“Either?” I ask.
Did I give the impression that I don’t like to be touched? I may be an exhausted thirty-year-old single mother, but I ain’t dead.
Just like that, Jake’s face shuts down.
Oh.
He runs a hand over his beard and glances back at the shelter, like he’s dying for some kind of interruption. “PTSD, remember?”
“Right.” I nod, “And you don’t like to be touched?”
“No,” he says abruptly.
Well damn. There goes every fantasy I’ve ever had starring this man, and trust me, there have been a lot. Jake shifts his weight from foot to foot. Nuke butts his head against Jake’s thigh, and he ruffles the dog’s fur.
“You ever talk about it?”
“No.” His tone is sharp, too sharp, and it stings, but I understand a thing or two about people pushing you to open up when you’re not ready, so I leave him be. For now.
Olivia, Eloise, and Percy emerge from the shelter carrying dog leads and what looks to be a giant bag of treats.
“Alrighty then, gather round, you two,” Olivia says, heading straight for the puppy pen with her no-nonsense face on. “These pups are nine weeks old. Training for these guys should have started two weeks ago but the Beasleys ummed and ahhed so long over their decision to sell or hand them over to me that it’s put us a couple weeks behind. Now we only have a week with them before I have to ship them off to the center in Mobile to their foster homes, so we’re gonna train them hard.”
She leans over and picks up one of the pups. “Do not be fooled by these little faces, people. These dogs will make suckers out of you all, and we need firm commands and rewards when they do something right. Spencer, you go ahead and pick your pup; he’s going to be your responsibility in this ring every day for a week.”
Spence looks to me for clarification. Normally, putting him on the spot like this in front of an audience would send him into meltdown, but it seems his decision is already made for him because he nods at the puppy that was falling asleep in his lap and says, “This one, I want this one.”
“Good choice, son.” Olivia hands him a green lead and he clips it onto the puppy’s matching collar.
We all take turns choosing a dog and fixing a lead to its collar, and Olivia talks us through some basic training. Jake’s pup keeps getting distracted, nipping at Nuke’s heels so the big black dog that Olivia tells me is a German Shephard—and not a wolf like I’d previously thought—gets to sit this one out.
The rest of us work in five-minute rounds of training and play, and then a half hour later we’re done for the day. We each take off our pup’s lead and carry them back to the kennels where they’re fed and put to bed in a big puppy pile. Spence and I watch their eyes close after an exhausting day. I know how they feel.
I leave my son outside their kennel as I go in search of Olivia, who’s inside cleaning up the mess from the dog’s dinnertime. Percy left five minutes ago and Jake is helping Eloise with the puppy pen and a few other bits and pieces that need carrying back to the main building.
“You need any more help?” I ask Olivia.
“Nope, we’re right as rain.”
“Alright then, Spence and I are going to head off.” I let out a tired sigh, feeling the weight of this week hit me all at once. “Assuming I can tear him away from the kennel without a meltdown, that is.”
“He did well today.”
“Yes, he did, thank you.”
“For what, hon?” She sets the last of the wet food dishes on the sink and turns to face me.
“You know what.”
“For being the bestest best friend that ever there lived?”
I laugh. “For that and for accepting us both. For treating Spence the way a blood relative would.” I roll my eyes. “Well, not my blood of course, because they’re a bunch of assholes, but you know what I mean.”
“Honey, we may not be related by blood, but the two of you are more family to me than any living relative I have left. I adore you both. Now get outta here; I got a Marine to train.”
I cock my head in confusion. “You’re really going to put him through more training tonight?”
“Hell yes I am. I can’t have my dogs out there jumping up on people and giving my program a bad name. That boy might have a rough exterior, but he’s nothing but gooey goodness inside—you can see it in his eyes. And he’s spoiling that pooch.”
“You can? See it in his eyes I mean?” The only thing I ever got from staring in Jake Tucker’s eyes was damp panties. I’d wager there was nothing soft about that man. Not after the way he gripped my wrist the other day at the salon. But I hadn’t told Olivia about that. I wasn’t sure why, when I’d told her everything else. I guess I just didn’t want her to blame him.
