Veterinarian's Vixen (Culpepper Cowboys Book 8) Page 9

  “Will she be okay?” Nancy asked.

  “Yeah,” Doc grunted. “Just like you will be.”

  With a final thwap, the port-a-potty door shuddered and listed open. Nancy caught sight of Doc standing through the sliver of light that seeped through the crack. Then the door swung open all the way.

  She lunged out into the clean, fresh air. Doc swept her into his arms for a hug, and she hugged him back…for all of three seconds. Then she pushed away, staggering to get as far away from the potty and into a patch of clean, non-stinky shade under a tree. She leaned against the tree, gasping for air, seriously concerned that she might hurl for a second.

  “You’re safe.” Doc exhaled with as much relief as Nancy felt and more. He followed her to the shade, then asked, “Are you okay?”

  With fresh air and shade around her at last, the creeping sense of ick was waning. Nancy nodded and stood straighter. Now that her stomach was settling, belated prickles of panic raced down her arms and into her hands. She paced in a quick circle, shaking out her hands and cleaning her lungs with a few deep breaths. “Oh, that’s so much better.”

  Evidently satisfied that she really was okay, Doc stepped into the path of her pacing and swept her into his arms. “I was so worried,” he confessed, voice low and husky.

  “Me too.” At last, tears formed in her eyes. Part of her wanted to hold them back, but another part figured that crying was just one more way to expel any lingering grossness from the port-a-potty. She let the tears rip.

  “Hey, you’re okay.” Doc brushed his fingertips over her cheeks, wiping away the tears as they fell.

  Nancy laughed. “I know, I just feel so disgusting right now.”

  “You are anything but disgusting.” Doc laughed along with her.

  “Right. I must stink.” She tried to pry herself out of Doc’s arms, for his sake.

  He tugged her closer. Not only that, he clasped his hands on either side of her head and leaned in to steal a long, deep kiss. It was the kind of kiss that Nancy had dreamed of—slow and savory. She closed her eyes and sighed with the beauty of it, loving the taste of him as he teased his tongue along hers. It was perfect—even if she was sweaty and stinky and miserable.

  “Stop, stop,” she laughed, taking a definitive step back. “I’m way too nasty for you to kiss on right now.”

  “You will never be too nasty for me to kiss,” Doc promised her. The fiery light in his eyes was proof of his words.

  “Ha!” She shook her head, scrubbing her hands down her arms as if that would get rid of some of the taint. “Only a man in love would say that.”

  She was joking, but when Doc replied with, “I do love you,” her heart splatted against her ribs.

  “You what?” She froze, forgetting the ick, forgetting the miserable jerk who had caused it all, forgetting her own name, even.

  “I love you, Nancy Tilson,” Doc declared.

  Regardless of the crowd beginning to disperse from the track behind them, of the curious onlookers pretending they weren’t highly interested in the drama unfolding under the tree, of Chris standing a few yards away, grinning, Doc dropped to one knee.

  “I love you,” he said for the third time. “That’s all I know and all I need to know. I don’t need time to think or get to know you better or anything. Thoughts are pointless when your heart knows what it wants, and I feel like I already know you like I know my own soul.”

  “Oh, Doc,” she breathed, unable to think of any other words.

  He reached for her hand. “Nancy, we seem to have a tradition here in Culpepper of getting married as fast as lightning. Would you do me the honor of helping me to uphold town standards and marry me?”

  In spite of everything that had just happened, in spite of the lingering stench, Nancy laughed and pressed her free hand to her mouth. “Of course I’ll marry you, Elmer.”

  Doc chuckled and shook his head, then stood and scooped her into his arms. “Good.”

  He kissed her soundly. Nancy’s heart rose higher than the mountains, higher than the clouds. She threw her heart and soul into kissing him back. They must have set the world record for shortest amount of time dating. It couldn’t have been more than two hours tops, and there had been an entire pseudo-hostage situation and a horse race in the middle of that.

  With those thoughts, Nancy’s bubble of bliss burst.

  “Stu,” she hissed, leaning back in Doc’s arms.

  Doc must have been right there on the same page with her. “He’s not going to get away with this,” he growled.

