CHAPTER 2
MAPLE
“I don’t know, Big Hermy, I think this could be a bad idea.”
My light pink flamingo friend stares at me with his sand-colored eye, his head cocked to the side, waiting for some pellets.
“I really wish you could talk back. I think you would have some good advice for me. I can see the wisdom you hold in your one eye.”
He squawks, and I nod. “No, no, I’m not making fun of your one eye. I think it’s dignified. Having one eye is the new thing and actually trendy. It’s why you’re the king of the lagoon. No one is going to mess with someone who survived a jackal attack.”
“Maple,” Kylie calls out from the shack. “They’re here.”
Ugh, great.
I stand and brush off my butt. “That’s my cue. Wish me luck, Big Hermy. I’m going to need it.”
I pick up my bag of pellets and head over to the Flamingo Shack, also known as our office. I set the pellets on the table next to the door, then grab some hand sanitizer and work my way to the main office, where I pause as I hear some whispering on the other side of the swinging door.
“Flamingos? Fucking flamingos. Gretchen, you can’t be serious. Bennett and OC get lions and giraffes, and I get a pink-feathered dipshit on stilts?”
Um…pardon me?
“The team thought it would be the best animal to gain the most sympathy and appreciation,” the lady who I’m assuming is Gretchen replies.
“This is a fucking joke. What am I supposed to do for two months with these asinine animals? Does anyone even care about them? Are they even endangered?”
Um, I do.
I care about them like they’re my own children.
“I have no idea, but get it together because this is not optional. This is mandatory.”
“Jesus Christ,” the guy mumbles. “You’re doing this on purpose, aren’t you? You know I can’t fucking say no, and you’re going to continue to twist the knife until I give in.”
“I’m not twisting a knife. I’m attempting to help you gain a positive reputation.”
“By pairing me with a fucking flamingo? What a goddamn joke. I mean, no offense, but I don’t want to spend my days fawning over a pink bird.”
A goddamn joke?
Um, sir, I take offense to that.
“Yes, and you’re going to put on a smile while doing it. Now get it together,” Gretchen answers before I hear them walk away.
I stand still, allowing his savage words to sink in.
He’s…he’s so rude.
How dare he insult flamingos like that? Pink-feathered dipshit on stilts? That’s just so mean. They’re anything but dipshits. They’re ecosystem engineers and a vital component to the wetlands. And it seems like someone needs an education on the matter.
And I will be sure to be the one that gives him a first-class talking-to. When he’s done at this zoo, he’ll…he’ll be composing sonnets about my precious birds. That’s right.
Sonnets!
Head held high, I push through the door and come face to…chest with the largest brick wall of a human I’ve ever seen.
Good God, that’s a lot of man in one body.
Slowly, my eyes trail up a tight black shirt where well-formed muscles pull on the threads, to a thick neck with traps that nearly touch his ears, to a square jaw covered in a five-o’clock shadow, and dark, menacing eyes that almost resemble the color of an obsidian stone.
His full and tousled pitch-black locks are artfully shaped into a fauxhawk, making him seem incredibly dangerous.
The shorter sides sharpen the angle of his jaw, while the style screams rebellious, flamingo-hating… douche.
“There she is,” Phil says as he comes over to me.
“Maple, I’d like you to meet your new partner in crime.
” I glance over to where two other very fit, very tall brickhouse men stand, one expressionless, the other nearly bouncing on his toes with joy.
“This is Graydon St. John, the defensive end for the Foghorns. Graydon, meet Maple, one of our flamingo zookeepers and your liaison for the next two months.”
A pained expression crosses his stern features before the corners of his lips slightly angle up. He holds out his bearlike paw of a hand and says, “Nice to meet you.”
Because I’m not someone to stir up trouble, I plaster on a smile and shake the flamingo-hater’s hand. “It’s very nice to meet you. We’re excited to have you here helping with our precious birds.”
He shifts on his feet and sticks his hands in his pockets. “Yeah…same.” Ooh, I really felt the excitement. Gretchen elbows him in the side, causing him to stand taller and mutter, “Really excited.”
