How do I feel about Mattie?
He respected her. She’d had a rough childhood, but she valued family and justice like he did. And she seemed to love his kids. That was important. And they had other things in common, like the way they loved animals, valued safety in their home and community, and had respect for others.
Quit the analysis and figure out how you feel.
Sheesh, counseling could come back and bite you in the butt. Okay, he liked her a lot, and he thought she cared for him too.
He wouldn’t let her pull away. Not unless he knew for a fact that she didn’t want to have anything to do with him anymore.
Mattie drove home with her mind in a whirl. While it had been good—wonderful, in fact—to see the two Walkers again, being near Cole, getting to be close enough to feel his warmth and receive his generous hugs, made her chest ache. Last fall, she’d realized that she loved him, but being around him and his kids through the Christmas season had taught her something very important.
Cole still loved his ex-wife.
Although that wasn’t the sole reason she’d pulled away, it was a large part of it. The other part was the fact that she needed some time and space to work through the shitstorm that her father had left inside her. She longed to be with Cole and his children in the worst way but didn’t see how it was possible under the circumstances.
Poor Candace. Had her father caused the same turbulence and distorted worldview inside her? Mattie felt certain that he had. And if so, had it somehow contributed to her death?
She parked outside in the darkness in front of her home, wishing she’d left the porch light on for herself. Feeling hollow, she turned to Robo, and he moved forward so that she could pet him. An all-consuming sadness descended upon her as she thought of Juanita Banks, who grieved the loss of her only daughter, and she wondered about her own mother, who’d willingly left her only daughter behind.
She swiped at her eyes and fought back tears as she popped open Robo’s cage to let him exit out the front with her. She wouldn’t let herself be distracted by her own garbage; she and the others had a case to solve.
Chapter 7
Wednesday
Cole’s assistant entered the clinic with her usual greeting. “Hi, hi.”
Sitting at the computer, Cole glanced up and then settled back in his chair to take in her new hairdo. Typically, Tess had unnaturally red hair, which she wore cut short and gelled up into small spikes, but today she had something new going on. Blue tips. A base of red with blue spikes. She looked like a walking ad for Independence Day.
“Hey,” Cole said with hesitation. He didn’t know if he should mention her hair or not.
“Do you like my new ’do?”
“It’s colorful.”
Tess gave him a patronizing smile, sort of like the one Angie had perfected. “Tom doesn’t like it either.”
Tom being her husband. “I didn’t say I didn’t like it.”
“Hmm . . . Didn’t need to.” She took off her jacket and hung it up on one of the wall hooks. “Do we have a big morning scheduled?”
Cole got up from the computer so that she could have her seat. “Not too bad. Just routine office stuff. No surgeries today, but we need to get some instrument packs set up and sterilized if you can get to it.”
“I’m on it.”
The first clients of the day entered, and Cole escorted the couple and their dog through the swinging door into the treatment room. The phone was ringing as he left the lobby.
When he finished giving the dog its vaccinations and called his next client in, Tess signaled that she wanted to talk to him at the pass-through. He excused himself and met her there.
“Gus Tilley just called and scheduled an appointment to have you preg check his mare. He was already in town, so I worked him in next. I juggled your schedule a bit to do it.”
Cole frowned. “I saw his dog last night. He called me after he’d arrived in town then too. I’ll have to talk to him about calling first before he makes the drive for routine appointments.”
“I’ll take care of it.”
“Explain to him that we might have been out of the office, and he would have wasted his time trailering his horse into town.”
“Okay. I never would have thought of that,” she said, giving him one of her sassy grins before turning away.
Cole realized he’d been micromanaging again. Tess would break him of that habit someday, although it was a bad one and she hadn’t yet succeeded, even after all these years.
He finished up with his cat client, went through the kennel room to the back door, and let himself into the horse treatment area. He heaved the rolling door open to the outside and found Gus Tilley waiting with a short, stout, Quarter Horse mare. Cole remembered her. Sorrel in color, white star on the forehead, went by the name Lucy.
Gus glanced up at him before hanging his head and slapping the end of the mare’s lead rope gently against his thigh, looking like a man who’d been well chastised.
Cole hoped Tess hadn’t been too harsh. “Hi, Gus. Bring her on in.”
“Sorry, Doc. Didn’t know you were so busy today.”
“No problem. I just don’t want you to make that drive sometime when we can’t work you in.”
“My phone’s out. I’ve been using the phone at the gas station at the edge of town.”
“Oh, no! Will they get out there to fix it for you soon?”
Gus hung his head, looking embarrassed. “I must’ve forgot to pay the bill.”
Cole wondered if he was having money trouble and decided to drop the whole thing. He unlatched the endbar of the stocks and swung both it and the sidebar wide open. “Go ahead and lead her in here.”
Gus led the mare slowly into the metal stanchion, and Cole closed it so that she was standing inside the sturdy rectangle that would hold her still while he worked on her. He took the lead rope from Gus and tied the mare’s head to the front for extra security.
Gus was still looking ill at ease, so Cole opted for levity in an attempt to make him feel better. “I have a rule here at the clinic. No one should get hurt while we work on the animals,” he said, going on with a grin, “especially not me.”
Gus nodded while alarm touched his face.
Attempt failed. “Just kidding, Gus. Lucy’s never given us any problems before.”
Cole took his portable ultrasound machine out of the storage cabinet against the wall and began to set it up on a stainless-steel table beside the stocks. “How’s Dodger’s ear this morning?”
“Better, Doc. Thanks for seeing him last night.”
“He must’ve had something in his ear and then scratched it out. Sounds like we’re on the right course with him.”
The machine set up, Cole put on a long plastic glove called a sleeve that covered his entire left arm. After squirting lubricant on it, he began the procedure to clear the mare’s lower bowel of fecal matter. Once the bowel was clear, he flipped on the machine and gently inserted the transmitter, guiding it up to a place that was directly above the mare’s uterus. He watched his progress on the ultrasound screen and paused when he reached the right place.
The uterus looked perfectly normal for an open mare. No pregnancy.
“I’m afraid she’s not pregnant, Gus. See here on the screen. This is the uterus, and there’s nothing here to indicate a pregnancy.”
Gus stared at the screen and crossed his arms, noncommittal.
Cole finished up the procedure, taking a couple screen shots and printing them out, one for his records and one to send home with Gus.