Chapter 21

Amy stood in the large cabin kitchen, saw the counter stretch along the outside wall, dog-leg around the corner. Nice big kitchen table in the middle, and to the right, a bedroom off the main room. Probably a couple more bedrooms beyond the closed door in the corner too.

Typical family cabin in the woods. Humble, functional. Often full of love.

And the puppy. He totally seemed over the issues he’d had in the clearing. He scampered to the corner by the closed door and picked up something that looked surprisingly like a balled-up sock, settled with it. Nathan waved her to a chair with a seat that was covered with cracked red plastic, grey stuffing sticking out of it in a thick tuft.

Though first he whirled around the room like a mini tornado swiping stuff off things. Tea towel from the back of the chair, beer bottle from the table. And he took a quick glance into the bedroom off the kitchen, hurriedly closed the door.

“Didn’t expect company.”

She sat, leaned back, rested her arm on the back of the chair. “Well, of course not. You had your to-do list today, just like the rest of us.” Her tone softened. “‘Carry dog to the woods’ was at the top of it, was it?”

Nathan looked shocked, like she’d seen something she shouldn’t have.

But he covered it over, wiped the table with a sponge, threw it in the sink. Then turned those dark eyes on her and shrugged. “He was scared.”

A response was at the tip of her tongue, but as she watched his face, she knew. So she did what good people throughout the ages have done when faced with a vulnerability that the vulnerable one does not want exposed. She covered it over.

“How long have you had him?”

He dropped into the chair across from her, very much a man at a smallish kitchen table. Raw, masculine. His hand curled on the tabletop. “About a month.”

“How’d you come to have him? Were you looking for a pet?”

“Looking for a pet?” He snorted. “No. At the time, he needed a home. So did his brothers. I thought I could provide one.” His tone took an odd downward dip. “My buddies and I each took one.”

He let his hand slip off the table, hang at his side and snapped his fingers lightly for Ryker. And then the pup was there, jumping on his knee. “Truth be told, he hasn’t had a good time of it with me. He was born in the backwoods of Kentucky with his mom, and we all chipped in for food and a vet. That part was rocky, but they all did okay. The bit with me hasn’t been good though. I…had some trouble.” His gaze tracked to the floor for a moment. “But I’m going to make it up to him.”

He hoisted the puppy onto his lap, and Ryker immediately tried to get on the table. Upon Nathan thwarting him, he pawed at his chest, and Nathan burst out laughing. “He’s a handful.”

“They usually are. But…unbeatable. Though I’ve got others in the menagerie. They all keep me company. I’ve got Cleo, Babette, and Pips at the moment. I don’t know what I’d do without them.”

His eyes grew wide. “Cleo, Babette and…wow. All dogs?”

“No,” she laughed. “Two cats and a…well, I’m just not going to tell you. You wouldn’t believe me if I did, and you’d try to talk me out of it. And I’ve decided I won’t be.” She grinned at him. “Maybe another time.”

“And where’s your place? I heard you guys had a house out on Belle’s Inlet? Not far from here?”

She shook her head. “That’s the fam’s place. The parentals go between there and our house on the outskirts of town, and whoever’s around at the time—I’ve got a ton of sibs, as you may know—stays at one place or another. No, I’ve got a little cabin a couple kilometers north of here. And the menagerie keeps me company. And I mean it when I say I don’t know what I’d do without them. They keep me sane.”

“But…you have a big family, right? And you guys are tight. Aren’t you?”

There was slippery ground here, she knew right away. Something. She couldn’t quite put her finger on it, but suddenly it seemed important to answer him…right.

She spoke slowly. “We do, and we are. But that doesn’t change things when a person needs to…prove themselves, you know? It’s still down to…what’s in here.” She tapped the top of her chest with her hand. And then followed suit by tapping the side of her head. “And in here.”

And so it was. Despite her tight family, and all their support and encouragement, when she wanted to do something they didn’t agree with, she felt strangely on her own. Regarding her business, for instance. The consensus was that she was putting all her hard-saved cash into a venture that would likely never slide into the black.

But that wasn’t something she was about to discuss with a man she’d just met. Or with anybody, really.

Nathan nodded, seemed to think as he rubbed the dog’s head. “What’s the deal with proving yourself? Seems like you have a pretty good reputation around Jack’s Bay, if I remember right.” His eyes flashed something unknowable for a second. “Squeaky clean. Well-respected. Am I right?”

