The Rancher's Family Thanksgiving Read online

  Mr. Rooney turned back to Tyler. “If that’s what you want to do, then yes, we agree. How soon can you move him?”

  “Right away.”

  Father and son turned and headed for the ranch house.

  Tyler got on his cell phone. He called his brothers Teddy and Trevor and his father, who brought his two teenage brothers, Kyle and Kurt, and several uncles. Within thirty minutes they had a horse trailer and equine stretcher and enough McCabe men to move the tranquilized horse with the immobilized leg back to Healing Meadow.

  Once back at the hospital barn, Tyler and his vet techs worked to x-ray and set the broken leg bone. They rigged the stallion with an immobilizing harness that lifted him a foot off the ground, hence keeping all the pressure off the injured leg.

  Finally, it was just Susie and Tyler.

  “You should really go on home,” Tyler said, noting it was nearly three in the morning. Susie still looked great. Her hair was mussed, her amber eyes rimmed with fatigue. But like the Energizer Bunny, she kept right on going. What amazed him even more, was his reaction to her presence. He’d been really glad she was with him tonight. It had helped, having her nearby.

  Susie edged closer, a comforting smile tugging at the corners of her lips. “Are you going to sleep in the hospital barn tonight?” Susie asked softly.

  Tyler nodded. Weariness settled in him, weighting his limbs. He rubbed at the tense muscles at the back of his neck. “Catastrophe’ll probably sleep most of the night, but I want to be around in case there are any problems. My regular vet techs can take over in the morning.” Tyler walked her as far as the barn doors. Outside, a black cat could be seen near the corner, lapping from a saucer of milk. When the cat saw the two of them, it disappeared off into the night once again.

  Tyler turned back to Susie. He took her hand, squeezed it fondly. Wanting her to know how much she meant to him, he looked into her eyes. “Thanks for staying.”

  Susie flushed and dropped her head shyly. “I didn’t do much.”

  Realizing he was still holding her hand, and didn’t want to let it go, Tyler reminded himself the two of them weren’t dating, no matter how intimate this evening had felt. He forced himself to untangle their fingers, step back. He shoved his hands in the pockets of his vet scrubs. “You made coffee and sandwiches for the men.”

  Susie compressed her lips. Unhappiness permeated her low tone. “I had to do something to keep myself from going back over to the Rooney ranch and punching both father and son out.”

  Tyler nodded. “I had a little trouble controlling myself, too.”

  Susie sighed, shook her head. “How do you stand it?”

  Aware she’d hit on the worst part of his job, Tyler stepped out into the silent November night and shrugged. “It goes with the territory. Kindness and concern can sometimes be in short supply, especially when it comes to animals.”

  Susie’s blond hair gleamed in the circle of light around the barn. “But to treat a beautiful stallion like Catastrophe as if he were completely expendable…” Her voice caught. She couldn’t go on.

  “It happens.” More often than Tyler liked to admit. He was just glad he had been there to stop it. Although, had it been any of the partners in his veterinary practice, he was certain they would have reacted the same way he had.

  Susie ran her index finger and thumb beneath her eyes. “Catastrophe is lucky he has you.”

  “And you, from the looks of it.”

  Unaware it was all he could do to keep from taking her in his arms and holding her close, Susie took a deep breath, shoved her hands in the pockets of her skirt. She looked in the direction Catastrophe was quartered, then back at Tyler. The edge of her teeth worried her soft bottom lip. “What will happen to him once he’s well?” she asked.

  Tyler relaxed. This much, at least, was already figured out. “I’ll give him to my brother Teddy. He can use him as a stud on his horse ranch.”

  Just that quickly, Tyler saw the invisible force field going up around her emotions.

  Even as he admired the inner toughness and tenacity that had helped Susie survive all life’s hardships, he wished she would lean on him a little more. Wished she would let him in…instead of allowing him only so close, and no closer….

  Tyler studied the new sheen of moisture in her eyes. Maybe he should have taken her in his arms and held her close. “Are you going to be okay?” He was used to veterinary emergencies. She wasn’t. Maybe this evening’s events had been more traumatic for her than she had let on.

