Page 25 of Fundamentals in Flirting

I gawped at Betsy, who just shrugged and mouthed,“What?”.

Giles gave me another nudge and I contorted my face into a grimace-attempting-to-be-a-smile, and positioned myself next to Betsy, trying to channel her zesty presence.

“Lady’s fine this morning, Teddy. Are you here to settle your bill? Because Jenny can absolutely help with that.” I kept the false smile plastered on my face, like a maniac, and Teddy took a hesitant step backwards as I approached.

“Are you ok, Hannah?”

He was looking at me as if I were a serial killer. Maybe I needed to tone down the homicidal grin.

“Yep.”

Giles appeared next to me. “Mr Fraser?”

“Please, call me Ted. We’re neighbours,” he said, with a meaningful look in my direction.

“Ah. I’m Giles, the other vet here. Have you bought The Old Rectory then?” Teddy nodded and Giles carried on: “Glad to hear it’s going to be lived in. Hannah, why don’t you take Ted into consulting room one and have a chat about his cat. Reassure him?” Giles beamed up at Teddy.

I stared blankly at my boss for a moment.

“Now?” Giles said awkwardly out of the corner of his mouth.

I let out a long, resigned sigh and angled my head towards the consulting room. “Come on. This way.”

Teddy dutifully followed and closed the door behind him. He laid the flowers and chocolates down on the examination table with a flourish.

“These are for you.”

“Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why have you brought me flowers and chocolates?”

“It’s stage one of my plan to woo you. How’s it working?”

Crossing my arms, I scowled at him.

I am not – I repeatnot– falling for this. At all. Ever.

And I was most definitely not thinking about the almost-kiss in the car last night. Nope.

“What are you playing at?”

Teddy folded his arms as well, frowning slightly as he said, “I’m not playing at anything.”

“Listen, I’m on decidedly dodgy ground here and there’s a real risk I may be about to lose my job. So, I don’t need you popping in on dubious social calls while I’m at work.”

“I’m here about Lady Fraser. I made an appointment to see you because I’ve not managed to find her owner yet, so I thought we should probably discuss what to do with her. And anyway, my social calls are not dubious, Hannah.” He paused. “What have you done to risk losing your job?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“I might be able to help…”

I shuffled my feet awkwardly and looked away. “Probably not.”

“Try me.”

I chanced a look at his face and saw that he seemed genuinely concerned. “Fine. All right. Well, the thing is … some clients have complained to Giles and accused me of being a bit prickly to deal with.”

---