  He let Nancy go, then took her hand. Chris fell in behind them, grabbing Booyah’s reins and leading him, as they marched back toward the racetrack. The crowd might have been breaking up, but there was still a cluster of people and horses around the finish line. As Nancy approached, she spotted Stu arguing with Sly and Karlan. Arch was standing nearby, along with Jesse and Valerie Savoy, Chastity, and half the rest of Culpepper, or so it seemed.

  “I won!” Stu was shouting. “It wasn’t even close. Everyone here will tell you that I pulled ahead in the final stretch!”

  “From where I was standing, Doc was ahead by a nose,” Karlan said, arms crossed, jaw clenched.

  “I’m investing in photo-finish equipment for next year,” Sly grumbled, “but it looked to me like Doc won it.”

  “That’s nepotism!” Stu shouted. “You’re only saying that because Doc is your brother. I demand that he be disqualified for conflict of interest.”

  To Nancy’s side, Doc tensed. He pulled himself up to his full height as he marched into the argument. Several people who were watching stepped aside to let him through.

  Stu’s eyes went wide with fury as Doc burst into the scene. “There’s the coward now. I want him disqualified.”

  “Coward?” Nancy barked. “You want to talk about cowardice? What kind of coward locks a woman in a port-a-potty just so he can distract her boyfriend—correction, her fiancé—from a race?”

  The bystanders gasped and exclaimed wordlessly, some looking excited by the declaration that Nancy and Doc were engaged, others furiously over the port-a-potty. Sly’s mouth twitched to a grin. Stu’s eyes looked like they might pop out of his head.

  “That’s just a smokescreen,” he shouted. “You’re trying to distract the judges with a fake engagement.”

  “There’s nothing fake about the way I feel for Nancy,” Doc growled, possessive and accusatory. “I can’t say the same for you and every dirty trick you’ve tried to pull since you got here.”

  “What?” Stu shouted in mock offense.

  “You’re a liar and a cheat.” Nancy stepped forward to accuse him.

  Stu glared at her, then appealed to Sly and Karlan. “She’s only saying that because I fired her this morning. It’s retribution, pure and simple.”

  “You are a cheat, though.” Honor stepped out from behind some of the people that had gathered to watch the fireworks, Angus right behind her. She was flushed and sweaty, as if she and Angus had been running, and carried a backpack.

  “How dare you accuse me of cheating?” Stu rounded on her. “I don’t even know who you are.”

  “Cheating aside,” Doc took a step closer to his brother, “that man locked Nancy in a port-a-potty. She could have been seriously injured.” He pivoted to glare at Stu. “Like Jesse and Valerie’s horse.”

  “She’s going to be okay,” Valerie interrupted, “but Ryan says it’ll be a tricky recovery.”

  “What kind of man deliberately injures a horse, then traps a woman in a port-a-potty?” Jesse added his accusation to the growing pile.

  “Not this one,” Stu snapped. His eyes darted around him at the mounting number of crossed arms and dubious frowns. “I didn’t do anything. You can’t prove anything.”

  “You locked me in that port-a-potty.” Nancy took a step closer to him. “You threatened me.”

  “Prove it.” Stu crossed his arms, but it was a weak and unconvincing gesture.

  “I d
on’t need to prove it. I’m telling you it’s true.”

  “And I say that you’re making it up because I fired you,” Stu insisted.

  “Yeah? Then who shoved that piece of wood into the door to jam it shut?” Nancy wasn’t about to back down.

  “I don’t know.” Stu shrugged. “Could have been anybody.”

  “But it was you,” Nancy insisted.

  “Yeah? Like I said, prove it.” He whipped to face Jesse and Valerie. “Prove I did anything to your horse.”

  “You want proof?” Doc took a step toward Stu, balling his hand into a fist.

  Stu flinched and stumbled back, ramming into Arch. Arch held him, preventing him from running away altogether.

  “How about this for proof?” Honor said, voice raised.

  All eyes turned to her. She held up the backpack. It was monogrammed with the initials “DS.” Once everyone saw that, she zipped open the top, reaching in and pulling out a short mallet with a rubber head. The watching crowd gasped. She handed the mallet off to Angus, then reached in again and pulled out three or four long, thick nails.

