Читать книгу Man Behind The Badge - Pamela Toth - Страница 9

With a sigh of relief, Robin Marlowe pulled up in front of a small box-shaped building at the outskirts of town and parked next to a dusty SUV with a dent in the side. The soda she’d gulped down when she stopped for gas at a truck stop back in Kansas was starting to make her squirm on the hot vinyl seat of her aging tan VW Rabbit. Her fingers were cramped around the wheel.

The faded sign beside the front door said Dr. Elliot Harmon, D.V.M. Specialty—Large Animals.

Dr. Harmon’s large-animal practice was the very reason Robin had traded the familiar crowds and chaos of Chicago for the empty Colorado plains, eerily silent but for the sound of the wind. She’d come to Waterloo in order to gain experience treating horses and cattle. She was looking forward to meeting her new boss almost as much as finding a rest room—if he hadn’t given up on her and hired someone else.

If he had, maybe he’d let her use the facilities anyway.

Robin blamed her delayed arrival on a broken water pump that had wrecked her budget as well as her schedule. According to the mechanic, whose rates were higher than her dentist’s back home, pulling the fully loaded utility trailer through the late-August heat had overtaxed her car’s small engine.

She probably should have called Doc Harmon to explain, but she’d figured it would be harder for him to fire her in person. Now she wasn’t so sure.

Robin had managed to extract herself from the sticky car seat without losing any skin from the backs of her thighs and was smoothing the wrinkles from her navy-blue skirt when the door of the clinic burst open.

“Dr. Marlowe?” demanded the elderly man hurrying toward her, a black leather bag gripped in one bony hand. Tall and lean as a coatrack, he was slightly stooped, his shock of white hair combed back from a thin face with a high forehead and a beaky nose. He was wearing a plaid sport shirt with sleeves that fluttered in the faint breeze and tan slacks that hung on his spare frame like cheap slipcovers.

“Yes, that’s me.” Robin removed her sunglasses and shielded her eyes against bright sunlight, bracing herself for bad news. “You must be—”

“Doc Harmon.” He gave her hand a quick, hard squeeze. “Glad to see you. I expected you yesterday, but no matter. I’ve got an emergency and my receptionist is out sick.” He gestured at the building behind him. “Can you man the phone till I get back?”

“Uh, I guess.” Her stomach fluttered with a mix of apprehension and relief. What if she messed up?

“Just take a message,” he said, heading for the SUV. “Tell ’em I’m out to Winchesters’ spread.” Without waiting for a reply, he opened the door and climbed in with surprising agility for someone his age.

Robin’s hand tightened on the shoulder strap of her purse as she watched him start the engine and lower the window. Perhaps he was too shorthanded to fire her just yet, but he still might.

“I’m sorry I’m late,” she said, raising her voice. “My car—”

“You’re here now.” He barely spared her a glance as he backed up. “My cell phone number’s on the counter.”

Slightly dazed, Robin watched him drive away. She was hot, thirsty and nearly broke. She needed a bathroom, a place to stay and, thanks to the gold-plated water pump, an advance on her pay.

“Not much of a welcome, huh?”

The unexpected touch on her shoulder and the male voice at her ear startled a shriek out of her. She spun around to see a man wearing a shiny silver starred pinned to his khaki uniform shirt.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.” He flashed a smile that revealed straight white teeth and twin dimples. Only a nose that looked as if it must have been broken saved him from being entirely too handsome. “I’m Charlie Winchester, your local sheriff,” he added, touching two fingers to the brim of his hat.

“Uh, hi,” Robin managed, still a little shaken. Her nerves had been stretched tight during the long drive from Chicago, and her shoulders ached from hunching over the steering wheel since she’d left the shabby motel early this morning.

But wasn’t Winchester the name Doc Harmon had mentioned when he’d told her where he was headed? Did they own the town? She could hardly ask the sheriff, whose dark eyes studied her with leisurely thoroughness from behind amber lenses.

Robin knew what he’d see, a plain woman with black hair cut ruthlessly short and a face free of anything fancier than road dust. She wasn’t a girly girl, and she didn’t bother much with paints and perfumes. It irked her that she had to tip her head back in order to look at his face instead of his wide chest. She was small but wiry, and as her aunt Dot used to say, Robin was tall on the inside, where it counted.

