by L. P. Maxa
Maykin had moved in the day after she’d adopted Miller for us. And we’d never looked back. I loved her more than anything else in the entire world. Miller was a close second though. We were still best friends, and we were still taking things one step at a time. But the future wasn’t scary, for either of us.
“I’m back here.”
I headed in the direction of her voice, which was coming from the bathroom. We were still living in the apartment, but we’d started to look at buying a house. Miller, as it turned out, was not a Boxer/Husky mix. After he surpassed eighty-five pounds, we did genetic testing. Miller was a Great Dane and Alaskan Malamute mix, which meant he was fucking huge. He was like Clifford the Big Red Dog and we were officially running out of room for him. He needed a yard, stat.
I walked into the bedroom, petting Miller as he literally stepped up onto the bed and lay down. I’d originally had a queen, but we’d had to buy a king-size mattress. He refused to sleep anywhere but between us, and we’d eventually had to get a larger bed. We were pretty lenient dog parents.
“Hey, baby, how was your day?” I stepped up behind Maykin, kissing her shoulder and watching in the mirror as she put on some lip gloss.
“It was good. How was yours?” She turned, wrapping her arms around my waist and smacking a glossy kiss on my cheek.
I still worked with Nicky at Revival Ink, but there was talk of him and Evie moving back to Austin and me taking over running the shop here. I was excited for the opportunity, but sad to think about our best friends moving away. “It was busy, but Nicky finally let us hire a fifth artist.” We’d hired a fourth about five months ago, but it’d taken us that long to find our fifth and final piece.
“Oh yeah, who’d you guys choose?” She braced her hands on the sink and hoisted herself up, sitting on the counter.
“The chick from LA, Paisley.” She was talented as hell, but she didn’t look anything like a typical tattoo artist. She looked like a high school cheerleading captain, ribbons in her hair and all. I was pretty sure our boy Hawkins had a huge fucking crush.
“Oh, I liked her, she was nice.” Maykin wrapped her legs around my waist and pulled me against her core. I thought maybe we were going to do it on the sink until the smile fell from her face. “I have something I need to tell you.”
“Okkkayyy?” Her tone didn’t sound like this something was going to be a something I was going to like.
“Just promise me that you aren’t going to freak out.”
My jaw dropped open. “Oh my god, baby, are you pregnant?” As soon as the words left my mouth, a smile took over my face. I’d thought babies were in the distant future, but I would be so fucking happy if it was now.
“What? No. I’m not pregnant.” Her eyebrows rose and she jerked back. “Do you want me to be pregnant?”
“Uh, I, um, well yeah.” I winced, knowing that she’d seen the sheer joy that had come over my face. “I mean it’s okay that you aren’t. But I think I would have been really pumped if that was what you were going to tell me.”
She stared at me, blinking and silent for a few moments. “Okay, well, we can start working on that if you want.”
“Are you serious?” I grabbed her face with both of my hands, kissing her lips.
She laughed and nodded. “Yeah, I think I am.” She pulled her bottom lip through her teeth and my dick twitched in response. “But, um, that isn’t what I needed to tell you.”
I was so happy right at that moment I wasn’t sure anything she could say would be able to freak me out or bring my mood down. “What’s up?”
“Margaret from the shelter called.” She started twisting her hands in her lap, chewing on her cheek.
“And?”
“Well, you know how Miller got so big so fast, and we were a little shocked, right?” I nodded, urging her to continue. “Apparently, a few of his brothers got returned to the shelter. The families that adopted them couldn’t handle their size, and they didn’t have the room and…”
“Baby.” I closed my eyes, taking a deep calming breath. “How many of Miller’s brothers are in route to our apartment?”
“Two.”
My eyes flew open and I started shaking my head. “Maykin, baby, how are we supposed to have three giant dogs here? I know that you want to help, and I do too, but—”
The sound of our doorbell cut me off.
