Chapter 33

33

L ogan had always taken a certain amount of visceral pleasure from being a horse. He loved the strength and speed he had in this form, and, shallowly, the way he was admired. He got plenty of second glances as a man, but as a horse, he got outright admiration.

Now, he would have given anything to have his own body back.

He spent the time that Tabby was gone wandering the ranch and trying everything he could think of to shift back.

He'd never dwelled much on how shifting worked, or analyzed what he did when he switched forms. It was like snapping or whistling; once he'd learned the trick to it, he never looked back. All he had to do was imagine himself as the form he wasn't, and flow into that shape instinctually.

With plenty of time to kill and absolutely nothing he was otherwise capable of doing, he ruminated over the mechanics of magic.

Cows are the ones who ruminate , his stallion reminded him in disgust. We don't have second stomachs .

It's an expression , Logan replied shortly.

Well, it's foolish, and you're thinking too much , the horse complained. It's a sunny day and our hide is warm. It smells good and we have the run of the ranch.

We have to figure a way out of this , Logan insisted. I'm not staying a horse forever.

Is it that bad? his stallion demanded. What's wrong with being a horse?

Everything!

The sound of a vehicle and the distinctive rattle of a trailer at the gate sent Logan trotting off to the woods above Tabby's house. He waited there, shrouded in shrubs, and watched as Tabby's truck came around the bend in the driveway not long afterwards, leading a strange truck with a horse trailer to the stable.

Tabby talked with two people for some time, signed some papers on the hood of her truck, and led a dun mare into the stable. Hands were shaken, hats were tipped, and the strangers drove away. Tabby walked after them, probably to lock the gate, and Logan came to meet her as she came back, his ears pricked for other interlopers.

"I was hoping you'd be human when I got back," Tabby admitted, greeting Logan with an embrace and a pat. "I told Mason you couldn't come in, but I didn't tell him why, or how long you'd be gone. I don't know how long you'll have a job, but I tried . I met Addison and Cherry, and Cherry says she knows some people. There's an agency that protects shifters, but she was pretty vague, and I'm not sure if she doesn't know more, or if she just wasn't telling me because I'm not a shifter."

Logan snorted conversationally.

"I didn't have time to stop at a pet store for one of those communication pads, but I saw a felt board on an easel with letters in Franzi's room. I could bring that out. "

Logan followed her to the stable and waited at the bottom of the stairs as she walked up to his apartment with two easy legs and her spare key. At least she was still fun to watch, even if he couldn't follow her up the stairs.

She came back out with the board. Even with Tabby to lay the letters out on the porch and stick them to the board, it was painfully laborious to pick out individual letters. T-H-I-S S-U-C-K-5, Logan spelled, using a five when he ran out of esses.

Tabby laughed half-hysterically and patted his neck.

Now that he was faced with the board, he wasn't sure what to spell out. He wanted to tell Tabby everything, but he didn't have room or dexterity to summarize the important bits of his story, and there were only two esses.

"Who branded you?" Tabby demanded. "Did Clancy do this?"

T-A-L-L-I-E-R, he spelled.

"Taller? Oh, wait, Tallier?" Tabby looked at it in confusion. "Someone named Tallier branded you? Was Tallier your buyer?"

Logan bobbed his head up and down.

"You're going to have to be careful, Logan," Tabby told him unnecessarily. "I have boarders coming and going, and I don't want word to get back to him that you're here."

F-R-A-N— He didn't have to finish the word.

"I will take care of her," Tabby swore. "I'm not going to let Clancy get her. Or child services. Or Tallier, whoever the hell he is. That little girl needs a home, this home, and I will protect her when you can't."

Logan's heart swelled up inside his chest. Tabby knew . She knew how much he'd come to care about Franzi, and she was capable and smart. His niece was safe with her, however long this inconvenient curse went on, and it was both a relief and a surprise. He'd never had anyone to trust before.

Except for ME , his stallion reminded him, huffy. Hello, am I chopped river?

Chopped liver, Logan corrected. It's an ? —

—Expression. I KNOW.

