“What’s on your farm?”
“Animals and tractors. I like tractors.”
She sat silently and waited.
“I’m also planting corn. I like corn on the cob when my friend’s dad grills it.”
Where was he going with this? She’d found there was always a reason for everything Henry said; she just had to follow his train of thought. “Grilled food tastes amazing,” she added, hoping to prompt him. “I like fat hamburgers, too.”
“You can have a picnic every day on a farm.”
“That sounds fun.”
He looked up from the game, his eyes as green as grass, the expression in them far too old for his age. “It’s just a game. It’s not real.”
Professional distance just wasn’t possible sometimes. She swallowed down the tears clogging her throat and nose and forced her face to stay mild and reassuring. “Your father is working very hard to get well.”
The voices in the hospital room grew louder, the words discernible. Declan’s voice growled, “I told you not to bring him today.”
Henry’s hand tucked in Mary Hannah’s, the soft and sweaty stickiness tugging at her heart as it shattered into a million little pieces.
“Told?” Callie sighed with unmistakable weariness. “What about discussed? God, Declan. When did we stop asking each other’s opinions?”
“When I lost an arm and half a leg,” Declan said in the next room while Henry clenched tighter, his other hand adding more animals to his farm. “I don’t want Henry seeing me this way, like some broken action figure that got tossed to the bottom of his toy box.”
“Don’t say that.” Her words choked on a sob.
“Even you’re wincing.”
Mary Hannah squeezed Henry’s hand once more before she shoved to her feet. She needed to stop this now for Henry’s sake. She tapped on the door. “Hello, Declan? Callie? Mary Hannah Gallo here.”
The voices inside went silent fast; then, “Come in,” Callie called.
Mary Hannah looked at the nurse, who nodded toward Henry, confirming she would keep an eye on him before she stepped out from behind the desk. “Hey, Henry, would you like to pick out some juice and pudding from the kitchen?”
“Sure.” He sighed, tucking his game into his backpack. “We can get some for my mom, too. She forgets to eat . . .”
Mary Hannah pushed the door open and stepped inside the hospital room she’d visited so many times over the past months as Declan struggled to survive . . . then regain his independence.
He sat in a wheelchair wearing a sweat suit, the left leg pinned up to the point where his leg had been amputated at the knee. The left T-shirt sleeve was empty. He would get prosthetics soon, which would restore some of his independence but could never replace what he’d lost.
Before the accident he’d been a college athlete, a track star, then afterward a competitive triathlete. The inactivity was clearly taking its toll on him emotionally, but his body could be pushed only so far as he recovered, and he insisted on hiding from the world until he could emerge whole again—or at least on two legs.
Life didn’t work that way. The damage he was inflicting on his family—and himself—with the isolation could prove just as damaging as the scars he’d gotten in Afghanistan. A missile hit had toppled his vehicle, trapping his arm and leg. Even with the scar down his left cheek, he was a handsome, all-American-looking man, with blond hair a shade darker than his son’s.
“Happy New Year, Doc,” he said sarcastically, always calling her “doc” no matter how often she corrected him.
She understood he had trouble thinking of himself as anything other than a patient, and everyone around him fit into that paradigm. “Hello, Declan.”
Before she could say more, he wheeled into the bathroom, and she heard the door lock. The sink faucet turned on, then a radio he kept in the shower, and she knew from past experience that this was his way of shutting out the world. Of course it also meant she could speak privately with Callie.
Was Declan offering his wife the comfort of talking out her pain to someone even if that someone couldn’t be him? Or was he genuinely just checking out? Things to work through later. For now, she needed to focus on the grieving wife.
Callie toyed with the miniature Christmas tree strung with popcorn. Her white silk shirt and black slacks were new, her shoulder-length red hair freshly cut. She’d clearly tried today. “Aren’t you going to tell me to be patient with Declan? That everything will get better with time?”
“Is that what you need for me to say?”
“Of course not, since it would be a lie.” Callie sank onto the edge of the hospital bed, her head tucked low, red hair covering her face even as she dragged her wrist across her eyes.
Mary Hannah sat slowly in the chair beside her. “There’s no denying this is tough, Callie, as tough as life gets.”
The young wife and mother glanced at her and whispered, “Most people tell me how grateful I should be that he’s alive, and I am. Really. But everything’s still awful.”
“Pain is pain. There’s no comparing one kind to another.” She hesitated. Sharing her own life experiences could be dicey and unprofessional. But she could safely say, “Marriage is difficult even when life runs smoothly.”
“That’s sure true.” Callie sniffled, grabbed a tissue from the box on the bedside table, then threw her head back with a long exhale. “It’s like even though he’s alive, he’s still dead to us anyway because he doesn’t want us anymore. I don’t know what to do. I thought once his body healed, things would get better, but they’re worse. He still doesn’t want to see Henry. I can’t let him keep hurting our son this way.”
Staying neutral was tougher some days than others, but Mary Hannah was here to treat all of them. And while she sympathized with Declan—God knows he’d suffered—the best way for him to heal was to help all three of them. “You need to take care of yourself, too, for your sake and your child’s.”
