Once home, she felt a zillion times better. Two places in the world that made her feel relaxed and like she belonged: Junebug Farms and her top two-floor apartment in the center of the city. Leafing through the mail as she walked through the living room to the kitchen, she felt her three cats weaving in and around her legs. How they managed to a) not trip her and b) not get kicked or stepped on was beyond her, but they avoided both every time. Jessica tossed the mail onto the counter and reached down to swoop Shaggy up into her arms, buried her nose in his gray and white fur. From the floor, Fred and Scooby looked up at her and blinked their large green eyes in anticipation of dinner, which she quickly prepared.
Cats munching away happily, Jessica went into her bedroom and changed out of her work clothes. While she didn’t feel the need to dress as professionally as Catherine tended to, Jessica was the owner and CEO and tried to at least always look neat and tidy. She wanted to look approachable, but also like she was competent to run the place. Once in her blue-and-white striped lounge pants and a matching blue V-neck T-shirt, she returned to the living room. It was late—nearly midnight—but she never went to bed without giving her cats some love and attention. So, she flopped onto the couch, pushed buttons on her remote until her list of DVR’d shows came up, and chose last week’s episode of Chopped. In no time at all, she was besieged by cats, as if she’d sprinkled catnip all over herself. Shaggy took his place in her lap. Fred lounged along the back of the couch, occasionally tapping Jessica’s head with a paw to remind her he was there. Scooby stretched out on the cushion next to her, his back along her thigh, his tail flicking languidly while she watched the chefs come up with a dish based around Gummi Bears and Dijon mustard.
It was after 2 a.m. when she woke up and sleepily trudged to her bedroom, three cats following in her wake.
*
In the wee hours of the morning as dawn broke, the sky went gorgeously from black to deep indigo to purple to crimson. As Friday morning gradually made its entry, Sydney saw every one of those colors out her bedroom window as she lay in her bed, wide awake since after two. Three glasses of wine were way beyond her usual, but her panic attack at Junebug on Thursday afternoon had shaken her. It had scared her. Most of all, it had embarrassed her. Connor had tried his best to cheer her up, to reassure her that it was no big deal, but his attempts to make her feel better only made her feel worse, and she hadn’t been able to shake the discomfort and uncertainty. Not to mention the overwhelming pissed-offedness.
Getting dizzy. Running away like a scared child. Ugh! How ridiculous. How embarrassingly unprofessional. Those thoughts had spun around and around in Sydney’s head like a load of dirty laundry for the remainder of the day and into the night. The third glass of wine had helped her fall asleep, but—as she should have known it would—had caused her eyes to pop open at 1:47 a.m., and the spin cycle had started up again.
At 5:33, she gave up trying to relax, got her workout clothes on, and headed to the gym. It was one of the first things she’d located during her apartment search a few months back. Not only did it keep her in shape physically, but if she went too long without exercising, she began to feel mentally sluggish. She didn’t enjoy working out, but she enjoyed the results.
She usually listened to music while she ran on the treadmill, but when it was early morning, she watched the news. Plugging her earbuds into the jack, she changed channels on the TV in front of her treadmill until she got to Channel Six. The anchors at 6 a.m. were Rob Kensington—painfully good looking…like David Muir with blond hair, and Josie Westfield—very pretty, but with a barely detectable lisp that drove Sydney crazy. They smiled and bantered playfully. Sydney had only met them a couple times, but they seemed nice enough, if not terribly conversational, which was how it tended to be in the news business. Everybody was friendly, but nobody got all that close because you could be transferred/hired/let go at any time. And the last thing you wanted to do was give somebody else the leg-up that you’d hoped for.
She watched the screen, watched as Rob kept a serious face and tone of voice while he reported on a house fire overnight. Then he teased the weather and threw it to commercial.
Sydney recognized the exterior of Junebug Farms immediately. The ad was short and to the point, but very well done. Lots of adorable dogs, kittens, and goats appeared. Kids hugging animals. People smiling and buying things in the gift shop. A shot of a dog-training class. All in quick succession, but all positive. According to the commercial, Junebug Farms was a shiny, happy place.