C-L-A?—

"Clancy," Tabby guessed. "Did Clancy have something to do with this? Did he sell you out and not just sell you?"

Logan nodded, but slowly, and finished it with rocking his head side-to-side. Horse shoulders weren't designed for shrugs.

"Maybe? You're not sure?"

Logan nodded more clearly.

"Are you worried that he'll want to take Franzi?"

This nod was vigorous.

"I warned them at Tiny Paws," Tabby said fiercely. "I made sure that they know not to give her to him for any reason."

Of course she had; she was as brilliant as she was beautiful.

"How did you get stuck?" Tabby wanted to know next. "More importantly, how do we fix this?"

Logan looked back at his flank. He wasn't positive that the brand was the reason for his predicament, but he was pretty sure it was at least related.

"Does it have to do with the brand?" Tabby guessed.

Logan gave another nod-shake.

"Do you know how to fix it?" Tabby asked.

Logan gave a definite head-shake. He had no idea. Nothing he had tried seemed to do anything.

You're just wrong, his stallion complained, but he couldn't say how. Being stuck as a horse didn't seem to bother him as much as the fact that Logan himself was off-kilter .

Tabby gave a deep sigh. "I'm going to go make sure the new girl is settling in, and then why don't you and I go for a ride? I need to exercise Trudy and train with Oreo, and you shouldn't have a completely sedentary day after the journey you've had. How far did you go?"

They tried for a few futile moments to figure out how to show her on a map on her phone, but Logan frankly had only the faintest idea where he'd been, instinct hadn't given him any street names, and the screen was hard to see, being barely bigger than one of his horse nostrils. He could only look at it with one eye at a time.

Tabby adjusted her hat and rested her hand on his nose. "Don't worry," she said kindly. "We'll figure something out."

The ride was unexpectedly pleasant, and Tabby wasn't wrong; it felt good to stretch his legs again as they took one of the longer trails, and Logan knew that it was smart not to have a rider for the leisurely trip. Trudy started out shying at blowing leaves and balking at places where the trail was overgrown, but Logan bumped her hip with his head and she settled, automatically responding to his stallion's protective presence.

At the end of their route, Tabby took Trudy through a short, easy jumping course. The horse clearly loved to leap and tried to take the course again. Logan whinnied at her and she sighed and let Tabby dismount.

"You're a good influence," Tabby said to Logan, as she settled the mare into her stall with fresh water and hay. "She liked having you along for that ride."

Logan followed her around to her other chores like he was Franzi, desperate to stay close to her. She smelled like…

Hay, his stallion supplied.

Hope , Logan countered .

When Tabby was finished with her chores, she stood in the middle of the yard and hugged Logan hard. He'd never longed so deeply to have arms to hug her back with.

"I love you, Logan," she murmured into his chest.

Logan froze.

They hadn't spoken of love before, or talked about what kind of relationship they really had, because Logan hadn't wanted to think too hard about it. She'd been so adamant that their relationship wasn't a romance, downplaying any definition of their partnership.

Mate , his stallion said in satisfaction, nuzzling Tabby when Logan wasn't sure what to do. Herd.

Tabby was everything he'd ever wanted in a woman or a partner. She was soft, strong, and honest. She set him on fire and kept him from burning out, all at once. Logan had never met anyone so kind and capable. He adored her humor, her impulsiveness, and her work ethic.

But he didn't deserve her love.

He was a trainwreck in a three-quarter-ton horse. He had more baggage than a tourist, and if it weren't for Franzi, he'd have left her high and dry months ago, because…that's what he did. The stability and safety he'd found at her ranch and in her arms was not in his nature. He'd spent his entire life running and changing his identity, living in the moment, and leaving whenever things got too intense. As much as he felt at home here at last, he was still waiting for the other boot to drop, sure that the beautiful fantasy he'd been living would inevitably be snatched away.

You're overthinking this, his stallion snorted. She is our mate, this is our herd.

But Tabby deserved someone whole and secure, someone who could love her back with his whole heart. Someone who wasn't just pretending at parenting, someone who was actually capable of living this life.

Someone who wasn't just a horse.