Resilience Read Online Free

sheriff’s badge. He was without a doubt the epitome of every jerk who’d bullied and beaten Adam in school, and Adam had hated him on the spot. He didn’t feel bad about it since he knew it was mutual.
    And of course, he thought as he pulled up to his clinic, there sat Sheriff Dickhead in his cruiser, glaring across the parking lot at Adam.
    “Yeah, well, fuck you.” Adam gave the man the biggest, fakest smile he could manage
    on only a cup of coffee, then parked his car and got out. He laughed when the sheriff gunned his engine and roared out of the parking lot. Maybe he’d make the sheriff so mad he’d roll his damned vehicle or something. “Calm yourself, inner bitch.” He really needed to work on his temper, but he had a really bad feeling about Kaufman, and life was too short to put up with shitty people.
    Adam tried to shake off his funk, let it get carried away in the cool early morning breeze. He unlocked his clinic—his, God, how he liked that!—and turned off the alarm before it could start blaring. He went ahead and turned the lights on, opening up officially even though his employees hadn’t come in yet. He checked the clock on the wall and grunted.
    They had fifteen minutes before they were supposed to clock in. Adam didn’t know
    Jade and Verna well, but they seemed like decent people. They sure didn’t seem broken up about getting a new boss. Adam didn’t blame them. The old vet had been an utter ass, and Adam would bet dollars to dog collars he’d not have sold the clinic to a gay man— knowingly. That was why realtors could be such a blessing, he mused.
    Adam turned on the computer at the front desk then flipped the lights on in each room he passed. The dogs heard him coming, and the noise from the kennels attached to the medical building ratcheted up to un-frigging-godly. Adam grinned as he stepped into the small kitchen and started a pot of coffee. He really needed to get a new coffeemaker, one with a timer so the coffee would be ready when he got in to work.
    Once the coffee had started brewing, and his mouth watering, Adam heard the
    electronic bell that let him know someone had come in the front door. “Back here,” he hollered, figuring it was one of his employees since there were no appointments scheduled until…tomorrow. “Please tell me one of you brought some more of those sausages…” Spicy and wrapped in a crescent roll, those things were divine and addictive and Adam really shouldn’t eat them if he didn’t want a fat ass. Then again, he wasn’t looking for a man, right?
    The lack of an immediate answer gave him a fissure of unease that turned quickly into embarrassment when an unfamiliar male voice called back, “Okay, you do know there’s so many ways that could be taken.”
    Adam’s eyes about popped out of his head. The man’s voice was just slightly breathy, flirty. Maybe not noticeably so to someone who wasn’t attuned to such nuances, but he sure as hell couldn’t miss them. Obviously he wasn’t the only gay guy in town… Bad news if he was intent on keeping to himself.
    Oh, shut yourself up, idiot. Just because he’s gay and I’m gay doesn’t mean there will ever be fucking of any kind involved. Jesus, I’ve had gay friends before that I never… Adam’s thoughts screeched to a halt. Even with Jameson, his best buddy ever, there’d been the occasional hand job or blow job when they’d been single and desperate…and usually really drunk.
    Well. He would just have to cloak himself in asexuality then, Adam decided. He’d
    meant it when he’d given up on finding a partner, and when he’d decided he’d had enough of his friends breaking his heart. Even Jameson, though he was only following his own, falling in love and being happy—and leaving Adam without a friend he could trust on the goddamned continent.
    Yeah, better to not be too friendly. Adam tried to put the slightest bit of frown in his voice when he called back to the stranger. “Sorry,