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“Hey,” Billie said, pointing her finger at Keith. “You promised.”

“Fine. You ready?” he said, turning to Mal. He tried not to let the catch in his breath show. She was just wearing jeans and a T-shirt, and her hair was pulled back in that ridiculous messy way, with a pencil sticking out of it. How did she take his breath away?

“Sure,” she said, giving him a funny look. “Actually, just give me a second to finish up in here.”

“Are you really just finishing something up, or are you going to start something new that takes hours?” Billie asked.

Mal laughed. “No, I promise I'm just finishing. Five minutes,” she said to Keith.

“I know how you get, that's all. This woman has a sickness,” Billie said. “And I have a date,” she said to Mal.

“OK! OK, just let me get to it.” She walked back inside.

“Come on, you can wait for her inside,” Billie said, holding the door for him.

“I'll just wait out here.”

“Keith.” She gave him a look, and just stood there, propping the door open with her hip, her arms crossed over her chest.

“Fine, I'll come in. But we have a deal.”

Billie stuck her tongue out at him and followed him inside.

It was exactly how he remembered it, with pale blue walls and white tile and a general air of sterility. He started down that long hall that would lead to the waiting area, peeking into exam rooms, seeing a kid and his mom gently petting their dog as Dr. Monroe finished up a cast. He remembered doing that, and how Dr. Monroe had taught him that being a vet was about more than fixing the animal, that you had to take care of the human, too. Keith didn't know how many times he'd told worried kids to just be gentle with Fluffy or Mojo or Dino and make sure she took her medicine, how many times he'd told parents not to worry about the bill, Linda would work out a payment plan. For so many people, all that mattered was knowing their four-legged kid would be OK.

Having been on the receiving end of such sympathies, he didn't know how people could take it. Of course, things were probably different when you were talking about your wife rather than your dog. And she hadn't had a broken leg or a tapeworm.

There was no sense reliving the past, though. That was why he never came here; Dr. Monroe's practice was his past. His future was . . . Wild Rose, maybe, although lately his heart wasn't in it, not the way Katie's was. But it was his responsibility. Although suddenly the reasons
why
it was his responsibility were a little fuzzy. Why couldn't he move on with his life again? Why had he made this choice?

“There you are,” said Mal, sticking her head out of the office door. “I'm almost done, I swear.”

“Take your time.” But hurry up.

He followed her into the office. That was the one place he didn't recognize. “They got office furniture?”

Mal laughed and leaned into the file cabinet, fishing. “That's what Billie said. I guess it's been buried.”

“Mal, it looks great in here.”

She pulled open another drawer. “Thanks. It took me a while to work out where things should go. I mean, I've done accounting before, but I've never worked with a vet or any doctor, so I had to really grill Billie on the workflow and . . .” She turned her head, still sandwiched between two file drawers. “Does this interest you at all?”

“It interests me that you're helping out a friend.”

“Yeah, well,” she said, and started to stand up.

“Whoa.” And suddenly Keith was at her back, holding her head down into the file drawers.

“Hang on,” he said, and pushed the top drawer closed. She just sat there, leaning over the bottom drawer, until she felt his hand on her back. “It's OK.” He gently guided her up. “I didn't want you to hit your head.”

“Wouldn't be the first time. Wouldn't be the first time today, actually . . .” She trailed off, looking around, placing a hand on his arm. He let her hold on until she was steady.

“Mal, come on!” Mal jumped a little at Billie's voice as it came barreling down the hall before her. “You promised . . . Hey, are you OK?”

“Yes, fine.”

“Did you hit your head again? Girl, you've been working too hard. You need more fresh air. And I need to get—”

“Yes,” Keith said quickly before she could finish the sentence. “We know.”

Mal smiled, then turned to shut down the computer and gather her stuff.

“Is this it?” Keith asked, holding up her purse.

“Well, I was going to bring some of these,” she pointed to a box of papers, the one messy spot in the office.

“No,” said Billie, grabbing Mal's arm, then her purse. “We're leaving. It will all be here tomorrow.”

