A Tail for Two

by Mara Wells

  Something soft and damp nuzzled against the tips of his fingers. He looked down and found the fluff ball gazing up at him with a clear—though to him, unreadable—plea. Guessing, he scratched behind her soft ears. She stood on her hind legs, placed her front paws on his thighs, and bounced. Mr. Pom-Pom—hey, he didn’t name his mother’s Pomeranian—used a similar move when he wanted to be picked up, so Caleb crouched down and scooped up the poodle. Her little heart beat fast against his hand, and her soft, springy fur curled around his fingers.

  “LouLou!”

  Caleb heard the frantic voice seconds before the stairwell door slammed open, and a young woman emerged, blond ponytail collapsing, sending wild curls springing every which way. She was tall, leggy, and long, with brown eyes that dominated her round face.

  “Patty, have you seen my LouLou?” Barefoot, the blond rushed toward the woman with the walker. “I was just leaving Grams’ when the elevator dinged. You know how she is about the elevator.”

  Patty smiled her crooked smile, scrunching up the wrinkles around her eyes. “She rode down with me. Such a sweet girl. You know I always enjoy her company, but right now, she’s enjoying someone else’s.”

  “What do you—” The blond’s eyes caught on Caleb’s dark-brown Gucci loafers and traveled up his legs until they landed on her dog. Her brows pulled together, and she angled her face up, one hand to the base of her throat. “What’re you doing?”

  Caleb wasn’t sure if the question was for him or the dog. Patty shuffled back to the elevator, leaving him alone with the poodle and her short-shorts-wearing owner. Suntanned legs and delicate bare feet with hot-pink nail polish. He’d never considered himself the type to have a foot fetish, but the flip-flop tan across the top of her foot was definitely turning him on—making him wonder what other tan lines she might have. But he was here for business, and he never let anything get in the way of business. Time to hand over the dog and be on his way to find and fire Mr. Carson.

  He hesitated, though, strangely reluctant to let go of the dog or the view of that flip-flop tan line. LouLou’s warm body grew heavy, so he shifted the poodle into a more comfortable position and scratched under her chin. “LouLou’s a cute name. How old is she?”

  “She’s a rescue so we’re not completely sure. The vet guessed around eight or nine years old.” Riley’s back pocket buzzed. She pulled out her phone, frowned at it, swiped, and tucked it away again. “Should’ve named her FloJo, though.”

  “Is that a rapper name or something?” Caleb continued to pet LouLou, but apparently he wasn’t doing it exactly right. The poodle maneuvered her head so he could get behind her jaw.

  “FloJo? Florence Griffith Joyner, the fastest woman of all time?” The woman laughed, a light and airy sound that hit him like a shot of his favorite sipping rum—straight to the gut. “My girl here loves to run. A bit too much, I’m afraid.”

  “She’s a getaway artist, huh?” He didn’t usually chat up residents of buildings he was scoping out, but he was curious about her and her dog. When was the last time he’d been curious about anything? Anyone? When the judge’s gavel came down and his father’s sentence was announced, Caleb’s whole world had turned upside down. He’d been scrambling for so long to put things to rights that he’d forgotten what it was like to simply be, to have a conversation with a stranger for no other reason than she and her little dog interested him. The gentle smile he’d given the woman with the walker spread to a full-out grin. “An escapee? A dog dodger?”

  She laughed again. “Indeed she is. Luckily, everyone in the building knows her. She rarely gets far.”

  “This building?” Caleb didn’t care for the sound of that. Pets could do a lot of damage in a small space, especially in a situation where all the units were rentals. Owners fixed up their places before selling, but renters moved on. “I thought no pets were allowed.”

  The blond flushed, turning almost as pink as the polish on her nails. “That’s what the lease says, for sure, but you can, you know, get special permission from the manager. In special circumstances. That are, you know, special.”

  So pet damages were another thing Carson would have to answer for. The list of grievances grew by the second, and Caleb felt even more justified in his decision to fire the guy as soon as possible. But none of it was this woman’s fault.

  “She seems like a special dog.” A special dog who didn’t live here. The woman was visiting; she’d said as much. Maybe her Grams had a cat or something. That was why she’d been flustered. Didn’t want to rat out her own Grams. He roughed the poodle’s fur and widened his smile.

