She was treating Dolly three times a day. Not twice. Three.
He looked at the log for a long moment. Nobody had told her to do that. He'd said twice a day was sufficient. She'd asked if she could do more, and he'd said it wouldn't hurt. And she'd added a midday treatment because the llama was uncomfortable and Tessa Lawrence, apparently, could not stand to watch an animal itch when she could do something about it.
"Charman Meow let Makayla give him his shot yesterday morning," Tessa said from behind him. "He let her scruff him and only growled twice."
"He must be going soft."
"Or Makayla’s tougher than she looks."
He turned and found her almost smiling. Almost. The corner of her mouth was engaged, but she was holding the rest of it back. Lexi used to do that. Claimed she'd been trained since birth not to show too much emotion to anyone because drama wasn't seemly.
"I brought something for Makayla," he said casually. "Could you send her out when she wakes up?"
"She's already up. She practices her violin before school every day."
That music coming out of the house was Makayla? He'd thought Tessa was playing a classical music station loudly on the radio. Seriously. The kid sounded like a professional musician.
Tessa's eyes narrowed slightly. He wouldn't call it suspicion, exactly. It was more like alertness when a variable she hadn't accounted for entered the equation.
"What kind of something?"
"Jeans and barn boots. She can't keep running around out here in those sneakers. She's going to step on something sharp and wind up in the ER."
"I was planning to take her shopping this weekend."
"Great. Then she'll have two pairs."
An awkward pause settled between them. He could see her working through it—the urge to refuse because accepting gifts from him meant more than she was willing to commit to versus the practical reality that her daughter needed jeans today and not a week from now. Ahh, pride versus pragmatism. Lexi chose pride every time?—
"Thank you," Tessa said quietly. Just that. No qualifier, no deflection, no devastating one-liner. A plain thank-you that had undoubtedly cost her more than any of her clever retorts.
Huh. That was not at all Lexi-like.
Don't read into it. She's just being polite. It's what she does.
He turned back to the animals.
Twenty minutes later, he was in the paddock checking Biscuit's hocks—the swelling was already down—and heard the screen door bang, followed by running footsteps on the gravel.
"Dr. Steele, Mom said you have something for me?" Her voice was high and breathless with excitement that no pair of jeans in the history of denim had ever warranted.
"Front seat of my truck," he replied without looking up.
A pause. A truck door opening and closing. Then a sound he hadn't expected and wasn't prepared for. A small, sharp intake of breath, followed by a silence so full it was louder than any of Loretta's braying.
That made him looked up.
Makayla stood by his truck, holding the jeans like they were made of gold. The awed expression on her face threatened the wall around his heart, and if he looked at her too long, something was going to crack that he wasn't ready to fix.
"They're real jeans," she breathed. "Like cowgirls wear."
"They're Wranglers. Standard issue around here. Nothing special."
"And boots!" She pulled the muck boots out of the bag and held them up, turning them in the morning light like she was inspecting a pair of glass slippers. "Can I put them on right now?"
"That's the idea."
She vanished into the house so fast the screen door nearly came off its hinges. Two minutes later, she reappeared on the porch in the jeans and boots, grinning so big it rearranged her entire face from careful and controlled into gloriously uncontained.