Flipping Love You by Erin Nicholas

9

As everyone else finally said their goodbyes and headed off to work, the woman from behind the bar arrived at the table with another older woman. And an older man.

“Jill, this is my grandmother, Ellie,” Zeke said.

Ellie gave them both smiles. “Here you go.” She set a plate down in front of Jill first.

“And this is Cora. She’s my grandmother in every way but blood,” Zeke said as the shorter, plumper woman with short curly hair slid a plate in front of Zeke. “Thanks.”

Cora patted Zeke’s shoulder. “Hello, darling,” Cora greeted Jill.

“And don’t forget these.” The man with them sat down two cups of coffee, two glasses of orange juice, and two glasses of water.

Jill smiled at them all even as she was inwardly gritting her teeth. She was meeting his family. She’d met his twin brother and a few of his friends. Now she was meeting not just his grandmother but his grandfather and a woman who was clearly as close to the family as his grandparents.

She understood how relationships like Zeke and Cora’s worked. Her own grandmother’s best friend had been a pseudo-grandmother to Jill as well. Which was exactly how life in Bliss was more complicated than in Omaha. She didn’t just have her family—which was large and extended, though nothing like the Landrys seemed to be—but she also had all the people who were important to all of the generations of her family.

Truly, her grandmother’s last birthday party had been on par with the town’s annual Founder’s Day celebration. The whole town had turned out, and they’d had to have it at the park to accommodate the crowd. And the party had gone on all day long.

Jill hadn’t gotten a lick of work done until ten o’clock that night and she’d been up until two. And extremely crabby the next day. Which her mother and grandmother had both pointed out.

“It’s nice to meet you all,” she said sweetly.

“Very nice to meet you. We’ve been excited for you to show up. So interesting to have penguins coming to town,” Ellie said.

“It’s wonderful that Griffin and Tori were willing and able to help me relocate them here,” Jill said. “Giving them a very safe and secure and quiet place to breed is imperative to the success of the program.”

Jill said it mostly to gauge the reaction. Did people here understand conservation and propagation programs? Did they understand that this was not going to be just another exhibit in their petting zoo?

“Tori and Griffin are wonderful,” Ellie said, her affection and pride evident in even those simple words.

“Charlie already ordered the most adorable stuffed penguins for the gift shop,” Cora said. “Everyone’s very excited.”

Right. It was just that “everyone” and “excited” were two words that were the opposite of what she was hoping for.

“You didn’t bring her eggs Benedict?” Zeke asked, checking out the plates of food that had been set down in front of them.

Jill focused, taking inventory. Zeke’s plate had eggs Benedict and hash browns on it. But hers looked like a bowl of oatmeal.

Oatmeal wasn’t really the cold, fruity cereal she most loved, but it was an okay substitute.

“You ever had grits?” Ellie asked.

Jill looked up at her. “Heard of them, but never had them.”

“It’s like cream of wheat but it’s made with cornmeal. Most of us down here like them savory with seasonings and cheese and hot sauce. But you can also eat them sweet. Some people will tell you that’s blasphemy, but I was thinking maybe that would be something you’d like to try,” Ellie said.

She looked up at her, surprised. “Did Zeke tell you I like cereal?”

Ellie looked at her grandson, then back to Jill. “No. Zeke hasn’t told me anything about you at all.”

Her tone definitely indicated that she thought Zeke knew some things about Jill, however.

“So what made you think I might like this?” Jill asked.

Ellie put a hand on her hip. “You know all about penguins. I know all about food. You handle those pretty black and white birds and I’ll handle the feeding people around here.”

Okay, well fair enough. She certainly was no great connoisseur when it came to Louisiana breakfast food.

Jill studied the bowl of grits. She had to admit that the idea of having someone else cooking for her was appealing. She’d done lots of food delivery when she was in Omaha. It saved time. While someone else was preparing her food and bringing it to her, she could work. And it was definitely better than buying her own food that would go bad or would make portions far too big for a single person to eat alone.

She hadn’t had anyone cooking for her since she’d moved away from Bliss though.

Ellie shoved the sugar bowl, a bowl of butter, and a shaker of brown powder toward Jill from the other end of the table.

“Doctor them up with the butter and sugar. You can add cinnamon too. I like them that way.”

Leo shuddered. “Sweet grits. That’s a travesty.”

Ellie shushed him. “Leave her be.”

“If you like sweets in the morning, you need to try the biscuits and strawberry rhubarb jam. Or cinnamon rolls. Or her cornbread.”

