Page 39

Nate

I wake up in the Montana version of heaven—early morning gold streaming through the east windows, the smell of coffee percolating, and Marcos the first thing I see when I open my eyes.

He’s still facing me, unmoved from where we’d fallen asleep the night before, lips parted as he breathes softly.

Both his hands are tucked under the pillow, and he’s got his knees scrunched up to his chest. It is, I realize, the cutest thing I’ve ever seen and that’s saying something, since I’ve got a foal waiting downstairs.

Speaking of, there is the very soft sound of movement from below, which tells me it’s time to get up and start the day. I barely lift my arm to slide the blanket off when Marcos opens his eyes. Sheepishly, I drop my hand back to the bed.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you.” Something occurs to me and I kick myself for not thinking of it sooner. “Oh my god, or did the horses wake you up? I’m so sorry, I didn’t think about?— ”

“Nate,” Marcos says, clearing his throat and rubbing a knuckle into his eye. “Nothing woke me up, I just…woke up.”

“The horses aren’t loud?” Now that I’m awake, I can definitely hear them. I’m used to it, though, and they’re mostly quiet through the night—it’s only in the morning, when they’re hungry and ready to be let out, that they get restless.

“I haven’t heard them once,” he admits, lifting his head and squinting into the middle distance of the room as though listening hard. “Actually, they’re pretty quiet, huh?”

“Yeah,” I agree, relieved. “They hardly move around at all at night, and if they do it’s quiet enough that we can’t hear them up here.

Actually, it’s when they’re super restless that you know something is wrong.

A fox got in once and I only knew about it because the horses started fussing at one in the morning. ”

“A fox?”

“Yeah. Poor guy was just wanting to get out of the cold, I think. He was more freaked out than the horses. Bolted as soon as I opened the door.”

Marcos huffs a soft laugh. “Do you have to get up? I’m assuming there are chores and shit that need to be done at some ungodly hour around here.”

“Ranching is, in fact, just an endless cycle of chores and shit.” He laughs again, and reaches out a hand to brush my hair back from my face. “But you, my beautiful man, get to lounge in bed and relax. No chores for you.”

“Oh no.” He sits up and scrubs his hands over his face. “I want to help.”

“You do?” I ask, excited. I’d been planning on completing morning feed at the speed of light, and crawling back into bed with him afterward. But if he comes along and helps, I won’t have to be without him at all, which is much more preferable.

“Of course.”

He flips back the blanket and stands up, stretching his arms over his head and leaning backward.

I stare at his stomach hungrily. The horses could probably wait.

It’s not as though they’ll starve. As though he knows exactly what I’m thinking, Marcos lifts his eyebrows at me as he walks around the end of the bed.

“Did you already make coffee?” he asks.

“It’s set on a timer. Early mornings run smoother if you’ve got caffeine waiting for you first thing.”

Marcos follows me down the stairs after we brush our teeth and toss on some clothes. The horses pop their heads over the stall doors and verbalize a morning greeting as they always do. Taking a sip of coffee, I set my mug down and turn to Marcos.

“All right, introductions first.” Pointing them out, I go down the line of stalls and tell him their names. By the end, his eyebrows have nearly been introduced to his hairline and his expression is incredulous. I laugh. “Don’t worry, I don’t expect you to remember all those.”

I go through the motions of morning chores, Marcos a silent, watchful shadow beside me.

Every time I look at him, his expression is so serious, I’m having trouble not kissing him each time I lay eyes on him.

Having him here is probably going to shit all over my productivity—it’s going to be impossible to concentrate on anything other than Marcos.

“What?” he asks, when I’ve been staring at him for too long.

“Nothing, sorry. You’re distracting. ”

“Right. I’m distracting.” He rolls his eyes. “As though you don’t know what you’re doing right now.”

He waves a hand from my head to my feet. I look down—I’m already warm enough that my shirt has a small V of sweat forming at the neckline, and the jeans I’m wearing are currently on day three of use. Marcos, eyes on my arms, shakes his head and mutters something in Spanish.

“Are you ready for your surprise?” I ask him, holding my hand out for his. He stares at it for long enough that I think maybe today is a no-go on the touching, but then he puts his palm against mine and I squeeze his fingers in thanks. “Come on.”

I lead him over to the last stall on the left, which I’d been avoiding in an effort to save it for the very end. Shrimp nickers, bobbing her head up and down as we approach. I scratch her forehead, between her eyes, and look at Marcos.

