Protecting Her: A Romance Bundle

by Mia Ford

  They weren’t dreams.

  They weren’t even nightmares.

  They were my reality.

  As I did for the first eighteen years of my life, I woke up curled into a defensive ball facing the bedroom door. I always woke up like this when I slept in this room, curled into a tight ball to ward off the blows that came in my dreams, regardless of how I went to sleep. Some mornings I woke up stiff and sore because my muscles were so tight. I’d have to literally roll out of the bed, lay on the floor, and stretch out my limbs before getting up and getting ready for school.

  I startled myself awake, though I couldn’t remember what I’d been dreaming. I sat up and looked around for a moment, trying to remember where I was and why I was there. I rubbed the sleep from my eyes and stared at the Dallas Cowboys poster on the wall next to the door, a young Tony Romo raring back to throw another touchdown bomb. There was another poster of Jason Witten diving over the pile to make the winning score. The Cowboys were my solace back then. I could get lost in the game, pretending to be Tony Romo as I went into the huddle with my high school team. It was the only thing I looked forward to … well… other than spending time with Annabel. But I royally fucked that up, so… yeah…

  I rolled off the bed and stood with my back straight, stretching my arms toward the ceiling. It was hot in the old house. The air conditioner was ancient and had barely worked ten years ago. Great, just something else that would have to be taken care of if I wanted to get the place sold. Maybe I’d find someone who wanted to just buy the place cheap “as is” and flip it. If not, I was gonna have to sink a ton of money in it to get it up to snuff. I knew there was no big inheritance coming my way. Uncle Seth told me mom had a burial policy that would cover those costs, but there was no life insurance or savings to pass on. Fortunately, the house was paid for, so maybe I’d make a few bucks. Honestly, I didn’t give a rat’s ass what happened to the place. Like I told Uncle Seth, I could set fire to the place and walk away humming, get on a plane back to Afghanistan, and sleep like a motherfucking baby on the flight home.

  I opened the bedroom door and stood still for a moment, listening. In my head, I could hear my old man yelling at my mother in the kitchen. I could hear her struggling to pacify him. I could hear him yelling my name. I shook the memories away and started down the hall.

  Kenny’s room was next to mine. I stopped at the door and pushed it open. I waved away the cloud of hot air and dust that boiled out, then stepped inside.

  Kenny’s room was exactly as it was the last night he had slept there more than ten years ago. He had the same bed, dresser, and desk setup that I did, only he had an old computer on the desk that dad bought him so he could play video games and get on the internet. I remembered the night dad brought it home and proudly presented it to him. Kenny beamed and asked me to help him set it up. I didn’t bother asking why I didn’t get a computer. I already knew the answer to that one.

  Kenny was a Cowboys fan, too. His wall was covered in posters, along with framed certificates he’d gotten from school because he was so smart. Beta Club, History Club, Chess Tournament, Spelling Bee, Math Olympics… Kenny was smart. Way smarter than me. I studied them for a moment, then turned away with tears in my eyes.

  Poor Kenny.

  Smartest kid in school.

  Loved by all.

  His father’s favorite son.

  Dead because of me.

  I quietly left the room and closed the door behind me.

  Kenny’s death was the one true regret I would never be free of because it was my fault. If there really was a God I would be dead and Kenny would be alive. I would have traded places with him right then and there if I could have. But as my Uncle Seth would say, “If people in hell were granted wishes they’d all be drinking ice water.”

  “Yes, I want her cremated.”

  The skinny man in the dark suit sitting on the other side of the funeral home desk frowned again and held out the burial policy he’d been showing me for the past fifteen minutes. “But, Mr. Mavic— “

  “Captain Mavic,” I shot back. “Mr. Mavic was my old man.”

  He kept frowning as his eyes grazed across my shoulders as if he was looking for some indication of rank on my black t-shirt. I guessed he was used to dealing with grieving families and assholes like me. He cleared his throat and forced a smile. His teeth were the color of ash.

