Reign of Terrier

by Lori R. Taylor

  “No!” a voice was yelling. “No, Princess. Phoebe, what was she doing out here?”

  It was Leslie, apparently drawn by the sounds coming from them — they weren’t exactly being quiet.

  Pulled and held away from the Jack Russell, raised above where she’d be able to reach, Princess calmed. The temptation to snap at Leslie was strong, but she wasn’t that dog anymore, so she shoved it down until the world came swimming back into its normal focus.

  The other woman, the stranger — Phoebe — dropped to her knees beside the Jack Russell, shooing away the other dogs who’d come in for a look. She visibly trembled, frightened by the display.

  “What happened?” Leslie asked.

  “I … I’m not sure. They were playing, then Princess snapped.”

  Not true. Princess grumbled a little at that answer — the Jack Russell had been the one to snap first. She was just defending herself.

  Leslie set her down but held her still, running her hands along Princess’ head and neck and body, startling just a little when she felt blood on her fingers. She peered closer at the wounds on her neck, then glanced over at Phoebe, who was performing the same examination on the Jack Russell.

  “How is she?”

  “A couple punctures on the neck.”

  “Right. Same here.”

  There was a short pause. Leslie’s hands were shaking a little, too, the first time Princess had ever noticed her losing that confidence she usually had when handling dogs.

  But it wasn’t fear. Princess could smell fear on humans as well as anyone. Phoebe was a bit afraid, but Leslie was…

  Angry.

  “Why’d you let her out? We say ‘no group’ for a reason!”

  Phoebe stood, holding the Jack Russell up and away from the press of the other dogs. Her shoulders hunched at Leslie’s tone. Her voice went quite small. “I didn’t know.”

  Leslie exhaled loudly but didn’t say anything more. Her anger wasn’t lessened, but she didn’t seem inclined to berate Phoebe further for what was clearly a mistake. When she spoke again, her words were tense, spoken through a tightened jaw. “All right. Put the other dogs away and bring Sparks to the lab. I’ve got Princess.”

  Phoebe nodded, her shoulders still hunched, and called softly to the other dogs to follow her in. Leslie, carrying Princess, trailed them through the kennel, then back into Dr. Dale’s room.

  The lab, as it was often called, was a familiar space — she’d spent some weeks in it when she first arrived here, being healed from all her various miseries. Unlike the kennels, the walls were bright and the windows large, and though the view was just the back of the next building, employee parking and a rusting green dumpster, the natural light made the flickering fluorescents from the kennel room largely unnecessary — and therefore thankfully less distracting.

  Dr. Dale looked up as Leslie brought her in. “What—?”

  “There was a bit of a scuffle outside. Phoebe’s got Sparks, too. Puncture wounds on the neck, and I’d check over her front left foot, too.”

  Leslie set Princess down on the cold gray table that jutted out from one wall, and she continued to talk softly with Dr. Dale, but she didn’t pay any more attention to them.

  Because at the other end of the room, looking over Eliza’s shoulder at a computer screen, was Tessa.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Tessa looked up at the sound of other people coming into the lab. Leslie set something down on the table, but she couldn’t see what it was. The conversation between her and Dr. Dale suggested it was a dog who’d just been in a fight outside, and there was another one coming just behind her.

  Then Leslie shifted a little, and Tessa could see the dog.

  Her heart lurched, and she wasn’t sure if it was a happy feeling or a terrible one, only that it hurt.

  Princess.

  There was a bit of blood already drying in the gray fur around her neck, and she held her left front paw off the table like it hurt to put weight on it. Tessa’s heart gave another painful lurch at the sight, and this time it was definitely a terrible feeling.

  Princess saw her; Tessa could see the moment she recognized her in the way her amber eyes lit up bright as light bulbs and her tail, a moment ago down at her hocks, leaped into a wag so fast it blurred.

  Tessa took a step toward her and away from the computer where Eliza was showing her around IntraVet, but was momentarily distracted when another woman, someone she’d never met before, carrying another dog, came in, too.

