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She didn’t know what that meant.
He claimed that he had lost his head for a time, that in the end, it had caused him quite a lot of pain.
Charity couldn’t imagine ever losing her head over a romance. What she had was better.
What would it be like to move away? To start a whole new life?
“Well, I don’t like it,” Ed said, snapping her back to the moment. “I’m going to see how he goes overnight and...”
“I advise against that,” she said, but the words got stuck in her throat and sounded strangled.
“Young lady, I’m going to do what seems right to me. You forget I’ve got age and experience. Wisdom.”
You forget that I have a degree in veterinary medicine. But she didn’t say that last part out loud. As much as she wanted to.
“I have to make sure you know, Ed,” she said, “that this is not a wise decision. It’s going to put the animal in danger and I—”
“You just want to make more money. Line your pockets.”
“If I wanted to line my pockets I’d do something other than be a veterinarian in a town that’s so small I can count the local families on two hands.”
“You think you’re smarter than me because you went to school, but experience—”
“No, that isn’t it, but Idoknow...”
“I have fifty years’ experience ranching. You’re making a mountain out of a molehill and involving yourself where I didn’t ask you to. Now, thanks for the vitamins, but it’s time for you to head out.”
She felt helpless. Angry. What could she do if someone like him didn’t listen? She was afraid the animal was in the early stages of colic, but he wasn’t her animal.
But thiswasher...job. She knew what she was doing. And this man wouldn’t listen.
She wasn’t going to convince him to, either.
She ground her teeth together, trying to hold back the growl of anger building inside her. “Please call me if his condition doesn’t improve.”
She got back in the big mobile veterinary vehicle and wrapped both hands around the steering wheel, sighing loudly. Then she hit the steering wheel for good measure, the palm of her hand stinging.
Sometimes she wondered if she should start wearing suits. If maybe her dresses undermined her.
But it shouldn’t. It didn’t matter if she dressed feminine or not. She was qualified to do her job. She needed... Maybe that was what she needed.
She had been thinking about Lachlan’s desire to be reformed. Maybesheneeded to be reformed. Oh, not in the same way that he did. Not in the sense that she was heathenous or problematic in some way.
But she was maybe a bit too soft. Lacking in confidence. And if there was one thing that Lachlan McCloud had, it was a surplus of confidence.
Neither of them had ever sought to change the other. He seemed to like her just as she was, in the way that she enjoyed how they were different. They amused each other; they filled something in each other’s lives they didn’t get anywhere else.
But he was asking her to help him change. Maybe she needed something similar. Maybe what she needed was a dose of his particular brand of swagger.
She tapped her finger on the steering wheel and considered that as she drove the short distance over to McCloud’s Landing.
There he was, out working a horse, holding the lead rope in one hand, and his other—the one with the giant gash—was held down at his side. His muscles flexed with the movement. The sun was low in the sky now, flooding the arena with golden light, catching the brim of his cowboy hat, illuminating the mane and tail of the animal as she ran circles around him.
The idea of leaving here made her feel physically ill. Her stomach lurched at the thought, rebelled. All of her did.
She got out of the truck and scrambled over to him. “I’m ready for inoculations,” she said.
She had her kit slung over her shoulder, held firmly down at her side.