 

 

The ride home was a little tense, but not as tense as, say, a war crimes trial. Despite his word, Keith had given Billie some, well, advice on how to handle Trevor, who was a troublemaker and who he thought was dating Katie. To which Billie responded that nobody goes out with Trevor for long. So Keith, like an idiot, asked what was the point, then, if you knew you were just going to get dumped? So Billie said that she wasn't going out with him because she wanted him to be her boyfriend. Then she said she wasn't going to talk to him anymore because he was getting that big-brother jaw clench and she didn't have time to argue with him
and
change out of her scrubs and into her date underwear. Then Mal piped in that he must really be worth it, and that it would take a lot to get her to wear uncomfortable underwear. At which Billie laughed and Keith practically ran to the car in an effort to stop picturing Mal in uncomfortable date underwear. He wasn't entirely sure what it was, but it sounded like something very . . . sexy.

“It's very sweet how protective you are of Billie,” said Mal, who was fiddling with the radio.

“She doesn't like it.”

“No, she doesn't. But you let her go anyway, so it's still sweet. Do you really only get country music down here?”

She flipped back and forth between the presets (all country, except for one for NPR, but even that was playing an old-timey bluegrass show). “Hey! This is that song we danced to! I can't believe I recognized it!” She turned to him, dancing in her seat. “I know a country song now.”

He smiled at her as she continued to dance, then she slowed down as she listened to the words. “Save a horse, ride a cowboy,” the singer sang out. She stopped. “Wow. Country music is dirty.”

He laughed then. He shouldn't have laughed, because she looked over and caught his eye, and her gaze was so heated, so full, he swore he could see that her longing matched his, and that was no way to drive a car.

He cleared his throat and turned back to the road.

After a few minutes of silence—not at all awkward—Mal said, “Hey, do we have the same phone?” pointing to the center console.

“Oh, no, that's yours. You left it in the barn.”

“Oh! No wonder it's been so quiet. Thanks for bringing it. I wonder if Luke called?” She started to scroll through the missed calls. He heard her sharp intake of breath, peeked over to see her looking pale and staring at the screen.

“You had a lot of calls today.”

She didn't say anything, just kept scrolling down.

“Mal?” She wasn't really listening, so he figured now would be as good a time as any to confess. “I answered it.”

“What?” she said sharply, turning to him.

“It kept ringing. I thought it might be an emergency. Or Luke.”

“Was it?”

He sighed. “I talked to Michael.”

She shrunk back in her seat. “Oh.”

“I'm sorry, Mal.”

“Sorry for picking up the phone or sorry for talking to my husband?”

“Ex, right?”

She turned away, blinking fast.

“You won't be married to him for much longer.” He hoped. For purely platonic reasons, of course. No one deserved a toad like Michael.

She snorted. Then she sat back in her seat with a sigh. “I don't know if I can express how badly I want to be done with him, to have this divorce final and official so I can move on with my life. But the idea of facing him, even if I know it's for the last time . . . it still terrifies me. More than the idea of being on my own for the first time in my life, more than the fact that I will have nowhere to live, no job, probably no money if he has his way, which he will. Every time I see him, he makes me feel so . . . small. I was just starting to feel regular-sized again.”

Don't go,
Keith thought.
Or come back. Come back and stay here.
But that was ridiculous, so he kept quiet until they pulled into the driveway. Peanut ran out to meet the car, jumping up and licking Mal's window. She laughed, then wiped her eyes.

Keith thought about the conversation he'd had with Libby that morning at breakfast.

“You know,” she'd said as Keith was remembering the way Mal's shirt came untucked from the back of her jeans when she leaned over, “I think you should take that girl for a ride.” He spit out his mouthful of coffee. “I just mean,” Libby continued, handing him a napkin, “that she said she's never been on a horse before, and here she is, cooped up until Lord knows whenever Luke moseys back here. Show her around, make her fall in love with the place. Then maybe she'd make that pretend engagement real.”

Keith hated to think about Mal marrying his no-good brother, but he hated even more to think about her leaving. Keith rubbed his chin and reached for a biscuit. “I'll think about it.” But he knew he would think of no such thing. The farther he stayed away from Mal, and her lips, the better.

