Chapter 4
Titus stood in the barn with his hand wrapped around a length of chain he had not meant to pick up. Cold iron pressed into his palm. The links were worn smooth in some places and rough in others where years of use had left a mark.
He turned it once, slowly, letting the metal settle into his grip as if it had always belonged there. It should have stayed a tool, another piece of equipment left where it had last been dropped. Then his thumb caught on a raised edge, and the memory returned without warning.
It was not the season that returned to him, nor the long stretch of nights that blurred together until February felt like a continuous grind. What surfaced instead was her.
He remembered the way Kyla had stepped through the shed door without hesitation. She had moved straight into the work as if the space had already made room for her. She had looked at him without asking if she should stay.
Titus went still. The chain tightened in his grip.
The barn around him remained steady in the present.
Fresh straw lay underfoot while daylight pushed through the slats.
No frost bit through his denim now. No breath turned white in the air.
Yet the feel of the chain in his hand told a different story.
He closed his fingers around it and did not let go.
February came back to him in full. Calving season had arrived, and that was the night Kyla stopped being someone he could ignore.
That night had started with Titus driving his shoulder into the calving shed door. His boots left marks in mud crusted with ice.
Darkness pressed over the yard. Frost irritated the skin along his jaw until it burned.
Every breath felt like it scraped down his throat.
Inside, the shed gave off its usual scent of manure and sweat.
Blood sat sharp enough on his tongue that he could taste it with his mouth shut.
One bulb hung overhead and threw weak light across stacked bales and empty grain buckets.
He stepped in and hauled the door closed behind him with a hard jerk. It made no difference whether the cold stayed or left. Nobody came out here unless they had no other choice. This job belonged to him. It always had.
He kicked loose straw aside and crossed to the Jersey cow stretched on her side. She dragged air into her lungs in broken pulls. Her brown eyes rimmed white every time another contraction took her. Her belly rose and dropped in uneven surges. Every part of her was thrown into this one fight.
His flashlight skimmed over the bedding and picked out two black hooves already showing. They were slick and wrong. The toes pointed up where they had no business being. His mouth dried out at once. He crouched on the balls of his feet, his jeans biting into his knees.
“Come on, old girl. Give me something.”
The words were low, barely more than a breath.
She bawled, thick and miserable, with froth stringing from the corner of her mouth.
Titus set his palm against her hide and moved his fingers along the ridges of her ribs.
He had learned her shape by touch before he was tall enough to sling a hay bale.
Her skin twitched under his hand. Her flanks shivered.
“It is going to be rough,” he muttered.
He yanked off his coat and shoved his sleeves up. He bared forearms marked by the cold and the scrape a bull calf had left on him the week before.
He dropped lower, one knee sinking into wet straw.
The smell in there was more than birth. It was ammonia and copper and dying grass.
The place reminded him that preparation did not change the fact that life liked to turn sideways when it could do the most damage.
He swallowed and kept his mind on the only things that mattered.
He had to get the calf out and save the cow.
“Breach, damn it.”
His fingers moved over the legs already showing to check for movement. They stayed limp. The angle was wrong. He pressed his thumb into the wet joint and cursed. He needed the shoulders and the head, not this.
He rolled his shoulders. He was already sore under the collarbone. He had gone almost thirty-six hours with no real sleep, but the rush in his blood kept his hands moving. He shoved one arm in, then more of himself, reaching through the warmth. He searched for the missing head.
It was not there.
His whole body started to shake. A cramp bit through his muscles.
Fatigue clawed at him. He shut his jaw hard and kept it all inside.
He did not do it for the cow or the dark outside.
He did it because he had to. His thumb found an ear and then a jawbone.
The head had bent back. The calf would not come out like that.
Sweat gathered under his arms and cooled too fast in the freezing shed. His breath came out white. Another contraction rolled through the cow. She let out a low sound as the pressure clamped around his arm so hard it wiped out everything except pain.
Titus braced and did not let go.
“Stay with me, girl. Do not quit yet.”
