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When I eventually went home sometime after midnight my feet were dragging and my eyes were crossing with exhaustion. Even Sadie collapsed in her dog bed the second I opened the front door. I kicked off my shoes, shrugged out of my jacket and went into the bathroom to do my nightly routine. But when I looked in the mirror I was taken by surprise.
My green eyes widened as I looked at my reflection. My cheeks, normally pale, were rosy as though I’d spent the night flirting and blushing. Red hair that fell to the middle of my back was messy from repeatedly running my fingers through it and the small smattering of freckles across my nose looked the same as always. I wasn’t gorgeous and I wasn’t a supermodel. Rose was always telling me how much she wished she had my thick mane of hair and I thought she was insane. I was plain and as a youngster I’d always been told as much.
Except for Gran. She would spend hours brushing and braiding my hair. When she’d tuck me in at night she’d count the freckles on my nose and then kiss me on my forehead. Her favorite thing was to tell me I looked like some Irish princess that she used to read about. A princess that was stronger and more fierce than her male counterpart.
I missed her so much.
I snuggled into bed that night with the blanket up to my chin. Staring up at the ceiling, I was caught off guard by the fact that no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn’t get a certain blonde out of my head.
But I couldn’t help it. Logan was off saving people left and right and it made me wonder who was there when he needed saving?
Chapter 4
I was in the middle of applying a light coat of makeup before I left for work when there was a sharp knock on the door. Sadie was in the middle of shoving her face in her food bowl and stopped, cocking her head to the side and staring at the door like she could see through it. There was no bark and no growl which was unusual, and I found myself pulling the curtain back and glancing out the window.
“Logan?” I said when I opened the door. “Is Mac okay?”
He gave a bright smile and then stepped to the side revealing Mac, who was standing behind his leg. Logan gripped a black leash lightly and the floppy eared puppy yipped excitedly when he saw Sadie.
“I made him a jacket,” he said proudly and gestured to Mac. It was another flannel, this one black and gray. The sleeves were cut and the buttons went up over the small expanse of the puppy’s back. It looked like it was knotted down by his ass and it was wa
y too big, but he wasn’t shivering.
My heart beat a little faster at the small, sweet gesture and I was immediately caught off guard. My heart never beat like that.
I wasn’t the kind of woman whose heart skipped a beat when she saw a handsome man and I wasn’t the type to blush or giggle. I kept my head down, worked diligently and went home alone every night. Which was fine. But seeing that Logan embraced his own puppy fatherhood was chipping away at the armor I’d spent years building and it was putting me on edge. Throwing me off my game.
I didn’t like it.
“What are you doing here?” I asked harsher than necessary.
He tucked his free hand into the pocket of his black leather jacket and lifted one shoulder in a half shrug. “Driving you to work.”
What?
“My car works fine,” I said and backed into the house to finish getting my bag together. Lunch for both me and Sadie, phone charger, adoption applications that I had yet to look at. I was pretty much good to go and right on schedule, anticipating a slow day due to the fact that it was Wednesday.
Logan walked into the house and Mac pranced along behind him, jumping up towards Sadie, who sat back on her haunches and stared down at him. Mac collapsed in front of her and started chewing on her paw, uncaring to the fact that it wasn’t something he was actually supposed to be doing. In response, she hesitantly leaned her block head down and sniffed him before giving a swift lick to the healing wound on his head.
My dog reminded me of a little old lady in a four year old shepherd’s body. Sadie was a year old when I began working at Arden and had received zero adoption applications because all she did was lay down in her stall and stare numbly at people who tried to give her any attention. She, like Mac, was also a survivor of abuse and neglect, something that bled into her first few months at the farm. She wasn’t trained, tried to bite anyone who went into her stall, and had run off into the woods multiple times. Rose, Violet and I feared the worst, thinking that she would have to be euthanized if her behavior didn’t change. She would purposely knock her food dish over and try to bite me whenever I went in to clean it up. Overall, she was a pain in the ass and a headache.
But it was all a test.
A test to see if I’d beat her like her last owner did. A test to see if I’d pull her tail or raise my hand to her. A test to see if I’d give up on her like others did.
I didn’t.
The truth was I spent such a long time grieving the loss of Gran that I felt just as riled up and on edge as the dog that probably wanted to tear me to pieces. But there was something we both shared; a common loneliness when. I was parentless and so was she. After realizing our unlikely bond, I knew that I couldn’t give up on her. I had to fight for Sadie the way Gran fought for me.
Sadie pushed my buttons and would attack my shoes the second I tried to put a leash on her. She’d pull so hard that she would choke herself. She even had to be sedated when it was time to get her nails clipped. It was miserable trying to train her and one day, completely fed up, I went into her stall and sat my ass right down on her dog bed. She looked at me like I was out of my mind, growling and baring her teeth- which was absolutely terrifying- and slamming her paws down against the edge of the bed.
“I’m not giving up on you!” I’d practically yelled with tears in my eyes, frustrated.
Sadie, who spent months ruling Arden with her bad behavior, looked at me, blinked twice and then completely surprised me.
She’d edged forward, slid her paws out so she was laying down and then rested her chin on my knee. That was the first time I ever pet her and it was the first time I felt the bump of a raised scar on her head. She’d growled when I ran my fingers over it but she didn’t bare her teeth or try to bite me.
I knew that night that Sadie was going to come home with me. It would take lots of training before I could bring her home and I knew that she needed to completely trust me before either one of us were ready for a big commitment. But no one else was going to adopt her.
