Page 32 of The Coppersmith Farmhouse (Jamison Valley 1)
Jess deposited her onto my lap and I cradled her with my good arm.
“Everything is going to be okay. I’ll be good as new, really soon. Promise,” I whispered. “You were my brave girl. I’m proud of you.”
“That was scary, Mommy.”
“I know, sweetie. I’m sorry.”
“Can we go home?” she asked.
“Soon. I need to sit here for a while so the medicine can do its job and make me feel better. Then we’ll go home. Maybe we should get some pizza for dinner? And ice cream?”
She gave me a small smile and nodded. “Chocolate ice cream.”
“You got it.”
“Time to explain, Georgia,” Jess said.
I sighed and squeezed Roe a bit closer. “I was in the barn cleaning out the back stall. There was a rattlesnake behind one of those old hay bales. I wasn’t paying attention, so when I grabbed the hay bale to throw it out, it bit me.”
Thinking about it sent a new wave of shudders through my body. Rowen tensed on my lap as she got chills of her own.
“I’m never going in the barn again.” Tears filled my eyes.
“Me either,” Rowen said.
Jess’s anger vanished at the sight of my tears and he moved into us, putting a hand around the back of my neck.
“I’ll take care of the barn. And the snake. Make sure it’s safe,” he said.
I sniffled and blinked a couple of times before the tears could fall.
“That’s sweet, Jess. But I really don’t think I can ever go in there again. Snakes scare the crap out of me. That place is tainted forever. Can you board the doors closed?” I asked. “Oh, wait! Let’s burn it down instead. We can roast marshmallows and make s’mores in the fire.”
He grinned and squeezed his hand at my neck. “Fire season, baby. Think Nick at the fire department would frown upon the sheriff lighting up a barn and causing a prairie fire.”
“Oh . . . dang. Then let’s lock up the doors, and this winter, I’ll be sure to leave a burning cigarette or twelve out there. I don’t smoke but that gives me five or six months to start.”
“Not a big fan of kissing an ashtray, Freckles. How about you don’t worry about the barn right now?” he asked.
“Fine.”
Not thinking about the barn was a very good idea. But he was dreaming if he thought I’d ever go back in there. That barn was as good as gone. As soon as I could afford it, I was hiring someone to tear it down. Then I was going to build a garage and stock it full of mongoose babies. Because anyone who’d ever read Rikki-Tikki-Tavi as a child knew a mongoose would take care of snakes. So I was buying a lot of mongooses for my new garage, assuming that a mongoose could live in Montana, of course.
He dropped his hand from my neck. “How much longer do you need to stay here?”
“Forty-five minutes, give or take a few,” I said after looking at the wall clock.
“Right,” he said. “C’mon, Roe. We’ve got a few things to do while your mom finishes here.”
“What things?” Rowen and I asked in unison.
“Gotta get my truck to the farmhouse so I can drive you home in your car. Pick up pizza and chocolate ice cream. Those things. Where are your keys?”
“Jess—” I started but he interrupted me.
“Got narcotics in that drip?” He tipped his head to my IV tower.
“Uh . . . yeah.”
