I couldn’t do this. “You’re insane.”
“I’ve been called that before. Doesn’t stop me getting what I want.”
Don’t ask.
Don’t be that stupid.
My mouth didn’t get the memo. “And what do you want?”
His smile turned into a shark. “You, of course.” Taking my hand that was firmly planted on Pikachu’s shoulders to prevent any more jumping mishaps, he curled his fingers around mine. “I accept your offer of a date. After all, that’s what your face on my cock meant, right? In some barbarian language, sniffing my man goods is code for ‘take me out, you stud?’”
I groaned. “Oh my God, did you just call yourself ‘man goods’ and ‘stud’ in the same sentence?”
He smirked. “Yep. And I’ve plenty more self-compliments to come. At dinner.”
“No dinner.”
“Yes, dinner.”
“I work late.”
“So unwork.”
I rolled my eyes. “This is my business. I can’t just play hooky.”
“Hooky is fun, now and again.” Moving back to his side of the table, the intensity faded and the crazy innuendoes vanished as if they’d never existed. He rolled his shoulders, sighing heavily. “Look, forget it. You know I’m joking. Just having a bit of fun.”
The sudden switch left me high and dry.
I knew it was a joke.
Didn’t I?
But that was the problem. He made me hate being so damn serious all the time. With him I could be stupid and say juvenile things. He offered a break from adulting and that was far too tempting.
“Okay, fine.” Forcing myself to focus on being a professional, I murmured, “Let’s just finish this.”
Ryder obeyed (for the first time) and our attention landed on the shivering wiener. I grabbed a sterilised syringe and drew blood while Ryder kept him calm with soft words and petting.
Medical terms and recommended treatments filled my head rather than images of riding this intoxicating man reverse cowgirl in my office.
Once the dog’s blood had been gathered and labelled for lab work, I said, “You’ll need to feed him four times a day but in small amounts so his stomach doesn’t explode.”
“Hear that, buddy?” He scratched the mutt under his chin. “Don’t want an exploding tummy now do we?”
The pooch yipped and licked Ryder’s nose.
I melted.
I was no longer a girl but a puddle.
How did this happen?
This infuriating man and his jackass jokes turned into putty when he spoke to a creature with four legs.
Maybe, I should get on all fours and he’d be nicer to me.
The idea shoved aside treatment plans once again in favour of blow jobs and addicting kisses, proving to myself that I sucked as a vet and needed to either go back to university or never be in the same room as Ryder Carson again.
Polly can have him.
This business was half hers. She could take one for the team.
However, as Ryder grabbed his wiener and held out his hand for the script, the thought of him having the same kinky, heated conversation with Polly, instead of me, twisted my gut.
Shit.
I liked him.
And there was no room in my colour-coded diary for a dirty talker, pooch lover, and gorgeously handsome man.
Even if I did want to touch it.
CHAPTER FOUR
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Ryder
IT WAS TOO FUCKING EASY.
She was so uptight; one tug on her strings and it sent her spinning like a top.
I laughed out loud, staring at the ceiling where a flake of paint had come unstuck thanks to years of neglect and howling storms with no one to patch the damage.
I wasn’t unhappy in my life. I found purpose and friendship and kept myself busy doing things that granted good karma and an even better feeling of worth. But Vesper Fairfax patched up that tiny hole left inside that no activity could fill.
Fun.
She made me set down my rules and seriousness and want to be an annoying idiot with far too much testosterone. She made me crave stupidity that came from no expectations or aspirations—just playing together because we could.
Not that she thought it was fun when I threatened her with a bogus law suit.
My gaze followed the flaky paint to the crack in the wall caused by a decade of slow leaks. The small town of Thorn River didn’t often have bad weather—in fact, we were pretty lucky as far as hurricanes and earthquakes went—however, nothing was worse than carelessness.
And this house had seen its fair share of unwanted abandonment.
I wasn’t saying Thorn River didn’t have bad weather. Shit, being a township along the famous rapids meant the area flooded every few years. But apart from that, it was a safe community.
Only problem was, I was still fairly new.
An outsider.
I’d grown up a few towns away, but in a parish of a few thousand people that meant I was a foreigner. I’d been a novelty when I first arrived, slowly becoming accepted or scorned depending on who I managed to piss off. Now, I was the butt of most jokes for buying the local dilapidated old mayor’s estate from the gold rush era.
No one had wanted the mess and I couldn’t fault them. The typical wrap around veranda, southern style mansion with rickety balconies, pretty spindles, large bay windows, and enormous cold bedrooms in winter was a fucking money pit.
But it had potential. And I’d keep fighting for it.
I’d bought this wreck sight unseen.
Stupid, right?
(Go on, you can say it was stupid).
I still thought it was stupid even though I’d fallen a little in love with the place. I’d been there a year and already my parent’s life insurance fund had been put toward new windows, building work, and erecting a large barn just a few metres away from the main house where my rescued pooches lived.
Every day, there was a construction team on site so I wasn’t lonely.
