by Jeannie Watt
* * *
LIV CONTINUED TO WALK along the fence as Matt strode toward where he’d parked close to the barn. She refused to let herself watch him go although each step he took made her feel that much better. By the time she found the low part in the fence, where Beckett had most likely escaped, Matt was in his truck and on his way down the driveway.
Okay. Maybe she’d jumped the gun. She wanted to blame stress from a long day with Shae and her mom, but really there was no excuse for flat out accusing Matt without getting more facts. But what was she supposed to think?
Tomorrow she’d tighten the fence with the small tractor while Tim was out in the field doing men’s work, and tonight Beckett could spend the night in his stall so he didn’t wander off in search of equine company again. Horses were herd animals and Beckett was all alone. Maybe she’d get him a goat for company.
As she started to walk the last stretch of not-too-bad fence leading back to the barn, her father’s truck and trailer pulled into the driveway. Long day for him and it was her fault. She should have checked the fence before she released the horse, but never in her life had she seen any fence on the property loose enough to walk over. Tim was fanatical about upkeep.
Was.
Liv’s stomach knotted as it always did when she wondered about just what was going on with her father. How long had he been sick and was he ever going to admit he wasn’t getting better?
Maybe when pigs started flying.
That point was driven home when he got out of the truck and started to the back of the trailer to open the door. Not knowing that Liv was there, he winced as he opened the latch, then stopped and stood for a moment with his hand pressed against his side.
That was the last straw. Liv banged open the gate and he instantly went back to unloading the horse.
Liv held back the “Dad, are you all right?” already knowing how he would answer—untruthfully—and instead said, “I can’t believe he left the property.”
She held the wide trailer door open as Tim went inside to get Beckett. He led the big sorrel out of the trailer, wincing again as he made the step down onto the gravel, but not slowing his pace. Liv walked beside Beckett, stroking a hand over his neck as he moved.
“Yeah. Mrs. Raynor wasn’t exactly happy to see him since he tromped through her rose garden on his way to her yearling pen.”
“I was just thinking I should get him something for company.”
“Can you afford another horse?”
I’m living rent-free, so yes.... “I was thinking along the lines of a goat.”
Tim’s face contorted. “I hate goats. Think of something else.”
“Why do you hate goats? They’re small and cheap to feed.”
“They eat everything in sight and they tend to stand on top of the vehicles. Scratch the paint.”
“Maybe we could keep it penned.”
“Maybe you could think of something else.”
“All right. But for right now, we need to stretch the fence. It’s so low along the east side that Beckett walked over it.” Just as Matt had said he’d done, damn him.
Tim nodded without looking at her. “I’ll get on that.”
“I’ll help you, Dad.”
He opened his mouth, then closed it again. “Right now would you mind getting me a plate of leftovers? I was about to eat when I got the call.”
“All right. I’m going to keep Beckett in the barn until we fix the fence.”
A year ago, Tim would have crossed the field and worked up a temporary fix so that the horse didn’t have to be contained in a smallish stall, but tonight he simply said, “Good idea.”
Fifteen minutes later she put a hot plate of food in front of her father, then sat at the table with him.
“Nothing for you?”
“I grabbed a bite on the drive home.” Even if she hadn’t, she wouldn’t have felt like eating after the encounter with Matt. Why was it so damned upsetting to be in the wrong?
Maybe what was so damned upsetting was that Matt was in the right...and she’d set up the situation.
“How’s your mother?”
Tim always asked, and Liv answered automatically. “In a tizzy over the wedding.”
“I can imagine. She was forever worried about what people would think.” He shoveled a forkful of spaghetti into his mouth.
“How did you two ever get together?” It was a rhetorical question, but Tim surprised her.
“By lying to ourselves.”
“Yeah?” she asked slowly. Both he and Vivian were matter-of-fact about the failure of their marriage, something Liv had once marveled at, until it occurred to her that her mother may not have been as accepting if she hadn’t married David so rapidly. But Tim had never talked about it before.
“What can I say?” he asked. “Dave is better for her than I ever was.” He pushed the plate away, then met his daughter’s eyes and said, “Don’t get a goat.”
Liv laughed at the sudden change of topic, but she knew it was brought on by the fact that Tim had almost given her some insight into his relationship with her mother. She picked up his plate and carried it to the sink. “I won’t get a goat.”
“You don’t know how much I appreciate that.” Tim got up slowly, hanging on to the back of the chair for longer than he should have, then started for the living room.
“But I am fixing the fence tomorrow.”
She stopped at the doorway and waited for her father, who stood by his recliner, to answer.
“I can help you when I come in for lunch.”
“I’ll be done by then. My horse is using the pasture, I can fix the fence.”
“You shouldn’t have to do that.”
