Chapter 3
Three
Otillie-James
I t had been a long-ass night, and I was tired. Emotionally, physically, and I was more than tired of Truett being here, judging me with his all-seeing eyes. Asshole. Lancelot gave me a questioning look, one that said he’d happily make Truett leave if I wanted, and I shook my head minutely.
I knew Truett’s heart was in the right place, even if he was high-handed and pompous about it. He was worried about me, and granted, if I was in his position, maybe I would be too. But they’d always underestimated me—as if just because I was raised in the wilds, I was some naive little kitten they needed to protect.
I wasn’t an Omega who needed to be coddled and protected from the outside world. Eventually, those two would find the perfect little Omega to finish their pack, and I’d have to rely on myself. I wasn’t going to readjust my life to make sure I was kowtowing to theirs.
Despite Truett’s belief that my upbringing had made me some innocent fool about to wander into a criminal trafficking ring around every corner, growing up the way that I had taught me it was that humans couldn’t be trusted, and I was always on guard. Animals, to a degree, were predictable. They wanted to protect their territory, their young, and their food source. All simple desires, and if you weren’t an idiot with no awareness, you’d be fine.
Humans were not predictable. Their needs and desires were varied and erratic. What one person wanted, another abhorred. Add in the different impulses of the designations, and there was no rhyme or reason to people’s behavior, which meant that I tended to treat them all like they were rabid until proven otherwise.
Lancelot had gotten me out of a scrape. More than a scrape, really. I’d call it a situation. One I wasn’t ready to tell Truett about, because he’d just use it as further evidence that I was some airhead who had no idea what was going on most of the time. Lancelot had done it selflessly, without promise of reward, and that told me what kind of heart he had.
So I owed him a lot. More than I could ever repay. I’d had to almost pressure him to return here with me, and he hadn’t even given me a moment of worry since he’d arrived. He was polite and helpful, and I wouldn’t admit this to anyone else, but I’d desperately needed the help. I was one more animal away from being wildly out of my depth. But whatever Lancelot had done before he became unhoused, it had been something where he’d had to think with a clear head, and he was handy with a Betadine swab and butterfly bandages.
I looked down at the rooster, eyeing his injuries, but Lancelot had done a great job. I put him back into the kennel in my parents garage, and he clucked around, but didn’t look stressed. He’d come out of his night much better than I had, that’s for sure.
“Let’s call him Spartacus.”
Lancelot snorted, but didn’t disagree. Truett made a choking noise, and I turned to glare at him, but I realized he wasn’t laughing at the rooster’s name. He was just shocked by the garage.
I sighed. There was no way this wasn’t getting back to my parents.
“Holy shit, OJ. What the hell? ”
It probably was a little shocking. The walls of the garage were lined with kennels, many with injured or quarantined animals in them. The kittens were in a tall cat incubator, though most of them were too small to do much other than lurch around on unsteady kitten legs and nap a lot. As well as Spartacus, I had two injured pigeons, two feral cats that had received surgery and needed to be rehabilitated, and Lucifer, the world’s meanest tortoise. It was lucky for the world that he was incredibly slow, but he definitely had snapping turtle somewhere back in his ancestry.
“Keep your big mouth shut, Truett. Most of these guys will be rehomed by the time my parents get back, but the animal rescues couldn’t take them immediately, and I wasn’t about to let them get put down.” I stared him down, my hands on my hips, and a flash of amusement crossed his face. I hated that expression, like he found me entertaining. I wondered if I could junk-punch him just once. Then he wouldn’t find me so amusing.
“What you keep in your house is between you and your parents, OJ. As long as they have four legs.” He glared at Lancelot again.
“You bitch-ass motherfucking shitstain!”
Truett jumped as he turned to the last cage in the room, and I grimaced.
“Give me my fucking money!”
Rufio was an African Gray, who’d been rescued from a crack house. I was only holding him until the parrot rescue in the area could find the right home for him. Unfortunately, it was hard to find experienced bird handlers who didn’t have small children, or shitty neighbors who’d definitely complain when Rufio screamed the C-word at them every morning on repeat. For an hour.
Despite his colorful language, he was a sweet boy. Walking over, I put my hand out so he could step onto my arm. “Hello, handsome,” I murmured, and he walked up and down my arm. He really was an amazing bird, but way too intelligent.
He eyed both Lancelot and Truett with the same beady-eyed stare, like he was plotting their demise. I scratched the top of his head for a minute, then put him back on his perch. If he was here much longer, I’d have to convert one of the ensuites into a bird room so he could get more enrichment.
Weariness washed through my body. There was always something.
The front door opened and closed, and we all turned in that direction. “Hello? Tillie? Uh, did you know there’s a three-legged dog in the foyer?” My stepbrother’s voice echoed along the halls, and I rolled my eyes. Man, I was going to have to do this whole speech again.
