“Her color looks better,” she said.
Silently, she berated herself for worrying about Jackson’s feelings when he behaved in such an unreasonable, arrogant manner toward her. Yet she went on trying to reassure him.
“Maybe her body’ll start fighting the infection now that the birth is over and we’re getting some medication in her,” she said.
“Maybe we should bring in a wet nurse for the foal after he gets the colostrum,” he said. “Take some stress off her.”
“We’ll see,” she said.
Darcy gave Tara another loving caress, then got up and stepped around her to go to the foal.
“He’s lifted his head again a couple of times,” Jackson said.
As he spoke, the colt started struggling to rise again, and Jackson moved back to give him room. Darcy stayed where she was.
“You can do it, Stranger,” Jackson murmured.
The satisfaction flowing in his voice touched Darcy again.
Oh, Lord, help me save this baby.
The foal staggered to his feet and took a step.
“Good,” Darcy said. “He broke the cord that time. Let me look that over and swab on the disinfectant, then we’ll see about letting him nurse.”
Stranger’s knees started to collapse. He went down in a sudden heap. Tara stirred, looked at him, then lifted her head and tried to get her hind feet under her.
Clearly, there was no way she had the strength to accomplish her purpose.
“She may try again in a minute,” Darcy said, as she looked in her bag for the Novalsan. “And she might step on him. Let’s move him to her head and they can get acquainted.”
Jackson stood up. It was an awkward task for him to bend and pick up the foal with his stiff, lame leg, but Darcy resisted trying to help, and he managed fine.
Carefully, he placed the baby under Tara’s nose.
“Just keep on drying and warming him,” Darcy said, as he scooted over to make room for her to kneel and care for the colt.
“No urine leakage, no hemorrhage, no swelling,” she murmured, and then wondered again at herself while she swabbed on the disinfectant.
Here she was, sharing every scrap of encouraging information, which, in the long run, might turn out to be only feeding false hope to this man. She’d better keep her own counsel, as was her habit.
Sure enough, Jackson gave a sigh of relief.
“He’ll be able to stand and nurse in a few minutes,” he said. “I’m sure of it.”
Darcy’s heart constricted, and she threw him a quick glance.
“Hey, now,” she said, trying for a light tone, “who’s the doctor here?”
His intense blue gaze caught hers and held it mercilessly.
“This foal’s going to live,” he said tightly, “and so is this mare. I set out to save them and I’m going to get it done.”
The pressure of that expectation tore the lid off her quick temper.
“Why can’t you see reason?” she cried. “They’ve got lots of sickness to fight and very few resources left to fight with! I can’t guarantee they’ll live!”
Jackson’s eyes narrowed to slits.
“There’s no guarantee to anything in life,” he said harshly. “But I’m not going to see another good horse die from something I didn’t do. Not as long as I can lift a hand.”
The last words almost broke apart beneath the weight of regret in his voice.
It was a grief that filled the barn without warning, a misery that rose to the rafters. Tears sprang to Darcy’s eyes.
Something terrible had happened to him, too.
Then, without warning, a realization swept through her like a searing wind. She had known that all along. She had sensed it. Of course. With his lame leg and his eternal gloves. Maybe he’d burned his hands in a barn fire that had killed a bunch of his horses. Whatever it was, it had washed him up as a wreck on the shore of the life he’d had before, just as her loss had done to her.
Her spine went limp, and she wanted to sink into the straw in a heap like Stranger. This was what her life had come to. She had let her terrible trouble take over her life completely. Not only did it fill her thoughts and torture her mind, but it determined where she stopped by the side of the road. This was why she’d insisted on staying to help Jackson.
Then another truth touched her with a beam of light.
Her own troubles had been gone from her mind ever since she’d started helping Jackson with his.
Tara snuffled loudly. Immediately, Darcy and Jackson turned to the horses. The mare had her head up and was beginning to check out her baby, nosing him all over, giving him a lick here and there. Stranger, too, had lifted his head, although he couldn’t hold it up for long.
Tara stirred as if she might try to get up.
“Let’s leave them alone for a little while, and maybe he’ll nurse on his own,” Darcy said quietly, and blinked away the tears she was surprised to find still standing on her lashes.
She got to her feet slowly, so as not to disturb the mother and baby. So did Jackson. He followed her out of the stall.
Darcy risked a glance at his fierce face. With his hat pushed back, she could see the sweat on his brow. It was also standing on his upper lip. The air in the barn was hot and close, and she felt physically and emotionally zapped, so he must be doubly drained with his long walk on top of all the stress with the horses.
Maybe acting as host would break him out of the trap of tragic thoughts that gripped him.
“I could use a glass of iced tea,” she said. “Or a really cold Coke.”
He glanced at his hands, then over his shoulder at Stranger and Tara.
“I’ll keep an eye on them,” he said, in an absent tone. “Why don’t you go ahead.”
Darcy kept walking beside him. If she left him out here alone he would only fall deeper into his sad funk.
“They’ll be fine. We’ll only be gone for a few minutes.”
He was silent for a moment, then he seemed to bring himself back to the present with an effort.
“Tara’s really weak,” he said.
“She won’t step on Stranger now that we’ve moved him.”
Darcy kept going, and he stayed beside her.
But he said, “Help yourself to anything in the house.”
“What should I bring you?”
“Anything. I don’t care.”
Just outside the door of the barn, he stopped, glancing toward some battered benches under the shed row as if he’d like to sit down. His shoulders slumped, and he stared into space.
Darcy stopped, too, and looked at him. The haunted expression on his face broke her heart. She couldn’t, she just couldn’t leave him out here alone with his ghosts.
“I’d feel like an intruder,” she said, careful to keep her tone neutral and not plaintive, “in your home.”
He threw her an exasperated glance, opened his mouth as if to speak, then snapped it shut. They started walking again, out into the sunlight and then across the yard.
“I need to call somebody about my trailer anyhow,” he said, as if to prove he had his own reasons for escorting her into