  “Yes, well, Captain Mavic, your mother had a policy that covers a casket, flowers, service and burial.” He held up the piece of paper again and tapped a skinny finger to my mother’s chicken scratch signature at the bottom. “Everything is paid in full. All you have to do is pick out a casket within the policy range, the spray of flowers, the headstone, and we’ll do the rest.”

  “I want her cremated,” I said again.

  “Well, yes, I know you keep saying that, but…”

  I held up a hand and his mouth snapped closed. I leaned into the desk and narrowed my eyes at him. He leaned back in the chair as if the weight of my gaze was pushing him. “How much did my mother pay for that policy you’re holding in your hand?”

  His Adam’s apple bobbed as he fiddled with the policy. “Well, let’s see… the total investment… was two-thousand-five-hundred dollars.”

  “And how much do you charge just to cremate a body and dispose of it?”

  “Well, that’s around two hundred dollars.”

  “So, if you do what I’m asking you to do, you’re twenty-three hundred dollars to the good.”

  His tongue darted across his thin lips like a snake testing the air for the scent of something to eat. “Well, yes, but we do not offer refunds on burial policies, Mr.— er— Captain Mavic.”

  “I’m not asking for a refund,” I said, putting my palms on his desk to push myself out of the chair. “I’m telling you to cremate the body and do away with the ashes. You can keep what you’ve been paid.”

  “Oh… well… yes, then that’s not a problem.” He opened the desk drawer and took out another form and slid it across the desk and held out a pen. “If you’ll just sign here I’ll get that taken care of today.”

  I signed the form and handed back the pen. As I started for the door, he cleared his throat yet again and held up a stiff finger.

  “Captain Mavic, don’t you want to at least see your mother’s body?”

  I paused at the door for a moment with my hand on the knob. Without turning around, I shook my head, opened the door, and left him sitting there with his mouth hanging open and a tidy profit in his pocket

  Uncle Seth called just as I got back into the car. I tapped the phone and Uncle Seth’s voice came through the speakers.

  “Hey, Shane, how are you feeling today?” he asked.

  “Better,” I said, putting on my sunglasses and leaning my head back against the rest. “Thanks for asking. What’s up?”

  “Wilma wants to know if you’d like to come to dinner tonight? She’s making a pot roast.”

  “Tell Wilma thanks, but I’m really not up to socializing. Maybe tomorrow or this weekend if she’s willing to give me a raincheck.”

  “Okay, that’s fine,” he said. “She’s also onboard for the yard sale. She said she can come up first thing Monday to start sorting through.”

  “Good, I appreciate that. You want the car and the truck?”

  “Dang, Seth, don’t you want to try and sell them?”

  “Nope. I just need them gone.”

  “Okay, I’ll try to get them out of your way this weekend.” I heard him sigh. His voice went down a notch. “Have you had a chance to talk to the funeral home yet?”

  “Just leaving there now,” I said as I started the car and pulled through the lot. “They are going to cremate her and dispose of the ashes.”

  “You sure you don’t want a service and burial?”

  “Positive.”

  “Okay, well, it’s your call.”

  “Yes, sir, it is.”

  “Oh, Wilma says don’t forget to deal with
your mama’s dog. I reckon Doc Bates’ office called here today asking what they should do with it. They need you to pick it up before five today if you can.”

  “Fuck,” I sighed. “Okay, I’ll go there now.”

  “Okay, son, sounds good. I’ll let Wilma know about dinner.”

  “Thanks, Uncle Seth,” I said. “I appreciate it.”

  I hung up the phone knowing that I would never go to Uncle Seth and Aunt Wilma’s for dinner. They were both decent people and they meant well, but they knew my old man beat the shit out of me growing up and never lifted a finger to get me the fuck out of there. They were no more family to me than the man in the moon.

  I settled back and turned onto South Street. The vet’s office was just a few miles away. I remembered the location because Annabel used to drag me there to pet the dogs that were up for adoption every Saturday afternoon. Annabel loved dogs and cats. I always figured she’d end up working with them somehow, maybe become a dog walker or a groomer.