Yeah, I can tell.
Insert eye roll.
Why? Why is this the guy I had to end up with? Why not the smiling fool behind him? Or even the silent one next to him? No, I get the annoyed, brooding asshole.
“Well, I’ll let Maple catch you up on everything flamingos while I take Oden and Bennett to meet their zookeepers. So glad that you’re here, Graydon.”
Phil guides the other two out the door right before Gretchen exchanges a challenging look with Graydon. She mutters something under her breath and then takes off, leaving me alone with the intimidating giant.
“So,” I say, feeling incredibly awkward. “Do you happen to know anything about this project?”
“No,” he says, his voice curt, uninterested.
Boy, is this going to be fun.
“Well, maybe we should take a seat somewhere, and I’ll give you a rundown of what’s going on.”
“Sure,” he answers, his eyes studying me for a second longer before he moves.
With that riveting start to the conversation, I guide him to the small bistro table we keep near the fridge that holds some of the brine of shrimp, krill, flies, and mollusks that we feed the flamingos.
He stares down at the wrought-iron chair for a beat too long and then grumbles something under his breath as he squeezes into the space, his shoulders kissing the wall and the side of the fridge, causing them to turn in, and his hands to forcefully rest on his lap in front of him.
His legs, long and as sturdy as freaking tree trunks, stretch well beyond the confines of the table’s width and into my personal table space. If only I had a camera.
Just for the hell of it, I ask, “Uh, are you comfortable?”
“I’m fine,” he scoffs as he shifts, trying to make the best of what little space he has.
Not wanting to make him too comfortable since he verbally assaulted my friends, I sit and cross one leg over the other, completely content.
“As you know, we’re looking for help here at the zoo because we’re trying to expand our facilities.
Not sure if you were able to see it or not, but our flamingo lagoon is quite small, and our facilities are incredibly dated. ”
He glances around the room at the scuffed-up walls and chipped cabinets. “I’ve seen better.”
Way to not sugarcoat it.
“Well, yes, I’m sure your facilities are much better than ours, which is one of the reasons we need your help.
A series of events, fundraisers, and grants are coming up in the next two months that could really help us grow and expand, add a few updates here and there that we’re desperate for.
A celebrity endorsement can help our chances, especially at certain events. ”
“Okay, so what? I need to go to a few parties?” Could he be any more uninterested?
“Well, yes, but also, we’re putting together a campaign that doesn’t just show you at events but shows you helping out at the zoo as well, almost like a vlog.
We know it can’t be daily, but weekly is what we’re looking for.
I believe the Foghorns offered two to three times a week, depending on your schedule. ”
His eyes nearly fly out of his head as he says, “Two to three times a week? Doing what?”
If only Gretchen were here to elbow him and tell him to watch what he says. Doubtful she would like his most recent response.
“Well, cleaning the—”
“Cleaning?” His brow rises. “Cleaning what?”
“If you’d let me finish,” I answer, the tension between us growing, “you would have heard me say, cleaning the enclosure, feeding once trained, and basic animal care, as if you were an intern.”
He rubs his lips together, avoiding all eye contact with me. “Don’t you have employees to do that?”
“We’re actually short-staffed at the moment. We’re looking to bring on someone else, but finding someone with the experience we need has been hard. After the avian flu broke out, there was a decline in flamboyance all around the country, leaving zookeepers to focus on other animals.”
“Flamboyance?” he asks with a quirk of his brow.
“That would be a group of flamingos.”
“Ah.” He blows out a heavy breath. “Okay, so what, I just show up here, do some chores, and then leave?”
“Well, yes, but—”
“Great.” He lifts from the table. “Then send me a schedule.” He holds his hand out to me, and I study it for a second, insulted at his abrupt departure.
So that’s that?
He’s just going to shake on it and leave?
You know, if I had half the courage I wish I did, I’d swat his hand away and tell him to sit back down because I’m not finished with him. But I’m afraid to admit I’m weak and haven’t quite established a backbone yet, so demanding that a man four times my size take a seat is not in my wheelhouse.
