Big Chance Cowboy

by Teri Anne Stanley

  Dad harrumphed. “I doubt it. Every time I’ve gone there to research a title or a deed, the file was conveniently burned in the Great Courthouse Fire or the Even Greater Sprinkler Disaster.”

  “That’s what I was afraid of.”

  “You know, your mom and I used to go to Mill Creek to neck.”

  “Ew!” Lizzie clapped her hands over her ears, which she’d done every time he’d told her this her entire life.

  “What’s this about, anyway?” Dad asked.

  She took a deep breath. “I think we should turn that land into a proper park, a kind of combination nature preserve, walking trail, playground, and local history center thing.”

  He raised both eyebrows. “That’s a lot.”

  “I know. But it’s a big place, and I figure if there’s a lot to do there, more local organizations will be interested in supporting it. It would be a community thing and part of my new campaign to bring Big Chance back to life.”

  “You have a campaign?”

  She nodded. “I do now.”

  “What’s it called?”

  “Well, it’s not official or anything, but I guess it’s called ‘Bring Big Chance Back to Life.’”

  He laughed. “Well, I can see the school system supporting the nature preserve idea, if you make it kid-friendly, and the town council ought to like the idea of a playground. But the entire Big Chance Historical Society is Mrs. Wells, the librarian, and the library closed three years ago, so she has the time.”

  The library was out of business? Lizzie put that in her mental “fix after the park” file. “I thought maybe you could help with the history part.”

  His face creased with pleasure. “I can do some groundwork.” After a beat, he added dryly, “And I suppose Vanhook Realty could be another supporter.”

  She smiled innocently. “That’s a great idea. And maybe I can reel in Chance and Sons Construction and any other local businesses that aren’t going under.”

  Dad raised his brows. “Aren’t you somethin’, diving right into being a part of this town again.”

  “I think it was inevitable. But we have to find out who owns that land. If you don’t know, who should I try next?”

  “Have you run this by anyone from the town council yet? Like the mayor? Call Joe Chance. Kill two or three birds,” Dad suggested.

  “Did I hear you mention Joe Chance?” Mom asked, entering the room.

  “Yes,” Lizzie answered, flinching. Not a good idea to bring up the name of Big Chance’s most eligible widower in Mom’s earshot.

  “Such a nice boy,” Mom said.

  “Yep. He’s a good guy,” Lizzie said.

  “And such a sad story,” Mom went on, shaking her head, “losing his wife so young. He has to raise those two little girls on his own now.”

  Mom was right, it was a sad story. Joe and his college girlfriend-turned-wife had been pretty happy, apparently. They had another baby several years after the first. But the woman died in a car accident. Joe, who’d been driving, escaped unscathed—physically, anyway. He’d come home to Big Chance to live with his family, where he was a busy lawyer, and—possibly because no one else wanted the job—had just been elected mayor.

  “You know that the Hometown Independence Day celebration is coming up soon,” Mom added. Some might hear that as a non sequitur, but Lizzie knew Mom was about to tell her to seek out the tragically single Joe Chance at the party, draw him in with her womanly wiles, and become the next—hopefully less tragic—Mrs. Chance.

  Lizzie wasn’t interested. Joe had been nice in high school—and definitely not unappealing, with his all-American blond hair and blue eyes—but the image of a tall, dark-haired soldier crossed her mind and eclipsed Joe.

  Of course, with the way Adam had barely spoken to her in the days since their Dairy Queen chat, maybe she should aim her sights at Joe. Reliable, friendly Joe.

  Chapter 12

  Lizzie saw a familiar tricked-out Camaro in the parking lot of the veterinarian’s office when Emma pulled her battered SUV into a spot and turned off the engine.

  “What the heck is that thing?” Emma asked at the same time as Lizzie said, “Marcus is here!”

  Emma looked confused. “Who?”

  “Marcus. Talbott?” Lizzie reminded her.

  “He’s one-a them soldier friends of Adam’s,” Granddad supplied helpfully from the back seat.

  “How do you know that?” Emma turned and looked at Granddad.

