ANDY TOED OFF HER WET shoes inside the kitchen door. The walk from Liam’s cottage through the dew-damp grass had soaked them through and she didn’t want to track across Millie’s clean floor. Thinking of the older woman made her smile and made her face flush at the same time. She definitely wouldn’t be sharing the details of her night with Liam, but Millie wouldn’t need any help figuring it out. Andy wasn’t sure when—if ever—she’d be able to stop smiling.
It had been almost impossible to drag herself out of his bed that morning. The only thing that made it easier was his promise to meet her for yoga in an hour and the fact she didn’t want anyone to catch her making the walk of shame across the yard. They were all adults, but until she figured out what she and Liam were doing together, it would be a hell of a lot easier on her to keep this thing between them private.
After last night, she couldn’t deny there was something more than sex between them. He’d made her feel things she’d never felt before and as unsteady as the realization made her, she wasn’t going to deny it. She had no idea what would happen between them, but she had no intention of pushing him away. She’d told him everything, things she’d only shared with Millie and then only because she had to. She’d cried on his chest for Pete’s sake and he hadn’t run away screaming. He’d held her and loved her; wrapped in his arms, the seed of something new had taken root and begun to grow. Liam couldn’t give her absolution; she wouldn’t take it if he offered, but for the first time since she left Bench and Stern the need to atone for her mistakes faded to the background, replaced by brand-new possibilities.
She heard the skittering of toenails on the hardwood floor seconds before Otter Fox came barreling down the hallway toward her.
“He’s all yours,” Millie called from her room on the other side of the house.
“Sweet baby, did you miss me?” She cooed and petted the dog while he wriggled happily at her feet. “Come on. Let’s go out.”
He bounced up and down beside her while she shoved her feet back into her wet shoes. When she opened the door, he bolted through, hurrying to the edge of the yard to relieve himself. Andy wrapped her arms around herself against the chill morning air and bounced on the balls of her feet to try to stay warm.
“Hustle up, little pup,” she called, when it looked like the dog was getting distracted. He hadn’t tried to run off and maybe he wouldn’t, but hounds were notorious wanderers. Now that he’d wormed his way firmly into her heart, she couldn’t stand the idea of losing him.
Otter Fox bounded across the yard toward her, his tail wagging, but before he reached her, he froze, his attention focused on something behind her. She glanced over her shoulder to see a man, jogging toward the house. It took a second for her to recognize Mike in the dim early dawn light. The dog at least wasn’t growling.That counted as progress.
“Thank God you’re up,” said Mike, sliding to a stop in the wet grass. “I need you to call the vet.”
“Of course,” she said, digging in her back pocket for her phone. “What’s going on?”
“Damned if I know. It’s Gretchen. She was fine last night. I went to get an early start on the milking this morning and when I got to the barn, she was lying on her side, panting. I’m afraid she’s dying.” The young man’s eyes held so much pain. Andy would have done anything in her power to fix it. Mike hadn’t worn that haunted expression in a long time. Since before he started working with the animals he loved. She knew Gretchen was a favorite. The nanny goat was inquisitive and sweet and thought she was in charge of everything. She’d seen the goat following him like a puppy while he went about his work.
“I need Dr. West out at Sourwood Farm,” she said when the emergency service answered. “It’s an emergency.”
“What’s going on out here?” called Millie from the porch.
“Can you call the dog in?” asked Andy. “There’s a problem with the goats.”
She waited a few seconds to make sure Otter Fox was on his way to the older woman before following Mike to the barn. She had to run to keep up with the younger man and by the time they reached the edge of the goat yard, she was gasping for breath. Leaving the top half of the barn door open so they’d hear the vet when she arrived, Andy breathed in the scent of hay, sweet feed, and warm animals. Since Mike came to the farm, she didn’t get to spend as much time with the goats as she used to but the barn still gave her an instant sense of comfort.
When she’d first bought Sourwood, back when she and Millie were getting used to each other, she’d spent every moment she could hiding out there. The goats never made her answer questions or look at feelings she’d rather keep buried. Their company had been as important to helping her heal as they were to Mike. Well, that wasn’t quite true. Her wounds were self-inflicted.
“It’s okay, Gretch,” said Mike, dropping to his knees beside the stricken animal.
There was something horribly wrong. The goat struggled to raise her head as the young man crouched beside her but she was clearly struggling just to breathe. When he pulled her head onto his lap, a long string of drool made a ribbon from the goat’s mouth to the straw bedding. The rest of the herd huddled together on the other side of the corral, bleating softly, their attention fixed on the pair in front of them.
“There wasn’t anything she could have gotten into, was there?”
Of all the goats, Gretchen was the most likely to butt her way into places she didn’t belong.
“I thought of that, but I checked everywhere she could have gotten. The only thing in the barn is the wormer and it hasn’t been touched.”
Andy knelt beside Mike and ran her hand over the poor goat. The animal’s eyes rolled in her head as if she were in pain and her chest shuddered with every labored breath. It was the most helpless feeling in the world, seeing the sweet animal suffering and not being able to do anything to fix it. If Andy felt it this acutely, she could only imagine what Mike was going through. Glancing up, she watched the young man, but his focus stayed fixed on the animal.
She doubted he’d notice if she left, and she had to do something. She stood, letting her hand rest on his shoulder for a moment before going to check on the rest of the herd. She didn’t tell him everything would be all right because she didn’t know if it would. One of the heartbreaking things about most of the vets who’d stayed with her is that they’d lived through things that made it impossible for them to believe the blanket statements so many people took for granted.Don’t worry. Everything will be okay. They’d been up close and personal with the exact opposite and any naiveté they’d once harbored had been burned away in war. Andy wished she could fix that too.
She moved in among the rest of the herd, scratching them behind the ears and running her hands over their coarse fur. They nudged against her, their stocky bodies bumping her legs as if they needed comforting as much as she did. She worked her way around them, looking for any sign of illness in the other animals. As far as she could tell, Gretchen was the only one affected by whatever it was. She gave one of the older nannies a rub behind her horns and then stopped in her tracks when she got to the feed trough.
“Hey Mike, when did you feed them?” There were a couple inches of sweet feed in the bottom of the trough and no one was going near it. The goats usually devoured the feed the second it hit the trough, scrambling over each other to get to it. Andy picked up a handful of the sticky feed. It looked normal.
“Not since last night. I haven’t had time this morning. Why?”
Before she could answer, the barn door opened and Dr. West came in carrying her bag. Andy closed her hand around the feed and hurried to meet the vet. She watched as Mike explained what he’d found and the veterinarian examined Gretchen.
“It’s hard to say for sure, but it almost looks like she’s got burns in her mouth,” said Dr. West, leaning in close to Gretchen’s muzzle. “Her breath smells like ammonia.”
“How is that possible? She couldn’t have gotten into anything hot enough to burn,” said Mike.
