Forever After

by Catherine Anderson

  Meredith pressed her bandaged hand to her waist, willing away the nervous flutter low in her abdomen. “Heath, we have to talk.”

  “Heath?” He raised one eyebrow, a mischievous twinkle creeping into his eyes. “Well, I’ll be damned. The lady condescends to call me by my first name.”

  She dragged in a bracing breath, exhaling with a sigh. “It won’t work, you know.”

  “What won’t?”

  She met his gaze. “Befriending Sammy to make points with me.”

  He placed his hands on his hips. The fact that his eyes didn’t lose that mischievous twinkle did little to settle her nerves. “It won’t, huh? I guess we’ll just have to see about that.”

  Meredith had expected him to feign bewilderment. Instead he was throwing down the gauntlet? If she had drawn a line in the dirt and he’d stepped over it, she couldn’t have felt more rattled.

  “You don’t seem to understand,” she said, wanting to kick herself when her voice sounded shaky. “I’m not interested.”

  “I see.” His mouth twitched at one corner. “So I’m wasting my time, am I?”

  “Yes.”

  He rubbed his nose, whether to scratch an itch or hide his grin, she wasn’t sure. “Well, I guess it’s my time to waste.”

  Meredith stared up at him. This wasn’t going the way she had hoped. “Listen, Heath. You’re a very nice man, and you’re very attractive.”

  “And?”

  “But I’m not in the market,” she finished with what she hoped was a note of finality.

  “No problem.” He moved toward her, his stride loose and unhurried. When he drew up in front of her, he reached out to capture a tendril of hair that lay on her shoulder. “I understand perfectly.”

  As he toyed with her hair, his knuckles grazed her shirt, the heat of him radiating through the cloth.

  “You do?”

  He wound the strand of dark hair around his fingertip, using it like a rope to haul her closer. She resisted the urge to clamp a hand to the top of her head to secure her wig. Now she wished she’d opted to dye her hair. At the time, though, wearing a wig had seemed to be simplest. Given her circumstances, she’d had no idea how long she might remain in one place, and changing her hair color frequently would have posed a problem, especially once she’d dyed it dark brown. There also would have been the worry of her blond roots showing, a dead giveaway.

  When the toes of her sneakers bumped the tips of his boots, he caught her under the chin with the crook of his finger. “If you’re not in the market, why aren’t you running?” he asked huskily.

  Because if she bolted, he would be left holding her wig, she thought a little frantically. “Why would I run? We’re…um…having a conversation. And I have a point I’d like to make.”

  “Me, too.”

  She gulped. “Heath, please. I want to talk to you about Sammy.”

  “So talk.”

  “She’s very—” He was bending toward her, his dark face seeming to eclipse everything else around her. “She’s very sensitive. And I’m afraid she may grow too fond of you if you persist.”

  His breath wafted against her cheek, warm and rich with the aroma of coffee. His lips grazed her temple like the caress of a butterfly wing, light and tantalizing. “Persist in what, Merry?”

  “My name is Meredith. And I don’t want her hurt.” She planted a hand against his chest. “Stop this. I don’t want to be kissed. Not now, not ever. Am I making myself clear?”

  “Then move away. I’m not holding you.”

  Oh, God…Meredith closed her eyes, battling waves of panic and memories of Dan, both of which swamped her as he trailed his lips lightly over her cheek toward her mouth. With his finger caught in her wig, she couldn’t move away, and he was interpreting her staying as encouragement. “You have hold of my hair.”

  “Which I’ll turn loose the second you move,” he assured her.

  Meredith clamped a fist over his finger to free her hair just as his mouth lightly touched hers. Moist silk. Her breath rushed from her, and he took it into himself, his lips settling more firmly on hers. He turned his hand to more fully grasp her chin and tip her head back. She curled her fingers over his shirt, forgetting about her wig, about Sammy, even about her aversion to being kissed.

  Fire and ice. His firm mouth took control, his tongue lightly teasing her closed lips with tantalizing strokes. Shivers ran over Meredith’s skin and shuddered down her spine even as heat pooled in her belly, radiating out from there like tendrils of fire.