So why had Sydney bolted out the door like she was being chased?
The dogs.
She knew it then and she knew it now, she just hadn’t wanted to admit it. The dogs had broken her heart.
Sydney Taylor came across to most people who met her as no-nonsense. Driven. Somewhat aloof. Maybe even a little cold. What they didn’t know was that she could feel things deeply. More deeply than many, and for some reason, dogs were her Kryptonite. Dogs could get to her in a way nothing and no one else could.
She blamed Rufus.
Lovingly.
She lovingly blamed him.
Rufus was a Maltese-terrier mix of some kind. Nobody seemed to know for sure. Her parents got him for her from the pound when she was six years old. Rufus was a puppy and he was hers and, as being an only child could be devastatingly lonely, she loved him with every fiber of her being. The best part of having a small dog—and maybe the worst part as well—was that they could live for quite a long time. As Rufus had. He’d stayed with her until he was nearly seventeen years old and honestly, after being around for so long, Sydney had almost convinced herself that he was never going to leave her. She went to elementary school, and Rufus was waiting when she got home. During high school, he stayed next to her into the wee hours as she studied for her finals. While in college, she would sometimes make a trip home for the weekend, not to see her parents, but simply to cuddle with Rufus. It was after graduation, that summer of her twenty-second birthday, that he’d finally had enough. His body was old, his fur matted, his eyes cloudy. He could hardly hear anymore. He slept close to twenty hours a day and pushing himself to a standing position was difficult and painful. But still, Sydney cuddled him every night. She gave him his pills. She carried him outside so he could relieve himself. She bathed him gently when she didn’t get him outside quickly enough. They spooned like sibling babies and—Sydney was thankful now, but hadn’t been then—he’d simply passed away in his sleep, his back tight to her stomach, as she slept on.
Even now, nearly nine years later, it brought tears to her eyes, and she squeezed them tightly shut as she ran, ordering the memories, the tears, to back the hell off. At least it was clear now, though. Something about the dog wing at Junebug Farms—the smell maybe?—had triggered a memory for her that she did her best to keep buried. The thought of all those lonely dogs, locked in kennels for God knew how long, simply broke her heart.
So she ran on the treadmill until she could leave the thoughts, images, and memories of lost dogs behind her. It took a while, and by the time she got back to her apartment, her early start to the morning had all but evaporated. The rest of her day went similarly, and before she knew it, it was after noon and time to head back to Junebug Farms. Connor met her at the back door; they ended up with the same intern driving them in the same sedan, and for a moment, Sydney thought of it as a weird Groundhog Day sort of do-over, that she was doomed to relive the same day again and again until she got it right.
“You going to be okay?” Connor asked once they were more than halfway there. There’d been no information exchange, no background or history this time. Just silence.
“Yeah, I’ll be fine,” Sydney said with a nod as she gazed out the window. She watched as they moved from city to suburbs to country, all within about thirty minutes. When they pulled into the exact same parking spot as before, she almost laughed out loud. They got out of the car and she caught Connor shooting her a look of concern. “Seriously. I’m
fine. That was just a fluke, some weird thing that won’t happen again. Don’t worry.” She kept it friendly, though she would bet Connor was more concerned about the embarrassment and his own reputation than actually worried about her. But she didn’t know him well at all, so forced herself to try not to judge.
Today’s volunteer was Judy, and Sydney felt herself blow out a breath of relief that at least something was different. The sound was still overwhelming and the smell hadn’t changed, but there were fewer people and the atmosphere felt a little more…relaxed was the only word she could come up with. Maybe because it’s Friday? She wasn’t going to question it; she just did her best to focus on her job.