“Oh, Ellie, you’ve been out of the game for far too long.”
“Okay Cupid, I’m out of here before you force me to become part of this training.”
She grins, flashing her perfect white teeth at me, her blue eyes twinkling with delight. “Now there’s an idea.”
“Goodnight, Olivia,” I say, and close the door firmly behind me.
When I reach the kennels, Spencer isn’t there. My heart beats a little faster, because he has a tendency to wander off. Stupid. I shouldn’t have left him alone but I thought he’d stay put what with the pups being there for him to watch. I call his name as I walk through the kennels and back to the main building for the shelter. I head around the side, hoping that maybe he went out to the car to wait for me but when I get to the small lot, he’s nowhere to be found.
“Spencer?” I shout, setting off a whole pound’s worth of pups baying and barking at the noise.
“What’s wrong?” Olivia says, as she comes tearing out of the building.
I rake my hand through my hair. “Spencer’s gone walkabout again.”
“Shoot.”
“I should have thought . . . I just . . . he was watching the puppies, so I came inside.”
“It’s okay, honey,” she says, rubbing her hands up and down my arms. “We’ll find him. He can’t have gone far.”
I just look at my friend, because we both know that’s not true. It’s not unusual for ASD kids to just up and vanish, and Spencer wanders off at the best of times. The last time he did it here, we found him thirty minutes later walking up Main Street half way to Montrose.
Jake comes out of the main building, followed by a smug Eloise. He takes one look at me and his whole body goes ramrod straight. His gaze scans the scene around us. “Elle, what’s wrong?”
“Spencer’s missing.” I try to keep the panic from my voice, but I fail miserably.
“You three check the property,” Olivia says. “I’m going to jump in the car and drive down the laneway, see if I can’t find him there.”
I nod.
“Don’t worry, well find him,” Jake says, and heads past the kennels toward Olivia’s house farther back on the property while I run toward the training ring. He isn’t there. I rack my brain, trying to figure out where he could have gone before I remember that Olivia sometimes sneaks him cookies when he comes to visit. I take off for the house imagining all the terrible things I might find when I get there, but Jake Tucker standing on my best friend’s porch and telling me to hush as I approach isn’t one of them.
“Did you find him?” I demand, wondering why he isn’t talking to me. I take the porch steps two at a time, and all the breath leaves me in a rush when I see my son and Jake’s dog, passed out on the loveseat with a half-eaten jar of snickerdoodles between them.
“Olivia’s going to kill me for this.”
My heart thunders, and I press my palm to it and take several deep breaths, realizing how unfit I am and how close I was to a heart attack. This boy will be the death of me.
“You?” I say breathlessly. “I’m the one who’ll have to spend all day baking tomorrow to replace the ones they ate.”
“Search and rescue get some of those too right
?”
I nod and smile affectionately. “I’m thinking they get a lot more than just snickerdoodles.”
Good Lord. Did I just say that?
“You like divinity? I’m terrible at making it. I can’t ever get my sugar the right temperature, but Punta Clara Kitchen makes the best. I’ll pick ya up some.”
Jake just laughs.
What in the world is wrong with me? I can’t stop my mouth from moving. I just keep puking words all over this man. At least it’s not actual puke, because I already did that.
“I better get him home,” I say, just praying for some sort of miracle in order to get me to shut up.
I wake Spence and chastise him for running off. Nuke wakes too, but Jake don’t even need to speak to him to let him know he’s in trouble—he jumps off the couch and hangs his head in shame. I clean up the mess they made as best I can, returning Olivia’s cookie jar to her cupboard inside and righting the chair Spence left sitting in the middle of the kitchen.
“Spencer Mason, you march your butt up that hill to the car right now,” I command and he and Nuke turn tail and plod on ahead of us. Jake and I don’t say a word as we walk along the path to the shelter. Me, because I’m afraid if I open my mouth again I won’t stop babbling, and him? Well, I guess he’s the silent type.