But a year in a small town while trying to make friends wasn’t easy. Really, the only time I felt marginally happy (after my parents died on my twenty-eighth birthday last year from a fatal train crash in Spain) was when I tormented Vesper.
Her quick come backs. The glare in her eyes.
She was alive.
Where so many people in this place were barely existing with no passion left in their dusty, dried-up veins.
I stretched in bed, letting my mind wander to the sexy vet and our consultation yesterday. She never did accept a date, but I had an odd feeling that she’d been close to saying those magic words.
Probably stupid optimism, or had I finally worn her down enough to break her?
How can I find out?
Grabbing my phone, I checked my emails while trying to come up with a plan to get her into my bed. I was expecting a large shipment of timber to replace the veranda this week—perhaps I could entice her around with promises of lots of wood.
Christ, you’re an idiot.
After checking my messages, I returned to my home menu. The image glowing behind the app icons showed one of the rental properties my deceased parents left me in their will.
The small two-bedroom bungalow had been mine until I moved into this run-down shack with lofty dreams of finally starting my life, finding a wife, and doing what was expected of a man about to hit his thirties.
Thanks to my parents instilling good values and grateful ethics, I would never take what I had for granted and stop working—even though I could retire right now.
Before my mum and dad died, they’d amassed a portfolio of fourteen rental properties that self-serviced their loans with over half already debt free. However, they were so meticulous in their investments, they’d even sorted out the owing balance with a life insurance policy to cover every outstanding mortgage, and provided me and my brother (not that he needed a penny) with a few million to ensure our lives and any futur
e children we had would want for nothing.
When the lawyer called me into his office after the funeral (the day I’d moved temporarily back into my old bedroom—complete with Wonder Dog pictures and Incredible Hulk plastered to the walls—to sort through my parents’ things), he told me the news.
He’d looked at me with his bushy eyebrows expecting me to be happy I’d never have to work again.
I was fucking gutted.
Money meant nothing to me. Two lives had been lost. My brother and I were alone. No amount of wealth could change that.
I’d always been close to my parents but independent. I’d moved out at seventeen to pursue a trade—a plasterer, of all things. After growing up on renovation sites, while my parents worked side by side knocking down walls and putting in new kitchens for prospective tenants, I’d learned how to wield a paint brush before I was out of diapers.
Plaster dust and cement were in my lungs (which probably wasn’t a good thing and thank God I wasn’t around asbestos) but it was a passion that kept me close to my parents while making something of myself.
But that was before they died and left me with everything.
And I did mean everything.
Their elderly collie called Sheep (ironic seeing as the dog hated sheep) came home with me until he died a few months ago. He was old but I think he passed from a broken heart. He missed his master and mistress too much to care about hanging around.
I’d also inherited their terms for tenants who’d been with them since the eighties. No rent increase (even though the market was three times what it was back then) and they expected me to provide an heir to carry on the Carson legacy.
Although the properties were all mine, I wasn’t allowed to sell them. They believed in housing those who needed help just as much as those who could afford it.
All inherited fortune must be used for good.
I was allowed a wife and to dote on her, but I wasn’t allowed to gamble.
I was allowed children and to spoil them, but I wasn’t allowed to blow it on a ridiculous mid-life crisis convertible.
Damn it, my plan is foiled.
They’d thought of everything but it boiled down to: I was to help others.
It was the worst decree ever. Because what the hell did I know about helping people? I didn’t know the first thing about being a good Samaritan. And judging by the hate stares I’d earned from Vesper, I wasn’t good at flirting either.
I guess that was where inspiration struck to help animals in need of rescue. That empathy for the victim kept me busy and worked with my parents’ final stipulation.
Sheep had given me the idea actually. He’d run off on one of our rare walks before he croaked and I’d had to chase the crazy thing. He’d disappeared into a bush by Thorn River and whined when I found him.
He’d plonked himself next to the scruffiest little mutt I’d ever seen. He looked as if he’d been dragged through a bush (probably had seeing as he was sitting in one) and his white and tan fur was smeared in mud.
He’d been the first I rescued.
But not the last.
Not by a long shot.
“Ry!? Are you awake yet?” David, my head foreman, banged on my bedroom door. Not that it was a door—just a piece of plywood covering the entry while the rest of the house crawled with workmen.
Although I’d taken my parents decree to help others and twisted it into helping four-legged friends, I also employed a decent amount of people in town. Currently, I had seven men working eight hours a day to create the best home I could for me and my rescues.
And, if by some miracle a woman enters the picture, it will be hers, too.
“Yeah, yeah.” I crawled out of bed and shrugged into a navy t-shirt just as David kicked the plywood to the floor.
“This is your wake-up call.” He laughed, striding in with his tool belt groaning under the weight of chisels and hammers. “Get up, sleepy head. Don’t make me drown you in paint.”
“Hey, dressing here.” David and I had worked together for a few months and the camaraderie between us gave me that element of fun I was searching for. “You’re such a douche.”