  The other dog was some kind of Jack Russell terrier, and it looked a little worse for wear. The short white hairs showed more clearly the places where it had been bleeding, and the rest of it was ruffled as if standing backwards in a hurricane. It squirmed in the woman’s hold and whined loud enough to echo against the half dozen metal cages against the wall to her left.

  Leslie had the woman put the other dog down on the rolling metal table just in front of the cages, since she had Princess on the permanently installed faux-granite one, and she hurried to obey.

  Dr. Dale looked at Tessa and Eliza, still by the computer, and half-smiled. “Right, then. I don’t like a dogfight, but might as well use the opportunities given. Tessa, take Sparks. I wanna see you handle her. And Eliza? Same with Princess.”

  Tessa had started once again to move toward Princess. She yearned to stroke her fur, treat her wounds, gentle her back to the dog she’d fallen in love with last week. She hated to see her hurt, and no matter how it would remind her of what she’d given up, she wanted her safe and whole.

  But Dr. Dale’s instructions stopped her. Tessa was to see to the other dog, and Eliza was going to touch hers. For a moment, anger flared inside her chest. Princess was hers, and no one but Tessa should be allowed to look after her.

  Then she remembered: Princess wasn’t hers. She couldn’t be. Tessa couldn’t keep her from the care she deserved just because she wanted to be the one who did it.

  Princess had been in a fight. Again. That was all the proof Tessa should ever need that she’d done the right thing in giving her back — she wasn’t capable of handling her, caring for her the way she needed.

  Tessa veered toward the Jack Russell, Sparks, instead and carefully didn’t look over to see Eliza touch her—

  Princess. She was just Princess. Not hers. She had no right to think that she was, in any way, hers.

  Tessa held her hand out for Sparks. She was already quite worked up, and she looked sideways at Tessa’s hand like she wasn’t sure what it was for or what she was meant to do with it. “It’s all right, Sparks,” Tessa murmured. “It’s okay.”

  The woman who’d come in with her stepped back as Tessa took hold of Sparks. The woman’s eyes were bloodshot, the skin around them puffy with recent tears. Tessa smiled softly at her, recognizing guilt as it wrote itself into the lines and curves of her face.

  “It’s okay,” she said. The feel of a dog’s fur under her fingers gave her voice the confidence it shouldn’t have had when speaking to a stranger. “They’ll be fine.”

  The woman looked at her and sniffled. “You think?”

  “I’m sure.” Tessa stroked Sparks’ side. Sparks relaxed under her hands, coming down from the nervous, adrenaline-rich wild animal she’d been and back to the quiet little terrier Tessa suspected she normally was.

  “I didn’t know she wasn’t supposed to be in group. She seemed happy enough to come out.”

  “It’s all right.” She wasn’t exactly sure who she was saying it to now, if her words were directed at the woman or the dog or even herself. It didn’t matter — they had the same effect across all three, releasing tense muscles and drawing quieter, less pained noises from all of them. “Dogs fight. It happens. There’s no permanent harm done.”

  With that, Tessa was finally able to take a good look at the places where pink had smeared across Sparks’ white fur. The dog had settled, lying down on the table and staying there with minimal need of restraint, and the ruffled bits o
f her fur were smoothing down under Tessa’s fingers. The wounds around her neck were shallow, already scabbing up, and, after searching with eyes and fingers for evidence of any other wounds, she found none.

  Dr. Dale came up behind her while she was giving Sparks her thorough once-over; she could feel his presence at her shoulder and his eyes flashing between her and her charge. Tessa didn’t look over at him until she was done with Sparks, then, summoning all the courage she could muster, finally turned to face him.

  “I think she’s okay.”

  He hummed in agreement, his gaze making the same rounds as hers had. He had two small plastic containers in his hand, which he set down next to Tessa. Both were half-full of cotton squares and liquid — one liquid clear and colorless, the other blue and sudsy.

  Isopropyl alcohol and something like chlorhexidine, if Tessa had to guess, for cleaning and disinfecting wounds.

  He nodded toward the containers. “Can you clean her up?”