“I don’t know what’s right for Henry.” Her eyes held a pain so deep it blurred out the rest of the room. “He wants his father, but his father doesn’t want him, so maybe it’s best for Henry if I just take him away rather than let him be hurt.”
“Do you really believe that will make the situation easier for Henry . . . or for you?”
“Sometimes yes, sometimes no.” She wadded up the tissues and hurled them into the trash. “But that’s not what you came here to talk about today. You said you had some program you thought would help Declan.”
Mary Hannah had come with a concrete idea in mind, but everyone had to be on board. And right now one Roberts male was hiding in the bathroom and the other was somewhere slurping down juice and pudding. “I’m here to talk about whatever is important to you.”
“Thank you. Really. I don’t know what we would have done without you.” Callie smoothed her hands down her black slacks, which still carried the sheen of newness. “Now tell me about the program you have in mind for our family.”
“Actually, it’s for Declan and Henry, if they’ll agree.” Mary Hannah reached into her paisley bag and pulled out the flyer and a packet of forms. “I’ve had a lot of success partnering patients with dogs. They find the training and contact therapeutic. In fact, a few doors down, another patient of mine is here with his service dog.”
“Really? To help him with tasks?” Callie sat up straighter, her eyes filling with a hint of wary hope and a lot of skepticism.
“And emotional support. The dog’s name is Lina. She was a rescue pup named Thumbelina, orphaned and near death.” The Second Chance Ranch had nurtured the litter of pit-bull puppies back to health a year and a half ago. “Now she’s eighty pounds of wonderful, trained awesome-sauce.”
Callie smiled, her first full-out smile since . . . ever. “I’ve seen television specials on things like that. It would be a wonderful, am
azing miracle if it could happen for Declan.”
“I’m glad you think so.” She passed over the flyer, wondering how AJ and Holly were managing. What kind of difference would Holly make for him? “There’s a six-week program where a shelter dog is cleaned up and trained for the My Furry Valentine Mutt Makeover competition.”
“You want us to adopt a puppy?” Callie held the flyer between two fingers as if not sure whether to read it or pitch it into the trash with her snotty Kleenex.
“No, an adult dog.” The last thing Callie Roberts needed was a puppy to train. Mary Hannah leaned forward, elbows on her knees. “You’re under no obligation to keep the dog, only train it for six weeks. There will be people lined up to adopt these dogs. So no worries.”
Callie glanced at the bathroom door then back at Mary Hannah. “But Declan can’t lift much.”
“Henry can, and they’ll have to work together.” If—please, God—his father would let him into his life again. “I have a dog in mind at the Second Chance Ranch. I’ll be helping with the basic training commands. Here’s a photo of the dog, a Cairn Terrier named Barkley.”
Callie studied the flyer and the picture, her brow furrowed. She looked skeptical but still engaged. “You really think this will magically fix my family?”
“Not magic. And not some guaranteed fix.” The family would be repaired through their work, one step at a time, through their own efforts. Mary Hannah settled for stating, “This is just a way to make a start.”
“A start?” Callie’s eyes watered again, her fist crumpling around the flyer. “We’ve been at this for so long, I’m ready to end things with him, not start.”
“I don’t believe that.”
“How can you be so sure?” Her voice wobbled.
Mary Hannah nodded toward Callie’s hand around the flyer. “You got your nails done to visit your husband.”
Her hand unfurled, and Callie tucked her French-manicured hands under her thighs. But her eyes glowed with love and a wary hopefulness. “That probably seems like a vain waste of money when we have such an uncertain future with Declan’s medical issues.”
Mary Hannah smoothed the flyer on the bedside table. “It seems like a woman who hasn’t given up on her marriage yet.”
Hopefully Declan knew how lucky he was to have Callie in his life. That kind of devotion was rare, something she herself and Ted hadn’t shared. Mary Hannah didn’t blame him for walking away, after all she’d screwed up so badly. Declan’s situation was an accident that occurred during honorable service. But she couldn’t help wondering what it would have been like if she’d had unconditional love.
What she would have been like.
* * *
AFTER A WEEK with Holly, AJ felt like he was hitting his head against the wall even with boatloads of help from Mary Hannah and Jim, reputed to be the dog whisperer of volunteers. This was an exercise in futility, frustrating the hell out of him rather than settling him the way his boss seemed to want.
Of course part of that could have something to do with Mary Hannah. She came by every evening after supper, always keeping her distance while showing him different training techniques and ways to gain Holly’s trust. He wasn’t so sure that was possible.
He dropped his bag of carry-out food on the table and sat while Holly watched his every move from her dog bed across the room. “Want some food, girl? Come over this way and we can share. What do you say?”
She didn’t move other than one slow blink. She’d been spayed that morning and wore the cone of shame to keep her from licking her stitches. The vet had said it was all right for her to eat a little food tonight if she wanted. She looked too loopy to him to do much of anything.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought.” He pulled out the cheeseburger and french fries, then flattened the bag into a makeshift place mat for his dinner. Holly’s nose twitched, but she still didn’t budge.
Who would have thought he would welcome a little food thieving from his dog. His dog? For now anyway.
