Healing the Vet's Heart Read online

  ‘I was rather hoping you’d take charge of it all. I don’t have the time.’

  ‘You’re sure about this? I can take some of the weight elsewhere, you must want to see it through yourself.’ Drew’s hand moved towards the booklet and then he pulled it back. The project sounded fascinating, and he was pretty sure that Lucas wanted to steer it himself.

  Lucas grinned at him. ‘I’d rather not be working during my evenings and weekends at the moment. You’d be doing me a favour.’

  ‘In that case...thanks. I appreciate it.’ Drew picked up the booklet and opened it. The introductory page bore the names of everyone who’d worked with Lucas in fitting the prosthetics, including one that he didn’t recognise.

  ‘This Caro Barnes... She’s the robotics engineer?’

  Lucas nodded. ‘Yes, I consulted with her on some of my Uber-Vet projects. She’s incredibly talented, and one of the few people I wanted to keep in contact with from my time as a TV vet. We struck up a correspondence, and when everything went south on the robotics programme she was involved with in California, she picked up on an off-the-cuff suggestion I’d made, and decided to investigate animal prosthetics. She came back home to the UK, and was in Oxford for a while, fending off various offers for research fellowships.’

  ‘She must be good.’ Research fellowships from Oxford University were usually hotly contested.

  ‘Caro’s at the top of her field. She can be a little odd at times...’

  Drew could handle odd. In fact, the more challenge involved, the better. ‘You said she abandoned the robotics programme. What happened there?’

  ‘I’m not sure. Some kind of spat over patents—apparently she lost the rights to something she’d developed. She clearly didn’t want to talk about it, and when Caro’s not in the mood to talk about something there isn’t much point in asking. But she’s not one to abandon anything lightly, if that’s what you’re thinking. She’s committed to this project and she’ll see it through.’

  ‘You’re frowning...’ Drew picked up on a note of uncertainty in Lucas’s manner.

  ‘When I say she’ll see it through, she’ll do it in her own way. I find it easier not to ask about her process.’

  ‘Fair enough.’ Drew nodded. ‘So what does she need from us?’

  ‘I’m not entirely sure. She says she only wants to discuss it on a need-to-know basis, and apparently I don’t need to know just yet. I get the impression that this patent business has made her a little paranoid.’ Lucas grinned. ‘She’s living at Smugglers’ Top.’

  ‘What?’ If anyone wanted isolation then Smugglers’ Top was perfect. ‘The house up there is in a terrible state, surely she’s not living there?’

  Lucas chuckled. ‘You’re behind the times, mate, it’s been renovated as a holiday let. Caro managed to get a reduced rate for the whole of the winter.’

  ‘She’s serious about her privacy, then.’

  ‘Yeah, Smugglers’ Top really suits her. But she’s a good sort when you get past the whole mad scientist thing she has going on, and the not speaking to you for days because she’s thinking. I went to see her at the weekend and took Mav with me. She gave him a miniature drone with a grab mechanism at the bottom. It’s a cool thing, we’ve been flying it around the apartment, picking things up and putting them down again.’

  ‘I’ll bet Ellie loves that.’

  ‘There were a few abject apologies after we crashed it into her favourite vase...’ Lucas grinned, clearly relishing the apology side of the process. ‘You’ll have to come over for dinner very soon, Mav can’t wait to show it to you.’

  Drew wondered if the last bit was a pity gesture, and decided it wasn’t. If Lucas had thought that Drew was in need of pity, he would have taken him down to the Hungry Pelican and they could have drowned their sorrows there.

  ‘So... I’m taking on a mad scientist who’ll only tell me what I need to know, when she’s speaking to me at all, that is, and who lives in an isolated spot that’s difficult to get to... Anything else?’

  Lucas grinned broadly. ‘Nope, that’s about it. Are you in?’

  Drew chuckled. ‘I’m in.’

  CHAPTER TWO

  DREW PARKED AT the mouth of the gully that led down to the beach. The high outcrop of rock that was known locally as Smugglers’ Top was inaccessible at high tide, unless you happened to have a boat. At low tide, it was possible to make the climb up to the house from the beach.

