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She had come west prepared to help a wounded man. Now she wanted to know what Jesse Pickett was like when he was well enough to take her to meet his horse.

Chapter Eight

Eden found Buck with his head buried in a feed bucket that did not belong to him.

“Your master warned me about that.”

The sorrel gelding lifted his head, oats clinging to his muzzle. A white blaze ran from his forelock to his nose, just as Jesse had described. He considered Eden with one brown eye, then reached for the bucket again.

“I see you share his opinion of being told what to do.”

“That’s Buck, all right.”

Tater stood in the livery doorway with a currycomb in his hand. He had brought Eden over after breakfast, though not without asking twice whether Nate knew where she was going.

“Jesse says he steals feed,” she said.

“Doesn’t need to. Gets plenty of his own, but taking something that belongs to somebody else has never troubled him.” Tater hooked the bucket out of reach. “Jesse raised him from a colt. Horse won’t take kindly to another rider.”

“I wasn’t planning to ride him.”

“Good. He’s liable to make a liar of anybody who says they can handle him.”

Buck pushed his nose against Eden’s sleeve. She had brought an apple from the kitchen. The gelding located it without difficulty.

“Now you know why he likes you,” Tater said.

Eden offered the apple on her open palm. Buck took it neatly, then searched her other hand.

“Greedy creature.”

“Jesse’s been saying that for years.”

She rubbed the horse’s neck. His coat was warm beneath her fingers, and a faint white mark crossed the leather of his halter where a buckle had been moved again and again. Jesse’s hands had worked that buckle. His boots had rested in stirrups astride Buck. For a moment she could picture him riding across the prairie, laughing at something Buck had done.

It was an easier picture than the one waiting back at the clinic.

“Does Buck know?” she asked.

Tater lowered the currycomb. “Know what?”

“That Jesse is hurt.”

“He knows Jesse hasn’t come for him.” Tater hung the comb on a nail. “Been looking down the lane every evening.”

Eden stroked the horse once more. “Then I’d better tell him I came.”

Tater opened his mouth, closed it, and gave her a curious grin.

“Tell Buck, I mean,” she added.

“Course you do, Miss Eden.”

She left before he could say another word.

Jesse was awake when she returned. The book she’d brought him lay face down on the coverlet.

“You went,” he said.