Robin wasn’t so sure of that anymore, and her aunt was no longer around to ask.

“I’ll bet you’re the new vet,” the sheriff said as if he was prompting her to speak.

Robin’s tongue came unstuck, and she peeled it off the roof of her mouth. “How’d you guess?”

He folded his tanned, muscular arms across his chest. His hands, she noticed, were ringless. “It wasn’t a guess.” He feigned a hurt expression. “I get paid to know things. That’s why I’m the sheriff. Besides, you’ve got out-of-state plates, a rental trailer in tow and the doc expected you yesterday.”

“Pretty clever of you,” she replied dryly, taking a step back from all that hunky broad-shouldered masculinity before it gave her the vapors. Good manners kicked in, courtesy of her late aunt. “My name’s Robin Marlowe.”

His grin widened. “See, I was right. Reading clues is part of my job, that and chasing bad guys. There aren’t a lot of those in Waterloo, so I have time to greet newcomers, too.”

“Kind of like a welcoming committee packing heat,” she drawled, her gaze flicking to the imposing holster on his hip.

His eyes widened, but his laugh came easy. “Yes, ma’am, I guess you could say that.”

From inside the clinic, a phone started ringing and a dog began to bark.

“Oh, nuts,” she muttered, turning. “I gotta go.” She didn’t mind the interruption, but instead of ogling Sheriff Tex she should have been looking for the bathroom while she’d had the chance.

“Nice to meet you,” she called automatically over her shoulder as she hurried up the front steps.

“You, too, Doc Marlowe,” the sheriff replied. “My office is right down the street, if you need anything. It’s the one with the bars on the windows.”

She waved, but didn’t look back. “Yeah, thanks. See you.”

Charlie Winchester stroked his chin thoughtfully as he watched her disappear.

“Count on it, sweetheart,” he murmured. For such a little thing, she had legs like a colt—long and fine-boned. And lips a man could settle into like a featherbed, if they were anywhere near as lush as they looked.

Welcoming committee, huh? Checking out the new arrivals was part of his job, even the ones who weren’t cute as pixies and reportedly single like this new little gal. He’d better talk to her again, though, just to make sure she wasn’t really an escaped con or an illegal, impersonating the vet’s new helper in order to commit some nefarious crime in Charlie’s town.

He hadn’t meant to scare her when he’d touched her shoulder, but she’d gone as stiff as a calf stuck in a blizzard. The sight of his badge hadn’t seemed to relax her a bit. Her big brown eyes had stayed wary, without a spark of female awareness to warm them, and her mouth hadn’t softened. Despite the gun at Charlie’s hip, most women saw right away that he was no more threat than a six-foot teddy bear.

From eight months to eighty, he liked women, always had, and they usually liked him right back. Robin hadn’t seemed overly impressed, though, not even by his uniform, tailored and pressed at the local laundry, or his badge. It was something a couple of the local ladies still gushed over, as though they were picturing him wearing the star and not much else. Made a man darned uncomfortable, being looked at like that.

Robin Marlowe had captured his interest. No, his “professional concern,” he corrected himself, even though it was doubtful that Doc Harmon would hire an assistant with outstanding warrants or felonious intentions—even one compact enough for Charlie to easily scoop up and cuddle or whose short haircut exposed earlobes begging to be nibbled.

He hitched up his belt and eyed the clinic. The ringing of the phone had stopped while he stood in the street like a lovesick calf, but the dog’s rhythmic barking kept time with the sound of the new vet’s voice through the open doorway. It had a husky quality that hinted at smoky, dimly lit bars and honky-tonk women.

Curiously Charlie circled her car, a nondescript tan Rabbit with barely legal tires, Illinois plates and a utility trailer hitched behind it. On the back seat of the car rested a hard-sided suitcase like you’d find in a thrift shop, and several cardboard cartons. One was open and held books, probably veterinary tomes. The other boxes were taped shut. Behind the front seat was a pair of high rubber boots that looked new, an electric fan that didn’t, a coffeemaker and a cheap toaster, cords all neatly coiled. On the front passenger seat were an empty water bottle, two candy wrappers and a Colorado road map that had been refolded in correctly. Some kind of crystal dangled from the rearview mirror, its faceted surfaces sparkling in the sun light.

