“Did the Gomez family return her?”
“No!”
“Because if Agatha were an automobile, she’d be a lemon.”
“I can see through your gruffness. I know you’re happy to see her, and look”—she extended the wriggling animal in his direction—“she’s incredibly happy to see you.”
Like a wind-up toy that starts thrashing before it lands on a surface, the dog’s tiny legs started moving before Finley set her on the floor. Agatha charged to him. Placing her front paws on his ankle, she panted up at him with what he could swear was the canine equivalent of a smile.
Agatha hadn’t forgotten him. For some reason, that made his throat tight.
He scooped her up and placed her on his lap. She’d grown, but she was still the smallest dog he’d ever seen. Her hair stuck out like a lion’s mane around her face, interrupted only by her giant ears. She rolled into a ball against his abdomen, and he supported the piece of fluff with one big hand. She licked his wrist.
Finley beamed at them. “Mrs. Gomez is on a school field trip with her kids today. She reached out to say that she was more than willing to put Agatha in doggy daycare but wanted to ask if coming here was a possibility. The whole family seemed to think that time spent with you would do her good. And they were right.Aww, look. Agatha’s on cloud nine.”
The puppy was still enthusiastically licking his wrist. “She’s only acting like this because she wants me to hand-feed her before she embarrasses me by forcing me to be seen with her in public.”
“Luke. I hereby give you permission to feel love toward Agatha.”
“The only thing I feel is annoyance that I donated several days of my life that I can’t get back to this animal. And now the Gomezes are hitting us up for free babysitting.”
“This isn’t the Gomezes taking advantage of us. This is our charitable organization gladly giving support to one of our excellent adoptive families.”
She smiled at him with so much tenderness that he found it hard to breathe. Finley appeared to know everything he was trying tohide. How he felt about her. How he felt about Agatha. All of it. The conflict and desire and longing and regret.
For the rest of the day, Agatha refused to let Luke out of her sight. When he was at his desk, she sat in his lap or napped on his shoe. When he walked around the Center, she ran beside him. When he took her outside, she eyeballed him while she peed.
“It’s best not to allow dogs to get accustomed to sitting on your lap while you’re trying to work,” Kat informed him near the end of the day.
He continued typing.
“It’s better if they self-soothe and learn to rest quietly on their mat or in their crate.”
“I wish I could take all your advice,” Luke said calmly, “strap it to a firework rocket, launch the thing into the sky, and then watch it explode.”
“Excuse me?” Kat demanded in an offended tone.
Luke met her eyes. “You heard me.”
Just as he’d known she would, she immediately backed down.
“May I hold her for a minute?” Trish asked sweetly.
He passed the puppy over. The older woman attempted to cuddle Agatha, who scrambled to get back to Luke. Not even Trish’s quivering Christmas tree earrings or the humming of “Away in a Manger” satisfied the dog.
“The puppy is not responding to lullabies,” Kat told Trish in a superior tone.
Trish stopped singing. “In that case, ’Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house ...’”
Agatha was having none of it.
“Oh my,” Trish murmured. “You really are partial to Luke, aren’t you, little sweetheart?”
“It’s best not to encourage such obvious favoritism when you’re training a puppy,” Kat announced. “You want them to show affection toward all—”
“Firework rocket,” Luke warned her, which shut her up.
He accepted the dog back from Trish.