Well. Nothing like getting to the point. “Yeah. You could say I do.”

“So it seems to me you’ve proven yourself already.”

“But it’s been working in my family’s business, and that’s secure. No risk. I want to start my own business, and while my family’s not out and out fighting me on it, they kind of are, too. They don’t see it as a money maker.”

“And you’re torn between the familiar and needing to prove yourself.”

“Exactly.” His gaze bored into her, steady. Interested.

She shrugged. “Enough about me. Have you…”

“Hold on,” he said. “I just want to say, I agree with you.”

The statement sat there, between them. And with a shock, she realized no one had really said that to her yet, about her wanting to strike out on her own.

“You…do?”

“Absolutely. A person’s got to go off on their own, no net, to test who they are. You may succeed, you may fall flat, but you’ll know who you are more in doing that than anyone who stays in the easy and familiar. It’s what I did. Admittedly, my past wasn’t like yours, but it opened the world to me, and it clarified a lot. I loved it.”

Her next breath drew deeper. “That’s what you did with the SEAL thing. Then…the Delta North Team.”

“Yeah. I know what I’m capable of. That I would never have had here.” He seemed to go off somewhere mentally. “And clarified what I’m not, too.” And he was back.

He stretched under the table, grabbed something from the puppy, and she saw it was one of his shoes that looked like it had already served as a pacifier for the puppy’s growing teeth. “If you ever need someone to bounce ideas off, I’m here.”

She smiled. “Kindred spirits, and all that?”

“Something like that.”

“Well, enough about me, as I said.” She tilted her head toward the puppy. “Ever think of doing obedience training with him?”

That seemed to ruffle him out of his good mood. “Not going to happen.” The statement had an air of finality.

Okay. Apparently that was a hot button. “You know best, I’m sure.”

“I know I need to do stuff with him, though.”

Honestly, the man looked like he was walking around with a sack of bricks on his back most of the time. He eased when it shifted, but never for long.

And she knew what that was like.

He looked at her thoughtfully. “You find Prince listens? Obeys you?”

“Well, he’s pretty good. Of course, I’m prejudiced.”

“I’m not sure how he’ll do when I have to leave him to go into town. I don’t want him scared, you know?”

And again, that tender concern. But something too about his expression indicated the concern hit a raw spot too. She hurried to ease him, though how, she didn’t know. “There’s stuff you can do. For one, you can crate him. That gives dogs a sense of security, if it’s done right.”

“I won’t do that.”

Now, there had to be a reason for that that wasn’t actually about the dog.

“You’ve got to do what makes sense for you. And Ryker.” She glanced at her watch. “Now I’ve really got to get going.” She stood up, and a small shower of dried mud rained down off her onto the puppy, who was currently under her feet. He looked up, eyes wide, and quickly scuttled to his corner.

And with that, they both looked at each other and laughed.

At the door, when she turned to say goodbye, Nathan towered over her. All six feet of him. His scent came to her. Masculine, clean.

“Thanks for coming by. It was good for Ryker. And…” he lowered his head, bent close to her as if someone else might hear, and that would be an issue. “…thanks for coming by to check on him. That was good of you.”

He seemed very touched by it and she found herself feeling the same way. “No problem. If you wanted, I could bring Prince over sometime. Might help Ryker get used to other dogs, help to socialize him.”

Nathan was walking her out now. She saw him cast a look at the row of garbage bags on the side of the cabin, saw the wince that flashed, then he immediately turned away. “What was that?”

“Prince. My dog. I just said I could bring him over to play with Ryker. A puppy play date.”

She saw the shock in his eyes. But whatever he was thinking, he wasn’t sharing.

“Or not. Just a thought.” They were at the edge of the forest now, close to where he’d found her earlier. A million years ago, it seemed now.

As if in testament to that fact, an impish grin appeared on his face, and his grey eyes sparkled as surveyed her. “Would you cake him in mud and slosh green paint on him? Make him wait at the edge of the clearing, until I said okay?”

She laughed, but hell, if he could play, so could she. “No, but I might want you to do that. I need to socialize Prince to big blobs of men that look like Sasquatch. You willing?”

He gave her a grin back. “It all depends on what’s being exchanged for it.”

She smiled back. “I’ll let you know.”