The Treasure of the Hairy Cadre (An Alpine Grove Romantic Comedy Book 8)

by Susan C. Daffron

  After she got back to her house and unpacked, Sara pulled out her papers to work on her lesson plans. Zack wasn’t the only one who was behind on work. She stared at the photo of the lake she had hanging on the wall. Because she’d been so upset and angry, she’d been hard on him about his fixation on work, which wasn’t completely fair. She took her job seriously too, after all. With a sigh, she flipped through some notes about wardrobe in Colonial times. The kids loved learning about tricorn hats and mob caps.

  Holly was curled up under the dining room table taking a nap. Kat had mentioned that Holly had run around the new exercise yard playing with other dogs until they were all completely exhausted. At least Holly had enjoyed some fun times while Sara was gone. She certainly hadn’t, and her swirling emotions kept flip-flopping from fury to regret to despair. The little voice in her head needed an off switch.

  The next few days went by at a glacial speed. No matter how long she sat and stared at the papers, Sara couldn’t concentrate on her lesson plans. She’d even tried going down to the school to focus on decorating her classroom, but she couldn’t stop thinking about Zack. Everywhere she looked reminded her of his comments about little silly things. She’d walked out to the playground and ended up sitting on the swings, crying.

  As the days passed, she felt worse and worse about the things she’d said to Zack when she was in Los Angeles. The words she’d said played like a tape in her mind, but he’d been so different. She missed the Zack she’d fallen in love with, not the distant, anxious person who spent every waking moment on the phone. She should have tried harder to make him understand. Now it was too late. Thanks to her planning and bossy nature, Sara had managed to torpedo yet another relationship.

  After the morning routine of jogging and breakfast, Sara sat at the dining room table again, trying yet again to focus on her lesson plans. This was getting ridiculous. School was about to start. Why couldn’t she get this done? She never had this much trouble. She put down her pencil and rested her head on her arms, staring at the photo of the lake hanging on the wall.

  At the jarring jangle of the phone ringing, Sara jumped and Holly leaped up from the floor. Holly barked a few times for emphasis as Sara ran to answer it. She ripped the receiver off the cradle and blurted out an overly ferocious “Hello.”

  “Hey Sara, I was hoping you and Holly would be back from your jog by now.”

  “Zack?” Sara felt a constriction in her chest, probably her unhappy shredded heart doing a swan dive off a cliff. “I, um, didn’t think I’d hear from you.”

  “Yeah, well, I didn’t either.”

  “Nice.” Irritation rose to the forefront of Sara’s tangled emotions. “Then why did you call?”

  “After I got over being mad and sad and every other thing, I decided this is all totally stupid and I should talk to you.”

  “All right. I’m listening.”

  “Actually, I’d kinda like to see you in person. Would it be okay if I came there?”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea. I feel bad enough as it is. Let’s not make it worse.”

  “But I really want to see you. I love you.”

  “You know I love you too, and I feel terrible about how I ended things. I didn’t say it well, but it doesn’t change the fact that we want different things from our lives.” Sara felt a tear slide down her cheek. She had gone over this in her head so many times. The last thing she wanted to do was hash it over again with him.

  “Can’t we talk about this?”

  “I thought you were busy with work. And you know I’m about to start school. I’m behind on my lesson planning.” Sara stared at the ceiling. He didn’t need to know how dreadfully behind she really was.

  “Yeah, I know school is about to start, but can I come by?”

  “I suppose we could set something up. Maybe on a weekend in a month or so? Columbus Day? But you’d have to leave your phone at home.”

  “Are you busy now?”

  “I’m working on my lessons, but I don’t have anything specific planned today.”

  “That’s cool. I’ll be there in a little over an hour.”

  “What?”

  “See you soon. ‘Bye.”

  Sara looked down at Holly, who offered a small wag of encouragement. An hour? Was he calling from his car? That was unlikely, since reception in the mountains on the way up to Alpine Grove wasn’t just spotty, it was nonexistent. What was worse was that she definitely wasn’t ready to see him yet.

