Animal Instincts (Gilded Knights Series Book 3)

by Emilia Finn

  “Inappropriate.” She has the snooty act perfected. And now that her man is coming, she’s able to turn it up effortlessly. “I don’t think it’s right we discuss me or my grooming habits.”

  “Because you have a boyfriend?”

  “No,” she scowls and finally looks at me. “Because you’re my boss. Do you not remember the discussion we had that day we met? You and sexual harassment are synonymous.”

  Glowering, I glance back to the road and rhythmically tap my thumb against the steering wheel. “This isn’t sexual harassment. If anything, you’re the one making inappropriate phone calls.”

  Stunned, her eyes whip to mine. “Huh?”

  Tell her, Beckett! Tell her what she did.

  What you did.

  What you did together.

  Though of course, I don’t. Because I’m not gonna be the prick who tosses something like that in her face. Call me a gentleman, but I don’t take pleasure in humiliating nice women.

  Instead, I’d rather goad her into doing it a second time on her own accord.

  While sober.

  I nod toward her phone when she grows impatient at my lack of answer. “Calling him while you’re supposed to be working? That’s hardly appropriate.”

  “Oh, right,” she extends a hand toward the road. “Because staring at the ‘Honk if a kid falls out’ sticker on the back of that van is a better use of my time.” Dropping her hand, she rolls her eyes. “You didn’t make a big deal about me speaking to my sister.”

  That was because I heard the things the sister said about Mark. Jen hates Tabitha’s boyfriend. She hates him with a fiery passion. And hell, I can get on board with that.

  “She sounds nice.” I shrug and lounge back to get comfortable. We have four hours left of this, and I’m going to demand her attention for every single one of them. “Why’d you want to work at Lakeside?”

  Surprised, Tabby looks to me with a glare. “Is this an interview? Last I checked, I already had the job.”

  I cough out a laugh. “We have time to talk, so I wanna talk. Why Lakeside?”

  “Because it was the only practice in a hundred-mile radius with a vacant position.”

  “Fuckin’ ouch.” I swing my gaze around and narrow my eyes. “I get that we’re pals, but could you apply at least a little filter to that mean streak? You’re gonna hurt my feelings.”

  She only shrugs and goes back to studying the road. Her phone remains between her thighs, her screen lighting up. But every incoming call goes ignored.

  “Lakeside comes with a good reputation,” she finally concedes. “Even at the practice I worked in before coming here, we’d heard of you.”

  “You had?” I study the side of her face. “Really?”

  “Yeah. I suspect the reputation was for Dr. Brandel, the owner before you. But sure, Lakeside is known for caring staff and not milking its clients for all the money a vet can make. Which became clear to me,” she grumbles, “on my first day, when I got a look at your files. Poorly made scheduling system. Wasted appointments. Un-invoiced treatment. Overdue accounts. It was gross.”

  “Lucky you came along to save the day.” Smirking, I study the same van Tabby does and count the stick figure kids. There are at least eight of them, plus two adults. Three dogs and a single cat. “Why did you want to become a vet in the first place?”

  Tabby’s wide eyes come to mine, so I add, “I haven’t forgotten. Just because I’ve pigeonholed you to a desk position doesn’t mean I forget the degree you worked so hard for. Early graduation, and with two years off between high school and college grad. Makes you either very smart, or very passionate.”

  “Can’t I be both?” Relaxing back, Tabby crosses one jeaned leg over the other and draws my eyes to her thighs.

  I need to stop it. I need to get my shit straight before I make her uncomfortable.

  “When I was six, I had a cat,” she tells me. “Darlene was the perfect little kitty.”

  “Darlene?” I choke out a laugh. “Okay.”

  “I didn’t choose the name,” she snickers. “Or, well, I guess I did.” She brings her hands to her cheeks. She blushes for such silly reasons. “I had this neighbor when I was a kid. She was a bittttttttch,” she laughs. “So effing mean.”

  “You named your cat for the bitch neighbor?”

