4. Josephine
CHAPTER FOUR
Josephine
By eight thirty, I’ve already wiped down the exam room counters twice, reorganized the drawer of syringes by gauge, and corrected the angle of the framed certificate in the hallway that no one but me has likely noticed is crooked.
Which is how I know I’m stressed, carrying too many moving pieces in my head at once, all of them rattling around until I give them something useful to do.
“Josephine.”
I look up from the supply cabinet where I’m needlessly straightening rows of gauze pads that were perfectly acceptable three minutes ago.
Dr. Gregory Harris is leaning one shoulder against the doorway of the treatment room, coffee mug in one hand, expression calm in the infuriating way only my boss can pull off.
“Yes?”
His gaze drops pointedly to the shelf I’m adjusting. “If those bandages get any more organized, they’ll start billing patients.”
I flatten my hand over the top box.
He smiles into his coffee and pushes off the doorframe.
Dr. Harris is in his late fifties, broad in the shoulders, graying at the temples, with the kind of laid-back manner that would be reassuring if it didn’t sometimes make me feel like I’m the only person here aware that things can, in fact, go wrong.
Which is unfair.
He’s an excellent vet. He’s also the kind of man who can leave a stack of charts slightly uneven on the counter and somehow not feel his skin crawl about it.
I, unfortunately, am not.
“What do you need?” I ask, because he only uses my full name when he wants something.
“Need you to run over to Buckhorn Feed & Supply for me.”
I glance at the clock on the wall. “Now?”
“If your social calendar allows.”
I fold my arms. “You have a very casual approach to medical logistics.”
“And you have a very intense one.” He takes another sip.
“We’re low on calf formula and electrolyte packets.
Plus, Virgil said he’d set aside the wormer shipment I ordered.
I’d go myself, but Mrs. Sanderson’s bringing in that tabby with the abscess at nine, and if I’m not here she’ll accuse us both of incompetence and then tell half the town about it by lunch. ”
“I can go,” I say as I rise to my feet. “That’s what I’m here for.”
“Excellent.” He glances behind me at the cabinet. “And maybe while you’re out, let those poor supplies miss you for a while.”
I slide the drawer shut a little harder than necessary. “Very funny.”
“I’m serious, Jo. You’ve been here early every day this week, and you’ve reorganized the treatment room so many times I can no longer find anything unless I ask you.”
“That sounds like a you problem.”
He laughs. “Just go to the feed store.”
I bite back the smile threatening at the corners of my mouth and reach for my jacket.
The truth is, I do like being sent out on errands.
It gives me a purpose with a beginning, middle, and end.
A task I can complete cleanly. And the rhythm of this place is almost comforting, and already settling into me after only a month in Buckhorn.
The clinic might be small, but it’s mine. A job I worked hard for, for years.
I just hope Buckhorn follows, and that I soon start to feel like I belong here too, because it’s all I have. Being a veterinarian in a small western town was never glamorous enough to impress my family. But it suits me.
The work is clear. Animals need help, and I know how to help them. There’s a steadiness to that, a kind of logic, while life outside of work has always been less tidy.
I head down Main Street, the spring air bright and dry against my face.
Buckhorn in the late morning has a kind of scrubbed, sun-baked charm to it.
Pickup trucks line the curb, wooden signs creak above storefronts, and a pair of older women stand outside the bakery talking with the solemn intensity of people discussing either a church fundraiser or someone’s divorce.
Around here, I’ve learned, it could easily be both.
I pass Buttercup Bakery and catch the warm smell of sugar and cinnamon drifting out through the open door. Across the street, someone's unloading sacks of seed from a truck bed while a boy in a baseball cap chases a red heeler that has clearly stolen something.
Everything in Buckhorn feels both slower and more watchful than any place I’ve lived before, in a way that makes it clear people notice things here.
Who comes and goes. Who’s eating lunch with whom.
Who looked tired at church, or bought flowers on a Tuesday, or left the bar with a man they just met.
