carter
Arden flies into the condo.Her hair is wild, eyes full of tears. She takes a look around the room, gauging who is here, but she’s far too distraught to care. She’s still dressed in her scrubs, her lunch bag clutched tightly in her palm. With a crazed look on her face, her eyes find mine.
“Are you okay?” Penny asks from the living room.
Arden swallows. “He’s gone.”
Nobody speaks.
I watch her carefully, but I already know what she’s talking about. We all do. Everyone in this room is on strict instruction to shut the fuck up right now. This is the kind of surprise she gets when she fails to tell me it was her birthday on the nineteenth of December, right after she lost her dad. She worked that night. I only know it was her birthday because Penny mentioned it to me when she and Lowesy got back from Canada, feeling bad that she hadn’t been aware either.
She turned twenty-nine and said nothing.
“Who?” I ask, rising to my feet.
Wyatt leans back in his chair, bringing his hand to hismouth to hide his smile. He better keep it together because I’m not letting him ruin this for me. This has been in the works for days, and it has to go off without a hitch.
“Wanton,” she says, her voice breaking. “I went to visit him after work. He’s gone. I didn’t get to say goodbye.”
I raise my brows. “He got adopted?”
She nods, bottom lip shaking. “I know I should be grateful. I should be ecstatic. I—I am. He deserves a home, but I wanted to say goodbye. I didn’t get to… I never even got to pet him.”
Boston stands casually, slowly making his way to my side. He’s on his phone, pressing buttons while he nods sympathetically. He’s very good at this whole nonchalant thing, it’s impressive.
Then there is Declan, who is staring at the ceiling with narrowed eyes like the colour white has suddenly become the most mesmerizing thing in the world to him. Very chalant. Outrageously chalant.
If Arden notices Boston’s approach, she doesn’t let on. She’s too in her head. Too heartbroken. It’s a helpless type of look. The face of someone who has already endured heartbreak after heartbreak, and this one just topped it all off. I take in her hopeless expression and am so fucking happy that this time, I can fix it for her. This one isn’t permanent.
“I just wanted to say goodbye, you know?” she whispers to me, shrugging as her bottom lip quivers.
Boston presses a few more buttons on the screen and then turns his phone to her. “Go on, then. Say goodbye. Or hello. Whatever you prefer.”
Arden’s brow furrows as she glances at the phone. When she catches a glimpse of familiar fur, she jumps forward, cupping the device in her hand like it’s made of plated gold. She squints at the screen, trying to make sure that what she’s seeing is real.
It is.
Sure enough, there he is, in all his grumpy glory. He’s lounging on a couch, stretched out like he pays rent, toes pointed outward on those back paws. The dude is full-on REM sleeping, tongue poking out of his mouth, looking more comfortable than he ever had in his prison cell.
“Wanton?” she breathes, and the dog's ears perk up. His head jolts upward, looking around the room.
“He can hear you,” Boston says with a nod. “The cameras have microphones.”
Tears pool in Arden’s eyes. She stares at the screen, pulling it closer to her face. “Hi, boy!”
Wanton looks around, confused. It warms my heart, even though I don’t have the same type of connection with the dog that Arden does. The dude paid his dues and wound up in the best possible home. He looks comfortable as all hell while he naps in Boston’s sun room.
You know how I know he won the lottery with his owner?
Boss had the room decorated and insulated for the dogs that he keeps at the farm.Justfor them. They’re allowed in the house, too. He doesn’t care where they roam, but most of the mutts he ends up with prefer solitude or work over people. They kept choosing that room time and time again.
So, he turned it into a penthouse for them.
“Where is he?” she asks, eyes darting up to look between us.
“My place,” Boston says with a little smile. She stares up at him with stars in her eyes, which I would typically fucking hate, but it’s permitted under the circumstances. Her eyes dip back down to the phone. “Forker pleaded a good case for the guy. I adopted him last night.”
“What?”she breathes. Her eyes snap to mine.