  Susie mustered up a smile, all easy grace once again. She shoved her hands through her hair. “Just tired. Speaking of which…tomorrow’s a workday.” She turned and headed for her pickup truck. “I really better go on home.”

  “I DON’T GET WHAT YOU’RE SO upset about,” Amy told Susie the next morning as the two of them unloaded flats of autumn flowers from the flatbed truck used to transport Amy’s product.

  “So Tyler plans to give Catastrophe to his brother Teddy, to use in his horse-breeding operation? Why is that bad?”

  Why indeed? Susie wondered, stopping to admire the quality of the chrysanthemums Amy had grown on her ranch.

  Looking like a petite blonde pixie, with her short, cropped blond hair, Amy pushed a full cart into the store. Susie followed suit.

  “He does it all the time, doesn’t he, with animals that come to his practice that—for whatever reason—no longer have a home.”

  Susie began stacking items on empty shelving next to the Thanksgiving wreaths. She thought back to the emotional events of the evening before.

  “I guess last night was the first time I actually saw him interacting with one of those animals.” Susie turned to her most sentimental sibling, knowing if anyone would understand her concern, it was Amy. “Tyler seemed to really feel something for Catastrophe. Something special. And then, once the crisis was passed, and everything was cool again, he just…turned it off.”

  Amy lifted a thoughtful brow. “Like he does with you?”

  Susie flushed. “Excuse me?”

  Finding it impossible to stand still a moment longer, she pushed her empty cart back out to the truck.

  Amy helped Susie unload decorative gourds and pumpkins from the truck. “You and Tyler both seem to have on-off switches for each other. Maybe that’s what is really bothering you.”

  Susie filled her cart, then rolled it over to the front of the store. “You’ve been watching too much Dr. Phil on TV.”

  Amy grinned, guilty as charged. “I learn a lot from that show.”

  “Such as?” Susie lined up the gourds in a neat row.

  Amy concentrated on arranging the pumpkins in a welcoming display of autumn bounty and only when she’d finished, turned and put a gloved hand on her hip. Her dark brown eyes were serious. “We all need a soft place to fall, Suze. For years now, Tyler’s been your soft place to fall. And I get that. I see the way he is whenever you’re having a rough time. And vice versa. What I don’t get is why in between the challenging times of your lives, the two of you barely hang out.”

  Was it getting hot outside or what? Susie wondered.

  Ignoring her baby sister’s probing gaze, she returned to the flatbed. “We don’t hang out all the time because Tyler and I are not like you and Teddy. Best friends forever and all that.”

  Amy rolled her cart up onto the truck, toward the back, for easier loading. “Then what are you?”

  “Crisis buddies.”

  “Hmm.”

  “What does that mean?” Susie demanded, beginning to feel downright irritable.

  Amy regarded Susie steadily. “It means maybe Mom and Dad are right,” she said quietly. “Maybe it’s finally time you started asking for more out of life than just surviving.”

  Emotion welled up inside Susie. Before she could stop herself, the resentment, long withheld, came pouring out. “You only think that way because you’ve never really had to battle for your life.”

  Amy looked so stricken, Susie fe
lt ashamed.

  She clapped a hand to her mouth. Tears welled. “Oh, Amy, forget I said that. I didn’t mean it. I swear.”

  “No.” Amy’s voice was thick, emotional. Looking as though she might cry, too, she swallowed hard and got it together. “You’re right. I haven’t been through what you have.” There was a little hitch in her voice. Teardrops fell over her lashes. “But I went through another kind of hell, watching you fight for your life, knowing there wasn’t much of anything I could do except stand by and wait and watch and pray that everything would turn out all right eventually, which it did. In that sense, at least, you had it easy because you could do something to influence the outcome. You could fight for your life!”

  “You’re right of course. I—I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s gotten into me lately.” She was feeling all tied up in knots.

  Amy hugged her fiercely. “Don’t be sorry. Just try really living for a change. And you can do it by giving those dates that Mom and Dad arranged for you a real chance.”

