Ruff Around the Edges

by Roxanne St Claire

  Beck looked up at him—way up—and blinked at the way the sunlight poured over Aidan Kilcannon, making his tawny-colored locks gleam and his blue eyes match the sky behind him. “Do you remember me, Aidan?”

  He didn’t answer, but stared at her for a second, maybe two, long enough for Beck’s beating heart to skip when a whole bunch of female hormones decided they liked the view. Whoa. Young Aidan Kilcannon had turned into one very fine grown man.

  Then the dog made another playful lunge at her, barking and demanding all her attention.

  “Oh my, you’re a wild one.” She dodged the giant head, laughing, trying to reach for a hug or at least a pet, but he was having none of it.

  “Careful,” Aidan said, who seemed to be using all his strength to hold him back. “He plays hard.”

  “Of course he does,” she said. “That’s why he’s named Ruff.” She looked up at Aidan in time to catch well-defined muscles bunch under an olive-green Army-issued T-shirt as he battled the excited dog.

  “I’m Beck, if you hadn’t figured that out yet,” she said, wiping her hands as she pushed up to one knee. “And I can’t believe he’s finally here!” She punctuated that with another attempt at a hug, but the big dog jerked in the other direction. “That’s okay, Ruffie. You’ll get used to me.”

  Glancing up, she saw Aidan react with a slight flinch. “He’s essentially untrainable, you know. You won’t believe how bad he is.”

  That made her laugh, a cascade of pure joy rolling through her. “Thank you so much for bringing him, Aidan. I really thought your father would call, but I guess he wanted to surprise me. I love that.”

  “Yeah, yeah, it’s a surprise for all of us.” Aidan managed to get his hand on Ruff’s head, and he must have added just enough pressure to calm the dog down. With his other hand, he reached to help her up, his gaze locked on her with more emotions than she could begin to read swirling in his crystal-blue eyes. “It’s been a while, Beck.”

  She sighed and gave him an easy smile. “Yeah, it has. It’s good to see you, Aidan.”

  He nodded, and she tried not to take it personally that he couldn’t return the compliment. She looked enough like Charlie, at least in coloring, that he was probably being swamped by a wave of grief.

  And if it weren’t for this big, beautiful dog, she would be, too.

  “I like that you brought him to me,” she said, sensing he needed some reassurance. “I thought your dad would, but it’s very thoughtful and sweet of you.”

  Ruff pulled on his leash, hard enough to jerk Aidan away from her. “Whoa, boy. Like I mentioned, tough to handle,” he said. “Really a very strong and willful dog.”

  So was the first Ruff. “Boxers can be.”

  “But he’s like really, really stubborn. And your aunt hates dogs—”

  “She’s afraid of them, no hate.”

  “—and even our best trainers struggled with him, so I’m happy to keep him. It’ll be so much easier for you.”

  She looked up at him, feeling her face form a you can’t be serious expression. “Keep him?”

  “I mean, if you’re dying for a dog, then I can get you one so easi—”

  “Charlie was the one who died, Aidan,” she reminded him. “And he left me his dog, as you know. So, if you’re dying for a dog, get one. Ruff is mine.” She slid her arms around the dog’s neck and tried to nuzzle him. “Ooh, I’ve waited so long for you, boy.” Seventeen years, to be precise.

  But he jerked away, gave a deafening bark, and looked up at Aidan as if begging for an escape from her.

  She didn’t care. Charlie had found “the reincarnation of Ruff,” as he’d written in his letter to her. It had been a long time since she’d had to say goodbye to the first Ruff and get in a car with Aunt Sarah and Uncle Mike to be taken away to a new, empty, pizza-heavy life with no Mama and Daddy and no Ruff. Her brother had kept his promise to replace Ruff. He’d gone across the world, given his life, but managed to keep that promise.

  No one could ever take her Ruff away again.

  She stroked his head and tried again to nuzzle him. “You’re mine now,” she said softly.

  But his only response was a noisy bark and a sudden lunge. He almost knocked her over as he took off with the leash flying behind him, running at full speed down the sidewalk like he couldn’t get away from Beck fast enough.

