Almost serves deer (3)
I believe the answer is:
doe
'deer' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'almost serves' is the wordplay.
'almost' means to remove the last letter (most of the word but not all of it).
'serves' becomes 'does' ('do' can be a synonym of 'serve').
'does' with its final letter taken off is 'DOE'.
(Other definitions for doe that I've seen before include "Female kangaroo" , "possible mate for Rudolph?" , "Female creature" , "Last FA Cup winners" , "A female deet" .)