  “I know everything,” he said. “Mrs. King spends all day on Facebook and that Insta-whatsits. She don’t even have to go out to the back fence to get her gossip anymore. Ain’t that a thing?”

  Lizzie saw Emma suppress a smile and nod in agreement. “That is something, Granddad. I don’t hear half as much in the Feed and Seed.”

  “That’s ’cause everyone goes over to that big place in Fredericksburg,” he said sagely.

  “God save us from Granddad and his ‘good’ days,” Emma muttered as they got out of the car.

  Lizzie thought the old man was pretty entertaining at the moment, but she also knew that his bad days were pretty darned bad, and he was a handful all the time.

  Emma took Granddad’s arm until he had his cane and both feet safely out of the car and steered him toward the entrance to the vet’s office. “Let’s go get these puppies,” she said, squinting at the painfully bright glare from Marcus’s white Camaro and raising her eyebrows at Lizzie in a What kind of redneck throwback is this guy? look.

  Boy, was Emma in for a surprise, Lizzie thought. Meanwhile, she wondered what Marcus was doing here. Hopefully, there wasn’t anything wrong with D-Day. If there was, surely Adam would have brought him here himself.

  “Real Estate Lady!” Lizzie heard as her eyes adjusted to the dimmer light inside the cool waiting room.

  “Marcus?” she asked. “What are you doing here?”

  “We found…a dog.” Jake’s halting voice came from behind a bedraggled golden retriever, which shook its head and tucked its nose into the crook of Jake’s neck.

  The women followed as Granddad stumped over to the bank of chairs to inspect the dog on Jake’s lap while Marcus stood to greet them. The dog wasn’t interested in making new friends and tried to crawl under Jake’s arm. “He’s scared,” Jake said.

  “Okay, we’ll give him a little space,” Lizzie said, backing up a step.

  After waving to the receptionist to make sure their arrival was noted, Lizzie provided introductions. She was shocked to see that Marcus’s Schmooze-Master persona was nowhere in sight as he held out his hand to Emma and said, “It’s nice to meet you,” and gave her an almost bewildered smile. Marcus wasn’t as tall as Adam or Jake, but he towered over Emma. He was built like a tank, and his dark skin and baby dreadlocks made an interesting contrast with Emma’s pale, edgy femininity.

  Much to his obvious disappointment, however, Emma barely gave him a glance and a two-millisecond handshake before moving on to greet Jake and the golden retriever.

  “What’s the deal with the dog?” Lizzie asked.

  Dragging his gaze away from Emma, Marcus regained his composure and grinned. “Well, it’s a funny story.”

  Jake ducked his head around the dog to look at Lizzie and shook his head.

  “Not funny?” she asked.

  Marcus rolled his eyes before sitting back down and putting a soothing hand on the dog’s back. “I meant funny-strange, not funny-haha.”

  Jake shrugged.

  Marcus said, “I went to get the mail, and this guy was sitting at the end of the driveway. Just sitting there next to the mailbox. I get up there and see someone tied him to the post.”

  “What?” Lizzie was stunned. “Why would someone just tie a dog to some stranger’s mailbox?”

  “I think they knew we’ve been taking in dogs. Decided to sen
d us one more. He’s good lookin’, huh?”

  Not really. Not only was the fur matted and filthy, but even through all the disgusting fur, it was clear the poor thing hadn’t had a full meal in a while.

  Emma, who’d been silent up to this point, said, “I bet Adam was thrilled.”

  Jake, once again invisible behind the dog, sighed.

  Marcus smiled sheepishly. “Adam doesn’t know yet. He had to, um, run some errands. We thought we’d bring him here, get him checked out, and see if he’s got a microchip in case he’s really lost and whoever abandoned him wasn’t his actual owner. In the meantime, we’ll keep him with us. Hide him between the puppies. What’s one more?”

  Emma snorted. Lizzie agreed. Adam was going to have a cow.

  “Where’s that other one?” Granddad asked.

  “You mean D-Day?” Marcus asked. “He went with Adam.”