“Hey,” he said to Mal now before she could open the car door. “Let's go riding tomorrow.”

“Horseback riding?” She looked surprised—not as surprised as he was, though. What was he thinking?

“Yeah. You said you've never been, and you're leaving soon, right?”

“As soon as Luke can take me.”

“So let's do it. Tomorrow.”

She smiled at him and this was why he should have stopped to think about taking her riding, because if he had known she would smile at him like that and if he had known what it would do to his heart, he never would have asked. It felt amazing, and it hurt a little, too. “Tomorrow,” he said, then climbed out of the car to pull Peanut off the door so Mal could get out.

Mal could feel Keith watching her and it was making her nervous. She was trying to decide if it was making her more nervous than being several feet off the ground on a creature that could kick her skull in when Keith said, “Relax, Mal. You're making him nervous.” Which made her even more nervous. What happened when a horse got nervous? A horse named Bullet? Sure, Keith said the name was a joke, that he was old and slow, but still. Would Bullet bolt? Bolt, then bite, then . . . the alliteration of her paranoia made her giggle.

Nervously.

“Hey.”

Keith had ridden up next to her and placed his hand over hers, which were squeezing the life out of the reins. Bullet turned his head and tried to bite Blue, the horse Keith was riding, which made Mal gasp and squeeze harder. She would never survive a horse fight.

“Mal.”

She looked up from where Bullet and Blue were engaged in a fierce battle of wills (aka trying to ignore each other) and looked over at Keith. His cowboy hat sat low on his forehead, shielding his face from the late morning sun, but his eyes still found hers. He was so sure and confident on Blue. He squeezed her hands on the reins, and in his eyes she saw, “You can do this.”

So she closed her eyes, took a deep breath and, with the reassuring pressure of Keith's big hands on hers, she relaxed.

 

 

Keith could feel it the minute Mal let go—the fear, the tension, whatever it was that had her sitting ramrod straight and pulling poor Bullet to a stop while telling him to go. Of course, her eyes were closed, so he wasn't sure how to tell her to get moving.

“Ready?” he asked, leaning back into Blue's saddle.

“Not really,” she replied, opening her eyes and looking ahead with determination. “But OK. Let's go.”

She had grit, he thought suddenly. She was scared, but she would cowboy up.

She was made to be out here.

And he was mooning over a woman who was married.
Almost not married,
the voice in his head reminded him. But still, technically, married. But then she turned around to face him, her brown eyes strong and focused, not on her fear, but on the adventure. They were practically sparkling with it.

“I'm ready.”

All told, she followed directions pretty well. Bullet responded to her tugs on the reins, although he was less inclined to speed up with her halfhearted kick to his sides.

“Mal, he's never going to go if you don't kick him a little harder.” They had pulled up to a stop again while Bullet munched on some tall grass off the trail.

“I don't want to hurt him!”

“You won't hurt him. It's like using a firm voice to give a command. If you don't kick him harder, he won't know you're serious about wanting him to stop eating every five steps.”

He thought he heard her mutter “command, confidence,” and then Bullet was off. At a mildly fast walk, at least.

“It worked!” She turned around in her saddle and beamed at him. She looked so bright and surprised. She was glowing under the brim of the old cowboy hat she wore.

Dammit. Keith was a goner.

“Good work,” he said, and pulled up to take the lead. Beyond the fields, they would pick up the old horse trail, then follow the creek up the hill a bit. It was a ride he had taken many times, usually to show the property off to prospective boarders.

He had no business being away from his work for several hours. Sure, the horses needed exercise, but there were more efficient ways to do that, ways that did not keep him out of his office when he had a pile of paperwork to deal with.

Then he heard her breathe, a deep, happy sigh that carried over the sound of clopping hooves. He looked ahead and smiled. The fields were laid out before them, and the hills were practically glowing in the distance, that mix of orange and yellow with a few spots of bright red. The colors rolled on, past the edge of his property line, past where they could see.

