What’s the matter with you? she upbraided herself as they continued riding to the main house. One kiss and you’re ready to forget about Donnie? Forget about what you had with Donnie?
A shaft of guilt at her disloyalty to her husband’s memory shot through her. How could she let herself get carried away like that?
Besides, that kiss probably didn’t mean anything to Chance, she told herself. He was just taking advantage of an opportune moment, nothing more.
Just look at him, she thought, slanting a quick glance at him. The man was gorgeous, every woman’s idea of the perfect cowboy. He undoubtedly had his pick of women, and that meant he had no need for a permanent relationship. Or any sort of a commitment.
Even if she was, by some wild chance, ready to allow herself to get carried away and start being serious about Chance, she knew she was bound to be hurt.
And the very last thing her heart needed was to be bruised. She already had gone through enough pain to last her a lifetime. There was absolutely no way she was going to set herself up to be hurt ever again—even if Chance was inclined to get involved with her, which she was willing to bet he wasn’t.
She had a strong feeling that relationships weren’t for him. The man was a loner. He’d all but told her so the first time they’d met.
No, she argued as they rode back, what happened at the lake was an aberration. A lovely aberration, but still just an aberration. And there wasn’t going to be a sequel—ever—she told herself.
By now they had reached the ranch and were nearing the stable. Chloe was more than ready to call it a night.
But Chance had other ideas.
“You’re not done yet,” he told her.
She had no idea what to expect as she finally forced herself to look in his direction. “Oh?”
“I might have saddled Mirabel for you, but now it’s time for you to learn how to take care of her. There’s more to working with a horse than just riding it,” Chance told her as he led the way into the stable. “So, since you’re through riding her for the day, you have to unsaddle her. It’s like when you were little and had to put away your toys when you were finished playing with them,” he added, hoping the metaphor would help her get the idea.
There was just one thing wrong with his analogy, she thought, and she told him so. “I didn’t have any toys when I was little.”
That piece of information caught him by surprise. Just how poor had she been? At that moment it occurred to Chance that he really knew very little about this woman whom he found himself attracted to.
“No toys? None? Really?” he asked. After all, he knew that she was Graham’s half sister. He’d just assumed that all the Fortunes were well cared for. But since there was no reason for her to lie, maybe she’d had it rougher than he’d thought. His heart—a heart he’d thought he’d forfeited on the battlefields of a foreign land—went out to her as he listened.
“Well, I did have one,” she admitted. “I had a stuffed bear—Theodore,” she told him, recalling the bear’s name. “And I took Theodore everywhere, so I guess you might say that I never stopped playing with him. And since I didn’t, I never put him away.”
“What happened to Theodore?” he asked, curious.
He watched, fascinated, as a fond, faraway smile curved her lips. “I loved him to death and eventually, he just fell apart.”
He dismounted before putting his horse in his stall. Chloe followed suit, and he came to join her.
“I guess then being loved by you comes with a price,” he said.
She knew Chance just meant it as a joke, but the comment had her thinking of Donnie. And aching—on two counts.
“I guess so,” she said quietly.
Her tone made him realize that he’d blundered. Chance quickly changed the subject to something more neutral.
“Because you’re new at this, I’m going to walk you through it this time. But from now on, when we go riding, you’ll have to saddle and unsaddle Mirabel—or any other horse if you decide to go on to a more lively one,” he added.
There was no chance of that happening, Chloe thought. “Mirabel is lively enough for me, thank you,” she told him. She was grateful to Chance for switching subjects. “And I’ll be happy to saddle her the next time we go out—although I have to say that I’m not too sure how happy Mirabel will be about it.”
“You do it right and she’ll be fine,” he told her. “It’s not that complicated.” And then he unconsciously went into teaching mode. “Okay, you’ll need to loosen the cinch in order to get the saddle off.”
“Loosen the cinch,” Chloe repeated gamely, looking at the saddle. She had no idea what the cinch looked like or where it was located. Moreover, she was afraid if she did the wrong thing, the mare was going to get skittish. Biting the bullet, she asked, “And how do I do that?”
Chance laughed. “The cinch is right here.”
Lifting the stirrup on Chloe’s side, he pointed it out. And then he walked her through the entire process, narrating every move he made until he had the horse standing in her stall, sans saddle, blanket and bridle.
He saw that Chloe looked as if she was ready to leave.
“Not yet,” he warned her. “You’re not finished.”
Everything had been taken off the mare except for her horseshoes, Chloe thought. She couldn’t see what else needed to be done.
“You going to put a nightgown on her?” she joked.
“No, but you’re going to wipe her down—just in case she’s wet.” He saw that Chloe looked a little bemused. “You’re familiar with the phrase ‘Ridden hard and put away wet?’” he asked. Then, not waiting for a response, he told her, “Well, we don’t do that around here.