Liv’s eyebrows shot up. “We worked on the fence all the time when I stayed with you.” It was a spring ritual to check and tighten fence, replace the corner braces, tighten the gates.
“Taking care of this place is my job. If you want to help that’s one thing—”
“I am helping, Dad. I’m fixing the fence tomorrow.”
* * *
MATT WALKED OUT of the Bozeman physical therapist’s office in a much worse mood than when he’d gone in, but his determination to come back from his injury hadn’t diminished one iota. He’d been doing his exercises and his range of movement was increasing, while the amount of pain he endured during the half-hour-long sessions was decreasing, so the obvious conclusion was that he was on the mend. And the therapist agreed with him, right up until Matt said he was about to start riding again.
That was when the lecture about lateral motion and collapsing knees began and when Matt had begun to tune out. He’d forced himself to listen under the time-honored premise of knowing your enemy—or in this case, your infirmity—however he was not taking the gloomy prognosis as gospel. People had come back from worse injuries than his.
Pessimistic bastard...
Matt wasn’t going to accept the therapist’s blithe opinion that his career was over, because it wasn’t. He’d step up his exercise program, continue eating protein, take his supplements, work at building the muscles around the joints and only wear the brace for extra support when he was roping or riding.
Matt yanked open the truck door and got inside, banging his knee on the steering wheel and letting out a curse.
Shit. Was nothing going right today?
He hadn’t heard from Willa, even though Craig’s week was officially up as of yesterday, so it loo
ked like he was going to have his roommate for an indeterminate amount of time. Not that he minded, but he wanted Willa to do him the courtesy of calling—not for his sake, but for Craig’s.
Craig didn’t seem all that put out by the deadline coming and going, but Matt knew all too well how kids could harbor resentment and not show it. He’d spent years bearing one hell of a grudge and as far as he knew, had hidden it like a champ.
Matt stopped at Safeway to pick up a prescription the Bozeman doctor had phoned in after his visit there, only to find that due to some glitch the order hadn’t been filled. The excellent day continued. As he waited, reading the labels on the vitamin display and wondering if there were anything else he could be taking to build up his knee, he heard his name. Turning, he saw Pete Barnes walking toward him.
“I heard you were back. How’s it going?” Pete glanced down at Matt’s knee. “Making progress?”
“Some,” Matt said. “You know how it is. Slow going at first.” Pete knew. Matt had seen him recover from almost the same injury in high school and he was still roping. Not professionally, but he burned up the local circuit and earned some decent money.
“Hey,” Pete said, “I saw your horse at the arena two nights ago. That big sorrel.”
“Was he wandering loose?” Matt asked.
“What? No. Liv was riding him with Susie’s drill team. He was having a hell of a time keeping up with them. For some reason she kept turning him in the wrong direction.”
Matt felt his jaw start to drop. His horse in a drill team.
The pharmacist’s assistant dropped a bottle into a bag and raised it so that Matt could see that his order was ready. Matt pulled his wallet out of his back pocket before looking over his shoulder to ask Pete, “How often does the drill team practice?”
Pete shrugged. “A lot. Susie and I are trailing down together tonight. I’m roping and she’s riding in the warm-up arena.”
“Yeah? What time?”
“Seven.”
“Thanks.”
“Hey, uh...” Pete nodded at the pharmacy bag. “How do you like Dr. Fletcher?”
Matt frowned, wondering if Pete was looking for a referral. “He’s okay.”
“I thought he was too cautious, myself.” Pete stepped up to the counter and handed the assistant his prescription slip.
“Cautious how?” Matt asked.
Pete gave a soft snort. “Cautious like once you injure a knee, you’re done for life.” He gave his head a slow shake. “That isn’t so.”
“You seem to be walking pretty good,” Matt said.
“Yeah. No thanks to Fletcher.”
Matt was about to ask who he was seeing when Pete gave a slight shake of his head. “I’ll catch up with you later.”
“Yeah. Sure. Later.”
As soon as he got into the truck, Matt tore open the bag, popped one of the anti-inflammatory pills into his mouth and washed it down with cold coffee. The best roping horse he’d ever owned on a drill team. He had to get him back.
He reached down for the ignition. Well, at least he now had a way to see Beckett, because Liv sure as hell wasn’t going to let him lay eyes on him at her place. And it still fried him that she’d assumed he’d stolen Beckett—although steal wasn’t quite the right word for getting back something that already belonged to you. What kind of a guy did Liv think he was?
The kind that wasn’t above doing what he had to in order to get his way, according to Liv.
Whatever the hell that meant.
Matt put the truck into gear and carefully backed out of the parking place, ignoring his instinct to tear out of the lot.
* * *
THE HOUSE WAS SPOTLESS, Craig was on the sofa, reading as usual. He looked up when Matt came in and hung his hat on the hooks.
“Mom called. She gave me a number for you to call her tonight.”