  In three hours, the tide would be in, and Smugglers’ Top would be completely cut off. But that was enough time to get to the top, meet with Caro Barnes, and get back down again. Drew had spent the whole of yesterday resting at home in preparation for the climb today.

  ‘All right, then, Phoenix.’ He opened the back of the car, and the puppy immediately raised her head, sensing that they were about to go for a walk. ‘This might be a bit of a stretch for both of us, but we’ll make it.’

  He slung the canvas bag that contained Phoenix’s mid-morning snack over his shoulder, and the puppy capered at his feet as he walked slowly across the beach. She had very little appreciation of the adage that slow and steady wins the race, and she’d be exhausted before they got to the top and wanting to hitch a ride.

  He was relieved to find that the old steps had new handrails on both sides, fixed firmly into the rock. With the aid of his walking stick, he was able to pull himself up with less effort than he’d anticipated.

  All the same, it was a long climb. Ellie had fussed over him, saying that it was impossible he should go all the way up to Smugglers’ Top, but he’d cordially ignored her suggestion that he take up Caro’s offer of meeting at the veterinary centre in favour of meeting Caro on her own turf. There was no better way of getting the measure of someone.

  ‘We’re going to take a rest now...’ They were halfway up, and the pup was beginning to tire. Lucas sat down on the stone steps, taking Phoenix onto his lap. After a couple of minutes the pain in his leg began to subside, and the top didn’t seem quite so far away.

  ‘Next time it’ll be less trouble, eh?’ Drew had fallen into the habit of thinking that his own recuperation ran approximately parallel to Phoenix’s development. One day soon they’d both be able to walk for a day without having to take a rest.

  But right now Phoenix couldn’t climb any more. The puppy was curled up in his arms, shielded from the wind, and looked to be snoozing. Protecting her made him feel strong again. Drew opened the canvas bag, pulling out the baby carrier he’d brought with him and fixing the straps under his coat. It was perfect for carrying a tired puppy when you needed both hands to support yourself, and he felt Phoenix snuggle gratefully against his chest.

  Another rest seemed in order at the top of the steps, because pride dictated that Caro’s first impression of him shouldn’t be to find him collapsed on her doorstep. He took the opportunity to extricate Phoenix from the baby wrap, and she began to caper around at his feet. Smugglers’ Top was much as he remembered it from playing here as a child. Trees were gnarled and bent in the wind, and hid a dilapidated stone house. But there was a newly laid path from the top of the steps and as he approached the house, he could see that was different too. The old boards that covered the doors and windows were gone now, in favour of a brightly painted door and triple glazing. The thick walls had been cleaned and there was a new slate roof. The place looked positively homely.

  Oddly enough, there was a doorbell. Casual callers were unlikely in this isolated spot, and leaving the front door unlocked for an expected visitor seemed the more practical option. But when he lifted the latch and pushed the door with his finger it didn’t move, so he rang the bell.

  He was starting to wonder whether the bell was actually working and thinking about trying it again when the door flew open. The words mad scientist flew at him like a missile.

  Caro Barnes was a head shorter than him. Blonde hair, some of
which was caught up in a messy plait, with the rest pushed behind her ears. She was wearing a pair of sweatpants that had probably been red once but were now a washed-out dark pink, along with a T-shirt and a large green cardigan that dwarfed her small frame.

  ‘Ah! Sorry! You’re...um...’ She pressed her lips together, looking up at him.

  ‘Drew Trevelyan. Maybe I’m a little early...?’ Drew looked at his watch. He was actually five minutes later than the time they’d arranged.

  ‘Um... No. Probably not. I was working on something and I forgot the time...’ She shrugged helplessly, as if that was something that happened a lot. ‘Come in.’

  She stood back from the doorway, watching uncertainly as Phoenix nosed her way inside. When she went to sniff Caro’s fleecy slippers, Caro stepped back suddenly.

  ‘This is nice. A bit different from the way I remember it.’ Drew decided that introducing her to Phoenix could wait as Caro obviously wasn’t used to being around dogs.

  ‘You know this place?’ Caro frowned suddenly. ‘I suppose you must do, since you live around here.’

  ‘Yes, I used to play up here when I was a boy. This house was deserted and very ramshackle then.’