  I hated to do it, but I was thinking I’d just have them put my mother’s dog down. It was probably an old mutt anyway, and I couldn’t take it with me. And God knows I didn’t want any part of anything that reminded me of her. I felt bad for the dog. It was just another victim left in the wake of Shane Mavic’s shitty life.

  11

  Annabel

  I had just finished giving Bootsie, the two-hundred-pound Mastiff, her annual shots and settled into my dinky little office to grab a Diet Coke and a protein bar for a late lunch when I heard the bell over the front door tinkle. That wasn’t unusual. As the only vet in town the bell tinkled constantly, so much so on some days that I’d threatened to rip the damn thing from its hanger. Then I remembered what old Doc Anderson once told me, “Every time that bell rings it’s money in the bank.”

  To which I wisecracked, referring to the old movie, It’s A Wonderful Life, “Kind of like every time a bell rings an angel gets its wings?”

  The old man rolled his eyes at me and shook his head. “Just try paying the light bill with angel’s wings.”

  I took a deep breath and rubbed the tiredness from my eyes as I munched on the protein bar, which tasted a little like cardboard that had been dipped in unsweetened chocolate. I glanced at the clock on the wall. It was nearly three and I hadn’t eaten since breakfast. No wonder my stomach was growling like a starving wolf. And my day wasn’t even close to being over.

  It was a Friday, which meant we were open until seven to give folks time to pick up the dogs we “doggy daycared” during the week to make room for dogs that needed overnight boarding over the weekend. Mine was the only boarding facility in town and I could charge twenty bucks per dog per night. Multiply that times the ten boarding pens and I could rake in four to six-hundred bucks over the weekend. That would cover my light bill and then some. It was good money I couldn’t turn down. Plus, since I lived right upstairs it was not a big deal for me to come down to feed and water the boarders and let them out to run in the fenced-in play area a few times a day. It wasn’t like I had anything else to do—not like I had a life or anything.

  I had popped the rest of the protein bar into my mouth and was washing it down with the water when I heard the voice of the man who had come in the door. My office was right off the lobby so I could hear everything that went on out front. I leaned forward in my chair and sat perfectly still for a moment, waiting for him to speak again. I literally froze at the sound of his voice, like a ghost from the past echoing in my ear. At first, I didn’t recognize it. It was a voice I’d heard before, but far back in my distant memory, like a whisper rumbling through a canyon in the middle of the night. Then it hit me. I knew who was standing in the lobby, but I could barely believe it.

  I heard Wendy, the receptionist, ask, “What’s the name of your pet, sir?”

  “Biscuit, and she’s not my pet,” he said, his voice deep and husky, much deeper than I remembered. “She was Irene Mavic’s dog. Irene is dead, so I need to make some kind of arrangements for the care of the dog until I can find it a home.”

  “Yes, sir, just let me pull that paperwork.”

  I slowly got out of my chair and tiptoed quietly to the door. I held my breath and peered around the door frame. There he was, standing with his hands in his pockets, perusing the various dog and cat toys hanging on the wall. He was huge now, all muscle packed onto his tall frame. It had been over ten years since I had last seen him, climbing on that Greyhound bus headed for Navy boot camp.

  When he turned and our eyes met, there was no doubt who he was.

  Shane Mavic—my Shane Mavic— had finally come home.

  Shane frowned at me for a moment, like he thought his eyes were playing tricks on him. His skin was too naturally dark to drain of color, but I could tell he thought he was seeing a ghost. Then a smile slowly broke across his lips.

  “Annabel? Is that you?”

  “It’s me,” I said, taking a deep breath before coming out of my office with my hands outstretched in front of me like a blind man feeling his way across an empty room. Shane took my hands, then pulled me in for a bear hug. His muscular arms closed around me like a warm blanket. My cheek instinctively pressed to his chest. My arms went around his thick back and squeezed. I listened for his heartbeat. There it was… soft but strong in my ear. It made me smile. Reluctantly, I pulled back and gazed up into his eyes.

  Shane glanced down at my white jacket and nametag. He gave me a sideways look and smiled. “Wait a minute… You’re the vet?”

  “I am,” I said proudly, tugging down the tail of my jacket like a little girl giving him a curtsy. “Dr. Annabel Lee Bates, at your service.”