Jill looked at Ellie. “You make all of that?”

Ellie laughed. “No, Cora does. But he’s right. Anything you want, honey.”

“You must have a huge menu.”

“The menu is basic,” Ellie said, waving her hand. “We make a couple things each night. They work as the special. That’s what most people eat. And that, of course, varies each night. But if people come and want something special and we’ve got the ingredients for it, we make it.”

Cora nodded. “You just let me know what you like, honey.”

Jill swallowed. She wasn’t planning on coming back. Cold cereal at home was so much easier. But damn, she hadn’t had a cinnamon roll in forever. And she really liked eggs Benedict, as a matter of fact.

“Thank you. That’s so nice. I’ll keep that in mind.”

Ellie, Leo, and Cora hovered for just a moment, and Zeke finally said, “The penguins don’t get here for a few days. She’s not going to just pull one out of her pocket.”

Ellie swatted him on the shoulder, but the three of them moved off and back to work.

“They’re really that excited about the penguins?”

Zeke cut into his breakfast, but gave her a look that clearly said, seriously? “Fuck yeah. penguins are awesome. And to have them right here in Autre…who would’ve thought?”

Dammit, these people were so nice. And they were excited about her penguins. She really wanted to give the penguins a quiet, peaceful place to lay their eggs and hatch a whole bunch of new babies. A bunch of loud, enthusiastic Cajuns clustering around watching would not be conducive.

What if the penguins wouldn’t breed? What if they didn’t lay viable eggs? What if the eggs wouldn’t hatch? What if the hatchlings didn’t survive?

“You’re overthinking.” Zeke pulled her bowl of grits closer to him, reached for the sugar, butter, and cinnamon and started adding them to her bowl.

“Hey,” she protested.

“You don’t know what you’re doing. Let me show you how this should be.”

You don’t know what you’re doing.

He wasn’t talking about the penguins. She knew that. Everyone here thought she was a penguin expert. She was, of course. At least relative to anyone else here. But she was definitely feeling a little unsure.

Zeke pushed the bowl back to her and handed her a spoon. “Taste it.”

She wasn’t really that hungry suddenly. “I’m okay.”

“Stop being a diva. Taste the grits.”

She looked at him with surprise. A diva? She hadn’t been called a diva before. “I’m just not hungry.”

“Bullshit. You haven’t eaten this morning. And you burned a lot of calories last night.”

He gave her a grin that made her tingle in spite of the niggling thoughts of being a penguin fraud.

“Besides, once you try this you will be hungry.”

Deciding that arguing with him was also a waste of time, she took the spoon from his fingers and dipped into the bowl. She took a small taste.

Huh. Not bad. She didn’t mind oatmeal and cream of wheat and this had a perfect combination of sugar and cinnamon. She looked at Zeke.

He smiled. “Right?”

“Yeah. Okay, you were right.” She took another bite.

He watched her eat for a minute or so, munching on a strip of bacon. After she had taken about four bites, he pushed his plate toward her. “Okay, now try this.”

He’d eaten about half. But there was plenty still left. The portions here were huge.

“You don’t like grits?”

“Grits are fine. Sometimes. But they’re no eggs Benedict.”

“Grits are probably more my thing though,” she told him. “I like simple and straightforward. Eggs Benedict is… complicated. There’s lots of ingredients and it takes a lot more time.”

“I hear you loud and clear, Kansas. Taste the fucking eggs Benedict.”

She really did believe that he understood her analogy with breakfast food and how she preferred her life and relationships.

But she still leaned over and cut off a piece of the eggs Benedict. She took the bite, fully expecting to enjoy it.

What she hadn’t expected, however, was to moan out loud.

“Oh my God,” she said, after she swallowed. “That’s amazing.”

He lifted a hand and tugged on the end of a strand of hair. “A little extra time and a few extra ingredients are sometimes worth it.”

Yeah, she didn’t miss his analogy either.

She also didn’t miss that it was the morning after, they barely knew one another, and he was already pressing for more.

“I’ll give you that,” she said. “But I don’t have time for eggs Benedict in my mornings. And the grits do the job. When all is said and done, all of the food gets broken down into the same parts that your body uses for nutrition and energy. All I need are the calories to get me through the day. It doesn’t really matter where they come from. So I definitely opt for simple.”

“You’re not wrong,” he said. “But if you’re only focused on what happens after, you’re missing a lot of pleasure of the initial experience.”

Yeah, yeah.

“Here you go.”

