How About No

by Vale, Lani Lynn

  “Wow,” I said. “I’m sorry. That makes me feel even worse.”

  Wade let me go to move toward the cage, and suddenly, the dog’s snarling just…stopped.

  I gasped.

  “I’m sorry to be a bother,” I heard from behind me. “But do you mind moving the van so that it’s not blocking my half of the driveway?”

  I stiffened.

  “It’s not blocking your driveway,” Hoax grunted. “It’s obstructing half of Wade’s half of the driveway.”

  I swallowed hard, unsure what to say to the woman.

  In all technicality, she was right. My van was blocking half of the driveway, but only because all the other parking spots were taken by various trucks, cars, and motorcycles. There was literally nowhere else to park except for the driveway itself—which I wasn’t going to do seeing as it wasn’t my home.

  “True,” the woman agreed. “But technically we share the driveway, and with you parked in my half of the driveway, I need to be able to utilize his half of the driveway.”

  Hoax growled and turned on his heels, stalking toward his bike.

  Seconds later, he was rolling it backward onto Wade’s half of the driveway and then leaning it back to rest on the kickstand once again.

  “Happy?” he asked when he stalked back over.

  It was then that I saw that the dog was staring at Wade—who’d gone up to the cage—with cautious eyes.

  Hoax came to stand beside me, and we both stared as the two alpha males stared at each other.

  “Do you want to…” the neighbor continued.

  “Listen, Mags, we’re a little busy right now. Do you think you can leave us alone?” Wade asked without once taking his eyes off the dog.

  This “Mags” chick huffed and turned on her toe to walk away.

  Neither man watched her go, but I did.

  I also saw that she looked over her shoulder to see if either man had looked—they hadn’t—and her eyes met mine.

  She hesitated on the threshold of her duplex and narrowed her eyes.

  I didn’t look away, knowing that I couldn’t or I’d risk losing ground—at least in her eyes—and waited her out.

  It didn’t take her long before she was rolling those beautiful eyes and stalking inside her place.

  The door shut with a loud bang, which still didn’t cause either man to look up.

  “Tell me his story,” Wade ordered.

  I swallowed.

  “The dog’s name is Capo. He’s seven years old. He retired from the military when he and his handler were in a Humvee that ran over a landmine. Capo was thrown free of the wreckage while the rest of his crew were caught in the flames or injured in the actual wreck.” I paused. “He lost his rear leg and was placed with an adoptive family once he recovered—at least physically. The adoptive family couldn’t get near him just like the vet couldn’t. The only person able to get close was a wounded veteran who worked in the vet hospital in Germany. They’d hoped that his temper would calm once he no longer required to be caged, but it hasn’t. I was brought in as a last resort before euthanasia.”

  Wade growled in anger as Hoax blew out a surprised breath.

  “You think it’s PTSD?” Hoax asked Wade and me.

  “Could be,” I admitted. “I’ve had MWD—military working dogs—before, but none of them were anywhere near this severe.”

  Hoax made a sound in his throat. Wade, on the other hand, went closer to the cage.

  The dog’s growl came back, but this time it was a low one instead of the high-pitched intense ones that were coming out of him before.

  Honestly, this one was almost way more menacing than the first.

  At least to me. Wade didn’t seem to care.

  He moved closer yet and pressed his palm flat against the cage, and the dog lunged at him.

  I gasped and would’ve fallen straight on my ass if Hoax hadn’t caught me around the waist.

  “Easy, darlin’,” he ordered. “It’s all right.”

  I didn’t see how…but the dog wasn’t lunging and snarling anymore. He was sitting there staring at Wade’s hand—which was still exactly where it’d been moments before—like he’d like to have it for breakfast.

  “He’s been fed,” I felt it prudent to point out. “I fed him a burger and some fries from my lunch on the way home from Oklahoma.”

  Hoax snorted.

  Wade looked over at me with laughter shining in those eyes that I loved.

  “Duly noted,” he rumbled. “Hoax, grab the cage with me?”

  Luckily the cage had handles on the outside so there wasn’t a need to grab the wire of the cage itself, reducing the possibility of Capo getting some little hors-d’oeuvres to hold him over until dinnertime.

  Each man carried the cage on one side, and it took everything I had to ask Wade if he needed help.

  He was limping badly—much worse than he had been three days ago—and that scared the crap out of me after hearing what I had heard from Bayou today.

  Biting my lip, I closed the van door and reached into the driver’s side—which still stood wide open—to grab for my purse, keys, and phone.

  Once I had them, I hurried and rushed in front of the two men, throwing Wade’s door wide open for them both to slip through.

  Wade directed them to the living room, and it was then that I took in Wade’s house for the first time.

  It was barren, almost as if he hadn’t planned to live there long.

  As if he was always planning on coming back and didn’t want to put down roots in case he had to pack his shit and go.

  I felt a wave of shame roll over me as I thought about how I’d done this to him—and myself.

  God, sometimes I felt like the biggest jerk in the world.

  But I’d always been one of those people that reacted first and thought about the repercussions later, and unfortunately, I couldn’t change that—it was too deeply ingrained in me.

