Saving the White Cougar by Terry Spear

Chapter 5

When Ted left, Stella was feeling so much better physically. Elsie came in and said, "Kate said if you have Tracey and the others to watch out for you, you can leave here tomorrow afternoon. We'll let them know you'll need transportation out there. They can take you to your Jeep in the impound lot or take it to the ranch for when you're ready to leave and return home."

"Okay, thanks. That sounds good." She was thrilled. She hoped she could sit out on the porch and watch the cowboys at work firsthand.

Then she tried to sleep, but the nightmare returned.

She just had to reach the barn, just several hundred yards across the field where the grass was short. She could do it. Sprint at forty-five miles per hour. Leap into the barn. Hope that no one at the horse ranch saw her run in there before she could shift. Then the men saw her out in the open and closed the distance, not calling out, not alerting the ranch hands if there were any about. The hunters were going to catch her. They were going to shoot her full of holes. They were nearly there. And they fired at her. One bullet after another, the rounds pinging off the metal building and she was afraid she was going to get hit by some of the ricocheting bullets. But she didn't feel that she'd taken any more hits.

That would soon change if they came into the barn and found her bleeding as a cougar in there and finished her off. She leapt up into the hayloft and moved around a bundle of hay and tried to shift. She heard men shouting at the hunters to drop their weapons. But they wouldn't comply. It was like an old-western shootout. The men would be eyeballing each other, but no one would concede.

Then she heard a man coming into the barn. One of the ranch hands? She couldn't shift. Damn, she couldn't even lift her head. She heard him close the doors to the barn. And then he said he was a cougar, and he would like her to stay with him. And he would take her to the Halloween party. But it would be here. Right here. At the horse ranch with other cougars like her. But not like her. She was a rare white cougar, and they would gawk at her, but no. She would be wearing a beautiful blue gown, her shoulders exposed, and she would look like a western princess, her knight in shining armor in western boots, chaps, and a Stetson, coming to her rescue on a white stallion.

She startled awake and smelled eggs and bacon and hash brown potatoes and saw Ted bringing her another home-cooked meal.

"Fresh eggs, even," he said. "Store bought bacon though."

"I…I thought you were coming for dinner, then they said I could join you all on your ranch this afternoon, so I thought—"

"I'll pick you up this afternoon. I just wanted to make sure you had a good hearty breakfast to get you through until then.”

She smiled. "Wow. Just, wow. Thanks, Ted. This is great. I've never had fresh eggs before. They're great."

He looked at all the flowers.

"Either everyone who wanted to has already given me flowers, or you've chased them all off with bringing me meals and your own roses."

He chuckled. "I had to do something to make you feel as though we hope your next visit to Yuma Town will be more peaceful and fun, and less painful and stressful."

"You've done a great job with that. And so has everyone else. Even the clinic staff has been wonderful. This is so much different than if I'd had to go to a human medical facility."

"It is. I'll take you home before we have lunch. Tracey's making something for everyone. We often do our own thing because she's busy with the kids, though when they get bigger, she vows to start doing some more of her work with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services."

"I heard her call out to the hunters that she was a special agent. I felt bad that I had brought trouble to the ranch. I hadn't thought that there might be women and children there, not to mention the danger to livestock because the hunters had come after me."

"I don't think any of us would have believed they would do that. We were just glad we could stop them and come to your aid. Even though you weren't with the family, we still consider you family."

She hadn't felt like she'd belonged anywhere for a long time. It felt good.

Then Ted had to leave, but he kissed her on the forehead before he left, and she grabbed his hand and made him kiss her mouth too. After all he had done for her? She wanted to.

Elsie came in and Ted finally ended the kiss, but not until after the nurse got an eyeful. He was definitely an alpha male.

"I'll see you in a little while. When is Kate releasing her?" he asked.

"She can go at eleven," Dr. Rugel said, coming into the room. He looked at the clock on the wall. "In four hours."

"Good. We'll be in time for lunch at the house then." Ted said goodbye to everyone, then took off, texting on his phone as he went.

