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That just happened to go for everyone in Greenacre, given that they were a clan more than just a community, and knowing a person from birth was just something that was done.
Tavish worked with two of his closest friends, and the other was kind of his boss slash clan alpha.
“You’re ridiculous,” he grumbled, slapping a few boxes of wound dressings onto the shelves in the supply room. Deliveries came in at least once a week, and it seemed that half his job at the clinic was unpacking the orders.
Not that he was complaining. He liked doing this. He liked making things neat and tidy and easy to find. He liked that in a crisis, when he went for something, no matter how inconsequential or how essential, he always knew just where to find it.
It surprised him that he enjoyed this job. When the clinic reopened in Greenacre with Trace’s mate Josephine running the place because she was a legit doctor in her old life in Seattle—before she’d come out to the clan to be with Trace and had brought their twins with her, Sam designated him and Kier to help out. Their jobs had been strictly guarding Sam for a long time and keeping watch over Greenacre. Doing rounds, checking security cameras in the woods, knowing what was going on at all times. He’d thought he’d make the world’s worst nurse, but clearly Sam hadn’t seen it that way.
It was more about knowing someone better than they knew themselves.
Two and a half years later, and Tavish was still loving it. He was a good nurse, if that was the right word. So was Kier, and so was Trace when he got called on to do that. They all just pulled together to make sure that whoever walked through the door got the treatment they needed.
Trace had clearly been listening in. He walked into the supply room, his hands in his jeans pockets, whistling a happy tune like he wasn’t just eavesdropping and happy to have been doing it. He was utterly shameless, with that big shit-eating grin of his. Honestly, Tavish couldn’t be annoyed at him for it. There had been way too many years where Trace hadn’t smiled at all. That was before Josephine and before his twins came into his life and taught him what love and healing were. Now, he smiled all the time, and it was a damn fine thing to see. “It could happen. Just get online. Meet someone.”
“No, thanks.” Tavish supressed a shudder. Greenacre might be opening up. They might be allowed to take human mates, but online dating? No. Just no.
“Then do it in person,” Kier suggested in an asshole, obnoxious way.
“I’m busy, in case you haven’t noticed.” Tavish waved a hand around the supply room. “We’re all busy. You’re busy too. We have Greenacre to watch over. Our alpha. This clinic. We’re healers now, not just guards. We don’t have time to just get online, and I certainly don’t have time to do it in person.”
“That’s good.”
“Oh really?” Tavish cocked a suspicious brow. There was no way Kier should be backing down that easily.
Keir shrugged those big, broad shoulders of his. “Yes, of course.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because the best people drop into our lives when we’re not looking.” He looked to Trace for help and he nodded, backing Kier up.
“That’s the best time.”
“You’re more open when your heart isn’t tangled up with the wrong person.”
Tavish grunted. “Okay. Who are you right now and what’s going on?”
Kier turned scarlet. This was an embarrassment crisis, which could only mean one thing. “You met someone. Are you kidding me? When? You didn’t think to tell me?”
“I was waiting until I had something to tell.” Kier’s dark eyes were doing something weird and shiny. He looked ridiculously happy, and Tavish wondered how he’d missed it.
He looked at Trace, who had gone suspiciously silent. “You knew?”
He shrugged. “I’m not denying or admitting to anything.”
“Were you planning on saying something and this is the long, roundabout way, or did it just slip out because I called you on it and we’ve been friends since we were in diapers, not just clanmates, so you know you can’t lie to me?”
“Yes,” Kier said. He grabbed a box and slit it open way too rough with the box cutter. “Oh, thank goodness. It’s just gowns in here.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s an answer. It’s the only one I’m giving. I’ve been told that gentlemen don’t kiss and tell.”
“What? You’ve met her in person already? You’ve kissed her?”
“I think that was a metaphor,” Trace said, always so helpful. He leaned against the supply room shelves, taking up space. He knew they didn’t really need his help and he’d only get in the way.
“That’s not what a metaphor is,” Tavish shot back.
