CHAPTER TWO

      HER FATHER HAD taken a whip to one of the Thoroughbreds once, when Merrie was in high school. She’d gone to see him after her father left the ranch on a European business trip with that Leeds woman. The trainer had talked to the horse softly, but it wouldn’t let him near it. Merrie had braved its nervous prancing and gone right up to it. The horse had responded to her immediately, to the trainer’s delight. After that, Merrie had been its caretaker. At least, as long as her father wasn’t around. He’d killed a dog she loved. He might have done the same to a horse that she’d shown attention to. Sari and she had never understood why their father hated them so. Probably, it was payback. He was getting even with their late mother, through them, for cutting him out of the bulk of her family wealth.

      “Have you had anything to eat, baby?” she asked Hurricane in a whisper as she moved her hand closer to the big horse. “Are you hungry? Poor baby. Poor, poor baby!”

      He moved closer to the fence. He shook his mane again.

      She went closer and sent her breath toward his nostrils, something she’d watched their trainer do with horses he was breaking back home. She blew gently into the big horse’s nostrils. Her father’s Thoroughbreds had been off-limits to the girls when they were growing up, or she might have learned more about horses. The injured Thoroughbred had been the only one of her father’s horses that she had access to. Although there were saddle mounts that the girls had permission to ride, they were careful not to pay too much attention to them when their father was around.

      “I won’t hurt you,” she whispered. Her face was drawn and still. “I know how you feel. You know that, don’t you, baby?”

      He moved closer, looking at her. She held the treat out in her palm.

      “Aren’t you hungry?” she asked softly.

      He shook his mane and then, suddenly, lowered his head. But it wasn’t to attack her. He took the treat from her palm and wolfed it down. He looked at her again, quizzically.

      “One more,” she said. She pulled the second treat from her pocket, held it out on her palm. Again, his head lowered and he took the treat gently from it with his lips. He wolfed that down, too.

      “Sweet boy,” she said softly. She held out her hand.

      He hesitated only for a minute before he moved closer and lowered his head toward hers. She pulled him down by his neck and laid her head against the side of his. “Oh, you poor, poor thing,” she whispered, her voice breaking. “Poor horse!”

      He moved his head against her, almost like a caress. She didn’t see the two returned cowboys in the back of the stable, gaping at her. There was Hurricane, laying his head against her. They were spellbound.

      She touched the bridle. Hurricane hesitated at first. But then he stilled. She reached up and unbuckled the halter. Very carefully, she took it away from his head and slipped it off. She grimaced at the bloody places there and on his body.

      “Sweet boy,” she whispered as she put the bridle aside. She reached her hand up and stroked him gently. “Sweet, sweet boy.” She laid her forehead against his with a long, heavy sigh.

      After a minute he lifted his head and looked at her and whinnied.

      “You need medicine on those cuts, don’t you,” she said softly.

      “And you need therapy,” Ren Colter said coldly from behind her. “You were told to stay away from that horse!”

      Hurricane jumped and moved back from the gate. He shook his mane and snorted.

      Merrie turned with the halter in her hand. She walked toward Ren and pushed it toward him.

      He stared at it, and her, with utter shock. “How did you get that off?”

      “He let me,” she said simply. “Do you have medicine I can put on the cuts?”

      “He’ll kill you if you walk into that stall with him,” Ren snapped. “He’s injured two cowboys already.”

      “He won’t hurt me,” she said quietly.

      He started to speak. But then he looked at the horse. Hurricane wasn’t stamping and running at the gate, as he had before. He was simply looking at them.

      “You’re sure of that?” he asked in a quiet undertone.

      She looked up at him with quiet, sad pale blue eyes. “Sort of,” she said. “Of course, if I’m wrong and he kills me, you can always stand over my grave and say you told me so.”

      The sarcasm pricked his temper. “You think you know how a horse feels?” he asked sarcastically.

      She shivered a little, even though it wasn’t that cold in the stable. She didn’t want to discuss anything personal with that cold, hard man. “He hasn’t attacked me, has he?”

      He hesitated, but only briefly. He turned to the two cowboys who’d been standing there while Merrie worked magic on the dangerous animal. “Do we have some of that salve the doctor left?”

      “Uh, yes,” one man stammered. He went to get it and handed it to Merrie. “Ma’am,” he said, taking off his hat, “I ain’t never seen nothing like that. You sure have got a way with animals.”

      She smiled. “Thanks,” she said shyly.

      Ren’s dark eyes narrowed. “If he starts toward you, you run,” he said firmly.

      “I will. But, he won’t hurt me.”

      They moved back, out of the horse’s line of sight. Ren was concerned. He didn’t want his brother’s girlfriend killed on his ranch. But she did seem to have a rapport with the horse. It was uncanny.

      She opened the gate and moved into the stall, with firm purpose in her step and no sign of fear.

      “Sweet boy,” she whispered, blowing in his nostrils again. “Will you let me help you? I won’t hurt you. I promise.”

      He shifted restlessly, but he made no move to attack her as she reached up and put some of the salve very delicately on the bad places on his head. From there she moved to his injured flanks, wincing at the cuts. She put salve on those, too, but she could tell they needed stitching. It was no wonder that he was still in this condition. He’d injured anyone who came near him. He was afraid of men, because a man had hurt him. Women, on the other hand, were not his enemies.

      She finished her work, smoothed her hand over his mane and laid her head against his neck. “Brave, sweet boy,” she whispered. “What a wonderful horse you are, Hurricane.”

      He moved his head against her. She patted him one more time and left the stall, securing the lock. She smiled at the horse and told him goodbye before she walked back down the aisle where the men were.

      “The cuts on his flank really need stitching, I think,” she said softly. “But he’s afraid of men. A man hurt him. Women didn’t.” She looked up at Ren. “Do you have a female vet anywhere within driving distance?”

      Ren started. She was right. The horse hated men. “There’s one over in Powell, I think. I could send one of the boys to bring her here.”

      “He’ll probably let her stitch him up.”

      “You can come out and work your witchcraft on him to get her in the stall, can’t you?” Ren asked sarcastically.

      She drew in a breath and turned away. She didn’t bother to answer him as she left.

      He stared after her with mixed feelings. He hated women. But this one...she was different. All the same, he wasn’t letting her close enough to bite, even if that