Page 11 of Rescued By the Dog Trainer

"You're steady."

"When you're at thirty thousand feet, and the flight surgeon is managing three compromised airways, the flight nurse closes the skin. I've placed dozens of these in turbulence over the Atlantic." I toss the empty packet into the kit.

"Calhoun expects excellence from everyone on this mountain." Jason turns back from the lodge door where Wyatt and Chief vanished. "Praise comes hard to him."

"He seems clear enough." I zip the first-aid kit shut.

"Your hands didn't hesitate." Jason steps closer, his gaze searching my face. "When there's blood on the deck, you don't posture. So why do you hide behind rank when you give Juno a command?"

"Control." I hold his gaze, keeping my guard up. "In a C-17 cabin, the engines are deafening. You have to project; you have to dominate the noise, or panic takes the room."

"Control is for people who are afraid of the landing." He steps closer, his broad frame blocking the wind from my face. "There are no engines here, Major."

His words land with ruthless truth, stripping away my defense. Cold air fills my lungs, sharp and dry. I keep my jaw locked, stepping back toward the paddock rail to coil Juno's lead before he can see the impact of his words in my eyes.

He's right. The flight engine memory is still there, roaring in the cold.

The rest of the day grinds past in relentless shifts of snow and labor. Up at the lodge clinic, Wyatt checks Chief's wound, wrapping the shoulder with flexible vet tape while Griff sits beside the exam table to anchor his dog.

Out in the paddock, the others push through the afternoon drills—Sarah working Tank through slow heel-and-halts along the west rail, Brody pacing Babe through crate transitions, and Danny standing with Buddy near the gate.

For six hours, I work Juno through line-of-sight drills, my shoulders aching as I try to drop the sharp edge from my voice.

Juno doesn't yield, but she stops pulling against the lead.

At five o'clock, the other trucks clear the shelter road, their tires crunching down the lane toward town. Mabel's Guest House is waiting for them with its warm radiators, Mabel's knowing gossip, and the quiet comfort of the guest rooms.

I stay behind. A full week of extra chores turned into nine days when Jason tacked on two extra penalty days, leaving me trapped on this mountain alone with the one man who sees right through me.

The snow falls thicker now, heavy flakes that cling to the pine branches and settle on the cedar posts. Twilight vanishes within ten minutes, replaced by a blue dark that eats the peak and the runs.

The lockup checklist has twelve points. I check the runs gates first, my boots sinking three inches into the fresh powder. Jason walks the other side of the row, his dark shadow moving parallel to mine behind the wire mesh.

We don't talk. The only sounds are the wind in the rafters and the dry rattle of the cedar gates as we latch them shut.

In the training barn, the cast-iron wood stove needs stoking before nightfall. I open the draft door, the orange light spilling out across the concrete floor like a line of blood. The heat hits my face, dry and resinous, but the barn's silence triggers heavy flight-deck memories, a tight pressure filling my chest.

I lean against the brick chimney, my head resting against the warm brick, my eyes closed.

From the main floor above, near the kennels, a sound rises.

It's a tune. Low and gravel-rough, hummed without words. The melody is a simple line. It climbs three notes, drops back to the root, and stays there, steady and quiet.

I freeze.

The shovel slips from my fingers, the metal clattering against the concrete. The sound is loud, but the humming doesn't stop. It continues, a harmonized whistle that matches the rhythm of the draft ticking in the iron stove.

I know that tune.

It's the song I hummed to the injured soldiers, airmen, and Marines clinging to life over the Atlantic. The tune my father hummed to me after my mother died, back when the darkness in my bedroom felt too large to sleep in.

He'd sit on the edge of the mattress and hum until the walls stopped closing in, telling me that nobody should have to be alone in the dark. I hummed it to keep strangers alive across endless hours of black ocean.

Two hundred and fourteen times.

My chest pulls tight, the skin over my ribs aching. I walk toward the stairs, my boots silent on the steps, the light from the doorway above casting my shadow back down the concrete.

Jason is laying a heavy canvas pad into one of the interior runs. He hums while he works, his hands smoothing the thick fleece blanket with a steady rhythm as Barnaby, his broad mastiff-boxer mix, watches him from the corner.