Thirty-five
It was a harrowing ride to the small town of Elsie Creek with the dog whimpering, Mason crying for the dog, while Harper drove as fast as Ash’s ute could move.
She knew the vet clinic was in town, but where? She drove past the pub on the corner, down the main street, past the hardware store on her left, then the supermarket.
That’s right, Ryan had told her his clinic was behind the supermarket. She steered a hard left, then left again, and cruised down the dark street with only the lights of the police station shining behind her. ‘Please be here …’
She hunched over the steering wheel, scouring the dark storefronts, where there was a council office, another business, and a little back from the road stood the veterinary clinic.
Harper parked close, with the headlights beaming brightly. She hammered her fists on the front door while pressing the bell.
Finally, a door at the rear opened, and the lights flickered on.
‘ Ryan? It’s Harper, Bree’s friend from Elsie Creek Station.’
Jiggling a stack of keys in his hands, Ryan approached the door. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘It’s one of Cap’s dogs. It got bit by a snake.’ She rushed back to the car and opened the passenger door. ‘It’s Mason’s nanny dog. She was protecting Mason. Please help her. Please?’
‘Okay, okay. Let me in there, Harper.’ Ryan pulled her back and leaned inside. ‘Hello, girl. Let’s see what we can do for you.’ Ryan scooped up the labrador and carried her inside, with Harper carrying Mason.
Inside the clinic, Ryan laid the dog on the examination table. ‘What kind of snake?’
‘I don’t know. I thought it was a stick, it was behind the washing machine.’
‘Have a look at that wall chart, it shows the most common snakes in the Northern Territory. See which one you think it is, so I can give Ruby the correct antivenene treatment. Did you bandage her up?’ He pointed to the leg wrapped in strips of sheet.
‘Within a minute or two of her being bitten.’
‘Good work. You’ve probably saved her life.’
Harper had never done a mug shot search on snakes before—terrorists yes, after that car bomb attack, but never wildlife. ‘That one.’ She pointed to the picture. ‘The brown snake. They’re poisonous, right?’
‘Yes.’ Ryan opened a medicine cabinet and pulled out a vial, then a syringe. ‘It’s not all bad, over eighty per cent of dogs recover from a snakebite, if treated quickly.’
‘So, Ruby will be fine?’ She patted the poor dog that had diluted pupils. Her breathing was erratic, and she’d lost her ability to walk. ‘Please let her be fine.’
Ryan injected the antivenene. ‘It’s up to Ruby, but I’ll keep monitoring her through the night. So you can leave her with me.’
She wanted to stay and hold Ruby’s paw. ‘Can we ...’
Ryan shook his head, guessing her question.
‘Call me if—wait, they don’t have a landline at Elsie Creek Station, and my phone doesn’t get reception out there.’
‘Bree’s got a landline in the caretaker’s cottage. I have her number.’
‘They’re out mustering.’ Cap was going to kill her for getting one of his dogs hurt. Then Ash might freak out that Mason had been in danger, and who knows what Ryder and Dex would do when they found out? ‘Can I come back in the morning?’
‘Sure.’ He held out a business card. ‘Here’s my number. Did you say you’re out there on your own?’
She barely nodded, trying not to show her fear of being home alone.
‘Did they leave you with a radio, or are they out of range?’
Again, she shrugged. ‘They said they’d be back sometime tomorrow.’
‘Right, well …’ Ryan took back his business card and scribbled on the back. ‘This number is for the pub, and the other number is for Cowboy Craig.’
‘I don’t want a date.’
‘Craig may be a flirt, but he’d help anyone, and he’ll check over the place for any more snakes. I’d offer to go, but I can’t leave Ruby.’
She gulped at the thought of more snakes infesting the place—it was as bad as those spiders that killed snakes. ‘I flicked the snake into the garden.’ How she did that was a miracle. ‘And I have two guard dogs.’
‘Sarge, right?’
‘Is it true that Sarge was a riot dog?’
Ryan nodded. ‘Yep. Sarge has a bullet wound in his shoulder from protecting his owner, who sadly died. Has Cap given you the command to feed Sarge?’
‘Yes.’ At least she’d fed the regal shepherd and his offsider Scout when she’d first arrived home.
‘Which means you’ll be fine with Sarge. He knows to trust you. But if you don’t feel safe at all, call Craig. I swear he will be a thorough gentleman. He’ll just sleep in his swag until the Riggs brothers get home. But put this little fella to bed.’ He gently patted Mason’s head, the poor boy was barely keeping his eyes open, and it was way past his bedtime. ‘You can come back and see your dog tomorrow, okay?’
‘Thank you, Ryan.’ With Mason, they hugged the dog together. ‘You be well, Ruby. We’ll come back for you, and you’d better be here, girl.’ The tears streamed down her cheeks as they left poor Ruby behind.
With a long journey back to the station in the dark, with only a small boy for company, Elsie Creek Station was proving to be a dangerous place for someone as precious as Mason. And she was only here for Mason.