by Deb Kastner
Her eyebrows shot up until they were hidden under her long bangs. “Yes. Partly, at least. But it’s more than that now. Since...” She paused and broke eye contact with him. “Well, since meeting you.”
His heart leaped into his throat.
Since meeting him?
So, it was about him, then. Was she telling him he’d made some sort of a positive difference in her life? Maybe not, but at least he’d had some kind of a good influence on the program, and that was saying something, wasn’t it?
For all his brothers and sisters in arms who would enter A New Leash on Love, those who would likewise benefit from this program for which Ruby had worked so hard?
Somehow, he’d forgotten about the endgame here. Along the way, in his mind, it had become about him and Ruby and not about some military contract.
For him.
For her, it was all about getting the contract and always had been.
His gut clenched knowing his part in this would be over in two weeks. But he could do that for her—see that this program was successful with him so it would continue long after he left. He suspected he might be leaving a part of his heart at Winslow’s Woodlands when all was said and done.
“Let’s conquer this agility course,” he said, hoping she couldn’t tell he was gritting his teeth against the ache in his chest as he spoke. “What do we need to do next?”
Chapter Nine
Let’s conquer the course.
That was all it ever was with Aaron. Coming out the victor. His worldview was all about defeating whatever was in front of him. Ruby wondered what it must be like to feel as if he needed to fight for every last thing.
But then again, he was a marine. Fighting had been his whole life. It shouldn’t be so surprising that he thought on those terms.
“I don’t want you to run. The ground is uneven in places,” she warned him, tapping her pen against the clipboard in her hand as she surveyed the agility course. She’d given quite a bit of thought to how she wanted to do this, but she’d been sidetracked by Aaron.
How easy it was these days for Aaron to affect her and turn her head. After Saturday, watching him with Jake and Avery’s children, she’d firmly promised herself that she would avoid thoughts such as these. She had to tamp down her attraction, no matter how strong it was. She’d even gone so far as to avoid him on Sunday at church because her emotions were still in a tizzy and she wasn’t certain she wouldn’t burst into tears at hello.
She’d pushed herself physically this morning, hoping she could work out her high heart rate and rapid breathing so by the time Aaron came around, she’d be all done with that.
It hadn’t worked.
Her heart rate had popped right back up the moment their gazes had locked, and as for her breathing...
“Come around here to the raised platform,” she told him. “And then put Oscar up there and command him to sit.”
He did as she suggested and waited for further instructions, looking, as usual, as if he was overconcentrating and trying too hard. His eyes were focused on Oscar, and his jaw was so tight Ruby could see his pulse pounding in the corner of it even through his scruff.
“Let’s break this down into patterns,” she said. “I’d like you to envision three obstacles at a time in the shape of a triangle. What I want you to do is stand in the middle of the triangle of obstacles and guide Oscar from there rather than running by his side through each one. Does that make sense to you?”
“I could try to jog along,” he suggested, not quite willing to give up on the idea of some type of normalcy in the run.
“You could, but remember, you don’t have Oscar beside you to offer you balance, and the ground is uneven.” She shook her head. Aaron probably didn’t realize just how much he’d come to depend on Oscar for balance, and she didn’t want to have him take a nosedive just because he was being too stubborn to put his needs first. “Let’s just try it my way first. Start with the A-frame and then have Oscar circle around to the collapsed tunnel and send him over the first jump.”
Aaron studied the course for a moment and then nodded.
“Oscar, hup.” He gestured toward the A-frame, and Oscar took off at a dead run. Dragging his foot only slightly, Aaron moved at a fast walk to the middle of the three obstacles, gesturing which way for Oscar to go after he finished one obstacle and moved on to another.
Ruby’s idea appeared to be operating quite well. She could tell Aaron had been working hard with Oscar beyond what they did in training every day. The dog never once took his attention away from the marine, and even though there was some distance between them, he was quick to listen to and follow his commands.
Ruby had just known in her heart that the marine and the poodle would make such a great team and had never wavered in her original decision to match Aaron up with Oscar. She smiled as she remembered how adamant he’d been against the pairing. How could she have ever imagined he would put so much effort into making it work between them.
She couldn’t be more pleased—or grateful, because she knew he wasn’t doing all this hard work for his own benefit. If he’d had his way, he would have left for good before the first training session had even finished.
But he’d stayed—for her.
It wouldn’t be long now before his trial would be over. They would be doing a final test at the end of next week, and once he passed that, Aaron would be free to take Oscar and move on with his life, wherever and whatever that may be. The thought caused Ruby’s stomach to tighten painfully.
Once she received the contract from Major Kelley, she would have other military men and women coming into the program to follow the same training itinerary Aaron was now doing. She would be ridiculously busy and probably wouldn’t have any time to dwell on the past.
Wouldn’t she?
Right now, she wasn’t so sure. Aaron had taken a place in her life and her heart unlike any client who had come before him. She couldn’t imagine the feelings she’d developed for him would simply disappear once he left the program.