  Sara spent some time straightening her papers and wandering through her house, trying to occupy herself. Seeing Zack was not what she’d expected to do today. She needed more time to figure out what she might say to him. Finally, she sat down and ate one of the last remaining cupcakes, which made her feel a bit better. Thank goodness she still had chocolate in the house.

  Holly jumped up, barking at a knock on the door. Sara hurriedly wiped the last of the frosting from her lips and ran to answer it. “Holly, that’s enough!”

  She shoved Holly back and opened the door. Zack walked in, closed the door behind him, and grabbed her in a hug. He whispered in her ear. “I missed you so much.”

  Startled by the sudden contact, Sara pushed him away. “I’m not sure what to say.”

  “How about you missed me too?” He smiled and raised his eyebrows. “Because you know you did.”

  “Of course, I did! But that doesn’t change anything. Didn’t you listen to anything I said?”

  “Yeah, I know, you dumped me. I got that.” He ran his fingers though his hair and then dropped his hand to his side. “The problem is I love you and I don’t want to be dumped.”

  “I’m afraid you don’t have a choice. I know I was angry and not particularly clear. I regret how I said what I said, but nothing has changed. You know who I am, and looking ahead I see no way that anything between us can work. We want different things. I don’t want to be like one of your flight attendants. I’m not going to be the girlfriend who flits down to LA every once in a while. I always knew I didn’t like LA, but I dislike your cell phone even more. I’m so glad Alpine Grove has such spotty reception, because otherwise everyone would be wandering around yammering on their phones.”

  “I’m sorry about that.” He looked down at his feet. “I actually shut it off.”

  “Yes, I saw you press the button. I’m sure it turns back on just as easily.”

  “No, I called the carrier and ditched it.”

  “Why? Don’t you need it?”

  “I might get one for emergencies I guess, but I’m never giving out the number again. It made my life miserable.”

  “You did seem distressed. I don’t know how you could stand people constantly intruding into your privacy.”

  Zack walked into the living room. “Can we sit down? I’m kinda tired.”

  “It’s a long drive.”

  “Yeah, although I didn’t drive.” He sat down on the sofa and kicked off his shoes.

  “Then how did you get here?”

  “I flew. There’s a tiny airport near here.”

  “Cedar County Regional Airport? You went there?”

  “Yeah. One of my clients has a pilot’s license and he checked around. There are shuttles that go back and forth a couple times a week. I almost missed the one today. I gotta tell ya, that’s one itty-bitty plane.”

  “I don’t know any pilots. Most people I know drive to LAX.”

  “Well, flights on those tiny planes are scary expensive, but I had to see you.”

  Sara put her hand on his forearm. “Zack, it’s sweet that you flew all the way here, but I keep telling you, nothing has changed. You know I want to get married and have kids. When I think about my future, I want a family. That’s my dream. It always has been. And when we were at your place, I knew for sure it’s not yours.”

  Zack leaned back on the cushions and took her hand. “You asked me once what my dreams were and I think I said something stupid.”

  “I don’t know tha
t it was stupid. I think you said you hadn’t thought about it.”

  “I hadn’t. And that was stupid. After you left, I called my therapist and whined at her for a while about the unfairness of life.”

  “I’m sure that was enjoyable for her.”

  “Hey, she’s used to it. But she asked me the same thing you did. What do I want? And I still had no answer. She said that if I’m happy, I should keep doing what I’m doing. If not, I should do something else.”

  “That sounds wise.”

  “I know, although at first I was pissed. Almost as pissed as I was at you. Then after I hung up, I started thinking. Every choice has costs. In business, to get different results you have to do something different. Whether it’s different marketing, production, whatever. Sometimes it’s hard or expensive, but you have to try, or nothing ever changes.”

  “I suppose that makes sense.”

  “The same goes for me. You said that you hated to see me unhappy. I hate seeing you unhappy too. It was awful seeing you so upset when you were at my place.”

  “I’m sorry I lost my temper. I need to apologize. Some of the things I said to you were unfair.”