  A look of confusion clouded his dark eyes. Was he disappointed that I had taken someone else’s name? It was silly, but I certainly hoped so.

  He asked, “Bates?”

  “Yeah, I sort of got married and divorced while you were gone,” I said, shrugging it off as if I was just explaining a stupid stunt that had gone wrong. “Randall Bates. Not sure if you remember him from high school.”

  His eyes told me he did, but he shook his head and forced a smile. His teeth gritted. Shane and Randall hated each other in school. Randall was a year younger and always trying to get the varsity coach to put him in when Shane’s passing wasn’t up to snuff, which rarely happened even though his back and ribs were usually covered in bruises.

  He quickly put Randall out of his mind and took my hands and held them out to look at me. “Wow, you look… amazing,” he said. “I remember you loved animals, but I had no idea you were interested in becoming a vet.”

  “Yeah, well, neither did I until halfway through med school,” I said, smiling at him, rolling my eyes like an idiot. I let go of his hands and shoved my hands into my jacket pockets so he wouldn’t see them shaking. “So, what are you doing home… Oh shit… your mom… Shane, I’m so sorry.”

  “Thanks, it’s okay,” he said, his round shoulders going up and down. “I’m just here to get her house sold and then get back to work.” He had black tribal tattoos coming down his thick biceps from inside his tight shirt sleeves. I wondered if they went across his shoulders and back. I wondered if he’d let me see them if I asked. I wondered if he’d let me touch them, lick them…

  He was even more handsome than the last time I saw him all those years ago. Just a cute boy then, he was now an amazing looking man. His dark hair was buzzed short. His face was tanned like dark honey, but his eyes were soft and brown and his smile warm and inviting. He had packed on the muscle. His chest and shoulders and biceps looked like they were about to burst from the tight black t-shirt. He had on a pair of tight jeans and worn cowboy boots. I couldn’t help but glance at the bulge going down his right thigh.

  “Work?” I forced my eyes to focus on his face. “What kind of work?”

  “I’m still in the Navy,” he said, holding out his left bicep and tugging up the sleeve to show me the large tattoo of an eagle perched on a ship’s anchor holding a trident and an
old timey pistol in its talons. “Captain Shane Mavic, US Navy SEALS. At your service, ma’am.”

  “Wow, look at you,” I said, slapping at his arm like a flirty teenager. It was like hitting a boulder. “I thought you hated the water.”

  “I did,” he said with a smile that made my heart flutter. “Still do. But I have learned to deal with it.”

  “Wow,” I said again, because I couldn’t think of a better word. “So, you’re here to pick up your mother’s dog?”

  “Actually, I was hoping you could just keep it and do something with it,” he said, making it sound like he was asking me to take out the trash. “I’m not really a dog lover and I can’t take it back to Iraq, so—”

  “Here you go, Mr. Mavic!”

  Shane looked up just as Wendy shoved the little white Maltese in his arms. Biscuit immediately climbed his round chest, making her way to his face so she could lick his chin. Shane grabbed her around the middle and held her out like she was a baby with a dirty diaper.

  “Oh my god, Shane, she’s not going to bite you,” I said, giggling at him. I took Biscuit and cuddled her to my chest. The six-pound Maltese wouldn’t take her eyes off Shane. Her tail wagged to beat the band as if she could sense that he was the son of her beloved mistress.

  “Like I said, I’m not much of a dog lover,” he said, wiping dog spit off his chin with the back of his hand. He gave me a pleading look. “Can you find her a home? I mean, I’ll pay for her boarding and food until you do.”

  “Wendy, do we have anyone looking to adopt a small dog?” I asked.

  “Not that I know of,” Wendy said, her eyes bouncing between me and Shane. I could hear the gossip gears turning in her head. “And I’m afraid we can’t keep her in boarding because we are fully booked this weekend.” She looked at Shane and sighed. “You’ll have to take care of her until Monday.”

  “What?” Shane looked like he was about to argue, but then blew out a long breath and started to nod. “Okay, um, exactly how do I do that?”