Page 32 of Take a Chance (Blue Creek Ranch #1)

He hummed. “I figured you might want to visit our other neighbor.”

I hung my head and groaned. “I wish there didn’t have to be all this meddling to just….”

Russ chuckled quietly. “To figure things out at your own pace?” He snorted. “You’re a parent, Mal. A parent of a sharp as a tack boy who seems to be doing real well here. Now, we just want you to be happy, too.”

What was this? Operation Get Malachi Laid?

I groaned again, and Russ laughed.

“Okay, fine.”

“Twisted your arm, did I?” He touched the rim of his ancient-looking cowboy hat and began his journey to wherever he was going next.

I turned back to the filly who was now sniffing around. “Okay, kiddo. You want to go back to your friends?”

I hadn’t given Crew a heads up, and when I knocked on his door later that evening, his expression told me neither had Russ.

“Oh,” he said, then glanced over my shoulder and shook his head fondly.

As I looked back, I saw Russ lift his hand in greeting as he sat in the rocking chair he’d carried to my porch.

“Yeah. We’ve been set up.” I smiled slightly. “Can I come in?”

Crew stepped back to let me walk through. I left my flipflops by the door and turned to look at him.

“So….” I felt a bit bashful suddenly.

He smiled. “I doubt the old man on your porch will give us enough time for me to do all the things I would like to with you tonight. But how about a beer on the couch and some making out?”

He wasn’t wrong there. I, too, wanted to take our time if we were to do anything more than we already had. Tonight wasn’t the night.

“Sounds good.” I stepped closer to him and kissed him softly. “Sounds really good.”

Hawk had recovered from the kick pretty quickly, but it had made him unable to work full speed for a week or so. That meant he was behind on some training.

“Will you take someone with you, go on a slow ride today and take a couple of the yearlings? Gemma has taught most of them how to pony, so it should be fine,” he assured me one afternoon post-lunch.

“Sure. I’ll ask her which ones to take and Jaina is great with ponying others.”

Ponying, which meant leading one horse while riding another, was a good exercise for horses who couldn’t be ridden for various reasons. With the younglings, it was great for their growth and their brain, because it gave them a safe way to exercise and get away from the barn a little.

Having a horse like Jaina, who was unflappable as anything, as the leader was particularly useful for the younger horses.

“I’ll invite Crew,” I said. I fought back the blush when I added, “Might as well use the time to hang out if he’s not too busy.”

Hawk smiled. “That’s a great idea. I know it’s not easy to date while working as much as we do here.”

I went to find Gemma and then texted Crew.

I would’ve called, but if he was doing something more important, I didn’t want to disturb him too much.

Wanna come pony some yearlings with me?

His response came back in the time it took me to go fetch Jaina from her pasture.

Absolutely. Be right there.

I smiled as I went to tack Jaina up. She was excited to be doing something, while the sun was shining through the occasional cloud, which meant we wouldn’t get too hot.

The yearlings Gemma had pointed out were perky little things, and I bet they’d be fun. With Jaina and Shooter showing them how to be horses, yeah… I felt like this could be a really nice afternoon.

Crew showed up when I was about done with Jaina. Since we were alone in the stock barn, I gave him a quick kiss on my way to grabbing a radio from the charger.

Since he’d taken a detour and had Shooter with him, I waited for him to tack him up, and we walked the horses to the yearling barn.

When we went past Ezio, he snorted, then whinnied surprisingly softly. Shooter didn’t give a crap, but Jaina glanced over at him and gave him a greeting back. Ezio kept watching us as we went past.

“That boy has a crush,” Crew stated, chuckling.

“Oh yeah….” I shook my head. “At least he’s a good boy, you know.”

About ten minutes later, we were on our way with the yearlings.

They looked tiny next to our horses, but they were pretty standard size for quarter horses that young.

The colt I was leading was a bit spookier, but he took his cues from Jaina and didn’t seem worried once we got to the route Crew thought might work best.

“Okay, this one fears absolutely nothing.” The filly at the end of his lead was practically prancing around, looking curious and at ease.

“That’s a good start. As long as she doesn’t get overconfident, she’ll be golden.”

We rode slowly, letting the babies do their thing. The conversation was slow, too.

We were nearing the creek when I asked, “So, would you like to come have dinner and maybe have a movie night with Pay and me at some point?”

I hoped to sound casual, but I wasn’t. This was more than a friendly dinner. It was me trying to… I don’t know. Integrate Crew into my little family as more than a friend? Yeah.

Because I’d realized something important. I couldn’t go all in with Crew, hell, I could hardly go any further than we had so far, if I wasn’t sure he wouldn’t be ready to be with a guy who had a kid.

The truth was that we could have a dozen “date nights,” like we’d had. I could start falling in love with him for real. But if he couldn’t see himself as being a second parent for Pay one day in the future, I needed to take a step back and figure things out.

Screw my heart being broken, but hell if I’d let another person in my son’s short life break his heart by leaving us behind.