Arden broke her gaze and looked at the duffel. “So, since you’ll be bunking here for the better part of a week, how about I give you an entire bedroom instead of just the couch? Grab your bag and follow me.”
“Hang on.” Kyle unzipped the bag. “I brought some stuff for Camo.”
He reached into the top pocket and took out the bottles of chondroitin and glucosamine chews and set them on the table. Camo’s nose went straight into the air and the greedy bugger approached the table, wagging his tail.
Kyle chuckled. “I know what you want.” He dug in past the dog blanket and pulled out a jar of peanut butter and a spoon. Camo tried to stand on his hind legs and Kyle told him to sit. He obeyed immediately, and Kyle couldn’t help but shoot a look of triumph Arden’s way. He opened the bottles and tossed two chews at Camo who caught them mid-air. He dug into the duffel again.Now, where is that new Kong?He pulled Camo’s favorite blanket and pillow out and set them on the chair along with a well-chewed Teddy Bear. He found the new Kong and filled its hole with a spoonful of peanut butter, then gave it to the dog, who trotted away happily to lick it out beside the back door.
In the meantime, Arden had walked slowly to the table, her eyebrows rising with every step, until she was close enough to peek inside the bag.
“Does anything in there belong toyou?”
He zipped up the bag before she could get a good look at the photos. They were none of her damn business, though he thought about deploying them later to strengthen his case and maybe garner her sympathy. “Yeah. I’ve got another pair of jeans, a shirt, change of underwear. If you don’t mind, I’ll probably be borrowing your washing machine a couple times. I’ll pay you back for the detergent I use.”
“Could you? I really need those pennies.” She smiled and batted her eyelashes, and there was that damn dimple in the middle of her chin, the one that made a brief but welcome appearance the night before. Holy hot hell, if he’d met her under any—any—other circumstances, he’d be demanding to see her bedroom instead of settling for the spare.
“Speaking of the wash, your clothes are in the dryer. At the very least you’ll want to put on your own jeans, I’m sure.” Her eyes darted down the length of his body, sending a sudden burst of heat through him, to the cuffs of his borrowed sweatpants sitting well above his ankles. Thankfully, she turned away before he embarrassed himself. Sweatpants sometimes left nothing to the imagination. He picked up his duffel and followed her down a hallway off the great room.
“This is the oldest part of the house,” Arden said. “The great room and kitchen were added in the Seventies. You can obviously tell from the architecture and the wall of windows at the back. But this section is the original ranch. There are four bedrooms, two with sitting rooms. I sleep in my parents’ old room. It used to be the parlor and has one of the original fireplaces.” The room was at the end of the hall. Through the door, Kyle saw the fireplace where flames flickered behind a metal screen.
“This one’s yours.” She opened the door next to hers. The air was noticeably colder in the room. “You’ll want to keep the door open to warm it up. I keep the heat turned low and use the fireplaces mostly, but I’ll bump it up.”
“You can afford to after I pay you those pennies.”
And there was that dimple again. “I’ll let you settle in. The laundry room’s right across the hall.” She headed back toward the great room and he couldn’t help but steal a look at her backside.Stop it. Concentrate on the mission. Operation Bring Camo Home.Stop getting too friendly with the enemy. But again, ‘enemy’ was no longer the right word. The local, then. Don’t get too friendly with the local.
Kyle retrieved his clothing from the dryer and closed the bedroom door behind him. He looked around as he changed. The room was tidy but smelled stale, unused. Too feminine for his tastes, with a flowered comforter on the bed and pale pink walls. He wondered if this had been Arden’s room as a girl. He noticed a panel in the ceiling that he thought must lead to the attic. Kyle opened the top drawer of the dresser and put his spare clothes into the empty drawer. He finger-combed his hair in the mirror over the dresser. There wasn’t much he could do about the stubble on his cheeks. He hadn’t packed his dopp kit and he wasn’t about to ask to borrow her razor.
