Worth It All(61)

“Are you kidding? I was planning on it. I figured that’d be the first thing she’d want to do when she got here. Right, Casey?”

Casey nodded.

“No reason to make her wait.” Hannah held her hand out to Casey and they all started toward the barn. “You’ll be staying in the cabin, which is right on the way to our house. And…” She swung her gaze to Jake. “You’ll be staying…”

Jake looked at Paige and she stared back, while Stephen and Hannah exchanged a look, then Stephen and Jake. “I’m not sure yet,” Jake finally said.

“I’m sure Mom will have something to say about it,” Stephen said with a smirk and Hannah elbowed him.

She barely had time to process the logistics of Jake staying with her before they were in the barn. It took a few seconds for her eyes to adjust to the dark, but the scent of hay and leather surrounded her immediately. It was even better than her childhood self had imagined. Hooves shuffled behind the wooden walls of their stalls, and Casey was firing off questions faster than Hannah could answer them.

Hannah greeted the horses hanging their heads over open stall doors and introduced each one. Her soft voice matched her looks and personality. There was something slow and deliberate about the way she moved that gave a sense of calm reassurance. She’d won Casey over in seconds.

“Easy,” Paige said, feeling her daughter ready to burst with eager anticipation.

Hannah opened the door at the end of the row and led out a small gray. “This is Hazel.”

“Hi, Hazel.” Casey patted the horse’s side while Paige rubbed her forelock.

Hannah continued talking to Casey, answering her questions and explaining things. She went slowly, naming the horse’s body parts and showing her how to brush her and where to walk.

Jake stayed right at Casey’s shoulder, stepping between her and the horse every time Hazel so much as bobbed her head, which was completely overprotective and endearing.

“Okay, Casey. Ready for your first ride?”

“Yes!”

“Now?” Jake asked as Paige smiled at her daughter’s enthusiasm. He sounded distinctly unenthused for someone who’d thought this was such a great idea. Stephen had slipped away without her noticing and was back with a blanket, a bridle, and a small saddle.

“Like, right now? Doesn’t she need…I don’t know, lessons or something?”

Hannah smiled patiently and patted his arm. “That’s where she gets the lessons, JT. On the horse.”

Well, shit. Casey was raring to go and Paige, Hannah, and Stephen were all looking at him like he’d lost his mind. Of course she was going to ride. That’s what they’d come for.

“I’ll be right beside her,” Hannah added.

“Okay.” He took a deep breath, relaxed his jaw, and checked the chin strap on her helmet, making it a little tighter.

Hannah led the horse out of the barn and directed Casey on mounting with a prosthesis.

“Not too fast. And listen to Hannah,” he said.

Casey sat tall and proud, the joy on her face shining brightly. “Okay.”

Hannah rolled her eyes at him and led the horse away, she and Paige walking on either side. Casey looked so damn happy up there he had to smile.

Stephen clapped him on his shoulder. “Follow me. We can watch them from the fence.”

He walked beside his brother, only half listening to him going on about the details of how they’d expanded the farm recently. His attention was on the tiny girl on top of the relatively giant horse. “Damn, she looks small up there.”

“Hannah knows what she’s doing.”

“I know,” he said quickly. “I mean I’m sure she does, but…I don’t remember horses being so…big.” For some reason he hadn’t pictured Casey hopping up there all by herself within five minutes of being here. He’d prefer it if he were riding with her, even knowing that would defeat the purpose of the therapy. “Doesn’t she have any ponies?”

Stephen grinned. “Hazel’s hardly a giant, but I get it. It’s different when it’s your own.”

“She’s not mine,” he said. His reply had been purely reflex, maybe a defense mechanism because he was feeling quite the opposite, about both of them. Especially after today. The way Casey had rested her head on his shoulder when he held her, how Paige had leaned into him for support on the train to their connecting gate. The way they’d easily juggled bags and child and food.

He’d sat beside her for hours on the airplane, sharing the small space, the armrest up, and linked his fingers with hers. She’d leaned into him then too, and they’d both watched Casey watch the clouds until she fell asleep. And when Paige had fallen asleep about thirty minutes after Casey, he’d smiled to himself and thought, his girls. They should be his.