LITMIR.BIZ

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leaned against the jamb.

      “I’m headed out to pick up our first official rodeo student.” Shane straightened and strode over to the mare and stroked her cheek. Responding to his gentle touch, she snorted against his hand and bobbed her head.

      Dressed in faded jeans and a formfitting, ab-enhancing fitted gray T-shirt, Shane shouldn’t make her breath catch, but damned if he didn’t, even after thirteen years. Lexi may have put his cheating ways in the past, but no one said working near the man responsible for the toughest decision of her life would be easy. Of course, she had the option to start over somewhere else, and she’d done just that for a spell.

      After a year at Colorado State, Lexi transferred to Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, where she completed veterinary school and her equine internship. She’d been set to stay in the upstate area, but Joe Langtry’s call six months later with a job offer and the opportunity to branch out on her own was impossible to resist. The Langtry patriarch was a true Southern charmer who had a way with words, and the money sure didn’t hurt, either.

      While it was an adjustment from the bone-chilling northern winters, once Lexi moved back to her family’s farm, she knew Ramblewood, Texas, would always be home. Regrets were a waste of time and Lexi wasn’t about to let a moment pass her by. Jumping into the swing of things with her old friends, she learned to adjust to having Shane in her life again, but it wasn’t until his brother Jesse’s wedding last November that she and Shane had started chipping away at the pain of the past. Some memories may have faded, but one still haunted her.

      “You’ve been waiting for this day for a long time.” Lexi smiled up at Shane. “I wish you the best.”

      Needing to concentrate on Little Miss Confetti, Lexi shifted her attention away from the roguish cowboy. After administering lidocaine to relax the mare’s hindquarters, Ashleigh wrapped its tail in pink, stretchy bandaging and loosely tied it to the crush’s back-gate support.

      “Most important—everything must be sterile,” Lexi explained to Billy. In her peripheral vision, she noticed Shane still watching her, making her acutely aware how many people banked on her success today. “We don’t want any unnecessary risk of infection.”

      “I still don’t understand,” Billy said. “Why are we using a surrogate if Confetti’s already pregnant?”

      “She’s our top cutting-horse competitor,” Cole said. “Eleven months is too long to keep her out of the ring, and then we’d have to retrain and get her endurance levels up to par again. When she’s older and no longer competing, we’ll allow her to carry.”

      “Plus we can get two foals from Confetti this year if we use a surrogate.” Lexi had read how some veterinarians were transferring up to six embryos a year from their donor mares by constantly manipulating their heat cycles. She didn’t agree with the practice and was glad the Langtrys were equally opposed to it. She only dared so much when it came to messing around with Mother Nature. “We also use surrogates if there’s an injury and the horse can’t carry to term, or if there are problems due to a previous pregnancy. There are many reasons, but we make sure overbreeding isn’t one of them.”

      Billy’s eyes darted between the equipment and the mare. “Will this hurt her?”

      “It may feel a little strange to her, but there’s no pain,” Lexi reassured him. “The process goes very quickly. Mystified Moonglow is our surrogate, but we had to prepare more than one mare in case she didn’t ovulate the prerequisite two days after Confetti. The ultrasound shows we’re right on schedule with both horses.”

      Ashleigh placed a white tube in Lexi’s free hand. “This is a two-way catheter,” Lexi said, turning her wrist over. “Ashleigh will attach one channel to the embryo flush.”

      Carefully inserting the catheter, Lexi inflated the bulb inside Confetti’s cervix to prevent the flush from flowing out while Ashleigh connected the saline solution with long tubing and elevated it on a modified IV stand above Confetti’s backside.

      “Embryo collection is always done on day seven or eight after ovulation,” she explained. “At six days, it’s not quite viable, and once we reach the nine-day mark, the embryo is too large and we risk damaging it. Day eight is perfect, and once we know where it is in the petri dish, it will be visible to the naked eye.”

      “I hope this works,” Cole said. “What’s the saying, third time’s the charm?”

      “It’s also the last,” Lexi stated flatly. If she failed again, she would know this wasn’t meant to be, and she didn’t want to tempt fate.

      “This isn’t foolproof. We’re looking at a fifty-to-seventy percent success rate. I’ve always collected them on the second go-round, if we missed the first, but Confetti’s been my problem child.”

      Lexi released a small amount of fluid through the tube and into the horse. Opening the switch between the two channels, the solution flowed through the other side of the tubing and into a filter cup that Ashleigh held.

      “The trick is to always have some fluid in the cup, never allowing it to drain all the way into the bucket,” Ashleigh added. “We don’t want the embryo to smack hard against the side of the cup on its way out.”

      A few minutes later, Lexi removed the catheter and transferred the collection cup to the Langtrys’ lab area. None of her other patients had their own laboratories, but then none of them owned one of the state’s largest paint and quarter cutting horse ranches.

      Lexi was grateful that Joe Langtry had spared no expense when he built the facility, because it allowed her greater opportunities to expand her knowledge while working in the field.

      A bead of sweat traveled down between her shoulder blades in spite of the room’s cool climate-controlled air. Opening a grid-lined petri dish, Lexi meticulously poured the contents of the cup into it and turned on the microscope.

      “We’re using the stereo microscope today.” She peered into the eyepiece and adjusted the focus knob. “Examining the cells in three dimensions allows me to grade the quality of the embryo.”

      Slowly moving the dish under the microscope, she scanned the solution, grid by grid, hoping they wouldn’t come up empty again.

      “We’re in luck, folks.” Lexi let out the breath she’d been holding since she arrived on the Bridle Dance Ranch that morning and smiled. “Cole, can you have someone return Confetti to her stall and move Moonglow into the crush? Ashleigh will prep her.

      “Take a look.” Lexi slid over, making room for Billy, who hovered nearby. “We have a grade one embryo. See how the cells are compacted and all the same size? That’s what we always look for.”

      A lot rode on this dream match between dam Little Miss Confetti and sire Dreamward Wink. The buyer, Blueford Thomas, was a longtime family friend, but Lexi had the feeling everyone was beginning to doubt her ability to get the job done, including Shane.

      Seemingly satisfied, Shane turned and left the lab area without a word. Knowing full well this situation was different, Lexi couldn’t help but think of the day he’d walked out on her so long ago. Ironically, an unborn child was involved, too.

      “Let’s transfer this baby into its new home for the next eleven months.”

      * * *

      SHANE CURSED HIMSELF on his way out of the stables. Damned if the sight of her didn’t still make his blood boil. It had taken a few years after she returned home for Lexi to warm up to Shane, but she still kept him at arm’s length. And who’d blame her? The one time he’d cheated on her led to a two-year nightmare he’d rather forget.

      A couple days before Lexi came home for winter break from Colorado State, buckle bunny Sharon Vincent knocked on his door and claimed she was five months pregnant with his kid. Their one night in Oklahoma shortly after high school graduation came back to bite him in the ass. Sharon wasn’t just bad news when he met her, she was a hot mess and Shane didn’t have the good sense to resist. Claiming

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