Читать книгу 'Tis the Season: Under the Christmas Tree / Midnight Confessions / Backward Glance - Робин Карр, Robyn Carr, Robyn Carr - Страница 9

Three

Rose McKenzie insisted that Annie take a plate of Christmas cookies to Dr. Jensen, but it made Annie feel silly, farm girlish, so she left them in the car when she went into Jack’s Bar later that afternoon.

She gasped in pleasure when she walked in—the place had been decorated for Christmas. A tree stood in the corner opposite the hearth, garlands were strung along the bar and walls, small evergreen centerpieces sat on the tables, and the buck over the door wore a wreath on his antlers. It was festive and homey, and the fresh pine scent mingled with wood smoke and good cooking from the kitchen to complete the holiday mood.

It took her less than two seconds to see that Nate wasn’t there, which made her doubly glad she hadn’t trotted in her plate of baked goods. Maybe this was the day he wasn’t going to show. It wasn’t as though he had any obligation here. In fact, besides giving the puppies a cursory look and asking Annie if there was anything wrong with any of them, he didn’t do anything at all.

She gave Jack a wave and went directly to the puppies, which, in the past week, had gotten surprisingly big. Boy, if those weren’t all border collies, she was no judge of canines. Out of the eight, two were solid black with maybe a little silver or gray or perhaps a mere touch of white—the only indication another breed might’ve been involved. But they had grown so much! And they were doing so beautifully—plump and fluffy and adorable. Just like everyone else who passed by that box, she couldn’t resist immediately picking a puppy up and cuddling it against her chin.

Jack came over to the hearth and she grinned at him. “The bar looks wonderful, Jack. All ready for Santa.”

“Yeah, the women got it ready for their hen party. Cookie exchange tomorrow at noon—you should come.”

“Nuts, I’ll be at work. But tell them the decorations are beautiful.”

“Sure,” he said. “Annie, we’ve got a situation. We’re going to have to come up with another plan here.”

Instinctively she picked up Comet to judge his size and strength; he wriggled nicely. “Why’s that, Jack?” she asked.

He was shaking his head. “This isn’t going to work much longer. I can go another day, two at the most, while you figure something out, but the puppies have to find a new home. They’re getting bigger, more energetic, and giving off the kind of odor reminiscent of a box full of puppy shit. This is an eating-and-drinking establishment, Annie.”

“Are people complaining?” she asked.

“Just the opposite,” he said, shaking his head. “We’re drawing a nice crowd on account of the big tree and the cute little puppies. But you know puppies, Annie. They’re wetting on a lot of laps while they’re being held and snuggled. This is going to go from cute and fun to a big problem real soon.”

“Oh,” she said, helpless. “Oh.” Well, it wasn’t as though she had trouble understanding. It was different when the litter was in your downstairs bathroom or under the laundry sink in a home, or when there was a mother dog around tending the nursery. You just didn’t realize how hard that mother dog worked unless you had to care for the puppies yourself. Even when there were eight of them, as long as they were nursing, good old Mom licked them from head to toe, keeping them clean and dry. The second you started giving them solid food, Mom stopped cleaning up after them and it took no time at all for them to get a little stinky and messy. But under normal circumstances, that came at about six weeks, right about the time they were ready to leave the nursery anyway.

In this case, there’d been no mom, and the formula and cereal that went in one end came out the other. Their bedding couldn’t be changed fast enough or their cute little bottoms washed often enough to avoid a smell.

“What am I going to do?” she asked herself.

“We’ve got homes for some of them figured out,” Jack said. “I’m not sure any of them are ready to be out of the box yet, but we’ve got a few adoptions worked out. There’s Christopher, of course. He’s not letting Comet get away.”

“Comet’s not ready to be the responsibility of a six-year-old. He needs a couple more weeks. And good as Chris is with him, he’ll have to be supervised,” Annie said.

“I know. And I’m sunk,” Jack said. “David keeps babbling about his ‘boppie.’ I’ve been thinking about getting a dog, anyway, something to clean up the spills around my place. But...”

“And, Jack, you can’t turn a puppy this size over to a three-year-old boy any more than you can put him in charge of eggs and ripe tomatoes.”

“Yeah, yeah, when it’s time, we’ll be careful. And Buck Anderson, sheep rancher, says it’s about time to get a couple of new herders ready. He’s got a little child of his own and seven grandchildren. He can speak for two—his sons can help get ’em grown before they turn them over to the other dogs and the sheep. He’d like them to be Christmas dogs, though. Now, I know you don’t trust people looking for puppies as Christmas gifts, but you can count on Buck. He knows the score.” Jack took a breath. “I don’t like their chances if they won’t herd sheep, however.”

