Page 10 of Her Greatest Mistake

I grind my teeth together. “He’s a dead man. He sold me lie after lie, and I believed every single one because ofher, and it nearly cost me everything. Is that not enough for him?” Glancing at Alexander, I release a tight breath and focus on speaking calmly and letting my appreciation show. “You saved my career once, and I appreciate that you’re willing to do it again.”

He nods. “You’re the best player in the league. Regardless of our personal relationship, I would have done the same thing for any member of my team in this position. You were young and naïve when you made those decisions. This side of the problem is not on you.”

“We can’t say the same about last night,” Dad says, completely in parent mode now. “You should have called me as soon as your sister called you. Noah’s life decisions are not your responsibility; they are mine.”

I swallow my laugh. “We both know you’re the last person Noah wants help from.”

He tries and fails to hide a wince. “Regardless, this mess could have been dealt with better.”

“We already have a few ideas on what to do next, but we want your opinion before we go forward,” Dougie says.

I turn to him, catching his brief, encouraging smile. “What are you thinking?”

“We’ll start with lifting your image from the gutter it’s fallen in. Some charity work, fundraisers, an official statement denying Roy’s claims and the accusations from last night, that sort of thing. You’ll need to walk a straight fucking line, kid. If someone asks for a comment, your answer is that you don’t have one. Avoid the press as much as you can. Keep up appearances, post on social media like normal. The goal is to make this look like one last-ditch effort from a bitter, washed-up agent to get revenge and a robbery gone wrong outside of that bar.”

My stomach churns as nerves spark through me. “And if that doesn’t work?”

It’s Alexander who answers, his words clipped. “We’ll cross that bridge if we get there.”

4

BRAXTON

My veterinary cliniccomes to life as I step inside and start flicking on the lights. As the room illuminates, I glance around with a weary smile. Squishy waiting chairs in a soft beige, stacks of magazines spread over the glass tables, animal-safe plants galore. The three kittens we have waiting to be adopted meow at me before running up the cat tree in front of the window. The runt of the litter—Rufus—stands on his hind legs and presses his front paws to the window as he lets out a low, long meow.

“No way, buddy. You only think you want to be out there because of the pretty colours, but trust me. It’s not all it’s cracked up to be,” I tell him. He looks at me like he understands what I’m saying, which I definitely think he can, even if it’s a bit unethical.

The clinic doesn’t open for another hour, but it’s only our third week in business with myself as owner, and the antsy feeling inside of me has yet to simmer down. We’ve done extremely well for only being open a few weeks, but I’m a self-diagnosed perfectionist and refuse to leave anything up to chance. So, I come in early and make sure everything is the way it should be before my staff and patients arrive.

My teal-blue Converse squeak on the tile as I head for my office, fully intent on just checking the schedule and swapping my black cardigan for my white coat, but as soon as I spot the holes of missing dog food bags on the display wall, I change directions.

Before long, I’m dragging heavy bags of food out of the storage room and struggling to lift them onto the empty shelves. I may have gotten ahead of myself when I thought it was a good call to bring every missing bag out to the waiting room instead of taking them one by one, especially now that I realize I can’t reach some of the higher shelves. My five-foot-five height makes me scowl.

I’m not short, but I’m not tall either. I’m stuck in the middle, neither here nor there. A place I’ve never liked to be.

The bell above the door jingles, and I blow stray curls out of my face as I look over my shoulder. I grin and drop the bag back to the floor.

“Thank God. I need your help to put these up on the shelves,” I say.

Marco Creeve, the only other veterinarian I’ve hired to work at my clinic, gives me a beaming white smile as he shakes his head and quickly toes off his dirty shoes on the doormat. “There are employees whose sole purpose is to do these things for you, you know?”

With his pale green eyes twinkling, he meets me by the mess I’ve made and, with ease, lifts the ninety-pound bag of healthy-weight dog food I was just struggling with before setting it on the designated shelf and starting on the other bags.

I stand and brush the dust off my scrub pants. “I was already here. Figured I might as well get a head start. What are you doing here so early?”

“I have an early appointment. A golden retriever swallowed a teddy bear two days ago and hasn’t eaten since.”

“Crap.”

“Nope. Hasn’t done that either,” he says, chuckling.

“Ha-ha. I’m going to clean myself up before we open.”

“Sounds good. Micaela just pulled up outside. She’ll get everything ready to go.”

Micaela runs the front desk and pretty much everything else that needs to be taken care of in the front during the day. I don’t know how I would do it without her.

With quick strides, I’m heading to my office for the second time this morning. The space is cozy, inviting, and I feel at home the second I step inside. With bookshelves lining the wall behind my desk and a desk chair I spent far too much on, it’s my own version of paradise.

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