Alden Brothers K9 | Alden K9 Foundation
My stomach squeezes. That does not sound like a stuffed animal company. I take a long sip of my coffee and pick up the phone. Might as well get this over with.
“Alden Brothers K9, what’s up?”
“Um,” I say, caught off guard at the casual greeting by whoever answered the phone. “Hello, this is Charlotte Brooks from Perfectly Planned. I’ve taken over the account for your upcoming event and I was hoping to schedule a quick meeting to go over the details.”
“Oh, yeah you’ll probably want my brother,” the voice on the phone says. “Most women do want him, actually,” he says with a snort. “Hold on a sec, I’ll go get him.”
I take a deep breath while I wait. And wait. And wait. Is this an actual professional nonprofit organization, or is it some kind of joke? Several minutes pass and then finally I hear, “Hello, this is Caleb. How can I help you?”
The voice is deeper than the first person I talked to. He sounds more mature, which is a good thing. I introduce myself again.
“Where’s Felony Melanie?” the deep voice says.
I can’t help but chuckle. “You call her that too?”
“That’s how she introduced herself,” he says. “Do you have a nickname as well?”
“No… I’m just Charlotte.”
“Well, Just Charlotte, why don’t you come up here today and I’ll get you up to speed on the event?”
“That sounds great,” I say, flipping through the extremely thin file on my desk. “Can we meet somewhere without dogs?”
“Are you allergic?”
“A little,” I say, because I don’t want to lie, but having an extreme fear is kind of like an allergy, right?
“Sure thing, I got you. See you soon.”
Alden Brothers K9 is located across town out in the middle of nowhere. There’s a fairly famous dirt bike track out here, too, I think. I don’t ride dirtbikes and I certainly don’t want to adopt a dog, so I never drive this far out of town where the buildings end and the road becomes two lanes with no sidewalk, and the land just stretches out as far as you can see. To my left: a farm with cows grazing. To my right: another farm. But there aren’t any cows on this side of the road.
I turn into the long driveway that has an old mailbox with faded numbers of the address on it. The numbers match, but there’s no sign indicating this is a business. Luckily, I also don’t see any dogs as I drive up the property. There’s a large white three story house to the right with several cars in the driveway. To the left is a couple of smaller buildings and a huge brown barn. I’m not exactly sure where to go, but I park my car in front of the first building and get out, looking for a welcome sign or some indication that I’m in the right place.
A dog barks. I flinch, spinning around. A massive dog runs toward me at full speed, barking every few seconds. It’s going to attack me! No, no, no, no.
I scramble backward, desperate to climb back in my car but the door is closed. I can’t get my fingers around the door handle. I can’t concentrate. The dog is getting closer. It’s going to hurt me. I scream.
chapter two
Caleb
“Nein!” Retired K9 Rex skids to a stop just a few feet in front of this terrified woman. She’s screaming and panicking, unable to open her car door. Rex’s tail wags as he looks to me for his next command. He’s hoping he’ll get to meet the new person and maybe get some ear scratches. Judging by her absolute panic, ear scratches look doubtful.
“Hey there,” I say, giving her a wave. “You must be my party planner.”
She turns around, her eyes wide with fear. “Why isn’t that dog on a leash?” Her breath is strained, her chest heaving as she draws in sharp breaths, trying to calm herself down. “I told you I was allergic!”
Allergies don’t tend to bother people when they’re outside, fairly far away from the dog. Something tells me she doesn’t exactly have an allergy, but maybe more of a fear.
“Sorry,” I say, pointing to my feet so Rex will fall in line. He sits with his back pressed to my leg. Rex doesn’t need a leash because he’s well-trained and he always behaves a lot better without one, but leashes aren’t always used because theykeep the dog restrained. Sometimes they’re used to keep people feeling safe and in control. This poor woman is clearly terrified of dogs, which makes me wonder why she’s even here. But it doesn’t matter. All of our dogs should be on leashes. We’re a real business with a new nonprofit on the property now. We need to do better. I need to do better.
I tug on the short blue leash around my shoulders and sheepishly clip it to Rex’s collar, feeling like an idiot, not like an experienced K9 handler and co-owner of a K9 foundation. “This is K9 Rex,” I say, gesturing to the four-year-old German Shepherd. “He’s very well trained. He won’t hurt you.”
“Any dog can hurt anyone,” she says, jaw rigid as she stares at Rex. I’m guessing she doesn’t know that sustained eye contact can serve as a form of aggression to dogs, but I’m not about to tell her and upset her even more.
“You are my new party planner, right?” I ask, remembering that she never technically answered my question. A woman from Perfectly Planned said she’d stop by this morning, and we’re not expecting anyone else. Well-dressed strangers don’t exactly stop by our part of the middle-of-nowhere very often. And a beautiful well-dressed stranger? Well, that’s never happened.
