The Virgin Beauty. Claire King
out that way, it worked out this way. We both have to live with it.”
“That’s what I’m saying. We don’t. We could sell the outfit, lock, stock and barrel. Get a fresh start somewhere else.”
“And how would Mom and Dad live? We don’t have enough equity in the land to give them a big chunk of money all at once, and the capital gains taxes would take what we did make off it. Would we just leave here and let them fend for themselves after everything they’ve sacrificed for us?”
Frank slumped over the wheel of the truck, studying the road ahead of him. “We could work around that.”
“No, we couldn’t.” After a long silence Daniel said, “I need you there, Frank. I need you, and I’m not about to pay you to leave.” He ran his hands down his face, pulled reflexively at his bottom lip. “Look, I know you’re frustrated. I know you’re overworked. Maybe we can see our way clear to hire on a summer rider. That’d leave me free to help you and Lisa with the farming.”
“She’s getting a job in town.”
“Lisa? Where?”
“With the new vet. Heard about it down at the Rowdy Cowboy, I guess. She doesn’t know much about vetting, but she took those secretary courses in high school, and those computer classes a couple years back.”
“Huh. I didn’t know she wanted a job in town.”
“Guess she does.”
“We’re about to start farming.”
Frank shrugged. “We’ll have to hire someone else.”
“Is she moving to town?”
“No. She said she’ll stay out in her house. Cost her too much to rent in town.”
“Huh,” he said again, though the longer he considered, the more sense it made. Lisa had been complaining, albeit gently, subtly, for months about Frank’s erratic behavior. It was no wonder she wanted out. “I guess I’ll have to hire a rider, after all. You’ll need help with the farming until we find someone.”
“Whatever.”
“Frank—”
Frank turned pleading eyes to his brother. “I can’t take much more, Danny. I swear to God.”
“You’ll be okay, Frank. You’re just feeling blue right now.”
“I’m not just feeling blue. It’s more than that.”
“I can see that it is.” He could, quite clearly. “Have you thought about seeing someone about it?”
“You were an animal doctor, Danny, not a human doctor.”
“I wasn’t either. But it’s been three years, Frankie. You need some help.”
“Yep.” His brother pulled up to the curb, behind Daniel’s pickup. “And I keep hoping you’ll give me some.”
Chapter 4
Daniel watched his brother drive away until he could no longer see the truck. He was opening the door to his own pickup when Dr. Grace McKenna herself stepped out onto the sidewalk.
Instantly his eyes narrowed and he ruthlessly pushed his brother from his mind. He had a bone to pick with this lady vet, and now was as good a time as any.
“Hey, McKenna!”
Her head jerked around at the sound of his voice. Oh, she should have known. She’d just been about to go back out after him, and here he was. Probably used those hunky long legs of his to run all the way back to town, she thought resentfully. She’d wasted an entire hour feeling guilty about leaving him stranded.
She walked slowly over to where he stood, hip-cocked and fuming.
“You made good time.”
He wasn’t about tell her he got a ride. Let her suffer. “I’m fast.”
“That wasn’t a very good display of common sense, walking back.”
“You never miss a chance at a shot, do you, McKenna?”
“I’m just saying—”
“I know what you’re saying.” She’d cleaned up since she got back, was in her office clothes. Damn if those prim pleated pants and the sensible blouse didn’t distract him. In her coveralls, he could think of her as just another vet, and his nemesis. In this getup she looked like a woman. She smelled like a woman. She certainly made every instinct and cell and nerve ending in his body sit up and take notice of her as a woman. Now, what had he been planning to say? Oh, to hell with it. “Have dinner with me tonight.”
She blinked those big brown eyes at him. “Are you kidding me?”
“No, I’m not kidding you,” he said, exasperated. “Why the hell is it every time I ask you to dinner you act as if I’ve just asked you to saw off my arm or something?”
“That wasn’t asking me to dinner. That was telling me to have dinner with you. Besides, you don’t even like me.” It came out a little less snippy, a little less confident than she wanted it to.
Daniel caught the edge of hurt in her voice. Wondered at it.
He frowned. “I still have to eat. And so do you.”
“Not together.”
His lips thinned. “Okay, Doc. I’m not going to beg you.” He turned on his boot heel and went back to his truck. And just as quickly turned back. He went toe-to-toe, face-to-face. “Listen, why do you have to make this so hard? You look nice in that outfit. I thought maybe we could talk. I don’t dislike talking to you, except when you get all huffy. And dinner at the café with me is not going to kill you.”
“‘Huffy,’” she said, cocking her head to peer up at him. “‘Huffy.’” She stood her ground, though he was close enough that their breaths mingled. When she couldn’t quite manage to hold his green gaze a moment longer, she looked up at the hazy spring sky. “And he asks me why I’m making it so hard.”
Grace shook her head, conscious of the fact they were standing on the sidewalk, and every client she could hope to have could come by at any minute and see the county vet in a knock-down, drag-out with one of the biggest cattlemen in the state. She lowered her voice, leaned in. “Let’s do a rundown, shall we?”
He couldn’t help it. He loved how her voice went from little-girl vulnerable to snotty in less than a moment. Yeah, she was huffy, and it made her darn near irresistible. He inched closer. Her breath tasted like coffee. And he could smell her hair.
“Run it down, Doc.”
“You come into my office the first day I’m in town and practically write down your grievances. I’m too young. I’m inexperienced. I’m a woman.”
“I never said anything about you being a woman.”
She ignored his interruption. “Then, in the middle of the night you bring me a cat that is clearly not in need of my attention, wasting my time. You don’t even know the cat’s name. It may not even be your cat!”
“It was not the middle of the night. And his name is…Boots!”
“Tiger. Then you take me home and act very gentlemanly and kiss me brainless.”
“Brainless?” He had more than enough healthy male ego for that to make him grin.
Grace ignored the grin, too. “Then I don’t see or hear from you for a week.”
That reminded him. “Look, Doc, I kiss a lot—”
She interrupted him this time. “Then you show up today and I think, Okay, he doesn’t seem that weird. He’s totally humorless, but maybe I imagined all that surliness and bad temper. Maybe he’s just a nice man and he can come