David found a box full of puppies under the tree! They’re freezing cold! They could be dying!” Christopher informed him desperately.
“We’re warming ’em up,” Annie said, indicating her and the hunters’ lumpy shirts. “About half of them are wriggling and we’ll know about the other half in a little bit. Meanwhile, we need to get some fluids and nourishment into them. They shouldn’t be off the tit this young. Infant formula and cereal would be ideal, but we can make due with some warm milk and watered-down oatmeal.”
“Formula?” Jack asked. “I bet I can manage that. You remember my wife, Mel. She’s the midwife. She’ll have some infant formula on hand.”
“That’s perfect. And if she has a little rice cereal or baby oatmeal, better still.”
“Do we need bottles?” he asked.
“Nah,” Annie said. “A couple of shallow bowls will work. They’re young, but I bet they’re awful hungry. They’ll catch on real quick.”
“Whoa,” one of the hunters said. “Got me a wiggler!”
“Me, too!” the other one said.
“Keep ’em next to your body for a while,” Annie ordered. “At least until we get those warm towels in the box.”
* * *
Because of a box full of cold, hungry, barely moving puppies, Annie had all but forgotten the reason she’d ended up in Virgin River. It was three weeks till Christmas and her three older brothers, their wives and their kids would descend on her parents’ farm for the holiday. Today was one of her two days off a week from the beauty shop. Yesterday, Sunday, she’d baked with her mom all day and today she’d gotten up early to make a couple of big casseroles her mom could freeze for the holiday company. Today, she’d planned to cook with her mom, maybe take one of her two horses out for a ride and say hello to Erasmus, her blue-ribbon bull. Erasmus was very old now and every hello could be the last. Then she’d planned to stay for dinner with her folks, something she did at least once a week. Being the youngest and only unmarried one of the McKenzie kids and also the only one who lived nearby, the task of looking in on Mom and Dad fell to her.
But here she was, hearthside, managing a box of newborn puppies. Jack rustled up the formula and cereal and a couple of warm towels from the dryer. Preacher provided the shallow bowls and mixed up the formula. She and Chris fed a couple of puppies at a time, coaxing them to lap up the food. She requisitioned an eyedropper from the medical clinic across the street for the pups who didn’t catch on to lapping up dinner.
Jack put in a call to a fellow he knew who was a veterinarian, and it turned out Annie knew him, too. Old Doc Jensen had put in regular appearances out at the farm since before she was born. Back in her dad’s younger days, he’d kept a thriving but small dairy farm. Lots of cows, a few horses, dogs and cats, goats and one ornery old bull. Jensen was a large-animal vet, but he’d be able to at least check out these puppies.
Annie asked Jack to also give her mom a call and explain what was holding her up. Her mom would laugh, knowing her daughter so well. Nothing would pry Annie away from a box of needy newborn puppies.
As the dinner hour approached, she couldn’t help but notice that the puppies were drawing a crowd. People stopped by where she sat at the hearth, asked for the story, reached into the box to ruffle the soft fur or even pick up a puppy. Annie wasn’t sure so much handling was a good idea, but as long as she could keep the little kids, particularly David, from mishandling them, she felt she’d at least won the battle if not the war.
“This bar has needed mascots for a long time,” someone said.
“Eight of ’em. Donner, Prancer, Comet, Vixen, and...whoever.”
“Which one is Comet?” Chris asked. “Dad? Can I have Comet?”
“No. We operate an eating-and-drinking establishment,” Preacher said.
“Awww, Dad! Dad, come on. Please, Dad. I’ll do everything. I’ll sleep with him. I’ll make sure he’s nice. Please.”
“Christopher...”
“Please. Please? I never asked for anything before.”
“You ask for everything, as a matter of fact,” Preacher corrected him. “And get most of it.”
“Boy shouldn’t grow up without a dog,” someone said.
“Teaches responsibility and discipline,” was another comment.
“It’s not like he’d be in the kitchen all the time.”
“I run a ranch. Little hair in the potatoes never put me off.” Laughter sounded all around.
Four of the eight pups were doing real well; they were wriggling around with renewed strength and had lapped up some of the formula thickened with cereal. Two were trying to recover from what was certainly hunger and hypothermia; Annie managed to get a little food into them with an eyedropper. Two others were breathing, their hearts beating, but not only were they small, they were weak and listless. She dripped a little food into their tiny mouths and then tucked them under her shirt to keep them warm, hoping they might mistake her for their mother for now, all the time wondering if old Doc Jensen would ever show.
When yet another gust of wind blew in the opened front door, Annie momentarily forgot all about the puppies. Some of the best male eye candy she’d chanced upon in a long while had just walked into Jack’s Bar. He looked vaguely familiar, too. She wondered if maybe she’d seen him in a movie or on TV or something. He walked right up to the bar, and Jack greeted him enthusiastically.
“Hey, Nate! How’s it going? You get those plane tickets yet?”
“I took care of that a long time ago.” He laughed. “I’ve been looking forward to this forever. Before too long I’m going to be lying on a Nassau beach in the middle of a hundred string bikinis. I dream about it.”
“One of those Club Med things?” Jack asked.
“Nah.” He laughed again. “A few people from school. I haven’t seen most of them in years. We hardly keep in touch, but one of them put this holiday together and, since I was available, it sounded like an excellent idea. The guy who made the arrangements got one of those all-inclusive hotel deals—food, drinks, everything included except activities like deep-sea fishing or scuba diving—for when I’m not just lying on the sand, looking around at beautiful women in tiny bathing suits.”
“Good for you,” Jack said. “Beer?”
“Don’t mind if I do,” Nate replied. And then, like the answer to a prayer she didn’t even know she’d uttered, he carried his beer right over to where she sat with the box of puppies. “Hello,” he said.
She swallowed, looking up. It was hard to tell how tall he was from her sitting position, but certainly over six feet. Annie noticed things like that because she was tall. His hair was dark brown; his eyes were an even darker brown and surrounded with loads of thick black lashes. Her mother called eyes like that “bedroom eyes.” He lifted his brows as he looked down at her. Then he smiled and revealed a dimple in one cheek.
“I said hello,” he repeated.
She