  That was interesting. Adam, who worked so hard to pretend like he couldn’t stand the dog, had taken him for a ride?

  “I’d like to be a fly on the wall when Adam gets a load of this addition to the family,” Emma said gleefully.

  “Right?” Marcus looked at Emma, and they shared an evil grin, which she glanced away from almost as soon as it started. “Hey, I have an idea,” Marcus said, eyes still on Emma. “Why don’t we do a cookout this afternoon? You guys are all coming out with the puppies and the mom, right? The weather’s not too hot, and we can have a ‘Welcome to the Big Chance Rescue Ranch’ party. I’ll see what grillables and drinkables I can come up with.”

  “Lizzie,” the receptionist called, “Dr. Chance said you can come back whenever you’re ready.”

  “Okay, thanks.” Lizzie, who was always up for flame-broiled meat—and beer—looked at Emma to see what she thought about the party idea.

  “What do you say, Granddad?” Emma asked. “Do you want to visit the ranch?”

  “The ranch? My ranch? I thought you sold that money pit,” Granddad said.

  “I did. To Adam.”

  “Who?” He cupped his hand around his ear.

  “Adam.”

  “Oh. But he’s off fighting them terrorists in the desert.”

  Emma sighed and patted him on the shoulder. To Lizzie, she said, “We’ll give it a try.”

  Plans agreed upon, Lizzie, Emma, and Granddad went through to the back rooms and found a much-improved mother pit bull and her now one-week-old pups in a small, hard plastic swimming pool.

  The female stood awkwardly but looked rather piratical with her patched eye and splinted foreleg. Emma looked up at the tech to confirm, “She’s friendly?” before holding her hand out a few inches from the dog so she could sniff her if she wanted to.

  “Sweet as can be,” the tech said. “Lets you pick up her pups, loves to get petted. She’s a little hesitant on the lead, like she’s been tied up or dragged, but she’s so sweet, I bet she’ll follow you anywhere.”

  “Pit bull, though,” commented another tech. “You need to keep her restrained or someone will call the dogcatcher if they don’t shoot her first.”

  “Every dog needs to be on a lead when they’re around strangers,” Granddad announced. “I used to train police dogs, you know.” He began to regale the technicians with a story of his glory days while Lizzie guided the mother dog into the nearby crate.

  Emma knelt, picked up a couple of puppies to hand in, and asked Lizzie, “What are you going to call them?”

  “The mama is Loretta,” she said. She looked under the two nearly solid black pups that Emma handed her. “These guys are Garth and Travis.”

  Emma gave her two more, holding a black-and-white spotted one higher. “Girl.” Then she raised the other, a brindle. “Boy.”

  Lizzie tapped her chin. “What do you think?”

  Emma smiled. “Taylor and Lyle.”

  “Taylor Swift…who’s Lyle?”

  Emma shrugged. “Lyle Lovett. He was married to Julia Roberts for, like, five minutes, a long time ago.”

  “Okay. Lyle and Taylor, get in here with Garth and Travis.”

  “And here are the last two, both girls.”

  Lizzie looked at them, one mostly reddish, the other mostly white. “Reba and Faith.”

  Emma stood. “Come on, Granddad. You can come back here to tell dog training stories another day.”

  The tech smiled. “Visit anytime.”

  “Be careful what you ask for,” Emma muttered.

  “Thank Dr. Chance for us,” Lizzie said. “We really appreciate his help.”

  “You’re welcome,” Dr. Chance said, coming into the room with a smile. “It was our pleasure.”

  The dogs securely settled in the crate, Dr. Chance hoisted it up and said, “Lead the way.”

  And Loretta and her band went to discover their new home.

  * * *

  “Why don’t you at least get the prescription filled, and then you’ll have it if you decide you need it?” Daphne asked Adam.

  “Okay,” he agreed with reluctance. He wasn’t going to take the new antianxiety meds, but if it got his therapist off his back, that was one less person he’d disappoint this month. “Thanks for coming outside to talk. Maybe I shouldn’t have brought the dog.” He pointed at D-Day, who was snoozing in the grass, soaking up the sun.

