Chapter Six #2
It was pure coincidence that Hayes had met Bailey, his bride-to-be, at the Tree Fork where she’d been working while hiding a semi-stolen horse. And it was just another coincidence that he and Maclyn had kissed.
“Horses,” Trev corrected. Wade cocked his head. “Mac brought two horses. One horse, marriage. Two horses … I don’t know. Not marriage.” He got to his feet and took his half-filled cup to the sink.
“Maybe two horses means a double wedding.”
Trev tried to count to ten, made it to five before he leveled a dark look at his uncle. “I’m going to bed. Don’t plan any weddings while I’m gone.”
*
“The trickiest part is separating the cow from the calf.” Trev closed the pen gate behind the mama cow he’d tricked into entering.
The cow whirled with astonishing speed considering the fact that she was a stocky fourteen-hundred-pound animal that had just given birth.
She butted the gate in an effort to get back to her baby, who was tottering on unsteady legs.
“Grab the calf in any way you can.”
Mac wrapped one arm around the baby’s chest, the other around its rear end and held the squirming heifer while Trev pulled one of the loaded hypodermics out of his shirt pocket.
The calf didn’t flinch as he expertly gave the injection but struggled mightily while he put a squirt of probiotics into her mouth. Maclyn managed to keep hold.
“She’s slick.”
“Oh yeah. Sometimes it’s like hanging on to an eel. Next …” Trev loaded a plier-like implement with a numbered tag. “Left ear for heifers, right ear for bull calves.”
“Reasoning?”
The baby jumped when Trev attached the tag, knocking Mac onto her butt. He recaptured the calf, and Mac took another tighter hold, determined not to let go until the process was done.
“Heifers get a metal clip in the right ear when they get the bangs shot,” he said as if nothing had happened. Meanwhile, mama was throwing dirt and straw over her shoulder on the other side of the gate. “Don’t want too much stuff in one ear. Also, you can tell heifers from bulls at a glance.”
Trev took a plastic tape out of his back pocket and wrapped it around the heifer’s hoof at the hairline. It was crazy to Mac that the weight could be taken by measuring a foot.
“Any guesses?” he asked after making a note in his booklet.
“Uh … fifty pounds.” The calf looked like fifty pounds but felt like a good hundred when she struggled.
“Sixty-five. Nice birth weight. Last step, we take care of the navel.” He grabbed the container of betadine, took off the lid and pushed it up onto the calf’s umbilical cord shaking it for a few seconds. Reddish-yellow droplets escaped, landing on the straw and Mac’s jeans. “Done.”
Mac released the calf, grimacing as she looked at the yellowish smear the calf had left on her jacket sleeve.
“Yeah … that’s just processed milk,” Trev said. “You get used to it.”
“Can I use the washing machine on the porch?”
“Of course. I take it that everything is okay in the house?”
“It was nice waking up in a warm dry place where I could stretch out my legs,” she said.
“No issues?”
“Meaning?”
“Every now and again, a mouse might visit.”
“If so they would have to contend with the mighty Raisin,” Mac said. Trev laughed and Mac found herself focusing on his mouth for a beat too long. The man was sexy, but she was in control. Nothing wrong with looking. Denial only brought on longing, so she’d enjoy what she could. Safely, that is.
They’d spent the day on different parts of the ranch—Mac at the fence line and Trev sleeping until early afternoon.
Wade had walked through the cows with her before she’d taken off on her fence-checking mission.
She liked Wade. He was kind of cagey as he felt her out, asking questions that were probably supposed to sound casual.
He wanted to know about her and her background and Mac obliged, skimming over the issue with Trev and the truck all those years ago as well as giving minimal information about her family.
She wondered what Trev would think about his uncle giving her the third degree.
Trev gestured for Maclyn to open the barn gate leading to the pasture and then he released the cow who made a beeline for her calf. The two trotted out of the barn to freedom and Maclyn closed the gate behind them.
“Only five more to go. This was an easy one.”
“What’s a hard one look like?”
“A foot in the face. Being knocked end over teakettle. The mother jumping the fence and coming to her baby’s rescue.”
According to Trev, cows were prodigious jumpers, a fact that seemed unreasonable considering their size and build, but true all the same.
“Do you worry about Wade?”