  “Probably. But I did the same thing. The bottom line is that I love you and being with you makes me happy. I feel like I’m a better version of me when I’m with you.”

  “I feel the same way.” Sara smiled slightly. “You bring out my very dormant fun side.”

  He nodded and gave her hand a squeeze. “So it follows that if I want to be with you, I need to ask myself if I’m willing to make changes so that can happen. Us being together might not work out in the end. But nothing will ever change if I’m not even willing to give it a shot.”

  “Are you?” Sara wasn’t sure she wanted to hear the answer. “I know you like what you do and your work is important to you.”

  “Yeah, but work isn’t everything. My therapist has pointed out on more than one occasion—okay probably a thousand times—that I have no balance in my life. I tend to push people away because I’m afraid of rejection, probably from being passed around so much when I was a kid. My parents chose drugs over me. And I was choosing work over you, so duh—why should I be surprised you left? I’m an idiot. It’s no wonder I have no real friends. And that sucks. I don’t want my life to be like that anymore.”

  “What do you want?”

  “You. I know you hate it when I say you’re dependable, but in my mind, it really is a compliment. I know I can depend on you. Not many people have been there for me. So being dependable—that’s kinda huge.”

  “I’m not sure what you’re saying.”

  “I don’t want you to be the weekend-flitting-girlfriend thing or whatever you said. I’ll get a place here. If I need to fly somewhere, I’ll make clients pay to fly me out of that tiny airport to LAX. Maybe get some hobbies. Or at least more of a life.”

  Sara gestured toward the guitar in the corner. “You could take lessons! I love listening to you sing.”

  “The main thing is that I want to spend time with you. I want to see if we actually do have a future.” Zack wrapped his arms around her. “I love you. I don’t want to end up like Ira, full of regrets.”

  “I love you too.” She put her hand on his cheek. “This is a huge change. Are you sure?”

  “I tend not to be sure about much of anything, but yeah, I’m sure about this.”

  Chapter 14

  Epilogue

  As Sara drove toward the kennel, Holly was leaping around in the back seat and Zack was gazing out at the huge cedar trees that lined the long driveway. The Friday before Labor Day weekend probably wasn’t the best time to be heading to Los Angeles, but it was necessary. Zack had suggested bringing hundreds of CDs to listen to while they sat in the inevitable traffic jam on the 405.

  They arrived at the kennel and unloaded Holly. Sara pressed the buzzer on the wall and Kat emerged from the house, accompanied by another woman, who had very large hair and a very small dress. Her unruly dark curly hair swirled around her face in the light breeze. The stilettos she was wearing weren’t ideal for walking on the gravel driveway and she lurched toward Kat a couple of times. Sara frowned. The heels were pretty, but not worth breaking an ankle over.

  Kat greeted Sara. “This is my friend Maria.”

  The woman flipped her hair back over her shoulder and said, “Hey there. Nice to meet you. I didn’t know you knew Zack.” She gave him a high five. “How’s my favorite new neighbor? Are you grooving on our ugly apartment building?”

  He slapped her hand and grinned. “Things are good. The place may be ugly, but the rent is one-fifth of what I was paying before.”

  “That is its biggest selling point. Your old place must be nice, so this will be a major letdown unless you are a fan of sixties decor, which I’m not. Did you get all that stuff moved in? Those movers had some motivational issues,” Maria said.

  “They finally got it all moved, although I gotta say snail snot might move more quickly.” Zack said. “Thanks for the Twinkies, too. I think the sugar helped give them a jump start.”

  Maria put her palm to her heart. “You can think of me as the snack-cake Welcome Wagon.”

  “We’re headed out to get the last of my crap from LA,” Zack said.

  “I thought your assistant was selling it for you.” Maria gestured toward Kat. “I did that for Kat when she moved here and employed some outstanding negotiating techniques, if I do say so. But I was getting a commission, so I was highly incentivized.”

  “Meagan got rid of most of the furniture that wouldn’t fit into the place here. We’re going to get the last of my files and business stuff,” Zack said.