“Okay, that’s four taken care of,” she said.

“Couple of other people have been thinking about it, but that’s the progress so far. Did you realize everyone in town has named them after the reindeer?”

“Yeah, cute, huh? Jack, I don’t have a place for them. I guess I could take them to my house and run home between haircuts to make sure they’re fed and watered, but to tell the truth, I don’t have that kind of time. At Christmastime, everyone wants to be beautiful. And I try to spend as much time at the farm as I can—the whole family’s coming.”

“Maybe we need to rethink that shelter idea. Couldn’t they just look after them for a couple of weeks? Then we’ll take at least a few off their hands....”

Just then Nathaniel blew in with a gust of wind. He pulled off his gloves and slapped them in his palm. He looked around the recently decorated bar and whistled approvingly. “Hey,” he said to Annie and Jack. “How’s everything?” Silence answered him. “Something wrong?”

Annie stepped toward him. “Jack can’t keep the puppies here anymore, Nate. They’re starting to smell like dogs. It is a restaurant, after all.”

Nate laughed. “I think you’ve hung in there pretty well, Jack. Lasted longer than I predicted.”

“Sorry, Nate. If Annie hadn’t been so convincing, these guys would have gone to a shelter right off the bat. Or someplace way worse. At least we’ve figured out homes for a few—when they’re old enough and strong enough to leave the litter.”

“Yeah, I understand,” Nate said good-naturedly. “Well, if Annie promises not to bail on me, I’ll take ’em home. I’m pretty busy most days, but I have a vet tech at the clinic to help. And they don’t need quite as much hands-on care as they did a week ago—at least they can all lap up their meals without an eyedropper now. I can put ’em in the laundry room and close the door so they don’t keep me up all night.”

“Will they be warm enough?” Annie asked. “Are they strong enough?”

“They’ll be fine, Annie. Jack—what’s for dinner?”

“Chili. Corn bread. Really? You’ll take them out of here?”

Nate laughed. “Can we mooch one more meal before we cart them away? I’m a bachelor—there’s hardly ever any food in the house.” He draped an arm around Annie’s shoulders. “This one is spoiled now—she’s used to getting fed for her efforts. And two beers.”

“Yeah,” Jack said, lifting a curious eyebrow. “Coming right up.”

“After we eat, you can follow me home,” he said to Annie, as if the matter was settled.

* * *

Annie knew approximately where the Jensen clinic, stable and house were, but she couldn’t remember ever going there. You might take your poodle or spaniel to the small-animal vet, but the large-animal vet came to you, unless you had a big animal in need of surgery or with some condition that required long-term and frequent care. His stable also provided occasional short-term boarding for horses. And he had breeding facilities, but that also was most often done at the farm or ranch by the farmers and ranchers. Some owners of very valuable horses preferred to leave their prefoaling mares with the vet.

Nate transported the puppy box in the covered bed of his truck. They were bundled up with extra blankets and wouldn’t get too cold on the short ride. Annie followed in her own truck. They made a left off the main road at the sign that said Jensen Stables, Dr. Nathaniel Jensen, DVM. The road was paved, which was high cotton in this part of the world. It was tree-lined and the snow-covered brush was cut back from the edge. The road had to be at least half a mile long. Then it opened into a well-lit compound. The stable was on the left of a large open area, with a corral surrounding it on the side and back. The clinic itself was attached to the stable. There were Christmas lights twinkling in one of the windows. On the right was a sprawling, modern one-story house with a brick sidewalk that led up to double front doors of dark wood set with beveled-glass windows. Not a single Christmas light or ornament on the house at all. Annie wondered if the vet tech had decorated the clinic.

Between the house and stable were two horse trailers. One could hold six horses, the other two, and both were so fancy they probably came with a bar and cabin attendants.

The garage door at one end of the house opened automatically, and Nate pulled in. Annie parked outside and walked through the garage. She carried the formula and baby cereal while he carried the box, managing to open the door into the house and flick on lights with his elbow as he walked through the kitchen and then disappeared. The kitchen was the kind Annie’s mother would have died for—large new appliances, six-burner stove, double oven, work island with a sink. It was gorgeous. It looked newly remodeled.

Annie moved more slowly, peering past a long breakfast bar into a spacious family room with big, comfy-looking furniture and a beautiful fireplace. On each side of the fireplace were floor-to-ceiling bookcases filled with leather-bound volumes.

“Annie? Where are you?”

