Page 9 of Wag More Bark Less

As fun as this charade was, I was fucking dead on my feet. I had a mile of paperwork waiting for me inside before I could entertain crawling into bed, so I tried a different approach.

“Luke Mason.” I nodded toward my attached unit. “I live next door.”

“Oh.” Her gaze slowly followed my nod. “For the record, I didn’t try to break in either.”

“You weren’t here when I pulled in,” I pointed out, biting back a yawn.

“Because you took nine years to get here, and you didn’t reply to a single message. Ellie and I ran across the street. Walter was kind enough to let us in.”

The dog’s tail swished once against the pavement as she looked up at her mom then at the front porch, as though bored with the whole situation and ready to get inside already.

“Walter?”

Fuck, my new guest was already on a first-name basis with my neighbors. Maybe I should’ve pawned the break-in call off on Johnson after all. It was his turn to deal with Mrs. Wilcox anyway.

“He’s just the sweetest old man,” she said, her gaze following Walter as he turned the corner down the block and disappeared around the corner house. “He saved me from what could’ve been a very serious situation.”

“I had a call,” I explained, clearing my throat, feeling suddenly guilty. “I am on duty.”

“I can see that,” Maggie said, her gaze raking down my body, snagging on my gun belt, and no doubt at the handcuffs I kept above my right hip.

It didn’t matter that she was looking at me with disdain. A brief, unsolicited image of Maggie reaching for those cuffs, a seductive gleam in her eyes, made my throat suddenly dry. Fuck, it hadn’t been that long since . . .

Yes, it has.

I looked down at the dog again, noting that the leash clenched in Maggie’s hand was not attached to Ellie’s collar, and felt instant relief at the opportunity to redirect my thoughts.

“Why isn’t she wearing a leash?”

“She’s a very well-behaved dog,” Maggie countered, evading my question as she stroked Ellie’s head with gentle fingers. “As I’ve been trying to tell you.”

“If you’re walking her within city limits, she needs to be leashed. No exceptions.”

“Got it, Officer.”

“If she chews anything⁠—”

“She won’t,” Maggie shot back firmly. “As I’ve told you no less than ten times.”

“I hope you’re right.”

I should be nicer. I’d be stuck with the pair for a month. But I was still a little salty about the non-chewer certificate comment from earlier that suggested she didn’t take my concerns seriously. I kept the comment on the tip of my tongue as I took the steps to her unit two at a time.

As I reset the code, it occurred to me that I might have included an old code in the welcome instructions. I’d intended to double-check the message before it auto-sent last night, but there was a call about a drunk driver, and by the time I got home, the sun was up again. I didn’t even make it to my bed before I dropped like a lead weight onto the couch for the two whole hours of sleep I was lucky to get in.

“I just messaged you the new code,” I said, stepping back as Maggie and her pup approached. “Go ahead and try it.”

Wordlessly, Maggie entered the code, and the click of the lock disengaging echoed.

“Thank you, Officer.” When I hesitated, she added, “I can take it from here.”

I nearly corrected her, told her to call me Luke. But where the fuck would that get me? In a whole mess of trouble I didn’t need where a woman was concerned, that was where. The second I backed out of the driveway, I’d make a point of avoiding my guest for the duration of her stay. The less we interacted, the better for us both.

Yet, my boots seemed cemented to the porch, as though waiting for . . . more.

“Is there something else?” she asked, twisting the knob.

I scrubbed a hand over my head, watching Ellie trot inside to inspect her new digs, tail swishing lazily. I felt like an ass for making such a fuss about her. I could already tell she was a good girl. But hell if I was going to admit I was wrong about that.