  Sara added, “But we’re going to go through it to see how much we can throw away first.”

  “That’s the plan anyway,” Zack said. “For years, I told the cleaning people not to touch anything in my office. It will be interesting to find out what’s under all that stuff. I’m kinda afraid to look.”

  Kat took Holly’s leash from Sara and walked toward the kennel. “Daisy went home, but Holly has another energetic playmate this time.”

  “Yeah, my boss Michael brought his hairy white dog for the weekend. That animal is a furry fruitcake,” Maria said.

  Kat went inside the building and the sound of dogs barking filled the air. She pointed at a cage. “Swoosie is the white one. She’s a Samoyed and she’s staying here with the black lab. Her name is Rosa.”

  Sara covered her ears. “They certainly can bark.”

  Kat settled Holly into the kennel and gestured toward the exit. “Samoyeds tend to have a lot of…enthusiasm. But Swoosie is really sweet and has energy to burn. I’m sure Holly will love playing with her,” Kat said, closing the door behind her.

  “Does the white dog play Frisbee? Maybe they can play together.” Sara said.

  “No, Swoosie isn’t much of a retriever,” Kat said.

  “More like a runner-awayer,” Maria said. “I swear that dog laughs at you when she does something obnoxious. Which is often.”

  Zack put his arm around Sara’s shoulders. “We should probably hit the road. There’s lots of traffic out there for us to sit in.”

  “Good luck,” Kat said. “We’ll see you on Labor Day. Did you write down the pick-up hours?”

  Sara nodded emphatically. “I promise we’ll be here when we’re supposed to be.”

  Sara and Zack said their goodbyes and got back into the car. Sara turned to Zack. “You already know your neighbors here. That’s a step in the right direction.”

  “You were right about the friendly people. Nobody ever gave me a Twinkie in LA. Not even once.”

  “Were you serious about the stuff in your office? I thought you had lots of important client information there that we need to retrieve. Are you saying you have no idea what’s in all those piles of papers?”

  “Well, there’s probably important stuff. I think so, anyway. It might be deep down in the mess, though.” He grinned at her. “Think of i
t as searching for buried treasure. You have lots of experience with that now, Sparky.”

  She put her hand on his and smiled. “That’s true. Being with you is always an adventure, Captain.”

  The End

  You’ve reached the end of Book 8,

  but not the end of the series.

  For more Alpine Grove adventures,

  check out Book 9: The Luck of the Paw!

  Thanks for Reading

  Thank you for dedicating some of your reading time to The Treasure of the Hairy Cadre. I hope you enjoyed Sara and Zack’s adventures. I’ll be writing more books that will feature Kat, Joel and various other residents of Alpine Grove who bring dogs to the new boarding kennel. Be sure to keep an eye out for the next novel.

  If you would like to be notified by e-mail when I release a new book, you can sign up for my New Releases e-mail list at SusanDaffron.com/releases.

  I know that not everyone likes to write book reviews, but if you are willing write a sentence or two about what you thought of The Treasure of the Hairy Cadre, I encourage you to post a review at your favorite book vendor site or share a message with your social networking friends.

  If you would like to share your thoughts about the book with me privately, you can reach me through the contact page at SusanDaffron.com/contact.

  I look forward to hearing from you!

  ~ Susan C. Daffron

  Acknowledgements

  Writing a novel is never easy and I’d like to thank my husband James Byrd for his support and encouragement throughout the publishing process.

  I’d also like to thank my alpha and beta readers for their eagle-eyed reading and great feedback:

  James Byrd

  Dian Chapman

  Adele Hudson

  Kate Turner

  Clare Cinelli

  Chase Ashley

  About the Author

  Susan Daffron is the author of the Alpine Grove Romantic Comedies, a series of novels that feature residents of the small town of Alpine Grove and their various quirky dogs and cats. She is also an award-winning author of many nonfiction books, including several about pets and animal rescue. She lives in a small town in northern Idaho and shares her life with her husband and two really cute dogs.