  “No problem. I’m sorry about the service dogs only rule,” she said, gesturing at the building. “So I’ll see you again at our regular time next month?” she asked, scrolling through her phone.

  “I guess so,” Adam allowed. He almost hadn’t come today. That was one of the reasons he’d let D-Day in the truck this morning. He’d hoped that by “accidentally” bringing his dog along, Daphne would reschedule when he called her from the parking lot, unable to enter the building with a dog.

  She’d laughed when he’d told her what he’d done and said, “Not many people would admit they accidentally on purpose brought their dog.”

  Now he rose and held out his hand to the middle-aged social worker assigned to him by the VA. She’d grown up in Dallas, had never witnessed anything more violent than a hockey game. And still she listened to his shit and, with very few comments, somehow made him feel better—for the first hour or so after their appointments anyway.

  “I wonder something,” Daphne said, looking at D-Day, who had risen to his feet with Adam. “There are more and more veterans coming in with PTSD service dogs, and it really seems to help.”

  Adam was already shaking his head before she finished her sentence. “This one’s not suited for that sort of thing.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “He seems to be pretty in tune with you, and you know how to train dogs. Teaching him how to respond when you’re stressed seems like a no-brainer to me.”

  Adam didn’t tell her that D-Day already seemed to notice when he was getting agitated and would lean against his legs, asking to be petted. But he couldn’t take care of another living thing. Ever. “It’s an interesting idea, but I’m not going to be responsible for this thing’s happiness,” he said, turning to leave.

  “I think you already are,” Daphne said, letting her parting shot drift over him on his way to the parking lot.

  It followed him clear back to Big Chance.

  He eyed the dog, who sniffed with interest at the air coming in through the cracked open window.

  Could D-Day learn to do things that a PTSD assistance dog would need to do? Turn on a light, fetch medication, interrupt the cycle?

  Adam wasn’t going to keep D-Day, because when he left Big Chance, he was going alone. But maybe he’d see what the dog could do, and maybe it could help someone else.

  Chapter 13

  “Thanks, Joe,” Adam said. “Next Thursday should be fine.” He held the phone to his ear with his shoulder and turned the truck onto Wild Wager Road.

  “Great. I’ve got you down,”
Joe said. “Oh, hey. I have a quick question. Probably nothing, but do you know anything about some sort of extra life insurance policy or investment account that your grandparents might have stashed away?”

  “What?” Adam laughed. “No. The only thing Granddad had was this ranch and a little social security income. Why?”

  “Just something your grandfather said. Let me know if you think of anything.”

  “Will do,” Adam said, then figured since he had the man on the phone, he might as well ask, “What’s the deal with that Mill Creek property? Lizzie was asking about it, but I don’t know anything except we share a fence line and Mitch Babcock lorded it over everyone that his family owned the coolest party spot.”

  “I don’t know much more than that. Mitch’s dad ran into some kind of financial trouble a year or two after we graduated from Big Chance. They pulled up stakes and disappeared almost under cover of darkness.”

  “Big scandal, huh?” Adam tried not to be pleased that overprivileged Mitch had been taken down a few notches.

  “I guess. I heard a bunch of rumors. His dad had stolen a bunch of money from the insurance company he worked for, his mom was having an affair with the principal of Big Chance…maybe Mitch’s dad wasn’t really his dad.”

  “Damn.” He wasn’t going to feel sorry for the asshole, but he did consider that maybe Mitch’s life hadn’t been as pretty and shiny as it had looked from the outside.

  “Well, anyway, your grandfather keeps saying something about the extra money, but he’s so confused, I figure it’s something he’s seen on TV or something.”

  “I’ll be sure to let you know if I run across any secret hidey holes with keys to a gold mine,” he said, and Joe laughed.

  A noise in the background was accompanied by a muffled “just a second” from Joe’s side of the line. “Hey, I’ve got to go. It’s time for another Independence Day planning meeting, and I’m in charge of the dance contest.”

  Yeesh. Adam’s money problems suddenly seemed more attractive. “You’re the mayor. Can’t you delegate that stuff?”