She stopped gawking and followed the voice. She passed a very long, old oak table in a large breakfast nook inside bay windows that looked out on the back of the property. A sharp left and down a short hall took her past a bathroom, a bedroom and into a laundry room. In addition to cabinets, there was a stainless-steel washer and dryer, along with a deep sink. This was not an old farmhouse, that was for sure.

“I’ll use linens from the clinic to line their box,” Nate said. “They’ll be fine in here. Listen, I know you signed on for this duty, but I don’t want you to feel like you have to rearrange your schedule to get out here the first minute you can escape work every day. Virginia, my tech, can help during the day and I get called out sometimes, but this time of year, no one’s breeding or birthing, so it’s not usually too hectic. But—”

“Okay,” she said. “I won’t come. I’ll leave a number. If you need me.”

“Well, could you still come sometimes?” he asked with a laugh. “If you give me a hand feeding and cleaning up, I’ll thaw a hunk of meat to throw in the broiler or something. Nothing like Preacher’s, but edible. Just let me know when you can be here.”

“You have your tech....”

“I don’t like to ask Virginia to stay after five unless we have special patients—she wants to get home, have dinner with her husband. I’ll fix you up with a key, in case I’m tied up on a case and you beat me home.”

“Sure. Tell me exactly what you want,” she said.

He put his hands on his hips. “I want to know what’s wrong. Why are you frowning like that? You’ve been frowning since I walked into Jack’s.”

Mentally, she tried to smooth out her eyebrows, but she could still feel the wrinkle. She’d been trying to picture him with a trophy girl on his arm, that was what. Or with an equestrienne from a high-muck-a-muck ranch who raced or showed horses all over the world. Or maybe a mature and attractive woman his age who was as smart and successful as he was. And he was so damn handsome it wasn’t hard to imagine all this. But she said, “You’re downright chipper. This is exactly what you didn’t want, but you’re almost thrilled about having the puppies here. What’s up with that?”

He laughed. “Nah. I knew it was going to come to this. I’m glad Jack and Preacher handled them for that first week for two reasons—they had to be fed, dried and checked frequently, and I enjoyed stopping by the bar on the way home every day. Don’t know when I’ve eaten so well,” he added, rubbing a flat belly. “Now that it’s apparent they’re all going to make it, they only have to be checked and fed every few hours, something Virginia and I can handle during the day. I agree with you about the shelter. They’d probably be just fine—those folks are devoted, and they interview and screen efficiently before they let a tiny, orphaned animal out of there. But why take chances? If we have to use the shelter, we’ll just do so after Christmas.”

“That’s it? You knew all along you’d get stuck with them?”

He just laughed. “Come on, I’ll show you the house I grew up in, we’ll put on some coffee, feed the pups and put ’em down for the night. How about that?”

“You don’t have to show me the house. I’m not going to be poking around in here.”

He grabbed her hand. “I’m not worried about you poking around. Come on,” he said again, pulling her back through the kitchen. He took her through a spacious great room, where he said, “Many fights between my sisters happened here. When I grew up, there was old, floral, ratty furniture in here, but once everyone got educated and off Mom and Dad’s payroll, new things began to appear around the house. Things got updated and remodeled.” He pulled her down the hall, showed her where the master bedroom and three others were located. “I got the bed-and-bath on the other side of the kitchen. Kept me away from the girls.” Then he took a right turn off the great room. “Formal living room, used only on family holidays like Christmas, and dining room, used for overflow at big family dinners.” And then they were back in the huge kitchen.

“It’s enormous,” she said breathlessly. “It’s very beautiful. What must it have been like to grow up in a house so large?”

“I probably took it for granted, like any kid would,” he said with a shrug. “It’s still my parents’ house, though I doubt they’ll ever move back here. Come on, I’ll put on coffee.”

“You don’t have to entertain me, Nate.”

“Maybe I’m entertaining myself. I don’t have much company out here.”

The moment they had the coffee poured Annie remembered. “Damn,” she said. “Don’t move. I have something for you.” She dashed out the garage door to her car, retrieved the cookies and brought them in. In typical country fashion, they were arranged on a clear, plastic plate with plastic wrap covering them. “For you,” she said. “They should be warm, but now they’re nearly frozen. My mother insisted.”

“She baked them for me?” he asked, surprised, as he peeled off the wrap and helped himself.

“Well, kind of.”

“Kind of?”

“We baked together today. All day. We do that for the holidays. Stuff for the freezer, gifts for neighbors and for my girls at the shop. We bake on my days off for weeks right up to Christmas.”

“You bake?” he asked, looking mesmerized, maybe shocked.

She smirked. “All farm girls bake. I also know how to quilt, garden, put up preserves and chop the head off a chicken. I couldn’t butcher a cow by myself, but I know how it’s done and I’ve helped.”

