Chapter 2
Chapter Two
ERIKA
I pushed through the front door into what had been my playground growing up, Midstreet Veterinary Clinic.
The stench hit me hard—a strange blend of deodorizer, microwaved Italian food, and wet dog.
I switched to breathing through my mouth, a skill I’d mastered after years of dealing with truly awful smells.
I hadn’t decided yet if I should outright kill Josh or chew him a new asshole. Maybe chew first and kill second? Prison sounded like a happy vacation from the new reality of my life.
The barn-like vet hospital housed two sides.
The left was a small animal clinic for dogs, cats, and assorted smaller pets.
The right side was reserved for large animals like horses, goats, llamas, sheep, and cows.
Usually, not pigs. Dad never liked working with them.
Not treating pigs was odd since this part of the state was considered hog country, but Dad always said there were better vets out there to handle the hogs.
The right side of the clinic served primarily as a mobile truck garage and the supply storage.
Tracker stuck close to my side. Three years ago, a client surrendered him to me when he couldn’t pay to fix his fractured leg.
I didn’t know I needed a dog until I spent six months helping him recover from surgery.
One of my prouder moments as an ER vet had been fixing his complex fracture and seeing it heal.
“Thank God, you’re here.” Marty Winters stood from behind the reception desk. She rushed around and pulled me into a hug I hadn’t realized I needed. She smelled of sugar cookies and hand sanitizer.
“You haven’t aged a day since I left.” I smiled at her as I pulled away. “I missed you.”
“You grew up, hon. I’m so sorry about your father.
Bless his soul, he was a bright light here.
” Her copper-red dyed hair and the wrinkle-free complexion she long ago credited to nightly cold-cream treatments kept her looking no more than her late forties, although she had to be in her early sixties by now.
Somehow, in addition to managing the clinic and working as a receptionist, greeter, debt collector, and janitor for twenty years—maybe longer—this amazing woman also led the Ladies League at the Methodist church and sat on the Festival Board for the town.
The Ladies League competed with the Women’s Society out of the Baptist church for Festival Board seats.
Marty scooted behind the counter to flip through pages in a hand-written appointment book. This had to be one of the only practices in the state that didn’t use a computer for their appointments. “There’s a stuck cow up at the Sawyer farm. She’s been pushing all night and now she’s down.”
“I’m sorry about the cow.” I picked at peeling paint on the reception desk counter, wondering why this was important.
The décor of the waiting room hadn’t changed in two decades—the wood paneling, the spindle chairs, and the slightly off-blue paint on the walls.
I think I saw a magazine that I might’ve read in my teens still in the magazine bin.
They hadn’t even changed the photo of a cow with his tongue out that my dad found at a yard sale in the early nineties.
“It’s Dr. Chomping’s day to do the farm calls, but since he’s no longer with us, God rest his soul, and Dr. Hurst is seeing dogs and cats today, you’re up. Dr. Hurst is fully booked all day. You remember how that goes, I'm sure.” Her tone implied I needed to do farm calls.
“Whoa.” I held up my hands. “I’m here to talk out details with Josh…I mean, Dr. Hurst, and go home. Home as in Pennsylvania.”
She pushed keys across the counter. “You remember how to get to the Sawyer farm?”
I stared at the keys. “I don’t work here.”
“The truck’s been sticky on the first startup of the day,” she continued as if she hadn’t heard me. “You have to pump the gas three or four times before turning it over. She only needed a jump twice this month.”
“I haven’t touched a cow since vet school. That was years ago. I'm not licensed in NC.”
“Yes, you are. Your dad kept your license up. He said you were moving back after graduation and even posted your license.”
“What?” Sure, I might’ve taken the NC Board exam in a moment of insecurity triggered by doubt I’d get the internship I wanted, but I didn’t think I’d told him. Or maybe I did during our holiday call? “He kept my license current? How?”
“You also pay a once-a-year privilege tax.” She opened the file drawer and pulled out a file folder labeled, “Licenses.” She held up a one-quarter sheet of paper that was a North Carolina medical license with my name and the current year.
I squinted at it to make sure that was my name.
Sure enough, Erika Chomping was written in bold along with the current year.
If the man wasn’t already in his grave, I’d strangle him for getting me in debt to Josh-freaking-Hurst and somehow keeping my license current without my knowledge.
