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Cowboy Vet
Pamela Britton
Reviewers and readers Love Pamela Britton!
“NASCAR fan or not, let In the Groove drive you to distraction.”
—Romantic Times BOOKclub (4 stars)
“A fairy tale that succeeds.”
—Publishers Weekly on Scandal
“This is the kind of book that romance fans will read and reread on gloomy days.”
—Publishers Weekly on Tempted
“Passion and humor are a potent combination…author Pamela Britton comes up with the perfect blend.”
—Oakland Press
“This nonstop read has it all—sizzling sexuality, unforgettable characters, poignancy, a delightful plot and a well-crafted backdrop.”
—Romantic Times BOOKclub (Top Pick) on Tempted
“It isn’t easy to write a tale that makes the reader laugh and cry, but Britton succeeds, thanks to her great characters.”
—Booklist (starred review) on Seduced
Dear Reader,
When I was in my teens, my friends and I had a huge crush on the large-animal vet who used to work on our horses. We would tease one another about calling the vet when our horses “sneezed” (actually just horse snorts) or when our horses needed their annual vaccinations (why couldn’t we vaccinate them more frequently?). When that vet’s truck pulled into the stable yard, we’d get as giddy as schoolgirls. Actually, I think we really were schoolgirls.
My hero in Cowboy Vet is nothing like the object of my childhood affection. (Okay, so my nose just grew a few inches.) Rand Sheppard is a culmination of all the vets who’ve worked on my horses over the years—yes, even the female veterinarians. To me, there’s nothing more heroic than the men and women who stay up late at night tending to sick animals. This book is a tribute to each and every one of them.
I hope you enjoy Cowboy Vet. If you’re in the mood to chat, feel free to drop me a line at www.pamelabritton.com. I love hearing from readers.
Pamela Britton
Cowboy Vet
Pamela Britton
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
PAMELA BRITTON never inflicted her early, unpublished works on friends or family. Instead she passed her books to the wives of famous race-car drivers and crew chiefs. Fortunately, the response was overwhelmingly positive, so she took the plunge and submitted them. Seven publishing contracts later, Pamela’s work has been voted the best of the best by Barnes & Noble, the Detroit Free Press and Romantic Times BOOKclub. Recently one of Pamela’s novels, Scandal, outsold J. K. Rowling—for two whole days.
You can visit Pamela on her wacky Web site, www.pamelabritton.com (http://www.pamelabritton.com), or snail-mail her c/o P.O. Box 1281, Anderson, CA 96007.
This one’s for all the real-life veterinarians out there who’ve helped me with my animals over the years. You’re all the best.
Books by Pamela Britton
MILLS & BOON AMERICAN ROMANCE
985—COWBOY LESSONS
1040—COWBOY TROUBLE
1122—COWBOY M.D.
HQN BOOKS
DANGEROUS CURVES
IN THE GROOVE
Contents
Chapter One (#u354879aa-3926-54e0-b480-327e323b4413)
Chapter Two (#uf6ee596b-a9f7-59ec-8483-908e3dad00eb)
Chapter Three (#u9a97b514-89b0-58d8-9b41-d14773579868)
Chapter Four (#u5c5c8cbb-9041-563c-97f6-19d7ecfb21d9)
Chapter Five (#uf876ead5-a42a-5aee-a172-9d8ddad478fe)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-One (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Two (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Three (#litres_trial_promo)
Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One
“Well, well, well. If it isn’t Jessie the Jezebel.”
Jessie Monroe stared down at the man who’d spoken, a row of windows to the right perfectly illuminating his handsome, scowling face. The glass coffeepot she held tipped dangerously toward his lap.
“Well, well, well,” she mimicked. Her least favorite customer. “If it isn’t Dr. Dolittle.”
The restaurant seemed to grow quiet around them, everyone in the tiny diner no doubt listening in. Not surprising, since everyone supposedly “knew” what it was she’d “done” to Dr. Dolittle’s cousin.
Dr. Sheppard leaned back, the orange vinyl squeaking in a way that sounded crass. He didn’t seem to notice. “You going to pour me that cup of coffee or do I have to get it myself?”
She shifted her weight to her other leg, slowly lowering the pot, the liquid glug-glug-glugging as she poured. “Guess that answers your question, huh, Doc?”
“Guess it does.” He gave her a smile that could only be called smug as he peered at her from beneath his black cowboy hat.
“I’ll be back in a minute to take your order,” she said in a monotone, turning away from his booth without giving him another glance. Damn the man. Not only did he think he was God’s gift to women, but he always, always took pleasure in baiting her. His own form of revenge, she supposed.