  “Put it down,” Wade ordered.

  Hoax did, groaning slightly when he stood up.

  “We’re just two peas in a pod, aren’t we?” Wade laughed. “You with your broken ribs and arm, me with my leg.”

  Hoax grunted an affirmative and dropped down heavily on the couch only to lean forward and rip his leather jacket off. Or, at least, he tried to. The jacket got stuck on his cast and he was shaking it to get it off.

  I laughed at his plight and moved forward, taking the cuff of the arm and tugged it gently free.

  “Thanks,” he said as I righted the armholes and laid it gently on the side of the couch.

  “Welcome,” I said as I joined him on the couch.

  Then we both watched as Wade talked to the dog.

  “How did he get in here?” Wade asked. “I’d like to take him out, but he doesn’t have a collar on.”

  I sighed. “He was under sedation,” I murmured. “And they got him in there after the fact. I didn’t think about getting a collar on him, but they did give me the medication that they use to calm him down enough to take him outside and stuff. It’s right here.”

  I pulled the bottle out of my purse and set it down on the card table that acted as a coffee table.

  “We’ll use that as a last resort,” Wade suggested.

  I didn’t agree or disagree.

  In fact, I was fairly sure that I was way over my head in this situation.

  A text message alerted from my phone, and I absently pulled it up to my face and read it.

  Kourt: Found a new place. It’s in the Red-Light district.

  I rolled my eyes at Kourt’s words.

  The ‘Red-Light’ district was actually a part of the city that had a traffic light every sixty yards for about two miles straight. It was a nice area, but it was residential and there was absolutely no reason for eighteen red lights in that two-mile stretch.

  The rich people of Bear Bottom had built it that way to keep normal people from taking
that route as a shortcut—which they had before—to the interstate.

  Now, everyone avoided it at all costs, otherwise, it would add ten minutes to your commute instead of taking away ten minutes if you went the other way.

  I texted him back with a smile on my face.

  Landry: You’re going to hate driving to work from there.

  The last three days I’d used wisely.

  After asking Kourt to leave, I’d then helped him pack as he’d searched for a place to stay.

  Kourt: True, but it’s halfway through the lights, and I found a back way that nobody but the residents of the Red-Light district know about. No, I won’t tell you what it is. Also, the house is furnished and move-in ready. I took the boxes this morning while you were driving. You’re officially by yourself again.

  “Who are you texting?” Wade asked.

  I looked up to find him staring at me instead of the dog.

  “Kourt,” I told him truthfully. “He moved out.”

  Something weird happened to Wade’s face.

  He looked almost…hopeful. Well, in reality, he looked too afraid to be hopeful. Cautiously hopeful maybe.

  The dog whined then, and I perked up. “Whining’s a good sound.”

  Wade looked back at the dog, who was staring at him with curiosity.

  Inadvertently, Wade had moved away from the cage when he’d turned to ask me who was texting, and when he’d heard me say that Kourt had moved out, he’d completely turned his back on Capo.

  And now Capo was staring at Wade as if he didn’t like not being his center of attention.

  “Sorry, Capo,” Wade rumbled. “Where were we?”

  Hoax turned the TV on at one point and I sat cross-legged on the couch, alternating my gaze from the TV—Hoax was literally watching So You Think You Can Dance—and watching Wade as he talked to the dog.

  At one-point Wade had gotten comfortable on the floor next to the cage, his back leaning against the recliner, which was shoved up against the wall.

  Wade spoke softly—too softly for me to hear over the television that Hoax had blaring—and Capo’s eyes never once strayed from Wade.

  At least not until I stood up to go to the bathroom.

  His eyes met mine, and he narrowed them.

  “It’s okay,” I said to the dog. “I just have to go to the bathroom. I’m not going to come close to you.”

  The dog dropped his head to his forepaws, but still didn’t take his eyes off me as I walked away.

  After finding the bathroom and using it, I wandered back into the main room.

  The duplex was small, and the kitchen was directly off the living room. There was a small kitchen island separating the two, and on the island was some paperwork that caught my eye.

  Admission papers.

  “Wade, what’s this?” I asked as I picked up the papers and started to read.

  “Admission papers for the hospital tonight,” he said from across the room.

  My heart started to pound. “You’re doing it tonight?”

  Something in my voice must've alerted him to my state of mind, because he frowned. “Yeah. Why?”

  I felt my heart start to palpitate.

  “How are you so calm?” I wondered.

  I wouldn’t be.

  Hell, I was freaking out, and it wasn’t even my leg coming off!

  “Because it’s what I have to do.” He paused. “And they’re only keeping me overnight. Once the antibiotics are done, I’m free to go home. They’re just ones they have to administer from the hospital and not something I can do at home.”

  And then I understood why he wasn’t freaking out.

  They weren’t amputating his leg today like I’d feared. They were giving him IV antibiotics.

  Shit.

  I pressed my hand over my heart and realized that in my worried state, I’d clenched the papers in a tight fist.

  Putting them down on the counter, I smoothed them out and pushed them to the center of the island. That was when I saw a balled-up piece of pink paper with girly handwriting on it.

  I frowned and picked that up, too.