  She smiled back, and it did weird things to him, narrowing his focus until all he could see was her. The wide lips, the way her eyes tilted at the corners, the color still staining her cheeks. Would she say yes if he suggested a coffee date? Drinks? Dinner? Her left hand darted up to tuck one of those wild curls behind her ear. No ring. What was her name? That was what he should ask first. Say something, say something. But nothing came out, and the silence grew longer and more difficult to break.

  She licked her lips, drew in a deep breath. Maybe she’d ask his name. Ask him out. The dog squirmed in his arms as if even she knew someone needed to break the awkwardness.

  “Come on, LouLou. Let’s go.” The woman reached for her dog.

  Caleb knew he should hand her over, but then LouLou turned her head so he could dig in behind her ears, which he did. She grunted a doggy sigh of satisfaction and angled her head, encouraging him to scratch the other side.

  “I’m sorry.” The woman sighed, too, so forcefully that a curl bounced on her cheek. “It’s a bit embarrassing how shameless she is. Her first owner must’ve been very affectionate. She’s sweet and well socialized. I can’t imagine anyone giving her up. But they did. In the cruelest way. People are terrible sometimes, you know?”

  “They certainly are.” Caleb flashed to his last visit with his dad, separated by a pane of glass, surrounded by other inmates and vigilant guards. “Even people you think you know.”

  Her surprised eyes locked with his. “Isn’t that the truth? Luckily, dogs are good through and through. All the way to the bone, you could say.”

  Her optimistic words washed over him, soothing the tightness in his neck that never quite went away. The lilt of her accent sounded local but more musical than that of a typical South Floridian. She settled a hand on the dog’s back, just below the hot-pink collar. Their hands were an inch apart, then half an inch when she slipped her fingers under the band to give a good scratch. The poodle’s fluffy tail thumped double time against his arm.

  What would it be like if he moved his hand that small distance to touch her? Although he kept up the steady pressure under LouLou’s ear, his mind wandered to how the woman’s skin would feel. As warm and soft as it looked? He was holding his hand very, very still, careful of her space, careful not to spook her, when Riley’s finger slipped from under the pink collar and brushed against his.

  Contact. Pinkie finger to pinkie finger. Accidental? Or had she wondered, too, what it would feel like? It was like he’d imagined, only better. Warmer. Softer. Both of them stopped petting the dog. He stared at their fingers. She stared at their fingers.

  He wanted to slide his hand until it covered hers, but that wasn’t like him. He didn’t touch women he just met, no matter how soft the skin or how good they smelled. Was it strawberries? Something fruity filled his nostrils, and he inhaled deeply, reminding himself that he didn’t do random hookups like his father. He was sensible in his romantic life, dating women with similar interests and incomes so they were always on a level playing field. But he also couldn’t move his hand.

  She didn’t move either, not toward him or away. Then her fingers curled in LouLou’s hair, and when they uncurled, she’d put a few breaths of space between them. He itched to close the gap and feel her skin again. Inappropriate, he scolded himself.
You’re not some kind of caveman who can’t control his urges. But he felt like one.

  Then he felt something else. The frantic wiggle of a dog with a mission. He’d been around Mr. Pom-Pom enough to recognize the signs, so he crouched down to let LouLou go off to do her doggy business. She didn’t go far, though, before copping a squat.

  “Oh no! Oh my gosh.” The woman pulled at his arm, and he let her drag him away from the scene of the dog crime. “Oh, I’m sorry. Really, really sorry. No wonder she beelined for the elevator before I could get her leash on. Hang on, I’ll be right back.”

  She dashed next to the elevator where, like many Miami Beach buildings that boasted a common-area lobby, a door displayed the stick figures universally signaling a public restroom.

  Soon, she was back, miles of paper towels heaped in her hands and trailing behind her. “The lobby restroom’s mostly used during the holiday party in December and sometimes by the mail carrier. Oh, and that time Rhonda in 202 forced some questionable sausage on the cutie-pie UPS guy when he delivered her new shower seat. It’s usually not a high traffic area, but I will definitely need to restock the paper products after today.”

