Cattleman's Courtship (3 page)

Images flickered in her mind. Uncle Alan wheezing as he lifted a box. His unusually high color.

Though he only worked part-time, Cara knew he’d been under stress lately. The practice had been extremely busy and Alan was called more often to fill in on the large animal work.

Another vet, Gordon Moen, was supposed to be coming to help out, but he wasn’t arriving for another three weeks.

Too late for Uncle Alan.

The stone in her chest shifted and tears thickened her throat.

Please, Lord, don’t take him away, too. You already took my mother, please spare him.

Then she caught herself.

God didn’t listen to prayers. How many had she sent up that her mother would come back to her? Would put her first in her life?

Had God listened when she prayed Nicholas would choose her over his work? Over his ranch?

Sometimes she wondered if her prayers were selfish but she believed that anyone else in her situation would want the same things.

Aunt Lori always said God moved in mysterious ways. Well, they were certainly mysterious to Cara.

Cara rolled her head slightly, chancing a glance at Nicholas, who had stayed at the hospital. The knot of his tie hung below his open collar of his rumpled shirt. She couldn’t help the hitch of her heart at the sight. He looked more approachable now, more like the Nicholas she remembered.

As if aware of her scrutiny, he glanced back at her. And again their gazes locked. He turned, then walked back in her direction.

He sat down in the empty chair beside her, resting his elbows on his knees. “How are you doing?” he asked.

The deep timbre of his voice still made her heart sing. Still swept away her natural reserve. “I’m okay.”

He frowned, as if dissatisfied with her reply. But what else could she say? She felt especially vulnerable now and if she said more, she would start to cry. She needed to maintain what dignity she could. To stay aloof, calm and in control. Nothing had changed in his life and she couldn’t put herself through that emotional wringer once again.

“Here’s your aunt,” he said suddenly, standing up.

Lori came down the hallway, clutching her purse. A nurse walked beside her, talking in hushed tones. As they came closer Cara heard snatches of the conversation.

“He’ll be on the monitors for a couple of days…good pulse…healthy man…”

Lori nodded, but Cara knew she wasn’t absorbing all this.

Cara got up, stretching her tired muscles, and walked toward her aunt.

“How is he?” Cara knew the question was superfluous but she had to ask.

Her aunt shook her head. “He looks so awful with all those things attached to him. You don’t want to see him yet.”

But Cara needed to.

“Can I see him?” she asked the nurse.

“You two can go in,” she said, gesturing at Cara. “But only for a minute. We don’t want to tire him out.”

Cara realized with a start the nurse had included Nicholas in the invitation. She was about to correct her, when the nurse turned, her shoes squeaking on the gleaming floor.

Cara didn’t look back to see if Nicholas was coming, but as she followed the nurse, she could hear his measured tread behind her, slightly slower than her own.

The nurse motioned for Cara to come closer. “You’ve got two minutes then I’ll come and get you.” She smiled at Cara, then past her. Cara could tell the moment her smile connected with Nicholas. Nicholas always had that effect on women, she thought dully, pushing aside the curtain around her uncle’s bed, her fingers trembling.

She stepped forward, then faltered at the sight before her.

Her uncle, a large, strapping man, lay on the bed, his face still obscured by the oxygen mask. Lines attached to circular pads snaked out to a machine beeping out a regular rhythm. His arms lay beside him, bare except for a blood-pressure cuff attached to a machine. Two IVs ran out from his arms.

He looked like death.

Cara pressed her hand to her mouth, stopping the faint cry of dismay, her knees buckling beneath her.

She would have fallen, but strong arms caught her from behind. Held her. Just for those few seconds she allowed herself to drift back against Nicholas’s comforting strength, thankful for his presence.

We fit so well,
Cara thought, letting him support her. His touch, his smell, his warmth felt so familiar it created an ache deep in her chest.

Then, when she caught her balance, his hands settled on her waist, held a moment and then gently pushed her away.

As if he couldn’t stand to touch her any longer than he had to.

Cara disguised the pain of his withdrawal by catching her uncle’s hand and clinging it to it, hoping he would pull through this emergency. She stayed by her uncle’s side a moment longer, then turned away.

“I want to…go,” she said to Nicholas.

Aunt Lori sat huddled in the hard plastic chair, her hands kneading each other. As Cara came closer, her head came up. “Is he awake?”

Cara shook her head.

“He was working too hard.” Aunt Lori’s voice sounded so small. So wounded.

Cara stifled the flicker of guilt her aunt’s innocent comment created. It wasn’t her fault, she reminded herself. Even if she had stayed behind and worked at the clinic as her uncle had always envisioned, Alan Morrison wouldn’t have slowed down. Wouldn’t have done less.

“We should go home,” Cara said quietly, taking her aunt’s arm in hers.

“Can we come back tonight?”

“Of course we can. But you should go home and rest a bit before we do.” Cara took her aunt’s arm and, as they walked to the door, she leaned heavily on Cara.

The air outside smelled fresh, new. The sun shone down with a benevolent spring warmth, but Cara couldn’t stop the chill shivering down her spine.

“My truck is parked over here,” Nicholas said, stepping ahead of them to lead the way.

Cara acknowledged his comment with a nod, following him more slowly, holding her aunt up.

“I made him eat his vegetables. I made him go for walks,” Aunt Lori was saying, clutching Cara’s arm. “I took good care of him.”

“Of course you did,” Cara said quietly, her attention split between her aunt and the man who strode in front of them, leading the way to his truck.

He opened the door and Cara felt a jolt of dismay. The cab had one bench seat with a fold-down console.

