by Lucy Gilmore
“What the hell is that?” Derek asked, blinking down at the Bubbles.
Harrison scooped the puppy up and held her out for inspection. “This is my service dog.”
“Why is it dressed in a Barbie sweater?”
Harrison pulled Bubbles closer to his body. He might think the puppy looked ridiculous, but he wasn’t about to stand here and listen to Derek denigrate her appearance—not when the yellow sweater made her happy.
“She gets cold,” he said, scratching Bubbles under her chin. “And we’ve had some problems with alternate heating options, so we’re making do with what we’ve got.”
“Is this some kind of joke?” Derek made a big show of looking around the front porch. “Is your dad going to pop out with a camera and make me a YouTube star?”
Harrison couldn’t help but smile. This was exactly what he’d been afraid of happening, what he’d tried to warn Sophie about to no avail. If his best and oldest friend found the idea of this little dog impossible to swallow, then Harrison had no idea how the rest of the guys were going to take it.
Wrong. He did know. That was the problem.
“My dad feels the same way about this puppy as you,” he said. “But I’m stuck with her, I’m afraid. Oscar’s orders.”
Derek opened his mouth to say more, but the crunch of tires on gravel drew their attention. Harrison almost groaned aloud to see Sophie’s tiny green Fiat pull up the drive. A few hours ago, nothing would have made him happier than to see her ignoring her own orders to take the weekend off, especially since the small fire he’d made in the grate hadn’t caused a complete and utter reversal of Bubbles’s training.
A few hours ago, however, he hadn’t been staring at Derek’s sorry mug. Introducing him to Bubbles was one thing. Introducing him to Sophie was an entirely different beast.
“Well, well. You’re quite the social butterfly these days, aren’t you?” Derek asked, his lips lifted in a mocking smile. Then Sophie swung her bare legs out of the car, and that smile turned downright evil. “And don’t try telling me this one isn’t a woman. I can see that for myself.”
Harrison could see it too. Sophie made it impossible to do otherwise, what with the short, tennis-style dress she’d opted to wear today. It rivaled the one she’d worn the day he met her and seemed all the more ominous because of it. He didn’t know what he’d done in a past life to deserve a dog trainer who looked as tempting as this one, but it must have been something terrible.
Or, he thought, taking in the sight of her unloading a box of supplies from her car, her legs leading up to the gently swishing skirt that skimmed over the rounded curve of her ass, something wonderful.
“Be nice,” he growled to Derek. Then, seeing that his friend’s eyes were riveted on the increasingly exposed expanse of skin near the tops of Sophie’s thighs, he added, “But not too nice.”
“Good morning!” Sophie called cheerfully as she made her way up the stairs. She didn’t even blink when she saw Derek standing there, nor did she explain what she was doing at Harrison’s house a mere twelve hours after giving him the weekend off. She shifted her box to one hip and extended a hand in Derek’s direction. “I’m Sophie, the dog trainer.”
“I’m Derek, the best friend,” he replied easily. He also made a motion to grab the box. “Let me take that for you. It looks heavy.”
“It’s not,” she said, but she handed it over anyway, sealing Harrison’s fate in the process. Now Derek had an excuse to linger—and linger he would. He too was more like a friendly goiter than anything else.
Before she could get far, however, Sophie noticed the cooler and fishing gear. Her eyes widened, and she sent an alarmed look Harrison’s way. “Uh-oh. I didn’t realize. Are you going somewhere for the weekend?”
“Of course not,” he said, just as Derek perked up.
“Hell yeah he is. He’s supposed to be going on a fishing trip. We head over to Farragut State Park around this time every year.”
“You do?” Sophie’s alarmed look didn’t lessen. “Why didn’t you say something?”
Harrison hunched a shoulder. “To be honest, I forgot about it until Derek showed up. But it’s fine. They can go without me. Bubbles is more important right now.”
“Bubbles?” Derek guffawed. He looked like he wanted to say more, but Harrison turned on him with a fierce glare.
