“Oh my god!” I squeaked and began bouncing in my seat. “This is so exciting! But wait, what do you need me here for?”
“Well, the pups have finally been weened and are ready to be picked up, and I need your help picking one you think the kids’ll love.”
I let out an “eek,” yanked my seat belt off, and shoved the door open. “Then let’s go see some adorable puppies!”
* * *
Trick
“They’re so cute!”
I stood outside a little makeshift pen, watching as Nona sat on her butt in the middle, letting five little pups jump and lick all over her. She turned her head and graced me with one of the biggest, brightest smiles I’d ever seen. That look hit me like a wrecking ball to the stomach, and I had to stuff my hands in the pockets of my jeans to keep from pulling her to her feet and slamming my lips against hers in a kiss that would take her breath away. I didn’t think I’d ever seen her look more beautiful in all the time I’d known her as she did just then. Her gaze was free of those walls she kept up around me, there were no barriers between us, just her pure, unadulterated joy. It took my breath away.
“Honey, I think you made a mistake bringing me. If it were up to me, I’d talk you into getting all of them.”
Christ, with that expression on her face, that warmth in those blue eyes, if I’d been able to, I’d have bought all five of those goddamn dogs right then and there just to keep that smile for as long as possible.
“May I make a suggestion?” the breeder, who’d been standing off to the side, asked. The woman looked to Nona affectionately. The puppies had stopped vying for Nona’s attention and had entered into a hardcore wrestling match. “Wait for one of those little buggers to claim you. They’ll all wrestle for your affection, but there’s always one who stands out with every person. You sit back and the dog you’re meant to have will make its claim.”
Nona’s eyes widened as she looked between me and the woman. “Oh, I’m not… it isn’t for—”
Before she could finish, one little puppy broke away from the mayhem and shoved to the back, planting her behind on the ground and looking up at Nona. She let out a high-pitched yip and batted the ground with her paw. After a few seconds, she did it again, as if she were demanding Nona pick her up to get her away from her roughhousing brothers and sisters.
Nona giggled and reached out to snatch up the bossy girl. “Well someone’s a little diva, isn’t she?” The dog licked the tip of Nona’s nose, curled up into a ball under her chin, and immediately fell right to sleep.
I pointed to the puppy Nona was holding and declared, “We’ll take that one.”
“Trick, no,” Nona objected even as she snuggled the dog closer. “You don’t have to—”
“And her name’s Diva.”
* * *
“This one. You have to get this one.” Nona held up a teal collar with bright pink flowers on it in one hand while still cuddling Diva to her chest with the other. “It’s so her, don’t you think?” She held the collar up to Diva’s fawn-colored fur.
“It is, beautiful. It’s perfect.”
“Oh! And you need some toys. And a bone. And a food and water bowl.”
“I’ll leave all that shit to you.” I hated any and all kinds of shopping, only going when it was absolutely necessary. I was in and out as fast as possible, but what should’ve been a half-hour trip, tops, running in and out of the pet store get grab some supplies, had turned into an aisle by aisle “browse-a-thon” as Nona called it. And I was officially done. “Have at it. You do the fun stuff, I’ll get the necessities.”
Her face fell. “Are you sure? I mean, she’s not my dog, Trick. I feel like I’m stepping on your toes.”
“All right,” I conceded, hating the uncertainty in her eyes. “Answer something for me. You think my kids’ll like Diva?”
“I think they’ll love her, but I still would’ve been more comfortable if you’d chosen a puppy you liked.”
“I did, sweetheart,” I replied softly. She had no goddamn clue. The moment that dog claimed her, my decision had been made. It was a no-brainer. I needed all the help I could get in repairing the rift I’d caused between us, and if that dog could help in any way, I wasn’t above using it to my advantage.
She chewed on her bottom lip, still unsure. “But what if I pick out something you don’t like?”
Moving back to her, I lifted my hand and traced her jaw with my fingertips, earning a lick from Diva. “Not possible, baby.”
“But what if—”
“It’s not possible, ’cause I really don’t give a damn what the stuff you pick looks like. I have Hannah, so trust me when I say I’ve grown accustomed to having my space taken over by bright girly shit. A dog bowl with daisies or something like that isn’t gonna faze me.”
That worked to ease her discomfort, and my chest swelled when she leaned deeper into my touch. “All right,” she whispered, her eyes going glassy as she gazed up at me. “I’ll pick some stuff.”
It took everything in me not to lean in and taste those lips. “Thanks, baby.”
Her voice came out breathy as she said, “Welcome.” And I knew I almost had her.
Just a little bit more and hopefully I’d be able to finally claim the woman who was coming to mean everything to me.
Chapter Thirteen
Nona
Hearing Chris’s truck whining and squealing its way up my lane, I rushed to throw the front door open.
Chris pulled up to the curb, and Tristan threw the passenger door open, shouting, “Hey, Mom!” from across the yard. He jogged my way, his backpack bouncing around on his shoulders, and slammed into me for a hug.
“Hey, baby cakes! Welcome back. You have a good time?”
“Yeah. You got anything to eat?”
