Page 93 of The Rancher Who Swore Off Love
She didn’t, of course. Miriam’s eyes belonged to whoever had left her in that basket by the fence, some woman Grace had never met and might never meet, and tried not to think about too hard because the thinking led to—
Anyway.
“Thank you.”
Because correcting a compliment about your baby—yourbaby, yours, not some random woman’s—ranked somewhere below kicking puppies on the list of things a decent person did.
Mr. Henley had her seed packets behind the counter. Pole beans, summer squash, and he’d thrown in a packet of marigold seed for free, on account of her being new to town and newly married. It probably also had something to do with Logan buying half the hardware store last week and paying cash for every bit of it.
She browsed. Lord help her, shebrowsed. Ran her fingers along bolts of fabric. Picked up a tin of beeswax and sniffed it. Found a little wooden horse on the toy shelf, painted red with a crooked tail, and bought it for Miriam with eleven of her seventeen cents.
Miriam grabbed the horse and shoved it directly into her mouth.
Grace chuckled. “That’s the spirit.”
Outside, she dropped onto a bench in the sun and let Miriam chew the horse and watched the town go about its business. A man tipped his hat to her. A girl about six years old stopped to wave at the baby. The fiddle player upstairs switched to a hymn, or tried to, but half the notes landed flat.
An hour slipped past. Then another. Miriam fell asleep in the sling with her mouth open, still gripping the red horse in one fat fist like she’d fight anybody who tried to take it.
Grace had bought the peppermint stick and ate it herself.
***
The commotion reached her before she cleared the front gate.
Hooves. Men shouting. The yard looked like somebody had kicked an anthill. Thomas cinched a saddle on the bay mare, yanking the girth strap so hard the horse sidestepped. Mason sprinted from the barn with a lantern in each hand, even though the sun still blazed high and bright. Jonah gripped three sets of reins by the water trough like he’d forgotten what reins did.
Logan came off the porch in three strides and ran straight to her. No hat. His shirt hung half-untucked from his trousers—Logan Foster’s shirt hanging half-untucked—and when he reached her, he stopped dead and stared at her. His eyes went too wide. His color had paled. The cords in his neck stood out like he’d been mid-shout and couldn’t remember how to stop.
“Grace.”
“Logan, what in the—”
“Where thehellhave you been?”
Behind him, Thomas stopped cinching. Mason set the lanterns down. Even the horses went quiet.
“I went to town…” She climbed off the cart. “I needed seeds for the garden, and Mr. Henley had my—”
“You went totown.”
“That’s what I said.”
“By yourself.”
“Well, Miriam came, but she ain’t much for conversation yet, so—”
“This ain’t funny, Grace.”
“I ain’tlaughin’, Logan. I went to the general store. I bought seeds. I came back. What is all…” She gestured at the chaos. “This?”
“Thisis yourfamilygettin’ ready to ride out and search for you because nobody knew where you went!” Logan’s voice cracked on the wordfamily, and he clamped his jaw shut.
Her stomach dropped. “I forgot to leave a—”
“Note? Maybe?”
“Look, Logan, I…” She shifted Miriam higher. “I—it didn’t occur to me. I just—”