  Susie stepped back with a defiant sniff. “Hey.” She thumped her chest. “I’ve met the first two.”

  Amy gave her a knowing glance. “And promptly discarded them, the second with Tyler McCabe’s help.”

  Susie rolled her eyes and went back to loading plants. “Like you won’t do the same when you’re up for five fix-ups, courtesy of the folks.”

  Amy released a wistful sigh. “At this point, with me fast approaching thirty, and no husband and baby in sight,” she admitted with a pragmatic wink, “I’m beginning to think the more the merrier when it comes to meeting potential soul mates. Although I haven’t given up finding that special someone all on my own. The difference between me and you and Jeremy is that I am actively looking, and in fact, have never stopped.”

  Susie wasn’t surprised about that. Amy always had been an incurable romantic, and would already be married with three kids by now if she had only met “The One.” “Well, you’ll be happy to know I’m seeing my second ‘arranged introduction’ for the second time later this evening,” Susie reported.

  Amy perked up. “It went that well, hmm?”

  “Let’s just say Gary Hecht and I had more in common than I expected.” Gary loved numbers, and there were times when such a deep understanding of statistics and probability came in handy. But Amy didn’t know Susie’s intentions with her suitor and her expression said Amy was already planning Susie’s wedding….

  “What about the others?” Amy asked.

  “My meet and greet with Bachelor Number Three is this afternoon. That’s going to be a real date this time, not just thirty minutes of conversation.”

  Amy recoiled in shock. “How did that happen?” she demanded.

  Susie smiled. “Let’s just say Hal Albert called this morning and made me an offer I can’t refuse.”

  “OF COURSE I’LL TAKE Catastrophe off your hands when the cast comes off and he’s ready for physical therapy,” Teddy said, when he and Tyler talked in Tyler’s office later that day.

  Although Tyler specialized in large animals, he also cared for house pets when his partners in the practice were overbooked or out of town. Today was one of those days. And though normally Tyler didn’t mind working in the vet clinic instead of the pasture or barn, today was one of those days when he felt really hemmed in, stuck inside a building.

  Today, he’d rather be outside.

  With Susie…

  Whatever that meant.

  Aware his brother was looking at him curiously, Tyler forced his mind back to the injured horse. “It’ll be another six weeks or so before we can move him to the Silverado, depending on how fast Catastrophe heals.”

  Teddy had been in the horse-breeding business long enough to expect that would be the case. “Sure you don’t want to keep him yourself?” Teddy asked casually.

  Why did everyone keep asking him that? Tyler wondered irritably, as he led the way back to the rear of the building, where his next patient awaited. “If I wanted to keep him for myself, I wouldn’t have just asked you if you wanted him,” Tyler told Teddy in exasperation.

  “Okay.” Teddy surrendered with a lift of his palms. He watched as Tyler greeted a stray puppy that had been brought in earlier in the day and removed him from the holding cage where he’d been put, until attention could be paid. “You don’t have to bite my head off.”

  “Sorry.” Tyler started his exam. From the looks of the skeletal mutt, she had been dumped in the countryside and left to fend for herself.

  Fortunately, the terrier-beagle mix had a really cute face and a winning personality and had already been claimed by the office receptionist’s sister, who had just lost her border collie to old age.

  “So what’s really bothering you—if not the horse?” Teddy persisted.

  Tyler turned his attention to a thorn in the dog’s paw. Motioning to Teddy to hold the pup’s lower half still, he steadied her chest and injured paw with one hand, and removed the thorn with a pair of tweezers. The paw looked red and angry where the thorn had been. Tyler applied an antiseptic-antiobiotic-numbing spray, then took a closer look at the wound. It seemed to require no other care for the moment. “What makes you think anything’s bothering me?”

  “Perhaps the fact you’re grouchy as all get-out.”

  Tyler turned his attention to the pup’s ears, which looked as if they had half a ton of dirt in them. “I didn’t have a lot of sleep last night.”

  “I’ve seen you without sleep before.” Teddy leaned against the wall. “You usually handle it a lot better.”