No, Aaron would live in her heart long after he left.
“Move to the next three obstacles,” she called out, desperately trying to keep her mind on her work. “Teeter-totter, hoop jump and regular jump.”
Aaron once again walked to the center of the three obstacles and directed Oscar through with only his voice. Then he moved again to the third set of obstacles and successfully finished the course without a single mistake.
“That worked well,” he said after he called Oscar to his side and approached Ruby.
“It did,” she said, noting the beading of sweat across his forehead. It was a warm day, but Ruby suspected the dampness on his face was more from exertion than heat from the sun. She was glad she’d forced the issue when it came to Aaron not running the course.
She moved over to a cooler she’d filled with ice and water bottles and handed him a cold one, which he opened up and downed in one long drink. Laughing, she handed him a second bottle. He pressed the bottle to the back of his neck and then sipped more slowly this time.
He appeared frustrated, if the frown on his face and the scowl between his brows were anything to go by. And yet he’d just successfully run Oscar through the entire agility course without a single hitch.
“Are you okay?” she finally asked, knowing Aaron wasn’t going to share his thoughts without prompting.
He scoffed and shrugged. “As well as I’ll ever be, I guess.”
“Meaning?”
“If you knew what I’ve lived through without giving it a second thought—moving around in heavy tactical gear in 120-degree weather—and now I can barely jog a few feet in jeans and a T-shirt on a mild Colorado summer morning without feeling as if I need to sit down and rest. I can’t walk right. I can’t breathe right. I’m not even half the man I used to be. It’s pathetic.”
“No, it’s not. And you’re not. It just is. I know this is difficult for you, but you need to keep fighting.”
He grunted in reply and looked away from her.
Now Aaron wasn’t the only one who was frustrated. Ruby would have thought after he’d gone so far in the program that he would understand that though his life was going to be altered going forward, that didn’t necessarily mean it would be bad.
Just different.
“You have to figure out other ways to do things,” she said. “Like with this agility course. You just proved you and Oscar can successfully complete the course if you want to, just in another way than the common path.”
He blew out a breath, his gaze dropping to the ground, where he was digging into the grass with the toe of his sneaker.
“Can I try it again?” he asked without looking at her.
“The agility course? Yes. You should,” she said. “Only this time, you’re going to do the whole course at once rather than in three pieces.”
She knew she was pushing him, but that was what he needed right now—to get out of his negative thoughts.
He nodded and finished off his second bottle of water. “Come on, Oscar. Let’s show Ruby what we’re made of.”
He posted Oscar on the platform and then called for him to begin. The run went better than Ruby expected. Oscar was smooth and followed Aaron’s lead even though he didn’t jog the course with him. The poodle was keen on Aaron’s commands.
There was one moment when Aaron stumbled, and Ruby caught her breath, but she laughed when he found his own balance and held up his hand, calling out, “I’m okay!”
Oscar knocked the top PVC pole off one of the jumps, but other than that, he conquered each of the obstacles with ease.
Afterward, with Oscar by his side, Aaron half jogged, half walked back to where Ruby was making notes on her clipboard.
“Better?” he asked. He wasn’t grinning with his lips, but Ruby thought she may have glanced a smile in his gaze.
“Much. I’m impressed with you both.”
“I know we made a couple of mistakes there. Is it okay with you if I use the course in the evenings? I’d like to practice more before next Friday’s big final test.”
“It’s just pass-fail,” she reminded him with a smile. “And I grade on a curve. You’ve already worked so hard. You don’t need to be concerned about how you and Oscar are going to do.”
“Maybe not,” Aaron said. “But shouldn’t I be taking as much of an advantage of this situation as I can while I’m still here?”
His words hit her hard, and she struggled for a moment to regain control over her emotions at the very same time his gaze met hers.
Could he tell what she was feeling?
Hardly, when she could barely decipher herself what those feelings meant.
But that didn’t stop her from looking away and busying herself by pretending to make additional notations on her clipboard. Anything so she didn’t have to meet his eyes.
She already knew this was going to be the most difficult two weeks of her life. What she didn’t know was how she was ever going to get through it, much less successfully get out on the other side.
* * *
It just is.
Ruby’s words echoed through Aaron’s mind for the thousandth time that week and into the next. Whatever he was going to make out of his life moving forward—that was all on him. He could either give up or man up—and for the first time since the explosion had stolen from him what he’d believed was his only role in the world, he was leaning toward the second option.
He was looking for another path forward for his life. He wanted to paint a new picture on his blank canvas.
There were other ways he could contribute to society. According to Ruby and all her siblings, he apparently had mad baking skills thanks to his grandmother, although he still couldn’t believe how fast his anonymous cupcakes were moving out of the Winslows’ gift shop. Ruby’s brothers and sisters, who all knew he was the secret behind the cupcakes, had profusely complimented him on his efforts, one after the other.