My boy had a hollow leg. For such a skinny thing, he ate like he was starving twenty-four-seven. “Dinner’ll be ready in about fifteen.”
“Sweet!” With that, he rushed past me into the house, and I turned back to watch my daughter make her way across the lawn at a much more sedate pace.
Where her brother was carefree, Blythe seemed almost stoic, and I could tell just by the look on her face that there was something bugging her.
“You okay, honey pie?” I asked when she made it to me.
“Yeah.” That one word came out in a mumble, and she kept her eyes downcast as I hugged her. “Gotta go unpack.” Then she pulled from my arms and slunk inside after her brother.
Moving from my front porch, I headed for Chris’s truck as concern raked its claws through my insides. He remained in the truck, watching me through the windshield as I reached the curb and rounded the hood. The moment I hit the driver side and got a good look at him, my eyes went wide. Sunglasses blocked his eyes from view, but there was no missing the ugly purple bruising peeking out from beneath the lenses and around his nose.
“Jeez, what the hell happened to your face?”
“Ran into a door,” he muttered.
I lifted a skeptical brow and narrowed my eyes. “You ran into a door.”
“That’s what I said, isn’t it? Woke up in the middle of the night to take a piss and ran into the door.”
Rolling my eyes at his surly attitude, I brushed off his bruised face in favor of something much more pressing. “Do you know what’s wrong with Blythe?”
“Nothing, far’s I know.”
A ball of dread formed in my stomach as I cast a quick glance back toward the house. “She seems upset. Did something happen while they were with you?”
He lifted his shoulders in a shrug. “She’s a teenager. I’m sure it’s just some drama she’ll get over in a day or two.”
Staring at him now, I barely recognized the man I’d once wanted to spend the rest of my life with. It felt like I was looking at a completely different person. Chris wasn’t perfect, and if I were being honest with myself, he’d never been a good husband, but at least I’d been able to comfort myself with the knowledge
that he loved his kids.
But something had changed over the past several months. The man before me now was a stranger who didn’t care about anything or anyone but himself. And that broke my heart, because my kids deserved so much better.
“Whatever,” I muttered, clenching my fists. “I’ll tell them you said goodbye.”
He shot me a scathing look and threw his truck into gear. “Yeah, you do that.” Chris barely gave me enough time to step back before hitting the gas and peeling off.
Shaking off the residual anger that always accompanied a run-in with my ex-husband, I headed back to the house, determined to make the best of the evening.
After all, I had my kids back.
And that was all that mattered.
* * *
Blythe had remained quiet all evening. I wanted to press, but I knew from experience that questioning her would only make her shut down even more than she already was. She didn’t say a word all through dinner, scooting her food around on her plate instead of actually eating it. And the whole time the three of us lounged around the living room watching TV together, she stared off into space, not paying a lick of attention to the show.
The longer she remained withdrawn, the more I began to worry. Eventually she disappeared into her room with the excuse it was to finish some homework, and I’d used that as an opportunity to grill my son.
“Hey, kid. You know what’s bugging your sister?”
Tris looked over to me with a furrowed brow. “No. She just woke up like that, and I don’t know why. I tried gettin’ her to talk to me, but she’s barely said a word all day.”
“Did she and your dad get into a fight?”
“Nuh-uh. He was barely even home yesterday. He dropped us off at the apartment after the game with some cash to order a pizza, then left, sayin’ he had something he had to take care of. I was asleep before he got back.”
My vision burned red, and it was only by the grace of God that I managed to make it through the rest of the evening without my head exploding. But by the time I got the kids up and off to school the next morning, that rage was past the boiling point and ready to spill over.
I made it to the salon and greeted everyone already there with a brittle smile as I hurried to the back room and pulled my phone from my purse.
The phone rang and rang until the voice mail eventually picked up, and I let fly everything I’d been holding back since the night before.
“You have two, maybe three weekends a month with your kids—that is, if you don’t bail on them, which you do at least half the time!” I seethed through the line. “And you actually think it’s okay to leave them alone at your place while you wander off to do god knows what? Jesus Christ, Chris! What the hell is wrong with you? These are your children! I’ve put up with your shit for months, and that ends now. Either you get your act together, or you find a lawyer, because I’m done letting you screw with their heads the way you are. You understand? Done.”
I jabbed the screen with more force than necessary and squeezed my eyes closed, working on my deep breathing in the hopes of calming myself before I went out to greet my first client of the day.
* * *
Trick
The back of my neck tingled, alerting me to the fact that I was being watched. When I turned my chair to look around the bullpen, I caught a couple of the detectives and a few uniformed officers staring. A few of them smiled big goofy grins when we made eye contact, others tilted their chins or nodded, and one or two gave me a thumbs-up.
“The hell is goin’ on?” I asked, spinning back to my desk to face Hayes. “I’ve been getting weird looks all morning. Joe Silvester even patted me on the back this morning when I stopped in at Muffin Top and congratulated me on a job well done. You have any idea what that’s all about?”
Hayes leaned back in his chair, lacing his fingers together and resting his hands on his gut as he burst into laughter.