“Just in case the horse is wet and the temperature drops at night, your horse might get a chill. No matter what you might have seen in the movies or on TV, horses are a lot more delicate than you might think. They come down with a lot of the same ailments that people do in addition to having their own set of diseases.
“You take care of your horse, and your horse will take care of you,” Chance concluded, then stopped abruptly, catching himself. “Sorry, I was giving you the exact same lecture that I usually give the boys,” he apologized.
He didn’t want her thinking he was talking down to her. It was just that he really cared about the way the horses were treated. Though they were powerful animals, he thought of them as defenseless when it came to being on the receiving end of bad treatment. Any horse in his care had to be treated well.
“That’s okay. I like it,” she told him truthfully. “And I did learn something,” she added.
He looked at her doubtfully. “Don’t kiss up to me, Chloe,” he told her.
She thought that was an odd phrase for him to use, given what had happened a while ago at the lake, but she let it go, other than to protest, “But I wasn’t.”
“Oh, in that case, good to hear.” And then he handed her a brush with coarse dark bristles.
She looked at it, confused. “Are you telling me that my hair’s a mess?”
Chance laughed. “No, I’m telling you to brush the horse.”
“Is that part of the ritual?” There were certainly a lot of steps to remember when it came to taking care of a horse, she thought.
“No, but Mirabel likes it, and I thought having you brush her might help build a bond between you two.” Since Chloe still looked just a bit perplexed as she contemplated the brush in her hand, he asked, “May I?”
Chloe was quick to surrender the brush. “Sure.”
“You don’t want to brush her too hard,” he told her. “Just long, even strokes. Think of it like getting a massage.”
That didn’t help. She shook her head. “Never got one,” Chloe told him. Then she looked at him curiously. “Have you?”
The very thought of it made him laugh. “I’m not exactly the beauty spa type,” he told her. “I was just trying to find a way for you to be able to relate to the brushing.”
Chloe took the brush from him and began to brush Mirabel’s flanks. “Like this?”
“Almost.” Chance covered her hand with his own and then slowly guided her through the first few strokes. “Like this,” he told her, then continued to move her hand beneath his and along the horse.
She knew that technically all they were doing was brushing the horse’s coat, but they were doing it in one joint motion, and somehow, it felt rather intimate that way.
She could feel her body heating up, the way it had at the lake when he’d kissed her.
She needed to maintain better control over herself than this, she silently lectured. And part of maintaining that control was not having him get so close to her.
She needed space.
Shrugging his hand off her own, she told him, “I think that I can take it from here now, Chance.”
“Go for it,” he told her, stepping back. He watched her for a few moments, and then he abruptly turned away and went into the next stall to take care of his own horse.
And to think about something else other than Chloe. Or try to.
Chapter Twelve
Chloe finally felt as if her life was slowly falling into place.
She was making decent headway with the four boys who were currently staying at the ranch, albeit at a different pace with each one. Initially, she’d felt as if all of the teens regarded her warily and were keeping up their defenses, but mercifully, that was all changing.
Jonah and Ryan had taken less time to come around than the other two. Since they had already made a bit of progress under Sasha’s counseling, it didn’t take them all that long to lower their guard and trust her. She was here a few weeks and they had begun to talk to her about things that were troubling them, as well as some things that they were trying to work out.
She found it rougher going with Brandon and Will. Brandon didn’t want to risk getting close to anyone because he was afraid of ultimately losing that contact, the way he had lost his brother. As for Will, although he clearly yearned for his mother, because of what she had done, he didn’t trust any woman who entered his life.
Although their progress was at slower pace, seeing all four of the teens come around because of her efforts proved to be exceedingly gratifying for Chloe. She felt as if she was actually making a difference in their lives, which in turn added a great deal of significance to her own life. She felt it gave her a real purpose.
And then there were the riding lessons with Chance. She would have never thought, not in a million years, that she’d be proud of the headway she was making with that, but she was.
Chance turned out to be the consummate teacher, which really surprised her. She would have said at the outset of their association that teaching someone to ride wouldn’t have made a difference to Chance one way or another. He had struck her as being the poster boy for the quintessential loner. But it turned out that Chance was nothing if not patient with her.
He was patient with the boys, too, she noted whenever she had the chance to observe them together. And she could see that they began to regard him as the father figure they’d lacked in their childhoods.
For that matter, she thought as she finished working on that day’s notes and looked out the window at the corral where Chance worked with Will, in a way he was the father she had never known, as well.
Except, she reminded herself, she would have definitely never reacted to her father the way she was reacting to Chance.
Chloe sighed.
She was still rather uncertain about all that. Uncertain how she felt about having feelings for him.
She felt as if she was going around in circles.
“You think too much,” she murmured to herself under her breath.
But she couldn’t help herself, couldn’t help analyzing, comparing—remembering. Remembering how it felt to be in love with Donnie—and how that had all ended so heartbreakingly.