  And just as he took off after the dog, Aidan’s eyes flashed like he was a little bit happy about that.

  Chapter Four

  “Ruff! Ruff, stop!” Aidan didn’t hesitate, taking off after Ruff and leaving Beck Spencer and her bad news behind.

  He managed not to run into a single pedestrian as he tore down the sidewalk along Ambrose Avenue, zooming into the square twenty feet behind Ruff. As they passed the brick-columned entrance, Ruff took a two-second break to get his bearings and pant. Aidan launched at him, snagging the end of the leash.

  “Nice work, dude,” he whispered. “Good thinking in the face of enemy fire.”

  Ruff dropped down to his haunches and stared up at Aidan like he was shocked that his bad behavior had gotten such a loving response. Assuming he was in trouble, he let out his high-pitched Ruff whine of remorse, which Aidan knew would last thirty seconds, tops.

  He really was a poorly trained dog, and the sooner Beck Spencer knew that, the better his chances of getting her to change her mind. So, yeah, maybe he’d held the leash a tad too loosely.

  Now, he wrapped the strap around his wrist a few times and seized the looped end with a solid grip.

  Turning toward the entrance to the square, he wasn’t surprised to see Beck striding toward them, her gaze locked on Ruff with intention and, yeah, something that he supposed was happiness. He noticed only now that over jeans and a T-shirt, she wore a red apron tied around a narrow frame. Narrow, but a hell of a lot more filled out than when she was fourteen, he couldn’t help noticing.

  “Does he do that often?” she asked as she reached him.

  “Yes,” he said vehemently. “All the time. You really may want to reconsider your—”

  “I’m not going to reconsider anything.” She bent over to get closer to Ruff. “Neither are you, my friend.”

  Ruff barked in her face, which only made her laugh. It was a sound he might have found incredibly endearing under any other circumstances.

  Damn it all. She wanted Ruff.

  As she looked up at him, Aidan stared into milk-chocolate-colored eyes, opened wide under messy bangs that brushed the tops of her brows. The rest of her long brown hair flopped over a shoulder in a sloppy ponytail that looked like it might fall apart at any moment.

  And he almost fell over again.

  Holy hell, she looked like Charlie. A pretty, delicate, finer version, with a wider mouth and a dusting of freckles on a feminine nose and a…was that flour on her sculpted cheekbone?

  Well, that really looked like Charlie. If he hadn’t been sitting in the cockpit of a UH-60 or cracking up his comrades-in-arms with endless bad jokes, he’d been proofing dough in the DFAC kitchen so he could treat the entire team to world-class pizza.

  His gaze dropped to the apron and the Slice of Heaven logo on her chest, reminding him that he and his dog—his dog—couldn’t have been less welcome at that pizza parlor.

  “Are you sure?” Something told him he was grasping at straws, but right now, he’d grasp at air to keep this dog. “’Cause your aunt—”

  “My aunt isn’t making this decision. I am.” She crouched down in front of the dog. “I still can’t believe he found a boxer who looks like this and named him Ruff.”

  “Yeah, well, he took a whole lot of grief for the total lack of creativity, but he insisted.”

  “He didn’t tell you why?”

  “He said it sounded like his bark and because he plays rough.”

  Her eyes twinkled, making them spark with a secret. “Exactly the reasons I named our dog Ruff, too.”

  “You and Charlie had a dog named Ruff?” How coul
d he not have known that? “He never mentioned that.”

  She shrugged, her fingers finding the flop of his ears, which made Ruff bark and give a hard full-body shake to get rid of this new offense. “Charlie was so excited when he called me from Kabul. Said it was a miracle. Like my Ruff was reincarnated.” She tried to pet him again. “And he was.”

  “Wow.” Why the hell wouldn’t Charlie tell him that? They had been side by side going through that shell of a bombed-out hospital the day Charlie found this dog curled up in a closet. “He never mentioned any of that to me.”

  She straightened and eyed him closely, as if this were the first time she’d really noticed him. “It was between us,” she said. “Brother and sister memories. And thanks for bringing him.” She looked at Ruff, and he could have sworn her eyes misted over. “I know it couldn’t have been easy.”

