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Sophie stepped in. “You want to ride, Andy?”
“Can Zach help? He can walk beside me.”
“Sophie knows how this works. I don’t.” Zach turned to her. “What do you want me to do?”
The tension seeped out of her shoulders. “I’ll lead Sam and you can walk on one side of Sam, and Beth on the other. Will that work for you, Andy?”
“Yes,” he crowed, hopping to his feet. He patted Zach’s arm. “It’s okay about your leg. I’ve got Down’s.”
“Really?”
Andy nodded. “Mom says I’m extraspecial.”
“She’s right.”
Sophie smiled at Zach. “Thanks,” she mouthed.
Satisfaction spread through Zach’s chest.
They walked to the mounting steps. Sophie got the horse into position. Andy scrambled up the steps.
“Put on your helmet, Andy,” Sophie called out.
He raced back down the steps and over to the row of helmets sitting on a shelf at the end of the stalls. He grabbed a helmet and put it on. He raced back to the steps. Zach rested his cane against the side of the stable by the mounting steps.
“Let Zach help you get on the horse, Andy,” Sophie instructed.
Whoa, he didn’t know how he was to help. Glancing at his sister, he silently questioned her.
“Just support him as he slips his leg over the pad,” she instructed, “then guide his foot into the stirrup.”
Resting his hands around Andy’s waist, Zach lifted the boy onto the saddle blanket. A smile curved Andy’s mouth.
Beth helped Andy put his leg in the stirrup attached to the blanket.
“Now, just hold his leg to make sure he doesn’t slip,” Beth instructed her brother. Beth had been here before and worked as a sidewalker.
“What do you say, Andy?” Sophie asked from her place by Sam’s head.
“Go forward,” Andy crowed.
Sam started walking.
Zach grabbed the front of the saddle pad and his other hand rested on Andy’s leg. Andy turned and smiled at Zach. His heart overturned. With the warm New Mexico sun on his back and the feel of the horse under his hand, Zach felt a peace in his soul—a peace he hadn’t felt in a long, long time.
Oddly enough, Zach, Beth and Sophie worked in tandem, he on the left side of the horse, Beth on the right, and Sophie leading Sam.
After three times around the ring, Zach felt the strain in his arms and legs. He stumbled, and his artificial leg folded underneath him, and he fell to the ground.
Andy cried out in dismay. Beth raced to Zach’s side. Sophie started to move away from Sam, but Zach waved her back.
“I’m okay.”
All the activity in both rings stopped. One of the sidewalkers from the next ring came to Zach’s side. The man stopped and said, “How do you want to handle this?”
He would’ve rather faced a terrorist in the streets of Baghdad, instead of being facedown in the dirt in front of his sister and the woman he’d been attracted to. He rolled to his side and told the man how to help him stand. It was slow and awkward as he struggled to his feet. When he stood, Andy clapped.
“You need any more help?” the man asked Zach.
Zach shook his head. He limped over to a bench under the stable’s awning, which sheltered the entrance to the stables. He’d been thrown by plenty of wild broncos and bulls in his rodeo days, but there’d been no shame in it. This time, he’d fallen flat on his face walking.
Walking.
What kind of man can’t walk?
He closed his eyes and rested his head against one of the porch posts. He knew that coming here this morning was a mistake. He just didn’t know how big a mistake it would be.
Sophie looked at Zach. Her heart had skipped a beat earlier when she glanced up and saw him standing above her. Beth had called Sophie at the beginning of this week begging for help with Zach. Beth and Sophie had kept in contact since their college days when they roomed together and Sophie was more than happy to offer her friend a helping hand.
Zachary McClure still took her breath away. Tall, with wide shoulders and narrow hips, he cast a large shadow. Somehow, that handsome face seemed to have aged more than the few years since she’d last seen him. The weariness in his deep blue eyes matched the new lines bracketing his eyes and mouth.
“Is Zach feeling okay?” Andy asked, snapping her out of her memories.
Turning to Andy, Sophie saw the frown crossing his young face. “I think he’s fine.” She prayed he was.
