Carly sat on the floor to kiss the cats goodbye. “Love you,” she whispered. “And love your mommy.” After their protracted farewells, human and animal, Carly and Tina got into the car again, and at Tina’s suggestion, stopped at Bailey’s for lunch. They were served by Miranda and enjoyed more back-and-forth joking—and their large order of nachos. “I’m thrilled to be doing this,” Carly told her. “And I’m going to sing lullabies to those adorable critters! But—” she frowned “—how will I get to the house? You won’t always be able to drive me.”

“Don’t worry. Like I said, we’ll sort something out.”

Carly decided to simply trust her.

CORD WAS SERVING himself and Mitch some chili, left over from yesterday’s dinner, when he got a phone call.

It was the two veterinary students from Montana State University, Karen Christie and Joey Knight, who’d been in touch a few days earlier. They would arrive in a week, Karen said, if that was okay. She also repeated that they’d read some of the more recent material on his site, regarding therapy horses, and this was an area of interest for them.

After a moment’s hesitation, he agreed with their plan and said he’d get back to them about lodging. The options? Have Shallie move into his room so the guest suite would be available? He wanted to do that, but was she ready? Having Karen and Joey stay at the elegant but expensive Big Sky Inn on the other side of town, as many of his clients had, was another possibility. However, they were students, with limited resources, as Karen had pointed out when they’d ended their conversation. Or—and this never would have occurred to him before—maybe they could get a couple of rooms at Russ’s motel cleaned up, with repairs made as needed. Cord was willing to assume the cost. He’d ask Shallie what she thought; in fact, he’d ask Mitch and Tina, too.

Mitch felt it was a reasonable plan, if Russ consented. And there was no way of knowing whether he would until someone—preferably Shallie—had spoken to him.

As they finished their lunch and their discussion, Tina and Carly reappeared, and Shallie came in right after with the dogs, having taken them for a long ramble.

“Chili, anyone?” Cord offered.

Tina and Carly had grabbed a salad at Bailey’s, while Shallie said she’d eaten a late breakfast and wasn’t hungry yet—but she’d take one of Tina’s blueberry muffins. “I’ll have one, too,” Mitch agreed enthusiastically.

Cord began by asking Carly about her morning with Meg. “Loved it! Love her, love the cats.” She gave a quick shrug. “We’ll have to work out rides, though. And Meg, Tina and I will need to set up a schedule.”