Page 59 of Swift and Saddled

A few minutes and a number of flaming candles that would probably give a firefighter an aneurysm later, I went back to Ada.

She was right where I’d left her—looking like a fucking goddess in my bed.

I knelt on the bed and started crawling up her body,placing kisses and playful bites wherever I could. I gave her waist a squeeze, and she giggled.

Ada wasn’t a giggly woman, but she giggled for me, and it made me feel like I could run through a wall. In a good way.

“That tickled,” she said, and I had no choice but to squeeze her waist again. She kicked and laughed. “You’re such an asshole,” she said with a smile. I stopped tickling her and planted a kiss on her mouth.

“We’ll see if that’s what you think after you see the setup I’ve got going for us in the bathroom.” I got off the bed and scooped her up, sheets and all. I was rewarded with another laugh, and I couldn’t believe my luck.

When we reached the bathroom, I set Ada down on her feet. She let the sheets fall as she took in the scene—the bubble bath, the candles. If I’d had rose petals, I would’ve sprinkled those, too, but I couldn’t win them all.

“Damn,” she said. “I’m going to need the power to go out more often.”Same,I thought. She linked her fingers through mine and pulled me behind her to the bathtub. It was big, so there was plenty of room for the two of us.

She was about to step in, but I stopped her. I bent down and touched the water first to make sure it wasn’t too hot. An expression I hadn’t seen before flashed across her face when I did it, but I didn’t know what it meant and it wasn’t there long enough for me to try to figure it out.

“All good,” I said, and she stepped in and lowered herself into the water. I shed my boxers and got in behind her. I pulled her back against my chest and both of us relaxed into the water.

She let out a soft moan, and it was like music to my ears. “This is perfect.”

So are you,I thought.

Ada and I stayed in the bath until the water started to cool, and then I made her get out because I wasn’t about to let her get chilled again on my watch.

I left her to get dressed in her room, even though it was the last thing I wanted to do, but while we were drying off, Waylon had come to get me, so I needed to check on Loretta.

Loretta.

The woman who told me she didn’t like country music named a calf after Loretta Lynn today.

Waylon led me back to the garage, where Loretta was still in her bed but wide awake now. When the calf saw me, she stood on wobbly legs. That was good. She wasn’t lethargic and she had good reflexes.

“Hey, baby girl,” I said as I approached. “You hungry?” Loretta was young. Really young. She would probably need a milk replacement before she transitioned all the way to solid feed. It tugged at my chest when a calf got separated from her dam, but it was a fact of ranch life. There were a million reasons that it happened—especially in first-time heifers, and there wasn’t really anything we could do to prevent it.

But we could take care of the calf. Bottle calves weren’t uncommon at Rebel Blue, and I secretly loved having them. I liked having something to take care of. I went to the back of the garage, which was stocked with a fair amount of farm supplies—not as much as our stables, but enough.

I set up one of the camp stoves and boiled some water in a kettle. I let it sit until I could touch it to my wristcomfortably before mixing in the milk replacement and shaking it up. I settled back in with Loretta and started trying to get her to take the bottle. This could be an adjustment for calves, so it took a little finessing and a lot of patience.

As Loretta finally latched on to the bottle, I heard the door from the house to the garage open. My heart kicked in my chest because there was only one person it could be.

Ada had changed into a hoodie and sweatpants and was still the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. She paused for a second when she saw me with Loretta on my lap. “The way you look right now is enough for me to want to drag you back upstairs and have my way with you,” she said. “Are you seriously shirtless and bottle-feeding a baby cow right now?”

I winked at her and she groaned, “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Come sit with me,” I said. She sat down with her back against the wall. Waylon made his way over to her and set his head on her lap and she started stroking his head.

“Is that just milk in there?” Ada asked, gesturing to the bottle.

I shook my head. “It’s a milk replacement—it’s like human baby formula but for calves.”

“Every day is a school day,” she murmured, and then was quiet.

“You okay?” I asked, starting to worry that she had already started running from me in her head.

She nodded. “Can I ask you something?”

“Anything,” I said truthfully.

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