He had looked at those hills every day for his entire life and he always felt the same about them. He let out the breath he was holding, mirroring Mal's happy sigh.

 

 

Mal wasn't sure when she'd ever been so terrified and happy. She was not the sort of person who sought out adventure, and generally preferred her adrenaline levels normal and steady. Still, the quick ratcheting of her heart when Bullet finally decided to move—at her command—she could see why people were drawn to horseback riding. As she rode behind Keith, her focus shifting between the ground (far away) and Keith's strong back (also far—knock it off, Mal), she could feel herself learning Bullet's movements. When she sensed him wanting to linger over a tuft of grass, she swept her legs along his sides. When he nickered and let his gaze follow a bolting rabbit, she pulled the reins and set him back on course. As if he could sense when she most needed it, Keith would occasionally turn around and offer some terse advice or a nod of encouragement. Probably he was just checking to make sure she hadn't fallen off. As the morning rolled slowly into afternoon, she felt less nervous on Bullet and more in control.

It was not a feeling she was used to.

Eventually, Keith led them off the well-worn trail and they began to follow a stream. It was clear and wide in places, and Mal looked longingly at the grassy patches that blended into the creek bed. Riding was exhilarating, but her butt was getting sore.

So when Keith jumped off Blue and parked her in a small patch of grass, Mal was almost too grateful to be concerned about getting off the horse. Almost.

“I figure we can have lunch here,” he said as she gripped the reins and looked over Bullet's side.

“You getting down?”

“Yes. Sure. Lunch.”

“Do you need a hand, Mal?”

She looked over, expecting Keith to be laughing at her. She was probably five feet off the ground and she couldn't figure out how to get down. But he just reached one hand over Bullet's neck to steady him and put the other hand on the back of her saddle.

“Just take your right foot out of the stirrup. Good. Now lean over to me and swing that leg around.”

As she did, Bullet moved a little and Keith grabbed her by the waist, saying “whoa” softly, and hopefully to the horse, and lowered Mal to the ground. He didn't move his hands right away. Mal didn't really mind.

 

 

Bullet and Blue were chomping happily in a small clearing as Mal spread out the blanket on the grassy bank. Keith unhooked the basket from Blue's saddle and looked hungrily at what Libby had packed. Some cold fried chicken, her famous potato salad, more oatmeal cookies than they could decently eat, and something wrapped in foil in a side pocket—candy? Libby was not a candy person. No.

Holy—

Libby had packed them condoms.

Where the hell was Miss Libby buying condoms?

“Anything good in there?” Mal asked as she kicked off her shoes.

“Uh.” Keith shoved the condoms in his pocket and went over to join her on the blanket. It was one of the last warm days before winter started thinking about showing up, and Mal had set them up in a sunny spot. He pulled off his flannel shirt and let the warmth seep in through his T-shirt.

They ate, they made small talk. He found it easy to talk to Mal, and he didn't find it easy to talk to anyone. But as they passed the container of potato salad back and forth, he found himself not just answering her, but asking her questions. Where she grew up, what her folks were like, how she could possibly be almost thirty and never have been on a horse.

She laughed. He did love when she laughed.

“Have you ever been on a subway?”

He smiled over at her. “I took a bus in Lexington once.”

“Hmm. Not the same thing.”

“I've never even been on a plane.”

“What? Not even on your honeymoon?”

He stilled.

“Sorry,” Mal said quickly. “I didn't mean to—”

“No, it's OK. We didn't fly. We drove. To the Greenbrier in West Virginia.”

“You honeymooned in West Virginia?”

“It's nice there. Too nice, really. We lasted one night, and then we rented a cabin in the state park.”

“That sounds really nice, actually. Very romantic.”

“That was sort of the idea.”

A moment passed. Keith reached for a piece of chicken.

“So where was your honeymoon?” he asked.

“The Bahamas. We took a plane.”

He smiled. “Sounds nice.”

“Yeah, it was nice.”

“Hmm.”

“Oh, no. It was nice. It was a beautiful resort, white sand beaches, amazing food. I think I gained five pounds.”