“Takes one to know one.” He fisted his tape measure, pulling out a length of metal measuring, trying to whip me with it. “No sleeping on the job. Get.”
“I could dock your pay for that.”
“You wouldn’t.”
“Why?”
He winked. “You’d miss me too much.”
Got me there.
Chuckling, I grabbed a pair of dusty paint-splattered jeans and hauled them on. “Is the crew here?”
“Yup, just unloading the extra timber now.”
“Great.”
Running hands over my face to wake myself up, I moved past him. “You’re mighty chipper this morning.”
He slapped me on the back as we headed down the curved stairs toward the large cobwebbed and rain damaged foyer. “It was date night with the wife. She got tipsy. We did things.”
“Things?”
His crooked teeth flashed in a shit-eating grin. “Yep. She agreed to a sixty-nine. Been married six years and never once did she drop the prude until last night.” He nudged my shoulder with his. “Might have to ruffie her next time—see if I can get her to unlock the back door, if you know what I mean.”
I groaned. “And this is why women have such bad opinions of us.”
“Hey, I married her. I love her. She loves me. Technically, she ruffies me all the time with her apple cobblers and cherry pies. She puts me into a food coma. The least I can do is put her into a sex one.”
I shook my head. “Well, if the cops come calling, I don’t know you.”
Stopping in the entry way, my neck ached as I looked upward. “Goddammit, there’s a leak up there.” When I first bought this place, the roof had completely caved in. We’d only just repaired it last month. Thanks to a quick downpour last night, an area that hadn’t been sealed correctly showed dampness.
“Oh yeah, I saw that too. Got one of the boys on it already.”
“Okay, cheers.” Moving toward the circular walls that looked grand and pretty but were a bitch to plaster, I touched the sheetrock. “Still a bit wet but with the roof keeping them dry, it won’t take long until we can get started on replacing the floor and begin interior painting.”
“Already pencilled in the oak flooring for delivery.” David puffed out his chest, looking like a lumberjack in his plaid shorts and white wife-beater. Sweat dotted his upper lip.
It was bloody hot already.
What was I thinking putting on jeans?
I needed some air and space and knew exactly where to get it. Cracking my knuckles, I said, “Tell you what, you get started on the south side today. I’ll get my abseiling gear on and tackle the front porch roof. Deal?”
David nodded. “Sure thing, I’ll ask Simon—”
The sound of an obnoxious rap song I rather liked (liked enough to make it my phone ring) cut him off.
“Whoops, sorry.” Snatching the phone from my pocket, I pressed accept and held the vibrating thing to my ear. “Ryder.”
“Hello, Mr. Carson, I hope I’m not disturbing you this early, but we’ve just accepted a call that requires urgent help and no one is prepared to make the long journey.”
My smile stretched as warmth filled me. I always got this feeling whenever I was asked to help. I called it the karma blanket. But it was just gratefulness, knowing what I was about to do would change a creature’s life and there was no better thing than that.
The house could wait.
This could not.
“You’re not disturbing me at all.”
David rolled his eyes, knowing full well I wouldn’t be on the job site today.
The local shelter had me on speed dial now. It hadn’t always been the case. The first few times I’d rescued a stray or found a lost dog without its tags, I’d been treated as a wanna-be-hero with no belief of my genuine need to help these poor critt
ers.
However, after more visits and volunteering with feeding and doing a few odd jobs around the shelter, I was put on an honouree list of sponsors.
Not only did I take every animal off their hands that were on death row, I rehoused them on my estate, set up a website that advertised pets to forever families, offered guarantees and return policies, and flew the lovable creatures all around the country to new homes.
I used the endless wealth I’d been given to help those who were reliant on humans to protect them.
“So, you’ll go?” The woman’s voice wavered with hope.
“Of course, I’ll go. What’s the address and what am I collecting?”
“Oh wow, that’s amazing of you—” She paused. “Wait, are—are you sure? I know you dealt with a rescue yesterday. I can get someone—”
“Don’t. I’m happy to. Truly. Now, cough up the details.”
The girl (I vaguely remembered her name was Cora from meeting her last month), said, “It’s about a four hour drive. I can’t stand the thought of them in that monsters care anymore. The sooner you can collect them, the better.”
“Consider it done. What am I looking for?”
“Two Chiweenies.”
“What the hell is a Chiweenie?”
“A Chihuahua Dashund hybrid.”
“How does that even happen?” I jerked a hand through my hair. “Know what—doesn’t matter. Text me the address and I’ll leave right now.”
Cora’s relief was a physical thing, fluttering through the phone into my ear. “Oh, you’re the greatest. Truly. Thank you. Thank you so much.”
“Don’t mention it.” I hung up with a grin. Nice to know I’m appreciated by one female at least.
Then my grin broadened.
Talking of that particular female.
In a few hours, I’d have another two dogs that would need excellent health care.
And I knew just the vet to do it.
CHAPTER FIVE
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Vesper