  She nods and studies the dash while her cheeks burn. “I really did. I was six, so I can’t be held liable for this stuff. But yes, Darlene, this bitch with too-big teeth, too-dry hair, and a body shaped like a pear—but like, five hundred pounds of pear. She was mean to me, mean to all kids,” Tabby adds. “She was the opposite of the cliché nice old lady next door. And I…” She presses her hands between her thighs and leans into the door so she can angle around to watch me. “Well, I was the good little girl. You know the type? The one who wanted to please adults, the one who wanted a pat on the hair and a gold star.”

  “I don’t know any of those women.” Chuckling, I think of Nadia, of Arlo, of Idalia, and then Abby. Then I shake my head. “Not one.”

  “Well, now you do,” she giggles. “I was the handy helper in class, and I would spend my lunchtimes in the library, because I got along better with grownups than I did with kids my age.”

  “You were too serious for your own good.”

  “Yup. Anyway, I was accustomed to adults liking me. I was the golden child, smart, passionate.” She makes a quirky face and waits for our eyes to meet. “But then I met Darlene, and I figure, all I have to do is be sweet and helpful and kind, and eventually she’ll love me, right?”

  I grit my teeth and imagine this overweight Darlene with the teeth and hair. “Uh oh.”

  “Right,” she sighs. “No matter what I did, I couldn’t please her. I couldn’t be perfect enough.”

  “You know that’s on her, right?” I meet Tabby’s eyes. “Narcissism at its best.”

  “Oh, I know that now,” she sniggers. “But as a six-year-old, I was being groomed to please adults. That wasn’t my parents’ fault, and it wasn’t my teachers’ faults. It was my personality, the wanting to be liked… then I met Darlene, and she just refused to like me back.”

  “I’m finding it hard to connect this woman I know, the one who doesn’t give a fuck about what I think, with a people-pleasing little girl.”

  “That’s because I grew and matured,” she counters with a smirk. “I learned who I should please, and who wasn’t worth the trouble. I learned self-respect. Anyway,” she says on a grinning exhale. “Back when I was six and I had this cat, I named her Darlene. I guess in my young brain, I figured if the human-Darlene wouldn’t accept me, then maybe the cat could be a good alternative.”

  “But cats are notorious for being assholes too,” I laugh. “Jesus, Tabby. You went from one narcissist to another.”

  “I was doing my best, okay?” Playful and smiling, she draws patterns with her fingertips in her jeans. “Long story short, the cat was actually pretty awesome. She was a stray I found, not a tiny kitten, but probably about a year old. I don’t think she’d been treated well wherever she came from, because she feared her own shadow. She didn’t like to be touched. Didn’t like to be in confined spaces. And when I fed her, she ate to excess.”

  “She was afraid the next meal might not come.”

  “Right.” Tabby lifts her feet to the chair and hugs her knees. “So I worked with her for years. Teaching her to trust me. Teaching her that she’s safe. I mean, it took over a year for her to allow me to pick her up without scratching me. And a few more months after that to hear her first purr.” Tabby pauses and grins. “She sounded like a little bird.”

  “I see it now.” I try not to stare at Tabby’s pert nose. Her thick bottom lip. Her feathered hair. “A little girl with a fat cat. A shitty name. A trust exercise for you both.”

  “I stopped needing to please people after her. She taught me it was useless. But she also taught me love, and trust, and selflessness. I fed her daily, patted her, homed her, all knowing s
he may never trust or love me back. For that first year, at least.”

  “Did you cry when she loved you back?”

  “No,” she snickers. “I whooped so loud I scared her and set us back a whole month. But it was a nice start for us. It was special.”

  “What has all this got to do with becoming a vet?”

  “When I was ten, Darlene was hit by a car. She was an inside cat, but this one time, she got out, wandered into the street. Probably remembered how awful the world was outside my bedroom, but before she got back inside, she was struck down right in front of me.”

  “Not traumatic for a little girl at all.”

  Tabby lays her head back against the window and shows off a slim neck. Light veins. A gentle pulse that makes me want to taste. To touch.

  Which leads me to thinking about her clit. About the pulse she spoke of.

  I flex my hands around the steering wheel and force myself to stay on my side of the fucking truck.

  “My parents helped me rush Darlene to the vet,” Tabby adds, pulling me back to now, and a story about a little girl.

