Rescue You

by Elysia Whisler

  “Well, look at that.”

  Rhett stretched his hand a little closer, but stopped just short of touching him. “What now?”

  Stanzi elbowed him in the ribs. “Want a dog?”

  Rhett’s smile fell. “Nah, I couldn’t.” Unexpectedly, his pulse rose. Aw, dammit. Not now.

  “You’re the only person he likes, so far.”

  “He likes you.”

  “He tolerates me. There’s a difference.”

  Rhett’s breathing changed, became shallower. The feeling about him changed, too, thickening and darkening, like heavy clouds. He hated this feeling. It had been a while since this had happened, long enough Rhett had thought maybe he’d beat the panic attacks. Why now? Not now. Any time but now. “I can’t.” He stood up slowly, but despite Rhett’s effort to be quiet and careful, Humphrey woke and bolted back into his cage.

  “Why don’t you come inside and have some coffee? Think about it. Maybe visit him again before you go.”

  “I can’t.” Rhett looked down at her, and his head clouded as he struggled to breathe. “I’ll just mess him up.”

  “He’s already messed up.”

  “I’d mess him up more.” Rhett cleared his throat sharply and drew air steadily into his lungs. “Thanks for entertaining me all night. And for showing me all this.” He scanned the rescue. “This is amazing. But I’ve got to get going.”

  “Go where? It’s Christmas Day.”

  Rhett shrugged. “Best day to get managerial stuff done. No gym to run and nobody to bother me.” He cringed after the words left his mouth. That’s not how he meant it, but he didn’t have enough time left to explain or apologize.

  Stanzi watched him, her eyes changing, like she knew a little about what was going on. “All right,” she said softly. “See you at the gym?”

  “Yep.”

  Then he left, not even looking back to wave. The zero pain he felt in his bad leg allowed him to get to his Jeep as quickly as possible. He dropped the keys twice before getting them in the ignition, but finally he got the engine going and peeled out and down the driveway as fast as he could go.

  twenty-two

  “Humphrey’s not trainable as a service dog,” Pete explained, “but he also doesn’t have to be. If Rhett had the effect on him that you described, then they already have a synergy I don’t need to mess with.”

  “Slow down,” Sunny panted. She leaned forward, hands on her knees, and drew cold air into her already gassed lungs. “God, I hate running.” She stood up, hands pressed to the small of her back, and arched into her palms. “How can you talk so much?”

  “Quit being a baby. You can ride that bike all day long, but you can’t run a few miles?”

  “I repeat. I hate running. I don’t have the legs for it.” Sunny extended one leg and pointed her toes.

  Pete blew off her comment with a smirk. He swiped some sweat from his forehead with the back of his sleeve. He had about two weeks’ worth of a beard now, which Sunny hadn’t realized he was growing until this moment. “So this guy must be okay, if Humphrey likes him.”

  “He seems like the real deal.” Sunny bent down to tie her shoe. The trails were wet and muddy from melted snow. She drew a deep breath to calm her lungs. The air smelled like a fireplace. “Though Cici said he acted weird about Humphrey. Well, she didn’t use the word weird. She said he ‘retreated.’ Didn’t want to even consider taking him home. Cici thinks he was having a panic attack, but he would never admit it.”

  Pete watched her tie her shoe, then nodded toward the trail, to indicate he’d be starting up again. “It might not have been the dog. Or not just the dog.”

  “What do you mean?” Sunny was relieved when Pete started at a fast trot, not a run.

  “That woman at the party—” Pete glanced over his shoulder “—was way out of line. The way she talked to him. About the medication and the spiders. If she were a man, I’d want to punch her in the face.” He jumped over a felled tree with a quick little hop.

  “I’ll punch her in the face for you.” Sunny climbed over the log, then pushed after Pete, who was picking up the pace. She’d never noticed how muscular his calves were until she ran behind him and watched him navigate the rocky trails with ease.