“All the time. He’s not as fast as he used to be. He’s not yet sixty, but that broken leg really slowed him down. Not that he’ll say anything or do any less.”
“He was limping pretty good today when we walked the herd.”
“I noticed. If it gets worse, I’ll ask.”
“Will he answer?” Mac asked curiously.
“Eventually.” Trev opened the gate leading to the pasture, where they would cut out the next mother and baby. “But I might have to ask Hayes where he keeps the thumb screws.”
*
Maclyn lacked cow experience, but she’d handled enough horses and foals that learning to manhandle calves came easily to her. The third calf was all hers and Trev held it as she followed the procedure he’d demonstrated—inoculation, gut paste, weight, tag, betadine for the naval.
“Okay?” she asked before screwing the lid onto the betadine container.
“You’re a natural.”
He released the calf, and she gave him a sudden smile that warmed him to his toes.
“Going to kiss me again?” he asked lazily.
She wrinkled her forehead in an as-if way. “I wasn’t planning on it. Are you going to kiss me?”
Wouldn’t mind, but he was following her lead. He was glad they could joke instead of feeling all shifty around one another. That meant they had the matter under control.
Uh-huh.
His phone buzzed. He looked at it, then dropped it in his pocket and, once Mac was clear of the pen he swung open the gate to let the cow collect her baby.
“Work,” he said after he closed the gate again.
“You can just ignore your work?”
“I can when I’m on leave, which I am.”
“What do you do, Trev? Other than to charm people and blind them with your good looks?”
“I’m an information security analyst.”
“No.” She cocked her head as if trying to form a mental picture.
He shrugged, then started toward the main gate, thinking he’d like to do a once-over on the tractor before his next walk-through. Maclyn caught him by the elbow, stopping him. “You can’t drop a bombshell like that and walk away.”
“Why is that a bombshell?”
She spread her palms as her gaze traveled over him, starting at his beat-up felt hat and ending at his equally beat-up, manure-splattered boots. “What do you think?”
“I don’t look the part?”
She folded her arms over her chest, her gaze speculative. “What do you wear to work?”
“Khakis and a button-down.” He cleaned up pretty good, even if it didn’t feel natural.
She laughed. “I want to see this.”
“You don’t get to.”
“Maybe for my birthday?”
“I don’t see that happening.”
Mac waited until they’d ducked into the barn before saying, “You’re really a computer jockey?”
“Nobody uses that term anymore.”
Undeterred, she asked, “What led a wild cowboy into …”
“Geek land?”
“That wasn’t what I was going to say. I knew you were going to MSU. Brooke mentioned it often enough, but I assumed that you were taking some Ag or natural resources course of study.”
She folded her arms over her midsection as she regarded him curiously. “Do you like your job?”
“I’m good at my job.” He spoke in a way that did not encourage more questions and Mac’s curious expression blanked out as she got the message.
He felt a little bad about that, but he did not want to talk about his job.
Didn’t really like thinking about it while he was on the ranch.
He had competent associates who could handle things while he was gone, so he didn’t have to think about it.
“Why don’t you work here full-time? It looks like Wade needs you.”
“One of us will always be here. Hayes is training for a job he can do remotely. Jordan is supposed to be here after he finishes his never-ending project.” He let out a breath.
“As far as my job goes, I’ve put too much into it to just bail.
” He made almost triple his ranch salary when he wore those khakis.
“I like the benefits. I like being a professional.”
But he still preferred wearing shit-stained boots to polished Cole Haans.
Mac touched his arm, and he realized he’d gone quiet.
“I’m going to town tonight to get a few things now that I have a fridge and oven. Do you want me to pick up anything?”
He smiled to let her know that he was aware she was purposely switching topics. “Estelle takes care of the shopping, so I think we’re good.”
“Okay.” She brought her hands together in front of her. “I’m doing the ten o’clock and two o’clock cow checks. Wade and I worked it out.”
That sent up a tiny warning flare.
“Wade didn’t happen to mention Hayes’s fiancée, did he?” Because the last thing he needed was some ham-fisted matchmaking on Wade’s part.
Mac gave him a curious look. “Not really. Why?”
“No reason.”
Mac wasn’t buying it, but she wasn’t pushing either. Smart woman. Some things were best left alone.