“Bubbles,” he echoed, daring his friend to argue.
Derek didn’t argue—at least, not about the name. Turning to Sophie, he put on his most wheedling smile and said, “There’s no reason why the dog can’t go too, is there?”
“Well, no,” she said, blinking at the sheer force of that smile. “Not really.”
“Except for the fact that she’s supposed to be in training. And that we need you to help with it.” Harrison wasn’t sure why the idea of going camping with Bubbles had him reacting so strongly, but that wasn’t anything new. Toss him out of his comfort zone, and this was what happened. The calm acceptance on both Derek’s and Sophie’s faces proved it. They would have been more surprised had he not growled a protest. “Besides, what about the c-a-m-p-f-i-r-e?”
“First of all, Bubbles is a dog, so you don’t need to spell it out,” Sophie said with a giggle. “Second, it might be good for her. The candles obviously haven’t been enough. We need to step up her exposure if we’re going to beat this thing.”
Harrison didn’t mention the small success he’d had in the grate that morning. It would kill him to get her hopes up only to dash them back down again. “But what about our regular training?”
She shrugged. “We can continue it there. A service dog isn’t supposed to change your lifestyle, Harrison; she’s supposed to fit into it. If camping is something you do every year, then you should absolutely keep doing it. Bubbles will adjust. She might even like it.”
Harrison barely heard any of what Sophie said beyond that ominous we can continue it there. We implied more than one of them. We included herself.
“All right!” Derek cried. “It’s a plan. You’ll like it out there, Sophie. Some of the wives and girlfriends come, so it’s not like you’ll be the only one.”
He caught the swift look of embarrassment that colored Sophie’s face and amended his words. “Not that you’re a girlfriend, of course, but you know what I mean. You’ll have company out there. More than this sorry bastard, anyway.”
This sorry bastard didn’t much care for the plan either way. He wasn’t ready to share Bubbles with the world. He wasn’t ready to share Sophie.
“We can’t ask Sophie to change her plans at the drop of a hat,” he said. “I’m sure she has other appointments, other places to be. We weren’t even supposed to work this weekend.”
“I’m in.” Sophie’s response was so quick it made Harrison’s head spin.
“But—”
“Are you leaving today?” She directed the question at Derek, bypassing Harrison entirely. “I’ll need about an hour to pack and make arrangements, but I don’t foresee any problems. In fact, it’s fortuitous timing. My mom came for an unannounced visit this morning. A prolonged unannounced visit. You’d be doing me a favor by letting me come along.”
Derek, who Harrison knew visited his mother almost every day for no other reason than his pure delight in her company, shuddered. “Oh, shit. It doesn’t get much worse than that. Is she a gorgon?”
“No.” Sophie sighed. “She’s the nicest woman in the world.”
Derek laughed. “I wouldn’t want to subject anyone to such horrors. By all means, let’s get you packed up and out of the way.”
“Yes, please.”
As if suddenly realizing that her plans hinged on Harrison’s acceptance, she turned to him and smiled prettily. It was the same look Bubbles had given him when he’d wrangled her into the goddamn sweater. “That is, if you don’t mind my coming along,” she added. “My reasons for wanting to go are selfish, I won’t lie, but I do think it’ll be good for you—and for the puppy. Give her a
taste of what it’s really like out there.”
Harrison glanced doubtfully at said puppy and then back at Sophie. Both of them stared at him expectantly, like all their hopes and dreams hung on his willingness to play along. He couldn’t decide if it made him want to laugh or howl. It wasn’t as if he had any say in the matter.
“Fine. We can all go on the stupid camping trip. But,” he added before the bright light in Sophie’s eyes toppled him over, “you have to help me figure out what to pack for this creature. I have no idea what a skittish, traumatized service puppy is going to need for a three-day stay in the wilderness. There are cougars out there, you know. And coyotes.”
Sophie nodded solemnly, but it was impossible to miss the gleam in her eyes or the way her suppressed excitement made her whole body come alight. This was not a woman who got out much, that was for sure. No one should be this excited at the prospect of a weekend in a tent with the wildfire crew. He sure as hell wasn’t.
