Page 93 of Clara Knows Best

“You’ll be fine,” his trainer said. “The real pain won’t hit until tomorrow.”

That was probably his idea of humor.

“Thirty minutes to dinner,” Clara called down the stairs.

She must have taken a quick break from flirting with Sam to put the enchiladas in the oven.

Jesse wondered bitterly if any woman had ever said “I’m definitely going to have a good day now” after receiving one text fromhim.He didn’t even know what kind of emojis he should be using to have that effect. Maybe he should buy the Marine a beer and ask him about his technique.

Then he wondered if Sam would be at the hardware store for the firefighters’ poker night that Jesse had been invited to by Teddy McMann’s little sister at the Valentine’s Day festival. Allie…he tried to remember the last name on her son’s chart. Hayden Bent, ear infection. That made her husband Roy Bent, another vaguely familiar name from the old days. Fridays at eight at the hardware store, she had said.

Hadn’t Clara said Sam worked there? Or was he just the nephew of someone who did? Either way, she and Yoli had definitely assumed that she would run into him there.

Jesse hadn’t been planning to accept the poker night invitation, but now it seemed like a good way to get a read on Clara’s new friend. Even if Sam himself wasn’t there, Jesse could ask his old wrestling buddies what they thought of the guy.

He’d feel a lot better about leaving town if he knew that the Marine wasn’t going to turn into another DeWitt Petty. And where was DeWitt these days, for that matter? Still in jail? The poker guys might be able to shed some light on that, too.

“I’m done,” he finally had to say. “My rib’s hurting.”And my legs have stopped responding.

“Good workout,” the Colonel said, and after removing some of the weights, left Jesse (without a backwards glance) to navigate the stairs on his own.

When at last he emerged from the basement on legs of jelly, Jesse paused to watch Greer hobbling back into her crate. She looked about how he felt.

“She’s getting antsy,” Clara told him, sounding very concerned. “She wants to play, and I don’t want to let her. I shouldn’t, right?”

“I don’t know. What’s your dad say?” he asked, glancing at her father who was now unloading the dishwasher.

“You’re her doctor!” she reminded him. “What doyousay?”

“Well, without knowing much about dogs, I’d say it’s too soon for running and jumping. You could roll a ball to her. Just no tug-of-war or anything like that.”

“I’ll try the ball. That’s a good idea. Do you think she’s pretty young?”

“Yeah. A year or two, I guess. Can’t you ask her owner?”

“I’m afraid to contact him. What if he said he wanted her back after all?”

“Great. Then I can tell him how much I charge to repair blunt abdominal trauma,” he said wryly.

“Is it pretty expensive?” she guessed.

“Hepatectomy, hysterectomy, bowel R&A. Not to mention bone alignment. Yeah, it’s pretty expensive. Unless he’s got insurance, he’s up to six figures.”

She smiled at him. “Would you tell him all that, really?”

No. Well, if she cried, he might. “Better not contact him if you’re worried about it.”

“Are you going to billmefor all that stuff?”

Now he knew how the security guard at the airport had felt when she’d left her truck in the fire lane. “No.”

And she went and gave him the same exact smile she’d given the security guard.

“Don’t get me anything for Christmas for a couple years,” she had the audacity to say.

“I won’t.”

At least she didn’t point out that he’d never given her a Christmas present. “Well, I guess I’ll just say her birthday’s theday we found her. Just for gift and party purposes, I mean. Not like I’m going to be looking up her horoscope or anything crazy.”

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