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nstorm. She’d take it to his condo, leave it there, locking the door behind her. She wouldn’t be able to latch the dead bolt, but she knew the security code so she could reset the alarm.
Liking the plan, she put the key back in her purse and went to work.
* * *
The dog was still hanging on. Every day Braden had been making the half-hour trip from his hotel in L.A. to the veterinarian who had him. Dr. Laura Winslow was wonderful with the dog and with Braden, too. She let him come and go as he pleased, visiting the dog after hours when that was the only time Braden could make it there.
The animal had suffered a broken leg, which would heal, and damage to his liver, which might not. Laura had had to take him into surgery twice. They were now in wait-and-see mode.
Braden was footing the bill, of course, and in the meantime had put up flyers and asked all over the area to find the dog’s owner.
There didn’t appear to be one.
The dog was only about a year old, according to Laura. He’d had no collar, no identifying chip. He hadn’t been fixed.
He could have been a stray or, more likely, according to her, a pup someone had left behind when they’d moved. It happened more often than people realized, she told him over coffee one night.
He was sorry to hear that.
Mostly he just wanted Lucky to get better.
That’s what they were calling him. Laura needed a name for her records so the dog became Lucky Harris. Braden hoped to God the creature was lucky.
Laura called him on Monday afternoon, eight days after he’d brought Lucky into her clinic.
“Any luck finding Lucky’s owner?” she asked.
He was getting ready to go into a meeting downstairs in the conference room at his hotel. He’d arranged to use it as a temporary meeting site when the occasion arose. “Not yet,” he said as he walked down the hall toward the elevator.
“Have you thought about what you’re going to do with him if he recovers?”
He shrugged. He hadn’t thought about it. “I keep thinking his owner is going to turn up,” he said. “Let’s get him better first.”
He sure as hell couldn’t keep a dog. He lived in a hotel suite.
“I think we’re there.” Her words stopped him on the thick carpet. “His liver is functioning at full capacity. He’s up, eating. In my professional opinion he’s out of the woods.”
Holy hell. “You’re serious?” The dog was going to live?
Her affirmative made him grin.
* * *
Mallory left The Bouncing Ball the second the last child was out the door on Monday. She’d been checking on and off all day. Braden’s parking spot had been vacant for more than a week—and still was. Just to be sure, she called William, not to ask about Braden, which would be breaking protocol, but to make up some nonsense about needing the L.A. contractor’s number, which Braden had already given her. She told William she couldn’t get a hold of Braden, but not because she was no longer free to call him.
She and Braden hadn’t set forth a rule to govern her business contact within Braden Property Management. Would it still be him, so that tongues didn’t wag over the change, or would he pawn her off on William?
Either way, she’d abide by his choice.
“Yeah, he’s in a meeting this afternoon,” William said, his usual friendly self. “He’s got more tenants than he can use for the L.A. facility and he’s interviewing them all himself.”
So he was in L.A. She had her confirmation.
William gave her the number she already had. She thanked him, rang off and turned her car in the direction of Braden’s condo.
It took a second to find a spot in the visitor’s parking section and another few seconds to wait for the elevator. Watching the security camera as she stood there, she felt like a criminal.
She was trespassing.
