“I’ll be ready. I know you’re not much for hugs,” she added as she gave Branna a squeeze. “But I am.” She stepped outside with Meara. “I don’t think Cabhan liked the music.”
“I hope it rings in his ears still. I’ll speak with you later,” Meara said to Branna, and strode to her truck. “I hate I’m saying this,” she continued when Iona sat beside her. “But don’t be too awful hard on him. Oh, he deserves it with no doubt, the donkey’s arse, but men can be such fumblers.”
“I don’t want to be hard on him. I just want to get through.”
“Then you will.”
* * *
HE DIDN’T EXPECT HER TO COME TO WORK, AND IT CHAFED at him that he couldn’t blame her. Before the mucking and feeding, watering and daily morning medications began, he huddled down with the weekly schedule. In a relatively short time, he realized, he’d assigned Iona to so many tasks, students, duties he’d need to do a bit of scrambling to fill in her spots.
Pain in the arse, and really when you thought about it all in a rational way there was no reason she’d get herself in such a state so she’d toss the work in the trash bin along with the rest.
And if he could just have a rational word or two with her, he’d surely climb out of the bin himself.
If women were more like men, life would run along smoother, without a doubt.
He stewed, and finagled the schedule, brooded and shifted hours and students. As he pushed away to pull out his mobile and begin to make the necessary calls, he heard Meara’s truck drive up. Hers ran with a cougar’s purr rather than Mick’s aging lion with bronchitis.
He strolled out, determined to pass the calls to her, and to, very casual-like, pump her for information on Iona, as word was she’d stayed over at Branna’s.
So it threw him off stride when Iona hopped out of the passenger’s door, dressed for the workday.
“Morning then,” Meara said with a kind of fierce cheer, and walked right by him into the stables.
He led with: “Ah . . .”
“I’m here to work.” In a clipped voice he’d never heard her use, Iona stopped a foot away to speak to him. “And that’s all. I need the work, I like the work, I’m good at the work. If you intend to fire me—”
“Fire you?” Shocked, and once again off stride, he gaped at her. “Of course I’m not after firing you. Why—”
“Good. Then that’s that.”
“Well now, wait a minute there, we need to talk about—”
“We don’t.” She cut him off in that same tone, cool and dismissive. “I know what you feel and think, and on some level I understand it. You’re entitled to feel what you feel, and I’m responsible for my own feelings. So it’s just work, Boyle, and you have to respect that.”
She turned her back on him, walked to the stables. He could stop her, just pluck her up and haul her off somewhere private where she’d have to talk it out and over. He thought of doing just that for a moment, then let her go.
He stuffed his hands in his pockets, stood in the cool morning air, and wished he’d gotten the damn flowers.
He tried it her way. As he was the one who’d fucked up, he was obliged to give her the room she asked for.
She went about her work, but not all brisk business as he’d expected. Oh no, she had plenty to say to Meara, to Mick and the others, a laugh to share, a question to ask. But not a bloody word did she speak to him unless given no choice.
She managed to be cordial and distant at once.
It pissed him off, then when the mad faded, the guilt piled in.
“You’re driving him mad.” Meara watched Iona saddle Spud for a guided ride.
“I’m just doing my job, and leaving the personal out of it.”
“Exactly what’s driving him mad. He’d say, being male, and being especially Boyle, the logical thing to do in such situations is separate the business from the personal, but you doing just that’s squeezing his balls. He doesn’t know whether to yelp or drop.”
“I’m getting through.” After tightening the cinch, Iona put on her riding helmet. “That’s what counts. But I can’t say I’m sorry it’s giving his balls a good squeeze.”
She led the group out—a couple and two teenage girls from America taking advantage of spring break—letting them chatter among themselves. But she did glance back, once, and couldn’t deny a quick twist of satisfaction at catching Boyle watching her ride away.