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She’d been abandoned and left alone in her misery, to cope alone her entire life. I could give her comfort and love in her final days, and I would.
It turned out that she had no interest whatsoever in exercise of any kind. She stayed on my lap or in the basket for the duration of the afternoon. Without her slight weight in my lap, and the intermittent coughing, her presence was barely noticeable, but a comfort to me just the same.
At the end of the day, Barrett came back for her. It broke my heart to pass her over to go back into her enclosure, but she didn’t seem to mind, and Barrett felt that taking her home with us would only hasten her end.
“I think she should stay here, where she’s contained at night, where she won’t get all excited,” he explained yet again, “you can have her on the days you’re here, and in that way she’ll be getting more days of happiness than if we took her home and overwhelmed her. She’s not used to care.”
‘On the days when you’re here’ echoed in my head. There was no way I would stay away. I decided to go into my office in the mornings and spend my afternoons at the shelter. I’d take work home with me at night if I had to so I could be with her during the day.
Chapter 34
Control Issues
Willa
Every day that week, I divided my time between my office and the shelter. All the dogs, except for Muffin, had started their heartworm treatment and most were tolerating it well. It would be my job to seek out experienced foster homes to be able to care for them properly throughout their treatment once the clinic doctors released them from hospital. Only Muffin was staying for sure, the rest had hope.
At the office, Junie and Minty covered me as much as they could, which should not have been necessary, but the client that we’d toasted each other for landing turned out to be a veritable asshat. He routinely canceled meetings five minutes before they were to begin and followed up by demanding appointments with no more than an hour’s notice.
“I’m afraid we’re all booked for the rest of the afternoon, Mr. Maltude.”
He snorted into the phone. “So, you’re telling me that if I walked into your office this afternoon, you wouldn’t give me five minutes to assess the work you’ve done so far?”
“What I’m telling you is that I’m going to be out with appointments, and I won’t be in office this afternoon. Are you available tomorrow morning?”
Junie and Minty were listening intently and signaling that they could be there in the morning. Tomorrow was Saturday, and we rarely booked appointments during the weekend. I felt badly that I was letting my team down with my frequent absences to be at the shelter with Muffin.
“How about tonight? We can do dinner.”
Junie put her finger in her mouth and pretended to gag, Minty smirked and pointed to the floor, indicating we meet here.
“We can meet this evening at the office. Both Junie and I are available.”
“I was thinking just you and I could work something out,” he offered, his voice lowering.
I shook my head firmly, though he couldn’t see me, he would hear it in my voice. “That’s not the way we operate. Would you like to meet this evening to go over what we’ve done so far?”
“I’ll be in touch,” he snapped and slammed down the phone.
I replaced the receiver carefully and looked at my girls, my eyes narrowed, “Asshole!”
“Indeed,” Minty agreed.
Junie was much more colorful in her assessment of his worth as a human being.
“Hey,” I thought suddenly, “I’ve been so wrapped up at the shelter, I haven’t asked, how are things going with Lenny?”
“Good!” she smiled brightly. A shadow passed briefly over her face. “Vanessa hangs around a lot. I’m not sure what to make of that yet.”
“She goes out with you two? Hangs around when you’re at his place?” I raised my eyebrows.
“Oh, no, she just calls him often, and when he’s not with me, he’s with her. She’s not interested in becoming friends with me. I’m almost certain she wants him back, but he doesn’t see it.”
“What are you going to do?” Minty asked.
Junie shrugged.
“He’s got to catch on sooner or later, right?” I asked.