  Uncomfortable, I adjust my posture and pray my cock goes soft once more.

  “Dr. Bennett,” she sighs, half in love with whoever helped Darlene that day. “He was—well, to me, he was old, but now that I’m not ten, I realize perhaps he was about your age.”

  “Ouch.”

  She giggles. “He was thirty. He was fit, and strong, and had a big smile that made me smile. I had tears streaming down my face,” she brings a finger up and trails it along her cheek. “Big fat sobs that made it hard for me to breathe. I was a damn mess, Beck. Completely and utterly broken. Darlene and I had worked so hard on loving each other. We’d trusted each other. And now, as far as I knew, she was dead or dying.”

  “Did she die?”

  She shakes her head. “Dr. Bennett saved her. Took her leg, mended her broken body, nursed her back to health. She stayed in his clinic for a week or two, since I was incapable of caring for her at home. But he let me visit every single day.”

  She cuddles into her legs and thinks back. “By the time she was ready to come home, I was a regular in there. The staff knew me. The clients thought I was Bennett’s kid. I was over my people-pleasing phase, but I made friends with adults still. That meant when I wasn’t at school, I was in that hospital visiting them all. It meant when Darlene didn’t need me, I was in that examination room, watching, learning. Helping when I could.” Tabby’s eyes come to my face. Silver, sexy, and staring deep into mine. “By the time Darlene could go home, I was invested anyway, so I kept coming back. And Dr. Bennett allowed it.”

  “When did you first examine an animal?”

  She flashes a playful grin. “I was pretending when I was eleven. I was doing it with Bennett’s supervision when I was thirteen. I gave my first vaccination—a needle—when I was fourteen. And when I was fifteen, I was working with some clients on my own.”

  “Not at all legal.”

  “Not even a little bit,” she giggles. “But these were controlled situations. Animals I’d known and worked with for a few years, clients who weren’t apt to freak out over their precious baby’s hooked toenail. The things I did were routine, and anything I wasn’t sure on, Bennett was in the very next room, the door open, so he could listen in anyway.”

  “Which is why, by the time you were ready for college, you sailed through.”

  “Yes. And I left Dr. Bennett’s practice so I could come here.” She sighs, nostalgia and uncertainty in one. “I left my home, all because my boyfriend wanted to move. Then I got here and met—”

  “Me.” I lounge back and open my legs wide. Sunlight hits the side of my face, but it’s warming, healing, and perfect. “You left the perfect Dr. Bennett, moved here, met Dr. Rosa, and wondered what the fuck happened to your perfect life.”

  “Well…” she nods. “Yeah, basically.”

  “Geez, no wonder you’re always so mad at me,” I snicker. “You’re a fucking child prodigy in the veterinary world. You’ve got more experience than me, almost, and I’ve relegated you to desk duty.” And at that thought, another bolt of anxiety lances through my chest.

  She will never settle here. Maybe I’ll get her for six months; hell, I might even get her for a year. But eventually, she’ll leave. She knows her worth, she knows her passion, and no matter how much loyalty she shows for a job, she won’t stay behind a desk forever.

  “Well… yeah. Basically.” She turns in her seat and studies the scenery, making me wonder if she’s just come to the same realization about her future at Lakeside. “I’m glad you understand me better now.”

  “Me too.”

  I tamp down the temptation to reach across to touch her; her hand, her leg, her whole fucking body, and instead reach out to snag my sunglasses. I bring them down over my eyes and block out the vulnerability I feel whenever Tabby and I speak.

  She was supposed to be an assistant. An easy hire, easy fire if the need called for it. But now I have Tabitha fucking Lawrence: smart, passionate, kind, a savior of animals in need. And the irony is, Mark is the only reason I know her.

  Worse yet, him coming to town in a few days is likely a good thing for me. If he stays away, she’s apt to leave sooner rather than later. But him coming to her means she won’t run away quite so soon.

  I hate the guy. And yet, without him, there’s no her.

  “What are you thinking about?” Tabby murmurs when the silence drags on too long. “You got super serious over there.”

  “Thinking about our hotel. I hope there’s a pool.”