  Doc’s jaw hardened and his arms and back bunched with visible tension under his shirt. “Those are the same kinds of nails I pulled out of Roxie’s hoof.”

  “And there are splinters in this mallet,” Angus added.

  “That still doesn’t prove anything,” Stu said in a panic. “Those things were planted in there. How do you even know that’s my backpack?”

  Honor reached in again and pulled out a wallet. She opened it to reveal Stu’s driver’s license tucked into a clear plastic sleeve.

  “You planted it there,” he spit, eyes wild with desperation. “This is all a set-up.”

  “Somebody call Officer Pinkston to arrest this loser,” Karlan hollered over the heads of the onlookers. A few of them dashed off.

  “What?” Stu struggled in Arch’s hold. “You can’t arrest me. You have no evidence.”

  “I’d say we have plenty of evidence right here.” Honor held the bag up once more.

  “And if that fails,” Sly said. “I’m sure the footage from the CCTV will show what really happened.”

  “CCTV?” Stu went completely limp.

  As far as Nancy was concerned, that was a confession. Or at least as close to one as they were going to get for now.

  “Regardless of that,” Sly went on. “I think we have enough evidence to disqualify you from the race at the very least.”

  Stu’s mouth fell open, but all the fight had gone out of him. He didn’t even protest.

  “That means that Doc here is the clear winner,” Sly finished.

  Nancy gasped and swung to face Doc. “You won?”

  A bashful smile replaced all of the strain and stress on Doc’s face. “Yeah. Did I forget to mention that?”

  She beamed at him, ready to throw herself into his arms. “But I heard the race end. And then you were right there at the port-a-potty. If you won, wouldn’t you do a victory lap or something?”

  Sly laughed. “He kept right on racing. Zipped clean out of the racetrack and went looking for you.”

  Nancy turned from Sly to Doc. “You did?”

  “Of course,” Doc answered, rubbing the back of his neck and looking modest. “I said I love you, didn’t I?”

  “You did?” Arch asked, still holding Stu up. “How come I’ve never met this girl?”

  “Long story,” Sly answered.

  “Nope,” Doc corrected him. “Short story. Boy meets girl. Boy falls for girl. Boy and girl get married.”

  In two steps, he crossed to her, lifting Nancy clean off her feet and kissing her soundly. Nancy didn’t care who was there to watch. As far as she was concerned, life couldn’t have been any better. Girl meets boy. Girl and boy have misunderstanding. Misunderstanding gets cleared up. And they all live happily ever after.

  10

  One week later…

  Culpepper’s church was packed to capacity with locals and out-of-town guests. One week might not have been much time to throw a wedding together, but anyone with livestock or horses—from Haskell all the way across to Everland—who knew or had worked with Doc got word that it was happening and showed up. The gossip that Doc was going to marry the cute, little reporter who had popped into town back in early spring, and then again for the Fourth of July, spread like wildfire, and everyone and their brother wanted to be there for the ceremony.

  “I didn’t even know there were this many people in Wyoming,” Nancy whispered in awe as she stood at the back of the chapel with Faith, her matron-of-honor.

  “Wow.” Faith whistled as she scanned the standing-room-only crowd. A moment later, she burst into a giggling snort. “Brother Anthony is going to have a fit.

  Faith was more right than Nancy wanted to think about. At the front of the chapel, Doc stood and stepped to the end of the aisle, Sly and Arch with him. The organist—Brother Anthony’s wife, Lovie—saw that as her cue, and a moment later, began to play the wedding march.

  Nancy’s heart flipped over in her chest a few times as Faith squeezed her arm, gave her a good luck kiss on the cheek, then started down the aisle. It would have been nice if some of Nancy’s own family would have been there for the ceremony, but when she’d emailed her mom to let her know about the wedding, all she’d gotten was a curt message that walking away from the family meant she wasn’t a part of it anymore. It hurt, but then again, since coming to Culpepper she’d found a whole new family.