For the next few minutes Sophie walked Sam, but Andy remained quiet. When she guided Sam toward the steps, she motioned for another sidewalker to help Andy dismount. The instant Andy’s feet touched ground he raced to Zach’s side.
“I’m sorry you fell,” Andy whispered, tears in his voice.
Sophie’s heart contracted.
Zach opened his eyes. Sophie felt Beth stop behind her. They both waited breathlessly for Zach’s answer.
Reaching out, he ruffled the boy’s hair. “I’m okay. Only my pride was damaged.”
Andy nodded and moved closer. “I hate it when I trip and the other kids laugh.” His lower lip trembled.
Zach slid his arm around Andy’s shoulders and pulled him to his side. “I do, too. Makes me feel bad.”
Andy nodded. “That’s why my mom wanted me to come to ride on the horse. She said it would help me.” He touched his stomach. “She said it would make my tummy stronger. Maybe it would help you, too.”
Zach’s brow arched and he glanced at Sophie as if accusing her of planning that little scene. He couldn’t believe that, could he?
“Thanks, buddy.”
The boy accepted the praise and leaned against Zach. “Will you be here next time I ride?” The youthful hope in Andy’s expression pulled at Sophie’s heart.
Zach rubbed his neck. “Well—”
She knelt by Andy’s side. “Zach isn’t trained for this. He only came today to see what we do here.”
Andy faced Zach. “I’m learning. So can you.”
Well, Andy certainly didn’t beat around the bush.
Andy’s mother walked up to the group. “Did you enjoy your ride?” After two sessions when Andy hadn’t left his mother’s side, she agreed to disappear until the session was over.
“I rode Sam,” Andy explained, throwing out his chest. “And I met a new friend, Zach. He’s got a fake leg. But he helped me get on Sam. You want to show my mom your funny foot and leg?”
Andy’s mother’s face lost all color. “I’m—”
Zach stood and smiled at the woman. “I’m glad I could help Andy.”
“I asked him to help me again next time, but he told me no.” Andy crossed his arms over his chest and stuck out his bottom lip.
Things were quickly getting out of control.
“Andy, Zach needs some practice himself,” Sophie gently explained. “Why don’t you come back next time and we’ll see what we can work out.”
Andy glared at the group. “I’d want Zach to help.”
Andy’s mother stepped in. “We need to get going. Why don’t you put up your helmet?” She unbuckled the strap and Andy ran to put his helmet on the rack.
“Thank you,” Andy’s mother said. After shaking everyone’s hand, she led her son down the breezeway to the parking lot behind the stable.
Zach sat back down and closed his eyes.
Sophie faced Beth. Before Sophie could say anything, Beth shook her head.
Sophie knew brother and sister needed time to themselves. She turned and headed toward Sam, who’d been left tied to the ring by the mounting steps and needed to be unsaddled.
Tears gathered in Sophie’s eyes as she walked Sam back to her stall. She knew the battle that raged inside Zach. She’d seen that clash countless times in each of the men she treated in Iraq as a medic. She helped soldiers, airmen and civilians survive their wounds. Now she wanted to help those brave men and women win the heart-and-soul skirmish to gain back their lives.
She stopped and pulled off the saddle blanket, resting it on the half wall of the stall.
“I want to save as many as I can,” she whispered into Sam’s neck. And maybe, just maybe, she could atone for the one life she couldn’t save.
Zach sat in the tack room. The humiliation this afternoon hadn’t been any worse than when he fell off his horse at his parents’ ranch in full view of his family and all the ranch hands. It was the first time he’d been on a horse since before the attack. He’d tried to ride away from the stable and his mount spooked and he fell off. Unfortunately, his prosthesis didn’t come out of the stirrup and he’d been dragged around in front of the stable. When his brother, Ethan, caught the horse, he hit the release button, breaking the vacuum holding the prosthesis onto Zach’s leg. His mother had cried, rushing to his side, and his father yelled for his brother to get the horse out of his sight. This afternoon wasn’t that gut-wrenching, but had left a mighty bad taste in his mouth. Literally as well as figuratively.
