I stop walking and stare at him. “Did you suddenly become a professional when it comes to autism? Do you have a degree in pediatrics I don’t know about?”
“No, I became a qualified dog trainer.” Jake smiles, and good God does it make my insides melt. “I’ve been working with Nutters since we rescued him. Olivia told me who he was for. I did a little research; it’s not a big deal.”
“Actually it is. This means a lot to me, to Spence. Thank you.”
Jake turns to look at me. His gaze meets mine and darts away up the hill to his own dog and my son. “You don’t get it, do you?”
“Get what?”
“The two of you saved my life. You’re saving possibly twenty, thirty, fifty more with the money you donated to this place, both humans and dogs, and yet you still don’t see how you’re deserving of someone doing something nice for you?”
I shrug. He’s right, though I am annoyed that it was so obvious that the money had come from me when I’d taken great pains to make it anonymous, opening a new bank account and requesting that the check be made out to Paws for Cause by an unnamed donor.
Jake shakes his head. “One day, Elle. One day I’ll show you just how grateful I am that you came barging into my life and made me whole again.”
I don’t have a reply for that but tears, and I do not want to shed those in front of Jake. Not now, and not ever again. Apparently my tear ducts didn’t get that memo, because my eyes well up and I have to blink like an epileptic hamster to get them gone.
Not fast enough though. Jake reaches out a hand and collects a droplet of saltwater from off of my cheekbone. I reach up to knock his hand away, but those butterflies in my stomach take flight again and I wind up slipping my hand around his. I forget all about why he shouldn’t be touching me and start to wonder if maybe he should be.
“Come on, slow pokes,” Spencer calls to us and I glance away from Jake’s too familiar gaze and walk up to my son, giving his new dog a pat.
Jake follows. “So we finish up here around three. I’ll come by later and teach you all the commands you’ll need for a day or so, but we’ll need to draw it out to a few sessions so that Spence isn’t overwhelmed and doesn’t become impatient with him.”
“Sure.”
“I better get back in the ring, but if you head into the office Eloise will have the paperwork all ready for you. I’ll see you later.”
“Jake,” I say, stopping him from leaving. “Thank you.”
He nods and calls Nuke to his side, walking back to the ring.
Spencer, Nutters, and I head into the office. We’re met by a sour Eloise, who all but throws the adoption paperwork at me. I get to work filling it in and the little evil harpy storms out the second Olivia glides in, looking smug. “Find everything you need?”
I frown at my meddling best friend. “I didn’t know he’d be here today.”
“Well sure, he’s my best trainer. All the bitches love him.” She winks at me.
I can’t help but laugh at her. Spence laughs too, a rare treat.
My humor all but evaporates when he starts yelling, “bitches,” over and over. He twirls on the spot, and his dog barks and jumps about with him.
“Spencer, no,” I say. “Sit down.”
The dog obeys; my son doesn’t.
Olivia goes back to ignoring his behavior, but it only gets louder.
“Give me that,” she says, taking the paperwork from me. “You don’t need to fill that out.”
“But you said . . .” I trail off and glare at my friend. “You did that just so I would talk to him didn’t you?”
She pins me with a look and ignores the subject. “So, Jake will be by later today to help with in-home training.”
“You know if you had told me sooner we could have been here for his training so that Jake wouldn’t have to come to the house.”
“And miss out on all that sexual tension? Hell no. You forget, sugar, that up until the last month I was living vicariously through you.”
“Bitches!” Spence shouts again.
I shoot him a look that he misses because he’s too busy sniffing his new dog’s butt. “Spence, what did we talk about? Remember there are adult words and kid words.” I lower my voice a fraction, “Bitches is not a kid word, and stop doing that.”
“Dogs sniff one another’s butts. It’s how they say hello.”
“I know, honey, but you are not a dog, you’re a people, and people do not sniff butts.” I turn back to Olivia. “I see what you’re doing here, and it isn’t going to work.”