My jaw tightens as I keep walking.
That was five days ago, and I’ve managed, through discipline and sheer refusal to think about it too hard, not to combust from embarrassment.
Mostly.
It isn’t the sex itself that keeps blindsiding me at inconvenient moments, though that certainly hasn’t helped. It’s the fact that I behaved like someone I don’t recognize.
Impulsive, reckless, entirely too willing to let a charming bull rider with dangerous eyes and a mouth built for trouble walk me home and straight into my bed.
I still don’t know what possessed me.
Actually, that’s a lie.
I know exactly what possessed me. It had broad shoulders, rough hands, and the kind of attention that makes a woman feel as if she’s gone from background detail to the only thing in focus… which isn’t a useful thought to be having right now.
I straighten my spine and push through the door of Buckhorn Feed & Supply.
The smell hits first. Grain, leather, dust, and old wood warmed by sun. There are shelves of feed, hardware bins, tack hanging from hooks, stacks of hay bales near the back, and an old register counter up front that looks as if it’s seen fifty years of gossip and has no desire to retire.
Virgil Tucker’s nowhere in sight, but a girl about my age is behind the counter, leaning over a receipt book and chewing the end of her pen.
She glances up when the bell over the door jingles.
“Oh. Hi.” Her face brightens with immediate recognition. “You’re the new vet.”
I slow, offering a polite smile. “Yes… am I that obvious?”
She laughs. “In Buckhorn? Extremely. I’m Penny.”
“Josephine.”
“I know,” she says, then winces. “That sounded creepier than I meant it to. Just… people talk, and I’ve seen you around. Plus my grandpa said Dr. Harris finally hired someone competent enough to stop him complaining about his knees while delivering calves.”
Despite myself, I smile properly. “That’s an aggressively flattering introduction.”
She beams, pleased with herself for getting me there. Penny Tucker’s pretty in an easy, bright way. Blonde ponytail, clear skin, pink gloss, lashes that probably don’t need mascara. She has the open, quick energy of someone who’s never once in her life tried to make herself smaller in a room.
“I’m here for an order Dr. Harris called in,” I say. “Calf formula, electrolyte packets, and wormer?”
“Yep.” She props both palms on the counter. “Grandpa set it aside in the back because apparently nobody else in this town can be trusted to leave anything where it belongs.” She squints at me. “You look like the sort of person who agrees with that.”
“I have no idea what gave me away.”
Her grin widens. “The fact that your jacket’s zipped exactly halfway and your hair doesn’t have a single piece out of place.”
I lift a hand to my bun instinctively.
She notices and laughs. “See? Knew it.”
“This is a terrible first impression.”
“No, it’s great.” She points her pen at me. “It means if I ever need help organizing my life, I know who to call.”
“That depends on the rate.”
“I can pay in diner fries and local scandal.”
“Tempting.”
She leans in conspiratorially. “Honestly, the scandal here isn’t as glamorous as people imagine. Half the time it’s just someone buying fertilizer from the wrong cousin.”
“That does sound devastating.”
“I know. We’re very brave about it.”
A laugh slips out of me before I can stop it.
Penny looks faintly triumphant.
She ducks into the back room before I can say more, calling, “Don’t leave, I have opinions about half the people in town and no one to inflict them on yet.”
“That sounds like a threat.”
“It’s friendship!” she calls back.
I glance around while she’s gone, taking in the store more properly. Feed sacks stacked by brand and size, coils of rope, shelves of canned goods and work gloves, and a spinning rack of candy sticks by the register that feels almost aggressively nostalgic.
Penny reappears a minute later carrying one box and dragging another with the toe of her boot. “Do you have a truck?”
“Not with me. But I can carry it.”
She gives me a doubtful look.
“Trust me, I’m stronger than I look.”
“Okay.” She eyes me suspiciously as I grab everything with ease. “So how are you liking Buckhorn?”
I pause. The truthful answer is more complicated than people usually want.