When we near the shelter I realize something important that I forgot to do in between having a heart attack and embarrassing myself, yet again, in front of the hot Marine. “Oh, shoot. I forgot to call Olivia. She’ll be past Montrose and half way to Daphne by now.”
I didn’t bring my phone. I rarely keep it on me. Most days I don’t even switch it on because I can’t afford the calls. I only carry it with me if we’re going out of town on long trips, which we almost never do, so I usher Spence inside to call Olivia’s cell from the shelter’s front desk. I am not losing sight of this boy again tonight.
After I hang up on Olivia, we walk outside. I almost stop dead in my tracks when I notice Jake and Eloise standing in the lot beside my car. Jake has his back to me but Eloise is so wrapped up in him she hasn’t even noticed they’re no longer alone.
“Thank goodness you were here,” Eloise says in her sugary voice that puts my teeth on edge on a good day. She twirls a strand of glossy dark hair around her finger. “I can’t count the amount of times that silly boy has run off and we’ve all had to waste time looking for him.”
Jake’s voice is pitched low when he leans in and says, “That boy has a disability, Eloise. The only thing silly here is your ignorance.”
For a beat I just stand there, blinking back tears. Eloise is young and offensively pretty, and I suspect there isn’t much going on inside her twenty-one-year-old brain, but hearing her talk like that about my son hurts. Hearing Jake stick up for him hurts too, but in a good way.
The gravel crunches beneath our shoes and Jake turns to look at me. His expression is tight-lipped as he leaves Eloise standing with her mouth gaping wide enough to catch flies. He moves toward us. I open Spencer’s door and let him climb in. Eloise storms past us both with her head down.
“Still winning friends, I see?” I tease, smiling through my tears and pretending they ain’t even there.
“Yeah. I’m a real popular guy.”
“Listen,” I say quietly, “I never thanked you properly.”
“For what?”
“For everything. For pulling me and my son out of the car. For helping find Spence today,” I add dryly. “For not sending me your dry-cleaning bill after I puked all down your shirtfront.”
He grins. “Oh, that one’s in the mail.”
I laugh. Spencer winds down his window, and for a moment I think it’s so he can tell me to hurry up because it’s dark already and we’re late for Fried Chicken Friday—he’s a big fan of alliteration and planning our meals to match the day of the week. But Spencer doesn’t say a word; he just sticks his hand out so Nuke can bump up against it.
“Looks like I’m not the only one making friends and influencing people,” Jake says, nodding towards our boys.
“Looks like,” I agree, watching how gentle his dog is. I feel terrible about accusing him of trying to hurt Spence. Deep down, I probably knew that his dog wasn’t trying to hurt my son. He was one of Olivia’s, after all. She wouldn’t let him graduate until he was fully trained. I don’t think what happened that day was anyone’s fault, but that hadn’t stopped me from exercising my right to be completely irrational. I make a decision there and then that might be somewhat selfish, but I think it will be good for all of us. “So you’ll be at the park tomorrow?”
“If you promise not to run me off the road this time.”
I narrow my eyes and fold my arms over my chest. “Hey, you were way past me when I hit that footbridge.”
“So Spencer didn’t just make that up?”
I frown, failing to comprehend his meaning. “Make what up?”
“He may have said some things when you were out to it.”
I sigh. “Of course he did.”
My son and his big mouth.
Too embarrassed to find out exactly what Spencer told him, I walk around to the driver’s side of my car, open the door, and climb in.
“Goodnight, Elle,” Jake says in his low, husky voice. The way he says my name makes my whole body shiver. I wonder what it would sound like in the dark, raspy with longing, our skin soaked with sweat and the sheets sticking to our warm bodies.
“Good night,” I whisper.