“We’ll see.” She grins wickedly. “My money’s on the Marine.”
I shake my head in disappointment. “What does that even mean?”
“We have a little pool going down at the Sister’s Bakery. That boy is crazy about you. He’s been miserable since you left him.”
“I didn’t leave him, he—”
She shuts me up with a glare. “Girl, you left him high and dry.”
“No I didn’t. He looks just fine to me.”
“Then you ain’t looking hard enough. Way I see it, you got two choices. You take a chance and let him in again, or you and me take on the world together, these two old biddies with more dogs and cats than county law will allow any pair of jilted spinsters to own.” She gently squeezes my arm. “Honey, I know you’ve had a tough year, what with Jimmy and Mr. Williams, and yes, even Jake. But that boy brought you to life again. You really wanna go and throw that all away?”
I sigh, not knowing what to say to that. Of course there’s a legion of excuses right on the very tip of my tongue, but I can’t get into those with Spencer here.
“I don’t know what I want, Liv. All I know is that I’m tired of working this hard. I’m stretched so thin I don’t know if I’m even here anymore. I just can’t deal with Jake Tucker right now.”
“When will be a good time for you to deal with him? Living is work, Ellie; love is work.”
“Maybe it shouldn’t be,” I say impatiently. Why is she pushing so hard? “If it’s meant to be, it should be easy.”
“Who told you that? Disney?” She looks askance. “Honey, anything worth having is worth fightin’ for, and let me tell you right now, that man is worth fightin’ for.”
“Then maybe you should date him,” I say childishly.
“Maybe I would, if he weren’t in love with someone else.”
I frown. This annoys me more than I care to admit, but I can see she’s proving a point because she raises her eyebrow with a smirk as if to say see?
I shake my head. “Are we done here?”
“For now,” she remarks, and walks over to Spencer. “Congratulations, Spencer. You’re now the proud owner of Sergeant Nutter Butters here.”
“Bitches!”
“Spencer,” I admonish.
At the same time, Olivia nods in agreement and says, “Bitches. You be good now, Nutters.” She pats his head and he closes his eyes in the way dogs do when you find a really good spot on your path to ear-scratch doggy heaven.
“He will.” Spence throws his arms around her. For a stunned moment Olivia and I just stare at one another, and then he makes a beeline for the door. Nutters follows behind, his lead trailing along the ground. I give Liv one last semi-reproachful look and snatch up the dog’s lead as we push out into the parking lot.
***
Several long, tedious hours later, the bell rings. Nutters and Spence had been lying on the rug, cuddled up together, but the two of them jump up and race one another to the door.
“Spencer Mason, what did I tell you about runnin’ around on the leg?”
“To not to,” he replies. Nutters parks in front of the door, barking at the person on the other side.
I check my reflection in the hall mirror again and give up on trying to look nice for him. Thanks to a completely off afternoon in the kitchen making Jake’s favorites, I wound up falling asleep because it was so quiet with Spence and Nutters chilling on the floor.
“Jake,” Spence shouts, as if he’s surprised to see him. He and Nutters rush forward and Jake and Nuke are swallowed up by affection from the two of them. He gives me that same pleasantly astonished look that Olivia had earlier today, and I just shrug. My son didn’t like to be touched, and yet here he is hugging not one, but two people in one day. Spencer darts off to the living room and Nutters follows.
“Hey.” Jake offers up a warm smile.
“Hi,” I say, grinning back. I’m sure I look like a loon.
“Smells good in here.” He reaches out to touch my cheek, gently brushing his thumb over my skin. I let out a strangled gasp. “You had a little flour on your cheek there.” Jake moves past me, into the living room, while I’m left standing in the hallway wondering if that tightening in my lady parts was actually my ovaries fist bumping one another.
“Alright, boys, you two ready for boot camp?” Jake says, as I follow them into the living room.