Charlie debated whether to go inside and ask her a few more questions, maybe see if she’d be interested in dinner or help in finding a place to stay, but the cell phone clipped to his belt chose that moment to claim his attention. Filing away his first impressions of Waterloo’s newest resident, he checked to see if a crime wave had just hit town.

Robin had been watching Sheriff Winchester through the front window of the clinic as she tried to explain to a suspicious-sounding older woman why she was answering Doc Harmon’s phone and not his “regular girl.”

“I don’t know where Erline is today,” Robin said for the third time, explaining again who she was and what had happened to the real vet. The term hadn’t exactly endeared the caller to Robin, but she resisted the urge to tell the old bat she had duct-taped the “real vet” and stuffed him in the supply closet just so she could have the thrill of this phone call. Curbing her tongue wasn’t easy, especially when the pressure in her bladder increased with each word.

By the time she’d taken a message and glanced outside, the sheriff had disappeared. After she’d found the bathroom and made use of it with a groan of relief, she did a bit of exploring.

The clinic was small but complete. In addition to the reception area, there were two examining rooms, a well-equipped surgery, a small lab and a supply room. Its only current occupant was the dog, a black lab mix with a bandaged leg, sitting in a roomy crate. When he saw Robin, his tail wagged, but he stopped barking and began whining instead. He wiggled so hard the cage shook. After she’d made sure he had water, she let him lick her fingers and she scratched his chin while he squeezed his dark eyes shut in obvious pleasure.

Typical male, she thought with a grin. Noisy and easy to satisfy.

As if she knew anything about satisfying a male, or wanted to. Her grin faded as fast as it had appeared.

Despite her fatigue, she was eager to get settled and start working. Doc Harmon had promised to find her a rental she could afford, but she didn’t have an ad dress, and of course she couldn’t leave until he got back. There wasn’t anything she could really do here until he showed her around, and she was hesitant to poke through his files, so she went back to the reception area and sat down at the big desk. There was a phone with two lines, thankfully silent, but no computer, which didn’t surprise her. With a sigh she started flipping idly through the open appointment book. Nothing scheduled until late afternoon and no telling how long Erline would be out sick, so she might as well get familiar with the setup.

Charlie didn’t need to follow the faint track through the grass to find the pasture where the two owners of the Running W had said they’d meet him. The land was as familiar as the face he saw in the mirror, and the men nearly so. He’d spent his youth on the Running W, chasing after his older brothers, Adam and Travis, and working beside them.

Topping a rise, Charlie spotted them standing with the vet near their rigs and several mounds that appeared to be sleeping cattle.

A chill went through Charlie. His hands tightened on the wheel of his Jeep as he struggled to replace a rancher’s sick dismay with the objectivity of a lawman.

No one had been more surprised than Charlie when he’d beaten out a bully and a green kid to win the election ten months before, and not everyone was happy about it, considering his reputation as a skirt-chasing lightweight who’d been riding along on his brothers’ coattails. He’d discovered a knack for the job, equal parts politician, paper pusher and crime solver, but he knew convincing his detractors would take time.

Whether chasing a woman or a criminal, Charlie was a patient man.

“Hey, bro, thanks for coming out,” Adam said after he’d parked next to the ranch pickup and joined the other three men.

“No problem.” Briefly, Charlie clasped the hand Adam extended. Charlie had sold out his share of the ranch to his brothers, but they’d all remained close. Today’s summons was no surprise; Charlie would have been upset if they hadn’t called.

“How you doing?” he asked Travis, whose grim expression matched Adam’s.

“I’ve been better,” Travis replied around the stalk of grass stuck in the corner of his mouth. “Dead cattle’s a bad business.”

“That’s for sure. What happened?” Charlie looked from him to the vet, who’d been bent over a dun-colored steer with his black leather bag open beside him. Five other carcasses were scattered nearby.

The old vet packed up the specimens he’d been collecting. “I’ll know for sure when we hear back from the lab,” he said by way of greeting as he got to his feet, “but it looks pretty obvious to me what happened.”

The sick feeling Charlie had been trying to blot out came flooding back. “What do you mean?” he asked.

Doc Harmon glanced at Adam. “Show him what you found.”

