She was a woman he was semi-obsessed with and trying very hard to not be even remotely interested in.
He should be glad she wasn’t going to be here for the holidays. Every time he saw her around their mutual friends, he liked her more. She was warm and funny and smart and someone he could get very, very wrapped up in.
Fuck.
“I’ve been in Florida,” she said.
“So how are you heading home?” he asked. “I’m confused.”
“Oh, we’re heading home home. To Europe.”
He blinked at her. Europe? What? “You’re from Europe?”
“That’s where my family is. My mom and my grandparents.”
“I—” He’d had no idea. “You’re not an American?”
“Nope.”
“You…don’t have an accent.” That was a stupid thing to say. But this was just one more fucking thing he didn’t know about her and it made him just as crazy as everything else he didn’t know and he didn’t fucking want to be crazy. About her or anything else.
She gave him a little smile. “I got rid of it.”
Oh, she’d put a little bit of… something in there. It didn’t sound British. Maybe Irish? She was fucking Irish? What? He was not going to ask.
“Okay so, well, Merry Christmas,” he said. He needed to get her out of his office.
“I stopped by for a reason, Fred.” She gave him a grin.
His cock really liked that grin. It was full of naughtiness and a bit of I-know-I’m-getting-to-you.
“Nope,” he said of the F name she’d guessed.
She rolled her eyes. “I need a favor, remember?”
How could he forget?
"What do you need?"
"Well…” She turned slightly and leaned over to pick something up.
And he heard the squeaking.
Oh. Fuck. No.
“Nope,” he said simply. To whatever this was.
“Come on.” She lifted a pet carrier with a bright red Christmas bow on top.
“Not doing it.” Whatever this was.
“Ferdinand, they’re just babies. They need you.”
“I’m not the guy.” He didn’t even bother to tell her Ferdinand was way off.
“You have to be the guy.”
“Why?”
She set the carrier on the corner of his desk. “Because I can’t sleep with a guy who isn’t willing to foster abandoned animals at the last minute.”
That made him stop. Just for a second. But she noticed.
Her gotcha grin told him she’d noticed.
He narrowed his eyes. “What's in the carrier?”
“Three baby otters.”
He did not want to be responsible for three baby otters. In fact, that might be the most ridiculous thing he’d ever heard. He didn’t want to be responsible for any animals, period. He lived in a town full of animal lovers. And otters? They had an enclosure where a family of otters lived at the petting zoo. A family of otters that had adopted the Landry family way back. He did not need to take care of these animals.
Still, he knew he was fucking going to say yes to this.
Dammit.
“I do not want pet otters.”
“Of course not,” she said, as if that was a ridiculous idea. “I just need you to take care of them while I’m gone over the holidays.”
“They’re river otters,” he pointed out. “They’re not exotic or endangered. There are literally dozens along the bayou.”
“But if you can’t take care of three otters, I’m definitely not letting you near endangered lemurs or even recently rescued dogs that have been traumatized.”
“Why do they need to be taken care of? Their natural habitat is right outside the back door of this building.” Literally. He could walk three blocks and plunk these babies in their natural habitat.
“These are newborns,” she said, pulling one of the tiny animals from the carrier and holding it up.
He frowned. It was indeed a very young otter. It had to be less than four weeks old. It didn’t even have its eyes open. “How the hell are there otter pups this time of year?”
“The mom and dad were being kept indoors as pets. We assume ever since they were very young as well.” She scowled. “Because of that, we’re thinking their…calendars…are messed up. Anyway, the babies can’t just be put outside. Baby otters can’t even swim without being taught.”
Yeah, he knew that. Otters had to teach their young to swim. And fish. And…how to be otters. Obviously, the pups wouldn’t survive without their parents. Or human intervention. Knox sighed. Fiona wouldn’t let even a butterfly suffer without trying to help it. “You want me to give them swimming lessons?” he asked dryly.
“Of course not. They’re not old enough for that. Yet.”
Right. Not because it was absurd to think that he might teach baby otters to swim, but because they weren’t old enough for that.
“These are going to need to be kept warm and protected and fed,” she said, nuzzling the baby before putting him back in the pet carrier.
Then she turned a big smile on Knox.
“I’m not handfeeding three baby otters, Fi.”
Her eyes softened at his use of the shortened form of her name.
He didn’t do it often and he’d only ever heard Griffin Foster, the local vet and long-time friend of Fiona’s—and the reason the woman had ever made that first trip to Autre at all—call her Fi.
The first time Knox had done it, it had been a total accident. It had just slipped out. And it had sounded affectionate. And sexy.
As it did now.
She braced her hands on the opposite edge of his desk and leaned in. “Please? The owners freaked out when their otters had babies. They thought they were both males. They were so upset, especially when two of the babies died. They dropped them off at the petting zoo in a shoebox with a note. How sad it that?”
“This is your fault,” he told her.
“Probably,” she agreed. “In part. Though, you all did have otters here before I ever showed up.”
“But you turned that place into an animal park where people think they can drop off any stray or abandoned or unwanted animals.”
"Good,” she said. “I want that place to be somewhere animals can be safe and cared for and for everyone to know that.”
Knox sighed. Right. "There’s literally a dozen, probably more, people who can take care of those otters. Happily. Better than I can."
"It's not about who can take care of them. It's about if you are willing."
He narrowed his eyes. Why wasn’t he just throwing her out of his office? He could. Easily. He could pick her up, toss her out, slam the door, and… think about her and wonder what she was doing in Europe and think about texting her the entire time she was gone.
Dammit.
"I promise you, once you’re naked in my bed, you won’t care how I feel about otters, Fi.”
He regretted the statement almost the second he said it.
Heat flickered in her eyes and she tipped her head and gave him a cock-teasing grin. “You’re probably right…once I’m naked. But you have to get me there first.”