This time it was Cash who spoke, so softly I almost missed it. “Yeah.” His gaze was fixed on the dog who had curled up at his feet.
“And you’ll, what? Take that off the bill?” Wilder asked. He wanted to confirm I wasn’t going to rip his friend off on account of being one of those heartless, money-hungry vets, I guessed.
“I’ll take fifteen dollars off the bill for every hour,” I confirmed. “Honestly, I could really use the help.”
Cash leaned over and whispered in Chase’s ear. Chase rolled his eyes. “He says thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” I said and unhooked a leash from the back of the door and handed it to him. “You wanna start by taking this guy out for a leak?”
And the pure joy on Cash’s face when he clipped that leash onto the dog? It was enough to chase away any regrets I might have had about agreeing to look after the stray.
By midnight,all those regrets were back. I tried to sleep, but the dog’s pitiful whines echoed through the old house. In the end I caved, punching my pillow and going downstairs. I let him out of the cage and he followed me up into the bedroom. Then he curled up on the rug for all of five minutes before coming to sit beside the bed, staring at me and panting like a hairy little stalker until I caved—again—and lifted him up. He weighed far less than he should have. He tried to nuzzle my face but ended up headbutting me with his cone before settling on the end of the bed. It was another hour before I finally fell asleep to the sound of him scratching at the cone every two minutes.
When my alarm went off at six, I opened my eyes to find the dog staring at me from where he was curled up on the pillow next to mine. His mouth was curved up in a doggie grin and he looked pretty fucking pleased with himself. And to be fair, I couldn’t blame him.
I told myself that tonight he was staying downstairs, but I already knew it was a lie.
I’d just showered and gotten dressed when there was a knock at the door. Jesus. It was barely even seven. I scooped my long hair up and twisted it into a loose bun as I padded down the stairs, fighting a yawn, and the dog trotted happily alongside me—probably becausehe’dgotten plenty of sleep.
And now I was going to have to walk a guy I barely knew and who didn’t talk through the cleaning routine, and I hadn’t had coffee yet.
I wondered what I’d been thinking, asking Cash to come in early instead of at the end of the day, and debated asking if he’d be willing to switch. But then I opened the door to findhim standing there holding a cup tray. The scent of coffee rose through the air, improving the day by about a million percent. Cash held the tray out to me wordlessly, nodding at the cup on the left.
I took my cup. It was from Gobble de Goose. I narrowed my eyes at the logo and then at Cash. “Did your brother make this?”
He nodded.
“So, what are the chances there’s strychnine in it?”
Cash ducked his head to hide his smile, then held his hand out and waggled it.Fifty-fifty.
“What do I owe you?” I asked, trying not to notice his falling-apart shoes.
Cash shook his head.
“Well, thanks,” I said. “Come on through. The dog probably needs to pee, if you want to take him out. Then I’ll show you where everything is.”
Because of the way Uncle Jim’s place was set up, there wasn’t as much delineation as I would have liked between the work areas and the living areas. The bedrooms were upstairs, of course, and so was the living room, which was a repurposed third bedroom. But the kitchen was still downstairs, and it was a shared space, meaning that one shelf of the refrigerator was reserved for Kayla’s lunch bag and soy milk, and there was a similar shelf in the pantry cabinet that was stocked with coffee pods, cookies, and granola bars from the petty cash.
I drank the coffee as I stood over the toaster waiting for it to pop up and watched Cash and the dog through the window.
I gave Cash the tour when he got back inside with the dog, gesturing with my piece of peanut butter toast. The treatment room, the consult room, the surgery suite, the lab and the x-ray room. I saved the laundry room for last.
“Cleaning supplies are in this cabinet. The big washer is for the stuff from the clinic. Don’t use the small one, please. That’sfor my clothes. Everything from the clinic is washed at a higher temperature than a regular wash, and we use a disinfectant detergent.” I pointed at the plastic bins. “Like the labels say, soiled items go in the red bin and clean goes in the green. The program on the washer is preset, so you just have to press the Start button. Make sure you use gloves when you’re handling soiled items, then dispose of them in the trash here.”
Cash nodded.
I opened the cabinet. “You sweep first, then mop with disinfectant. We don’t have anyone in isolation at the moment, but if we do, you don’t use these mops. These are for everywhere else in the clinic. It’s all pretty basic stuff, but we have to be aware of cross-contamination. But you probably know that already from Sunny Fields.”
He nodded again.
“If you’ve got any questions, just…” I trailed off, suddenly aware that telling the guy who didn’t talk to “just ask” would be pretty fucking awkward. About as awkward as this very awkward silence, actually.
Cash ducked his head and stared at his shoes. Then he whispered, “I can ask.”
“Okay,” I said, relieved and embarrassed at the same time. “Great. I’ll let you get started.”
He nodded and pulled a pair of earbuds from his pocket and popped them in. Then he pulled last night’s towels from the dryer and started folding them. His movements were surprisingly quick and efficient as he transformed the towels into neat squares. After watching for a minute to make sure he put them in the right storage bin—if there was one thing I’d learned as a vet, it was that no matter how simple the instructions, people still got it wrong—I left him to it.
