Chapter 11
Callie
Rita’s eaten a pack of gum, foil paper and all. I’m guessing she thought it was jewelry based on the way she was prancing around with it hanging from her mouth like she’d committed another crime.
“You’re going to die one day from this behavior,” I tell her as I haul her toward the Cedar Ridge Veterinary Clinic.
“And I’m going to feel bad for about five minutes before I get a normal pet.
Like a fish. Fish don’t eat foil. Fish have dignity.
Fish don’t cost me three hundred dollars every time they see something shiny. ”
Rita bleats in response, which could be disagreement, intestinal distress, or her planning her next dietary disaster. With Rita, it’s always multiple choice where all the answers lead to veterinary bills.
The parking lot’s absolutely packed because it’s the first Tuesday of the month, the day Dr. Meyer does his supply runs and every rancher in three counties shows up to stock up on vaccines, antibiotics, and all the other things that keep their animals alive.
The chaos is impressive even by Cedar Ridge standards.
There’s the old guy from the bowling alley wrestling his ancient mutt out of his truck while the dog acts like he’s being taken to his execution.
Mrs. Rodriguez has her prize-winning barn cat in a carrier that sounds like it contains a small, angry demon.
And Tommy Burke’s got his arms full of roosters because of course he does.
“Why roosters, Tommy?” I ask as I pass.
“Don’t ask questions you don’t want answered, Callie.”
Fair enough. In Cedar Ridge, sometimes ignorance isn’t just bliss, it’s self-preservation.
I’m trying to navigate Rita around a massive truck that’s taking up three parking spaces when I nearly collide with another one pulling in like they forgot how to use their brakes.
The McCoy truck. Of course. My stomach does that flutter thing it’s been doing lately whenever I see the brothers, like butterflies, if butterflies were on fire and possibly drunk.
It’s only been two days since our last..
. encounter... and my body’s still humming from it.
Every time I move, I remember exactly where they touched me, kissed me, held me.
It’s extremely inconvenient when I’m trying to do normal things like exist in public without blushing.
Wyatt’s driving with that focused intensity he brings to everything, as if parallel parking requires the same concentration as defusing a bomb.
Jesse’s messing with the radio because he’s incapable of listening to one song all the way through.
And Boone’s in the back laughing at something on his phone, probably a video of someone falling off something because that’s his brand of humor.
Jesse spots me first and his whole face lights up in a way that makes my chest tight. Not tight in a bad way, tight in a “oh no, I really like these idiots” way.
“Well, well. Look what the goat dragged in.”
“Pretty sure I’m the one doing the dragging,” I say, trying not to grin too wide as Rita attempts to dislocate my shoulder in her struggle to reach the guys.
“What’d she eat this time?” Wyatt asks, climbing. There’s something in his eyes when he looks at me, a warmth that makes me remember exactly how his hands felt on my skin last time I saw him. How he said my name when he… nope, not thinking about that in a vet clinic parking lot.
“Gum, foil wrappers and all,” I say. “I’m thinking she thought it was jewelry. She has expensive taste for someone who sleeps in hay.”
“I’ve always admired manifesting abundance,” Boone says, already crouching to greet Rita. “Good girl. Always aim high. Even if high is just shiny garbage.”
“Don’t encourage her criminal behavior.”
“It’s not criminal, it’s entrepreneurial,” Jesse argues, moving closer, so close I have to make fists to keep from touching him. “She saw an opportunity and took it.”
“The opportunity to need veterinary intervention?”
“The opportunity for attention. Look, it worked. Here we all are, focused entirely on her. She’s basically a genius.”
He’s standing close enough now that our arms brush, and even that simple contact sends heat through me. God, I’ve got it bad. Two days, and I’m already touch-starved like some Victorian maiden who’s just discovered her clitoris.
“You guys here for supplies?” I ask, trying to sound normal and not like I’m mentally replaying our last night together in high definition.
“Calving season prep,” Wyatt confirms. “Dad’s convinced we’re going to have a baby boom this year.”
“Based on what? Science? The Farmer’s Almanac? His horoscope?”
“Based on the way the bulls have been looking at the cows. He says they have ‘romantic energy’ this year.”
“That’s... not how biology works.”
“Try telling our dad that. He’s already picked out names for calves that don’t exist yet.”
“Bad move, naming your food,” I say.
He gives me the kind of nod that says, “the man’s gonna do what he wants.”