Jessica Barstow looked gorgeous today. It wasn’t something to be argued. If you didn’t think so, you were obviously blind. She wore jeans again, and for the first time, Sydney found herself paying attention to the figure underneath them. Wow. Nice. Uncertain why she was surprised, she did a quick scan. The denim was dark, which made the jeans seem slightly less casual. Jessica’s shirt was a light blue waffle-weave Henley with a feminine cut and the Junebug Farms logo embroidered tastefully small on the left side of the placket. Her auburn hair was again pulled back in a ponytail and silver hoops decorated her ears. She was a very pleasing blend of neatly casual with only the slightest bit of makeup. A little mascara and not much else.
“You came back,” she said with what seemed a genuine smile as she held her hand out to Sydney.
“I did,” Sydney replied, shaking hands and again noting the warmth, the soft strength of Jessica’s grip. “I’m really sorry about yesterday.”
“No worries. I just hoped you weren’t coming down with something.”
“I feel absolutely fine today.” Sydney pasted on her camera smile, the one that said every single thing was as it should be, even if it wasn’t. “How about showing us what we missed yesterday?” She worded it that way on purpose and Jessica, thank God, took it as it was meant—we already saw the dog wing…we don’t need to go there again—and directed them toward the front doors.
“Let’s go outside.” But Jessica stopped short as her eyes took in Sydney’s three-inch heels. “Um…will you be okay in those? The path is gravel and dirt.”
With a glance down at her feet, Sydney gave a nod. “Shouldn’t be a problem,” she said with a confident smile, though she knew the possibility of rolling an ankle on a piece of gravel was pretty realistic.
With a shrug, Jessica led the way in her flats, talking as she walked toward the large barn, giving them the history of the shelter, which both Sydney and Connor already knew from their research.
“The grounds are beautiful,” Sydney commented, and she meant it, even as she tried to be subtle about how carefully she was stepping. The grass was thick and lush, the petunias planted along the brick front of the building blooming in all shades of pinks and purples.
Jessica smiled with pride. “We have volunteers who take care of a lot of those types of things.” She gestured to the flowers and Sydney remembered there’d been a woman working on them yesterday. “They mow the lawn, plant the flowers, help muck the stalls in the barn, walk the dogs, play with the cats, answer the phones, run the front desk. We’d never survive without all the amazing people who donate their time here.”
Sydney opened the Notes app on her phone and typed in Volunteers, thinking it might be another good thing to focus on for one of the many stories they’d need to fill six hours of live television in a few weeks. “How many do you think you have altogether?”
“It varies all the time, but I’d say on average, probably close to a hundred or so.”
Connor gave Sydney a wink and subtle thumbs-up as his research was confirmed.
The barn smelled exactly like one, the strong scents of hay and manure wafting through the air so thickly, Sydney was surprised they couldn’t see it, like smoke or vapor. Jessica glanced down at Sydney’s feet a second time, at the heels that went so well with her skirt and jacket, but not so well with the terrain of a farm and said, “We don’t have to go all the way in, but this is where our livestock reside. Currently, we’ve got four horses, a burro, a dairy cow, and two sheep.”
“How do you end up with livestock?” Sydney asked.
“They tend to come in as abuse cases or cases of neglect. Often, Animal Control is called to a farm or an expanse of land where there have been reports of animals not being properly cared for.” She gestured at Sydney and Connor. “Step in a bit,” she said. “We won’t go trudging through, but you should see this guy.”
Sydney moved carefully and a few feet inside the barn, she could see into a couple of the stalls. One held a horse, but its appearance brought tears to Sydney’s eyes almost immediately that she blinked rapidly to try and dispel. He was more a skeleton of a horse with sagging skin hanging over it. He watched them carefully with his huge brown eyes as Jessica inched closer, talking quietly, soothingly. She held out a hand to him and, ever so slowly, he stepped toward her. Little by little. Inch by inch.
