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Ken Cartwright, who was steering him with a consoling hand on his shoulder, was more relaxed—although he must face this sort of situation fairly often in his professional life.
‘Well, that’s it. I’ve done all I can. I think you’d better take this guy home and give him a stiff whiskey.’
He thought alcohol the best way to handle grief? Kate’s heart swelled in her chest.
‘Oh, Drake,’ she said helplessly, sharing his misery, ‘I’m so sorry. Your beautiful dog!’ She burst into tears and threw her compassionate arms around his neck, burying her wet face in his chest.
His arms came up to clamp around her shaking body, his strong, encircling arms almost muffling out the sound of the vet’s next words.
‘Beautiful? She surely can’t be talking about Prince—his ugly mug would win the booby prize at Crufts!’
Kate stiffened, her head bumping Drake’s chin, unable to believe her ears. She could feel the chest under her wet cheek silently vibrating…oh, God, was he actually crying?
She turned her head and gave the grinning Ken Cartwright B.V.Sc. a blistering look.
‘You call yourself a vet? What kind of thing is that to say to a man who’s just lost his dog?’
‘Prince is lost? Are those tears of relief?’ Ken grinned over her angry head at Drake. ‘You should be so lucky!’
Kate’s jaw dropped. ‘Someone should report you to the—to the—’
‘The place where people report vets for making really bad jokes?’ he supplied. ‘I’m sorry, Kate. But it looks like Drake is going to have that ugly mug around for the foreseeable future.’
‘You mean he’s still alive?’ She jerked her head back to look up into Drake’s face through tangled wet lashes.
‘He’s more than OK. He’s perfect.’ The smile he was wearing was even bigger than Ken’s. It hadn’t been dammed-up grief, but fierce relief that he had been fighting to control when he’d walked out!
‘Is he?’ she sought professional confirmation from the man she had been vilifying only seconds ago.
‘A bouncing box of birds.’
Kate blinked at his cheerful alliteration and pulled her hands from Drake’s neck to swipe the wetness from her cheeks. ‘But there was b
lood—’
‘Rubbed a bit of skin off his nose, that’s all.’
‘I felt the bump, I felt the car go over him—’
‘No sign of any crushing, or marks on his coat. Are you sure it wasn’t something else you ran over?’
‘No…at least, there were some rocks along the side of the driveway…’ she faltered, remembering how the steering wheel had seemed to jump out of her hands when she had swerved to try and avoid the dog ‘…but he was lying there up against the tyre, whimpering and whining—’
‘Yes, fancies himself a bit of a Hollywood star, does our Prince. Wouldn’t surprise me if you gave him a bit of a nudge and he decided to fall over and ham it up. For all he’s skittish he likes attention, especially from a tasty woman.’ He winked.
‘He travelled all the way here with his head buried in her lap,’ said Drake drily.
‘Lucky dog!’ chuckled Ken, making Kate pinken. ‘Here I thought he was some kind of giant schnauzer-cross and he turns out to be a ladies’ lap-dog. ‘Nuff said!’
Kate suddenly realised she was still snuggled up against Drake, her stomach pressing into the buckle of his jeans, her breasts squashed into the narrow space between their upper bodies. She wedged her elbows against his chest and shoved herself out of his entangling arms—with difficulty because he seemed reluctant to cooperate. Probably because he knew what she was going to say.
‘You knew I thought he was dead! And you were laughing at me!’ she shouted.
‘Not at you, sweetheart—with you,’ protested Drake, acknowledging his utter defencelessness to the charge.
‘You insensitive pig!’ She scrubbed again at her cheeks to make sure all trace of her sympathy was gone. Unfortunately, so were her chances of appearing aloof in her displeasure. ‘You and that—that…scrofulous hound deserve each other. I bet he was laughing at me too,’ she said, remembering the lolling tongue.
‘Is she always so volatile?’ asked Ken.
