Sam’s breath came out in a rush of air. She dropped the cotton ball, then flexed her fingers for a moment as if to rid them of the feel of him. Firming her lips to hide their trembling, she picked up the tube of ointment and squirted a dime-sized dollop onto the tip of her finger. She leaned closer, combing Colby’s hair out of the way, and gently traced the wound.
“The cut’s a little deeper at her hairline, so I’m going to put on a butterfly bandage to close it in order to prevent scarring.”
“Scarring?” Before Sam could stop him, Nash had wedged himself between her and Colby, his face going pale as he examined the wound.
His reaction confirmed Sam’s earlier opinion that Nash Rivers was an overprotective father who was overreacting to a simple accident.
“Nothing to worry about,” she assured him. “In a couple of weeks, you won’t even know it was there.” She waited until he moved out of her way, then she carefully stretched the bandage over the skin, closing the wound. “There!” She stepped back, briskly dusting her hands together. “All done.” She grinned at Colby. “That wasn’t so bad, now was it?”
Colby smiled back shyly. “Not bad at all. You’ve got soft hands.”
Stunned, Sam opened her palms and looked down at them. Soft? Her hands went places Colby wouldn’t even want to think about and were as rough as cobs due to the number of washings they received each day.
“I think she means gentle,” Nash offered.
Sam whipped her head around to find him watching her. Quickly, she stuffed her hands in her pockets and took another step back, her face flaming as she turned her gaze on Colby. “Speaking of hands, you need to wash yours. We don’t want you spreading any germs if you happen to touch your bandage.”
“My hands aren’t dirty,” Colby argued. “I just—”
Nash caught her under the arms and. set her on the floor, interrupting her. “Wash them anyway. Doctor’s orders. And stop by Nina’s room and apologize for your behavior. You almost gave her a heart attack.”
“Oh, Daddy,” Colby whined, “Nina’s a worrywart. You know that.”
“She worries because she loves you. Now scoot,” he ordered firmly, giving her a light swat on the behind to get her moving.
Dragging her feet, Colby obeyed.
And Sam wished she could call her back, for now she was alone with Nash. Fishing for something to say to fill the silence, she asked, “How long’s Colby been riding?”
“Since she was three. She’s always been nuts about horses. After we moved to Austin, I found a stable where she could continue her lessons, but it’s a forty-five-minute drive from here, so we had to quit after a few months.”
“We?” Sam asked, cocking her head to look at him. “You took lessons, too?”
His eyebrows shot up at the question. “Me? Hell, no! But somebody had to drive her there.”
In other words, Colby’s lessons didn’t fit into Nash’s busy schedule, Sam concluded. “Would you mind if I saddled Whiskey and rode him around for a bit?”
His frown returned. “For what purpose?”
“Just to form an opinion. Then I’d like to see Colby ride him, to see how she handles him.”
Nash narrowed his eyes and stabbed a finger in the direction of Sam’s chest. “You can ride him all you want, but Colby stays on the ground. I won’t have my daughter on that horse’s back again.” He tightened his jaw as he turned to stare down the hallway Colby had disappeared into. The image of her lying on the ground, blood spurting from the wound on her head, formed in his mind and he had to swallow back the fear that rose with it. “She’s my baby,” he murmured, “and all I’ve got left. I can’t take a chance on losing her, too.”
Grateful that Nash had stayed behind at the house to make phone calls, Sam took the saddle Colby had offered her and tossed it onto the horse’s back. She settled it over the pad before dipping her knees to reach underneath for the girt. “Did you pick out this saddle yourself, Colby?”
Perched on top of the stall gate, watching, Colby shook her head. “No. Daddy bought it for me for my birthday.”
And money was obviously no object, judging by the quality of the leather and the tooled name of the saddle maker. “How old are you?”
“Six. My birthday was May first.”
“Really?” Sam tightened the cinch, then threaded the strap back through, making a loop, and tugged it into place. “Mine’s the tenth.”
“Did you have a party? I didn’t get to have one this year. Daddy said he didn’t have time to fool with it. But he said next year we’ll have a bi-i-ig blowout. Course I don’t know who I’ll invite. We’ll be gone by then.”
Sam angled her head, hearing the disappointment in the girl’s voice. “You’re moving?”
Dejected, Colby dropped her elbow to her knee and her chin onto her palm. “Into a condo, just as soon as Daddy gets the deal on the ranch. He’s turning it into a subdivision. You know, houses and shops and stuff. The works. I think he calls it a planned community.” She flapped a hand, scrunching her nose. “Or something like that.”
“So your daddy doesn’t ranch?”
Colby sighed, obviously disappointed. “No. He’s a developer. He buys land, divides it all up, builds streets and stuff then sells it to builders.”
Which explained to Sam the neglect she’d seen upon first entering the ranch. Nash Rivers wouldn’t spend time or money on fences and cultivation if he was planning to subdivide the property for development.
She frowned, remembering the rusted sign that she’d driven under proclaiming the place Rivers Ranch. At one time, someone named Rivers had ranched the land. If not Nash, then who? “Have y’all lived here long?” she asked, her curiosity getting the better of her.
“About a year. We lived in San Antonio when I was little, but when my grandpa died, we moved here.”
His father’s ranch, then, not Nash’s. Probably an inheritance, Sam decided.
“Before we lived in San Antonio, we lived in Dallas,” Colby added. “Daddy didn’t like Dallas after my mother died. He said it held too many memories, so we moved to San Antonio.”
That the child could speak so matter-of-factly about her mother’s death surprised Sam. She’d lost her own mother when she was barely two, and though she didn’t remember her, she never thought of her without feeling a swell of tears.
“How old were you when your mother died?” she asked softly.
“About eight hours. She was a diabetic. She wasn’t supposed to have any babies, but Daddy said she wanted me so bad that she was willing to give up her own life just so that I could be born. That’s pretty cool, isn’t it?”
The tale was heartbreaking, and made even more so by the emotionless way in which Colby told it. Sam had to ease her breath out before she could answer. “Yeah, that’s pretty cool.”
“Daddy says I look like her, but I’ve got her picture in my room on my nightstand and I don’t think we look anything alike. Except for the color of our hair, maybe. She was blond like me, but her hair was straight and pretty and mine’s all kinky and curly.” Wrinkling her nose, Colby wadded a fistful of hair in her hand then let it drop in disgust. “Daddy says it would probably look better if I’d put a comb through it sometimes, but, heck, it just gets tangled up all over again.”
Sam bit back a grin as she bent over to lift Whiskey’s front hoof to clean it out. Did the kid ever run out