The True Cowboy of Sunset Ridge (Gold Valley #14)(64)

“It’s great,” he said.

“But?”

“I didn’t say but.”

“It was implied. But...”

“You’re right. It needs a little TLC.”

“Come inside,” she said.

“All right.” He followed her into the building. The waiting room was open and nice. He didn’t really have any opinion on decor.

“I was thinking,” she said, “that it might be nice to have some kind of a big carving. Like a tree of life. And I could put it in here. And maybe something like that echoed on the front. Nature and animals. Women and children. Something that shows the connectedness of birth to all of nature.”

“Mallory Chance,” he said. “You’re a hippie.”

“I’m not.” She mused for a second. “Okay, I guess I’m a little bit of a hippie.”

“I don’t know—that might be a deal breaker.”

“I’m a little bit of a tree hugger too. But just a little.”

“How much of one?”

“The bark chafes, so I try to save it for weekends only.”

He chuckled. “So basically you want to commission me to do a bunch of... Art?”

“That’s exactly what I want to do. A bunch of big, granola crunchy artwork.”

“That’s not really what I thought you wanted.”

“Colt,” she said, “I can hire anyone to do carpentry work. But what you do... What you did in the little cabin... It’s really extraordinary. I feel something every time I look at it.” The way she was looking at him... “Maybe it’s because you made it. But either way, I would love to have something that you made in here. Actually, I would love to have several things you made.”

“Sure. I can do it.”

And that was how he found himself deep in a bigger wood carving project than he’d ever been involved in before. He already knew that he wanted to take Lily’s little fox and hide it somewhere within the larger piece. Make it a removable component at the bottom of the tree. And after he thought of that, he decided to do it with a lot of the woodland animals.

Make them light enough that they wouldn’t fall and hurt anyone, and big enough that they wouldn’t be a choking hazard. But something that children who were waiting for their mothers could play with. And there was something he enjoyed about carving something like this.

Something that used natural material, that was beautiful and functional. Before long, he had a big piece of wood carved into the shape of a tree with branches that arced upward. And in the base were all the little animals.

When he got it hauled down to the clinic, Mallory nearly erupted.

“This is amazing,” she said. She knelt down on her hands and knees. “The little animals,” she said.

“I made one for Lily a couple weeks ago. It just... Seemed like something that might work here.”

“It works amazing.”

Lily was strapped to his chest, and he put his hand on her back. It was amazing how much she’d changed in the last month. She’d grown so much, and she was working on holding her little head up. She made more noises. Looked around and turned her head to the sound of their voices. She heard Mallory exclaiming over the tree and was craning as much as she could in the carrier, but it didn’t take long for her to tire and let her head relax again.

“She’s excited that you’re excited,” he said.

Mallory moved over to him and dropped a kiss on Lily’s head. When she looked up at him, their eyes met.

“I’d kiss you,” he said. “But we are in a semipublic space. And there is a baby present.”

“And?”

“I can’t keep it PG.”

“I don’t really mind...”

“Sure. But... Don’t you have patients today?”

“Yes,” she said.

The door opened, as if on cue, and a young woman came in that he vaguely recognized, followed by a man he definitely recognized.

“Hey, Grant,” Colt said. “Good to see you.”

Grant had been a lot older than him, but everybody knew the Dodge family. They were somewhat infamous, like his family, though for different reasons. And he clicked that his wife would be one of the Daltons. One of the secret Daltons. They were a more infamous family than either the Daniels or the Dodges.

“Colt,” Grant said.

But clearly, Grant was more focused on the discomfort of dealing with his pregnant wife and being in this situation at all.

“Wow,” McKenna said, looking at the tree. “Is this new?”

“Yes,” Mallory said, touching him on the arm as she spoke, as if it were the most natural thing. And with that touch, she linked them together, whether she knew it or not. He could see it in the way the woman’s eyes followed that touch. In the way Grant regarded them.

“Well it’s amazing,” McKenna said. “Do you do... I need something for the nursery. We need something for the nursery,” she said to Grant.

“Well I...”

“He can pay for it,” she said.

“Thanks,” Grant said.

“What? I want a tree like this in the nursery.”

“Give me your information,” Colt said. “I can get in touch with you. I’ll need measurements and things like that.”