  Tiffy. 883-3039.

  I threw it into the trash.

  He wouldn’t be needing that.

  Wade’s chuckle had me looking at him.

  His eyes were on the trash can where I’d just thrown Tiffy’s number away.

  “That was the nurse I have to talk to when I get to the hospital,” he explained, making me feel dumb.

  I winced and bent over to pluck the paper out of the trash can, and then put the paper back on top of the other papers that I’d practically ruined.

  Once done with that, I took a seat at the kitchen island and tried to figure out what I should do next.

  I wanted to stay where I was. I wanted to go with him to the hospital. I wanted to have him move back in with me. I wanted to wrap my arms around him and bury my face into his chest. I wanted to remember what it felt like to wake up beside him.

  I wanted him back.

  Which was comical since I was the one who made him leave.

  The metal latch on the cage rattled, and my head snapped up just in time to see Wade opening the smaller of the two doors. It was designed to where you could open up a side hatch and deposit food or possibly a chew toy for the dog to play with without actually opening the entire cage and risk the dog getting out.

  It was a good setup, and I was glad that I’d made the hefty purchase.

  I watched, heart in my throat, as Wade’s hand slowly eased inside the cage.

  The dog didn’t growl. Didn’t move a single inch.

  Capo did flinch when Wade’s hand came near his big body, but otherwise he showed no outward appearance that he cared that Wade’s hand was nearly touching him.

  Wade didn’t make the final move, though.

  He waited, hand rock steady, inches away from him.

  Finally, after what felt like fifteen minutes but was more likely three or four, Capo shifted until his back was pressing against Wade’s hand.

  I breathed in deeply as tears came to my eyes.

  The dog wasn’t a lost cause.

  I knew it.

  Chapter 12

  Any pencil can be a number two pencil if you eat it.

  -Wade to Landry

  Wade

  Running late, I parked my bike in the hospital parking lot and got off, hurrying as fast as my broken body could move without actually making agony jolt through me with every step.

  I hadn’t intended to spend the afternoon trying to get a dog to like me, but something in Capo had sparked a protective instinct in me. I also hated seeing my wife cry.

  Always had.

  Which led me to now, five minutes late for an appointment that was necessary to me hopefully keeping my leg.

  Papers in hand, I walked onto the floor and looked for the nurses’ station, finding it in the very center of the huge floor.

  My eyes scanned the nurses that were all giving me their full attention.

  “I’m looking for Tiffy,” I rumbled.

  A woman stood up and started toward me, her face the only one in the entire bunch that looked disinterested in me.

  I was used to women’s eyes being on me. One, because I was a police officer and being a police officer usually drew peoples’ attention to me. Two, because I had my dad’s genes. Tall, dark, and handsome—or so I’d been told.

  Tiffy was a cute little thing. She was a short, slightly built woman with features that clearly hinted at Japanese ancestry.

  “You are Wade?” she asked in a no-nonsense voice.

  I nodded once. “That’s me.”

  “You’re late,” she said.

  I nodded. “I had a problem I had to deal with. I apologize.”

  Tiffy—who didn’t look much like a Tiffy—narrowed her eyes. “Follow me. Your room is at the back of the floor.”

  I did and grinned when I r
ealized she wasn’t lying. The room really was in the back—and I meant way back.

  It was also about three-quarters of the way through a remodeling process and likely wasn’t supposed to have any patients in it.

  “I doubt that we’ll come check on you much once we get this started. The doctor said that you weren’t in need of our attention, and honestly, I can’t spare the manpower. We didn’t have room for another patient, and you in this room that isn’t even finished being remodeled goes to show that.” She showed me to the bed. “I don’t need you to change out of your clothes. I see that you’re in the sleep pants that the doctor recommended. Good. All I’ll need is your shirt off.”

  I tossed my phone, wallet, and keys onto the bedside table and then kicked off my tennis shoes.

  Once those were off, I took my shirt off and turned to sit on the bed.

  Tiffy—whose nametag read Greta—a name that still didn’t fit her—walked in front of me and examined my arms.

  “Left or right?” she questioned.

  Her abrupt manner had me almost smiling.

  I shrugged. “Left, I guess. I’m right-handed.”

  She moved to my left hand and examined it. “Don’t even need a tourniquet.”

  My lip twitched. “No, probably not.”

  She put one on anyway and started an IV within seconds.

  Moments after that, she directed me onto the bed. “I hope that your phone works, or that you’re tired. The television in here doesn’t work. We have two of these bags to run through you tonight. When this one is empty, I’ll come hang the other bag. It should be about eight hours of flow. Any questions?”

  After getting a negative shake of the head, she did some fancy things with the iPad on the bedside table and scanned the antibiotics barcode followed shortly by the hospital bracelet I’d gotten at the doctor’s office earlier that morning.

  She then hung up the meds—that had to have been in here waiting for me since I hadn’t seen her carry anything back with her—and got me started.

  Once I was hooked up, she directed me to lay back.

  “You can go to the bathroom. You can get up and walk around if you so please. You can also come to the nurses’ station if you need something to drink—but I really don’t have any time to spare. I have thirty patients and four nurses so…”