“Wow.”

She was not flattered by his response. She’d hardly led a glamorous life and she’d much rather have told him she’d gone to boarding school in Switzerland and dressage training in England. “I bet I remind you of your mother, huh?”

He chuckled. “Not exactly. Do you fish? Hunt?”

“I’ve been fishing and hunting, but I prefer the farm. Well, I shot a mountain lion once, but that was a long time ago and I wasn’t hunting. The little bastard was after my mother’s chickens, and the boys had already moved away, so I—”

“How old were you?” he asked.

She shrugged. “I don’t know—thirteen or fourteen. But I’m not crazy about hunting. I like to ride. I miss the cows. I loved the calving. Ice cream made from fresh cream. Warm eggs, right out from under the chicken. I have more 4-H ribbons than anyone in my family. Erasmus, that mean old bull? He’s mine. Blue ribbon—state fair. I was fifteen when he came along—he’s an old guy now, and the father of hundreds. I have a green thumb like my mother—I can stick anything in the ground and it grows. I once grew a rock bush.” He threw her a shocked expression and she rolled her eyes. He recovered. “Just one of those plain old farm girls. Size-ten boot and taller than all the boys till I was a senior in high school. My dad calls me solid. Steady. Not the kind of girl men are drawn to. I attract...puppies. That’s what.”

He smiled hugely, showing her his bright white teeth and that maddening dimple. “Is that a fact?”

“Not your type, certainly. I’ve never had a string bikini. I wouldn’t know what to do with one. Floss your teeth? Is that what you do?”

He laughed. “There are sexier things than string bikinis,” he said.

“Really?” she asked. “The minute I heard you describe being lost in the middle of a hundred string bikinis, I got a picture in my mind that I haven’t been able to get rid of. It’s like having a bad song stuck in your head.”

“Oh, Jesus, don’t you just have a giant bug up your ass,” he said, amused.

“I have no idea what you mean,” she said, though she knew exactly. She was a terrible liar. “I didn’t even know you weren’t your father, you know. I had no idea you were the vet until you showed up at Jack’s. And today while we were baking, my folks told me that when you came up here to take over the practice, they’d talked about nothing else for months. I guess you brought your girlfriend with you. A beautiful, fancy, Hollywood woman.”

Shock widened his mouth and eyes. “Get outta here,” he said. Then he erupted into laughter. “Is that what they’re saying?”

A little embarrassed, she shrugged. “I don’t know that anyone’s saying anything anymore, and I don’t know who besides my folks saw it that way.”

He laughed for a long time, finally getting himself under control. “Okay, look. She was my fiancée, okay? But it was my mistake, bringing her up here, because she was far too young. I must have been out of my mind. She wasn’t ready to get married. Thank God. And she wasn’t a Hollywood woman, although she really wanted to be. Maybe she is by now, for all I know. Susanna was from Van Nuys. The only thing she knew about horses was that they have four legs and big teeth. She was twenty-four to my twenty-nine, had never lived in a small town and really didn’t want to.”

“And thin,” Annie added. “Very thin.”

He put his hands in his pockets, rocked back on his heels, lifted expressive dark brows and with a grin he said, “Well, not all over.”

“Oh, that’s disgusting,” she returned, disapproval sounding loud.

“Well, it’s not nice to talk meanly about past girlfriends.”

“I bet she looked great in a string bikini,” Annie said with a snort.

“Just unbelievable,” he said, clearly taunting her. “Now, why would you be so jealous? You don’t even know poor, thin Susanna. For all you know, she’s a sweet, caring, genuine person and I was horrible to her.” And he said all this with a sly smile.

“I am certainly not jealous! Curious, but not jealous!”

“Green as a bullfrog,” he accused.

“Oh, bloody hell. Listen, I’m shot. Long day. Gotta go.” She grabbed her purse and jacket and whirled out of the kitchen. And got lost. She found herself in the wide hall that led to the bedrooms. She found her way back to the great room, then to the kitchen. “Where the hell is the door?”

He swept an arm wide toward the door that led to the garage, still wearing that superior smile. What an egomaniac, she thought, heading for the door.

When she got to her car, she thought, well, that was perfectly awful. What’s more, he saw right through her. She was attracted to him, and because she knew there had probably been many beautiful women in his past, she’d let it goad her into some grotesque and envious remarks about the only one she knew of, Susanna. The child-woman who obviously had a little butt and nice rack. Why in the world would she do that? What did she care?