“Hey there, handsome,” Jessica said very softly. She cooed to him and her tone was gentle, relaxing, and Sydney was mesmerized. “This is Jock,” Jessica then said, this time to Sydney and Connor. She carefully slid her hand along his snout. “As you can see, he was not getting nearly enough food. Or attention.” She talked to him a bit more and Sydney was touched again by the gentleness, the tenderness in her voice. “You’d think this was a case of abuse, but it really wasn’t. Jock’s owner was a very elderly man who was suffering from the onset of dementia. So he didn’t intentionally not feed Jock. He simply…forgot sometimes. A lot of times. Luckily, a concerned neighbor called 911. They sent Animal Control, who then contacted us. We had room and Jock is slowly but surely regaining his strength.” As if he understood her words, the horse blew at them, his lips making the sound of a raspberry. The trio laughed and Sydney felt herself transfixed.
“Can I pet him?” she asked quietly, surprising herself with the question. Surprising Jessica, too, judging by the expression of mild disbelief on her face.
“We can try, sure,” Jessica said, with a nod. “Come here.” Sydney stepped toward the stall, catching herself as her heel hit a chunk of…something…and Jessica shifted her stance until she stood alarmingly close, her front slowly pressed against Sydney’s back. “Give me your hand,” she said, her voice startlingly near Sydney’s ear. Sydney obeyed and Jessica linked their hands. “He’s a little skittish with strangers, but he trusts me, so let’s do this together.” She reached out her hand—and by extension, Sydney’s hand—and stroked the horse’s snout. Sydney’s hand was on the bottom and she felt her breath hitch the slightest bit, hoped Jessica hadn’t noticed. Whether it was from how shockingly soft the horse’s velvety nose was or how comforting and warm Jessica’s hand was, she couldn’t tell. So instead, she caught her bottom lip between her teeth and did her best to focus on the horse for the next few moments.
When Jessica finally, gently, pulled their hands back from the horse, Sydney reclaimed her own and quickly stepped forward, away from Jessica and toward Connor, who caught her by the elbow to keep her from toppling. When she looked at him, he’d already let go and was furiously jotting notes on his tablet, one corner of his mouth tugged up in a grin. She glanced back at Jessica, whose face had tinted a soft pink as she cleared her throat and looked away.
“Goats?” Jessica asked, seemingly out of nowhere, snapping them all to attention. She led them out the door and back to the gravel trail. “This way.”
Connor looked at Sydney, who shrugged, and they both fell into step behind Jessica.
*
What the hell was that?
Jessica’s pace was fast. Too fast, and she knew it. The TV people had to scurry to keep up with her, and she was pretty sure scurrying wasn’t easy in those heels Sydney Taylor was wearing. But seriously, who wears heels to an animal shelter? Especially when you know you’re getting a tour? If she rolled an ankle, it would serve her right. Janet Do
bson would never have worn such inappropriate footwear.
Sydney’s hand under Jessica’s had felt good. Really good. Unexpectedly good. Soft and warm and soft and strong and soft. It had been a long time since Jessica’s skin had touched another woman’s, and she’d found herself enjoying it a little too much. Obviously.
That’s definitely enough of that.
She shook herself mentally and led the two across the property. At the goat pen, she launched into a robotic explanation of the shelter, how they cared for the goats, where they’d come from. It was all burned into her memory because she’d given this tour a zillion times. And it was good that she didn’t have to think about what she was saying, because she couldn’t get the image of her hand guiding Sydney’s along the lines of the horse out of her head. It was disturbingly sensual, their forearms parallel, their fingers almost entwined…
So, Sydney Taylor was pretty. So what? That wasn’t news. So her hair was shiny and smelled great, and was probably really soft. Who cared? And her eyes were ridiculously hypnotizing and her body was—
Stop it!
Jessica did her best to banish the visions from her head.
“And that’s about it,” she said—too loudly she thought. “You saw the dogs. We can check out the cat wall inside, but essentially, that’s the whole shebang.” Her eyes darted from Sydney to Connor and back, and then she set off toward the front doors of the main building.
Dare to Stay (Puppy Love Romances Book 3) Page 4