Maykin hopped off the counter. “We’re looking at houses. It’s not like we were planning on staying in the apartment that much longer anyway, right?”
“Yeah, but Mayk, come on.” I followed after her, Miller jumping off the bed to join our little parade to the front door. “Three giant fucking monster dogs. Really?”
She turned, taking my face in her hands, smiling. “You give me the three dogs, I’ll give you three babies. Deal?”
I sighed, chuckling lightly. “Deal.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Bleu, Four Months After That
After Maykin had adopted two more massive dogs, we’d found a house pretty fucking quickly. It was a fixer-upper, with a huge backyard. When we purchased it, we were excited for the renovations. We figured we could take it one day at a time, one project at a time, and really make it ours.
But then, well, Mayk had made good on that kid promise. She was three months along and renovations had been kicked into high gear. She’d killed it with her gallery show and was graduating from college about two months before the baby was due.
Nicky and Evie had moved to Austin and I was running Revival Ink, Dallas. Life was…busy. But it was also really fucking spectacular. Nothing ever seemed to go exactly the way we thought it would. I’d never planned on hooking up with Maykin, and I’d certainly never dreamed that we’d be parents to three dogs, in the middle of a massive home renovation, and pregnant with our first baby.
But I’d never been happier. Ever.
“There you are.” Maykin rested her hands on my shoulders and placed a kiss on my neck. “The tile we picked is on backorder, so it’s going to take a little longer for the master bath to be done.”
I reached for her hand, pulling her into my lap, and kissed her palm. “About par for the course, right?” I was sitting in the backyard, throwing the ball for the dogs.
“Yeah, well, who knew that you’d knock me up so damn fast?” She leaned against my chest, her small baby bump on display.
I slid my hands under her shirt, laying my palms flat against her stomach. “My exquisite dick shoots out spectacular super sperm.” Maykin had stopped her birth control and then exactly one month later, she’d come into our bedroom with a positive pregnancy test in her hand and tears in her eyes.
“You know, you aren’t going to be able to talk about your dick all the time once this kid gets old enough to understand.” She turned and rested her forehead against my cheek while Monster, one of Miller’s brothers, dropped the ball in my lap.
“You’ll miss the dick talk once it’s gone. Mark my words.”
She snorted. “Why would I miss hearing you talk about it? I wake up to it poking me in the ass every morning.”
“Hey, you’re the one who demands to be the little spoon.” I put my finger under her chin, lifting her face so I could kiss her perfectly plump lips. “Speaking of…” I pulled a black velvet box out of my pocket, popping it open for her to see. “You wanna fight over who gets to be little spoon forever?”
She sat up, her gaze moving between the emerald-cut solitaire and my eyes. “Are you asking me to marry you?”
“I want you to steal my covers and shrink my clothes for the rest of our lives.” I smiled, taking the ring out and placing it on her finger. “You’re my best friend, you’re my whole fucking world, and you have been from the first moment I met you. I can’t imagine my life without you in it, and I really don’t want to raise all these dogs and this kid without their mom being my wife. Will you marry me, Midge?”
I watched as tears filled her eyes and a grin warmed her face. “Fuck yeah.”
BURNOVER
Diane Benefiel
Dear Readers,
Thank you for supporting Project Freedom Ride with your purchase of this anthology. My husband and I adopted Finn from a high-kill shelter in April of 2018, and as in Burnover, our Finn is a very sweet escape artist. We’ve had several people comment that his coloring looks husky, but he’s definitely a terrier. It was my son-in-law, Matthew, who discovered that schnusky was indeed a breed mix. Google Images proved him right, because if you search “schnusky” there are many Finn doppelgangers.
