“But our annual dog pageant is this weekend,” Ashanti called. “Puddin’ always takes part.”
“Not this year,” he said without bothering to look back.
She stared in dismay as he and Puddin’ exited the lobby.
“What an ass,” Ashanti said the minute the door closed behind him.
“With a very nice ass,” Leslie added.
She wasn’t lying.
4
Thad had reached the second-to-last step before he realized his grandmother’s cantankerous poodle hadn’t followed him off the daycare’s front porch. He turned and gently, but firmly, tugged on the leash.
“I don’t have time for this shit today, dog. Come on.”
Puddin’ plopped down and refused to move. The sun glinted off the absurd rhinestone collar wrapped around his pencil-thin neck.
For a hot minute, Thad considered bringing him back inside and washing his hands of this spoiled, stubborn pain in his ass. At least the one with the braids—he figured she was the owner—would be happy about that. But after seeing the charge to his credit card for the dog’s five-week stay, he refused to pay that dog sitter a single extra cent. Who in the hell charged that kind of money to watch a dog?
Maybe if she got rid of some of that fake, gold-plated royal family crap she wouldn’t have to charge her clients the equivalent of a monthly mortgage.
“Move.” Thad tugged again.
Puddin’ stretched his front legs out in front of him and went from sitting to lying flat on his stomach.
Thad dropped his head back and swore up at the sky. Eight months ago all he had to do was snap his fingers and a company of over one hundred soldiers would follow his orders to the letter. Now, he couldn’t get a bare-assed poodle with a sparkly collar to show him respect. He’d left behind a fifteen-year military career for this?
He jutted his chin toward the door. “She the one give you that stupid haircut? And you still want to hang around here?”
Puddin’ let out a doleful whine and wagged the pom-pom on the tip of his tail. It really was a stupid haircut.
“Look, we’re not doing this today,” Thad told him as he climbed back up the steps. He scooped the poodle into his arms and carried him to the Ford Maverick XLT he’d bought from a used-car dealer when he’d arrived in Louisiana a month ago. It took him two tries before he could get the door open while still cradling the dog.
He cursed again as he set Puddin’ on the passenger’s side. He should have thought to bring a towel or something for the seat. Now he’d have dog hair all over his new-to-him truck.
Did poodles even shed their fur? Maybe he could ask the dog sitter. She would know.
Thad shut the door and hauled it to the driver’s side when he realized he was fishing for an excuse to go back inside.
He’d kept his sunshades on longer than necessary so that the one with the braids, Ashanti, wouldn’t notice how he couldn’t stop staring at her. It was the freckles. A smattering of freckles on a woman’s nose and cheeks got him every damn time.
Nope. He was not stepping foot in Barkingham Palace—that name was as ridiculous as Puddin’s haircut—again.
The dog let out another whine. Thad started the engine and turned up the radio to drown him out.
He’d just put the truck in drive when the purple-and-white front door opened and the woman he’d just convinced himself he wasn’t making excuses to see came jogging down the steps.
“Wait!” she yelled while flagging him down.
Thad put the truck in park, turned down the radio, and lowered the window.
Before he could get a word in, she shoved a plastic chew toy shaped like an alligator inside the open window. “You forgot Ali. It’s Puddin’s favorite.”
As if to put an exclamation point on her statement, Puddin’ jumped up from the seat, climbed into Thad’s lap, and clutched the chew toy between his teeth. He waved it around like a maniac, thwacking Thad in the jaw.
“Dog, get off me.” Thad lifted him from his lap and set him back on the passenger side.
