He kept their horses, Reno and Kiwi, here. Dell handled most of the day to day care of them, but on this foggy morning as he made his way to the pens, only one equine head appeared to pop through the fog as she neighed a soft greeting.
Kiwi.
Reno and Adam were gone. “Aw, you got left behind,” he said, laughing when she butted her face to his chest, knocking him back a step, letting him know what she thought of being deserted.
Kiwi always played hard-ass. “Much like another woman in my life,” he said.
Kiwi snorted and searched his pockets. When she found the apple, she softened her limpid eyes and batted her lashes.
Her version of the femme fatale.
He laughed again when she ate it nearly whole and then burped in his face. “If only you were all so easy.” Saddling her up, he rode into the nearby hills, where as a boy he’d gone to be invisible instead of the easy, skinny, scrawny target he’d once been.
He rode hard, grateful to not be on foot as he mostly had been in those years, trying to outrun his demons.
Halfway back, he ran into Adam and Reno.
At a wordless command, Adam halted Reno and studied Dell’s face. He said nothing, just arched a brow in query.
It was rare, extremely rare, that Adam beat Dell into Belle Haven.
“Overslept,” Dell said.
Or not slept at all.
Adam just looked at him and Dell sighed. “Everything’s fine.”
With a nod, Adam urged Reno onward.
“Good talk,” Dell muttered, and followed.
They made it to the center a good half hour before any patients were due. Normally Dell cut it closer than that, but Jade always came at exactly seven thirty and he wanted to be there when she arrived.
Assuming she
But as he walked Kiwi onto the property, she pulled in, and he knew a moment of unrelenting relief. He hadn’t realized until that very moment exactly how afraid he’d been that she might simply vanish as mysteriously as she’d arrived.
Going to happen sooner or later, he reminded himself. Because no matter what had set her off last night, she was temporary here. She’d been telling him that since the day she’d walked in with his help-wanted ad in hand.
She got out of her car and hesitated. Their gazes met for one long, charged moment.
“Well, that’s new,” Adam said.
Dell ignored this comment as he dismounted.
Adam slid off Reno at the same time and casually grabbed the reins from Dell’s hand. He didn’t say anything more, just led the horses away.
Jade reached into her backseat for Beans’s carrier, then headed across the parking lot toward him. Hard to tell what she was thinking behind her big, dark Hollywood glasses.
All he’d managed to piece together about last night was that fourteen-year-old deaf and slightly mentally handicapped Timmy, had run by her, wearing a mask.
At the sight of it, Jade had completely lost it.
Clearly she’d found it again because she walked right past him now and into the office, her usual implacable self.
The phone was ringing as he followed on her heels and she answered it while unbuttoning her jacket and slipping out of it.
She left her glasses on.
“Belle Haven,” she said, the phone in the crook of her neck as she gathered her hair up and held it there with two tongue depressors, the kind he had in small jars in each exam room.
She wore a black wraparound top, tied with a neat bow over her hip, and black pinstriped trousers. The sophistication was broken by the kick-ass boots with the stiletto heels and the pin above her breast in the shape of a dog cookie that said: REAL DOCTORS TREAT MORE THAN ONE SPECIES.
She looked both prim and outrageously sexy as she let Beans out, and Dell’s brain stuttered and twitched. His dick also twitched, but he ignored both responses.
“He just walked in,” she assured the person on the phone, not looking his way as she uncovered Peanut and booted up the computer. “We’ll work you in before he heads into surgery. No problem, see you then.” She hung up and nearly plowed into Gertie, who wasn’t at her usual spot but standing very close to Jade staring up at her.
“Gertie,” Jade admonished. “Out of my way, please.”
Gertie stayed at attention, still staring up at Jade, and then let out a low whine.
With a noise of annoyance, Jade walked around the dog, avoiding Dell by turning to her computer, even though he’d stopped and leaned against the counter, also right in her way.
Dell eyed Gertie, who was watching Jade with worried eyes, clearly noticing the tension in Jade’s body language. “Jade.”
“Jade,” Peanut squawked. “Jade, Jade. Pretty Peanut. Peanut so pretty.”
“You’re going to have to hustle this morning,” Jade told Dell, handing him a file comprising all of the faxes that had come in.
Yes, but hustle was the usual speed around here, especially in the mornings where they always had to hit the ground running to keep up. Dell typically began his day checking on any of his patients who’d been hospitalized during the night, reading through the lab results that Jade pulled for him off the fax machine. That’s what was in the file she’d just handed him.
The closest overnight animal hospital was in Coeur d’Alene, and sometimes he’d have to go there to see his patients in person and do rounds. Either he’d drive or Brady would fly him in their Bell 47 helicopter, but he flipped through the file and saw that wasn’t required this morning.
Jade had turned to her printer, which was now spitting out his schedule for the day. “You’ve got your usual early morning rounds and four surgeries; a spay, two neuters, one dental cleaning, and then-”
“Jade.”
She went still for one telling beat, then turned to face him.
Pushing away from the counter, he crossed her work space and pulled off her sunglasses. As always, her makeup was flawless. She wore lip gloss that smelled like vanilla mint and there was no sign of a sleepless night.
She’d made damn sure of it.
But as he stared at her, she drew a deep, bolstering breath and just like that, he knew. She wasn’t cool, calm, or collected. Not even close. But she had a hell of a store of bravado, probably because she was braced for him to mention last night. In fact, her eyes, those mesmerizing green eyes, were daring him to.
He wouldn’t. Not here, not now, when she so clearly needed to keep her shield. He handed her back her glasses.
There was a flash of surprised relief and then she slowly turned away. “I’m really swamped,” she said. “So-”
“I need some help.” He paused, waiting until she turned back.
“What kind of help?” she asked suspiciously.
And with good reason. He rarely, if ever, asked for help. “Work help.” He’d made it a point to never let anyone fuck around with his files. It was a lifelong habit deeply ingrained from growing up having to watch every penny, and it had carried over. His receivables and payables were as personal to him as his patients, and he handed them directly over to his accountant quarterly.
In between those times, he muddled through, sometimes messing everything up without trying, more often than not simply neglecting them. He knew the piles on his desk drove her nuts. And he’d always enjoyed driving her nuts. She looked so pretty steamed.
But today felt different. She felt different. He felt her tension, her fear every bit as much as Gertie did.