Well. Maybe he was a little now.
“It’s a deal.” She extended her hand and held it there. If it wasn’t for Derek standing there, watching the interaction with unholy glee lighting his face, Harrison might have been able to avoid taking her hand. As it was, he was forced to slip his palm against hers, once again feeling that sharp juxtaposition of his own rough skin and her soft, supple touch. “You and Bubbles won’t regret this.”
Which showed just how little this woman knew. He was regretting it already.
Chapter 13
“She’s okay like this, isn’t she?” Harrison asked with a worried look at his lap, where Bubbles stood at full attention, her tongue lolling and her ears perked. “She doesn’t need to be in a…car seat or anything?”
Sophie barely managed to tamp down an unseemly giggle. For such a self-sufficient man, Harrison sure lacked confidence when it came to his puppy. “Do you feel comfortable with her on your lap?”
He cast a doubtful glance at the animal. “I don’t have any choice in the matter. She refuses to sit anywhere else.”
Sophie could have pointed out that, as a two-hundred-pound human being with opposable thumbs and a stare that could bring down a forest, he had the power to make Bubbles do anything he wanted—up to and including riding in a crate on the floor.
But Sophie didn’t. She liked that he was so much at the puppy’s mercy. It was sweet. It also made her feel as though she too might have a shot at worming her way into his heart.
“Then I guess that’s where she sits,” she said cheerfully. “If it makes you nervous, though, they do make doggy seat-belt harnesses that work just like ones for humans. I bet if you put one of those in, she’d wear it with pride.”
Harrison’s only response was a grunt, but Sophie didn’t let it bother her. Why would she? Grunting was one of his primary methods of communication. He could lose the capability of speech altogether, and she’d still be thrilled to sit next to him as his truck rumbled in the opposite direction of home.
This was what freedom felt like. Sweet, rebellious freedom—the kind that most people enjoyed in their teens, sure, but she wasn’t in a position to cavil the opportunity. She might be a decade too old for this kind of behavior, but that didn’t mean she regretted it. In fact, she was enjoying herself. Derek had driven off in his own car while she made arrangements with her family, leaving her to Harrison’s sole care. She’d left behind a worried mother, an oddly supportive Lila, and a winking Dawn—all of whom she loved to pieces and didn’t want to look at for another minute.
“No offense, Mom,” she’d said, “but I’m sick to death of you acting like I need to be taken care of all the time. Lila could decide to move to an off-grid remote island, and all you’d do is remind her to take sunscreen. Dawn once dated that cult leader, and you invited him to Christmas the next year. But not me. I sneeze one time, and all of a sudden it’s like someone ordered my headstone.”
“For the last time, he was not a cult leader—” Dawn protested, but Sophie had cut her off.
“I’m a fully functioning adult human being whose bill of health has been clear for years,” she’d stated, simply and with a stern look that would have made Harrison quake. “Unless you’d like to hold me hostage in the basement, you have no choice but to bid me a cheerful farewell.”
And it had worked.
Well, mostly. Her mom hadn’t been cheerful about her goodbye, but that went without saying.
“We’re going to have so much fun this weekend, aren’t we, Bubbles?” she asked the puppy now, her enthusiasm overflowing to the animal seated next to her. “All those tents and fishing poles and marshmallows…”
Harrison grunted again. “Can you name one other thing associated with camping?”
“Um.” She scanned her vast childhood reading list for any and all mentions of the great outdoors. Most of what she’d read involved children hiding in train boxcars and rafts barreling down the Mississippi, so there wasn’t much to go on. “Cans of beans?”
This time, his grunt was closer to a laugh. “You weren’t kidding when you said you don’t get out much, were you?”
“Alas, no.” She heaved a mock sigh. “My life has been much smaller than you realize. Although, to be fair, I did go to Disneyland once with my parents and sisters.”