“But?”

Mal picked at her cookie. “Well, I'm not much of a beach person. I mean, it was gorgeous and luxurious, like out of a magazine. But there was nothing to do, you know?”

“You couldn't find something to do on your honeymoon?”

She threw a crumb at him.

“It was just, I don't know. It didn't feel right.” She took a bite of her cookie. “I guess I'm just not cut out for marriage.”

Keith knew he shouldn't be asking the woman who was masquerading as his brother's fiancée when she was already married to another man any more about her views on marriage. “Why not?”

She snorted. “I'm just not that good at doing what someone else wants, I guess. I have to be free!” She flung her arms out, knocking her hat back.

“Marriage isn't about one person being in charge.”

“No? You weren't the breadwinner? The man of the house?”

“No. I mean, yes, I was the man, but it was more like a partnership. Vanessa was good at some things, I was good at other things, and we made a life. Trust me, I was not in charge.”

He looked over to see her looking at him funny.

“What?”

“Keith Carson, I do believe you are a romantic.”

It was the last thing he expected anyone to say about him—ever—and he barked out a laugh and rolled onto his back.

Mal leaned over him. “You laugh, but it's true. I can see it. You pretend to be all gruff and serious, but you're secretly polite and kind. You pretend to be all hard and business, but inside you're just a softy.”

He knew what she was saying was true, but he didn't want to hear it, not from her. He didn't want to know how well she knew him.

So he did what he thought was the most expedient way of quieting her. He reached behind her neck, pulled her toward him, and kissed her.

 

 

Mal could feel the instant Keith started thinking. His lips, at first warm and soft, froze, and the hand at the back of her neck relaxed its gentle pressure.

She liked that pressure.

She liked those lips. And, dammit, she liked Keith. Whatever battle he was fighting with his conscience, she wanted to end it, preferably with his lips going back to warm and soft.

She raised her head a little and opened her eyes.

“I'm so—”

“Don't you dare apologize.”

Keith looked stunned.

“If you're really sorry for kissing me”—Mal punctuated her anger with a poke to his chest—“then just shut up about it. A woman doesn't like to hear a man's regrets.”

“I don't—”

“But I'm not sorry. I wasn't sorry the other night and I'm not sorry now. I like you, Keith. I like how you make me feel. I like that you try to act like a jerk but you're hopeless at it. I like your hat and I like how you fill your jeans.”

Keith raised his eyebrow. Mal ignored him and soldiered on.

“I know being here is not right and that this fairy tale Luke dropped me into is not going to last.”

“You think mucking stalls is a fairy tale?”

“I do. I mean, not all of it. The details are not important, Keith. I'm talking about this place. I've never seen any place so beautiful.” She swept her arm around her. “And Libby's cooking and the horses and the way all the men are so handsome. It's like this place is enchanted. And I know I have to leave soon, to go back or go . . . somewhere, I don't know. But I'm here now and I like the way you kiss, so please, please don't apologize out of politeness to me because I'm. Not. Sorry.”

Mal was a little breathless and as he continued to stare up at her, she could feel a blush work its way up her neck and into her cheeks.

He was just staring. She couldn't stand it.

So she braced her hands on his chest, leaned down, and kissed him.

 

 

Keith was through with thinking. He knew that Mal's speech gave him permission to do what, he had to admit, he had been thinking about since he first saw her on Luke's arm. Such a short time and already she had invaded every part of his life.

But thinking prevented him from feeling her kiss, the pressure of her small hands on him, the rise and fall of her chest against his.

He brought his hand up from her neck to the back of her head, twining his fingers through her hair and pulling her even closer. She made a sound—Surprise? Pleasure?—and he deepened the kiss, welcoming her curious tongue and making his own sounds as she shifted to a better angle.

He liked her where she was, sprawled on top of him, so he moved his hand to her waist to keep her there. But then that wasn't enough, so he slid his hands down, over her bottom to the back of her knee, which he hitched up to his hip, opening her on his lap.

She raised her head with a little gasp of surprise, then one corner of her mouth lifted in a smile.