“You guys here for supplies?” I ask, trying to sound normal and not like I’m mentally replaying our last night together in high definition.
“Calving season prep,” Wyatt confirms. “Dad’s convinced we’re going to have a baby boom this year.”
“Based on what? Science? The Farmer’s Almanac? His horoscope?”
“Based on the way the bulls have been looking at the cows. He says they have ‘romantic energy’ this year.”
“That’s... not how biology works.”
“Try telling our dad that. He’s already picked out names for calves that don’t exist yet.”
“Bad move, naming your food,” I say.
He gives me the kind of nod that says, “the man’s gonna do what he wants.”
We’re all standing there grinning like idiots when the church secretary walks by with her dog, literally on his last legs. She has a doggie wheelchair for him that he propels with his front paws.
“McCoys. Thompson.” She looks between us with the interest of someone who’s about to have the best gossip at bridge club. “Together. In broad daylight. How... progressive.”
“It’s a parking lot, Mrs. Delaney, not a speakeasy,” I tell her.
“These days, hard to tell the difference. Lots of things happening in parking lots that shouldn’t be happening.Very scandalous things.” She gives us a meaningful look that suggests she knows exactly what we’ve been up to, which is impossible. But on the other hand, this is Cedar Ridge where impossible could be just another day.
She continues inside, dragging her dog-on-wheels behind her, but not before giving us another look that promises this encounter will be discussed, analyzed, and speculated about at length.
“She knows,” Boone says immediately.
“She doesn’t know,” Jesse counters.
“She definitely knows,” I confirm. “She has that look. The one that says ‘I know things and I’m going to tell everyone.’”
“How would she know?” Wyatt asks, but he looks concerned.
“This is Cedar Ridge. The trees have eyes and the walls have Facebook accounts.”
We sigh and head to the clinic.
Once inside, chaos erupts because Rita doesn’t do anything halfway. The moment I relax my grip on her lead to sign the check-in form, just long enough to write my name, she’s on the counter investigating doggie treat jars like a detective at a crime scene.
“Rita, no?—”
Too late. She’s knocked over three jars, sending dog biscuits cascading across the floor. Every dog in the waiting room lunges forward. It’s like Black Friday at PetSmart. Pure pandemonium, and I have to keep from laughing. Boone, trying to help, steps on a rolling biscuit and goes down, arms windmilling. He takes out a display of flea medication on his way down. Boxes fly, andTommy’s roosters, sensing opportunity, escape their containers.
“Smooth,” Jesse observes, stepping carefully over his brother while a rooster investigates his boot.
“It’s not my fault,” Boone protests from the floor, a rooster now perched on his chest like a feathered conqueror. “And hey, I could have been seriously hurt.”
“By who? The biscuit fairy?”
“It’s possible. Very vengeful, that biscuit fairy.”
Wyatt’s already at the reception desk, automatically pulling out his wallet because that’s his role in their chaos trinity—Jesse causes it, Boone amplifies it, Wyatt pays for it. It’s like they have a system.
“Just... put it on our account,” he tells Brenda, the receptionist, who’s trying not to laugh.
“All of it?”
“Whatever ‘it’ encompasses, yes.”