Stop it, she upbraided herself. Just enjoy whatever happens as it happens. For heaven’s sake, for once in your life just float, don’t plot.
Chloe shook her head. Easier said than done.
She turned away from the window and went back to her work.
* * *
Like a delayed reaction, it slowly dawned on Chance that for the first time since he’d gotten back from serving overseas that he finally, finally had a renewed sense of purpose. That was something that had eluded him while he’d been in the military and certainly afterward, when he’d returned stateside.
He supposed that was why he had subconsciously drifted from ranch to ranch and job to job. He’d blamed it on restlessness, but he now realized that he’d been searching for a meaning to his life, some sort of a purpose. Working here, at Peter’s Place, with its rescued horses and its rescued kids, was giving him that sense of purpose.
And it felt damn good, Chance thought. The troubled teens he had been put in charge of had essentially come a long way in a short time. He knew in part that was because of Chloe and her sessions with them, but in part it was because of him, as well. And their noticeable evolution gave him a reason for getting up in the morning.
He never thought he’d ever feel that way again. For the longest time he’d believed that opening his eyes each morning, feeling as if his soul had been sucked out by forces he couldn’t grapple with, couldn’t untangle, was going to be his fate until the day he died.
Now he saw firsthand that it didn’t have to be that way. That it wasn’t that way.
That started him thinking.
If being here, working with both teens and horses that the world had all but given up on, could ultimately rescue his soul, maybe it could do the same for other returning soldiers who were trying—and failing—to find a place for themselves in society.
The thought fired him up.
So much so that he decided to bring it to Graham’s attention and see what the man thought of it.
And there was no time like the present.
So, hat in hand—literally as well as figuratively—Chance knocked on Graham’s door.
“Door’s not locked,” Graham called out.
Opening the door to the small bedroom that Graham had converted into his office, Chance made no move to enter. “Mind if I talk to you?” he asked, standing just on the other side of the threshold.
Graham beckoned him forward. “Come on in,” he invited warmly, turning away from his computer. “What’s on your mind? Everything going all right with the boys?”
“Everything’s fine,” Chance told him. Then he fell silent. The words he had rehearsed in his head on the way over all seemed to disappear. He mentally shook himself, getting back on track. “That’s kind of why I’m here.”
But he still stood there like a supplicant before his boss’s desk, looking no doubt very uncomfortable.
“Why don’t you sit down?” Graham suggested, gesturing to the chair before his desk. “Maybe if you take a load off, you’ll find it easier to share whatever’s on your mind.”
Chance took a seat, but he remained ramrod straight. Graham probably thought he looked like an action figure that had been bent into an uncompromising position.
When Chance didn’t start talking, Graham’s face took on a serious look.
Other than at the dinner table or by the horses, Chance wasn’t used to talking to Graham, and he couldn’t read the man’s expression. He just had a feeling his boss was about to say something bad.
“You’re not leaving us, are you?” Graham finally asked him.
It took a second for Chance to replay the question in his mind. “What? Oh, no, no I’m not—unless you’re not
satisfied with my work,” Chance qualified, wondering if perhaps the man was looking for a way to break the news to him.
“Trust me, I am more than satisfied with the caliber of your work,” Graham told him. “But something must have brought you in here.”
Chance cleared his throat. While he was used to going his own way, he wasn’t used to being part of a team, and yet that was what he was right now. Part of a team, and making a suggestion that would in turn affect that team.
Chance began to stumble through a response. “Yes, it did.”
“I’m listening,” Graham encouraged.
In order to make his point, Chance realized that he was going to have to do something he absolutely hated—he was going to have to talk about himself. But there was no way around it because in order to sell his suggestion, he could use only himself as an example.
“When I was first discharged from the military, because of what I had seen, I kind of came apart at the seams and was pretty much at loose ends.” Because the story felt too personal to him, Chance kept the details vague and general. “After having seen combat, after watching more than one person’s life wiped out in the blink of an eye, nothing seemed all that important anymore. I certainly didn’t feel like I fit in to the world I came back to.” He moved closer to the edge of his seat, his eyes intently on Graham to see if he was getting his thought across to the man. “There was no place that felt right to me.”
“Go on,” Graham urged when he paused.
“But when I came here, when I started working with the boys you had on the ranch, with kids who were caught between two worlds, and working with the rescued horses that you stocked the place with, things began to fall into place for me. They started to make sense.” His voice took on volume as he warmed to his subject. “I knew why I came back when so many of the other soldiers I shipped out with either didn’t come back at all, or came back with their bodies and spirits maimed and damaged. I found my purpose here.”
“I’m really glad to hear that,” Graham said, and Chance could hear the man’s sincerity.
Then Graham leaned forward in his desk chair. Chance had the feeling he knew that Chance wasn’t finished, that there was more to the reason why he’d come into his office this afternoon.
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