Ramona and the Renegade

“Don’t you ever check the condition of your spare?”

Her eyes narrowed beneath her soggy bangs. “Somewhere between studying for my finals—and the examination for my vet license—and juggling a part-time job to pay for little incidentals like food, it must have temporarily fallen off my ‘immediately to do’ list.”

He ignored her sarcastic tone and answered matter-of-factly. “Well, that’s a shame,” he told her. “Because your spare’s flat, too.”

Mona closed her eyes. It figured. All things considered, this had not been one of her better days. Opening her eyes again, she looked at Joe. “As flat as the one on it?” she asked.

You just didn’t substitute one flat tire for another. Flat was flat. His dark eyes would have pinned her to the wall—if there had been one around. “You know better than that.”

Yes, she did. She was just desperate. And really, really annoyed. With both tires for being flat and with herself for not noticing that the spare had slowly lost its air. And most of all, right now she was annoyed with Joe for pointing it out.

Hands fisted at her waist, Mona swung one booted foot at the right front tire and kicked it.

“That’s not going to make it come back to life,” Joe commented.

She glared at him. “I know that.” The hood she had on provided next to no protection for her at this point and when it slid off her head, she didn’t bother to try to pull it back up. “Now what?”

The weather seemed to be getting more hostile by the moment. He turned so that the rain was at his back. Because he was taller, he provided a little shelter for her, as well.

He gave her options, although only one was really viable. “Well, I could call Mick and you could wait here for him to come with his tow truck—if you don’t wash away first. Or I could give you a ride into town and you could talk to Mick yourself, face-to-face.”

Mona was in no mood to share a car ride with him, even though she knew it was her best bet. “No third option, huh?”

“Sure.” Joe raised his voice again, competing with the increasing sound of the wind and the rain. “You could wait here for the tire spirits to come and perform the miracle of the reinflating tire.”

His expression was so serious that anyone not knowing Joe would have thought that he actually believed in the spirits he’d just invoked. But she had grown up witnessing displays of his deadpan sense of humor.

With a sigh, Mona resigned herself to her only real alternative. “I guess I’ll have to pick option number two.”

“Good choice,” he answered.

Turning on his heel, he started to lead the short distance back to his parked vehicle. It took him less than a minute to realize that Mona wasn’t following behind him. He stopped and looked over his shoulder. She was still next to her Jeep.

“Change your mind?”

Crawling into the rear of the vehicle, Mona hauled out a large suitcase. She had no choice but to set it down in the mud.

“No,” she told him, “I don’t want anyone making off with my clothes.” She didn’t bother looking at him as she leaned into the back and grabbed a second suitcase. This one, lodged behind the driver’s seat, proved to be less cooperative and she struggled to get it out of the vehicle.

Joe shook his head at the woman’s unadulterated stubbornness. He crossed back to her in a couple of long strides. Firmly taking hold of her shoulders for a second time, he moved her out of the way and easily pulled the large suitcase out. Instead of putting it down next to the first one, he held on to it, keeping it out of the mud.

Mona squared her shoulders. “I could have managed,” she protested.

Arguing with her served no purpose. “No one said you couldn’t,” he answered. Still holding one suitcase, he deliberately picked up the other with his free hand. “This it?” he asked. “Or are there more?”

She’d never been one to be careless with her hard-earned money, but she had accumulated a few things in the past eight years. “The rest are being shipped,” she told him.

Something small and hopeful zipped through him. He banked it down quickly, giving absolutely no indication of its momentary existence. Instead, he asked in what passed for a disinterested voice, “You moving back?”

She wanted to. But there were things she needed to work out. Not to mention that her brother had said he had other plans for her, plans that included having her move to a large city. She didn’t want to disappoint him, but Forever was really the only home she ever knew. The only place she’d ever felt she really belonged.

“For now,” she allowed.

Joe weighed her tone and made a judgment.

He was forced to raise his voice yet again as he walked to his vehicle. The wind grew louder, the rain more harsh. He felt as if his words were being snatched away even as he uttered them.

“Set your sights on somewhere else?” he asked.

She had nothing to carry but the shoulder bag that had seen her through both college and veterinarian school. Holding it tightly against her, Mona moved quickly to keep up. At this point, she wanted nothing more than to get out of the rain and curl up somewhere warm and dry. In lieu of that, Joe’s car would do.

“Not me,” she told Joe, then repeated the words when he looked at her quizzically. Satisfied he’d heard her, she added, “Rick.”

Reaching his vehicle, Joe loaded first one suitcase, then the other into the backseat. When he turned to look at Mona, she had already scrambled into the passenger seat in the front.

He opened the driver’s-side door and got in. “You want to explain that?”

Mona felt around for the seat belt. Finding it, she secured it around herself. “Rick—” She realized she was still yelling and lowered her voice. “Rick has high hopes that I’ll move to the big city, open an animal hospital and be a big success.”

“And you?” He put his key into the ignition, but didn’t turn it just yet. “What are your hopes?”

Mona ran her hands up and down her arms, trying not to shiver. It was unseasonably cold for spring.

“To get dry again,” she answered.

She glanced out the side window. The rain was getting worse, but that wasn’t what was bothering her. She heard a distant muffled roar and it was getting louder. That could only mean one thing. She turned toward Joe. Now wasn’t the time for any false bravado or stubborn ploys on her part. They had trouble.

“Joe—”

Joe turned the key and after a what seemed like an unnaturally long moment, the engine caught and turned over.

“Yeah, I know,” he answered. “Looks like we’re in for it.”

They both knew what he was talking about. “It” was Joe’s loose reference to the flash floods that they were periodically subjected to when Mother Nature decided to be too bountiful with her supply of rain and drenched the lands far too quickly to be of any actual benefit to anyone.

Mona twisted around in her seat, looking back at her vehicle. She knew she had no choice, but she really hated leaving it behind.

“My car,” she protested.

“We’ll find it once it stops raining,” Joe told her with an assurance that defied argument.

She turned back around and sat facing forward again. Mona watched as his car’s windshield wipers vainly battled the downpour, losing ground with every stroke they spasmodically made. To her dismay, the man beside her slowed down and began driving at a speed that would have brought shame to an arthritic turtle.

The fearless daredevil she’d once known would have laughed at the rain and gone full throttle into the storm.

But that boy was gone now and in his place was a cautious man who thought things through.

She knew that any faster and they risked driving off the road and landing in a ditch.