Pale blue-gray light came in through two tall windows. The snow had mercifully let up again, allowing him to see more of the yard like he could that morning. One window framed the most perfect evergreen he’d ever seen, standing alone in the yard against the backdrop of tree-spotted hills. He looked back at the trap door in the ceiling.I wonder if that’s where she keeps the Christmas decorations?
Kyle heard the clicking of Camo’s toenails coming down the hall so he opened the door. The dog came bounding in as if another two years had passed since they’d seen each other. God, it was so fucking good to have him back. Kyle automatically checked Camo over. Unless they were injured, military working dogs usually retired around ten years old, about the time their bodies started to slow down.
Camo was younger than that and he showed no signs of grievous injury, which led Kyle to suspect the other big reason MWDs retired—they stopped doing their jobs. Some dogs suddenly got spooked by gunfire. Others would wake up one day and refuse to chase and bite. And then there was the worst scenario, though not as common—some dogs became too aggressive out of fear. Those dogs were usually retired to Lackland and not adopted out.
Sometimes you could trace a dog’s refusal to work straight back to a particularly hard or brutal mission. Sometimes it was just too many missions over time, too much built-up stress.
Kyle laid his cheek on the dog’s head and whispered, “What was it, boy? What made you see the elephant?” Like so many missions, Camo’s last one was classified. Kyle may never find out what sent the dog over the edge. But then again, Arden mentioned that they’d told her about Camo. Maybe she knew. If he could gain her trust, she might tell him. In the meantime, the best Kyle could do was observe Camo for any signs of PTSD, anything that triggered fear. So far, Camo had seemed like his old, happy, enthusiastic self, if a bit more mischievous.
Kyle ruffled the top of Camo’s head, stood, and they went back to the great room. He heard Arden laughing, a sweet lilt to her voice. She was facing him, sitting at the table with her laptop open and watching the screen with an enthusiastic smile that threatened to undo him. She’d put on a pair of glasses with delicate gold frames that made her look nerdy-sexy.No, no they don’t.He wasn’t going to think about anything that made her look sexy.
“That’s great, Danny, I love it.” She must have had an earbud in, because he didn’t hear a reply before she said, “Yes, I’ll be back out there at six to give Ripple his apple, I promise. You can watch me then. I’m sorry too that you can’t be here, but that drawing you made sure does help, doesn’t it?” She rested her chin on her hand and smiled. “All right. I’ll let you get to it, and you’ll see me at six. Bye, Danny.”
Arden glanced up as she closed her laptop. She took out her earbuds and fixed him with a quizzicalwhat do you need?look.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to intrude, or violate any patient…” He paused. Was she a doctor? A therapist? “Any patient confidentiality.”
“It’s okay, I’m not a doctor and I don’t think you could pick Danny out of a line-up only from what I said.” She glanced out the window at the falling snow as she spoke. “Internet is spotty up here on the best of days, and today is not one of them. The best reception in the house is right here or else I’d hole up in my room.” She looked him over again. “I see you found your clothes.”
He cleared his throat around the lump that had suddenly formed in it. Those steely grays really did a number on him, especially behind the glasses. “Yeah, thanks for taking care of them.” He walked to the table and took the same seat she’d offered at breakfast. Camo sat between them and Arden scratched his head. “Can I return the favor?”
She looked confused. “You want to wash my clothes?” But then he realized she was teasing him when her eyes twinkled.Damn.Okay, play it cool.
“Well, um, not wash your clothes. I mean, unless you needed them washed, but I didn’t see a pile in the laundry room…” As he made more of a dumbass out of himself, the twinkle in her eyes went full-on supernova into bright mirth. “What I’m trying to say is, as long as I’m staying here, it’s only right that I help out.”
“Ooohhh.” Arden tilted her head back, her sexy lips forming an inviting shape that sent his imagination racing. “You want to help out around theranch.” She rested her chin on her hand again. “How much ranch experience do you have, Kyle California?”
“Hey, we have plenty of ranches and farms in California, I’ll have you know.”
“Uh-huh. And did you grow up on one?”