Spence raises his hand to his forehead in a spirited salute. “Sir. Yes, sir.”
“March,” Jake commands pointing to the backyard. Spence speeds away as fast as his little legs can carry him, out the door and into the yard, followed closely by Nutters. Nuke stays by Jake’s side, and I wonder if he’s picking up the awkward tension between us.
“You coming?”
Not yet, but give me time.
“Er . . . yeah, of course.” I stumble over my words and the corner of Jake’s mouth turns up just a fraction of an inch. I follow them onto the back deck, staring at Jake’s ass the whole time. Then I take a seat and watch, Nuke stretched out at my feet. Jake demonstrates all of the hand signals and Spencer studies the movements like a hawk. My boy is a quick study, always has been, and soon he asks Jake for more signals, more information, more everything. He’s like a little sponge, soaking it all up, and I know I made the right decision.
After Jake announces that they’re done for the day, I head inside and grab some cookies from the bench and place them on the table. I’m bending over at the fridge, pulling the pitcher of iced tea from the top shelf, when his conversation with Spence comes to an abrupt halt. When I turn, his eyes are dark and hooded and the bulge in the front of his jeans is more pronounced. I swear I flush from the tips of my toes to the roots of my hair. I glance away and move by him, but I swear I feel his predatory gaze follow me all the way to my seat.
Spencer drains his milk in three seconds flat and hands Nutters a couple of cookies under the table when he thinks I can’t see. Jake does the same with Nuke, and just this once I let them both get away with it because I figure it’s a special treat on a special day.
After a while, Spence and Nutters head for the lounge room floor again, and Jake and I are left alone. With the exception of Nuke, who sits on the floor beside his owner. He burrows his head into Jake’s lap, and Jake absentmindedly rubs his ears.
“You feelin’ alright?” I nod to the dog’s head in his lap.
“It makes me uneasy, being here, being this close but unable to touch you.” He traces his fingers over my forearm as it’s resting on the table and pulls me towards him. “Have dinner with me.”
I shake my head, wincing at how those words from his lips smart. I want to. God, do I want to say yes to this man, but my head tells me no, and my heart can’t be trusted.
His smile fades, and I gently pull my hand from his grasp. Taking the pitcher of iced tea, I put it back in the fridge and close the door. Jake brings the glasses into the kitchen, and I take them from him and rinse them out in the sink.
Big arms wrap around my waist as he draws me against him.
I gasp in surprise. “What are you doing?”
“I know why you keep runnin’ from me, but I also know it’s pointless,” he murmurs against the shell of my ear. “Eventually I’m gonna wear you down, angel. One thing the military taught me is to never give up. So I’m giving you fair warnin’—you best be prepared to wave that white flag of yours because I ain’t giving up, I ain’t goin’ away, and I ain’t gonna let you slip through my fingers again.” His hand slips lower, grazing my stomach and heading south. I arch back into him and close my eyes as his erection grinds against my ass. “You wanna play hard to get now, that’s fine, but either way you’ll be surrendering to me before long.”
I don’t have a response for that, but it don’t seem as if he needs one. Jake’s heat leaves my back, and the rush of cold air that takes his place has me mourning his departure.
“Same time tomorrow, buddy?” he says to Spence out in the other room.
“You bet,” Spence says. I sag against the sink, wondering how I’m supposed to make it through the day without going to find him. I’m sad and I’m spent, but mostly I’m tired of fighting. Jake’s right. He will wear me down, and we both know it.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Ellie
I can’t believe I am doing this. It’d taken Jake two days to convince me to let him take me to dinner, and I’m so mad at myself for not holdin’ out longer, but I just couldn’t keep saying no to him.
I check my hair for the third time this evening and smile at my reflection, making sure I have no lipstick on my teeth. I don’t normally wear such a bold color, preferring instead to choose tinted lip balms and my rosebud salve. This shocking red pushed my comfort zone light years away and then some. It also made me paranoid that I’d spend the entire night licking crimson from my teeth.
