Jude was at the door, locking it with a frown creasing his face. I left Delilah, joined him, and pried the keys from his hand. “I’ll do it.”
“Thanks.”
“No problem.” I locked the door and dropped the keys into his upturned palm. “Do you need help with anything else?”
He shook his head and yawned so hard his jaw cracked. “Shaqueela did everything last night. All I had to do today was keep the doors open.”
“I liked her.”
“I like her too. She keeps me in some semblance of order. Listen, I’m totally with it enough to get a couple of snakes out for the kids, but don’t leave the room, okay?”
A smart arse quip danced across my tongue, but I swallowed it as I realised he was serious. “I won’t. I promise.”
Jude stepped around me to retrieve Delilah from the snails and Tam from a tank of creatures that looked like crocodiles. I trailed them into the backroom and settled on the floor, close enough that I could step in and do who-the-hell-knew what if anything happened, but with enough distance that I wasn’t hovering.
I figured Jude would go straight for the white snake that had Delilah so captivated, but he opened the tank I’d slipped the milk snake into yesterday.
“Your dad says he forgot to tell you about Milk yesterday. Did you know, your dad is now an official snake rescuer?”
I snorted. “Hardly. I drove to Sainsbury’s and there’s still no bread in my house.”
“Shut up.” Jude flicked me a grin that left me hot all over. “Come closer, kids. I’m gonna tell you a story.”
I rolled my eyes, but let him have his moment. Jude had always enchanted me in every capacity I’d been lucky enough to have him, but there was something hypnotic about watching him captivate my children. His gentle, melodic accent made my limbs weak, and my bones heavy. I could’ve listened to him talk all day. Watched the life return to him as he spoke about the animals he cared for so deeply.
Bewitched, I leaned back on a dented filing cabinet and enjoyed his fabled account of our impromptu trip. The way he told it made it seem as though it had happened to someone else, and he didn’t glance at me, not even once. But I relived every second, the good and the bad, and for a protracted moment, I felt like someone else.
Someone worthy of the wondrous glances my kids were sending my way.
I shifted, resisting the urge to pull out my phone and feign indifference. I’d invited Jude into my car yesterday because I hadn’t been able to leave him in a damp bus stop. Because the thought of him sitting in the cold for even one more minute had made me feel sick to my stomach. The welfare of the animal Tam and Delilah were so fascinated with had barely occurred to me.
The brightly-patterned snake went back in its tank. Jude made the kids wash their hands, then retrieved the white snake with the glittery eyes. If anyone had asked my layman self which species was the milk snake, I’d have plumped for this one, but I was starting to realise that even beyond the reptile world, I knew very little about anything that mattered.
Jude placed the animal in Tam’s lap and stood guard as it coiled around to make itself comfortable. After a minute, Jude beckoned Delilah closer and allowed her to run her fingertip along its flawless skin. “She's more docile than ever. If she wasn’t so valuable, I’d probably keep her.”
Tam frowned. “What does that mean?”
“Which part? Docile or valuable?”
“Valuable. Dad says we have to look after things that cost a lot of money.”
I cringed. “I said you had to respect other people’s property, T. A living creature isn’t the same thing. I’d imagine Jude means that he can sell her for a high price, so she’s valuable to the shop.”
“That’s exactly what I meant,” Jude concurred with a sigh. “This is a business, not a charity, and animals have to pay their way.”
Delilah’s bottom lip wobbled, and I suppressed a sigh of my own. I was used to talking in circles with my kids, but I wasn’t up for another round of why I couldn’t buy them the pretty white snake. “Maybe you should be a charity, then. Or at least carve off a section of the business to be so. That way, you could solicit donations for the rescue animals you take. How much is this one worth?”
Jude shrugged. “Commercially, around a grand, but I’d let her go for less to the right home.”
“So, if you raised enough money to pay her commercial price, she’d have paid her way, right? So you could keep her as an ambassador for your charity, or whatever.”
Jude ran his weary gaze over the snake coiled in my son’s lap. “It’s not as simple as that. If I kept my rescue animals I’d need a bigger premises or I’d never be able to take any more, and that’s not going to happen.”
“What about the outbuilding round the back? You couldn’t extend to there? Who owns the building?”
Irritation coloured Jude’s face. It was on the tip of my tongue to retract my flurry of questions, but he spoke before I could. “I rented the place for years, but the landlord went bankrupt a while ago, so I managed to buy it at a knockdown rate.”
I nodded. I was familiar with the arsehole who’d once owned seventy per cent of the property in Thorston. “Glad you got a decent price.”