  ‘You’ve always lived here, then?’ Caro was looking at him as if he came from another planet. Which wasn’t an entirely unpleasant sensation, as her eyes were wide and brown, the colour of dark honey. Knowing and beautiful, all at the same time.

  That was entirely irrelevant. Imagining how her hair might shine if she gave it a brush was also irrelevant. He was here to appreciate Caro’s intellect.

  ‘Yes, I’m a Cornishman, born and bred.’ That was a matter of some pride to Drew. ‘I grew up in Dolphin Cove.’

  ‘That sounds nice, growing up somewhere.’ Caro frowned, as if the sentence didn’t entirely cover all of her intended implications. ‘I mean... I grew up, of course. In quite a lot of places.’

  ‘That sounds nice too.’ The sudden urge to make her feel at ease gripped Drew. ‘Lucas tells me you were working in California before you came here?’

  ‘Yes.’ Caro didn’t seem to want to elaborate on that. ‘I’ll get you some coffee and...um...freshen up if you don’t mind. I’ll only be five minutes.’

  It occurred to Drew that Caro had probably been up all night, working on something, and he suppressed the urge to tell her that whatever it was could probably have been done just as well after a good night’s sleep. How she chose to organise her life was none of his concern.

  ‘Take your time. I can make the coffee if you show me the way to the kitchen.’

  ‘No. That’s all right.’ Caro’s glance flipped to his walking stick. ‘You should probably sit down. I actually really wish you would, it’ll make me feel a bit better for bringing you all the way up here and then answering the door in my pyjamas.’

  Somehow, the invitation to sit didn’t carry with it the tang of frustration and humiliation that it usually did. Standing next to Caro made him feel strong and steady, in a way he hadn’t felt for a long time now. And she was charming, in an odd kind of way. Nakedly honest, although he really shouldn’t include the word naked in any sentence that referred to her. The green cardigan seemed to be inviting him to imagine the figure it so effectively hid.

  She waved him towards a pair of sofas that stood next to the hearth, at one side of the open-plan living area. Drew sank down onto the cushions, trying not to heave a sigh of relief and keeping Phoenix on her lead so that she didn’t wander off and get under Caro’s feet. The pup sprawled out on the hearth rug, her gaze following Caro as she skittered nervously into the kitchen area.

  The conversion had been nicely done. The ceiling beams were new, but the oak would mellow with time. The large space was divided into two by a breakfast bar, and the pale colours in the kitchen and on the walls of the sitting area made everything seem spacious and clean. Wooden floors and the pale, natural tones of the furnishing fabrics added a touch of warmth.

  And the house looked entirely unlived-in. Nothing was out of place, not even the cushions on the sofa. It was as if Caro had been parachuted in here to add a little delicious mess to her magazine-cover surroundings.

  She was banging the doors of the kitchen cupboards, obviously looking for something while the coffee brewed. Drew watched as she stood on her toes, reaching to the back of one of the units and bringing out a packet of chocolate biscuits.

  ‘Would...um...he like some biscuits?’ She pointed towards Phoenix, who returned her gaze steadily.

  ‘She. Her name’s Phoenix. She shouldn’t have chocolate.’

  Caro frowned, tipping half a dozen biscuits onto a plate and then adding a few more for good measure. ‘What does she eat, then?’

  ‘She loves cheese, if you have any.’ Phoenix’s ears began to twitch at the mention of the word, and Drew wondered whether he should have spelled it out.

  ‘Oh! Really? I’ve got cheese...’ Caro fetched two large blocks of cheese from the fridge, and Phoenix jumped to her feet. ‘Which does she prefer? Extra mature, or mild and creamy?’

  Phoenix wasn’t a connoisseur, she just liked cheese. ‘Mild and creamy will be fine.’ Caro unwrapped the package, hovering her knife somewhere in the middle of the block. ‘Not that much. Just a few small squares.’

  Caro shrugged, cutting some squares of cheese and putting them onto a saucer. ‘What made you call her Phoenix?’

  Drew resisted the temptation to say that not everything had a meaning attached to it. In Caro’s world, he suspected it did. ‘I guess...she’s helping me rise from the ashes.’

  ‘Nice thought. Rising from the ashes is always good.’

