Page 39 of Stables Spurs Suits
“Ahhh, so he’s like Connor with the cows?” Alan says, and Atlas slaps him on the back of his shoulder.
“Exactly. Come help me get the rest of the horses out. Matthew will get Loki sorted,” Atlas tells him, and they walk around us toward the new stables.
On their way, I hear Alan ask, “Why did you name him Loki again?” And I have to laugh. The Marvel movies are a favorite of most of the guys on the ranch, and Atlas thought calling a horse that played dead Loki was fitting, though he wasn’t too impressed to find out that Loki dies for real in the movies. Either way, the name stuck.
Loki lifts his head a little, and I try not to get too excited, but it’s the most he’s done around other people, ever.
“You can do it. I know you can. This is just like when it’s you and me and the other horses. It’s easy. You can stand, look, I’ll do it first,” I say, and I stand up. His ears flick slightly, and I know he’s watching me. I kneel again.
“See how easy that was. Now it’s your turn, come on, up up up,” I say, and I stand again. His head lifts a little, but that’s it. I crouch, my thighs starting to burn. I pet him slowly. “I know you can do this.”
His nostrils flare again, and his ears flick, then I feel someone behind me.
“Do you think a carrot might tempt him?” Ryan asks, and he crouches beside me, and Loki’s ears follow him.
“Can’t hurt. Give it a go,” I say, and he looks like I asked him to stick his hand in a barrel of snakes. “He won’t bite you.”
“Are you sure?” he asks, hand shaking a little as he starts to move the carrot closer to Loki’s mouth. Loki’s nostrils flare again.
“I’m positive,” I say, and I pet Loki as Ryan gets up the courage to try to feed it to him. Loki’s lips flutter and curl, and then his mouth opens, and his tongue helps to reel in the carrot.
“He took it,” Ryan exclaims excitedly.
“Now we just need to get him to stand,” I reply, and Ryan reaches behind him and pulls out another carrot. Loki clocks it right away.
“Can I give him another one?”
“Make him work for it this time,” I say, and Ryan holds the carrot just out of reach. Loki tries to get it with his tongue, all the while still lying on his side on the ground pretending he’s dead, and the way his tongue flops to the side when he fails to get it actually helps pull off the look.
“Is there anything else he loves besides carrots?” Ryan asks.
“Dancing,” I reply.
“Really?”
“Sort of. He likes jumping around while I dance, but I’m not doing that right now.”
“Fair enough,” he replies, and he stands, moving the carrot further out of reach. Loki lifts his head all the way off the ground this time to try to knock me on my ass. Ryan dangles the carrot in front of Loki, and then for the first time ever, he stands in front of someone new.
Atlas cheers from over by the barn. “How’d you get him to do that?”
“It’s all Ryan,” I call back as I stand and give Loki a scratch behind his ears, as Ryan pulls out yet another carrot to feed him.
“How many of those do you have back there?” I ask, and he laughs.
“Only one more. I don’t think he got up for me, it was just the carrots.”
“Skye’s been trying to bribe him with carrots and every other treat he can think of to get him to stop playing dead around him.”
“So I should maybe not mention this at dinner, then?”
“Yeah, probably not.”
Loki takes off to the far side of the paddock, which is good, because Dean, Nial, their gramps, and who I’m assuming is their sister, Kelly, make their way through the stables and onto the field.
“So, you work on the ranch?”
“Yeah, I help out here, but my job is actually as Connor’s assistant.”
