She jumped around quickly sometimes when she had info or needed info.
“Fire away.”
“Has Felix been vaccinated? I can’t believe I didn’t ask this before.”
“Uh. No?”
“Is that a question?” Faith chuckled.
“It was me admitting that we’ve never vaccinated him but also asking if we should have. He wandered out of the woods and we, well, we,” she hated to admit that they hadn’t done what they should have done for him. Or that they didn’t know any better. “I should have called someone. I can’t believe we didn’t give him shots.”
“Relax. It’s not the end of the world. We’ll give him a round when he gets here and keep him quarantined until we’re sure he’s ready to meet the herd. It’ll be fine. I just needed to know what we were up against, and now I can have the guys prepare a place to hold him.”
Clove dropped her head back and groaned. “Not another holding pen. He’s going crazy as it is.”
There was a pause before Faith blew out her lips. “Listen, I don’t want to be the one to bear bad news, especially at Christmas, but things aren’t moving along as well as Anna thought they would.”
Clove gripped the phone. “Just tell me.”
Caleb said something in the background.
“I’m going to put you on speakerphone so we can all talk. Can you grab Drake?” asked Faith.
Drake put down the sledgehammer–the very one she’d used to sort of pound the dent in the trailer back out. He put his hand on the small of her back and she leaned against him. The move was so natural, so strengthening, that they could have been doing it their whole lives instead of for the last two days.
She felt like she’d known him for a lot longer than that and trusted him in a way she’d not known possible. The thing that sealed the deal for her was that he never left her behind, unless she insisted on staying with Grandma.
Poor Grandma. She’d slept a lot these last couple of days. Clove needed to have a heart-to-heart with her and lift her spirits, but there was so much to do to get ready to leave, so many questions to ask and updates from Anna and Abner that she fell into bed at night and was asleep in seconds.
Not even a half hour to dream about her wrangler and his wonderful arms holding her tight.
“Drake?” asked Caleb.
“I’m here.” Drake’s deep voice went right through her whole body and down to her toes. “What’s the holdup?”
“This whole thing has turned into a political mess with our governor and Mayor Winston. The bottom line is that you guys may be there for a couple of weeks.”
“Weeks?!” Clove yelled. She cringed at herself for screaming into the phone. “Felix’s feelings aside, if we stay here for weeks, I’m going to lose it.”
Drake ran his hand up and down her back. She closed her eyes and concentrated on the feeling of it, the light pressure, and the soothing motion.
“Caleb, come on man–you gotta do better than that.” Drake kissed her hair. The man had horrible aim! Could he not find her mouth, or was he playing coy?
She fought the urge to grab the front of his jacket and lay one on him. While she was a woman who knew what she wanted—--and could build it with her own two hands, thank you very much—she didn’t want a wimp. She wanted someone who would fight for her, slay dragons and all that. Yes, it was terribly archaic thinking, but she couldn’t help but feel like she was worth a slayed dragon or two.
So far, Drake had taken on a mayor and a sheriff. He’d earned that kiss a dozen times over, so why didn’t he kiss her?!
“We’re working every angle. Mitzi even posted that video of Felix.Hoffman’svoicemail is full of requests to let Felix go. We’re getting messages from people who say they can’t even get through to give him a piece of their minds. He smarted up and stopped answering his phone.”
“How can he not answer calls?” Clove groaned. “He’s a police officer.”
“Maybe he changed his number,” offered Faith.
Clove and Drake exchange a look that said: it’s possible.
“We should be ready to roll out of town in less than an hour. I’ll call you then, hoping for good news.” Drake hugged her close and then let her go.
Clove said goodbye to Faith and Caleb and hung up. She tucked her phone in her back pocket. She walked slowly over to where Caleb pounded on the steel once again. After watching him for a couple of minutes, he finally put down the hammer. He glanced at her and then double-taked to make full eye contact. “What?”