She didn’t add that it had been part of the Make-A-Wish program, and that the trip had been overshadowed by the deep but unspoken fear that it might be Sophie’s only chance to see the Magic Kingdom. There was something altogether depressing about riding through the Haunted Mansion when you had more in common with the ghosts than the passengers.
“You’ve got one over me, then,” Harrison said. “I’ve never been to a theme park of any kind. My dad wasn’t big on family vacations.”
“But you camped?” she asked, a determined note of optimism in her voice. “Together, I mean? You had no pets and you had no trips to Disney, but you did that much, right?”
He cast her a sideways glance. “Yes, we camped. It’s one of the only things I can remember doing with my dad. One of the only good things at least.”
That was one of the saddest things Sophie had ever heard, but she knew Harrison well enough to realize that showing him pity would only shut him down. “Well, now you have a pet—kind of—so that’s something. I know you think I’m being silly, insisting on this trip when Bubbles is still so new, but if you spend half your life outside, she needs to get used to it. The tents, the people, the atmosphere—all of it. And the timing is perfect. We can introduce the pouch.”
The truck lurched as Harrison touched the brakes. “What did you just say?”
“We can introduce the pouch.” She reached into the bag at her feet. Fortunately, Derek had said there were more than enough camping supplies to go around, so she hadn’t had to pack much more than her clothes, toiletries, and her newest stage of the Harrison-Bubbles training routine. “I know you’ve been worried about how you’re going to carry her around on the job, but I wasn’t kidding when I said her size is more of an asset than a drawback. I have a plan.”
“You have a plan?” he echoed.
“Of course. And it should be easy once you get used to wearing it. I found it online. I think you’re going to like it. It’s not bad, as far as pouches go.”
The truck lurched even more, this time grinding to a halt on the side of the highway. Sophie barely had time to lift a hand and brace herself on the glove box, but Harrison was on top of things, his arm shooting out to prevent Bubbles from cascading to the floor.
He didn’t even realize he was doing it either. Like a mom protecting her kids from an oncoming accident, he was all instinct. And his instinct was to keep that sweet little dog safe at all costs.
Sophie’s heart swelled in her chest. It was impossible to feel anything but admiration for someone so un-self-consciously, heroically good. Protecting Bubbles came as naturally to him as breathing. She felt, down to the tingle in her toes, that those protective urges extended to all the living creatures luck
y enough to cross his path.
Of course, getting him to admit that…
“Say that word one more time,” he said.
“What?” she asked. “Pouch?”
She wasn’t able to stifle her giggle in time. Yes, Harrison’s thunderous look was dark, but he’d scooped up Bubbles and was holding her against his chest. It was impossible to be scared of a man clutching a Pomeranian puppy like a shield.
Poor Harrison. Bubbles was a great dog, but she wasn’t a miracle worker. Even she couldn’t save him from himself.
“If you think for one minute I’m going to wear this dog like a kangaroo bouncing through the outback—” he began.
“You’ll do what? Turn this truck around?”
“For starters, yes. And don’t think that sweet, innocent smile is going to save you. I’ve had just about enough of you two wriggling and squirming and licking me until I can’t think straight.”
Sophie raised her eyebrows. “Is there something you need to tell me about what you and Bubbles get up to after hours?”
“That is not what I meant, and you know it.”
“I mean, I don’t like to judge, but there are better ways to work out some of those downstairs feelings. If you want, I could show you—”
He turned to her, his eyes sparking with the laugh she knew so well. “Sophie Vasquez, I swear on my life, if you finish that sentence, I’m getting out of this truck and throwing my keys in a ditch.”
“Go ahead. I’ve got nowhere to be and no one to answer to for seventy-two blissful hours. Nothing you do can bring me down.”
“You’re a strange woman, you know that?”
She nodded happily. Being called strange might not sound like a compliment to most women, but most women weren’t being called strange by a man like this one. The way the words formed on his lips made it sound like both a curse and a term of endearment. In fact, she doubted whether he knew which it was. That was what made it so delicious.
He was just being himself—Harrison Parks. Raw and honest, volatile and real.