Once and for All

“You’d think a man his age would know how to wipe his feet,” Margarite grumbled.

“Yeah,” she agreed. “But he’s here, so maybe we can put up with the mess for a while? You know, just in case another animal needs shots?”

“Yeah, maybe.”

Jodie picked up her coat from the chair where she’d tossed it.

“Going somewhere?” Margarite asked.

“I’m going to see Sam Hyatt in person.” Even though he’d killed the horse last year, he’d done all right with Bronson. And he was better than no vet at all—although she doubted her father would see things that way.

Margarite shrugged philosophically. “At least that way he can’t hang up on you.”

KATIE HAD GONE HOME for the day and Sam was deep into the paperwork, hating every minute of it, when Beau came to the clinic.

Sam glanced up at his gangly nephew with a feeling of déjà vu. “Why aren’t you at practice?” Beau had passed the test. He should be eligible this week and there was a game on Saturday.

Beau’s mouth worked for a moment, poignantly reminding Sam of his brother, Dave, who’d never been good at spitting things out. Now, instead of coaxing his brother into telling him what was going on in his head, he was coaxing Dave’s sons into spilling their guts.

“I didn’t pass.”

“You did. I saw the test.”

He’d managed a C, which raised his grade to passing.

“I got turned in for cheating.”

Sam’s jaw went slack. “Did you cheat?”

Beau looked everywhere but at him.

“Did you?”

“Yeah,” he muttered at last.

“You cheated.”

“I cheated,” Beau said in a stronger voice that almost bordered on a shout. “I didn’t understand the problems. I cheated. I need to play.”

“Well, you aren’t playing now, are you?”

Oh, man. How did he handle this one? Sam wondered. What would his parents have done? They’d experienced the whole gig from diapers through college. He’d been dumped into child rearing during the boys’ adolescent stage. Logically, Sam knew that parenting teens wouldn’t have been that much easier had he raised the kids from birth, but at least he would have had some experience to fall back on. He could have eased into the traumas of the teens after dealing with small problems like not getting invited to birthday parties or going up the slide backward.

“No,” Beau snapped. He gave Sam a frustrated scowl before glancing out the window at the car pulling to a stop in front of the clinic. It wasn’t just any car. It was Jodie De Vanti’s classic Spitfire, and despite his obvious turmoil, a look of pure envy crossed Beau’s face. Sam knew how he felt. A second later Jodie opened the clinic door and Beau took advantage of the moment to make his escape. He hefted his heavy backpack with one hand.

“I’m going to go get something to eat.” He nodded at Jodie, then walked around the counter, heading toward the rear exit. Sam watched him go, really wanting to call him back but knowing he had to deal with the rich chick first.

He turned back to Jodie, having no illusions about what prompted this personal call.

“Is this about the bull?” Sam asked, knowing it had to be. Katie had fielded a call from the Barton ranch before she’d gone home.

“Yes.”

“Sorry. Can’t help you.”

Her blue eyes flashed, but her demeanor remained remarkably calm as she said, “Damn it, Sam. I can’t have my father’s animals dropping like flies.”

“Your father got himself into this situation.”

“My dad felt justified in bringing suit against you or he wouldn’t have done it … but that’s not an excuse,” she added, as if remembering her mission was to finesse him, not beat him in an argument. “Just an explanation.”

“Feeling justified and being justified are not the same,” Sam felt obliged to point out. “Or maybe it is for you legal types.”

“We legal types understand the difference,” she said patiently, even though she was obviously annoyed at his remark. “He lost a thirty-thousand-dollar horse. Surely you can understand—”

“The horse couldn’t have been saved.”

“The professor from the UC Davis disagreed, which was why my father brought suit.” She met Sam’s eyes, her expression candid. “You can’t fault him for that. He sought the opinion of an expert and acted on that opinion.”

Ah, yes. The star witness, who’d been working with twenty-twenty hindsight and after-the-fact information.

“Your expert didn’t convince the judge, did he?” Sam reminded her. And the expert hadn’t been there the night the horse died, either. Sam had been, working his ass off trying to save an animal with a twisted gut. And he’d done everything he could, everything he’d been capable of … although it had happened only a few weeks after Dave’s death and Sam had still been suffering from shock. Hadn’t been thinking all that straight. But he’d gone over his responses a thousand times in his mind, logically reviewing what he’d known at the time.

He hadn’t made a mistake, and he truly resented Joe for coming after him at such a time in his life.

“No,” Jodie agreed.

“Because I was right,” he replied. And it felt good to say that out loud to a Barton. He put his palms on the counter that separated them and leaned closer. “And that is why you can’t get services. People don’t want to deal with your family.”

JODIE FOUGHT BOTH desperation and exasperation, with a healthy dose of anger thrown in. Why was she wasting her time here? She wasn’t going to win and the bull was going to die.

She put her own hands on the counter opposite Sam’s and leaned across the laminate surface until they were practically nose to nose. “I didn’t sue you,” she said adamantly. “I’m asking for help. Not my father.”

Sam wasn’t buying her argument. Hell, even she wasn’t buying it. She’d sat in court with her dad, which made her pretty much a party to the action, even if she hadn’t been the one to file suit.

“I am not going to be responsible for killing my father’s prize bull.”

“He killed his bull,” Sam said stubbornly. “Not you.”

“The animal is still alive, Sam. You could keep him that way.” She’d barely gotten the last word out of her mouth when the phone rang.

Sam glanced at the caller ID. “It’s my nephew. I have to take this.”

“Will you come to the ranch?” Jodie asked before he got the receiver to his ear, and was horrified to hear a tiny crack in her otherwise even voice. What next? Sobs?

Instead of answering her, Sam said into the receiver, “What is it, Ty?” He bent his head as he listened.

Jodie knew she’d hit her breaking point then. Her mission was futile. The bull was going to die. Her father would come home to a dead animal and missing a vet-trained cowboy. His blood pressure would skyrocket. The vacation would end up being wasted time….