Page 7 of The Thing About My Secret Billionaire

I give his nose a big rub and tell him what a gorgeous guy he is.

Once the crunching’s done, he withdraws his head from the window and wanders off, satisfied with just his one carrot. He’s not greedy. But he will undoubtedly be back for another later.

Man, I have to save this place.

“Apart from anything else,” I call back to Paige as I close the window to keep out the November chill, “where would all these amazing creaturesgo if we sold?”

“Isn’t the whole point to find them new homes?”

I return to my seat. “Most of the ones here right now are unadoptable for one reason or another. Grandpa can’t resist the oddballs.”

“But if you take the emotion out of it,” she says, “and look at it in a purely academic, based-on-the-numbers, completely unsentimental, fiscally responsible kind of way, my advice is to sell it.”

I pick up my mug, the surface of the tea trembling. “It’s not unemotional, though, is it?” I take a sip of the warm, comforting liquid and swallow it past the tightening of my throat.

There’s another tapping noise.

“Is that Dave again?” Paige asks.

“Nope. The door.” I put down the drink. “It’s probably the hay delivery guy. Back in a sec.”

“Is he hot?” Paige asks.

“Last time I saw Barry, he was a five-foot-two, sixty-five-year-old bald farmer with not as many teeth as nature intended.”

The chair catches on a cracked tile as I stand up, and Thelma opens her eyes just far enough to throw me a look of utter contempt.

“And don’t worry,” I respond to Paige’s obviously worried expression. “I bought the hay with my own money, not the sanctuary’s.”

“You’d have to.” She raises her voice as I walk away to answer the door to Barry, ready to ask him to put the hay in the usual barn. “There’s barely enough money for a handful, never mind a bale.”

I drag the heavy door open on its rusting hinges. “Hi, you can?—”

The surprise of seeing a man the exact opposite ofBarry stops me mid-sentence.

“Hi.” The tiny two-letter word comes from the dazzling smile of someone who looks like he just stepped from the pages of aGarden & Gunarticle about the season’s chic new farmwear trend.

“Hay?” is the only word I can force out.

“Hey,” he says, tipping his head to one side, giving the cool fall sun the chance to sneak around and highlight his cheekbones.

“What? Oh, no.” I shake my head as much to pull myself together as to affirm the negative. “I meant, are you here with the hay? The hay delivery I ordered?”

His eyes widen with his smile, his chin tipping up on a chuckle to reveal a perfect line of perfect stubble.

“God, no.” He sounds unreasonably horrified by the idea of hay. “I mean…no. It’s just me.”

He spreads his arms and looks from side to side then behind him, demonstrating there is no hay anywhere in his vicinity.

“Right, sorry.” Heat blooms in my cheeks. “It’s just that I was expecting the hay guy and?—”

“I’m here about this.” He produces one of my volunteer recruitment flyers from the pocket of his tan work jacket—a jacket that looks like it hasn’t seen a second of work in its life and might even still have the tags on it.

“Oh, you want to volunteer?” Wow, that was quick.

My chest lightens. Maybe this won’t be the impossible task I thought it would be after all.

“I do.” He says it in a velvety voice more appropriate for appreciating warm chocolate cake than mucking out a donkey stall.