I wasn't sure I trusted her with one, but I brought it over to her, watching with furrowed brows as she stabbed it into the side of one of the plastic containers, then turned it in a circle to create a hole. I watched, a bit confused as she dropped the heating pad into the container with a hole, then fed the cord through it, placing the second container into the first, then piled the blankets in.
"To keep him warm," she explained. "He shouldn't even be away from his mama yet. Can you put him in? I need to make him formula."
As I lowered the cat into his makeshift bed, silently wondering what the fuck I was doing here, Rey moved around, carefully mixing powder with water.
"You just happen to keep kitten formula in the house?" I asked as she opened a sealed syringe and loaded it up.
"The pet stores close at nine. If you came across a kitten at night, you wouldn't be able to feed it for hours."
She almost made it sound logical.
Even though it wasn't.
Who anticipated kitten emergencies enough to plan for them way ahead of time?
"Hey buddy, let's get some food in you. Can you let the dogs out back?" she asked, doing so as though we hung like this all the time, like she asked me to do this very thing many times before, like we were more than on a just barely first name basis.
But I moved toward the back door, opening it, and watching the dogs storm outside, barking as loudly as possible.
And in walked, I shit you not, some kind of fucking fluffy chicken.
A fluffy chicken.
"Ah, is this chicken supposed to come in the house?" I asked, watching as it confidently walked over toward the dog food bowl, pecking at the food there.
"How do you keep getting out of the greenhouse, Wonka?" she asked, but seemed wholly unconcerned with his presence as her cockatoo came walking over to me, grabbing onto the plastic-wrapped edge of my shoelace, and working at it with his beak.
I was in fucking Ace Ventura's place.
At two in the morning.
With a very pretty, but also very whimsical and strange woman who was still wearing my coat, with no real interest, it seemed, in taking it off as she nursed the motherless kitten.
And I was starting to think that this was just about enough crazy for one night.
I didn't really need the jacket back.
Or the aforementioned hot chocolate.
"Alright. I am going to get going," I said, carefully pulling my foot away from the bird, having to jump to the side when it made a lunge for the lace again.
"So soon?" she asked, but seemed distracted. "Well, it was nice to meet you, Reeve. Please keep an ear in this cold weather for animals that might try to find warmth in your truck."
That was, apparently, her goodbye.
And with a goddamn winged white dinosaur chasing me the whole way, I made it to the front door, carefully slipping out without letting the bird out, hearing its beak hitting the wood of the closed door as I stood outside.
Weird.
Fucking.
Night.TWOReyI had all but forgotten the man until sometime around eight a.m. when it seemed like Ford was properly warmed up, fed, and all his parts were working as they should.
"I know. I'm sure you are wondering how it was possible to forget a man like him," I told Ford as he nuzzled into his towels on top of the heating pad set to low. "And by 'like him' I mean insanely, beautifully good-looking with his masculine bone structure, stunning blue eyes, blond hair in need of a trimming, and very nice hands and forearms. What? Don't go acting like it is weird to notice those things. I like a man whose hands say he works with them."
There was a crashing sound in the living room, making me wonder if one of the dogs or the cats were to blame.
If I were the betting sort, I would always put my money on the cats.
Though they would try to pin it on the dogs, I was sure.
I moved over toward the kitchen window, pulling up the shade to let the light in so my basil and thyme wouldn't starve for sunlight in the cold months.
It wasn't like me to forget to give someone a hot beverage that I had offered. But, quite frankly, Ford was in a fragile place. Kittens that young without their mothers often die simply because they refuse to eat without the pheromones from their mama cat. So Ford had the odds stacked against him already. And then he was out in the freezing cold, soaked through with snow for who-knew how long. He needed my full attention if he was even going to have a chance at life.
And, well, his life was more important than talking to the man with the sad, soulful eyes, the voice that was designed to liquify panties, and the very nice work-hardened hands.