“Five,” Emily said, and clapped a hand over her mouth.
Too late. Lilah snorted with mirth. “Honey,” she said, “you do realize you don’t have to pay to shadow him, you do that every single day. They pay you.”
“I just wanted to contribute to the cause,” Emily said, and grimaced.
“That’s your story?”
“Yep,” she said with much more confidence than she felt.
Lilah laughed at her.
Emily sighed. “You’re not going to make a big deal about this, are you?”
“Oh hell yes,” Lilah said. She laughed again and disconnected.
Great. Shaking her head, Emily got showered and dressed, and stepped off their porch to head to work, cutting across the wild grass growing in her yard to her car. They’d had rain several nights in a row now, and the grass had grown halfway up to her knees. She made a mental note to ask the landlord if she was responsible for cutting it.
She hoped not.
At the odd rustling sound, Emily went still, and then slowly turned around.
There, just behind her, was something moving in the grass. Hopefully not a snake, the only animal she wasn’t crazy about.
When the rustle came again, she almost acted like a complete girl by turning tail and running, but something had her taking a step forward instead.
Parting the long strands of grass, she smiled. A turtle was on the move. He—or she—was about nine inches long, olive and black, and had a nasty-looking gouge on one side of its face from jaw to left eye. It was so puffy he couldn’t possibly see out of it. “Oh,” Emily breathed, and crouched low. “Oh you poor baby.” She scooped the thing up in her hands to get a better look, and it retreated into its shell.
“It’s okay,” she said, moving back to the garage to grab a box leftover from when she and Sara had moved in. Gently, she set the turtle in the box and then set the box on the front passenger’s seat of her car. “I’ll fix you right up at work.”
The turtle remained in its shell, but she could feel its misgivings.
“Really,” she promised. “I actually know what I’m doing. At least when it comes to animals. Life, not so much, but we’re not going to go there.”
Her patient was polite enough not to respond.
Wyatt walked into the center to find Dell had beat him in. Jade had flown back to Chicago for two weeks to help her mom recover from knee replacement surgery, and she’d gotten someone to fill in for her.
Either that person hadn’t shown yet, or her substitute was Dell, which was highly doubtful. Dell and Jade had a solid relationship, but Jade had a rule—her husband wasn’t allowed in her domain. She called it the how-to-stay-married rule.
No one was more respectful of that rule than Dell himself. He had a caller on speaker phone as he tried to retrieve a pencil from Peanut, who didn’t want to give it up.
“How’s it going?” the female caller asked.
Jade.
“Great,” Dell said, still playing tug-of-war with Peanut.
“Boner,” Peanut yelled.
“Great, huh?” Jade asked doubtfully.
“Fantastic,” Dell said, giving up on his pencil.
Peanut cackled in triumph.
“I’ll be available if you need anything,” Jade said. “Don’t let Peanut eat any more pencils.”
Dell looked at Wyatt and grimaced.
“I almost forgot,” Jade said. “I saw you’d ruined your favorite shoes.”
“Yeah,” Dell said. “Gertie ate the laces and threw up on them.”
“I bought you new ones,” Jade said. “They’re in your office closet. Keep her out of there.”
Dell’s face softened. “Thanks, babe.”
“Anytime.” Jade’s voice was soft now, too, and filled with affection. “Love you, babe. Don’t mess up my front desk or we’ll have problems. Oh, and Wyatt’s kicking your ass in the auction. Don’t worry, I’ve put in a bid for you that’ll top it. You can thank me in person.” And then she disconnected.
Dell stared at the phone for a long beat, that warm, affectionate look still on his face, and Wyatt felt an odd pang.
Envy.
He was happy for Dell, even as he envied the hell out of what he’d found with Jade.
Wyatt had had that once, however briefly, with Caitlin. She’d worked in town at the local medical clinic, and they’d had about six months of bliss.
Until an opportunity had come up for her to go work for Doctors Without Borders. She’d promised to be gone only a year, two tops.
How the hell did a guy resent that? Easy answer— he shouldn’t. He couldn’t. Just because he wanted to settle down and grow roots and a family, and she wanted to save the world . . .
No, he couldn’t have asked her to stay. For years he never had a say in where the wind took him. He’d refused to do that to Caitlin, to anyone. He wanted to settle down in one place without having to ask someone to want the same.
So he hadn’t asked, not that Caitlin had given him any sign that she’d wanted him to ask. It had sucked, making the break with her, but he wanted to believe that there was someone else out there for him. A woman who would belong to him the way Jade belonged to Dell. A woman he could belong to the way Dell belonged to Jade.
“If I screw anything up,” Dell muttered, hands on hips, looking uncharacteristically flustered, “she’s going to kill me.”
The chances of this happening was high. Dell was famous for screwing up the scheduling, the billing, whatever he got his fingers on.
So Wyatt understood the concern.
Adam walked in the front door wearing S&R gear, two yellow Labs at his side. He took one look at his brother behind the counter and shook his head. “Jade’s gonna kill you, man.”
“Whatever,” Dell said, scowling. “I’ve done this before. I did this before Jade.”
“And you sucked,” Adam reminded him.
“Then you do it.”
“And risk the wrath of your gorgeous wife?” Adam asked with a rare laugh. “Hell no.”
Dell’s shoulders sagged a little. “Who am I kidding, I totally can’t do this. I promised I wouldn’t, but the woman she hired to cover us got sick. I’ve called in some favors from everyone I know. I’m waiting to hear back.”
“You’re fucked,” Adam said under his breath.
Yeah, Wyatt was getting that. “What are our choices?” he asked Dell.
“I’ve got a great choice, and one . . . not so great,” Dell admitted. “And the last one is oh-holy-fucking-shit we’re in trouble, but she’s better than nothing.” He paused, rubbed a hand over his head. “Maybe.”
Adam gave Wyatt a told-you-so look.
The front door opened and Emily walked in. Weeks ago now she’d wised up and ditched the business suits for more practical clothing. Today she was in khaki pants and a knit top that was one of those snug wraparound deals that tied beneath a breast with a bow. He watched her walk toward them while having some pretty damn explicit thoughts about that bow. Like untying it.
With his teeth.
She had a box under each arm. She set the smaller box down and read the note out loud:
Dear Dr. Dreamy Eyes,
Heard you love homemade mac and cheese, so for treating my dear Boo-Boo yesterday, I whipped some up. There’s plenty more where this came from,
any
time
.
Sue Mason
Dell and Adam started laughing.
“What’s so funny?” Wyatt demanded. “When you first opened up this place, every single woman in town suddenly had a dog or a cat that was sick.”
“Just happy to have passed the torch,” Dell said. “Dr. Dreamy Eyes.”