They were interrupted by another woman. This one looked to be in her mid-fifties. She had brown hair the same mahogany color as Zeke’s and the same brown eyes. She set a paper grocery bag on the table next to Zeke.

“Hello,” she said to Jill. “I’m Elizabeth, Ezekiel’s mom.”

“Hello.” And now she’d met his mother. Who called him by his full name. Wonderful.

“And you just happened to be coming in here and thought to bring me this…stuff?” Zeke asked, pushing the bag further under the table.

“Of course not,” Elizabeth said. “Your brother texted Fletcher, who texted your dad, who texted me that you were here with the pretty new penguin veterinarian.”

Jill pressed her lips together. Yep, she knew exactly how texting trees like that worked.

Zeke didn’t say anything.

Elizabeth nodded and addressed Jill. “And he’s not saying anything about that because he would have done the very same thing. I swear Leo and Ellie are the only people who spread more gossip than my boys.”

“Knox,” Zeke finally said. “Knox knows as much.”

“Knox might know as much, but I said spread. He doesn’t talk about what he knows the way you and Alexander do.”

And Zander’s full name was Alexander. Okay, then.

“Anyway, it’s very nice to meet you, Jill.”

“Thank you, you too, Mrs. Landry.”

“Oh, Lord, there are way too many of those around here. Call me Elizabeth.”

She really had a point about the number of Landrys. Mrs. or otherwise.

“And I used the ocean breezes dryer sheets for you,” Elizabeth said to Zeke. “But if you like them, you’ll have to get me some more. I’m out.”

Jill looked from his mother to Zeke, then leaned to look into the paper bag Elizabeth had given him.

He pushed it further away with his foot.

“I’ll see you both later,” Elizabeth said with a smile. Then she turned and headed out.

Zeke blew out a breath.

“Ocean breezes dryer sheets?” Jill asked.

“She was…kidding.”

Jill leaned in and propped her chin on her hand. “Was she? Or did she just hand you a grocery bag full of clean clothes that she washed, dried, and folded for you?”

“She…helps me out sometimes when I get really busy with projects. Like huge, impressive, never-before-attempted-in-Autre penguin enclosures.”

“Your mom does your laundry for you,” Jill summarized.

“Sometimes.”

“Okay.”

“She likes doing it. She says she loves it when we let her mother us.”

“Okay.” Jill picked her fork back up.

“It makes her feel good.”

Jill took a bite.

“And she uses those dryer sheets for other people too.”

Jill swallowed and shook her head. “Zeke, I would love to have someone else do my laundry. I am not judging you. Go for it. Let her do it all, all the time. Hell, throw mine in with yours if you get a chance. I’ll buy the next box of dryer sheets. And you can pick the scent.”

He paused with his mouth open. Then shut it. Frowned. Then opened it again. “Really?”

“Of course. Having someone do my laundry for me? That’s right up there with grocery delivery services.”

He nodded, seeming to accept that. That was good. She totally meant it.

“By the way, we don’t have grocery delivery services here.”

She sighed. Yeah, she’d figured.

* * *

It was amazing to Zeke how much he liked watching Jill eat grits. Grits were not a sexy food. They weren’t even all that interesting, to be honest. They were a side dish, a base, a filler. But watching her eat the grits, when it was clearly out of her norm, and because he’d encouraged it, made him stupidly happy.

She also ate a third of his eggs Benedict and stole his last two pieces of bacon. And he happily gave them up. Which was a sure sign that he liked this girl more than most.

It was very clear Jill was holding herself back. She’d admitted as much when she’d told him she was from a small town. She knew what it was like for people to get involved in her business.

Jill was obviously a very independent person. She was used to taking care of herself. She liked things a very certain way and in the short time he’d known her she’d already made it very clear that she liked things simple and straightforward.

Zeke could get on board with that. Simple and straightforward was a great way to be. When things went as expected, it made things much less dramatic. And with a big family like his, there always seemed to be some drama, even when things were going smoothly.

Where he and Jill differed was that she clearly wasn’t used to other people doing things for her. Whereas Zeke not only had a lot of people doing things for him all the time, but he absolutely loved it.

He hadn’t made himself breakfast in he couldn’t remember how long. And while cold cereal was fine, why would he eat that when he could drive a mile up the road and have eggs Benedict and hash browns or French toast or just about any other breakfast food made by one of the best cooks in the state of Louisiana?

Half an hour later, they pulled up by the penguin habitat next to Griffin’s truck.