Chapter One
Eva crouched down, keeping her voice soft. “Hey, buddy, you want to come over and say hi?” The little gray and white dog did not. Instead he looked at her from under bushy eyebrows as he lay on his cot. But his tail twitched a little. She pulled the baggy from her pocket and, glancing to make sure the wardens weren’t paying attention, offered a little bone-shaped treat. When he rose, she could see that he wasn’t big, maybe thirty pounds. The sign by his cage said he’d been picked up as a stray and his age estimate was one year. He approached cautiously, golden-brown eyes holding a tiny spark of interest. He took the offering, carrying it back to his bed before carefully chewing and swallowing. “What have you been doing for a year, buddy? I can tell you, my year’s been pretty crappy.”
Crappy was an understatement. In the past twelve months, she’d been fired from her job after reporting her jerk of a boss for sexual harassment. Turns out she hadn’t been the first, and now a lawsuit was pending. The sounds of doom coming from her car engine had signaled a $1,500 repair bill. And, oh yeah, she couldn’t forget being jilted a week before her wedding by her ex-fiancé Bruce, who’d decided the traditional life wasn’t for him, and had set off to join a Taoist monastery in the Wudang Mountains of China. Since Bruce had trouble surviving without his iPhone and morning latte, she had doubts about how long his spiritual journey would last.
Her arrival in Hangman’s Loss signaled a fresh start. She had recently moved into a cute little cottage, had started a new job, and now she was about to satisfy the urge to get a dog. Adopting a dog hadn’t been possible before because dogs were one of a long list of things to which Bruce was allergic, a list that included cats, lettuce, toothpaste, and, she suspected, air. Bruce had also been prone to intestinal problems and anxiety. Which indeed were real complaints, and difficult for the one suffering, but sometimes she wondered if maybe Bruce’s issues were more an effort to control his world than true ailments. In fact, she’d never actually seen him sick or having an allergic reaction to anything. Didn’t matter, because Bruce was no longer her problem, and she could get a dog if she damn well pleased.
The tiny Chihuahua in the cage next door quivered as it yapped at her, so she slipped it a treat before returning her attention to the terrier mix. “Okay, here’s the plan. I’ll find a warden and see if they’ll let me spring you for an hour so we can get to know each other.”
Within minutes she was leading him to a fenced-in grassy area. The little guy perked up, nose going as he sniffed every blade of grass. Eva walked him, talking softly, and when he looked up and she saw a kernel of hope in his eyes, she was sunk. She sat on a bench and the dog sat next to her, resting his chin on her knee, gaze locked on hers. She tried to be rational when making her decision. Calm? Check. Walks well on leash? Check. Not too big, not too small? Check.
Glad the rational part was out of the way, she asked him, “Would you like to come home with me, buddy?”
At her question he lay his head on her leg and stared at her with adoring eyes. “How do you know how to be so dang cute?” Maybe she was projecting a tiny bit, but she was going with it.
She rubbed his pricked ears and he stretched his neck for her to pet. “I’m going to call you Finn.”
Thirty minutes later, Eva was driving home alone. Finn would have to be neutered, get the necessary shots, and wouldn’t be ready for pickup until the next afternoon. Which would give her time to get what she needed to make her new best bud feel at home in her little cottage.
###
Eva burst through the back door of the café calling out, “I got a dog.” Eva’s super-sweet, super-cute cousin Maddy stood at the prep table, rolling out dough for cinnamon rolls. She was married to the über-hot Logan and roundly pregnant with twins, neither of which did anything to dissipate the lifelong feeling that Maddy had it all and Eva was forever following in her shadow. Eva pushed aside the twinge of envy and whipped out her phone.
“Here’s a pic.” Maddy used a floury hand to rub her back as Eva held the phone in front of her. “Isn’t he adorable?”
Maddy studied the screen. “Oh, he is adorable.”
“The animal shelter picked him up as a stray a week ago. He was on death row.”
“He looks like a schnusky.”
Eva looked doubtfully at the image. “What’s a schnusky?”
“Miniature husky, schnauzer mix.”
“Really? I’ve never heard of that.” She did a quick Google search. “Oh my gosh, you’re so right, that’s exactly what he is.”
“He’s lucky you came along. What’s his name?”