  “Whatever Rhett is going through,” Pete continued, “he feels all alone. To have that girlfriend or ex-girlfriend or whatever she is act like she’s got it all figured out is insulting and condescending. Then along comes Humphrey, who for whatever reason, makes a connection. So the only person that’s connecting with him is a messed-up dog who’s lived in a cage all his life. That might’ve spooked him a bit.”

  Sunny realized she’d never really talked to Pete much about his experiences in Afghanistan. He never brought it up, and she was afraid to overstep by asking questions. But there was a reason he trained service dogs for service members, at no charge. Nobody took on that kind of work unless they were passionate about it. Nobody took on that kind of work unless they truly wanted to help.

  “I think Cici has made a connection, too.” Sunny’s words came labored. “I’ve never seen Cici react like she did last night. Rhett’s gotten to her somehow.”

  Pete went silent. After a second, he said, “Well, that would spook him even more.” After that, Pete picked up the pace considerably. Sunny realized she’d pushed Pete’s buttons, or more like his one big button: Constance. She briefly wondered why she’d done that, but her body was in too much pain to ponder too deeply. Her lungs were ready to burst by the time the rescue came into view. Roger was out running the dogs, and just looking at the mutts’ tireless energy made her jealous.

  Sunny sagged against a tree. Pete turned around and began stretching his legs. He smirked at her.

  Sunny was just getting ready to call him a jerk when a van, driving past the house along the road out front, caught her eye. “Pete.” She barely whispered his name. “I think it’s happening.”

  Pete followed her gaze, but the van was gone. “What?”

  Sunny’s insides warmed instantly, which hadn’t happened in three miles on the trail. “Animal control,” she said. “An animal control van just drove by.”

  twenty-three

  “Show me how to climb the rope.” Constance grasped the hemp and looked up at the high ceiling, where the rope was attached. There was a piece of black electrical tape wrapped at the fifteen-foot mark, which seemed really high from her place on the floor.

  “On your list of goals?” Rhett slid a bench over.

  “Rope climbs were in the very first workout I did here. I remember being in awe of how fast you zipped up and down. Now that it’s January, it’s time to work on a resolution.”

  Rhett smiled and patted the bench. “Have a seat.”

  That smile felt like a warm ray of sunshine. Since Christmas, all of Rhett’s responses to her texts had been tight and short. Not rude, but distant. Constance had been coming to class like a regular member, with no special instruction from Rhett and little exchanged between them but a few nods and waves. The gym had been crowded since the first of the month and snagging alone time with him had been impossible. Today, Constance came in early on purpose, saw Rhett in the office as she went by, but left him alone. She tried a rope climb by herself, failed miserably and found herself on her back, staring up at Rhett.

  “It seems impossible.”

  “It’s not.” Rhett sat down on the bench. “Two ways to wrap your feet. You can snake the rope—” Rhett wrapped his leg with the rope several times, like he was doing needlework “—or you can do the J-hook.” He made a little shelf with both of his feet, one on top of the rope and one beneath.

  “Ah, okay.” Only now did Constance realize that the rope climb, like so many lifts with the barbell, was more about the lower body than the upper. “But you didn’t even use your feet, that time I watched you.”

  “I know�
�” Rhett arched an eyebrow at her “—but it takes a lot of upper body strength to do a legless rope climb.”

  “Show me. I forget what it looks like,” she lied.

  Rhett stood up, grabbed the rope and, using only his upper body, pulled himself all the way up to where the electrical tape was wrapped. Then he rappelled himself back down, the same way. Constance silently admired his smooth athletic ability. He made that look so easy. She couldn’t help but picture him without the shirt on.

  “Let’s try the J-hook. Just sitting on the bench, I want you to make a shelf out of the rope, with your feet.” He demonstrated a second time, then passed her the rope. Once Constance got it right, he said, “Good. Now, in order to minimize how much upper body you use, I want you to focus on leaning your body back and getting those feet as high as possible on the rope for your second hook.” He stood up and showed her what he meant, climbing his feet up near his hands. With his height, he was able to climb the rope to the black tape in only a pull and a half.