They found the other vet pacing in front of the habitat on the phone. It sounded as if someone was calling him about an animal that needed his attention. He was not just the veterinarian for the animals in the petting zoo but was the general vet for the local area as well. He and Tori saw cats, dogs, cows, horses, and everything in between.

“Hey, guys,” Griffin greeted, disconnecting his call. “I’ve got to head out soon. Going to have a new colt today.”

“No problem, everything here should be mostly done,” Zeke said looking at Jill. “You checked the place out this morning, what do you think?”

“It really looks great. I’m thrilled that it’s finished. I do want to do a little bit more with the rock formations,” she said. “Did you get my email about the man-made nesting areas they’re building in the Galápagos ?”

“You mean the article you attached and said, ‘read this’?”

“Yes.”

“I got the email.”

Jill narrowed her eyes. “Did you read the article?”

“I opened the article and skimmed it. Then I emailed you back some follow-up questions.”

“Which I responded to.”

“Yes, and you referred me to paragraph six on page two.”

Jill nodded. “Right.”

“That’s not really the same thing as just telling me what you wanted.”

“What I wanted was what they described in paragraph six on page two.”

“Well, I put the rocks in there, and figured you could tell me how you wanted them set up when you got here.”

“So you waited until I got here to hold your hand through finishing the project?”

“I guess that’s one way to put it.”

“Why couldn’t you just read the article and do what it said? The article gave you not only the instructions for it, but also the reason behind it.”

“I’m the contractor, Jill. I just need you to tell me how you want things built, not all the reasons why.”

“I want them built like it describes in paragraph six on page two,” Jill said, clearly growing exasperated. “You’re the guy who wanted me to tell you what kind of knobs to put on the drawers in my new bathroom. Clearly, you do care about details.”

“I care about the details you care about. When you didn’t email me back, even about the drawer pulls, I figured that where these rocks were set up was another tiny detail.”

“But I—”

“Do I need to be here for this?” Griffin interrupted.

Jill blew out a breath. “No. We just need the rock formations configured so that they mimic what they have on the islands. The penguins need to have very safe and secure areas to build their nests. The deeper and more enclosed these little caves are, the greater the chance they will use them and will produce viable eggs that will hatch.”

“There’s a chance they won’t lay eggs?” Zeke asked.

“We’re not really sure what kind of effect the different climates, and of course the huge move across the country, and all of the changes will have on them. A.J. was not successful breeding them within captivity. I’m concerned that there’s going to be some disruption because A.J. is no longer around.”

“The penguins were attached to him?” Zeke asked.

“Lots of animals grieve,” Jill said with a nod. “But all they will really know is that he’s no longer their caregiver and that their entire environment is different. They may be disrupted just having someone new in their environment. It was part of the program that he would be the only one interacting with them so that they didn’t attach to many humans. But truly, once he knew that he was sick, he probably should’ve brought me in so that the penguins could have gotten used to me too.”

Jill felt the rising bubble of panic climbing from her stomach up into her chest and to her throat. There were so many unknowns. The penguin population was so fragile and even these eight mattered a lot to the survival of the species. It wasn’t that these specific animals were fragile and vulnerable. They were healthy and demonstrated normal behaviors. Except breeding, of course. But she honestly didn’t know what all of these interventions and changes would have on them.

“So then making nests and laying eggs is the most important thing?” Zeke asked.

“Yes. Absolutely. We’re trying to increase the numbers of these penguins. We estimate there are fewer than six hundred breeding pairs alive today, so they are at risk for being totally lost.” Jill felt the anxiety swirling through her. “We’re hoping these independent captivity programs can help save them from extinction. But we have to know that they are able to thrive in these environments. We’re experimenting with what those environments look like now. We have way more questions than answers. We’re trying to mimic their natural environments as much as possible, of course, but captivity is different from the wild no matter what. And just as A.J. had everything set up, he got sick and now that he’s passed, packing them up and moving them several states away could end up being detrimental. But we really don’t know.”

Zeke stepped in front of her and met her eyes directly. “Simple. Straightforward. You need these rock formations to be a certain way so the penguins will lay their eggs and make more penguins.”

Jill took a shaky breath. “Yes. At this moment, the most important thing is getting those rock formations right.”

Zeke gave her nod. “All I needed to know.”

Jill took another breath. This one deeper, where she actually felt it expand her lungs. He’d just cut through all the B.S.

She liked that.

She felt that all of the humans around and interacting with the penguins should understand their part of the bigger picture. But he had a point. If, at this moment before the penguins got here, they needed to have the habitat constructed as close to perfectly as they could, then she needed to communicate clearly what that meant.