The door to the tack room opened and an old man walked in. He nodded.
Zach acknowledged the greeting with his own nod.
The old guy went about putting up tack. “I saw you ride at the Frontier Days Rodeo in Ocate. It was a great win.”
Zach remembered that rodeo held in the little town in northeastern New Mexico. It had been his first all-around championship. He’d been a senior in high school and full of himself. “Thanks.”
“You’ve got a natural talent, Zach McClure.”
“Had.”
The old guy stopped. “I didn’t know talent was in your foot.”
The unexpected comeback stunned Zach. The old guy had a point. A smile curved Zach’s lips. “I didn’t know it, either.”
The man walked over to where Zach sat. “When I was young and riding the circuit, I had more drive than sense. I got tossed off a bull. He was a nasty piece of work. Once he throwed me, he came back to stomp on my arm.” He shook his head. “I never saw a clown move so fast as to get that bull’s attention on him.
“It took me six months to heal. It took another six months for me to get my body back into shape. I kept falling off those mean critters until I built my body back up. I figure with you being in the hospital a while, you got the same problem.” He started toward the door. “You might cut yourself some slack, son.” He continued toward the door.
“You know my name. What’s yours?” Zach called out.
“Ollie Morton. I’m foreman here.”
“Thanks.” Zach closed his eyes and shook his head. Was he feeling so sorry for himself that he couldn’t see the obvious?
“Did Ollie hit it on the head, Lord?” Zach asked when Ollie had left. As he thought about the foreman’s advice, Zach realized he may not have been thrown by a bull, but he might’ve stumbled onto the truth.
Sophie walked back from stabling Brownie, the small chestnut mare they used with the younger children.
Other riders were exiting the arena and the chatter of happy voices surrounded her. There would be no other lessons today and all the horses needed to be unsaddled, watered and fed.
There were two other hands to help with the horses, but they needed more help. Sophie’s boss, Margaret, couldn’t help anymore since her stroke six weeks ago, and Margaret’s children wanted nothing to do with the facility.
Sophie worked for twenty minutes, putting the horses in the corral on the east side of the barn. Each of their stalls needed to be mucked out, and fresh water, feed and hay put in each one. The large metal building had two main halls that ran parallel. Stalls were on either side of the hall and an enclosed tack room stood at the far western end of the building closest to one set of large double doors. At the end of each hall was another set of double doors leading to the outside corrals.
She tried not to think, but went on automatic with the chores. She prayed under her breath, asking the Lord for wisdom and to comfort Zach’s heart.
“Sophie, I’ve finished. So has Marty,” David Somers called out. “You want me to put the horses back in their stalls?”
“No, go on. I’ll see to it.”
He nodded and disappeared.
Each of the horses had earned an extra treat and praise for their performance today. She wished Ollie was still here, but with her encouragement he’d gone to the hospital to see Margaret.
Sophie put new hay in Sam’s stall and walked to the tack room to put up the lead ropes she used. Sitting on a bale of hay was Zach. In his hands he held one of the bridles. Those strong hands worked over the leather, cleaning it.
Sophie stopped and stared at him. “You’re still here?”
“I am.”
Now what? Zachary McClure had a way of rattling her that no other man had. She had no trouble dealing with the soldiers in her unit or her patients. None of them had this effect on her of making her stomach flip-flop. She tried to ignore the feeling.
Zach’s hands stilled. “I’ve been thinking a lot about what happened this afternoon.”
He hadn’t been the only one. She’d played the scene over and over in her mind, wondering what she could’ve done differently. She knew that Beth had worked weeks to get Zach here, and then to have him trip in the middle of the ring… She wanted to run over to him and help him up, but she knew he wouldn’t appreciate it. He’d been rodeoing since he was in middle school and had been on track for a championship rodeo buckle before he joined the army.
“This afternoon with Andy has been the best afternoon I’ve had in a long time.” He closed his eyes, and a satisfied smile curved his mouth. “I wanted to get up on Sam myself and ride.” His wistful smile nearly brought her to her knees. “It’s a dream for me.”