Adam held up a bag Charlie hadn’t noticed before. “This was mixed in with some feed we found scattered nearby.”

Charlie glanced at the printing on the bag. It was a common brand. “Have any idea how it got out here?” he asked.

A muscle flexed along Adam’s jaw as he shook his head. “It’s the same kind we keep in the shed,” he replied. “I’ll have to check and see if it came from there, but everyone who works here knows better than to leave rat poison anywhere near the stock.”

The vet cleared his throat. When Charlie glanced at him, he said, “Looks deliberate to me. Maybe you’d better ask your brothers if they’ve made any enemies lately.”

When she heard a vehicle pull up outside, Robin set aside the three-month-old magazine she’d been reading and went to the window. Once in a while a car went by and she’d had several calls; no one had come into the clinic. Even the dog in the back was asleep.

She recognized the SUV, relieved Doc Harmon had returned. She had a lot of questions, a couple of them being whether she had anywhere to sleep tonight—or a job tomorrow. As she continued to watch through the window, he got out of his car, grabbed his bag and walked over to the olive-green Cherokee that had pulled in behind him. It had a gold star painted on the door and an official-looking row of lights on top. Through the back window she could see a rifle rack, and it wasn’t empty.

Robin couldn’t hear what they were saying and the vet’s back was to her as he leaned forward, but the smile Sheriff Winchester had worn earlier was noticeably absent. After a couple more moments, Doc Harmon straightened up.

The sheriff glanced at the clinic window and Robin moved away so he wouldn’t see her spying on them and get the wrong idea. By the time her boss came through the front door, she was standing behind the counter trying to look indispensable.

“Everything okay?” she asked innocently as the dog in the back room began barking again.

“Some days I really dislike this job.” He set his bag on the counter, looking tired. “How did you get on? Any emergencies?”

Robin told him about a couple of the calls she’d taken. “Nothing urgent,” she concluded. “I told them Erline would get back to them. Do you know when she’ll be in?”

“Tomorrow, I hope. Thanks for covering.”

“It doesn’t sound like things went well at the Winchesters’ spread,” she asked, prompted by both professional interest and personal curiosity. She’d mentally reviewed her brief encounter with the sheriff several times, wondering if her abrupt dash into the clinic had made her seem unfriendly, and then telling herself it didn’t matter what he thought as long as it didn’t affect her professionally.

The vet picked up his messages, but she had the impression that he wasn’t really looking at them. “Half a dozen dead cattle at the biggest ranch in these parts,” he said finally. “One of the hands found them this morning.”

Robin could understand his reaction. This was cattle country. A contagious disease could endanger an entire herd if it wasn’t treated in time. No wonder he looked worried. “Were you able to make a diagnosis?” she asked.

He ran his hand through his hair, making it stand on end. “It looks like someone tainted their feed with rodent poison. The sheriff is looking into it.”

“The sheriff?” Robin echoed.

Doc Harmon nodded. “Cattle will eat damn near anything. Ranchers don’t leave poison around for them to get into.”

“So it was deliberate?” Robin asked. “Why would anyone do that?”

He shrugged. “Everyone has enemies.”

“Is there some kind of range war going on around here?” she probed.

His smile was fleeting. “This isn’t the Old West, my girl, but bad things still happen. Could be an unhappy ex-employee or an envious neighbor. Those boys have worked hard, and they’ve done well. I even heard a rumor that they’d had an offer for their land.”

He glanced around the office. “Did you get a chance to explore?”

Robin would have liked to ask more about the Winchesters, but she didn’t want to push. “A little.” She clasped her hands together and took a deep breath. “I know you expected me to get here yesterday, but I had car trouble. I should have let you know.” Before she could add anything more, anxiety closed around her throat like a noose, choking off her voice.

All Doc Harmon did was shrug again. “I was out most of the day and we’ve been having trouble with the answering machine, anyway. It’s nice you were here to get the phone today, though, so no one started thinking I’d died or retired.”

He glanced out the window as she nearly went limp with relief. “Car running okay now? You’ll need something reliable, you know.”

Her gaze followed his to where the sorry little coupe sat baking in the sun. “Oh, yes, it’s fine,” she assured him. “I guess I just expected too much, towing a trailer full of all my worldly goods.”