  Oh, God, he was good at this.

  Remembering how bruising the force of Dan’s mouth had become immediately after their wedding, Meredith couldn’t believe this man’s kiss could be so different, persuasive instead of demanding, intoxicating instead of nauseating. She couldn’t feel her feet, and her legs were beginning to melt like wax placed too close to a flame.

  Regaining her senses, she jerked her mouth from his and looked up at him with nothing short of stunned amazement. Unwrapping her hair from around his finger, she lurched away from him, half expecting him to stop her. A safe distance. That was what she needed. But at the same time, she didn’t want him to think she was running.

  Once at the table, she rested her good hand on the back of a chair, gripping it hard for support, still not able to believe she’d responded to him so easily. During their courtship, Dan had been sweet and gentle, too. Granted, he’d never made her feel like this—as if all her bones had melted. But she had enjoyed being kissed by him, all the same—until their wedding night. Had that experience taught her nothing? Evidently not, if all it took was some charm and a few slick moves to have her heart pounding.

  Angling a glare at him over her shoulder, she said, “I don’t want Sammy hurt. Do you understand that? Leave her out of this. Don’t use her to get to me. I won’t have it.”

  “I wouldn’t dream of it,” he replied, his smile infuriatingly unruffled. “My relationship with Sammy is totally apart from mine with you, Merry.”

  “Meredith!” she said with a little more force than she intended. “And you don’t have a relationship with me.”

  Completely ignoring her denial that there was anything between them, he replied, “You seem more like a Merry to me than a Meredith. I’m not sure why.”

  It was almost as if he instinctively knew that Mary was the name she’d gone by all of her life. “I want to be called Meredith.”

  He inclined his head. “I’ll try to remember that.”

  “And I don’t want a relationship. Am I making myself absolutely clear?”

  “Absolutely.” He traced her features with his gaze, his smile deepening the creases in his lean cheeks. “It was only a kiss, Meredith, a pleasant pastime between consenting adults, not a lifetime commitment. People kiss each other all the time. It doesn’t mean anything.”

  It meant trouble; that was what it meant. He’d made her feel things she had believed she was incapable of feeling anymore. Feelings that would only tempt her to lower her guard. To take a chance she had no right to take. To risk a repeat of the misery and pain that had changed her and her little girl forever.

  Like a shaky old woman gathering a shawl around her to ward off the cold, Meredith groped for her composure. “Sammy is wearing her heart on her sleeve,” she told him tremulously. “If you’re not careful, you’ll break it. I won’t stand by and watch that happen.”

  He looked deeply into her eyes. “Your daughter’s heart is safe with me, Meredith.”

  “Is it?”

  “Yes. And so is yours.”

  Chapter 9

  The following evening while Heath was fixing supper, Meredith excused herself from the kitchen to use the restroom. She’d just gotten her jeans unsnapped when a deep rumble echoed all around her. The sound was coming from the bathtub. She inched over to draw back the curtain. A black and rust-colored leg was thrust up over the edge of porcelain. She poked her head around the curtain. Goliath lay sprawled on his back, all four legs lim
ply spread, his slack jowls vibrating with every breath. Crazy dog. How on earth had he gotten in the house, and what was he doing in her tub?

  As Meredith tried to ease away, the Rottweiler cracked open one eye to peer at her. After regarding her for a moment, he slurped his tongue over his nose, heaved a deep sigh and growled. A second later, his tongue went limp, falling back out the side of his mouth. The rumbling snore resumed.

  As recently as a week ago, Meredith would have fled in terror. But it hadn’t been a threatening growl, and the dog obviously had no intention of attacking her. At least not until he finished his nap. Remembering the way Goliath had curled his leg over Sammy the other night and how lovingly he’d snuffled her hair, Meredith gingerly touched his belly. Goliath arched his back, snorting and smacking his chops, encouraging her to give him a little scratch. Cautiously, she obliged, trailing her nails lightly over his ribs. The dog growled again and twisted, clearly enjoying the attention. Meredith smiled, convinced that the growl was conversational, not threatening. Heath was rubbing off on her. Next, she’d be making excuses for everything else the dog did.