  Constance started from a seated position on the bench, then worked her way to standing. At first it was awkward to hook her feet, then when she finally did she’d run out of upper body strength while she hung there, trying to hook her feet a second time. Rhett told her she “wasn’t horrible” and made her rest before trying again, and again.

  By the time she’d put in a solid twenty minutes of work, Constance could get two mini pulls that moved her a third of the way up the rope.

  “Make sure you come down the same way,” Rhett said, arms folded over his chest, something of a proud smile on his face. “Don’t slide down and give yourself rope burn to the hands or legs. Control your descent.”

  Constance tried, but that was easier said than done. Her arms fatigued quickly and she slid down the rope. She sank to the bench and peered down at the rope burns on her inner thighs. This was the first day she’d felt comfortable enough about her legs to wear shorts to the gym, and now she had rope burns.

  Rhett knelt down in front of her. “Let’s see.” He pushed her knees apart and grazed his thumbs over the reddened, scraped skin. “All right. Not too bad. We’ll clean it, and next time you’ll control your descent better.”

  Chills popped over Constance’s skin.

  Rhett looked up into her eyes, his hands going still on top of her thighs. “I’ve been wanting to talk to you about the night of the party. About Katrina. And Humphrey.” Rhett tilted his head from side to side, as though shaking his thoughts around to sort them out.

  That warm ray of sunshine expanded inside Constance’s stomach.

  “That’s not how you taught me rope climbs, Santos. I’m jealous.”

  Constance and Rhett both jerked their heads in the direction of the amused male voice that came from the vicinity of the entrance. It was obvious neither one of them had heard him come in.

  “Callahan!” Rhett smiled and rose to his feet. “You haven’t been in much. Just when you promised you were going to start taking your fitness more seriously.”

  Constance’s breath caught in her throat. Detective Callahan stood a few feet away, wearing gym clothes and toting a giant gym bag. He grasped Rhett’s outstretched hand and pulled him in for a man-hug, that one-armed-shoulder-bump dance that the American male favored.

  “I’m back for sure now,” Callahan said. “I’ve done some soul-searching over the holidays and I made a decision that’s got me back on track.”

  “I hope so.” Rhett popped him in the gut. “You’re not getting my special rope climb instruction package without a serious commitment.”

  Callahan laughed as he took the hit, giving a sharp exhale. He rubbed his midsection, which was mostly flat, and looked over at Constance. After a second, his eyes narrowed. “Miss Morrigan.” He dragged out her name with recognition. “What are the odds? I was just going to tell Santos here how this one little lady, a masseuse, got me back on track. You told me to quit saying yes to something I wanted to say no to, remember?” He walked over and stuck his hand out. “Well, I finally told my ex that getting back together was not going to happen. Told her on Christmas Day. My neck hasn’t hurt since.”

  “You broke it off on Christmas Day?”

  “Best present I could give myself.”

  “I’m glad to hear it worked, Detective.” Constance rose from the bench and accepted his handshake.

  “Call me Sean,” he said. “And yeah, it did. Thanks again.”

  “Anytime.”

  “Wait.” Rhett pointed at Constance. “You two know each other?”

  “There are better ways to meet, but yes,” Sean said. “And it looks like her magic is working just as well on you as it did on me.” His gaze went from Constance to Rhett and back again. “I knew it.”

  The room went quiet. Rhett’s eyebrows knitted.

  “Sunny has had some trouble with the law,” Constance said quickly. “Between her and the neighbor, who has a puppy mill. But I think that’s been ironed out. Right, Detective?”

  “Got a court order. Animal control did a preliminary last week and should be back over there any day.” Callahan smiled. “Now, as long as your sister behaves, all should be good.”

  Rhett’s knitted brows slowly relaxed. He rubbed his chin as he looked at Sean, then slowly over to Constance.

  “I’m going to warm up. You two carry on.” Sean walked off toward the rig, leaving Constance alone with Rhett, who was watching her with a curious glint in his eye.

  “You guys get arrested for something?”