  “Ha.” Stiffening, Tabby turns toward the window and keeps her face turned away. “Yep. I hope so too.”

  14

  Tabby

  Bed and Breakfast

  Tension bubbles thick in the air. Curiosity, then impatience, as our GPS leads us off a main road heading into town, and instead, onto something much narrower… dirtier… bumpier.

  “What the fuck?” Beckett growls when the road stretches on. “Where is this bitch taking us?”

  “Um… to our accommodations.” I avoid eye contact and stare at my phone hard enough to crack the screen. If it looks like I’m busy seeing to emails and whatnot, then surely Beckett won’t demand I speak to him, right? Or answer questions. Or defend my choices. “We’re nearly there.”

  “Why are we heading toward a farm, Tabitha? Why is there a dude on a fucking tractor?”

  “Um… hmm…” I make noncommittal noises in the back of my throat. “Well, see, the Four Seasons was booked out. Everyone else booked ahead of us, so by the time you told me to call, they had no rooms left.”

  “First of all, that’s a damn lie!” He shoots forward until his chest touches the steering wheel, and his eyes scour the land surrounding us. “And second, this is a farm. They have cows. And corn. And look! Over there. A horse.”

  “You act like you’re afraid of animals,” I huff. “Grow up, Rosa.”

  “I’m afraid of spending my time here dodging whoever owns this place because he wants free veterinary care for his pregnant fucking horse. I’m afraid of missing out on the spa, and the cocktail hour, the room service. The room service, Tabitha!”

  “Stop calling me Tabitha,” I grumble. “Sounds like I’m in trouble.”

  “You are in trouble! Where’s the Netflix? The bar? The pool? Where’s the w—”

  “Women?” I snap. I shouldn’t. I have no right to judge this man. But knowing that doesn’t stop my temper from flaring and demanding answers. “Really? Having a buffet of women to select from is that important to you?”

  “I was gonna say wi-fi,” he snarls, slowing near a big, red shed. The kind one might see in a children’s picture book about Old McDonald. He turns and meets my eyes. “I was talking about wi-fi.”

  “Oh, well…” Nervously, I scratch the back of my neck. “The good news is, they have wi-fi.”

  “Would it bother you if I brought women back to my room at The Four Seaso
ns, Tabby?”

  “What?” I scoff so loud, so obnoxious, that everyone within a fifty-mile radius is certain to call me out as a fake. “Why on earth would it bother me?”

  “I don’t know.” Creeping to a stop out front of a cottage-style home and an English garden, Beckett pushes the truck into park and turns in his seat to pin me with a look. “I’m just wondering,” he murmurs, “if it would.”

  “I would consider it somewhat inappropriate,” I sniff. “Unprofessional, for sure. But not… it’s not…” I’m getting flustered. “Um… no.”

  “It would bother me in reverse,” he concedes quietly. “I’m man enough to admit that. It would bother the fuck out of me if you brought random dudes back to your room.”

  “Well…” My stomach jumps. “Lucky it’s irrelevant. I have a boyfriend, so…”

  “Uh huh.” At that, Beckett pushes out of the truck and tosses his sunglasses back inside before slamming the door.

  The moment I follow him out on my side, he extends a hand—not to hold mine, not even to touch me, but to guide. To show he pays attention. “Will he be living with you?”

  My brows pull close as confusion flitters through my brain. “Who?”

  “The boyfriend.” Together, we step through a creaky wire gate and under a trellis of climbing roses. “When Mark gets here, is he moving in?”

  “Of course.”

  “So there’s no courting?” Beckett pushes. “No waiting. There’s just a dude, turning up and living with my… assistant?”

  “Well, yes.” I clear my throat and take the first step onto a wooden porch. “We’ve done the courtship. The waiting. We’re three years into this, Beckett. We’ve kinda passed all the formalities that lead to this point.”

  “So on Saturday night, when we return to town after this is all done, you’ll be going home, and a dude will be there. In your apartment?”

  “In our apartment,” I counter.

  “In your bed?”

  “In our bed,” I press. My stomach flip-flops, but still, I stop at the top step and turn back to look down at my too-tall boss. “What is going on with you?”