“J.P.?” Sara asked, gazing down at him from within the halo gleaming around her. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” he lied somewhat gruffly.

With that, he turned to his gelding, swung up into the saddle and gathered the reins.

He gave Sara a sidelong look. “Let’s go, Luke,” he teased.

Now that he was mounted on Shiloh, he felt like himself again, firmly planted inside his body instead of slightly out of alignment with it.

Sara laughed. “Don’t forget,” she said, “I’m actually a greenhorn. A total fraud when it comes to boots-in-the-stirrups type stuff.”

With a motion of his hand, J.P. saluted her. “I wouldn’t go that far,” he replied easily. Sara might not have a lot of confidence in herself as a rider, but she wasn’t a raw beginner, either. He knew she’d ridden with Shallie on occasion and, like him, she’d helped out over at Emma Grant’s stables, working with kids.

He let Sara lead the way, and she soon eased Misty into a gentle trot across the expanse of the rolling pastureland.

J.P. kept up, as did Trooper, who, though not as agile as he’d once been, seemed to be enjoying the fresh air, the rich green smell of good Montana grass and the earthy scent of fertile land. The famous big sky was a cloudless dome overhead, edged, in the distance, by timbered mountains.

This was home, this wide-open space.

This was the place he longed for whenever he was away, the place that had healed him, body and soul, after endless, painful months in a military hospital back East. He drew it in deep, like a soul-breath.

As the minutes passed, Sara seemed to relax in the saddle, loosening her grip on the reins, taking in her surroundings instead of focusing on the space between Misty’s twitching ears.

They didn’t speak; it didn’t seem necessary out here, where the sky and the breeze and the whispering grass spoke in a language all their own.

When they reached Painted Pony creek, the broad stream for which the town was named, they let the horses drink.

Meanwhile, Trooper dashed up and down the muddy bank, chasing a handful of butterflies, as happy as any dog could wish to be.

Watching him, J.P. smiled. He loved that mutt, and he didn’t care who knew it.

“I appreciate this, J.P.,” Sara said quietly, leaning forward a little, causing the saddle leather to creak, and patting Misty’s long sweaty neck.

“It’s no big deal,” J.P. answered. Though, God help him, it was a big deal.

She drew a deep breath, seemed to relish it. “Sometimes I wish I’d raised Eric and Hayley in the country, instead of in town,” she said.

He wanted to hear more. “Why?”