In hindsight, the leg had been a mistake, because when Garbage Disposal made contact, she went flying backward, plunging into the frigid Pacific waters. The seventh wave in the set, which surfers claim is the biggest and most powerful, began to curl at the shoreline—taunting her with its whitecapped speed. Teagan had just enough time to block her face when it crashed down on her.
Not prepared for a saltwater neti pot cleansing, or the abject terror it triggered, Teagan held her breath until her lungs burned. She clawed at the sea floor, but the sand slipped through her fingers, giving her little traction.
When she figured out up from down, she was able to stand and stagger closer to shore until another wave hit, this one smaller, but still carrying enough kick to knock her forward. Better than backward. She was distracted by a face full of water and found herself on the losing end of some undertow, which caused her to lose serious ground.
Garbage Disposal, mistaking drowning for playtime, leapt, his big paws on her chest, his tongue licking her from chin to hairline.
“Stop.” He didn’t stop. “Down.” He laid down on her. “Off.”
That seemed to be a command he remembered because he backed away. Teagan got to her feet, only to find herself wading in hip-deep water, struggling for balance as the surf continued to roll in. She was preparing herself to be dragged out to sea, where she’d die the horrible death of her recurring nightmare, when two large hands gripped her arms and pulled her to safety.
“You okay?” her rescuer asked.
She held up a finger. “I need a minute.”
Bent at the waist, she coughed and trembled as her savior held her steady. The water swirled around their feet, barely touching their calves.
After she caught her breath, she glanced around. “My dog!”
“I thought he didn’t belong to you.”
Teagan went still. Beside her, emitting testosterone and Prince Charming vibes, stood Colin. His sun-soaked brown hair was a little wild, the ends blowing in the wind.
He was sporting mirrored sunglasses, navy-blue board shorts, and bare feet—all of which were dripping wet. Besides his dry hoodie, he looked as if he’d just come in from windsurfing. Something he’d done every summer morning when they’d dated.
Teagan met his gaze, soft with concern, and felt herself still trembling from the near miss with the rumbling tide. The past mixed with the present and she found herself wanting to hug him and run home and hide under the covers all at the same time. Embarrassingly, she started to cry. No sounds or actual tears, just a few sniffles.
But she was okay. She looked around to find herself on blessedly solid ground. Her hair was plastered to her face, her pajamas soaked, and her flip-flops were somewhere between Carmel and Mexico but she hadn’t died. She wasn’t at the bottom of some oceanic trench choking on seaweed and saltwater.
It had been a long time since she’d gone into the ocean. And, if it were up to her, it would be the last.
She looked at Garbage Disposal, who was staring up at her as if she were his favorite toy ever. “I’ve come to terms with it. The whole lost puppy thing wore me down.”
“You have a knack for attracting devoted strays,” he said, looking like a safe, calm buoy in the middle of the tsunami of troubles that had become her life. He might have been one of those strays when they were younger, but there was no mistaking the fact that these days, Dr. West was a competent, capable—unflappable—man who’d made himself a happy home.
She was still desperately trying to make her house a real home. For her girls and herself.
“My sister would disagree with your assessment.”
It wasn’t that Teagan didn’t want to spend time with Harley. She loved her sister with the fierceness of a thousand suns. At one point in their childhood, very early on, they were each all the other had—they’d been each other’s entire world—then the divorce happened and they’d been ripped apart. That was a long time ago—one time in her life that didn’t remind Teagan of failed promises and heart-shattering disappointments.
Harley was sweet and genuine—she didn’t have a judgy bone in her body. Her heart was too big for that. Trusting her to follow through, though? That was like playing Trust Me If You Can Roulette, and Teagan wasn’t willing to bet her kids’ happiness on what was, at best, a total and complete crapshoot. She didn’t want to open her home and her girls’ hearts to someone who had a hard time sticking.
Harley wouldn’t mean to hurt anyone, and she’d be genuinely sorry, but in the end she’d wind up making promises she couldn’t keep. Teagan knew what abandonment could do to a person. She didn’t want that for her girls. Which was why she was gun-shy about allowing Harley, or their dad, into their lives for any extended period of time.
The occasional Christmas card or birthday call was enough for Teagan to keep tabs on her sister without setting herself up for a hurricane of heartache.
Wanting some attention, Garbage Disposal shoved his big head between her and Colin. Once he’d put enough space between them, he shook. Droplets of water and sand flung all over the two humans. The dog looked proud of his accomplishment.
“Come on, GD,” she said. “At least apologize.”
Arf! Arf!
“GD?” Colin asked.
“He came with the name Garbage Disposal—I’m assuming because he’ll eat anything. But GD is more kid appropriate than me yelling ‘God Dammit’ every time he does a nosedive into the garbage can or decides my wooden rolling pin is a new delicacy.”
“You’re shivering. Here.” Before she could decline his gentlemanly offer, he pulled the sweatshirt over his head—one-handed in a very masculine way—leaving him bare chested and her speechless.