  “You’re just a big old love, aren’t you?” she whispered incredulously. “Heath should have named you Growler.”

  The dog rumbled at her again, turning his massive head to lick her arm. For a heartbeat of time, Meredith froze, her gaze fixed on his huge fangs. But when he continued to bathe her arm in friendly dog kisses, she finally relaxed. Lightly running her fingertips over his muzzle, she lifted his lip to look at his teeth. The fangs were the longest she’d ever seen, and his back incisors were well over an inch wide. Yet, oddly, she felt no fear.

  It was a good feeling. The best. Tears stung her eyes. Somehow this dog had overcome Sammy’s fear. Now he was overcoming hers, and in the process, he was helping her close yet another chapter in her life with Dan.

  The Rottweiler ran his tongue over his nose, then sighed, drifting back to sleep while Meredith gently stroked his silken ears. In that precise instant, she lost her heart to the big old galoot.

  After finishing her business in the bathroom, which was no easy task with only one hand, she returned to the kitchen. Heath stood at the stove.

  “Your dog is asleep in my bathtub.”

  He turned a smoky gaze on her. “He is? How’d he get loose?” He laid down the spoon. “I’m sorry, Meredith. He must have slipped his collar.”

  She touched her hand to his sleeve. “Just let him enjoy his nap.”

  He lifted a brow. “In your tub? My dog, the man-eater, loose in your house? Are you running a fever?”

  She laughed in spite of herself. “I’ve never felt better.” Warmth crept up her neck. “I can’t explain it. He just—” She shrugged. “I know it seems silly, but he looked so harmless. And sort of loveable. So I touched him. He didn’t take my arm off, and so I—we—well, I think we’ve made friends.”

  His eyes twinkled. “You don’t have to explain. He’s my dog, remember? I told you all along that you’d love him once you got to know him.”

  “My tub will never be the same.”

  “Welcome to the world, according to Goliath. That’s what he thinks tubs were made for. He likes the cool porcelain and sleeps in there most of the summer.”

  Meredith smiled, remembering how silly Goliath had looked. “On his back?”

  Heath smiled. “His mother’s milk didn’t come down, and the county had already paid for a pup. I got him when he was no bigger than a minute and fed him from a doll bottle. The simplest way was to hold him in the bend of my arm, like a baby. He took to sleeping on his back and seldom sleeps any other way now.”

  Meredith tried to picture Heath with a tiny puppy cuddled in the crook of his arm, his hand curled around a bottle. “You must love him an awful lot.”

  His eyes darkened, and he glanced away. After a moment, he said, “Let’s just say that having him around keeps my life interesting. I really missed him when they sent him away for training. It was like losing a kid.”

  “Was he gone a long time?”

  “Only four weeks. He didn’t take well to the separation, so they let me finish his training here. The school sent me an instructional video, so I’d know how to go about it. That’s not usually the way it’s done, but for Goliath, it worked well. He was the best dog on the force, barring none. It’s a shame he was injured.”

  “Injured?”

  Heath tapped the spoon on the edge of the pan. “When he rescued the little girl from the fire, it was the end of his career. I’m just glad I didn’t lose him.”

  Sammy, who sat at the table making a horrific mess peeling carrots, glanced up, her huge blue eyes dark with anxiety. “You almost lost G’liath?”

  Meredith saw Heath hesitate. Then he said, “Yes, honey. Goliath almost died.”

  “How?”

  “Remember, I told you about the apartment building that caught fire and Goliath’s rescuing a little girl? That was when he got hurt. The firemen missed a little girl when they evacuated the building. Goliath was my deputy back then, so he was in the Bronco with me, and he kept telling me someone was still in there.” Eyes crinkling, he gave Meredith a teasing glance. “He does talk, you know. Dog language, of course.” He turned down the flame under the pot. Then he went to take a seat near Sammy at the table. “He kept throwing himself against the door, trying to get out.”

  Sammy had become so intent on the story that she held the vegetable peeler poised over a forgotten carrot, her eyes fixed on Heath. “Then what?” she asked, much as she did when Meredith paused while reading to her from a book.

