A Bravo For Christmas

“Hello, Daisy.”

“Now you can come meet my horses,” he said.

She grabbed her wool beanie off the passenger seat and put it on, then took his offered hand. His fingers were surprisingly warm as he helped her down to the snowy ground.

Gathering her coat a little closer around her, she went where he led, across a cleared space, past a faded red barn to a stretch of paddock fence.

The horses spotted them and trotted over—three of them, a white mare and two geldings, one black, one a bay. “Josie, Clem and Sweet Sam, meet Ava.” They greeted her with soft snuffling sounds. Dare had three small half-withered apples in his pockets. “Here. They’ll love you forever.” He passed them to her, and she gave each horse a treat.

Then she bent to pet Daisy, who’d followed them from the car. “In school, you always seemed like a guy who’d go to Yale,” she said. “Preppy, you know? And a jock. I never made you for a cowboy.”

He took her hand and pulled her to her feet again. “I’ve got three horses and a barn, but I wouldn’t say I qualify as a cowboy.”

She thought about kissing him and felt shy all over again. “What about the hat?”

He tipped the snowy brim at her. “The hat, least of all—and in high school I didn’t know what I wanted, really. Now I do. I like horses, and I like a place with lots of trees. And I have a workshop in the basement. I do some mediocre carpentry when I have the time.” He pointed off across the paddock. “I own twenty acres, most of it forest.”

“It’s a lot to manage, isn’t it—I mean, what with running Bravo Steelworks, too?”

“I have help. His name is Corky. He lives in what used to be the foreman’s cottage, on the far side of the barn. Corky does most of the cowboying around here. He works with the horses, mends the fence and takes care of Daisy when I’m not around.”

“Sylvie would love it here.” The words kind of slipped out, and she regretted them instantly.

“Bring Sylvie next time.”

She stared off toward the barn. “I shouldn’t have said that.”

“Why not?”

“It’s not a good idea. This is supposed to be a secret, remember? And it ends with the New Year.”

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