  Tyler batted his lashes in a parody of a Southern belle. “Keep up the compliments and you’ll give me a swelled head.”

  “Which has me wondering,” Teddy continued with a knowing grin while Tyler cleaned the mutt’s ears, “if this foul mood of yours has something to do with Susie Carrigan.”

  Finished, Tyler reached into the cabinet to get the first of several vaccinations the pup needed.

  “What about Susie?” Tyler asked casually, giving the pup her shots.

  Teddy shrugged. “I thought it might be hard for you, seeing her dating like there’s no tomorrow.”

  Tyler went to the cupboard and retrieved a can of puppy food with nutritional supplements. He popped it open, dumped it onto a small paper plate and set it down on the floor next to the mutt. “First of all, there is no reason for me to object if Susie Carrigan wants to go out with guys other than me. We’re the kind of buddies who help each other out in emergencies. That’s all.”

  Teddy looked skeptical. “If you say so.”

  Tyler sure as hell did. “Second of all,” he continued, aggravation increasing. “What the devil are you talking about?”

  “Susie’s got two dates today.”

  Irritated Susie hadn’t mentioned either to him, but pleased she was dispensing with the potential boyfriends so quickly and efficiently, Tyler shrugged. “I imagine she wants to get the introductions over with so Meg and Luke will stop nagging her about settling down.”

  Teddy scoffed. “That wasn’t the impression I had. In fact, Amy told me Susie was really excited about meeting Hal Albert at the Laramie Airfield.”

  THE ADVANTAGE OF BEING a McCabe in Laramie, Texas, meant there was no shortage of family. Tyler had relatives in every type of business in the area, including the airstrip.

  Luckily for him, his cousin Will McCabe was working in the office of his charter jet service, instead of out flying a client to another destination.

  Married after years of being single, the forty-two-year-old ex-navy pilot was the poster boy for happy family man.

  Will greeted Tyler with a hug and a slap on the back. “What brings you out here?”

  Curiosity. “I was in the neighborhood and thought I’d drop by and see what’s going on out here.”

  Will smiled. “That sudden urge to say howdy wouldn’t have anything to do with Susie Carrigan, now would it?”

  Tyler accepted Will’s offer of a seat. “She’s here?
“

  “Not anymore.” Will walked over to the printer, spewing out pages. “She left with Hal Albert.”

  “I don’t think I know him.”

  Will grabbed a stack of papers out of the tray and headed back to his desk. “Hal’s a skydiving instructor in San Angelo. He’s looking into opening a school out here, if he can get enough interest.”

  If the McCabes and the Carrigans thought highly of Hal Albert, he had to be a nice guy. That did not in any way explain the jealousy roiling around in Tyler’s gut. “Did Hal say where they were headed?”

  Will nodded and pointed to the sky.

  Okay, so Hal had taken Susie up in a plane.

  That was no reason to wig out.

  Tyler pretended an ease he could not begin to feel. “They seem to be hitting it off?” he asked casually.

  Will shrugged. “No clue. All I can tell you is that Susie took off with Hal in his private plane a few hours ago and I haven’t seen them since.”

  Which could mean they’d flown off to another destination. Or had engine trouble. Or were just flat-out having such a good time they weren’t going to come back to the airstrip anytime soon.

  None of the notions appealed to Tyler. “Do you know when they’ll be back?” Tyler asked.

  Will shook his head. “Neither Susie nor Hal left an estimated time of arrival with me.”

  Tyler frowned, knowing even as Will spoke that this was none of his business. As Susie had pointed out to him recently, he was not her chaperone. She’d call him if and when she needed him. When she didn’t, it was his job to bow out like the Texas gentleman he was.

  So why was that just about the hardest thing he had ever done?

  Will gave Tyler a long, considering look. “Want me to leave her a message from you?”

  Tyler exhaled, slowly and deliberately. “No. That’s okay. I’ve got to get going anyway.” He stood up and left.

  “JEALOUS,” SUSIE REPEATED TO Will McCabe, an hour later.

  Will waved at Hal Albert, who was already taxiing his small private plane back to the end of the airstrip for takeoff.