The doc glanced at the messages again and then he set them on the counter. “Speaking of which, I rented you a little house at the edge of town. If the bar down the street from it is too noisy, you can look for something else, but there’s not much of a choice right in town.”

Especially in my price range, she added silently. “I’m sure it will be fine. Thank you for going to the trouble.” She was trying to figure out how she could possibly ask for an advance when he pulled open a drawer in the battered desk.

“No trouble. Figured you might need to get a few things.” He thrust a check at her.

Robin stared speechlessly at the amount. She’d been on her own for so long, counting on no one but herself, that she was blindsided by his gesture. She ducked her head, her eyes filling with tears that she barely managed to blink away before they ran down her cheeks. She had to be more tired than she’d realized to get so emotional.

“Thank you.” She looked up. “I can use this.”

The crusty expression relaxed for a moment. “You’ll earn it,” he said gruffly. “I’m an ogre to work for. Ask anyone.”

Somehow she doubted that very much. For one of the few times she could remember since her aunt had died, the hard knot of tension in Robin’s chest eased up. When she’d been sending out résumés, she’d almost decided not to answer his ad, figuring an old geezer in a small town surrounded by cattle ranches would never consider hiring a woman as his assistant. “You don’t scare me,” she replied somberly.

“We’ll see about that.” Chuckling, he glanced at the plain round wall clock above the door. “I can manage for now. Why don’t you take the rest of the afternoon to get settled? Open a bank account, get some groceries. I’ve got the key to your place here somewhere.” He fished around in the drawer while Robin folded the check he’d given her and tucked it into her pocket.

“Are you sure? I can stay, if you need me.”

He handed her a brass key. “The lights and water are hooked up, and I had your phone connected.”

“What do I owe you?” she asked. “Didn’t you have to pay deposits on the utilities?”

This time his laugh was more of a cackle. “This ain’t Chicago, Doctor. All I did was to tell them you were coming to work for me. And this way, people can start calling you in the middle of the night ’stead of me when their prize stud gets a sliver in his arse.”

She wondered how long it would be before anyone around here actually did request her services, rather than merely tolerate her whenever the “real” vet was otherwise occupied. “Can you give me directions to my house?” she asked after she’d thanked him again.

The words my house danced on Robin’s tongue. Since moving out of Aunt Dot’s, she’d lived in college dorms and rundown apartments with an assortment of roommates to keep the rent low, but she’d never had a place to really call her own. She was determined to make this a real home, despite it being another rental and no matter what the condition.

“I’ll draw you a map.” He grabbed a scratch pad. “It’s not hard to find. Nothing in this town is, but you’ll get lost a few times heading out on calls, so you’ll need this, too.” He handed her a cell phone. “You pay for your personal calls.”

She swallowed. “I don’t have anyone to call.”

His eyes narrowed. “No family?”

“My aunt died while I was in college.” She braced herself for more questions, but he didn’t ask them. Despite all the help he’d given her, she was an employee and that was all, she reminded herself. Her life story wouldn’t interest him.

Except for that one time at veterinary school, which she made a point never to think about, her life was pretty darned boring. Just the way she liked it.

He drew three intersecting lines on the paper and made two X’s. “You’re here,” he said, pointing an one X with the pencil. “Go five blocks to Aspen and take a right. Turn left on the next street, Nugget, and look for a little house painted yellow, number 505. Can’t miss it.”

Robin started to thank him again. “Dr. Harmon—”

“Call me that, people will get me mixed up with the medic, Dr. Nash. I’m just plain old Doc.” He cocked his head to the side, considering. “Don’t suppose I can call you Birdy. Kind of a clever nickname, don’t you think?”

“No,” she replied firmly. “No way.”

He shrugged. “Didn’t think so. Okay, you scat, before something comes up. See you in the morning, at eight sharp. You got my number if you need anything before then.”

Robin hesitated, but the phone rang and he reached for it. She waited to see if he’d want her to stay, after all, but he waved her off before turning his back.

She didn’t need to be told twice, so she hurried out the door before he could change his mind. To her relief, her car started right away. As she drove down the street, following his crude map, she tried not to get her hopes up about the house. It was probably a dump.

When she passed the sheriff’s office, she kept her head turned straight, not wanting to be caught looking for him. He wasn’t for her, she reminded herself. No man was.