  Once Faith reached the front of the chapel, Nancy took a deep breath and began her wedding march. A flurry of ‘oohs’ and ‘aahs’ met her as she paraded down the aisle in the wedding dress she’d borrowed from Grace. Linda had tailored it in a jiffy, and it fit like a dream. Nancy smiled and mouthed “Thank you” for Linda—who was seated next to Roy the electrician—as she passed.

  And then she was standing at the front of the chapel, turning to face Doc. He looked so handsome in his tuxedo that it took Nancy’s breath away. He was clean-shaven and smelled so good she could have taken a bite out of him right there in front of everyone. His dark hair had been trimmed and was slicked back like a cover model. But it was the sparkle and delight in his eyes that had Nancy shivering from head-to-toe. Gosh, how she loved him!

  The organist stopped…and there was silence.

  And more silence.

  Nancy blinked her way out of her rapture and glanced around. Doc lost his smile as he did the same. He turned to Sly and Arch—both of whom shrugged—then glanced to his twin sister, Elvie, sitting in the first row. Nancy had met Elvie a few days before when she flew in on short notice, especially for the wedding. She was stunningly pretty and tall, but she didn’t look like she had a clue what was going on either.

  Brother Anthony was nowhere to be seen.

  Lovie twisted on the organ’s seat. “Tony!” she hissed toward the door at the corner of the room. “Get out here.”

  A second later, the gray top of Brother Anthony’s head poked around the doorway. His wide, blue eyes took in the full chapel, and he darted back into the room.

  “Tony!” Lovie hissed again.

  “There’s people out there, Lovie,” Brother Anthony called back.

  Lovie got up from the organ and marched to the door. “Of course there’s people here. It’s a wedding.”

  She crossed through the doorway, and a few seconds later walked out again, dragging her husband behind her. The congregation was as understanding as could be, smiling and nodding in encouragement. One townsperson whispered, “Come on, Brother Anthony! You can do it!”

  Others took up the whispered encouragement. A few steps later, Brother Anthony straightened and blinked. He glanced from the sea of smiling faces looking on, to Nancy and Doc, front and center at the end of the aisle.

  “Well, I’ll be.” Brother Anthony stood straighter and spoke louder. “I reckon I can do this.”

  He let go of Lovie’s arm and strutted on to take his place before Nancy and Doc.

&nb
sp; “Morning, Brother Anthony.” Doc grinned and thumped Brother Anthony on the arm. “Glad you could join us.”

  “Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Brother Anthony replied. “I love weddings. Who’s getting married today?”

  “We are,” Nancy told him, trying hard to keep a straight face.

  Brother Anthony’s eyes went wider. “Well, I’ll be! It’s the port-a-potty girl!”

  Nancy winced. She could laugh about it now, since no harm had come to anyone. Stu had ended up confessing as soon as he saw the jig was up. He was currently sitting in the Sweetwater County Jail awaiting a trial on several charges. And now Nancy was standing across from the man of her dreams, about to become his wife.

  “It’s Nancy,” Doc corrected Brother Anthony, as forcefully as he could while still being kind to the scatterbrained preacher. “Nancy Tilson.”

  “Oh, that’s right.” He chuckled to himself. “And of course, I could never forget your name, eh, Elmer?”

  Doc’s expression went flat and he rolled his eyes. “You forget everyone’s name in town, but remember mine?” he muttered.

  Brother Anthony waved a hand. “You can’t exactly forget a name like that.” His gaze drifted past Doc to Sly. “Or a name like S—”

  “Stop.” Sly held up a hand.

  Brother Anthony laughed and winked. “Right. We’ll save that until you’re up here standing next to your own girlie. Say, are you hooked up with anyone yet?”

  “Nope,” Sly answered. “And I plan to stay that way.”

  “Right,” Brother Anthony drawled, tapping a finger to the side of his nose. “Anyhow, it’s about time we got these two handsome young people hitched, right folks?”

  “Right,” the congregation called back.

  “Well, there you go.” He nodded and straightened, tugging at the bottom of his suit coat. His proud grin faltered. “Now where’s my Bible?”

  To the side, Lovie sighed and skittered to the pulpit at one side of the room. She fetched a Bible, then ran it out to where Brother Anthony waited.