It probably had something to do with touring a four-thousand-square-foot custom home, beautifully furnished, across the compound from a spacious stable with a couple of horse trailers her dad would have killed for. Well, what was one to expect from a veterinary practice that served so many, over such a wide area? And not a new practice, either, but a mature one—probably forty years old. Established. Lucrative.

She’d grown up in a three-bedroom, hundred-year-old farmhouse. Her three brothers shared a bedroom and never let her forget it for a second. They all shared one very small bathroom. But she loved the way she’d grown up and had never been jealous a day in her life—why would she be now? Could it be that in addition to all that, she’d never gone to special, private schools, never worn custom-tailored riding gear, never could afford the best riding lessons or most prestigious competitions? Also, she had wide hips, big feet and a less-than-memorable bustline. “Oh, for God’s sake, Annie,” she said to herself. “Since when have you even thought about those things!”

How long had she been sitting here in her car? Long enough to get cold, that was how long. Well, it was time to suck it up. She’d go back in there and just tell him she was cranky, that being one of those “sturdy” farm girls who owns exactly one pair of high heels she can barely walk in, it just rubbed her the wrong way hearing about the kind of woman who could get the attention of one of the county’s few bachelors. Not that she wanted his attention, but just the same... She’d apologize and promise never to act that way again. She wasn’t usually emotional. Or irrational.

She walked back into the still-open garage, up to the back door and gave a short tap. It flew open. He reached out and grabbed her wrist, pulled her roughly into the house, put his arms around her, pressed her up against the kitchen wall just inside the door, and kissed her! His mouth came down on hers so fiercely, with such dominance and confidence, her eyes flew open in shock. Then he began to move over her mouth while he held her against the wall with his wide, hard chest, his big hands running up and down her rib cage, over her hips.

She couldn’t move. She couldn’t raise her arms or let her eyes drift closed or even kiss back. She held her breath. What the hell...?

He finally lifted his lips off hers and said, “You like me. I knew it.”

“I don’t like you that much. Never do that again,” she said.

“You want me,” he said, smiling. “And I’m going to let you have me.”

“You’re conceited. I do not want you.”

He kissed her again, and again her eyes flew open. This time she worked her arms free and pushed against his chest.

“Well, hell, just kiss me back and see if I start to grow on you,” he said.

“No. Because you think this is funny. I came back in here to apologize for being crabby. I don’t care about that skinny woman. Girl. I’m just a little tired.”

“You don’t have to apologize, Annie. I think it’s kind of cute. But you don’t have to be jealous of Susanna. She’s long gone and I hardly even missed her. We weren’t right for each other. At all.”

“That’s what my dad said.”

“Hank said that?”

She nodded.

“What did he say? Exactly?” Nate wanted to know.

She shouldn’t. But she did. “He said I’d be more your type, but I’d have had to kill the skinny blonde first. He said she looked near death, anyway.”

Nate thought that was hilarious. He laughed for a long time, but he didn’t let go of her. “Good thing she left, then. She couldn’t hold her own in any kind of fight. She cried if she broke a nail.”

“I bet she was just one of many.”

He withdrew a little, but the amusement stayed in his eyes. “You think I’m a player.”

“How could you not be? It’s not like I don’t know about those rich horse people. And you’re the doctor! Of course you’ve had a million girlfriends.”

The smile finally vanished. “No,” he said. “I’m not that guy, Annie. Just ’cause I’ve been around those folks doesn’t mean I’m that kind of guy.”

“Well, there are the girl vets you’re going to the islands with,” she reminded him.

“Tina and Cindy,” he said with a laugh. “Shew. I hate to brag, but I’m thirty-two, Annie, and there have been a couple of women in my past. But I bet there are a couple of guys in yours, too. Tina and Cindy are just friends of mine.”

“Uh-huh. I’m sure. Old friends and a hundred string bikinis.”

“Come back in and finish your coffee,” he said with a tolerant chuckle.

“I have to go. I have to get home to Ahab.”

“Who’s that?” Nate asked.

“My cat. Ahab. Tripod. He has a lot of names. He’s three-legged.”

“What happened?” Nate asked.

“I don’t know. I adopted him from the shelter when it was clear no one else would ever take him. He’s got a bad attitude, but he loves me. He’s very independent, but he does like to eat. I have to go.”

“Are you coming back tomorrow after work?”

“Are you going to be a gentleman?” she asked.

He lifted one of those handsome brows. “You want me to?”

No. “Absolutely. Or I’m leaving the puppies all to you without helping.”

“Just come tomorrow after work. Swing by home and feed your cat first so you don’t have to be in a hurry to leave.” He gave her a very polite kiss on the cheek that just oozed with suggestiveness. “I’ll see you then.”