A pile of hay in a barn stall would have been more comfortable than the lumpy mattress and cushion Stevie had to use for a pillow. She flipped from one side to the other trying to find a position that was semi-comfortable and had just drifted off to sleep when her alarm went off. She tiptoed around Cody, who was curled up in a ball and trying to use his coat to cover his whole body.

Dixie was sleeping soundly with her newfound feline family, and Stevie hated to wake her, but the little thing needed nutrition every four hours. After the night was done, she could put the alpaca on formula and extend her feedings to five hours, but until tomorrow at noon, she would get colostrum.

“Please let the hembra on Sonny’s ranch adopt her,” Stevie mumbled.

Cody sat up and rubbed his eyes. “Is everything all right? Dixie still alive?”

“She’s fine. I’ll put a stick of wood in the stove since I’m up already. Go back to sleep,” Stevie said.

“Okay, thanks.” Cody pulled the coat back up over his shoulders.

Stevie checked the water she had put on the stove before she went to bed. It was entirely too hot, so she stepped around Cody and filled the bottle half-full of cold and then added what was on the stove. What she wouldn’t give for a flashlight couldn’t be measured in dollars and cents. There was one in her van, but opening and shutting that squeaky door out into the barn would wake Cody again, so she used the tiny bit of light from the window to get the mixture right.

Dixie was already on her feet and butting her head against Stevie’s leg by the time the bottle was made, and she sucked her bottle dry with her little tail straight up in no time. When she finished, she flopped back down with the cats and didn’t even wiggle while Stevie changed her diaper.

Cody sat up, felt around in the dark until he had a stick of wood in his hand, and shoved it into the stove. “That should keep us warm until morning.”

“I said I would do that,” she told him.

“The alarm on my watch woke me,” he mumbled and curled up again.

He must have been in some tough places to condition him to catch sleep in bits and pieces like he was doing. Once Stevie was awake, for any reason, it took a while for her to go back to sleep. She stretched out on her mattress and, like Cody, covered up with her coat. She glanced over at Cody, lying between her and the stove. As the heat from the stick of wood began to fill the room, he pushed the coat off his shoulders.