Gus Casey extracted his wriggling twenty-one-month-old son, Cal, from his car seat as Dulcie, his five-year-old, waited patiently at his side. It had been less than a week since his sister, Laurie, left for Wyoming, and he was going crazy juggling two children and work. Thank God for the Cottage, the Morgan’s Run day care, where his two went tuition-free. As Cal toddled off toward the Cottage door, Gus took Dulcie’s hand. “It’ll get better soon, sweetie. I promise.”
His daughter nodded but said nothing. Gus worried about her constantly. Cal was plump and strong, but Dulcie never seemed to grow. A tow-haired wisp of a girl, she looked at least a year younger, as if one strong breeze would blow her away. The doctors claimed she was doing well, but still, he worried.
“Morning!” Lynn Manguilli, lead teacher, greeted Cal as the toddler sped by her. She gazed up, smiling at Dulcie, then Gus. “How are the Caseys this morning?”
He gave her a wry smile. “Holdin’ on by a thread.”
“It’ll get easier,” she said, smoothing Dulcie’s hair as the child hugged her.
“That’s what I keep tellin’ my sweetheart here,” he said. “Now I just have to convince myself.”
Lynn watched the handsome horse trainer with arresting green eyes and a grin that could melt an iceberg. His thick sandy hair was tousled as if he’d just rolled out of bed, and she had to repress the urge to comb her fingers through it to settle it down. Salt of the earth and steady as a rock. A girl could do worse than Gus Casey, Lynn mused, not for the first time. “You’re a great dad. You’ll see. You three’ll get into a routine of your own now that Laurie’s gone. And you can always hire extra help. Willow’s around this summer,” she said, referring to his boss’s eighteen-year-old who was just completing her freshman year of college.
“Yeah, Harley’s already suggested that. Thanks. I don’t know what we would do without you, Polly, and the Cottage.”
Lynn smiled. “You can thank the big bosses for this,” she said, referring to Ben Morgan Senior, his wife Leonora, and his college buddy Spark Foster, who had conceived of the idea for the day care center on the Morgans’ ranch. They’d also bankrolled it, from construction to the day-to-day running. Teachers’ salaries, supplies, and operating expenses were entirely funded by the Morgan-Foster Trust, and tuition was free for the children of all employees of Morgan’s Run and Valley Stables, the thoroughbred farm north of town where Gus was assistant trainer.
“Pretty amazing, aren’t they?” he said, thinking so are you. Lynn was warm and beautiful, and more than once since he’d moved to the Valley, Gus thought about asking her out. Too good for me, and way too smart was the conclusion he always reached. Also, too awkward if it didn’t work out and the kids still came to the Cottage.
He hung up backpacks, deposited lunches in the kitchen refrigerator, then kissed them both. “Be good,” he said to each child. Cal squirmed and ran off to the truck area, and Dulcie nodded, index finger in her mouth. Try as he might, he couldn’t break her of the finger-sucking habit. One day at a time, he thought, waving to Polly Granger, Lynn’s partner, then stopping at the door to say goodbye to Lynn. “Hope they behave for you.”
She patted his arm. “They always do. Don’t worry.”
Her touch was both comforting and electric. Gus gave her a weary smile and turned away, hoping she hadn’t caught the yearning in his gaze.
She had, and it surprised her as it always did. Surprised and unsettled her.