Animal Attraction

Nineteen

Two days later, Jade had lunch with Lilah in town at the bakery, where they stuffed themselves with turkey and cheese croissants. Lilah was entertaining herself by turning her ring finger to and fro so that the sun coming in through the window hit the diamond just right and glared into Jade’s eyes. “How do you get any work done if you’re staring at that thing all day?” she asked, slipping on her sunglasses to keep from being blinded.

“It takes concentration, believe me.” Lilah grinned. “Hard to believe, right? That Brady and I live together now-and I still love him.”

Jade tried to fathom it. Living with a man. Letting him see the morning routine. Having to share closet space. Needing to consult someone when she ran out at midnight because she had to have ice cream.

“You ever done it?”

“Live with a man?” Jade shook her head. “Nope.”

“Is there someone back home, waiting on you?”

“After a year and a half,” Jade said lightly, “I’d have mentioned it, don’t you think?”

Lilah shrugged. “You’re pretty tight-lipped.”

“There’s no one.”

Lilah tilted her head. “So you and Dell…?”

“How did we get on this subject?” Jade asked. “We’re talking about you, sharing your space with a man. And how does that even work, anyway? What happens if he leaves the toilet seat up? Drops his tighty-whities on the floor? Eats your emergency stash of ice cream?”

“Brady doesn’t wear tighty-whities. Sometimes he doesn’t wear any underwear at all.”

There was a beat of silence as they both contemplated that image for a moment.

“And if he eats my ice cream-and he does-he buys more.”

“Are you telling me he has no bad habits that drive you nuts?”

Lilah laughed. “Well, he’s a man, isn’t he? Of course he drives me nuts. He stubborn as a damn mule, he thinks he’s always right, and he hogs the remote.”

“So how are you going to live with that for the next sixty years?”

“Buy another TV.”

Jade stared at Lilah. “I’m serious.”

“So am I,” Lilah said.

Jade must have looked confused because Lilah patted her hand. “You do realize that none of those things are deal breakers, right?”

“How do you know?” Jade asked. “Maybe a year from now, you’ll-”

“What? Get tired of the way he looks at me as if I’m his entire life? Get over the fact that for the first time ever, someone wants me for me? That the man somehow actually enjoys making me happy?”

Jade stared at her. “The ice cream…”

“I’ll buy a lifetime supply of ice cream. Hell, I’ll even pretend he’s right some of the time… it’s worth it. He’s worth it. And you know what? So am I.” Lilah popped her last bite into her mouth and pointed at Jade. “And so are you.” She pointed to Jade’s plate, and the half of her croissant still sitting there. “Now see, that’s why you look so hot in all those pretty clothes of yours. You have self-control. Too much even.”

“I’m taking a line-dancing class. If you think I have too much control, you ought to see me on Wednesday nights.”

“Yeah? Any cute guys in it?”

“Not that kind of lack of control. I didn’t know how to dance before. So I’m pretty much winging it.”

Lilah was looking at her with approval. “You’re trying to learn how to have fun.”

“Yes.”

“Maybe you should take Dell with you.”

“Dell doesn’t need to learn how to have fun. He invented the word.”

Lilah gave her a little smile. “You of all people shouldn’t let his protective shell fool you. You’re smarter than that.”

Jade let out a breath. “You know he does pro bono vet work every Monday?”

“Yes, and I know he didn’t tell you that. He doesn’t tell anyone.”

“I went with him.”

Lilah’s brows shot up so far they vanished into her hair. “You went with him?”

“I just showed up at his house in the morning and got into his truck. He had no choice.”

Lilah laughed at that. “Honey, that man has all the choices in the world, and all the brawn. Believe me, if he didn’t want you to go, you wouldn’t have. He must have needed you there.”

Now it was Jade’s turn to laugh. “Need? Dell doesn’t need anyone.”

Lilah was shaking her head. “He might like to think it-all three of them do. But it’s not true. Brady realized it with me. And someday Adam and Dell will know it.”

“Know what?”

“That needing someone isn’t the same as being weak. That they can still be big and bad and strong and still lean on someone. You’re that someone for Dell.”

Jade’s heart stopped. “Lilah, I-”

“I know.” Lilah covered Jade’s hand with her own. “You’re leaving. I don’t want you to. I’ve been trying not to say that because you have to go back, I get it. But I’m sick over it, and if I feel that way, I can only imagine how Dell feels.”

“I’ve got a temp service on standby and the front desk running like a charm. Anyone can take over, they’ll be fine.”

“You know damn well that’s not what I’m talking about.”