“You okay?” Griffin asked her.

It took her a moment to pull her eyes from Zeke’s. “Um…no. I’m freaking out a little bit. There’s so much pressure here. I need to keep these penguins alive. First of all. Then I need to make sure that they thrive. I have three breeding pairs and two juveniles who will hopefully breed eventually as well, and I need to get at least one of them, if not a couple of them, knocked up soon.”

Griffin chuckled. “There’s no reason to think that it won’t work here, though, right?”

“This project with private ownership is fairly new. We don’t have any reason to think it won’t work, but we actually don’t have any data to prove that it will. Will limiting their interactions with humans be better? Will having them in private, quiet spaces be better? Would they be better off if we could just have protected areas actually in the Galápagos? I mean, that seems obvious, right? But that’s not the best solution in some ways.”

“You can’t just leave them there?” Zeke asked.

She looked at him again. He actually seemed interested and maybe a bit concerned.

Well…he asked…

“There are a number of things that threaten them. They have natural predators, of course, like sharks and giant sea lions and fur seals. Occasionally they are caught up accidentally by fishermen too. Because they are air-breathers and have to come up for air while swimming, oil spills and pollution are a huge threat. But the two biggest dangers to them right now are climate change and invasive species introduced to the islands.

“Climate change is causing more El Niño events which affects their food apply. When their food supply diminishes, they will skip nesting and won’t hatch new penguins. When it’s really severe, some of the adults starve.

“Additionally, cats have been introduced to the islands and they will attack and kill the penguins. The other invasive species is mosquitoes that carry avian flu. An outbreak could wipe out what’s left of the penguins on the islands.”

Jill paused to take a breath, but found Zeke was still listening intently. He was watching her with a mix of fascination and surprise. Possibly she was telling him facts that he found surprising. But it was also possible he was surprised that anyone could just talk non-stop about penguins like this.

Well, if he wanted to hang out with her, he was going to have to be okay with that.

“The Galápagos Islands are the only place that these penguins exist indigenously. So fighting those threats on the islands is important, but they’re huge and it takes a long time to change any of that. Climate change alone is an almost overwhelming threat. So out of desperation, conservation groups have relocated some penguins to various zoos and animal parks.

“But this private group of investors decided to get together and start a new program. Having private ownership of groups of penguins cuts through lots of regulatory red tape. There is licensing and specific permissions given—these aren’t black market acquisitions—and we’re sharing ideas and data and working together to make the penguins successful in the program, but these people have definitely been given special privileges to own penguins that not just everyone could get.

“Basically, the penguins become pets of individuals who have the money and knowledge to support them. Decisions can be made faster and changes implemented. Trials can be conducted. The birds get more individualized attention from the veterinarians that are caring for them. There are some advantages, certainly.”

She finally stopped talking and crossed her arms, pressing her lips together.

Zeke was either going to think this was intriguing or he was going to think she was incredibly weird.

Weird would get him to leave her alone though. That would be good. She wouldn’t be distracted that way.

But she wanted him to find her—the penguins, she meant the penguins—interesting.

The more people who found the penguins and their plight interesting, the more help they would potentially get.

Griffin looked at Zeke. “You know how you love how passionate Fiona and Tori and Charlie and everyone is about animals?”

Zeke nodded.

“Jill is the same, except that all of her passion is focused on penguins. So all the worry and enthusiasm and willingness to fight get directed at one particular animal—one that’s endangered—and Jill gets…a little worked up.”

Jill frowned at Griffin. “Worked up? About now being solely responsible for keeping eight endangered animals alive that I have been in love with my entire life? With the only real guidance being ‘do whatever you think is best’? Everyone else in the program is looking to me to guide them. But the program is new and—”

Suddenly Zeke reached out, took her upper arm, and pulled her close.

Then he wrapped his big arms around her and gave her a bear hug.

For just a moment she was stunned. She wasn’t a big hugger. She hugged people she was close to, but she lived far away from most of those people so hugging wasn’t a daily occurrence. And she wasn’t close to Zeke.

But he seemed perfectly at ease wrapping her up and squeezing her.

She felt a huge breath of oxygen rush into her lungs. Then it rushed out. She felt her muscles relax. And she felt her arms go up and around Zeke.

Her eyes closed and she just let him hold her.

Damn, that felt good. So she just leaned into it. A big hot guy who smelled good and felt even better, was pressing her up against his body. Who was she to fight it?

It seemed that he enjoyed it just as much because he held her until Griffin cleared his throat and asked, “And, again, do I need to be here?”