“I’m not getting on that,” he tells me seriously, making me laugh.

“Nope,” I agree. “Marcos, this beauty is Shrimp.”

“I’m sorry—Shrimp? You’re joking.”

“There’s also a Spaghetti and a Turkey running around here. Sometimes we name the horses on an empty stomach.”

Marcos snorts a laugh and reaches tentative fingers out to brush Shrimp’s nose. His expression is wary, and he’s standing far enough away that he has to fully extend his arm to reach her. She’s a gentle mare, so she stands still enough for him that he feels safe to take a step closer.

“She won’t bite,” I tell him, before nodding toward the other end of the barn. “Atlas, however, will. That horse is a dick.”

“Ay dios mío,” he mumbles, getting a little bolder and sliding his hand up Shrimp’s nose. She huffs softly, happy with the attention.

“You’ll have to come just a little bit closer to see your surprise,” I tell him, pushing a hand against Shrimp’s neck to prompt her to step back and away from the door so he can approach. He moves to my side, looking confused.

I lean an elbow against the top of the stall door, and coax him forward with a hand on his back. He’s frowning as he looks down into the stall, gazing at the little brown foal, lying curled up in the bedding. I wait.

“That is the cutest thing I’ve ever seen,” Marcos says, sounding almost angry about it. I laugh, watching as he rests both hands on the stall door and leans his chest against it so he can see better.

“Marcos, meet Tuna.”

I drape an arm over the side of the stall and Tuna, who is only a baby, momentarily forgets how to use his limbs and stumbles as he gets up.

He comes over to greet us, wobbling on unsteady legs.

Less than two weeks old, he’s still in that awkward phase of having far too much leg and not nearly enough control.

He pushes his tiny nose against my hand and flicks his tail.

“Oh my god,” Marcos says, shoulder pressed against mine and head ducked as he watches. “How old is it? She?”

“He,” I correct. “And only a couple of weeks. He was a late baby. Here, do you want to touch him?”

“Can I?” he asks desperately. I pull my hand away from where Tuna is testing whether my fingers are edible or not, and wrap them around Marcos’ wrist instead.

Bringing his hand down the way mine was before, I let him go.

Immediately, Tuna presses his nose to the back of Marcos’ hand, snuffling softly .

“He just needs to smell you,” I tell him. “And of course you can touch him. Want to go in?”

“Inside there ?” Marcos asks incredulously, looking at the stall. “What if…what if Shrimp doesn’t want us around Tuna? God, Nate, these names are fucking ridiculous.”

Laughing, I nudge him back so I can open the door. I shoo Tuna away before he can make an ungainly attempt for freedom and step inside, waiting for Marcos to follow before closing us in.

“She’s a horse, not a grizzly,” I joke. “And she doesn’t mind, do you, beauty?”

I pat her rump and she snorts. Tuna, apparently feeling the need to show off for Marcos, attempts a round of the zoomies, but stumbles and falls.

Marcos, muttering something under his breath in Spanish again, reaches down and pets him the way one might touch something made of glass.

Carefully, he brushes the chips of bedding off of Tuna’s light-brown coat.

I watch him, little bubbles of joy popping in my chest and making my skin tingle.

“Does he go outside?” Marcos asks, smiling as Tuna leans against his legs. “Or is he too small?”

“He goes out in the round pen. He was actually foaled by one of the other mares, but she rejected him. We’d been hoping that Shrimp here would be a nurse mare for him—hence the fish name—but mostly we just feed him by hand. If you want to stay here, I’ll go grab a bottle for him?”

Marcos nods, watching as I leave the stall and head toward the tack room.

It only takes me a few minutes to prepare the milk replacer, before I’m walking back to him.

He looks over as I approach, smiling in a way that is certain to put me in cardiac arrest if he does it too often.

I hand him the bottle and rejoin him in the stall, leaning over to kiss his cheek for no reason other than I am desperately in love with him.

Tuna, who is nobody’s fool, whinnies at the sight of the bottle and flicks his little tail in excitement.

“Hungry?” I ask, taking the bottle back from Marcos and angling it down for him to latch on to.

He eats like a fucking pig, so I wait for him to settle a bit before I shimmy to the left and gesture for Marcos to take the bottle.

“You can hold it. Make sure you get a good grip, though, he’s a lot stronger than he looks. ”