AllFreeNovel
Share Us
From across the room, Tabitha caught Delaney’s eye. She had packed up her things but stopped to pet Humphrey before she left. As usual, the beagle didn’t flinch from her touch, soon rolled over and offered his belly. Tabitha felt the knots inside of her loosening as Delaney held her gaze. Delaney offered a soft, knowing smile.
“I’ll see you guys later.” Tabitha plucked her phone from her pocket. “I’ve got to get home. I live with my great-aunt and she’s getting up there in years.”
“Alrighty, Tabby.” Hobbs’s voice got its boom back. “See you soon.”
Tabitha just waved, no longer in the mood to talk.
“See you later.” Clementine checked her watch. “I’ve got to get to the shop, too.”
As soon as Tabitha walked away, Hobbs fell back into his boisterous story, the women around him laughing and still neglecting their equipment. She gathered Trinity and her bag and headed out. Delaney fell in beside her and hooked an arm around her shoulders as they walked into the sunshine. “Hang in there, girl.”
After Tabitha drove away, Delaney tossed her bag in the truck and headed back into the gym. The gaggle of smitten women had dispersed, finally cleaning up their shit under Rhett’s piercing gaze. Hobbs was busy mopping the floor of remnant DNA. Delaney marched right up to him, planted her hands on her hips and said, “Stop it.”
Hobbs fixed her with a set of sky-blue eyes that matched his beach bum personality. “Mopping?”
“Don’t play dumb with me.” Delaney wasn’t sure he was actually playing dumb, or was just dumb, but she didn’t care. “I’m talking about Tabitha.”
Hobbs, who’d dunked his mop in the bucket, lifted it from the piney smelling water and wrung it out by pressing the bucket handle forward. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“You know exactly what I mean. You walk around here acting like you’re God’s gift and then, after you somehow reel Tabitha in, you do a one-eighty and blow her off. Typical for your kind. But Tabitha doesn’t deserve that.”
“My kind?” Hobbs released the handle of the mop wringer and turned to face her.
“Yeah. Your kind. Use ’em and lose ’em. Don’t even pretend I’m wrong.”
Hobbs fixed Delaney with the most serious look she’d ever seen on his grinning face. “Let me get this straight.” He set the mop head on the floor and leaned into the handle. “Last time you were here, you got mad at me for being too flirty. Now I’m being too cold. Make up your mind. Which way do you want me to be?”
Delaney stepped a little closer and lowered her voice. “It’s not going to be any way. Not with her. I don’t know what happened on the Fourth of July, but something made her trust you. And now you’re acting like Prince Charming to every girl in the gym but her. Not cool.”
Hobbs surprised her by meeting her gaze with solid resolve. Any hint of the party boy was gone, wrung out as hard as he’d twisted the mop head. “Calm down, Devil Dog. Please stop treating me like I’m stupid.” He held up a hand as Delaney parted her lips to speak. “Trust me, I get where you’re coming from. And I understand you wanting to protect her. But I’m not the asshole you think I am. I definitely don’t want to do anything to hurt Tabitha. Okay? You’re just going to have to trust me on that.”
Delaney stared into his eyes for a long time, and to his credit, he didn’t look away, like he offered himself up for inspection. Delaney didn’t hate what she saw. There was something there that she’d missed before. Something in his eyes, behind all the bullshit. Then his gaze shifted downward and Delaney felt her anger rush back in. Was he really checking out her tits? After all this?
“Why are you wearing a Go Big Red shirt?” Hobbs pointed, and only then did Delaney remember what tank top she’d worn today. The shirt was so old you could barely read the words across her chest, cracked and eaten away by the laundry, unless you were up close.
Delaney’s ire started to cautiously fizzle away. “Because I was born and raised a Huskers fan. Why do you care?”
“Because so was I.” He leaned into his mop again. He looked a little bit like a janitor with an attitude now. “Where you from?”
“Omaha.” Delaney thrust the word out, like a challenge. “You?”
“Same. My whole life. Until Camp Lejeune, where I met Rhett.”
“Wait.” Delaney paused to process. “Youwere a marine?”
Hobbs stuck his mop back in the water and turned to wheel the bucket away. “Don’t act so surprised,” he called over his shoulder.
Delaney parted her lips but then shut her mouth and let him go.
Well. I’ll be damned.
Pittie Place and Canine Warriors—which Delaney was told had become a joint venture over the last month—was like Disneyland for orphan dogs. At least, that was the pitch Delaney would write if she were putting together an ad campaign for Sunny’s rescue and Pete’s training center. There was a big sign, shaped like a dog bone, on a wooden post in the ground, with the wordsPittie Placeemblazoned in the center and surrounded by black paw prints. Next to it was a twin, with the post on the opposite side, so that the two signs met in the middle and looked like puzzle pieces that fit together. This one read Canine Warriors, beneath which was a dog silhouette adorned with dog tags. A flagstone path led to a fence, surrounding a building that looked like an elegant log cabin with a backdrop of endless woods. Once behind the fence, Delaney could see the wide expanse of open grounds to run and play that surrounded the building. Despite the other dogs running free, chasing each other, lying under trees or playing in a series of kiddie pools with shallow water, Wyatt didn’t rush to join them when Pete unhooked the leash from his collar.
“Stay,” Pete said gently. That one word revealed his soft Virginia accent, just a little twist to the vowel sound that danced over Delaney’s ears.
Wyatt eyed the dogs in the kiddie pool with longing and shifted his paws, but didn’t move. Delaney watched, fascinated by Pete’s dog magic. Wyatt’s jitters had ebbed considerably, even though Delaney could still sense a slightly anxious vibe from the pittie. Pete, who had a down-home country look in his Virginia Tech T-shirt, blue jeans and work boots, tipped the brim of his baseball cap with the back of his wrist and said, “Come.” He tapped his thigh and strode toward the large building. Wyatt followed, keeping right by Pete’s heel as Pete strode confidently through the pack of playful dogs.
Sunny and Delaney fell in behind as Pete led them to that elegant log cabin—what Sunny called the “doggy abode.” The building was large enough to house rescues awaiting fosters and forever homes, she’d explained, as well as the main caretaker, Roger, who was polite, but focused, busy keeping the dogs in line with the natural smoothness of someone who’d been doing this a long time and loved his job.
