She had coffee brewed and an omelet browned to perfection when Jake entered the kitchen. They sat opposite each other at the little table.
Jake cleared his throat and tapped his fork on his coffee mug to the tune of “Yankee Doodle.” He’d reached a decision while he was in the shower. He was going to ask her to marry him. He couldn’t manage another sleepless night. Besides, they’d known each other for five days. That seemed like a respectable amount of time. It wasn’t as if they were rushing into anything.
“Amy,” he began.
Amy looked at him over the rim of her teacup.
“Amy…” He wondered if a breakfast table was romantic enough. He wanted to do this right. After all, proposing to a woman wasn’t an everyday occurrence. Someday they would be telling their children about this. He could just hear it. Amy would lower her voice conspiratorially and say to their daughter, “… it was
Jake added salt to his coffee and stirred it with his fork.
Amy’s eyes widened as she watched this. Premature dementia, she thought. Probably brought on by too much sex. Maybe his tie was too tight, cutting off the oxygen to his brain.
He leaned forward and took her hand.
“Amy…” Lord, what if she turned him down? It was possible. She was a goddess, and he was just an out-of- shape veterinarian who lost chickens. He didn’t even have a decent car. Probably he was going bald and no one had told him. Baldness was one of those things everyone knew but the baldee, because it crept up on you from behind, starting with a small shiny patch of skin on the top of your head. And he thought he detected the beginnings of a paunch this morning. He shook his head sadly. She’d never marry him. Never in a million years. “Amy…”
Jake stared at her for a moment, then let out a whoosh of breath. “I was afraid you’d say no.”
Amy blinked at him. “I don’t think I heard the question.”
“Didn’t I ask you to marry me?”
“Was that what you were trying to do?” Amy said, trying to suppress the laughter.
“Did I do it all right? Was it romantic enough?”
Amy nodded. “It was wonderful. I was just distracted for a moment because your tie is hanging in your coffee.”
Jake looked down, a horrified expression registering in his eyes.
Amy gently lifted the tie and blotted the tip with a paper towel. How could she not love a man who proposed with his tie floating in his coffee? It was… real.
Chapter Eight
The twenty-minute men had followed Amy, just as Jake had predicted. She could see them through the window in the clinic waiting room. They were sitting in their van, drinking soda, doing crossword puzzles. Creepy, Amy thought. She was living in a goldfish bowl. She had weasely little men following her around, waiting for her to say the wrong thing, waiting for her to make the wrong move. A shiver ran down her spine. Definitely creepy.
She watched Jake come chugging into the lot and breathed a sigh of relief. Jake, the trusty dispeller of gloom and doom. The knight of the breakfast table. Slayer of dragons and rude newsmen.
Her hero coasted to a stop beside the van.
His maroon jeep-thing shuddered violently, backfired, and settled down to a brooding, sullen silence.
Mrs. Boyd jumped from her seat in the waiting area. “What was that? Was that a gunshot?”
Amy sent her a crooked smile. “That was Dr. Elliott. His car backfired.”
“Oh yes,” Mrs. Boyd said. “I’d forgotten about his car.”
Jake came whistling into the office with Spot in tow, a new tie dangling from the collar of his button-down shirt and the morning paper under his arm.
“Good morning,” he said to Mrs. Boyd and her cat, Sarah. “Good morning, Amy,” he said, plopping the paper on her desk and planting a big smackeroo kiss on her surprised lips.
“We’re engaged,” he explained to Mrs. Boyd. “We’re getting married soon. Maybe this afternoon, if we get a cancellation.”
Mrs. Boyd smiled her approval.
“Do we have any cancellations?” Jake asked Amy.
Amy wasn’t able to share his enthusiasm. An uneasy feeling was prickling at the nape of her neck, and there was a leaden depression settling in the pit of her stomach.
“We’ve had four cancellations,” she whispered, turning her back to Mrs. Boyd. “All from people who were bringing their animals in for surgery that would require boarding.”
Jake raised his eyebrows in question.
“One woman asked if we’d seen the morning paper. She sounded sort of… huffy.”
Jake unfolded the paper on Amy’s desk and began turning pages. “Omigod.”
Mrs. Boyd looked up with interest.
Amy read the headline and clapped her hand to her mouth.
“Is that the article about the clinic?” Mrs. Boyd asked. “Isn’t that a clever headline?”
“Clever,” Jake said numbly. He read it aloud. “Doc Loses Cock.” It sounded as if he’d been emasculated. The story itself was innocuous enough. More human interest and humor than criminal, but obviously it was damaging. Nine o’clock in the morning and they’d had four cancellations.
“This is crazy,” he said to Amy. “This calls for drastic action.”
Amy nervously twisted a pencil in her hand. “What did you have in mind?”
“Jelly doughnuts.”
“Pardon?”
“There’s a great bakery in the supermarket across the street.” He reached into his pocket and handed Amy a twenty-dollar bill. “Some men smoke. Some men drink. I eat jelly doughnuts. I always feel better after a jelly doughnut. Get some for yourself, too. And don’t forget Mrs. Boyd.”
“I like the kind with cinnamon sugar,” Mrs. Boyd said.
Amy trudged over to the bakery. This was all her fault. Jake had turned to jelly doughnuts because of her. What would be next? Boston creams? Another week of this and he’d be hooked on Napoleons and eclairs.
She pushed through the barkery door and took a number. This chicken stuff was only newsworthy because Lulu was implicated, she thought bitterly. She’d been hardly noticed as a clown, important to just a few hundred children, but as a chicken thief she was infamous, a scandalous joke. If it continued she’d ruin Jake’s business. People didn’t want to leave their beloved pets in the hands of a woman accused of eating her competition for lunch.
She stepped up to the counter and chose a dozen doughnuts. Why couldn’t she have gotten a job in a bakery? Bakeries were cozy and smelled great, and if you were accused of cannibalizing the doughnuts nobody cared too much.
The girl behind the counter stared at Amy. “Do I know you?”
Amy shook her head vigorously. “Nope. I’m new in town…”
“I know! You’re Lulu. Your picture’s in the paper.” She handed Amy the bag of doughnuts and winked. “Having a change of menu today, huh?”
By midafternoon Amy had covered her bright yellow sweater with a blue lab coat, hoping to be less conspicuous. Most of the clients had stared at their toes or buried themselves in magazines. A few had good- naturedly flapped their wings and clucked at her. One woman asked for her autograph.
At five o’clock Amy had a splitting headache and was almost happy when the last two appointments of the day canceled. She wanted to go home and hide. She wasn’t usually one to run from a problem, but this wasn’t the sort of thing she could easily confront. If she said nothing at all, it implied guilt. And if she tried to explain, it smacked of guilt.
Jake perched on the corner of her desk, a stethoscope dangling from his neck. “Why so glum?”
