Free Buchanan's Pride by Pamela Toth

in his head like brightly colored scraps of paper, but all he could remember was a woman’s voice. Promise me , she kept pleading.
    When he came out of the tack room a couple of minutes later, Leah was turning out the horses at the other end of the barn. She glanced at him and looked away without speaking. If he’d been shouting in his sleep, she probably thought he was nuts. He wondered if she’d heard what he was saying, but he was almost afraid to ask.
    By the time he’d splashed water on his face in the tiny bathroom and come back out, sucking down the coffee as if it were plasma and he a vampire, she’d gone outside.
    John looked around and found her bent over Jewel with a hoof pick. The morning before he hadn’t known the names of the tools she’d lined up along the top rail of the corral fence. Today he remembered them easily, rasp, currycomb, sweat scraper. Somewhere inside him was the knowledge to use them. Did that mean his memory was returning?
    Biting the bullet, he went over and asked if she’d been able to understand anything he was shouting.
    â€œJust the word mother, ” she replied as she straightened and arched her back to get the kinks out. “The rest was pretty garbled.”
    Shocked, he watched her pick up another hoof.
    â€œI’ll be right back.” He felt guilty for not pitching in right away, but part of him needed to be alone—to take in what she’d told him. The woman he’d known in his dream to be on her deathbed, the woman whose face had been no more familiar to him than a stranger’s, was his mother.
    It was the first real glimpse of his past that he’d had, and he hated it. Feeling shaky, John went back into the barn. Except for a cat that melted into the shadows, it was quiet and cool. There he sank down onto a hay bale and buried his face in his hands.
    Vaguely, he was aware of Leah’s approaching footsteps, but he couldn’t summon the will to lift his head and pretend things were normal. Not this time.
    â€œHeadache?” she asked, bending over him and touching his shoulder. “There’s aspirin in the tack-room cabinet.” When he looked up, her gaze slid to the gash on his forehead and then back to his eyes. He’d forgone the bandage last night; the wound was scabbed over. It was going to leave a scar she had solemnly assured him would be “chick bait.”
    He wanted to wrap his arms around her waist and hide his face in her feminine softness. The impulse shocked him. How weak a man was he?
    â€œNo, I’m fine.” He tried for a reassuring smile. A little of the anxiety faded from her expressive face, but she appeared to be in more of a hurry than the day before. Then he remembered that she’d told him she had to work at the library this morning. They’d discussed what he could do, clean stalls again, help with the feed and then go through a list of repairs she’d written down for him. By the time he’d done all that she’d be home again.
    John got to his feet, intent on pulling his weight. Leah stepped back, but when she looked up at him, her gaze was still intent, seeking. It made him nervous.
    â€œIs your mother still alive?” she asked gently.
    â€œSure,” he replied without thinking. “She has a condo in Florida and she’s hooked on bingo.”
    â€œThat sounds like a good life.” She glanced at the plain watch on her wrist and frowned. “I’ll go fix breakfast and then I have to change for work. You know what to do?”
    He patted the pocket where he’d put her list of instructions. “Got it all right here.”
    â€œThe number for the library is up at the house, on the pad by the phone.” She nibbled on her lip. “Miss MacPherson frowns on personal calls at work, but if you really need to talk to me—”
    â€œI understand. I won’t bother you unless the barn catches fire.”
    Her eyes