“I can’t do this,” I say to myself, but Olivia—as usual, with the worst timing ever— stands in my doorway with Spence and Nutters.
“Of course you can.”
“I look like a whor . . .” I glance at Spence and change my choice of words. “A woman who sweats in church in this lipstick. And do you think my hair is too big?”
“Girl, if there’s one thing my mamma taught me, it’s that a southern belle’s hair can never, ever be too big.”
I frown, leaning in to separate a couple of lashes that have merged into one heavily mascaraed clump. “Didn’t your mamma also die from lung cancer without ever havin’ smoked a cigarette a day in her life?”
Olivia waves me away. “Hush now, no one could prove it’d been from all those years ingesting hairspray.”
“I think you look like an angel,” Spencer says.
I smile at my boy and mimic pinching his cheeks. I don’t really touch him of course. “Spencer Mason, I could kiss you right now.” He scrunches up his nose and makes a gagging sound. I turn to Olivia. “You have my number?” She glares at me. “And you have Jake’s number?”
“And I have the number for Shux, and if that don’t work, I can call any number of people to come help me out of a bind. Or I could just put Spence in the car and come get you myself.”
“And Nutters,” Spence says, tugging on Olivia’s shirt sleeve.
“And Nutters,” she agrees, and turns her attention back to me. “Will you stop worrying please?”
“I’m sorry, I’m just—”
“A nervous wreck?” Olivia finishes.
Spencer pulls at the hem of my dress. “You wanna take one of my travel puke bags?”
I laugh and squat down to his level. “I think I’m gonna be okay. Mamma’s gonna be brave.”
Surprisingly, he reaches out his little hand and tucks my hair behind my ear. “Thatta girl.”
***
Dinner is at Shux on the Pier—not the finest restaurant in Fairhope, but it does have the best view of Mobile Bay and it serves the best crawfish balls in town. We talk a little about Spencer and Nutters, about Nuke and how Jake wound up working at the shelter, and how he’s attending AA meetings and a veterans help group for PTSD survivors. We mostly stick to safe topics—with the exception of his PTSD—and we pretend that there isn’t this huge thing between us, this doubt and self-loathing an
d hurt that buzzes at the edges of our calm little bubble. It’s nice, but it isn’t real. It feels very much like we’re playing house and not for the first time tonight, I wonder whether this is such a good idea.
After dinner, we buy ice cream from a lone vendor and walk along the pier. Summer is all but gone, but there’s still a bit of Alabama warmth digging its heels in. For the most part though, the on season is coming to a close, and we only pass a fisherman casting off of the pier and the odd elderly couple out for an evening stroll.
Jake sits on a bench at the end of the pier, and I take a seat beside him and look out at the moonlight on the water. I can feel his eyes on me and when I turn to face him, Jake lightly runs the back of his fingers over my cheek.
I pull away. “What are you doing?”
He sighs. “Why do you keep fighting me, Elle?”
“Jake . . .” I stare at him, wondering how to answer him truthfully.
“No, I know I put you through hell,” he whispers in that whiskey rough voice. “I don’t exactly have the best track record when it comes to stability, and I understand that’s what you need right now, for you and for Spence, but I won’t ever hurt you like that again.”
“You say that now—”
“And I mean it, every damn word. Come home with me,” he says, and though the words are gruff, there’s an unmistakable vulnerability in them too.
“I should get home to Spencer so Olivia can—”
“Goddamn it, angel.” He raises his face to the sky and puffs out a heavy breath through his cheeks.
I shake my head. “You and me we go back and forth so often I’m afraid it’s gonna give us both whiplash. It’s never-ending with us, and I know you’re getting help, you’re a different man than you were two months ago. I see that, but if I’m being honest with you, Jake, I don’t know if I can go through that all over again.”
Toward the Sound of Chaos Page 22