  “Well, this lady in a beat-up old car drove up. She jumped out and started running through the crowd, screaming for her child. Then she tried to run into the building. It took two cops and a fireman to hold her back.” He directed another glance at Meredith, a serious one this time. “It turned out she was a waitress who worked nights, and her babysitter hadn’t shown up that evening. She’d asked an old lady across the hall to keep an eye on her little girl. When the fire broke out, the old lady got so scared, she forgot about the child and left the building without her.”

  “Oh, no.” Meredith hugged her waist, thinking how she would have felt if it had been Sammy trapped in an inferno. “The poor woman.”

  Shadows darkened Heath’s eyes. “By that time, the fire was out of control—so bad that only a suicidal fool would have gone back in. Two firemen were suiting up to do just that when I turned Goliath loose.”

  By Heath’s expression, Meredith knew what it had cost him to let his dog go.

  Heath glanced at Sammy. “Goliath has always had a kind of sixth sense when it comes to little kids. It’s as if he can hear their thoughts or something. Sounds weird, I know. But it’s true. And that night, he was in fine form. He seemed to know exactly where that little girl was. He dragged her out from under the bed where she was hiding on the third floor and pulled her to a window. Fortunately, when the little girl saw the firemen down below, holding a net, she had the good sense to jump.”

  “Then what?” Sammy asked.

  “Well, the firemen lowered the net so the paramedics could reach her. With all the noise, they couldn’t hear me yelling at them to get the net back up. Goliath was used to working with me or other deputies, and he trusted the firemen to catch him.”

  Sammy’s small face went white. She glanced at Meredith. “That’s a long way up, huh, Mommy.”

  “Yes, sweetkins. A very long way up.”

  “You ever heard the story about Humpty-Dumpty?” Heath asked Sammy. When she nodded, he said, “Well, that’s how it was with Goliath. When he fell, he got busted up so badly the veterinarian here said he couldn’t be put back together.”

  Sammy glanced bewilderedly toward the bathroom. “But he is back together.”

  “That’s because there’s this really wonderful vet in Eugene,” Heath explained. “He does special operations on dogs, like they do on people. That vet heard about Goliath on the news and called me, offer
ing to do all the surgery at cost. Even at that, the tab ended up being six thousand dollars by the time he was done. Goliath had a crushed right hip, three broken ribs, a punctured lung, and both his front legs were broken. Now he has an artificial hip and pins in both front legs. The firemen helped raise money to pay for the operations. Lots of people in this county donated money as well. Goliath was a hero, and everyone wanted to save him. In the end, I only had to pay three thousand.”

  “Only three thousand?” Meredith couldn’t imagine anyone’s spending that much money on a dog. Then again, she decided perhaps she could. Some dogs were special, and the Rottweiler snuffling and snoring in her tub was obviously one of them. She recalled Heath’s telling her that Goliath had received seventeen citations for saving children during the course of his career. At the time, those had been mere words that hadn’t penetrated her fear. Now she realized that for each of those citations, Goliath had saved a precious little soul. “It’s a lot of money, but you can’t place a price on a child’s life.”

  Her gaze trailing to Sammy, Meredith silently added that you couldn’t put a price on a child’s happiness, either. Heath and Goliath. Somehow, between the two of them, they were working magic with her daughter. Magic that Meredith, despite all her efforts, had failed to work.

  “He’s a wonderful dog,” she said with a slight tremor in her voice. “Since he can’t be your partner anymore, I’m surprised you aren’t training another pup.”

  He conceded the point with a nod. “I want to. But it can’t be just any pup. It’ll have to be a chip off the old block. Because of Goliath’s hip, the vet said—” He glanced at Sammy. “Well, we have to let Goliath heal a little longer before he can have another family. As soon as he’s up to being a daddy again, I’ll take pick of the litter. Probably a female this time. Two males, even father and son, might fight.”

  Meredith suppressed a smile over the delicate way Heath had explained that his dog couldn’t be used for stud yet. “I’ve, um…been thinking, Heath. Instead of leaving Goliath locked up over at your place tomorrow when you go to work, why don’t you drop him off here? He would probably enjoy spending the day with Sammy.”