Flipping Love You (Boys of the Bayou Gone Wild #3) - Erin Nicholas Page 0,1

not only with what A.J. had left them in his will, but the kind words about what their friendships had meant to him that William, his attorney, had read.

A.J.’s children—two sons—were grown and wildly successful themselves. One lived in New York and one in London. They had inherited shares of A.J.’s company—Jill wasn’t clear on what exactly A.J. had done to become a millionaire—and money, but they didn’t want or need his house, furniture, artwork, or cars.

Now it was her turn to find out what A.J. had left to her.

She swallowed and sat up straighter, tucking her boots under the chair. “Yes, I’m ready.”

She wasn’t ready at all.

She was here with two people who knew A.J. really well. They’d known he lived in a gigantic house and had millions of dollars to his name. They’d done things for him.

All A.J. and Jillian had done was chat about animals and travel and her work. Some days they talked about recent research in wildlife veterinary care. Sometimes they talked about conservation efforts around the world. They talked about everything from deforestation of the rainforests to the news story about a mother tiger that had adopted a stray litter of puppies as her own.

They’d shared their love of animals, but she hadn’t taken him anywhere, or helped him in any particular way. She’d been touched to find out that he’d remembered her in his will at all. If he was going to leave her some of his wildlife photography or even one of his journals from his travels to the Galápagos Islands where he first fell in love with the penguins, she would be ecstatic and treasure it forever.

“To my dearest Jillian.”

Jill’s throat constricted with even those first four words.

“Everything I needed to know about you, I learned on the very first day I saw you. I was watching you caring for the penguins in the exhibit. You didn’t know I was there at first, and I overheard you talking to them. You were loving and sweet and patient. You were not just feeding them, but truly interacting, and taking the time to give each of them individual attention and care. It was clear they loved and trusted you implicitly. After that, we became fast friends and you always treated me similarly.”

Jill had to blink rapidly. A.J. had been surprisingly verbally affectionate toward her. He praised her care of the penguins and had told her many times what her friendship meant to him. But hearing it like this in a letter, that he’d clearly taken time to write, knowing it would be his final chance to say it, made her heart ache. She dashed the tear off her cheek that had slipped from her lower lashes.

“There is no one else I could possibly entrust my beloved animals to. I know that you will give them the love and attention and care they need and will make the choices for them no one else can.”

Jill lifted her head and met William’s eyes.

Animals?

Oh…shit.

Clearly, A.J. had had pets. That didn’t surprise her.

But he thought she would be good at taking care of them?

Of course he had. She was a veterinarian. Sure, she specialized in wildlife, but yeah, they’d covered cats and dogs in vet school. She remembered the basics. Plus, tons of non-veterinarians had cats and dogs. Obviously. Most cat and dog owners weren’t vets.

But Jill was…not good at taking care of other things. Laundry. Home repairs. Feeding herself. Other things with a pulse.

Unless the other thing was black and white and had flippers.

Nope, that wasn’t even true. She would have no idea what to do with an orca whale.

She was good at taking care of penguins.

And that was pretty much it.

Penguins were all she cared about. Caring for penguins, helping save them from extinction, was her life’s work and well, she didn’t want to do anything else.

She’d fallen in love with penguins at age eight. When she was thirteen she’d found out that she could work with them—like actually touch them and feed them and pet them every day—if she became a wildlife vet and that had been that. It was all she’d ever cared about.

Okay, so A.J. hadn’t known her as well as he might have thought.

William was watching her, seemingly finished reading aloud.

Jillian sighed. “How big is it?”

William lifted a brow. “How big is what?”

“The dog.”

She supposed it could be a cat. Or, God forbid, multiple cats, but A.J. seemed more like a dog person.

Her heart thumped. That wasn’t true. A.J. was more