He bit into his juicy burger and chased it down with a fry and a gulp of tea. And yeah, that spot by the window offered him the perfect view of Second Chance Ranch Rescue, lit by motion-sensor lights and two tall lampposts. He watched Mary Hannah’s sedan travel down the long driveway toward the barn.
The family that had lived here before—a mother and son—hadn’t been fans of the animals and apparently had used this spot to spy on the operation. When their efforts to shut the place down failed, they’d sold their home and moved to Kentucky to live near the mother’s sister.
Lacey McDaniel had purchased the property to expand the fences for her rescue. Wyatt had suggested renting her cabin for now, but at some point she planned to transform the cabin into office space and a clinic.
It had been a damn long time since AJ had made plans other than getting through the next undercover assignment. Each time he slipped deeper into the job and further from himself.
Hungry as hell after a long day in which he’d used his lunch break to check on Holly at the vet, he bit into the burger again, grease oozing out and down his hand. He swiped his fingers along a napkin, his eyes tracking Mary Hannah stepping out of her car. The icy branches between their properties glistened, the moonlight throwing a fat beam along the bridge over the frozen stream. Mary Hannah walked that route each night, and he found himself anticipating this part of the day more than he should.
He wasn’t some Peeping Tom or stalker, but he couldn’t help but notice when she came home from work unless he blacked out the window. Her red coat flashed like a beacon, her steps neat and efficient as she unloaded her work bag and a sack of groceries. She climbed the stairs to her apartment, but he knew she would come over to check on Holly’s progress as she’d done every night this week.
His pulse ramped at the thought. Yeah, he wanted her all right, but her past addiction, his past falling for an addict and the fact that she was tied to his cousin . . . it was just too complicated.
Or so logic said.
Attraction never gave a damn about logic—especially when he knew from his night with “Francesca” just how much heat steamed between them. Beyond that, he was surprised to find her kind, and rather funny, too.
Exhaling hard, he tossed down his burger and leaned back in his chair. He picked up a french fry and held it out for Holly. She didn’t move—no surprise.
He waggled the fry in her direction. “I wish you could talk to me and let me know what you want.”
Still, she didn’t do anything except stare back at him. Granted her eyes weren’t as whale-looking anymore. Probably because of the painkillers making her mellow. Mary Hannah swore they’d made progress, but he wasn’t seeing it. He wouldn’t have minded if Holly slept on the bed or sofa, but she refused to get on the furniture. Period. Which would probably make her forever family happy.
He didn’t want to crate her after seeing how much of her life she’d spent chained and likely caged. Mary Hannah had suggested leaving an open crate tucked in a corner where Holly could retreat if she felt overwhelmed. For the first two days, she’d slept there. The next couple of days, he’d found her on the dog bed near the sofa. Last night, she’d snuck into his room and slept on the rug by his bed. Sort of like the progress he and Mary Hannah had been making until she revealed her secret.
But he didn’t want to think about that now. He was focused on Holly, right? And damn, but that progress was so slow. Maybe by next year Holly would let him pet her.
Except he wasn’t keeping her that long. Right? But where the hell was he supposed to send this sad, broken dog?
Holly stretched up her back end, her mouth opening in a big doggie yawn. Mary Hannah had told him that yawns could be a sign of stress. Great. Even fries stressed her out. His sympathy for the dog mixed with frustration.
The boxer stood and took a wary step off her bed, staggering a little from the
meds, but she was moving toward him of her own free will. AJ held still. Totally. He knew from experience if he so much as twitched, she would bolt back to the bed or out the doggie door to cower behind a bush to do her business before running back inside.
Would she take the food?
God, he wished Mary Hannah was here. She knew so much more about this dog whisperer stuff.
Holly stood upright and took another stumbling step forward. AJ held his breath. Was she actually coming for the fry? Mary Hannah had told him to be patient. And how damn crazy that his hand was trembling.
“Hey, Holly,” he said softly, “do you want a fry? You can have the rest of my burger, too, if you’ll come over here.”
She tipped her head to the side and took another step, then another, but not toward him. A log fell in the fireplace, snapping and popping sparks. Holly flinched, halting for a second before creeping forward again. She inched her way to the sofa, stopping beside the coffee table cluttered with magazines, his iPad and the TV remote.
“Do you want to get on the furniture? That’s cool by me.” Still, he kept the fry in his hand, just in case she changed her mind.
She tapped the coffee table with her paw.
He frowned. “Do you want to shred a magazine? Or for me to bring the food there?”
Carefully, he stood, carrying the container of fries. Holly’s muscles bunched as she ducked her head. He stopped at the other end of the coffee table and placed the fries there.
“See, girl? All for you.” He backed away, giving her the space she needed, sensing they were on the edge of discovering something, coming to some kind of understanding. Maybe the painkillers had taken away some of her inhibitions.
She thumped the table again, knocking aside the magazines until her paw landed on the remote control. And stayed. Her intent was clear. The dog wanted the remote.
AJ laughed. “Seriously? You want the one thing in the house that is a hundred percent mine?”
He nudged it toward her.
She flinched down again.
He tapped it closer.
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