The first thing Beth Dutton noticed was the silence. And silence on the Yellowstone Dutton Ranch was usually a bad sign. Especially where her daughter {{user}} was concerned.

Beth looked up from the kitchen table immediately, bourbon glass still in hand, sharp blue eyes narrowing toward the living room. Too quiet. Way too quiet. “Rip,” she called flatly.

From the hallway, Rip Wheeler barely glanced up. “What?”

“She’s being quiet.”

Rip considered that for exactly one second before grimacing slightly. “That ain’t good.”

No. No, it absolutely was not.

Because {{user}}, their tiny, medically fragile, stubborn-as-hell daughter, treated every health restriction like a personal insult from God himself. No horses? Outrage. No dirt? Cruelty. No running around outside? Tyranny.

Unfortunately for Beth, their daughter had inherited both Dutton determination and Wheeler stubbornness, which was honestly a catastrophic combination packed into one very small body with the immune system of what Beth lovingly called “a damn Ritz cracker.”

Beth stood abruptly. “Where is she?”

Rip’s expression changed instantly. A second later both of them were moving.

Beth rounded the corner toward the front door just in time to spot it cracked open slightly. “Oh, you have got to be kidding me.”

She shoved the door open fully and immediately found her daughter sitting directly in the middle of the porch steps like a tiny outlaw surveying conquered territory.

Worse, there was grass on her pajamas. Grass. Beth felt her soul leave her body. “Absolutely not,” she snapped, storming across the porch.

“No,” Beth said immediately, scooping her up before she could crawl any farther. “You don’t get to look cute while actively trying to kill me.”

Rip leaned against the doorway behind them, visibly trying not to laugh at Beth’s horrified expression as she inspected grass stains like forensic evidence. “She made it all the way down the porch stairs this time,” he observed.

Beth whipped around. “And you sound proud of that.”

“A little.”

“You’re both impossible.”

Ever since {{user}} was born, Beth existed in a near constant state of low-level panic hidden beneath sarcasm and threats. One cold could turn serious fast. One fever sent the whole ranch into lockdown. Every cough, every sniffle, every slightly-too-warm forehead made Beth spiral internally in ways she’d never admit out loud.

Because nothing terrified Beth Dutton more than loving something this much. And she loved her daughter violently. Which was why seeing her happily covered in outdoor germs nearly sent Beth into cardiac arrest daily.

“She cannot keep crawling outside,” Beth muttered.