And if he ever hit his head hard enough to climb back on the relationship horse, it would be to a low-maintenance country girl who made up for a lack of drama with a love of big bird dogs. Labs would work. Or Chesapeake Bay Retrievers.
“Weeeeell, Ididrun into Lou Ellen last week at the club.” Kennedy’s cheeks tinged pink as he opened the exam room door. “And she may have let slip that you were in need of a little female companionship. After all, it has been a long time since…well…”
Ah.And there it was. His own personal elephant in its own personal corner.
He reached for the knob, careful not to grind his molars, at least not audibly. If there were a better way to deal with references to that one time he was left at the altar…he hadn’t found it.
Once, just once, it would be nice to make it a goddamn week without some reference to Birdie.
“Remember this, Rhett Valentine.” Kennedy squeezed his bicep, her thick gardenia perfume exacerbating his headache. “There’s noIin happiness.”
“Come again?”
She screwed her nose like he’d come up a few Bradys short of a bunch. “H-a-p-p-y-n-e-s-s?”
He took a deep breath. She had to go. Now. Before he said something he regretted.
He ushered her and Muffin into the foyer. “Don’t forget to grab a Milk-Bone in the bowl by the magazine rack.” He shut the door, the loud snick cutting her off mid-protest.
He scrubbed his jaw, eying the locked cabinet that stored the horse tranquilizers. Lou Ellen was going to raise hell once she caught wind of this snub.
Tempting, but nah. “Suck it up, Buttercup,” he muttered. If the biggest problem in his life was a bossy big sister determined to sail him off into a happy-ever-after sunset, he should be grateful that things were looking up.
Or at least not facedown in the gutter.
Was he happy? Well-meaning busybodies pestered him with the question, but no one ever quit talking long enough to hear his answer.
Yeah. He was. Happy enough anyway.
He didn’t return to his office until Kennedy’s Miata convertible screeched from the parking lot. His three Golden Retrievers, Faulkner, Steinbeck, and Fitzgerald, dozed on their respective pillows and didn’t flinch when his desk phone rang.
“Valentine Veterinary,” he answered.
“The council work session got postponed to next Thursday,” Beau Marino drawled in his deep, no-nonsense tone. He was Everland’s youngest mayor in a century, son of a Bermudan bartender and local blueblood, and Rhett’s best friend since kindergarten. “Weather service predicts it’ll be blowing seventeen this afternoon with gusts to twenty.”
“Sounds good.” Rhett broke into a grin. They jointly owned theCalypso, a bachelor pad in the form of a coastal cruiser moored at Buccaneers Marina. “I don’t have an appointment for an hour. I’ll swing by home for the marina key and pick you up after work.”
“You know where to find me.” Beau lived in Belle Mont Manor, the biggest house in the county, but he called city hall home. Worked around the clock.
Rhett hung up and drummed his fingers on the desktop, shedding the irritation from Kennedy’s appointment like an onionskin. An evening sail should screw his head on straight. Always did.
As his headache faded, the wall clock chimed ten o’clock. Outside the street-facing window, a silver-haired man in a seersucker suit led a Maltese whose lavender ribbons matched his bow tie. Doc passed the same time each day, a warm and cozy thirty seconds carefully orchestrated to make his only son feel like shit.
And the gambit worked.
Migraine roaring back, Rhett opened his top drawer, shook two ibuprofen from the bottle, and chased the pills with a swallow from the cold coffee in the mug next to his keyboard.
What masqueraded for an innocent pleasure stroll was, in point of fact, a one-man protest against Valentine Veterinary. Doc had made good on his long-ago vow never to darken the door to Rhett’s office—going so far as to drive to TLC Pet Hospital in Hogg Jaw for Marie Claire’s care—a dick move, but it proved the saying about Valentine men. They did stay true.
Even if it was to words spoken in anger.
Rhett was groomed to study family or internal medicine at Duke and join his dad’s practice, not bolt to UGA and become a doctor ofveterinarymedicine.
Mama’s death had sent them both to hell, but they dealt with different devils. Seemed his old man was bent on sailing into his final years on a bitter ship.
God-fucking-speed.
As for him, Rhett had his dogs, a growing practice, and low tolerance for bullshit. He was sick and tired of being the bad son for having a different vision of his future. He sank into his leather office chair, shoved his glasses up his forehead, and exhaled.