  Tessa nodded and reached for the bluish squares, figuring that rubbing alcohol would hurt like hell to rub near a half-open wound.

  She scrubbed away the bloodstains on Sparks’ light fur, then with a little less pressure at the wounds themselves, not wanting to disturb the scabs and reopen the wounds, but also wanting to make sure to clean them well. Sparks barely squirmed even with the press of disinfectant on her injury, only continued to watch her with quiet eyes and loose muscles.

  She did her best, aware at every moment how Dr. Dale was watching her and how Eliza was behind her, probably doing a much better job for her — for Princess. The other woman — had someone called her Phoebe? — watched just as carefully, teeth worrying at her bottom lip until Tessa was done.

  Finally, slowly, she looked back up at Dr. Dale. “What else? Does it need … bandaged or something?”

  He stepped closer, nudging her aside to run fingers over Sparks, though she did keep a hand against her face, remembering from an early class that one of a tech’s main duties was to keep the animals from biting the vet while the vet was examining them.

  After a moment, he shook his head. “These’ll heal on their own in a day or two.” He glanced up at Phoebe. “Put a note on her chart that everyone is to keep an eye on these and alert me immediately if they aren’t healing as expected. If—”

  He was interrupted by a sudden crash of metal against tile.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  For the space of a heartbeat, the sound echoed in the frozen silence of the lab. Then Sparks wheeled around, breaking free of Tessa’s admittedly unprepared hold, her eyes wide and feral again, her teeth bared an inch from Dr. Dale’s stilled fingers.

  Tessa recognized the look — it was the same one Princess had worn that first night she had her at home, when she’d dropped the pan. The same triggered panic, blind in its desperation to defend itself and not caring who or what it hurt as long as they couldn’t hurt it in return.

  She wanted to look over at Princess. She wanted so badly to make sure she was okay, that Eliza knew what she was doing in easing that fear out of her, but she didn’t dare take her eyes from Sparks. Whatever had fallen, whatever bowl or container or instrument had been knocked to the ground, it could wait.

  Sparks was Tessa’s patient, and she deserved her full attention, no matter how much her heart yearned for the dog at the other end of the room.

  And, right now, her patient was a blink away from sinking teeth into Dr. Dale’s hands.

  “Sparks. Sparks, it’s okay. You’re safe.” Tessa kept her voice low and unhurried, the way it had soothed Princess that time, and reached as quickly as she thought she could toward her head, determined to nudge it back toward her, to keep her teeth off Dr. Dale’s flesh. If she bit Tessa instead … well, she was interviewing for an externship. A bite would hardly affect her ability to do her job.

  Her lips loosened from the drawn-back snarl they’d pulled into, and her ears twitched toward the sound of her voice.

  “Easy there, puppy. It’s okay. It was just a bowl or something. It can’t hurt you. I won’t let it hurt you.”

  Her fingers were on her fur, at the sides of her neck. Tessa eased her face back around, away from Dr. Dale’s hands, careful not to touch the scabs.

  She felt the tension in Sparks’ neck and face relax, and her eyes cleared as she looked back up at Tessa. She smiled down at her, softly, being sure not to show teeth. “There you are. See? There’s nothing to worry about.”

  Did she like her ears rubbed like Princess did? She scrubbed the tip of one finger behind her ear, and she leaned into the touch.

  “Pretty puppy. It’s all just fine.”

  Finally, sure that she had better hold of Sparks this time, she glanced back up at Dr. Dale, who smiled back. “She didn’t get you?”

  “Nope. All good.”

  Tessa let out a breath. “Good. I thought for a second she might. I should’ve been holding her better.”

  “You’re fine. That was … good. Impressive, actually.”

  Tessa dropped her eyes again, her ears tingling with heat. He’d said shortly before the dogs came in that her lack of hands-on experience wasn’t an automatic disqualification — that was the point of an externship, after all, to gain hands-on experience — but with nothing but the promise of being a quick learner to make up for what she didn’t have, Eliza was still the obvious choice.

  Maybe somehow, in this moment, she’d done something to warrant his consideration. Maybe she wasn’t as hopelessly out of her depths as she’d first feared.