“You and Dr. Cutie are exchanging evil glances again, I see,” Mavis said, her dark skin glistening beneath one of the warming lights as she picked up four plates of food and balanced them precariously up her arms. It was late spring, but you wouldn’t know it. The diner didn’t have air-conditioning.
Jessie looked over at the table. “I think he likes me about as much as I like him.”
“Well, then, I guess it’s a good thing you don’t have a crush on him like half the women in this town.”
“Guess so,” Jessie said. In fact, she was probably the only woman who didn’t fancy the good doctor. Not that she didn’t understand his allure. She might not like him, but she was honest enough to admit that something in his eyes made her want to squirm.
Tall, dark and handsome he was, the term cliché and yet somehow appropriate. He looked like he belonged out on the range with a few hundred head of cattle milling nearby. There was nothing, absolutely nothing guaranteed to melt female hearts faster than a man who wore boots and who doctored furry little animals for a living.
“You gonna go back over and take his order, or shall I?” Mavis asked.
Jessie smiled. Leave it to Mavis to try to run interference. The two of them had formed a fast friendship the first day Jessie had come to work at the diner. They’d bonded over their mutual dislike of the pink polyester dresses they were forced to wear.
“No thanks, Mavis. I can handle Rand Sheppard.”
“Can you?” the man himself asked when she walked up to him a second later, order book in hand.
Jessie turned as red as the blinking Open sign, or at least it felt that way.
Damn it, she hadn’t meant him to hear. Or maybe she had. Her feelings always ran hot and cold where he was concerned. All that smirking self-confidence drove her nuts.
“Dr. Sheppard, I hate to bruise that overlarge ego of yours, but I’ve eaten men like you for breakfast.”
“Yeah,” he said softly. “So I’ve heard.” He looked back at his menu. “I’ll take the Rancher’s Special with a side of bacon and English muffins.”
“English muffins?” she said with a lift of her eyebrows. “Would you like some Earl Grey with that?”
“Nope. Just the muffins,” he answered gruffly, back to his usual surly self.
“Coming right up.” She tucked her pencil behind her ear, much easier to do ever since she’d chopped off all her red hair. “Rancher’s Special with a side of bacon and English muffins,” Jessie called out, slipping the order sheet into the spinner, then flicking it toward Frank. “Extra arsenic,” she muttered under her breath.
But as she moved about the Kleenex box-shaped diner, she couldn’t stop herself from glancing in Rand Sheppard’s direction. It seemed every unmarried woman in town had set her cap for him—and failed to win him. And while Jessie knew better than to form a crush on the man, a part of her still wished he’d treat her as kindly as he treated everybody else. But that would never happen, she thought, watching as a man from the Diamond W slid into the booth across from Rand. Jessie had one of the worst reputations in town, one that had started when she’d—supposedly—ruined Rand’s cousin’s life.
“She only lasted two days,” she heard Rand say, over the clinking of dishes and silverware. “Shortest vet tech career at Sheppard Veterinary.”
Vet tech? He’d hired a new vet tech? What had happened to Sandy Anders, his old one? The woman was an icon at Sheppard Veterinary, almost as much a fixture as the ancient wagon wheels that guarded the clinic’s gate.
“So what are you going to do?” she heard the wrangler—Pete, she thought his name was—ask. Jessie picked up a hot plate while straining to listen. “You need help.”
“I know,” Rand answered.
She set the plate down in front of Hank, the smell of cooked bell peppers and cheese wafting up to her.
“Can I have some salt?” Hank was one of her regulars, a crusty old cowboy with a beat-up straw hat.
Jessie handed him the sugar.
“I said salt, Jessie.” He tapped the scarred white laminate turned yellow with age.
She blinked. “Oh, yeah. Sure, Hank. Salt. Sorry.”
She grabbed one of the forty salt-and-pepper sets on the bar beside the old-fashioned pie display, all the while listening in.
“You going to run another ad?” Pete asked.
“Guess I’ll have to. But I don’t hold out much hope of finding someone soon. You know how it is. Five hundred people want to work with animals, but only a few are qualified. Then they find out we’re out in the sticks and, well…”
They didn’t want to commute from the city. Jessie knew how it was. For three years she’d done the opposite commute from Los Molinos to the city—the nearby Bay Area. It’d taken her three years of night school and days of working in the diner, but she’d gotten her degree in animal science.
What Rand Sheppard didn’t know was that she, Jessie the Jezebel, was a certified veterinary technician.
And she was about to ask Rand Sheppard for a job.
