Eleanor Jones - The Country Vet

Donald pulled over outside the vet clinic, leaving his engine running. “Oh, Bill will get there,” he insisted. “Jake, now, I’m not so sure about. Anyway, thanks for your company, but out you get. I’m late as it is. You’ll have to come and have dinner with us one night. Meet the brood. I’ll get Jenny to give you a call.”

Cass got out of the vehicle, glancing back inside before she slammed the door. “Thanks, Donald,” she said. “I’d like that.”

Somehow it felt as if she’d just made a friend.

CHAPTER THREE

TODD WAS IN the surgery going through some paperwork. He looked up when he heard Cass come into the room, peering impatiently at her over his glasses.

“How did it go?”

She shrugged. “I knew how it would go. The poor little pony was in a bad state.”

He went back to his work, leaning forward over the desk.

“Well, that’s good then. Oh, and Mary Park is in the waiting room. Would you mind having a look at her dog? She doesn’t have an appointment but she’s a bit upset, says someone ran him over.”

“Of course,” Cass said, pulling on a white coat and pushing open the door into Reception.

The woman sat on a chair that was too small for her large frame. A bright-eyed Yorkshire terrier she clutched wriggled in her arms.

“Mrs. Park, is it?” Cass asked with her best professional smile, pushing all thoughts of Jake Munro and his tragedy out of her head. “What can I do for you?”

“Mary,” she said, struggling to her feet. “Call me Mary. It’s Poppy here. He ran into the road in front of a car...”

“Well let’s go into the examining room and I’ll check him out,” Cass suggested, already leading the way.

After a thorough examination of Poppy, Cass looked up at his worried owner with a broad grin.

“Well, Mary, you’ll be pleased to know there’s absolutely nothing to worry about. He has a scuff on his shoulder, that’s all, and he may be feeling a bit bruised.”

The woman’s round, pleasant face contorted into an expression of pained relief. “But are you sure?”

Cass picked up the little dog, settling him in his mistress’s outstretched arms.

“One hundred per cent. Now don’t let him run out into the road again. He might not be so lucky next time.”

Todd appeared just as they were leaving the examining room.

“I’m glad that Poppy seems to be okay,” he said.

“You’ve taken on a good vet this time Todd,” Mary told him. “She’s sorted my Poppy out good and proper.”

“Glad to hear it.” He held the front door to let her out.

“There wasn’t actually anything wrong with him,” Cass admitted as it shut behind them.

Todd grinned. “You’ll soon get to know Poppy—he’s one of our most regular visitors. Oh, and...” He paused. “I know you aren’t really supposed to be on surgery, but I’m afraid I have to pop out, so would you mind? There’s a bit of a line building up, I’m afraid.”

* * *

BY LUNCHTIME CASS had seen two cats with fur balls and one with a ripped ear, an elderly, bedraggled hamster, five more dogs and a parrot that was pulling out its feathers.

I can really identify with that parrot, she thought as she started to tidy up. Suddenly a sit-down and a coffee seemed very appealing. She was about ready to leave when Sally, the receptionist, popped her head around the door.

“You have a visitor,” she said. “And he doesn’t seem to have a pet.”

Cass frowned. Whoever would be visiting her at the clinic? She didn’t even know anyone around here yet.

Sally hesitated.

“I’ll send him in, shall I?”

“He?” Cass echoed as Sally’s perfectly made-up face disappeared again. Could it be Jake Munro coming to apologize, perhaps? Fat chance of that. Cass’s mind wandered back to the moment when she first saw him, and something tightened in her throat. He had seemed... What, she asked herself, what had he seemed?

“We meet again,” said a familiar voice, and Cass looked up in surprise to meet...not quite the icy blue eyes that kept haunting her thoughts, but something very similar.

“Bill,” her visitor announced, holding out his hand. “Munro. Remember, from Sky View,” he added, as she stood with her mouth open.

“Of course.” She placed her hand in his calloused palm. “How could I ever forget? What can I do for you?”

“Well, it’s really more what I can do for you.”

“For me?”

He nodded. “Yes... You said you needed somewhere to rent, and I have a vacant cottage. It’s small, but it’s a pretty little place and quite enough space for one.” His bushy gray brows drew together. “I take it there is only one?”

Cass laughed. “Oh, yes, just me, I’m afraid. I have enough trouble trying to sort myself out.”

“So what do you say? I was about to put it in the hands of a rental agency, but if you need somewhere...”

“Well, I do, but what about your son? He and I didn’t get off to the best start. I don’t think he would appreciate me living nearby.”

“Jake?” snorted Bill. “It has nothing to do with him. The cottages are how I make my income, and I’ll rent them to whoever I like. Anyway...” His face creased in a smile. “It’s not as if it’s right on the doorstep of Sky View. More like just around the corner.”

Cass felt happiness bubbling up inside. She belonged somewhere at last. “Well, then, I would love to come and see it,” she said. “After work today, perhaps? I don’t have a shift tonight, and for once I’m not even on call.”

“Any time is okay by me,” Bill said. “Say around seven?”

“See you at seven,” she agreed. “Just tell me where to go.”

* * *

IT WAS A BRIGHT, sunlit evening, the kind where the whole world seems abuzz with joy. Cass felt some of that joy as she drove toward Sky View. She had a good job, a job she could really come to love, and now she might even have a new home. Not a shared flat, but her very own place, here in some of the most beautiful countryside she’d ever seen.

The wind blew in through her open window and she breathed in the country scents as she left the village, humming softly to the strains of a modern love song. Love! It was totally overrated as far as she was concerned. Her fellow students had been constantly falling in and out of love, one minute wandering around with their heads in a euphoric cloud and in the next, totally inconsolable.

Sometimes Cass worried that there was something wrong with her because she’d never really fallen for anyone. There had been boyfriends, of course, but they’d been kind of lukewarm relationships, more friendships than love affairs. Her mind wandered back to the day Jamie had told her it was over. She had been seeing him for almost six months, but when he finally plucked up the courage to tell her he had met someone else, all she’d felt was a sense of relief.

Her only real passion had been the same since she was twelve years old—the passion to become a vet that had arisen on the day Bud died in her arms. Everything else had taken second place since that day, as if she’d been driven by the desire to make amends for her lack of knowledge.... And now that she’d fulfilled her goal, now that she had the opportunity to stop and reflect, love and romance still didn’t figure in her scheme of things.

Her parents had lived to work, with little time to spare for their child. Cass felt she had inherited that drive from them, as if her ambition overrode everything else. She couldn’t picture herself having the time to give a husband and children the attention they needed. She’d once thought that when she was finally qualified as a vet, she’d be able to slow down and start a family. But now that she’d finished school and begun her career, she wanted to push herself further. Beyond honing her skills, she wanted to specialize in equestrian medicine and become highly respected for her expertise. Did that make her selfish? she wondered. Surely it would be worse to have a family and neglect them.