“I like the work,” I say first, which is easy. True. “And the town is…” I glance toward Main Street. “Different than what I’m used to.”
“Nosier,” Penny supplies helpfully.
“Yes.”
She laughs. “You get used to it. Or you don’t, but by then everybody already knows your coffee order and who you waved at in the post office, so it’s too late to leave.”
I lean against the counter. “That’s a horrifying sales pitch.”
“It’s accurate.”
I smile faintly. “I think I like it more than I expected.”
Her expression softens a little, less teasing now. “Good. And once I’ve taught you all the Buckhorn rules…”
“There are rules?”
“Of course.” Her tone turns mock serious. “For example, if Clara Jenkins at the bakery ever offers you pie ‘on the house,’ that means she’s decided you need either comfort or a husband.”
I laugh again, quieter this time. “Which one does she usually mean?”
“With Clara? Both.”
“Well, I better get out of here,” I say as the feed starts to get a little heavy.
“Text me if you ever want diner fries!”
“I don’t have your number.”
She blinks. “That does make texting harder.”
Five minutes later, after she has dramatically insisted on adding herself to my contacts as Penny New BFF, I head back toward the clinic.
I shift the box in my arms as I step back out onto Main Street, adjusting my grip so it doesn’t dig into my ribs. The sun’s climbed higher now, warming the pavement, and the town feels more awake than it did earlier.
I straighten my shoulders and start toward the clinic, mentally running through what needs to get done. Supplies stocked, charts updated, Mrs. Sanderson’s cat. Normal things. Predictable things.
Things that don’t involve…
Him.
My brain registers the sight of him before I can stop it.
Across the street. One boot hooked on the lower rail, hat low, talking to someone, but not really paying attention.
Clay.
Every muscle in my body locks.
No, absolutely not.
I turn my head so fast I nearly trip over my own feet.
Keep walking. Don’t look again. Do not, under any circumstances, make eye contact.
My heart’s already racing, which is ridiculous because nothing has happened. Nothing is happening. He hasn’t even seen me.
I think.
I risk the smallest glance.
Mistake.
He shifts slightly, like he might turn, so I pivot immediately.
Abort, run, escape…
My boots crunch over gravel as I slip around the back of Buckhorn Feed & Supply, pressing myself briefly against the side of the building like I’m evading something far more dangerous than a man I had a one-night stand with.
This is insane. I’m a grown woman, a professional, a licensed veterinarian. I don’t hide behind buildings.
I close my eyes, calming my breathing.
He didn’t see me, which is good. Ideal, actually. Because what would I have done if he had? Said hello? Pretended nothing happened? Acted like I didn’t let a near stranger into my home and my bed less than a week ago?
My stomach flips.
I push off the wall and take a cautious step toward the corner, peeking out just enough to check.
He’s still there.
Of course he is.
Why wouldn’t he be?
He shifts his weight, says something to the man beside him, and I swear his head starts to turn in this direction.
I duck back instantly, my pulse thundering so hard against my rib cage I fear it might explode. I press my hand flat against my sternum like I can physically force my heart to calm down.
Okay, new plan: I wait. He’ll have to leave eventually, right?
I stand there for I don’t know how long. Long enough for this to go from mildly ridiculous to deeply embarrassing. A truck drives past. Someone laughs somewhere down the street.
Life continues while I’m hiding behind a feed store. Fantastic.
I inch forward, slower this time. I peek again and find he’s gone. Relief hits so fast it makes my knees feel weak.
“Oh, thank goodness,” I murmur under my breath.
I straighten, brush imaginary dust from my jeans, and step back out onto the sidewalk like I haven’t just completely derailed my morning.
Like I’m not going to spend the rest of the day with him in mind.
I tighten my grip on the box and focus on the rhythm of my steps instead. One foot, then the other.
Clinic is three blocks down. You have work to do. You have responsibilities. You have a life that doesn't include impulsive decisions or men who feel like trouble…
Anyway, he won’t be in town much longer.