We’re all standing there grinning like idiots when the church secretary walks by with her dog, literally on his last legs. She has a doggie wheelchair for him that he propels with his front paws.
“McCoys. Thompson.” She looks between us with the interest of someone who’s about to have the best gossip at bridge club. “Together. In broad daylight. How... progressive.”
“It’s a parking lot, Mrs. Delaney, not a speakeasy,” I tell her.
“These days, hard to tell the difference. Lots of things happening in parking lots that shouldn’t be happening.
Very scandalous things.” She gives us a meaningful look that suggests she knows exactly what we’ve been up to, which is impossible.
But on the other hand, this is Cedar Ridge where impossible could be just another day.
She continues inside, dragging her dog-on-wheels behind her, but not before giving us another look that promises this encounter will be discussed, analyzed, and speculated about at length.
“She knows,” Boone says immediately.
“She doesn’t know,” Jesse counters.
“She definitely knows,” I confirm. “She has that look. The one that says ‘I know things and I’m going to tell everyone.’”
“How would she know?” Wyatt asks, but he looks concerned.
“This is Cedar Ridge. The trees have eyes and the walls have Facebook accounts.”
We sigh and head to the clinic.
Once inside, chaos erupts because Rita doesn’t do anything halfway. The moment I relax my grip on her lead to sign the check-in form, just long enough to write my name, she’s on the counter investigating doggie treat jars like a detective at a crime scene.
“Rita, no—”
Too late. She’s knocked over three jars, sending dog biscuits cascading across the floor.
Every dog in the waiting room lunges forward.
It’s like Black Friday at PetSmart. Pure pandemonium, and I have to keep from laughing.
Boone, trying to help, steps on a rolling biscuit and goes down, arms windmilling.
He takes out a display of flea medication on his way down.
Boxes fly, and Tommy’s roosters, sensing opportunity, escape their containers.
“Smooth,” Jesse observes, stepping carefully over his brother while a rooster investigates his boot.
“It’s not my fault,” Boone protests from the floor, a rooster now perched on his chest like a feathered conqueror. “And hey, I could have been seriously hurt.”
“By who? The biscuit fairy?”
“It’s possible. Very vengeful, that biscuit fairy.”
Wyatt’s already at the reception desk, automatically pulling out his wallet because that’s his role in their chaos trinity—Jesse causes it, Boone amplifies it, Wyatt pays for it. It’s like they have a system.
“Just... put it on our account,” he tells Brenda, the receptionist, who’s trying not to laugh.
“All of it?”
“Whatever ‘it’ encompasses, yes.”
“Including the therapy these dogs are going to need?”
“Dogs need therapy?”
“After this? Probably.”
Hell, I know I do.
Dr. Meyer appears from the back, looking at the destruction with the resignation of someone who long ago gave up having normal days. “Let me guess. Rita?”
“Rita,” I confirm. “In her defense, the treat jars were asking for it. Sitting there all smug and full of irresistible goodies.”
He points over his shoulder. “Exam room three. Let’s get this over with before she discovers the surgical supplies and decides to perform unauthorized operations.”
I snicker, then abruptly stop when I see the vet’s not actually amused.
Before we get to the exam room, Dr. Meyer gestures at a crate in the hallway. “We just got this stuff delivered and they just left it here. McCoy, help me move this thing.”
Wyatt moves to one end, and Dr. Meyer looks at me. “Thompson, steady the middle while we shift it. Unless you want to wait out here with the roosters.”
So now I’m sandwiched between Wyatt and the vet, trying not to notice how Wyatt’s arms flex as we lift, how his shirt pulls tight across his chest, how he smells like hay and soap and that uniquely Wyatt scent that makes me want to climb him like a tree.
He catches my eye and winks, the bastard, like he knows exactly what I’m thinking.
Which he probably does because my poker face game is really pathetic.
“On three,” Dr. Meyer says, oblivious to my internal crisis.
We move the crate, but not before Rita decides to help by wrapping her lead around our legs, creating a weird veterinary group hug that would be funny if it weren’t embarrassing.
“Your goat’s trying to kill us,” Wyatt murmurs, his breath warm against my ear in a way that makes me shiver.
“Or bring us closer together,” I counter, then immediately want to eat those words because they sound way too relationship-y and feeling-y and other things ending in Y that I’m not ready to deal with.
But Wyatt grins and steps closer, his hand squeezing mine before we untangle ourselves. “I’m okay with either option.”