So, there was that.
He tried to imagine what being a full-time baker would be like. He could purchase a little shop in town and bake more than just cupcakes—cakes and cookies, perhaps. Spending time in the kitchen was something he enjoyed now that he’d picked it up again, and it did give him a sense of peace he didn’t find in much else in his life, but he wasn’t certain he could or even wanted to make a career out of it.
Not full-time, anyway.
Dog training came to mind. There was that, too. As he’d spent the last four weeks interacting with Ruby and her dogs, he’d discovered that not only did he have a real knack for working with Oscar, but he also immensely enjoyed the experience and had been spending a great deal of time considering how he might be able to serve his fellow brothers and sisters in arms through working with dogs.
At first it was a general thought, maybe breeding working military dogs—German shepherds and Belgian Malinois—and putting them through basic training before they started their official military careers. But that had its limits. He wasn’t physically capable of training a fighting dog. Not with his bad balance. That was beyond him. Anyway, most military dogs were specially bred overseas in Europe.
The more he pondered it, the less viable and interesting that idea sounded.
He had to dig deep to figure out what it was he really wanted, and when the answer finally hit him, his realization almost knocked him over, it was so simple.
And yet so complex.
Lord, I’m gonna need a lot of help with this one.
The truth was, he really wanted to stay here after his time in the program was over. He liked hanging around Winslow’s Woodlands and especially A New Leash on Love. He appreciated everything Ruby did with her dogs. He enjoyed living in the mountains, with its fresh air, babbling brooks and backyard hiking trails.
Most of all, he wanted to be here with Ruby, maybe spend more time together to see if there was something real and permanent on which they could build a solid relationship. He already had strong-enough feelings for her that it was something he knew he wanted to pursue.
Whether she felt the same about him was a whole other thing, but he wasn’t quite ready to get into that yet, nor was he ready to ask her for a job, as obvious as that next step was. He was ready to do anything in order to work at A New Leash on Love with Ruby, even if all she needed was someone to clean up the dog pens and take care of feeding the canines.
But before he broached his idea with Ruby, he had other stuff to do first, starting with this afternoon. He’d been waiting for the final test since the moment he’d stepped on the Winslows’ property, and now that it was Friday and the day had finally come, he needed to keep his mind on his work with Oscar. If he became sidetracked around Ruby, Oscar would pick up on it and they’d make a bumbling mess of the whole test, even if Ruby had assured him it was pass-fail and made it sound as if they were a shoo-in to succeed.
What if he failed?
The fear of failure had been a major hurdle for him throughout his whole life, even as a child, and he supposed it was partly what had made him the man he was. Fear loomed prominently at the back of his mind as he tacked up Oscar and prepared him for the special day. He ran the poodle through a series of basic training exercises to calm both of them down, then hopped in his truck to make his way to the Winslows’.
Ruby was already waiting for him outside, her ginger hair pulled back in a loose bun and a smile on her face. He was used to seeing her with a clipboard tucked under her arm, but this time his eyes were instantly glued to it, as that particular item represented the test itself and was now more than a little intimidating.
She was going to be grading him on that thing, checking off what he’d learned throughout his time in the program.
Pass or fail.
He briefly wondered what would happen if he failed. Would she send him on his merry way, minus Oscar? His heart grew heavy just thinking about it, and not only because he’d grown used to having Oscar in his life and now appreciated all the ways he helped him in his daily routine.
This was more about Ruby.
But either way, pass or fail, she was going to boot him to the curb unless he could figure out some clever way around that. Some reason to stay in town, to stay with her.
Concentrate, he reminded himself. There would be time for figuring out his future after he passed the course.
“Why don’t we move on into the building and you and Oscar can show me what you’ve learned in basic training?”
The corner of Aaron’s mouth twitched upward. He knew all about basic training, and not just of the “sit, down, stay, heel” variety. And he really wasn’t worried about this part of the test. He and Oscar were on the same page and had practiced this drill literally hundreds, maybe thousands, of times.
It didn’t take them long to work through all the commands, including putting Oscar into a down/stay and walking clear across the building to the other side, nearly a football field’s length, before calling the poodle to him. When he sat handsomely at Aaron’s heel and stared up at him with his adoring doggy eyes, he beamed with pride.
Maybe having a poodle wasn’t all bad.
“That’s my good boy,” he praised him lavishly. He didn’t even have to use food as a motivator for training anymore, but he slipped him a small piece of liver treat anyway and scrubbed behind his ears.
Ruby brought over a folding chair and had Aaron sit in it. “Stand up using Oscar to help you,” she commanded, her expression grave. “Really make him work for it, as if you’re experiencing a particularly bad day and are having a tough time balancing.”
All work and no play for Ruby today, apparently.
Oscar knew the drill. He immediately stood in front of Aaron and tensed his body so Aaron could put his palms on his back and use him to balance as he rose. He didn’t move a muscle until Aaron commanded him to heel.