* * *

Ted hurriedto decorate the bunkhouse before he had to pick up Stella to take her out to the ranch. He just hadn’t had the time, or the inclination, but with being so restricted on duties, he figured he would get it done, now that Stella was here staying with him, and not just Kolby. He hated to admit he wanted to decorate for her—to make everything perfect.

He draped fall leaf garlands across the fireplace mantle and hung a fall leaf wreath on the front door. He set out a big white pumpkin with a lantern and autumn foliage surrounding it in the center of the dining room table.

He pulled out a couple of scarecrows to set out on the front porch and saw Tracey was out helping the kids paint faces on their pumpkins. Ted went over to see what she needed him to do.

She smiled brightly. "You can help the kids with their painting."

Ted frowned. That wasn’t what he had in mind.

"Hal's helping Kolby with the horses. You can help me with the Halloween decorations. A bunch of our friends, Chase and Shannon, Travis and Bridget, Jack and Dottie, they'll all be over later to help do some more decorations for Halloween. You can help with that later."

"Okay." He sat down on the ground with the kids, who were already covered in paint, and helped them to paint faces on their pumpkins.

"I want a smiley face," Denise said.

"Mine is sticking his tongue out," Liam said.

Ted glanced at Tracey. She just smiled as she painted her own jack-o'-lantern.

"No, not like that," Denise said as he painted a smile on her pumpkin. "She has a pink mouth, not red."

Smiling, Ted shook his head.

"Red and white paint mixed will give you pink," Tracey said.

"I think this goes beyond my duties as foreman."

Tracey laughed as Evan Chase sat on his lap, making it even more difficult to mix paint and apply a mouth to Denise’s pumpkin.

"Blue eyes," Denise said.

He made two blue eyes.

"A pink nose."

He added that. Then Tabitha handed her paintbrush to Ted and said, “Mine too.”

Of course Hal and Kolby had to smile as they saw him sitting there painting a pumpkin and getting paint on himself too. Or maybe it was paint from Denise’s brush.

* * *

Stella was sograteful to the staff who took care of her at the clinic and she left her flowers there so they could give them to anyone who would like them. When Ted arrived, he took her in a wheelchair to a black pickup truck. She hadn't expected that. She could walk, for heaven's sake, but when she tried to stand, she did feel a little woozy. He swept her up in his arms and put her in the truck.

She frowned at him and smiled. "You have pink polka dots."

"What?" He looked down at his hands and chuckled. "Hal is not letting me do a lot of work still and Tracey put me in charge of helping the kids paint pumpkins. I guess I missed some spots when I washed up."

"That's funny. About my Jeep…," she said.

"We can take it to the ranch, if you would like, or leave it where it is."

"I don't want to put anyone out, but I would like it at the ranch so when I'm ready to go I can just leave."

"Sure. I'll make sure we get it. No problem at all."

She looked over the town as they headed out to the ranch and she thought how cute and well-maintained everything was: the sheriff's department, a park in the center of the town, a bakery, a boutique and everything was decorated for Halloween. When they finally reached the ranch, she realized just how big the place was with the main ranch house, a couple of barns, other outbuildings, and the bunkhouse, several horses, cattle, corrals, and a couple of dogs running around playing with each other.

"Where are the kids?" She had been looking forward to seeing them.

“I imagine the kids are taking their naps about now.”

“Oh, okay.” Then she saw the cute pumpkins. "Did you paint all those?"

"Unfortunately, yes. Have me paint a barn and I can do a great job. Fences? Same thing. Pumpkin painting? I'm totally out of my element."

She laughed. "Well, I think you did an outstanding job and when you have kids someday, you'll have the technique down pat."

"Hopefully, I won't have that many all at once."

She smiled. "For your mate's sake, I would have to agree."

She was going to get the door herself, but it was harder to do while wearing a sling. Suddenly he was there, opening her door, and lifting her out of the truck, then setting her on the ground. Her hero.