Which meant her aunt would be sitting by the window and Cara…right beside Nicholas.

She helped her aunt into the truck, then had to walk around to Nicholas’s side. She began to get in slowly, wishing she’d worn sensible shoes instead of high heels made for walking short distances, not climbing running boards of pickup trucks.

She faltered as she stepped up and Nicholas caught her, his hand on her elbow. She tried to ignore his touch, wished her heart didn’t jump at his nearness.

She settled on the seat beside her aunt, and buckled herself in. Nicholas got in and Cara’s senses heightened.

“Can you move over a bit,” Aunt Lori asked, nudging Cara with her elbow. “I’m feeling claustrophobic.”

Cara shifted as much as she dared. No matter what, though, she sat too close to Nicholas. She felt the warmth of his arm through the sleeve of her sweater and the scent of his cologne drew up older memories of other trips in this truck. Trips when she didn’t mind sitting as close to him as she was now and often tried to sit even closer.

That’s over,
she thought.

The trip back to Cochrane was quiet, broken only by the hum of the tires on the pavement, the intermittent noise of the fan sending cooling air over the truck’s occupants.

Cara kept her arms folded over her purse and tried, like her aunt did, to keep her eyes fixed on the road rolling past them.

But she couldn’t stop her awareness of the man sitting next to her. Each curve in the road and each bump in the pavement brought the two of them in contact with each other.

“Did the doctor say anything about what might have caused the heart attack?” Nicholas asked, breaking the heavy silence.

Cara took a breath. “He told me his cholesterol levels were high. And I imagine the stress of working added to that.”

“Did they say how serious it was?”

“A heart attack is serious. Period,” Aunt Lori said in a tone that didn’t encourage any further discussion.

A heavy silence followed her remark. Cara wished she dared turn the radio on. She wished she and her aunt could share casual conversation. Anything to keep the picture of her uncle falling down the stairs out of her mind.

Anything to keep her from being so sensitive to Nicholas’s presence.

The beginnings of a headache pinched her temples and by the time Nicholas pulled up to her aunt and uncle’s home, Cara felt as if a vise gripped her forehead.

“Thanks for all your help,” Aunt Lori said, leaning past Cara to give Nicholas a worn smile. Then she stepped out of the truck and headed up the walk to the house.

Cara slid over and from a safer distance risked a glance at Nicholas.

He draped one arm over the steering wheel, his other across the back of the seat, bringing his fingertips inches from her shoulder.

“Thanks for the ride and for all the help,” Cara said. “I’m so glad you could bring Aunt Lori to the hospital.”

Nicholas didn’t say anything, his eyes holding hers. “Are you going to be okay?” His voice sounded cool, as if he were asking a mere acquaintance.

Cara shrugged and slipped her purse over her arm. “I don’t know.”

Quiet fell again and Cara didn’t have anything more to say. So she slipped out of the truck and trudged up the sidewalk. But before she got to the house, she couldn’t help a glance back over her shoulder.

Nicholas was watching her.

She took a chance and lifted her hand in a small wave, but he started his truck and drove away.

Cara closed her hand and pressed it to her chest, surprised at the jab of hurt.

Did you expect him to come running down the walk, pull you into his arms and beg you to give him another chance? Did you really think he was pining for you the whole time you were gone? He doesn’t care for you anymore.

The words mocked her, and she turned and entered the house.

Aunt Lori sat in her usual chair in the kitchen, her arms wrapped around her midsection.

“Do you want some tea?” Cara asked, walking to the stove.

Aunt Lori nodded.

While she waited for the water to boil, Cara joined her aunt, glancing around the papers piled up on the room table, the dishes scattered over the kitchen counter. She wished she had the energy to start cleaning.

Her aunt was not a housekeeper. She always joked that she preferred to paint walls than wash them and she could always afford to get someone to do it for her.

Though she missed her aunt and uncle, she didn’t miss the mess either in the house or her uncle’s vet clinic. Her mother wasn’t much different and at times Cara wondered if she really was a Morrison. Every time she came back to her aunt and uncle’s place, either from university or visiting, she spent the first few days tidying up.

However, in spite of the chaos, Uncle Alan and Aunt Lori’s home had been Cara’s most stable home since Audra Morrison dropped Cara off at their place. Audra had assumed Cara was old enough to be without her while she followed her conscience and went to work overseas.

Cara still remembered the grim voice of her uncle, trying to plead with his sister, Cara’s mother, to think of Cara.

Her mother’s reply still rang in her ears. Cara had been raised with more privileges than any of the children she left to help. She didn’t need her mother as much as these destitute young orphans in Nicaragua.

And then she left. Aunt Lori had come upstairs and had sat beside Cara, not saying anything, simply holding her close, letting Cara’s tears drench the front of her shirt.

When Cara turned fifteen, everything changed. Cara’s mother was killed flying into the Congo to help yet another group of lost and broken children.

And Cara was alone.

Uncle Alan and Aunt Lori were named her guardians. They paid for all her expenses, bought her a car. Put her through vet school and Uncle Alan offered her a job when she was done.

She started working for her uncle, met Nicholas and she thought her life had finally come to the place she’d been yearning for since she was a young girl.

A home of her own. A family of her own.

And now, her uncle lay in a hospital bed and Nicholas was more removed from her than ever.

“How are you doing?” Cara asked, reaching over and covering her aunt’s icy hands with hers.

“I’m tired. And I’m scared.” Lori looked up at Cara. “Will you pray with me?”

Cara was taken momentarily aback. How could her aunt talk about praying after what had just happened? What good would it do?

But she wasn’t about to take what little comfort her aunt might derive from praying, away from her.