Taters whimpered to alert Decker of just how close he was to a full-blown attack and that’s when Decker knew he had about three minutes to get somewhere he wouldn’t be seen having a breakdown. The bedroom.
Taters was at his feet whining his alert and Decker’s vision became more and more blurry around the edges. He made it down the hall and into the bedroom, barely getting to the mattress right as his vision closed in.
Taters did what he was trained to do. He stood in front of Decker and pressed his forehead to Decker’s chest, giving him gentle, soothing nose butts to the ribcage. The warmth and rhythmic pattern helped slow Decker’s heart rate into a steady beat that followed Taters’s. But it wasn’t enough.
Decker sank his fingers into Taters’s scruff and brought his snout to Decker’s mouth, then he kissed the dog on the nose.
“Good boy. Good boy,” he rasped out.
Before he knew what was happening, two cool hands slid at the base of his neck and ran their way all the way to his forehead and back.
He looked out of the corner of his eyes and found Poppy sitting next to him.
“Just close your eyes,” she whispered.
Too tired to fight, or be embarrassed, he did. She started her gentle stroking of his hair, back and forth, and by the third passhis breathing had evened out and his chest no longer felt as if it were hiding a pipe bomb ready to detonate.
His posture started to straighten.
“Not yet.” She guided him back until his head was in her lap and she ran her hands over his eyelids, closing them. Then she massaged her fingers from his forehead to his temples. Easy, therapeutic strokes that brought him all the way back to normal.
“How did you know how to do that?”
“My mom suffered from severe panic attacks after my dad left. So I learned how I could help.”
Of course she did. The more he learned about her, the more he realized just how selfless and caring she was to those around her.
“It doesn’t always work. You have to catch it at the beginning of one. So we were lucky.”
Lucky. That was a word that had never felt so right. Laying with his head in her lap. Talking about her life. Being gifted this rare insight into her past. Lucky indeed.
“How did you train Taters to do that?”
He snorted. “Found him as a stray on a work site. Brought him home and a neighbor had a cat who was nursing a litter of kittens. She took to Taters immediately. So he was raised with a litter of kittens. Still thinks he’s one. Which makes him the perfect emotional support animal. So I signed him up in a training class and he was a natural.”
“I know he weaves in and out of legs and likes to scratch on cardboard, but thinking he’s a cat?”
“Oh, he curls up in your lap like a cat. Sleeps on the counter like a cat. Even tries to purr. Loves catnip and drinks milk.”
She laughed, then noticed she was still massaging his head with her nails. “I should probably stop touching you.”
“I like it.”
“It sends the wrong signals.”
“Like?”
“Like this could go somewhere.”
He looked up at her from the security of her lap. “Is that such a bad thing?”
She sighed. “It complicates things.”
“Like what? We’re nearly done with the house. So what’s the problem?”
She shoved him to a sitting position, then moved next to him, crossing her legs under her. “I overheard you and Miles. And Vegas is an airplane ride or six-hour drive from LA, which is where my home base is.”
“What if I don’t want to go to Vegas?”
