I reached out and patted the top ofhishead. It wasn’t so bad. The way his scraggly tail wagged when I reached out to him was kind of cute, in an eight-pound man-eater kind of a way. “All right, I’ll admit it. He’s not that bad when you’re holding him. But all those other dogs—”
“Are just as nice. The people who run this place wouldn’t put a vicious dog out there with all the volunteers and pooches.”
I took a deep breath and held my fingers out for Angel to lick.
“Are you ready to do this?” Cash asked.
“I guess it would look pretty bad if Grandmother showed up and I wasn’t doing anything with the dogs.”
“Granny’s coming here?”
“Yeah, after a week of dodging real estate tours with her, she finally decided to go building shopping without me this morning. She said she’d stop by here when she was done being my personal agent and tell me how it went.”
“Why not just come to your place later on?”
I sighed. “I have no idea. The less charitable side of me thinks she wants to catch me doing something she wouldn’t approve of. The other side of me can’t really fault her for checking up on me considering howcreativeI’ve been with the truth lately.”
Cash chuckled. “Well, she can’t disapprove of charity work. And it’s no lie that you’re here to wash dogs.” He gestured toward the doors with an open palm as if he was my guide, ushering me to meet my fate.
“True.” I sucked in the deepest breath of my life considering it just might be my last. “Let’s get this over with.”
“That’s the spirit.” He winked and fixed his gaze on me as we walked through the doors. The twinkle in his eyes tickled my stomach and made my cheeks heat up.
“Stop laughing at me,” I said.
“I’m not laughing,” he lied as the smile grew on his lips.
“Yes, you are. You’re laughing at me with your eyes.”
“I’m not even sure that’s a thing, but whatever you say, Willow.” We stopped in front of two wash tubs. His gaze never left me.
“You say you’re not laughing at me, but I think you’re still secretly doing it.”
Cash put Angel down and stood toe-to-toe with me. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not a subtle man. When I do something, there’s no secret about it.”
His eyes narrowed. Not in anI’m angry at youkind of way. It was more of a hungry look than anything else. He ran his tongue along his lower lip and inched closer to me. I chewed the inside of my cheek as I waited to see what he’d do next.
He took my hand and peeled my clenched fist open, his fingertips dragging a lazy trail across my palm that left my knees wobbling. I didn’t care about the dogs. I didn’t care about the other volunteers. Cash and I were in our own little bubble, and I was pretty sure it was shaped like a heart.
Suddenly the scorching hot pads of his fingertips were replaced by a nylon strap. He closed my fingers around it, and I looked down only to see Angel’s leash back in my hand. “I think it’s about time we washed some dogs, don’t you?” he said.
One of these days, I was going to get tired of letting him tease me like this. And one day, I was liable to grab his face, pull it down to mine, and haul off and kiss the man just to get it out of my system.
“Here you go, Cash.” The nasally giggle of some woman I hadn’t noticed before grated on my ears. “Take mine.” With the way she was looking up at him, anyone might have guessed that she was offering him her heart if it wasn’t for the bottle of dog shampoo in her hands.
“Thanks, Vanessa. I’ve got some at my station already, but it doesn’t look like Willow has any.”
Clearly crestfallen, the woman glanced my way and offered a micro-smile. I held my hand out to accept the soap, but her focus was back on Cash half-a-second later. She dropped the bottle before I was ready, and it splashed into the tub of water at my feet, its unscrewed lid floating to the top.
Vanessa gasped. “I’m so sorry,” she said, really looking at me for the first time. But her eyes darted right back to Cash a moment later. “I’m always so clumsy around you, Cash. You must think I’m a hopeless cause.”
My stomach turned at the way she batted her eyelashes at him. This was a classic fishing for compliments scenario. I’d seen it a thousand times before. It was a rookie move that everyone learned in Flirting 101. I bit my bottom lip wondering why I hadn’t put my foot down about not coming to this stupid dog wash.
Of course every woman around would flirt with Cash. Why would I have expected anything different? He’d never lacked for a female fan base since I’d met him. But this time it was different. This time he was supposed to be mine.
I couldn’t watch.
My gaze fell to the wash tub. Memories of the way my cheating ex used to look at other women when we were supposed to be out together bubbled to the surface of my memory much like the shampoo bubbling up out of the bottle.