Brady walked through the door juggling two hot dogs and a large soda from the convenience store up the street, tailed by Dell and Adam. Dell was also armed with crap food, but Adam strode directly to the bakery’s front counter.

Adam was the only one of the three who cared in the slightest about what he put into his body.

“He’s going to order tea,” Lilah murmured. “That man is hot, but he doesn’t know much about how to eat.”

Brady’s gaze went directly to Lilah, and he gave her one of those smiles that told the whole world they’d very recently been naked together and were planning on getting that way again as soon as possible.

Dell was on his phone, but his eyes tracked to Jade in a way not all that different from Brady, and her pulse kicked up. Brady had already dragged a chair to the table and was kissing Lilah hello when Dell kicked another chair over. He glanced at Brady and Lilah kissing like their mouths were fused and something flickered in his gaze.

Jade wasn’t sure what he was thinking, but she knew what she was thinking. That the intimacy between Brady and Lilah was so easy and real. Which stirred up a surprising twinge of envy.

A woman came into the bakery and saw Dell. “Finally,” she said. “I catch up with you.”

He looked up and gave her an easy smile. “Stacy.”

Stacy was a petite, curvy brunette in jeans, boots, and a broad smile. “I wanted to tell you that Trickster’s feeling so much better. We appreciate your house call the other night. I’m just sorry you had to leave so fast. Was everything okay with the emergency call?”

Brady and Lilah were preoccupied with something on Brady’s iPhone. Jade tried to busy herself with her own cell phone, but her ears weren’t on board with that plan and she eavesdropped shamelessly.

“Yes,” Dell said. “It’s handled.”

“I was thinking maybe you could come back out tonight,” Stacy said, hunkering at his side, giving him a nice view down her top. “My kitty needs a checkup.”

Jade, who’d just taken an ill-timed drink of her water, choked.

Dell slid her a glance and she went back to studying her cell phone, like look at me, I’m just sitting here working…

“Tonight’s not great,” Dell said to Stacy.

“Oh. You working?”

“Teaching a self-defense class, actually,” he replied, and this time didn’t look at Jade at all.

“After, then.”

Dell didn’t say anything. Clearly taking that as agreement, Stacy leaned in even closer and whispered something in Dell’s ear, and though Jade nearly fell out of her chair to try to catch it, she couldn’t. Whatever it was, he had no reaction at all as Stacy sashayed out of the place, taking one last look over her shoulder at him.

Jade rolled her eyes and stuffed the rest of her croissant into her mouth in three bites, not even tasting it. Which meant that on top of being inexplicably irritated, she was also going to have to work out to lose the extra million calories she’d just consumed.

Lilah was helping herself to Brady’s soda. “Was Lulu delivered to the kennels while I was gone?”

“Yes, and Dell had just come by to get me. She was very happy to see him, so happy that she ate one of his socks.”

Dell pulled up the leg of his jeans. He had only one sock on.

“Sounds like she thinks she’s a goat.”

Brady leaned back in his chair, tilting it so that he was leaning against the wall as he grinned. “Turns out lambs don’t recognize calm assertive. All they want is something to eat.” He tugged a strand of Lilah’s hair fondly. “Saw that new puppy you rescued. Cute little guy.”

“Yeah, but I think I’ve given everyone in town a puppy by now. Not sure who I can get to take him.”

“You’ve never given Jade a puppy,” Brady said.

“That’s because Dell’s her puppy.”

Brady cracked up. Dell kicked the leg of Brady’s chair, almost toppling him over.

Brady dropped his chair back down and looked at the soda, which had spilled on his chest. “You do know I can still kick your ass, right?”

Dell leaned close to Jade, slipping his arm around her. “I have a kick-ass partner now. You can’t take us both.”

“I knew it!” Lilah grinned, pointing at them. “You’re an ‘us’!”

“Hey, man, this was a clean shirt,” Brady grumbled, swiping his chest with napkins.

Lilah smacked him. “Did you not hear?”

Brady lifted his head. “Hear what?”

Lilah ignored him, looking between Dell and Jade. “So what is this? What does this mean?”

“It means that I can finally kick Brady’s ass,” Dell said. “With Jade helping me.”

“And…?”

“And we’ll take Adam, too. Just on principle.”

Lilah sighed. “One of these days you’ll admit it.”

Jade didn’t look at Dell, because she knew better. She knew that while sometimes she and Dell were indeed an “us”’-like when they were working or possibly naked-most of the time there was no “us.”

They both wanted it that way.

Besides, Dell wasn’t interested in an us and even if he was…

You’re leaving…

She kept forgetting that one pesky little thing. And maybe she kept forgetting because at some point she’d started thinking about not leaving…