Sunny is quiet for the first few minutes, her gaze fixed on the road ahead and her fingers still gripping that clutch. I can practically hear her brain running through escape routes and contingency plans, and I'm about to find something easy to talk about when she beats me to it.
"So how are the ducks?"
I glance at her and find the tight set of her jaw has loosened. She remembered, and the genuine curiosity on her face draws a chuckle out of me.
"The situation has escalated." The flicker of curiosity in her eyes is exactly what I was aiming for. "The landscaper finished the permanent enclosure on Wednesday, with a custom-built pond, a drainage system, and predator-proof fencing. I sentRachel pictures, and she showed them to Evie, who immediately declared that the ducks needed a bridge."
"A bridge?"
"Exactly, to go over the pond. Evie was very specific about it. It also has to be arched, with pink railing because, and I quote, ‘pink makes the ducks happy’." I shake my head, but I'm grinning. "So now my landscaper is pricing out lumber for a miniature arched bridge, and Wade has informed me that if I ask him to paint anything pink, he's turning in his resignation."
Sunny's laugh breaks free, and the tension in her shoulders drops away. "How is Evie handling the ducks living with you?"
"She came by Thursday afternoon for an official inspection. Not twenty seconds after Rachel rolled up, Evie marched straight to the enclosure, greeted all six ducks by name, and spent forty-five minutes telling them about her week." I smile at the memory. "At one point Gerald must not have been paying close enough attention, because she put both hands on her hips and said, 'Gerald. I am talking to you.' I swear that duck understood every word she said."
Sunny is laughing harder now, one hand pressed to her mouth. "She sounds like a handful."
I snort. "She's three going on twenty-five and an exact miniature of my sister. She told me the ducks looked happy and that she approved of their accommodations but that Kevin needed to work on his attitude." I check my mirrors and accelerate around a slow-moving tractor. "I asked her what was wrong with Kevin's attitude, and she said, 'He's grumpy, Uncle Charlie. Like Daddy before coffee.'"
Sunny wipes her eyes. "I love that child and I've never met her."
"You'd get along. You share a similar outlook on the world." I say it with enough warmth that she knows it's a compliment, and I watch the realization land. Her mouth opens, then closes,and she turns toward the window, but I catch the smile in my peripheral vision.
The conversation shifts as the miles pass. She asks about the horses, and I tell her about the handful of yearlings we’re training, as well as the two-year-old filly Wade's been working with.
"Wade has this way of just standing in the pen and letting the horse come to him," I explain. "He doesn't push or chase. He just waits, and eventually the horse decides she's safe."
"That takes a lot of discipline. Most people don't have the patience for it." Sunny's angled toward me now, and the guarded expression she wore earlier has been replaced with openness.
"That's exactly it," I reply. "Most people think patience means doing nothing. But it actually doing everything right and then waiting for the other side to trust you enough to meet you halfway."
I feel Sunny's gaze on me for a beat, and something shifts between us, a current beneath the conversation that neither of us names. She looks back at the road and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear.
"Tell me about your business with Mason," she says. "You compared it to winemaking the other day. How does it actually work?"
I spend the next ten minutes explaining the basics, how most of it comes down to studying pedigrees and conformation, matching the right mare to the right stallion based on what you want to produce, and then hoping the foal inherits the best of both lines.
"Wade and I handle them early, get the basics in,” I continue. “After that, Mason takes them on for rodeo training."
"Then the whole process is about controlling variables," she says when I finish. "Genetics, environment, timing. It's not that different from what I do with wine."
"You picked that up faster than most people I've explained it to."
"I'm not most people, Charlie." She throws my own line back at me with a cute smirk.
"Touché." I chuckle. "I walked right into that one."
She's grinning, though, and it warms her whole face and makes her eyes crinkle at the corners. The sight makes my pulse kick up a notch and I make a mental note to spend the rest of the evening earning as many of those as I can.
The outskirts of Fredericksburg appear in the distance, the town's rooftops and church steeples catching the last of the light. I haven't been here before, but it has an appealing charm to it, German heritage mixed with Texas grit. The main drag is already filling up with the Saturday evening crowd.
"I've been meaning to explore this way," I say as I navigate toward the restaurant. "But we've been so busy with the ranch that I haven't made the time."
"It's one of my favorite spots in Hill Country." Sunny points me down a side street. "Turn left here. Das Edelgarten is at the end of this block."
I find parking along the curb, and before Sunny can reach for her door handle, I'm already around the truck and opening it for her. She gives me a look that's half exasperation and half pleasure.
"I'm perfectly capable of opening a door, Charlie."
