Page 9 of Coiled Tight
“Let me think. It had blue and pink and white and some symbol, but I couldn’t see because you know how pixelated the video calls look on the computer in the office, and it felt rude to ask.”
I groaned. Blue, pink, and white would usually mean trans, but if there was a symbol…
The ABDL flag came to mind right away. Stripes of white, blue, and pink with a diaper clip to the side.
Surely not. If nothing else, why would he flag being a Little for a job interview? No one in their right mind would do it, would they?
I could see it, though—under the right Daddy, all that anxiety could melt away while he slipped into a softer headspace. With none of the being on edge all the fucking time, no worrying that the next gust of wind would be the one to end him.
That was a musing for another day and time, though. Right now, I had to deal with my father’s meddlesome ways. And the fact that I now knew something about the man I’d be sharing a roof with for the foreseeable future.
“Da.” I let my voice carry more of the biting tone I got chastised for, even at my almost forty years, now that I was away from the horses. “Next time, stay out of shit.”
I wasn’t going to ask him if he was playing matchmaker—I just ended the call. The answer was obvious, and I wasn’t one for asking redundant questions. Besides, just because my father had effectively given me a roommate who might share some of my core interests? It didn’t mean that I had to do shit about it.
My Daddy days were long gone.
Hell, my dating days were long gone.
“Saúl!” One of the ranch hands who had stayed with us the longest waved at me from the truck he must’ve grabbed to check on the fence near the wolves’ habitat. One of the volunteers had noticed one of the pikes seemed off when they went to feed the animals. It had been my task to do today, but…Cam. “A ride?”
“Sure.”
I could’ve used the walk home, but it wouldn’t have been very smart. Tomorrow was going to be a long day as it was. Besides, they already talked enough about me and my hermit ways. If I could curb some talk, it was for the better.
It made ordering them around easier, too, if they didn’t fully see me as an outsider.
“So how come we didn’t know about this new vet until today?”
Of course. I should’ve realized the offer for a ride back to the main house wasn’t based solely on a sense of hospitality or team building.
“Beats me.” I shrugged. “We’re lucky Da gave him my number.”
“Shakira liked him.”
Which meant Dwight did, too. Cam hadn’t even batted an eye when he was informed that, yes, the wolf was named Shakira because she was the first female wolf we housed, and Dwight had had that song stuck in his head at the time.
Shakira was also one of our friendliest animals. She’d beenchilling next to Dwight, where he was checking out the fence when we drove by, making him go ten times slower because she kept trying to rub against people and get some love. There were two other wolves in the habitat with her, but she’d been rescued from a family who had stumbled upon her when she was a puppy. They didn’t have any sense, but they had loved her well enough until they had to move and suddenly realized no landlord out there was okay with them owning a wolf.
The point was, for all intents and purposes, she was a big dog with quite a bit more strength to her. If it wasn’t for the health inspections, I’d have her run around with us, or at the main house, instead of here, but… Playing favorites never ended well for anyone.
“Shakira likes everyone,” I reminded him regardless. I understood why the old man wanted to focus the petting zoo on cubs and foals, keep it away from the actual threats, but damn. If the man wanted an animal to draw crowds and thrive with the attention, it was the grey-haired wolf. “And I would hope he has some kind of touch with the animals.”
“Remember that one we got about… ten years ago now, was it?” He snickered. I breathed out when looking up showed that we were almost by the house. “That man refused to be anywhere near a ten-mile radius of an animal if it wasn’t fully sedated.”
And he only lasted more than a week because Ma had taken a liking to him, and she didn’t want to stain his resumé too badly. My blood boiled just remembering the smugness in his face every time I’d tried to fight my case in front of either of them. That was before thethinghappened.
I shook it off. Dwight definitely knew about it, but it wouldn’t surprise me if he didn’t connect the dots. It was the trigger that had started the divide, but it was also the thing they all avoided discussing directly.
“Thanks for the ride, man.”
I hopped off the truck as soon as it was safe to without making it clear that I was running.
“Sure.” Dwight leaned through the open windowpane. “And hey, if this guy doesn’t suck, we should set up a bonfire or something. Give him a proper welcome.”
“We’ll see.”
Even if he didn’t suck, I couldn’t imagine Cam with a beer while everyone swapped stories around a fire and inevitably ended up talking more politics than they—we—had any business doing.