“Good night, Jake Tucker. Bye, Nuke,” Spence sticks his head out the window and calls to them both. I tell him to buckle in and wait until Jake and Nuke have moved away from the car, and then I peel out of the lot and float home in a bubble.
Bubbles are bad. Very bad. Because eventually, they pop. No matter how much you wish it weren’t so.
Chapter Six
Jake
Saturday begins like any other day. After a long, sleepless night, Nuke and I get up early and go for a run. Because it’s the weekend, I think Ellie and Spencer won’t be there until later, but the beat up Datsun is parked in the lot and sure enough, the two of them sit on the beach watching the water, though there are at least two yards between them.
I slow to a light jog thirty yards away, not wanting to let my muscles cool down too quickly. I don’t run because I love it; I run because if I don’t this shrapnel in my leg will likely cause me to lose the use of it. From ankle to neck, my left side is covered with pock marks and keloid scars. One whole half of me is ravaged, ruined skin. By the time I was found the pieces were too deep and too many to remove without causing considerable nerve damage, but your body knows when something is lodged inside it that shouldn’t be, and every day there’s new pain as the pieces shift around. Sometimes I wake with the sheets beneath me soaked in blood from the tiny piece of metal that’s worked its way out of my skin.
I ignore the ache in my muscles as Nuke and I walk towards Elle and Spencer. Sweat beads on my brow and I wipe it away with the shirtsleeve of my grey Henley, different from the one that Ellie puked on. I’ve been distracted today, and I didn’t push myself nearly as hard as I usually do, so I’m thinkin’ the heavy perspiration is because this woman unnerves me like no other ever has.
“Hi, Jake Tucker,” Spencer yells. “Mamma, Jake Tucker’s here.”
She turns and smiles at me, and Jesus Christ is she fucking amazing. Warm brown, eyes, cute little button nose, and full perfect lips. I have a semi from that one fucking look alone.
“I see that,” she says to her son. He jumps up and down on the spot like he don’t know what to do with himself.
“Mornin’,” I say, and with creaking bones I park myself in the sand next to Elle.
“Morning.” She smiles, and if I didn’t know any better I’d say she looks as nervous as a virgin on her wedding night.
Nuke whines and I give him a pat between the ears and unclip his lead. “Go be a dog.” His big goofy head looks between Spencer and me, and I shove his flan
k with my hand. “Go on, get.” He bounds off to play with the kid.
“Olivia is going to kill you,” Elle remarks, and the corners of my mouth tip up into a grin.
I nod. “Yup. I reckon she might.”
“I’ve been savin’ this stick all morning for you, Nuke,” Spencer says. Nuke sits and waits for it to get airborne, but the kid doesn’t throw it. He drops it in front of my dog and they both just stare at it.
“Spence, you have to throw it so Nuke can chase after it,” Elle says.
He looks at his mother as if she’s insane. “Why?”
“Because that’s how you play fetch,” she says matter-of-factly. He looks skeptical but picks up the stick anyway and tosses it about a foot in front of him. Nuke glances at him, still waiting for Spencer to throw it.
“Hey, buddy, can I see that?”
Spencer picks up the stick and hands it to me, looking as if he’d rather be anywhere else because this game of fetch isn’t at all like he thought it would be.
“The trick is to throw it as far as you can, so he has to run to get it. Can’t have him slacking off now, can we?”
“No, sir.” Spencer shakes his head. I throw it as far as I can without standing up to do so, and Nuke takes off down the beach to chase after it.
“Whoa,” Spence says, as Nuke retrieves the stick and drops it at my feet. I hand it to the boy and he throws it, a lot farther than he had the first time, and like a shot Nuke is returning it to his feet so he can do it again.
I glance at Ellie; there’s so much excitement in her expression, so much love and pride in that one smile she gives him. My heart lurches, wondering what it must be like to feel that adoration, and hoping that someday I might feel it too.
Jesus. What the fuck is wrong with me? I should leave. I should walk away before she begins to think I’m someone who deserves to be in their lives. I’m not.
Toward the Sound of Chaos Page 4