  “No, it wasn’t. A huge pain. Multiple international parties involved, volunteers, money, airfare, and a few twisted arms, all to get Ruff home…” To me.

  “Thank you.” She gave a brief smile and shifted her attention to the dog, who was sniffing some grass with clear intent to pee on it, and when he did, she smiled as if it was the cutest thing she’d ever seen.

  Not good. Not good at all.

  But Night Stalkers don’t quit. Aidan took a breath and mentally regrouped.

  “Maybe when Charlie suggested the possibility of you taking him, it was before we realized just what a, you know, difficult dog he is.”

  She flicked her hand as if that idea was a flea on Ruff’s fur. Then her eyes tapered to slits as she looked harder at him, her gaze moving over his unshaven face and unkempt hair. “You mustn’t be home on leave, unless they’re letting you guys grow your hair longer than military regulations.”

  “I’m out,” he said simply. And he’d started growing his hair after Christmas, when he decided not to re-up when he hit ten years a few months later.

  “Oh.” She did a terrible job of hiding how much that surprised her. “I thought you were career Army.”

  He’d thought so, too. He wasn’t sure how to answer that, except with the truth. “The job wasn’t much fun without Charlie.”

  Her shoulders dropped, and they both stood still for an awkward beat, but then Ruff pulled the leash, attracted to the bushes and grass of a place where dozens of dogs visited each day. Aidan went along with him and glanced at Beck in invitation.

  He didn’t need to issue one, though. Her gaze was locked on Ruff as she followed, a mix of wonder and joy and disbelief on her pretty features.

  After a moment, she reached for the leash. “May I?”

  “You really need to be strong to walk him.” He glanced at her arms, exposed in a short-sleeved T-shirt, noticing they were toned but slender, like the rest of her. “I don’t know if you can manage him easily.”

  She tilted her head to one side. “Are you serious? If I could handle a full-grown boxer at eleven, I can do it at twenty-eight.”

  He lifted his brows to show his doubt, but untwirled the strap and handed the looped end to her, his fingers brushing soft, feminine skin as she took it.

  Everything about her was feminine, to be honest. Although the family resemblance to her brother was strong, she was smaller, sweeter, and a helluva lot prettier. And she wanted his dog, which took away some of that pretty and put her on the wrong side of this battle.

  “Oh!” She startled as Ruff yanked and tried to go forward, grabbing the arm Aidan offered as she nearly stumbled.

  “Told you.”

  “I got it.” Although she didn’t sound so sure. “I can manage him.”

  He waited a beat, then his curiosity got the best of him, still unable to believe Charlie wouldn’t share a piece of history after he’d found and kept Ruff. “So you and Charlie had a boxer named Ruff when you were little?”

  “Technically, Ruff was mine. My parents got him as a rescue for my tenth birthday.”

  “What happened to that Ruff?”

  “My aunt…” She shook her head. “We couldn’t bring him here when we moved, and our next-door neighbors adopted him.”

  “Oh, got it.” Sarah might have just become his best and strongest ally. “She was not happy to see Ruff.”

  “She was bitten as a kid,” she said. “I can’t fault her for that fear, but I don’t need to have them in the same room together.”

  But she would be at the pizza parlor all day, right? He sneaked another peek at the flour on her face and the apron, remembering Dad said she was working to help them out. Full time, he hoped. “Don’t you have to work?”

  “I do.” She made a face and glanced over her shoulder in the general direction of Slice of Heaven. “I should go back soon.”

  “Okay. Then I’ll keep Ruff for as long as you need to think about it. Longer.”

  “There’s no thinking involved.” She brushed some hair off her face and shot him a sideways glance. “But I’m getting the impression you’re not keen on my having him.”

  Maybe it was time to change tactics and tug the heartstrings. “We got real close in Afghanistan, Ruff and me. Especially in the last few months…after Charlie died.” He pulled back, not wanting to tug so hard he hurt her. “I’m really sorry for your loss, Beck.”

  She nodded. “We both lost.”

  He appreciated her acknowledging that. “Ruff has been a real solace to me, honestly.”