  Drew wasn’t entirely sure what she meant by that, but Caro didn’t seem to think that the comment required any further explanation. She poured two cups of coffee, taking a quick swig from hers before balancing the biscuits and cheese on top of the mugs to carry them over. As she set everything down on the coffee table, Phoenix decided to stake her claim and came to nuzzle at her hand.

  Caro pulled her arm back quickly. If she was going to be studying animals, and her work in making prosthetics made that inevitable, she was going to have to get over her nervousness.

  ‘She won’t hurt you.’ Drew smiled, picking up one of the squares of cheese. ‘Why don’t you give it to her?’

  Caro shot him a querying look, and he flattened his hand, perching the cheese on top of his fingers to demonstrate. She nodded, sitting down cross-legged on the hearth rug and holding her hand out. Phoenix was keeping her eye fixed on the cube of cheese and her head arced round as he placed it on Caro’s fingers.

  ‘Oh!’ Phoenix wolfed down the treat, and started to lick Caro’s hand, on the off chance she’d left anything behind. ‘I thought her tongue would be raspy, like a cat’s...’

  Drew couldn’t remember the first time a dog had licked his hand. And he couldn’t imagine a childhood that wasn’t surrounded by all kinds of animals.

  ‘You haven’t been around dogs much?’

  Caro pressed her lips together, as if slightly embarrassed by the question. ‘No, not much.’

  ‘But you’re spending a fair bit of time and energy making animal prosthetics.’

  ‘Yes. I always wanted a dog when I was little, but I couldn’t have one because my parents moved around so much.’ She gave a little smile. ‘So I made my own. I built my first robot dog when I was ten. It couldn’t do much, and one of its legs kept falling off, but I really loved it.’

  ‘But you couldn’t feed it treats.’ Drew put another square of cheese onto her hand. Almost as soon as he’d done so, Phoenix ate it, and then climbed onto Caro’s lap.

  ‘No. I could probably make one now that responds to treats. She smells them, I suppose...’ Caro’s mind was obviously exploring the possibilities, and she started to examine Phoenix carefully, parting her coat with her fingers. ‘She’s so soft...�
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  ‘She still has her puppy coat. In a couple of months she’ll start to shed that, and she’ll grow a double layer coat. The top layer is waterproof with a warm underlayer.’

  ‘Hmm. I’d like to see that.’ Phoenix had mistaken scientific enquiry for love and was nuzzling at Caro’s chin. Perhaps Drew was the one who was mistaken, and love and science weren’t so different for Caro.

  ‘You probably wouldn’t like vacuuming up all the dog hairs. They get everywhere.’

  ‘Oh, that’s all right, I have a tortoise... Tony does my vacuuming for me.’

  Drew decided not to ask. Caro’s attention was all on Phoenix, and she was stroking her carefully. There was the kind of magic about it that brought a lump to his throat.

  ‘I’ve...um, I’ve got to move.’ Caro looked up at him questioningly.

  ‘That’s all right. Just push her off your lap, she’ll get the idea.’

  Caro gently pressed her fingers against Phoenix, and the pup ignored her completely. Drew grinned. ‘You need to be a bit firmer with her... Phoenix, come here.’

  Phoenix took no notice of him, clearly reckoning that Caro was far more interesting. He held out another square of cheese, and Phoenix scrambled off Caro’s lap to reach him.

  Caro got to her feet. ‘I won’t be long...’ She swiped two of the biscuits from the plate, putting them into the pocket of her green cardigan. Then she picked up another, taking a bite from it as she walked towards a door that led from the open-plan living area to the other side of the house.

  Phoenix was eyeing him with that I-haven’t-eaten-in-months look, and he put the saucer containing the last cube of cheese on the floor. She wolfed it down and started to lick the saucer. Drew took a gulp of coffee, almost choking it was so strong. If this, and her obvious requirement for calories, was anything to go by, Caro definitely had been up all night.

  Not his business. Not even close to being within his remit as a professional consultant. And however entrancing Caro contrived to be, or rather didn’t contrive to be because it was quite obvious that she had no idea just how fascinating she was, professional was the word that should cover every aspect of their relationship. He’d made his mind up about that.