His own voice sounded worn thin. Between that animal and death, there was nothing but his hands and his stubbornness. There was no room for his father or the bunkhouse talk. There was no room for the list of things that had already gone bad.
He pushed deeper and searched again. Jawline. Slack tongue. Eyelid. The head still lay wrong, with the neck trapped back along the spine. Every part of him narrowed to elbows and pressure.
One more contraction shook the cow. Titus felt it move down his own arms. It was the push and drag of living muscle fighting him at every inch.
“Move for me,” he growled. “Come on.”
He looked straight into the cow’s eye as if daring her to stay. Steam lifted off her flanks. Blood smeared into the straw. Mud and damp climbed his jeans. His own heart drove hard inside his chest while the whole shed narrowed to one question.
Then light cut across the barn.
He jerked his head up. Even months later, that was the part he remembered first. It was not the sound of the latch or the rush of cold.
Kyla crossed the last few feet without waiting for permission. Up close, the reality seemed to hit her. She saw the blood and the way the cow’s body strained. She swallowed once, steadying herself, and dropped into a crouch opposite him.
“What do you need?” she asked. She did not pretend she already knew.
Titus did not waste time questioning why she was there. “The head is back. The shoulder is stuck,” he said. His words were clipped by the effort. “I cannot get the angle.”
She nodded and took that in. Her gaze moved from his face to where his arm disappeared inside the cow. For a second, uncertainty showed, but it did not slow her.
“How can I help?”
He studied her for several seconds before inclining his head toward a shelf.
“Grab gloves. This is going to get messy.”
She moved to get gloves with hands already starting to shake from the cold.
“Is this okay?” she asked. She lifted her hands a fraction. It was more confirmation than hesitation.
“Yes,” he said. He ignored how the gloves dwarfed her. They were meant for arms his size. “Come here so I can show you what I need you to do.”
She moved closer, her knees sinking into the straw. She set her free hand against the cow’s flank and felt the rise and fall of the animal’s skin.
“Tell me where,” she said.
He adjusted and gave her space without pulling back. “Follow my arm. You will feel the jaw.”
She did so, inching forward. Her movements were slow and careful at first. When her wrist brushed his, the contact registered. It was brief but sharp enough to notice, though neither of them acknowledged it.
“I think—” she started. She stopped and corrected herself. “Is this it?”
“That is it,” he said. “The head is turned back. We need it forward.”
Another contraction hit. The cow’s body tightened around both of them. Kyla sucked in a breath but did not let it turn into a sound. Her shoulders squared and she adjusted her angle. Her fingers searched again, this time with more certainty.
“Okay,” she said. She was quieter now and focused. “Okay.”
Titus shifted his grip on the legs. He gave her what room he could without losing the progress he had fought for. He could feel the difference already. It was not just her help, but the fact that he was no longer working alone.
“Easy,” he said. He spoke more to the movement than to her. “Do not rush it.”
“I am not,” she answered. He believed her.
Her breathing changed and became steadier. She matched the rhythm of the cow’s contractions as she worked her hand along the line he had shown her. When she found the jaw again, she made small, controlled movements to test what would give.
“Tell me when,” she said.
He watched her hands and the way she adapted. He nodded once. “When it shifts.”
It took longer than he wanted. He had little patience left, but she did not force it. She did not panic when the first attempt failed. She reset and adjusted again. When the next contraction came, she moved with it.
“Now,” she said.
He followed her lead. He lifted and pulled at the same time she guided the head forward. Resistance fought them and then gave just enough to matter.
“There,” he said. The word was sharp with relief. “You have it. Keep that.”
She held the position with her shoulders braced. “What next?”
“The chain,” he said. “We pull with her.”
She glanced down, spotted the metal near his knee, and grabbed it without ceremony. Her movements were quick. “Like this?”
“Yes. Ankles. Tight.”
Her fingers worked faster now. Confidence built from repetition in the moment. When she finished, she looked up at him again and waited.
“On the next push,” he said.
They did not speak after that. The cow’s body drove the timing and they followed. They pulled together when the contraction hit and released just enough between to keep from losing ground. The strain worked through his arms and into his shoulders.