“Finn.”
“Aww, that’s cute. He looks like a Finn.”
“Right? I thought so too.”
The bell over the door rang, and her cousin said, “You’re on the register today.”
Eva tied the pocketed apron around her waist as she went through the swinging door to the front.
Three men and a woman, all with Hangman’s Loss Fire Department patches on their crisp navy shirts, stood in front of the counter, perusing the menu hanging from the ceiling. All except the youngest man. He stood maybe a shade under six feet and his biceps stretched the material on his short-sleeved uniform shirt. That guy’s gorgeous chocolate-brown eyes hadn’t left her since she’d come through the door.
“Hey there, firefighters. What can I get you today?”
In her mind she christened him Firefighter Hottie, even though his nametag read Jones. His lips quirked like he was thinking an inappropriate response to her question, one he knew he’d better not say out loud. The smile revealed a dimple in his right cheek.
“What’s good?”
His velvety voice made his response sound like foreplay. Time to nip this one in the bud. “The spinach and kale quiche with cottage cheese and pickled beets on the side,” she deadpanned.
The female firefighter snickered and elbowed FH in the side. “She’s got your number, Rook.”
“I’d eat that if I had to, but I’d rather have the eggs and sausage on a croissant, and coffee.”
The others placed their orders and Eva handed them mugs for their coffee. The firefighters trooped to a booth to sit. All except FH.
“So, you’re Eva.”
She eyed him as she came around the counter to check the coffee level in the urns. “That’s what it says on my nametag,” she eyed his, “Jones. But your colleague called you Rook. That short for Rookie?”
“Yeah, I’ve been working in the house for three years, but since I’m the most recently hired, I’m the rookie. My name is Diego Jones. I’m guessing you haven’t worked here long. I would have noticed you.”
“Is this you flirting? Because if it is, you can stop now.”
“Just making conversation.”
The bell tinkled and a family with a toddler in a stroller entered. “Ah, customers to the rescue. Excuse me.”
###
Diego drove his old Chevy pickup along the highway, slowing to take the turn onto his street where the forest edged up to backyards. A guy walked along the side of the road, glowering as he drove past. What the hell was that about? With a shrug to the peculiarities of people, Diego drummed his fingers on the steering wheel and brought his attention back to the mystery of the new girl at the café.
Women liked him. He was an affable guy. He made sure a woman climaxed more than once before he got off when he was lucky enough to have sex, and he was fun to
be with. But Eva? She was having none of his charm. Not that she was his usual type. He’d generally stuck with lean, athletic women. Eva was curvier, and he’d have to be blind not to have noticed her breasts. Not that she’d worn a low-cut top or anything, but all he could think was wow. Her hair was pretty—kinda brown, kinda blonde—and her eyes were a deep, mysterious sea green. He’d always been a sucker for green eyes.
The first time he’d met her when he’d gone in for breakfast with some of the crew, he’d thought there’d been interest until she’d shut it down. He’d tried again a few days after that, and thought he’d struck gold when she’d smiled at him. He’d tried to start a conversation and she’d been polite, then had given him the freeze. He didn’t want to give up on her, but didn’t want to be a jerk either.
Steering onto the driveway to his house, he parked, leaning back in his seat for a minute before gathering the energy to get out of his truck. He needed sleep like his next breath. And food. Plus, with summer heat at its peak, he could really use a shower. An attic fire had extended his shift from twenty-four hours to thirty and he was feeling it. There’d been an unusually high number of calls and he’d caught maybe three hours of sleep.
He got out of the truck, and a blur of movement at the corner of his house caught his attention. A skunk? God, he hoped not. Maybe a dog. After a moment weighing food and shower against investigating, he detoured to the back of his property.
With skunk on his mind, he moved cautiously, pausing at a scraping sound. Without a fence, any animal was free to roam his property. His lot ran back into the forest, but he’d cleared out the trees closest to the house and garage to make a defensible space.