If I did work here—and not saying it was happening…
no, it most definitely wasn’t happening—I would have to sort out details with the NC Veterinary Board.
“Mr. Sawyer’s threatening to hook the cow up to the tractor if you don’t get down there. You remember the last time he did that when you were a kid, don’t you?”
I covered my eyes, guilt tugging hard at my chest. I remembered too well. The calf had come out with a shattered hip. It never got a chance at life. I also hadn’t forgotten the February wind cutting through bone and the mud sucking at boots like it wanted to swallow me whole.
No one could pay me enough to relive that.
“Your dog can ride in the truck,” Marty said gently.
“There are coveralls and boots in the back. We keep a spare set for an assistant. Julie is on maternity leave, so it’ll just be you and whoever Mr. Sawyer ropes into helping.
” She hesitated, then gave me that soft, pleading look she saved for emergencies. “I really need you right now, Erika.”
I swallowed hard, forcing myself to look at her, not the situation, not the cow, not my own dread.
Marty looked worn down in a way that had nothing to do with today.
She had to be missing Dad. They’d built this clinic together for over twenty years.
She was its backbone now, whether she wanted to be or not.
“Okay,” I said quietly. “I’ll do my best. But I have to get Vinny from school this afternoon.”
“Oh, hon, you’ll be done well before then. It’s only ten-thirty. If not, give me a buzz here at the clinic and I’ll run over to school and get him.”
I grabbed the keys, then paused at the door, nerves buzzing like static under my skin. “You can tell Dr. Hurst I expect fill-in pay,” I added, trying for levity and landing somewhere near bravado. “Pennsylvania rates.”
Her eyebrows lifted, amused despite everything.
“I’m serious,” I said, then sighed. “Mostly.”
Marty gave me a tired and grateful smile that was enough to get me moving.
* * *
I hadn’t pulled a calf in about five years—not since my senior year of vet school—and I’d never done it alone. My internship and residency had both been focused on dog and cat emergency medicine. Cows were one species I’d deliberately chosen not to treat.
Reason number one I elected to stay far away from farm medicine was the weather. I hugged myself against the blistering wind and spitting rain when I got out of the truck.
Bless the veterinarians that chose this life on purpose.
Today wasn’t just cold—it was a vicious, biting chill that robbed my fingers and toes of feeling within minutes, and made my skin curl inward like it was trying to save itself.
Daggone North Carolina crazy weather. It was mid-February and supposed to be springtime.
The rain meant I’d be covered in manure-mud splatter from face to foot by the end of this.
Sure, we were under “cover.” The walk-in area was little more than a lean-to with a piece of holey metal lined by a ditch overflowing with manure-soaked water.
The straw they’d spread well after the cow went down had long ago turned into a soupy slop.
Tracker found the only dry spot on the far edge of the walk-in area where he settled and glared betrayal at me. Like a proper city dog, he didn’t like rain or mud. Perhaps, I should’ve left him in the truck.
A man called out, “Look what the cat dragged in. You’re looking beautiful as ever, Erika.”
I glanced over my shoulder and double blinked. “Drew, is that you?”
“Yes, ma'am… Or should I say Doc?” He winked at me.
Drew had put on about a hundred pounds of muscle since high school, probably from hauling everything on a farm day in and day out.
He wore gray coveralls and a baseball cap with a tractor insignia.
His blue eyes held the same kindness I remembered from kindergarten, when he helped me mop up a spilled juice box during snack time.
That easy, relaxed confidence of his hadn’t changed either—the kind that made people feel comfortable and somehow happier just being near him.
“I’m sorry we’re not up at the main barn, but this was as far as we could get her to move once she started.” He cleared his throat and asked gently, “Are you sure you got this?”
I glanced up at him while thinking, “No, I'm not sure I’ve got this.” The tiniest bit of doubt crept in that maybe I wasn’t strong enough. Maybe I wasn’t experienced enough.
However, his tone ignited my need to show him I could do this.
I remembered how to do this. I'd been on more calls with my dad to pull calves as a kid than I could remember.
I didn’t do doubt when it came to my job. I got it done. I gritted out, “I’m good.”
“You let me know when you need me to pull,” Drew offered. “Usually, the other vets have it hooked up and the whole business over within an hour.” He'd moved in close to me, which made me feel petite, even though I was five-foot-seven. He asked, “Where is Josh? I mean, Dr. Hurst?”