My heart fluttered in my chest, the way it did every time I saw Sonny. If being in the presence of Truett made my blood run hot in my veins, then being near Sonny made other parts of me burn. I kept that feeling locked right down, though, because he was my stepbrother, and this wasn’t a porno.
“In the garage!” I yelled back.
In response, Rufio screeched, “You fucking cocksucker, you ate the last of the Cheerios!” It would be even funnier if whoever had taught him these phrases hadn’t had a deep voice, because the lines were always delivered in the creepiest demon tones.
Truett snorted a laugh, but left the garage, probably to meet Sonny halfway and tell him about Lancelot. Sighing, I looked over my shoulder at the man in question and gave him an apologetic expression, but followed Truett out.
Lancelot whistled, and his dog, Akio, appeared. I smiled down at the German Shepherd, as much my hero as Lancelot had been. “Hey boy, were you napping?” I asked, scratching his ears as we walked further into the house.
Sonny was there in the foyer, inexplicably holding Doodles in his arms. The scrawny little dog was wiggling like a worm on a hook, trying to lick the inside of Sonny’s mouth. Sometimes I could relate to that impulse.
Smiling at me, Sonny put the dog back on the ground. “Hey, Tillie. It appears that Noah’s Ark exploded in here, and you seem to have a mismatched parade of weird animals?” He came over and kissed my cheek, and I tried not to flush. He was just being friendly. Familial, even.
Don’t make it fucking weird, Otillie-James Baler.
“They’re just boarding here for a bit while I find them homes.” A lie. Fifty percent of these animals were unhouseable, so until someone found a better place, they’d live here permanently. But I wasn’t about to tell Sonny that. Or Truett.
He put his hands on my shoulders, holding me away a little so he could take me in. “You’re okay? Truett said you’d been picked up by the cops.” His eyes ran over me, like he was searching for injuries, both physical and emotional.
I glared over at Truett, because of course he’d made it sound worse than it was. “Just a little misunderstanding. It’ll be fine once I get a good lawyer.”
Sonny snorted, used to my bickering with his best friend. “Truett’s the best, and we both know it.” He looked past me to Lancelot. “New friend?”
Sonny was an Alpha, but unlike Truett, he didn’t try to beat you over the head with it. No, there was a steady confidence to his aura; you knew that Sonny had your back. Need a snack? Sonny had one. A Band-Aid or a tampon? Sonny had a special pouch in his rucksack filled with supplies, no matter where you were bleeding from. Need a shovel to bury a body? Sonny had one in the back of the truck and would even help you dig.
He might have a more congenial nature, but he was still an Alpha, and I knew he’d side with Truett on principle, especially when it came to threats to the people he considered family.
I sighed. “Yes. This is Lancelot. He’s also living here for the moment. Can we have breakfast now? Some of us have been sitting in lockup all night. I’m starving.”
I stomped out of the entryway and further into the house, a small trail of animals behind me. Looking over my shoulder at Doodles, Honkers the Lab, and Kevin the pig trotting behind me, I couldn’t help but smile. I might be impulsive, maybe even a little irresponsible, but I was changing their lives, and that brought me joy. I didn’t really care what Truett said, or Sonny, or my dad and Citrine. I was doing what was right.
I decided on a pastrami sandwich, because it was more brunch time than breakfast, and besides, it felt like a faux pas to eat a BLT with Kevin in the room. Now that Spartacus the rooster was around, maybe I’d have to cut out the chicken for a little while too. As long as I didn’t rescue a cow, we were fine.
Surprisingly, the guys didn’t follow me into the kitchen, but Akio did, coming to sit by my feet, on alert. Akio was a strange dog, both flighty and well trained. Terrified of the thunderstorm we’d had earlier in the week, yet had stood between me and… the situation I’d been in when I first met him and his owner.
He didn’t mind the other animals always bouncing around him, especially Doodles, but it was almost like he didn’t know how to play. He tolerated them all, even the kittens, but he was more like an old soul than an animal.
Despite that, he was sweet and loyal, and I sometimes wished there were more people with those traits. Grabbing ingredients from the fridge, I gave everyone a small treat. Doodles didn’t know how to sit, and Honkers physically couldn’t sit yet, but he was losing weight every day on his special diet, so I hoped he might get back more mobility soon. I’d take him out for physiotherapy in Citrine’s heated pool later. I was going to have to get a pool guy in to clean out the filters before the parents came home, because I was pretty sure they were clogged with Labrador fur.
I even gave some pastrami to Kevin, who had no qualms about eating another beast of burden.
Washing my hands, I started constructing sandwiches for me and Lancelot. If I didn’t make him food, or insist he ate the stuff in the fridge, he wouldn’t eat. It was like he was waiting for me to yell at him for taking more than was explicitly offered—which was why I wasn’t worried about the things Truett had mentioned.
Huffing a sigh, I also made a sandwich for the asshole in question, and Sonny too.
Ridiculously loyal assholes.