“What the hell’s so funny?”
Before he could answer, Micah Langford, another detective with the department, came up and clapped me on the shoulder. “Heard you landed Wynona Fanning. Congrats, brother. On a scale from one to ten, that woman’s at least a twenty.”
He took off after that declaration, and I slowly turned back to Hayes to find him grinning like a maniac. “Word got out that you and a certain redhead were seen lookin’ particularly cozy at the pet store yesterday, and the rumors started flyin’.”
“Jesus Christ,” I grunted, raking a hand through my hair. “Do they have a goddamn phone tree for this shit or something?”
“Or something,” Hayes said on a chuckle. “Better get used to it, my man. Once they get something good to talk about, they don’t let go. Tempie and I were cause for speculation for more than two decades. And for most of that time we didn’t even live in the same place.”
“For fuck’s sake. This is the last thing I need right now. Word gets back to her that people are talkin’, and she’ll spook worse than she already is.”
“I take it you’re workin’ on fixing your fuckup. Happy for you, brother. You deserve something good after the bullshit Emma put you through. You two get past your rocky start, something tells me Nona’ll show you the kind of good that’ll blow your mind.”
I didn’t have a single doubt about that. I had an uphill battle in front of me, but I knew it would totally be worth it once I got us to the other side.
“Don’t congratulate me yet,” I said as my cell began ringing. “She’s determined to put me through the ringer, not that I blame her one damn bit. But I’ve got my work cut out for me.”
“Best things worth havin’ require the hardest work,” he stated seriously as I pulled my phone from the inside pocket of my blazer. I looked at the screen and felt my jaw tick involuntarily as I swiped to answer.
“Emma.”
“Hey, Patrick. You have a second?”
“Not particularly,” I replied in a flat, emotionless voice. “I’m at the station. Something wrong with the kids?”
Her heavy sigh came through the line. “Why do you always assume something’s wrong with the kids?”
I squeezed my eyes closed and pulled in a calming breath. “Because you and I have nothing else to talk about.”
“Well, they’re fine, but what I need to talk to you about affects them, so I’d appreciate you giving me a couple minutes. I don’t think that’s too much to ask.”
A dull throb built behind my eyes, and I had to massage my temple to fight off the headache suddenly pounding inside my skull. “I’m right here, Emma. You have your few minutes, so start using them.”
“Nice,” she spat. “When did you become so cold, Patrick? You never would’ve talked to me like this in the past.”
“Yeah, well I stopped worrying about taking your feelings into consideration when you went through with filing for divorce after I begged you to give us another chance. Now, say what you need to say, or I’m hanging up.”
“We need to talk about Wynona Fanning.”
That dull throb turned into a stabbing pain. “That’s where you’re wrong. Nona’s none of your business.”
“She is if she’s gonna be around my children,” Emma snapped.
“Emma, she’d be around our kids even if there were nothing between us. Her son and Shawn are tight, and she lives right across the street.”
“Yeah, that’s real convenient, isn’t it?” she spat in a snarky tone.
“I’m not even gonna address that one. What I will say is that who I’m involved with now or in the future will never have a goddamn thing to do with you. I’ve got a dealer supplying high school kids all over town with some very nasty shit, so I’m only gonna take the time to say this once. And I expect you to listen if you want our situation to remain amicable. This is the last time I’ll speak with you about Nona. From here on out, consider her off-limits. You got me?” I didn’t give her a chance to reply. “Now, I’ve got more important shit that requires my attention, so this conve
rsation’s done.”
I hung up before she could say another word, then tossed the cell onto my desk.
Hayes studied me for a beat before asking, “You good?”
“Far from it,” I answered, pressing the heels of my palms into my eye sockets. “I have a feeling that woman’s gearing up to cause trouble.”
“Just ride it out,” he advised. “Remember what I said, brother. You have a lot of good coming your way. All you have to do is ride out this one last storm. Then it’s nothing but sunshine and blue skies from there.”
I hoped to hell he was right.
Pulling in a deep breath, I pushed up from my chair and told him, “Taking my lunch break. Call my cell if something comes up.”
“Where are you headed?”
The corner of my mouth kicked up in a smirk as I turned and started out of the bullpen, calling over my shoulder, “To get me a little taste of sunshine.”
Chapter Fourteen
Nona
“I heard they were making out in the squeaky toy aisle of Paws and Pals yesterday,” Ms. McClintock, the surly, blue-haired, eighty-year-old matriarch of Hope Valley, stated with a smug look on her face.
It was official. I was in hell.
Apparently someone had spotted Trick and me at the pet store yesterday, and everyone and their dog—no pun intended—had started speculating on the state of our relationship.
As soon as I came out of the back room after my call to Chris, I’d been bombarded with one question after another. When I refused to answer, they’d started teasing and throwing around their own theories. It had been like that all morning, and as I lounged in the chair at my station, waiting for my next appointment who wasn’t due for another hour, I began to question my decision to stick around during my lunch hour instead of going out.
The Best of Me: a Hope Valley novel Page 11