  This time when she looked up at him, he could see the anguish in her sweet features. “I know you were close to Charlie, Aidan. I know you two were inseparable, and I resented you for that. I shouldn’t have, since he loved being around you.”

  “So why did you resent that?”

  “I guess because you swooped in ten minutes after we landed in Bitter Bark and stole Charlie from me when I needed a brother more than I needed anything in the world.”

  He tried to remember when Beck and Charlie had shown up in town as orphans whose parents had died in a car crash. He and Charlie had rarely discussed that, frankly. But then, they were guys. Guys who faced death every single day, so they didn’t spend their spare time talking about it when they didn’t have to. Maybe that was why he’d never mentioned having a boxer named Ruff.

  “I didn’t exactly kidnap him,” he said, remembering the early days of his friendship with Charlie when the new kid arrived at school after Christmas break his sophomore year. The minute Aidan found out he’d played baseball at his old school, he’d taken Charlie straight to Coach Bergh and gotten him signed up for tryouts for the spring season.

  From that moment on, Charlie and Aidan had been close friends on and off the field.

  “You had him playing baseball or at your house or riding around chasing girls or whatever you two did, anywhere but home.”

  And they were all good times. Where had Beck been during those years? A child, to him. He couldn’t remember anything more than a casual, Hey, Beck, is Charlie here? when he stood at the front door of that two-story house in a cookie-cutter development called Pine Woods Grove.

  “Then you dragged him off to the ROTC,” she added, yanking him from the past.

  Dragged him? “He wanted to enlist and skip college,” Aidan reminded her. “I’m the one who convinced him to go to Wake Forest and get a degree. He never wanted to do anything but the military.”

  She didn’t answer as they walked Ruff from one tree to the next. Occasionally, Aidan stole another glance at Rebecca Spencer. It was impossible not to notice she was not a child anymore. She moved with grace, like a dancer, her skin luminescent in the sunlight, her messy hair silky, her body feminine with the right amount of curves under that apron.

  And then he remembered why he was there. Not to be tempted.

  Time to find a new front in this battle and quit looking at hers. “So where are you living in Bitter Bark?”

  “With my aunt and uncle now.”

  Perfect. “Your aunt is not going to like this dog in her house.”

  “Oh, she won’t let him in.�
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  “Then I can—”

  “I’ve already figured this out.” She cut him off. “I’ll move to the apartment above the pizza parlor. Then I can visit him when I have a break and take him out when he needs to go. Easy-peasy.”

  For her, not him. And not Ruff.

  “Won’t that disappoint your aunt? Doesn’t she like having you live with her?”

  She smiled as if to say, Nice try, and let him know she was totally on to him. Didn’t care. Night Stalkers don’t quit, they find a new way to win.

  “I think she’d be fine if I moved up there,” she replied. “I never really expected to stay this long, but things are worse than I thought.”

  Ruff finally found a spot of sun-washed grass, and they headed to a bench near it.

  “I heard your uncle had a stroke. I’m sorry,” Aidan said as they sat down.

  “Yeah, he did.” She held up a finger in warning. “And don’t you dare use that as an excuse to keep my dog, too.”

  Actually, for once, he wasn’t. “I like Mike. He’s a good man, and I’m sorry he’s struggling.”

  She nodded in full agreement. “And that’s why I came to help.”

  “How bad was the stroke?”

  “Not awful, but bad enough.” Easing back on the park bench, she twirled the leash off her wrist and rubbed it where the strap had chafed a bit. “But it hit him hard mentally. He’s sullen and doesn’t talk much. He certainly doesn’t work. He’s in bed like he’s ninety, not sixty. He’s got some mild paralysis, but it could be treated and overcome with good physical therapy. He won’t do that, so he can’t make pizza.” She choked softly and looked skyward. “And neither can I, but I’m trying to help them hold Slice together.”

  “Wow, that place is like an extension of him,” Aidan mused. “I don’t think I ever walked in the door that Uncle Mike wasn’t in the back pounding dough and stirring sauce.”

  “He’s owned it for thirty years,” she said on a sigh. “And he’d always expected Charlie to take over when he got out of the Army.”