  She tore off a few feet of paper towels and handed them to him, then stooped to drop some on the floor, still chattering in what was apparently a nervous habit. He found himself leaning toward her, the sound of her voice, waiting for the next syllable to fall from those berry lips. About a public restroom. Good Lord, what was wrong with him, waiting to hear more about delivery folks with intestinal distress and paper-restocking protocols?

  “She’s really a very good dog.” The woman gave him another wad of towels, although he wasn’t sure what she expected him to do with them. She swiped more around on the floor with her bare feet. “We were at Grams’ longer than usual, and we were on our way back to the dog park when she ran for that stupid elevator.” Swipe, swipe. She pressed more towels, and more words, on him. “And she is getting older. It’s hard to find homes for older dogs, you know? I couldn’t take her to a shelter, not knowing what might happen. That’s how I ended up with her.”

  “I’m sorry I waylaid her.” He finally found his voice, although it didn’t sound much like him. Rusty, croaky. He cleared his throat and tried again. “It’s okay. These things happen.”

  She nodded so vigorously that more hair flipped out of her ponytail to wave wildly around her face. “Sadly, they happen pretty often with her. At home, she has her pads and the patio, but there are still accidents.” She stopped wiping the floor for a moment to inspect him from head to toe. “Sorry about the shoes.”

  Shoes? He looked down. Sure enough, they’d taken a bit of spray.

  Her bottom lip shifted back and forth as though she were chewing on the inside of it. “I can have them cleaned for you? Do dry cleaners even take shoes? I’m not sure. Maybe it’s easier to give you money for a new pair? What do you prefer?”

  Prefer? He’d prefer that she stop throwing paper towels at him and look him in the eye. Her raggedy cutoffs, her Grams living in this old building. She didn’t need the extra expense of designer shoes.

  He didn’t have to force his smile. “I said it’s okay. It was an accident.”

  She fluttered her hands at him, up and down. “There must be something I can do.”

  “Have dinner with me.”

  He got his wish. Her eyes flew to his and locked there. Shocked.

  She squashed the last clean paper towel in a tight ball and let it fall. From the waist up, she was motionless, but her toes tap-tapped a nervous beat. “You don’t even know my name. I don’t know yours.”

  “That’s easy to fix. What’s your name?”

  She shot out a hand to shake his. “I’m Riley, Riley Carson. And you are?”

  He didn’t take her hand. He couldn’t. “I’m here to fire you.”

  Cold Nose, Warm Heart

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  Acknowledgments

  A heartfelt thank you to my husband, Michael Crumpton, who puts up with a lot so I can do this thing. Thank you for the love and support.

  For help with research, I am indebted to Damian Carlin, Ben Cook, and Amanda Thibodeau. Any mistakes are mine, but I swear I was listening.

  I am grateful to my beta readers, Jenny Luper and Joyce Sweeney, super stars who keep me on my toes!

  Thank you to my writing friends who take the time to listen, advise, and understand: Kait Ballenger, Laurie Calkhoven, Alex Flinn, Stacie Ramey, and Katy Yocom.

  Alison Morris, thank you for helping me figure it out. I wouldn’t have gotten this far without you.

  Nicole Resciniti, agent extraordinaire, I am so grateful for all you do.

  Again, I must thank Kay Rico Coffee for the neighborhood vibe, tasty treats, the couch, and the support. To Brian Acebo, who introduced me to the drink that has become my writing staple, and to Alesandi Sanchez, who keeps the dirty chais with oatmilk coming—you are baristas without compare. Thank you to Dan, Tim, Liz, and JR for the best launch party ever!

  And of course, it’s all possible because of the Sourcebooks Team, especially my editor Deb Werksman, and the amazing folks behind the scenes who make everything happen: Dawn Adams, Sabrina Baskey, Susie Benton, Diane Dannenfeldt, Rachel Gilmer, Stefani Sloma, Jessica Smith, Sierra Stovall, Katie Stutz, Jocelyn Travis, and Cari Zwolinski. Thank you!

  About the Author

  © Michael Crumpton

  Mara Wells loves stories, especially stories with kissing. She lives in Hollywood, Florida, with her family and two rescue dogs: a poodle mix named Houdini Beauregarde and Sheba Reba Rita Peanut, a Chihuahua mix. To find out more, you can sign up for her newsletter.

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