“What’s so different? Is it because I’m a woman and we need to talk, but you’re a big, tough cowboy who can keep his feelings inside?” she asked.

Cody shot a mean look toward her. “I’m not having this conversation with you, Stephanie. I’m going out in the barn to work for a while. I’m going to clean out the stalls, and split all the wood that’s out there. I need something to do.” He grabbed his coat from one of the nails on the wall beside the door.

“If you’re going out to work, then by damn, I’m going with you. You don’t have to talk to me, but I’m not staying in this tack room all day by myself. I can split wood or muck out stalls right along with you,” she declared.

“Suit yourself,” he said as he went through the door. Dolly, all three kittens, and Dixie paraded along behind him.

Our first fight, Stevie thought, and I don’t even know what it’s about. But I’m pretty damn sure there won’t be makeup sex when it’s over. Not that either of us would want that right now after three days with no shower. Thank God it’s wintertime, or we would really be smelling ripe by now.

Stevie slipped her coat on and buttoned it up the front. She hadn’t realized just how warm the little stove kept the tack room until she stepped out into the cold barn. The aroma of hay and what was just the scent of every barn she’d ever been in was different from the smells of the tack room. She took a deep breath, the cold almost burning her lungs, and went straight to her van, where she rustled up two stocking hats and a couple of pairs of work gloves. Cody had been an old bear all morning, but if he caught a cold or pneumonia, he could be even worse. She found him in the last stall with an ax in his bare hands.

“Put this on!” She laid the cap on the rail and went back to the tack room.

“I’ve got my cowboy hat. I don’t need that,” he said.

“If your stupid ears get frostbitten and fall off, how are you going to keep your reading glasses on when you pass forty? You’re getting pretty damn close to that age right now,” she said, “but have it your way.”

He removed his cowboy hat, hung it on the post of a nearby stall, and shoved the stocking hat down over his ears. “Happy now?”