“Great.”
Craig watched him carefully while pretending not to. Matt made an effort to keep his expression bland, unconcerned. The kid may act as if this situation were totally normal to him, but the still-packed suitcase told Matt otherwise. He was ready to leave, to put down some roots somewhere, have a stable life.
“I’m going down to the roping tonight. Want to come?”
“Actually, there’s a movie I want to watch.”
Matt didn’t ask twice, although he did wonder how Craig stayed so thin when the kid never got off the sofa except for when he was cleaning. He must really work up a sweat with the vacuum.
He wasn’t going to spend that much time down at the arena. Just get a look at Beckett under the guise of watching the roping. He needed to see his horse.
CHAPTER SEVEN
MOST OF LIV’S teammates were in the arena warming up when she pulled into the parking lot twenty minutes late. The small tractor had broken down before she’d gotten it out of the barn and she and Tim had lost track of the time as he tinkered with the engine and she’d handed him tools—just like old times. She didn’t know if she’d been lost in some nostalgic time warp or what, but it’d felt good to be communicating with her father again, even if it was only over a tractor, and hoped that it might lead to discussing more important stuff—like his health.
When she pulled her trailer up to the end spot, she was relieved to see that Susie and Margo were still tacking up their horses. She’d be late, but not that far behind the others.
Liv jumped out of the truck and ran back to the trailer, unlatched the door and pulled it open. Beckett, who hadn’t been tied, obligingly stepped out. She caught the lead rope draped over his back as he walked by and then tied him to the trailer next to the tack compartment.
“Hey, Liv,” Susie said as she passed.
“Hi,” Liv replied as she ran a quick brush over Beckett’s back to get the road dust off. “Will you tell Linda I’ll be there in a few?” Late, late, late.
“Will do,” Susie called over her shoulder.
Liv tossed the brush into the grooming bucket and yanked out her pad and saddle. She carefully settled the pad in place and then turned to pick up the saddle. A shadow fell over her, startling her, and she looked over her shoulder just in time to see Matt yank the saddle pad off Beckett’s back.
“What the hell happened to him?” he asked.
Liv slowly straightened back up, the saddle still lying at her feet, trying to make sense of what was happening as a very angry Matt Montoya ran his hand over the large white spots where the saddle sores had healed.
“How the hell did you manage to rub him this raw?” His gaze was deadly as it settled on her. “Didn’t you notice that the saddle didn’t fit?” He stepped closer. “How many times did you ride him with that saddle?”
“Never.”
“Bullshit.” He turned back to the horse, ran a hand down Beckett’s legs as if checking for injury, then smoothed a hand over his neck and left it there. “Those spots didn’t just appear.”
“No. They healed after I got him,” Liv said coldly. “They had maggots in them.”
Matt’s eyes darkened. “There’s no way you got him in this condition.”
“Well, I did.” She folded her arms as she began to get an idea of what was happening here. “And since Trena was afraid of horses, as far as I can tell, there’s only one person who could have put those sores there.”
If anything, Matt looked even more outraged. Oh, he was good. “You think I put them there?” he demanded.
“Who else?” Li
v took a step forward, brought herself closer to him, determined to show him that she would not allow herself to be intimidated any more than she would allow herself to be charmed. She didn’t know what his game was, but she wasn’t going to let him get away with it. If he thought for one moment that he could get some leverage in this situation by accusing her of animal abuse...well, it wasn’t going to work. “It had to be you.” She stabbed a finger at him. “Don’t try to do this, Matt.”
“Try to what?”
“Accuse me of abuse so that you can get the horse back. There are people in Billings who saw Beckett when I first got him. My vet treated the sores. There are records. Dated records.”
“What kind of a guy do you think I am?” Matt took a step away from Beckett—toward her—and without realizing what she was doing, Liv took a step back. She instantly stopped and drew herself up. She would not retreat, even if he were so close that she could practically feel the heat of his body. “I don’t abuse animals and I’m not going to use underhanded tactics to get one back. Even one that should still be mine.”
Liv simply raised her chin. “If you don’t abuse animals, then explain those sores. And why did Beckett refuse to take a bit when I first got him? Why was he so head shy that it took me over a month to get to where I could rub his ears?”
Again the stunned and angry expression. “Why don’t you tell me?”
“Because you might be so intent on winning that you don’t realize the damage you’re doing to the tools you use to win.”
Cold anger froze his expression and Liv once again felt like taking a step back. Then Matt pulled his gaze away from Liv, focused on Beckett, his jawline pulled taut. He didn’t seem to notice when Margo rode by, but Liv noticed. The woman had probably heard everything. Damn.
Finally, Matt shifted his attention back to her. He was angry. Confused...or trying to look that way. She wasn’t going to let him work her again.
“You know me, Liv. How the hell could you think I could do something like that to a horse?”