He held his arm out and I walked into him, wrapping my arms around him and leaned into the embrace for a while. My head was on his shoulder, and I soaked in the contact. Idly, I wondered if Theo ever got touch starved. When was the last time anyone just hugged him for the sake of being close to him?
After a few moments, I felt awake and energized enough that I pulled away from Riv and looked out of the windows.
“Seems like a nice morning,” River murmured.
“Yeah. Here’s hoping it lasts for the whole trip. Much nicer to drive in good weather.”
I made myself coffee and slowly drank it, nibbling on a piece of toast River made me. When the clock got closer to feeding time, I pulled on my boots and a thick flannel to keep me warm and went to see if Theo was already at the stable.
The dogs were eating their breakfast and Rose and Bucky wagged their tails as I walked past them and greeted them. None of them lifted their heads from their bowls though, which I totally understood.
I found Theo in the feed room, measuring something into the buckets while the horses started to stir and cause a ruckus in their stalls. His trusty smoothie was on the shelf next to him.
“Morning,” I said quietly, feeling as if the morning was still too fragile to be louder.
He smiled. “Morning.”
“Once we feed everyone and I get breakfast, are we ready to leave?” I picked up the goats’ buckets to deliver them.
“Yeah, we’re all set.”
“What are we going to do with the twins?”
“We’ll put them in the paddock since it’s not likely to be windy. Just in case though, I called Seb, our vet, last night. He has a day off, so he’s going to come over to move them with whoever is at hand if needed. He’s one of the people who’s handled them the most because they had some health issues when they came in.”
Theo pushed the cart into the aisle, and I headed toward the goats.
“Volunteers coming in today?” I asked once I’d dumped the food into the little menaces’ bowls.
“Yeah, Rachel Cobb and her son Abe are coming after lunchtime. They’ve been volunteering for years, but took a break after Abe broke his arm a couple of months back. He’s itching to get back to the animals though, so they’ll be happy to help Seb if needed. Rachel did some show jumping growing up, so she’s comfortable with most horses.”
“That sounds good.” I had met some of the volunteers in passing, but I was still to discover who the core group really was. “Okay, let’s hustle so we can get on the road!”
Theo handed over a couple of buckets, and I went to feed the respective horses on the other side of the aisle. Within half an hour we had everyone fed and an hour later we were in the car, trying to figure out what to listen to.
“Do you do audio books?” I asked as I was trying to figure out a radio station, because the truck didn’t have anything fancier—a thing I needed to change ASAP for everyone’s comfort.
“Not really. My mind starts to wander, I think it’s a sensory thing. I need to have a book or an e-reader in my hands and turn pages and all.”
“But you read a lot, I saw you have a lot of books.” For some reason, I suddenly felt shy. “When I’ve delivered stuff to you, I mean.”
Theo glanced at me and grinned. “Have you been spying on me, Lake?”
I rolled my eyes and finally settled on a rock station that seemed to be fine as background noise.
“This okay?”
“Yeah.”
Suddenly I wasn’t sure what to talk about. I’d been thinking we’d chat while driving, but now I couldn’t come up with anything.
We sat in a semi-awkward silence for a while as Theo drove us away from Joliet.
“How have you been feeling?” I asked when we’d gotten through the worst of initial traffic.
Theo had told me he’d take the smaller roads for about an hour, and then we’d cross the state line. He didn’t like bigger roads when he was towing the trailer, because he always felt like he was in the way.
He sighed and thought for a moment. “Better.” His fingers tapped the steering wheel to the rhythm of the song playing on the radio. “I think your suggestion of us hiring someone would be good. It would…I don’t know…I thought about this last night. I feel like I’ve not only lost Ruth, but the way I used to work.” He glanced at me quickly. “Not that I’d expect you to take over everything she did.”