  She didn’t want to hope — hope was what made disappointment hurt as it did — but there it was, bubbling softly at the center of her.

  Maybe she had a reason to hope.

  “Right.” Dr. Dale huffed out the word and turned halfway around to include Eliza in his next thought. “That should be all for now, ladies. I’ll let you know in the next day or two.”

  Tessa looked at Eliza through her lashes, her head still bent a little lower than she meant it to be. Eliza had taken her hands off Princess, leaving restraint to Leslie, and crouched down to pick up the bowl and scattered cotton squares that had fallen.

  Leslie pulled a lead from the back pocket of her jeans and settled the looped end around Princess’ neck before lowering the dog to the floor. She must’ve seen Tessa looking because she smiled a little and offered her the other end of the lead. “Here. Help me take them back to their kennels.”

  Tessa took it, already certain it was a bad idea to do so but unable to come up with a polite way to say no.

  Leslie gathered Sparks in her arms, sent Phoebe and Eliza off to make the appropriate notes in the dogs’ records, then nodded once at Tessa to follow her.

  They walked back to the kennels in silence. Tessa tried not to notice Princess at the other end of the lead, still gimpy on her left front foot, though perhaps more because of the bandage around it than because she was badly hurting.

  At least, she hoped so.

  Tessa could feel Princess looking up at her, the focus in those too-intense amber eyes, the low, slow wag of her tail speaking louder than words about how uncertain she was. She wanted to scoop her up in her arms, and the excuse of her bandaged foot would be a perfectly sensible one, but she didn’t dare.

  If she touched her dog, she didn’t think she’d be able to let her go a second time.

  They followed Leslie into the kennel room. The dogs in their kennels barked eagerly as they went down the aisle between them, but a shush from Leslie was all they needed to stop.

  Tessa hadn’t had a chance to appreciate it before, but she was remarkable with dogs. She couldn’t imagine anyone else able to quiet an entire room with a single word.

  Leslie put Sparks down in an empty kennel, then waved Tessa down a few more to Princess’. She opened the door of the kennel but didn’t make any move to take the lead from around Princess’ neck.

  Sensible, Tessa tried to tell herself, even as panic she hadn’t felt since realizing Dr. Dale in
tended to interview both her and Eliza at the same time rose in her throat. It would surely be unspeakably rude and presumptuous for someone to remove a lead from another’s dog without their permission.

  But it meant Tessa had to crouch down and take the lead off Princess herself. Which would’ve been fine, if she wasn’t actively trying not to notice or touch Princess for fear that she wouldn’t be able to stop if she did so.

  But they couldn’t stand like this all day, with Tessa panicking and Leslie holding open the kennel door and wondering what on earth could possibly be wrong with her. So she crouched down. Looked at Princess. Reached her hand toward the loop of rope around her neck.

  Her fingers brushed against her fur, and they both let out a noise at the contact, a soft, hopefully inaudible whine of mutual grief. She missed Tessa as much as Tessa missed, and the certainty that she was doing the right thing in bringing her back, giving her a chance at a home that could care properly for her — that certainty cracked.

  Tessa thought she was doing the best she could by her. She was sure of it. If she hadn’t been, she wouldn’t have done it. They were both too emotionally unstable, too anxious, too needy, to be what was good for the other. That was the whole point of bringing Princess back. She needed a confident, stable person who didn’t panic at silly things, who could help her manage her fears and anxieties like Tessa couldn’t because she was too far wracked with her own problems.

  But she couldn’t deny the fact that they had been better together. The touch of her fur gave Tessa a confidence she’d been able to parse into today’s interview, and even then, she’d been able to handle Sparks’ panic only because she’d seen Princess through a similar episode.

  And Princess? Tessa had been so focused on Sparks, on the patient in front of her, that she hadn’t noticed how Princess reacted to the moment that had sent her into a spiral at home, but she also hadn’t heard any snarling, any snapping, any sounds of pain or unhappiness from Eliza, so she couldn’t help but wonder if Princess had handled her own certain panic better this time than she had the last.