Page 36 of Summer Ride

Over the past few years, she’d tried to convince him to take payment for his services. Whenever she had cut him a check, he’d handed it right back to her and told her to spend it on the animals.

It was hard to take money from a place that never seemed to have enough to do all the wonderful things they needed to. There were always animals in need.

“Where do you need me?” he asked as he glanced around. He could already see the new horses and three cattle grazing in the pasture with the rest of the animals.

“Over here.” Leslie motioned towards the large building that housed all the dogs. “We’re doing baths and shots this morning. After, we’ll assess each one for health and adoptability. They’ll need to be in quarantine for a while, but we’re hoping to get them placed as quickly as possible.”

He followed her into the massive climate-controlled building. Kennels filled the entire space now, each one housing at least three small dogs.

There were six other employees already working over at the washing stations.

He knew that he’d be put in charge of giving the animals their shots, so he moved over to the small medical room near the side of the building. There were already a few kennels with dogs waiting for him, so he jumped right into it.

By lunchtime, his back hurt and he had a few new scratches on his arms thanks to a particularly feisty older male chihuahua, whose toenails had been in desperate need of clipping. He hadn’t been able to walk or stand very well.

Leslie joined him in clipping or sanding down each animal’s nails when she came in to check on his progress.

Pizza was delivered and all of the staff and volunteers sat under a large tree to eat together.

When he’d first started volunteering at the sanctuary, back when he’d been a teenager, there had been only a handful of locals working there. Then the sanctuary was featured in an article in the local paper and a flood of others started lending a hand.

Now there were almost a hundred people who helped out each month. Some were daily helpers while others only worked when they needed the extra hands, like today.

During his break, he sent a text message to Kara with a few images that he’d taken of the smaller dogs, particularly ones he’d seen her gushing over or playing with the day before.

One was a black and white chihuahua puppy who was no older than three weeks. The little girl hadn’t been doing so good yesterday, and Kara had spent most of her time snuggling the thing. She’d been found in a small kennel with her three siblings and her mother, who had all passed away by the time they’d been discovered.

The little girl was doing so much better now. She was no longer dehydrated and had latched onto another mother dog who had lost a few of her newborns.

Kara’s reply came back immediately. “I wish she could be mine.”

He smiled. “Say the word,” he replied.

Her next reply took a little longer.

“I’m not sure we’re ready for kids just yet.”

He laughed. “She has to be in quarantine for at least a month.”

“Then we have time to discuss it, later. Gotta get back to work.”

“Love you. See you later. I’ll make dinner.”

“Okay.”

He knew she wasn’t ready to admit her feelings for him. They were obvious though. There was no doubt in his mind that she loved him.

With what she’d admitted about her past, it was no wonder she was leery of showing her feelings. But he had the patience and all the time in the world to get her to see the way she felt about him.

He’d just have to keep working on her, proving to her that he was the man she was destined to be with. The one that would do anything in the world to protect her and love her till their dying days.

For the remainder of the day, his mind was filled with Kara. Of their future together.

When she’d finally opened up about her past, her real one, he’d been shocked, angry, and a little hurt that she had believed she had to keep the truth from him. Then he’d thought about it from a different angle.

He knew that his mother, a woman he’d looked up to all his life, had been married prior to meeting his father. She had only been married to her first husband for three years. All that Carter knew about the man was that he had been in the Navy during their brief marriage and that he had been extremely abusive towards his mother.

His mother had finally left the relationship after she’d ended up in the emergency room after a bad fight with a broken arm.