  “It was nothing.” Constance waved a hand. But even as various excuses rolled through her mind, she knew that lying wasn’t an option. “What I said about Sunny and the neighbor is true. My sister has this little habit of taking the law into her own hands when animals are abused. That’s where Willy and Humphrey came from.”

  “Dog bandits.” Rhett laughed under his breath.

  Constance decided the rest of it needed to come out. If the detective was back at the gym, there was always the chance he’d say something he shouldn’t—like he had just now. Constance didn’t want anything popping out on Rhett when he wasn’t expecting it. He’d had too much of that in his life already. “I just want you to know that, a little while back, Sunny asked me for a favor. A favor from Sean, who would in turn do her the favor of getting the law in gear over the neighbor’s puppy mill.”

  Rhett was silent, his face showing no emotion.

  “Sean asked if I’d help you with your leg.” She nodded toward Rhett’s right thigh, which hadn’t been giving him any visible trouble today. “But it’s not like I planned it.” Constance scrambled to speak as she watched the light in Rhett’s eyes change. “Coincidentally, I had already met you. I had already worked on your leg, too. They just wanted me to keep helping you.” Constance shrugged. “Which I wanted to do, anyway.”

  Rhett’s head drooped, and for a second, he looked a little like Humphrey. When he next raised his gaze, his hazel eyes were heavier on the green than the brown. “I was part of a bargain?”

  “It wasn’t like that.” Constance nodded toward Sean. “They may have thought so. Though nobody meant anything bad by it. Everybody just wanted to help everybody else. But no, it wasn’t like that.”

  “I see.”

  “Rhett.” Everything drained away: the joy she’d felt at making it a third of the way up the rope, the arousal she’d felt when Rhett’s large, warm hands had run up her thighs and the anticipation of what he was going to say about Katrina and Humphrey. He’d come to trust her.

  And now he didn’t.

  The world became colorless and flat. “This is kind of like a huge coincidence,” Constance said. “We’d already met. I could have made up anything. Why would I tell you the truth if the truth was that I thought you were part of a bargain? It wasn’t like that for me. It never has been.”

  People were starting to f
ill the gym. They walked by and greeted Rhett, then Constance, then headed over to warm up. Chatter filled the air, and it seemed out of place inside the heaviness that hung between them. “I don’t need anybody’s help,” Rhett said. “And I don’t like the idea of people I’m close to talking behind my back about how to fix me.”

  The blood drained from her face. “It wasn’t like that.” Constance knew her words wouldn’t carry the weight she needed to convey, but she also knew that words weren’t going to fix this.

  “I have to start setting up for class.” Rhett’s eyes were no longer fiery, but they held none of the joy from earlier. “You should go warm up.”

  As he walked away, Constance bit back the burning that simmered behind her eyes. She gathered her things and slipped out while no one was looking.

  twenty-four

  Sunny trained her binoculars on the Matteri property. The air inside the car was so cold her breath was turning to steam. A couple of weeks had come and gone since the animal control van’s visit, and it was hard to tell if Janice’s operation had changed much. Other than there was a certain stillness over her house and back kennel. Were all the dogs gone? Even though there was only one road in and out of this neck of the woods that housed Sunny’s, Janice’s and Pete’s holdings, it was a vast stretch of land, encompassing dozens of acres and many miles. Sunny could easily have missed a second pass of animal control while she was out, asleep or merely not looking at the road.

  She sighed. What the hell was she doing out here? She had a pile of adoptions and fosters today, including Pete’s collection of Chevy’s pups to take back to Canine Warriors for training, and she had to be at her best. A late night with Callahan hadn’t helped, either. Just a little too much wine and not enough sleep made a baby hangover press around the edges of her temples. She’d just tossed her binoculars to the passenger seat and started the engine when she saw it: the animal control van creeping around from the back curve of Janice’s house. Excitement pumped up Sunny’s heart as she watched it edge out onto the road. The van was too dark, and Sunny was too far away, to see if the van held dogs, but she’d been peeping at Janice’s house for fifteen minutes, watching for comings and goings, which meant the van had been back there for at least as long.