Instead, I stand as well, reach out and take his hand in mine to give it a shake, but he looks at me as if I’ve grown three heads, two of them being flamingos, before he shakes me off.
“What are you doing?” he asks.
“Giving you a handshake? Or were you looking for a high five?”
“I was looking for your phone so I could give you my number so you could send me the schedule.”
Well, that wasn’t obvious at all.
Grumbling, I reach into my pocket and say, “Words accompanying the hand would have been helpful.”
I unlock my phone and hand it to him, only to find him staring at me with mild curiosity.
“What?” I ask.
“Nothing,” he replies as he punches his number into my phone. When he hands it back to me, he says, “I put my number under Graydon St. John.”
“Wow, novel idea, since that’s your name.”
The smallest of twitches appears around his lips, which only pisses me off even more because I find nothing about this funny.
Not a single thing. When Phil came to me about the prospect of attaching a celebrity to my efforts to upgrade our facilities, hope and ideas bloomed inside me.
I know that with a big name attached to your events, more people pay attention.
But now that I see that the person I’m going to have to work with is only willing to give the bare minimum, all of that hope has been quickly extinguished.
“Is there…a problem?” he asks, folding his massive arms over his equally massive chest. Dear God, the muscles on this man. I think if I told him to, he could lift the crustacean fridge with one hand right over his head.
“No,” I answer.
He studies me for a moment, his dark gaze swooping over me, intimidating me, making me want to shrink right back down into my chair.
“You’re lying.”
He just calls it like he sees it, huh?
Well, maybe I will do the same.
Holding my chin up high, I say, “You know what? Yes, I am lying. Because this program means a lot to me and those…those birds that you seem to think are pink-feathered dipshits on stilts, they mean the world to me too.” His brows rise.
“Yeah…I heard what you said. And you might not want to be here, but I do, and I want nothing more than to help out these birds that have done nothing to the human race other than grace us with their beauty. So…buck up, mister.” I clear my throat, my nerves getting the best of me as I shakily hold my finger out to him, attempting to give him the scolding of a lifetime.
“Because I’m here to say that you…you are now under my jurisdiction, and we…
we work here. This is not some cushy job where you can roll in and pretend to put in the work. Unlike the Foghorns, I intend to win.”
My finger shakes as I lower it back down to my hip.
I know nothing about the Foghorns other than that they don’t win a lot.
I know nothing about him other than that he’s the largest man I’ve ever seen in real life.
And I know nothing about his work ethic other than that he clearly has no problem insulting things before he even gives them a chance.
But there is one thing I do know: my insult does not go over well.
When my eyes meet his, I wince as I watch his expression grow dark and angry. And for a moment, I get the sense that the look he’s giving me is the same one he gives his opponent right before a match.
Is that what they call it?
A match?
Honestly, I know nothing about football.
What is a defending end, anyway? Is that what Phil called it?
Either way, his nostrils flare, his teeth grind together, and his chin juts out in anger.
Oh boy…
He steps in closer, my eyes even with his nipples, causing me to have to crane my neck back to look at him.
Speaking in a dark, rather deathly tone, he says, “You know nothing about my work ethic.”
My legs shake under me, his intimidation factor winning, because boy oh boy, do I wish I was anywhere but here, in the path of a goliath of a man holding back his transformation into what I can only imagine to be a beastly, snarly mythical creature that eats chest cavities for a snack.
But to my credit, I don’t back down.
“Yeah, well…prove me wrong,” I say, the need to pee my pants as we stand nose to nipple very evident.
“I don’t have to prove anything to you.”
“But you do have to prove something to the public, right?”
“I do what the fuck I want.”
Still shaking, I respond, “Ah, so it was your idea to come here and play with pink birds?”
His nostrils flare even wider, and he takes a step back, his jaw tight and his anger billowing. I think I know why this man plays football. It seems like he has a lot of aggression built up inside him.
“Just send me the schedule when it’s ready.” He blows past me and tears open a door, walking right into a closet.
“Exit is that way,” I say, pointing to another door as he swears under his breath.
Wow, this is going to be so much fun…