While she'd been at the clinic wearing a clinic gown, the ladies had washed her clothes that had been in her car, but she realized she didn't have a change of clothes for tomorrow. No toiletries either.

Ted took her inside the bunkhouse, and she was amazed to see how lovely it was. She'd halfway expected it to have used furniture, thrown in there for a bunch of raucous cowboys to sit on, but instead she found beautiful leather couches and chairs, paneled walls and bookshelves, a fireplace, large screen TV, a lovely kitchen with granite counters, stainless steel fridge, double sinks, island counter, a place that would be great for baking cookies or having a pizza party. Her apartment had a pint-sized kitchen so she was really wowed to see this one.

The dining room was just as lovely with eight chairs seated at the long rectangular table. Horse statues and paintings added to the cheery bunkhouse.

He showed her the guest bedroom first. "Kolby's room is down the hall and mine is the last one. I have the master bedroom suite. The bathroom is there, and Tracey picked up some things for you to use while you are here. Shampoo, toothbrush, toothpaste, body wash. And she bought you some clothes to wear also, judging on the size of the clothes they found in your Jeep."

"Oh, how sweet of her. How did they get into my Jeep? They didn't break the lock, did they?"

"No. Dr. Kate asked you when you were coming out of anesthesia what the combination was. We were able to get in after that."

"Oh, I don't remember that. All you need to do is drug me and I'll give you anything, I guess."

He smiled. "Tracey said we can join them at the house for lunch, or if you think you would be more comfortable here where it's quieter, than she said we could do that. It's up to you."

"After all she's done for me, I want to thank her for it. Let's go over to the house. Unless you're worried Tracey might make you paint more pumpkins."

He chuckled. "Yeah, no telling." He walked Stella to the main house but kept an eye on her to make sure she didn’t get faint like she did when she was getting out of the wheelchair before she climbed into his truck.

"Your bunkhouse doesn't look anything like what I expected."

"Old worn-out furniture? Yeah, we had that."

She raised a brow at him.

“When Hal mated Tracey, she redid the main house and then came out to the bunkhouse to begin 'fixing' it up. We didn't know what to expect. And at first, we had to stay at the main house for a while. She had everything renovated, including a master bedroom and bathroom for the foreman, and redid all of the kitchen and the bathrooms. All new furniture throughout. We didn't know what we were missing out on until she redid everything. From the horse paintings to the statues, re-paneling the walls and floors, granite countertops, all new appliances in the kitchen. It made it a real home for us and a place we are proud of. The housekeeper keeps after the main house and the bunkhouse too, but we try to tidy up after ourselves also. Something my mother ingrained in us. My sister, Josephine, and brother—triplets—and I had to clean and cook and wash. Not just my mom and sister. It was a good lesson for us. I love to cook. Not just grill out of doors when the weather is nice. So it was great having a new kitchen."

"That's wonderful. You should see my tiny apartment and kitchen."

When they reached the house, Tracey ushered them in. "We're all ready for lunch."

"Thanks so much for everything," Stella said. "You've all been so kind."

"Will you shift for us?" one of her girls asked.

"Yeah, Mommy said if we were extra good and you wanted to—" Then the boy's jaw dropped as he looked at Stella’s arm in a sling. "Oh, she said if you were still hurt, you couldn't."

"I will be back for the Halloween party," she said. "I'll be fine by then. Though if I'm better tomorrow, I could remove the sling and test out shifting. No running as a cougar, but just to show you my white coat."

"That's if she can," Hal said, coming down the hall from the bathroom, looking like he had just washed up for lunch.

Kolby came in the front door. "Sorry, I'm late."

"Where's Bill?" Stella asked.

"I took him to the airport this morning before I had breakfast with you at the clinic. He meant to say goodbye, but he didn't want to mess up anything between us," Ted said.

She frowned at him.

"Hey, I didn't tell him anything was going on between us. He just assumed it. Anyway, he's a great brother." Ted smiled at her.

She sighed. "I hope everyone's not going to too much trouble over me."

"No, we're always glad to meet other cougars like us," Tracey said, as everyone helped set out the food.