“Oh, really?” I said, taking the leash of a yipping little terrier-mix from one of the volunteers. “Is that your considered opinion?” My voice held a bit more of an edge than I’d intended. I blamed stress—and Cash for not letting me back out of this horrible idea.
I’d had enough stress in my life with Grandmother on my back all week, bugging me to tour properties with her. I didn’t need to deal with wash day at the circus on my day off. That was my name for this place, which was filled with barking and mewing animals. Something inside was even snorting. Either one of the big dogs nearby needed a good dose of allergy meds or there was a three-hundred-pound pot belly pig around here somewhere.
“The little ones can be slippery,” Cash said, scratching Moose behind the ear while eyeing my much smaller doggie selection.
I held the leash as far away from me as possible, keeping the bouncing dog at bay. “What dog would you recommend? Moose?”
Cash nodded. “He’s a good boy, and he loves you.”
“Ha! You’re not pushing that monster off on me. He equals at least fifteen of these little guys. He’syourfoster, and that means he’syourresponsibility. I’d prefer to start with a small dog and work my way up, if you don’t mind.”
I tossed my hair over my shoulder, showing Cash that I was wise to his tricks. He wasn’t going to ropethisnoob into the worst job of the day.
If that humongous dog was going to get a bath, Mr. Cash Walker was more than welcome to do the job himself.
One of the volunteers handed me a ragged bath towel. “The tubs and supplies are out in the fenced yard through those doors.” She pointed to a pair of double doors that led to one of my worst nightmares—an enclosed space filled with dogs of every imaginable size and color. “Be careful though. All that surprise rain we had last night made the yard pretty mucky. Don’t let little Angel get away, or he’s liable to get covered in mud all over again.”
I looked at the snarling little spitfire gnawing on the end of the leash and tugging with all his might as ferocious growls came from some wild place inside him. Angel? Yeah, right!
“Thanks for the heads up,” I said. “There’s no way I’m washing this thing twice,” I muttered to myself.
“Come on,” Cash chuckled as he led the way outside with Moose walking by his side. He slung a towel over his shoulder and pushed the door open for me.
My heart thundered in my chest as I hesitated in the doorway. I’d had a week to get used to the idea of Cash being my boyfriend. I’d made peace with it—almost a little too much peace, if I was honest about it. But there weren’t enough hours on the clock, days in the week, or months in the year for me to be able to make peace with the idea of being surrounded by so many dogs at once.
“You coming?” Cash asked, holding the door open for me. “Their bark is worse than their bite, I promise.”
“They bite? I knew it.” I took a step back, the little terror on the end of my leash zipping back and forth, yapping his battle cries to the pack outside. Either he was challenging all the dogs in the yard to a fight, or he was rallying the four-footed troops out there and plotting my demise. I hadn’t decided which. “This was a bad idea.”
Cash let go of the door and stepped up to me, placing his warm hand on the small of my back. “I’m sensing a little tension coming from you.”
“A little?”
“You’re going to be fine. You’re not going to get bit.”
“You can’t know that.” I looked up at him. There wasn’t an ounce of worry on his face. I must have looked ridiculous to him—a grown woman terrified of dogs—but I couldn’t help it.
He brushed the backs of his fingers down my cheek, warmth bubbling up inside me at his touch. “I would never let anything bad happen to you.” He wove his fingers into the hair at the base of my neck and rested his forehead against mine. “You’re stronger than this, you know,” he whispered.
“Than what? Dogs? I’m not so sure.”
He pulled back and looked me in the eyes. “Stronger than your fears.”
“I only have one fear, and it’s been hounding me ever since I was a kid.”
The corner of his mouth turned up into a grin. “We’ll talk about facing your fear of Granny later. Right now, let’s stick with this fear of dogs, shall we?”
I clapped a hand over my mouth to stifle the laughter that burst from my lips. “Okay, fine, so I have two fears. But Grandmother isn’t even on my radar right now.”
He stepped back and patted Moose on the side of his barrel of a body. “What’s to worry about? You and Moose have been getting along fine all week.”
I didn’t have a comeback for him. He was right. Moose was tolerable, almost likable when he wasn’t shoving his enormous, wet nose places it didn’t belong.
Cash scooped my pint-sized nemesis up off the floor and tucked him under his arm. “Pet him.”
“What? No, it hates me.”
“Hedoesn’t have anything against you. Pet him.”
