She definitely didn’t want to get Seth’s dad involved. “No. Don’t do that. I’ll be fine. Really.”
Seth gave Josie an unreadable look that made her stomach clench. “Normally this isn’t something I would ever say to a woman, but you really do need to shower, Josie.”
The groove between Josie’s eyebrows puckered in blatant offense. “Well, gee, thanks.”
“I’m only saying that because…” He moved close and took a clump of her sodden hair between his fingers. “It looks like you’ve got more than just rainwater in your hair.”
When the strands in question waived in front of her face, it instantly hit her. Bile rose into her throat. “Is that…?”
“Cow manure?” Seth’s expression fell somewhere between embarrassed and empathetic. “I’m afraid so.”
Oh good grief. As if being cold, wet, and bedraggled wasn’t enough, she had to smell like cow crap, too. Josie groaned so loud her back molars vibrated. “I must’ve landed in a pile with that last big tug.” She gave Seth an irritated, if not jealous, sneer. “And would you look at that—you managed to get by completely unscathed.”
“Must’ve narrowly missed it,” he said with a full belly laugh, complete with his hand clutching his stomach. He was having too much fun with this.
“Totally not fair.” Now that Josie had gotten a whiff of the putrid scent, it was all she could smell. Her nostrils burned from the sour aroma. “Heater or not, I’ll have to get this cleaned up. I’m gonna have to just suck it up.”
“Or come back with me to my place.”
The words were so out of the blue they made Josie gulp. “What?”
It took Seth a second to find his voice, and even when he did, it came out as a stammer. “I just mean…I’ve got a fireplace...” His eyes were saucers, like his own words took him by surprise. “A fireplace you can sit in front of to warm up after you wash your hair.”
The thought was enticing for multiple reasons. But still, showering at Seth’s did strange, strange things to Josie’s brain, along with every other part of her body. Unfortunately, she was out of options. “Okay. I suppose