The Vet from Snowy River by Stella Quinn

CHAPTER

45

One sneaky text mid-afternoon to Graeme was all it had taken.

Josh turned off the old highway just as the setting sun was stippling the upper crags of the Snowy Mountains in gold and orange and pink. Vera, thankfully, was in such a tizz of delight she had barely noticed when he pulled into the alley behind the café instead of driving her home.

He walked round to her side of his truck and opened the door for her.

She gave him a half-smile. ‘I don’t have a work shift tonight, you know. We could go back to my place …’

Man oh man. The glimmer of flirt under those words stripped the blood from his head. Perhaps he’d been a little rash sending that message to Graeme, but given the hubbub leaking out from between the brick and timber of the café walls, he was too late to cry off.

But he could have a moment.

And—if he played this right—he could maybe have a lifetime of moments.

Vera cleared her throat. ‘Umm, are you going to say something?’

‘I’m about three seconds away from planting my lips on yours, Vera, I just …’ Woah, this was a heck of a lot harder in reality than when he had been practising it in his head. He blamed it on the skip bin and the food scrap smells lurching out of it. Could he not have used his brain and pulled over by the lake reflecting the sunset? Under the majestic snow gums in the town’s heritage-listed park?

To hell with it. He’d waited long enough and he wasn’t waiting a second longer. Love was love, no matter where he proclaimed it.

‘I love you, Vera.’

‘Oh, Josh.’ Those green eyes had smudged into smoke, and the lips he was about to kiss trembled. ‘You have to know I love you too.’

He couldn’t stop the grin from spreading across his face. ‘Yeah. I figured.’

Her eyebrows snapped together. ‘You figured?’

He hauled her in close and swivelled so she was pressed up against the dusty length of his old ute, and he was pressed up against the prim, grey-suited, jasmine-smelling length of her. ‘I’m kind of irresistible,’ he murmured as he ran his hands up into her hair and held her face there, just inches from his own. ‘Just ask Jane Doe.’

She gave a little giggle that made his heart spin cartwheels in his chest. ‘Okay. You are indeed irresistible.’

He brushed the tiniest of kisses onto her mouth.

‘Oh,’ she moaned.

‘I’d kiss you again,’ he said, ‘but we need to get some things settled first.’

‘Yes to anything. Kiss me quick.’

He hovered a breath away. ‘So that’s a yes to my question?’

Her lashes were dark against her cheeks, and her cheeks were flushed, and her mouth was doing things to the stubble on his chin that ought to be outlawed in a public place like an alley.

‘What’s the question?’ she murmured against his cheek.

‘I want to get married. To you. Say yes and I’ll let you kiss me properly.’

Those dusky lashes shot upward. ‘You want to get married? To me?’

He shrugged, all kinds of insecurity tightening around his gut. He had everything riding on this moment. His life. His happiness. His desperate desire to have the whole of that future happiness tangled snugly with Vera’s forever and then some more.

‘I want it more than I’ve wanted anything. What do you say? You got room in your life for a small-town vet with a fifteen-year-old daughter and an old brown dog?’

She ran her hands up his chest and all sorts of unquenchable fires started burning.

‘I have all the room in the world. Yes, Josh. Yes!’

That was all he needed to hear. He gathered her close and fastened his mouth to hers.

It took a while, but eventually he remembered there was a café full of people waiting to join in the celebration. He rested his head against hers while he lowered his, um, heart rate enough to brave the crowd.

‘Let’s get out of here,’ she murmured.

‘I’m with you a thousand per cent on that. Small problem.’

She smiled. ‘More questions? Let’s just fast-forward and pretend I’ve said yes to everything.’

‘You hear that ruckus going on inside The Billy Button?’

She lifted a head. ‘You’re right. It does sound a little rowdier than usual for a Friday evening.’

‘That’ll be the welcome home party.’

‘For … me?’

‘If you’re going to get mad with someone, get mad with Graeme,’ he said gallantly. ‘Come on.’

He shepherded her round the side of the building and in through the front door and the blast of laughter and cheering nearly lifted the roof off the place.

Marigold was first in line, a blur of tangerine lipstick and beaded earrings. Alex was there, dusty and tall in his fire brigade outfit, clapping him on the back, and Kev must have dug deep into his endless drawer of ties, because he was wearing a yellow swirly number that could have stopped traffic.

He ducked to the side so the wellwishers could throng around Vera, and was heading for the counter to sweet-talk Graeme into selling him the coldest beer in the fridge, when a squeal nearly took out his eardrum.

He turned, and there was Poppy.

‘Dad!’

‘Popstar, I wasn’t expecting you so soon.’

She looked smug. ‘I had a secret plan going. The school year finished at noon today, so I caught the first train out and Hannah collected me from Cooma.’

He wrapped her in a hug. ‘Huh. Where is my secret-keeping sister?’

‘Oh, some sheep fell off a truck and she took off. Graeme’s in charge of me in your absence.’

He held her away from him so he could look her over. Was this the same girl who’d barely looked in his direction without rolling her eyes six months ago? He kissed her on the cheek and hugged her again until she squealed.

It was a lucky day for him when Vera offered his daughter a job.

It was an even luckier day the day she agreed to be his wife.

He held Poppy’s hands in his. ‘Poptart, I have some news.’

She grinned. ‘Oh yes? It’s not lovey-dovey news, is it, Dad, because I have my limits.’

He pinched her hand. ‘I just asked Vera to marry me.’

This time her squeal got buried in the lapel of his jacket before his eardrum was perforated.

‘Dad, that is so amazing only …’

She pursed her lips.

‘Only what?’

‘Who’s going to break the news to Jane?’

He pulled her ponytail. ‘You working here tonight or what?’

‘Of course I’m working. I’m Graeme’s right-hand girl.’

‘Well, go find me a beer, will you, kiddo?’ he said, his eyes roaming the crowd until they found Vera’s smiling face. ‘Your dad’s in the mood to celebrate.’