Page 18 of Tom's Chance
“Yes, please call Faulkner, this woman just assaulted me.”
“I saw that,” the man said as he slowly pulled his phone from his pocket and made the call. He spoke so low Lorissa didn’t hear what he said, even though he was less than three feet from her. This was likewatching a train wreck and she couldn’t look away. She looked up when there were screeching tires outside and expecting to see a cop car with the flashing lights, she was shocked to see a fire truck, with their flashing lights, there instead. Five of the handsomest men she had ever seen disembarked from the vehicle, and despite the fact they were smudged with soot from a recent fire, they rushed into the bakery.
“Stolls,” one of them called out and when Tom tried to go to them, the woman shook her head, dug her nails into his arm and screamed at him.
“You aren’t going anywhere, you fucking bastard! You fucking owe me!”
Lorissa felt her eyebrows disappear into her hairline and so wanted to rip the extensions out of that woman’s head, but knew she would learn more if she kept quiet and observed.
“What’s up, Seth?” Tom asked the man who had called to him, ignoring the screaming woman who wouldn’t let him go. “You just come from a fire?”
“Yes, we were on the way to your clinic when we saw your truck.”
“What’s up?”
“We found some kittens and puppies in the fire. We were coming to you to check them out. We got them before they were too severely burnt, but there’s some hair singed on a couple of them.”
Lorissa immediately put her cup and muffin on anearby table and demanded, “Where are they?” She ignored Tom and barely heard him tell the man that she could be trusted. She looked at Tom with a nod. “Later?”
“Yes. Go, take care of them. The guys know where my clinic is, but I’m telling you right now, I’m full in the hospital area.”
“Okay, I have room at the house. Can I get some medication from you if I need it? I have some, but I was going to call or stop into your clinic to see if I couldn’t order more.”
“Yes, we’re closed now, but call me with what you need, and I’ll bring it out.” He was able to get his arm free enough from the woman to extract his wallet and retrieve his business card to hand to her.
“Give me a few, then I’ll be out.”
“Okay,” Lorissa said as she rushed after the man and the last thing she heard as she ran through the door was the woman screaming something about him being a two-timing cheater and she would make him pay for humiliating her like he had.
Lorissa didn’t have time to stay and listen. She knew there was a story but also knew she was needed elsewhere that was more important.
“What do we have here?” she demanded as she approached the fire truck with the men standing around the open door. When they only looked at her with raised brows, she sighed heavily. “My name is Lorissa Gibson. I am a DVM as well as a farrier.”
“What’s that?” one of the men asked.
“The DVM stands for Doctor of Veterinarian Medicine, I’m a vet, I work on animals. The farrier part is that I take care of the hooves of horses and or cows if needed. Mostly horses.” At their skeptical look, she sighed heavily. “I work for Erin Riceman.”
“Ah, okay. I’m Seth Falco, and these are my brothers. We responded to a fire and as we were clearing the building, we heard crying and yipping. This is what we found.” He had the men step aside and sitting on the seat was a box that he brought down to hold before Lorissa, while one of the other men grabbed a box off the floor. Inside the one Seth held was a small Yorkie that seemed to be in labored breathing and there were several pups around her. She looked up in shock. “How many pups?”
“We counted six. Mama was lying on top of them. We just scooped them up and ran. Ms. Gibson, the puppies’ eyes aren’t even open yet.”
“Got it,” Lorissa turned to the other men and nodded. “What do you have?”
“A mother cat with four kittens. Same as the puppies, their eyes aren’t open yet.”
“Okay, I don’t know if you know the place or not, but I live out at what Erin and Clark refer to as The Old Atherton place. I’ll take them home with me, and I have plenty of room to set them up. My truck is over there, I don’t want to disturb them if I don’t have to.” She pointed to her truck and in five minutesthey were settled, and she was pulling away from the bakery as the police car arrived. She saw Tom through the window, but only gave him a chin lift as she drove past.
With the dog’s box on the seat in the middle of the front seat, she reached in and put her hand gently on the mother’s side and cooed that everything would be okay. As she drove she made a mental list of what she would need and used the Bluetooth device on her steering wheel to call The Broken Wheel.
“Naomi, it’s Lorissa.”
“Oh, hey, is everything okay, you sound rushed.”
“Yes, and no. I was on my way home and stopped at the bakery in town. While there, a fire truck stopped and rushed in to talk to Tom, who was there.” She didn’t get into any more details than that.
“Okay, was it the Falco brothers?”
“Yes, but they just came from a fire, and they had a box with puppies and kittens. Six puppies, four kittens, their eyes aren’t even open yet. I have them with me because Tom said his hospital is full. I’m still thirty to forty minutes out, I was wondering if you could gather some supplies and meet me at my house?”
