Page 54 of Fallen Creed

“What’s wrong?” She wanted to know.

“Nothing. Everything’s fine. I’m a little tired,” Jason explained. “I thought we could get a couple of rooms and grab a few hours of sleep.”

“We’d have separate rooms?”

“Yeah, is that okay?”

When she didn’t answer, he glanced over. Her fingers were wringing the hem of her T-shirt.

“I’ll see if they have any connecting rooms,” he suggested. He wasn’t sure which part was making her uncomfortable?

Finally, she said, “Okay. Hank can still be with me?”

“Yeah, of course.” He paused, then added, “And Kitten, too.”

Her eyes checked the backpack at her feet. “Are you mad I brought him?”

“No, not at all. I wish you trusted me enough to tell me.” He took a left turn into the hotel’s parking lot.

“I trust you.”

“Then why didn’t you tell me?”

“I didn’t think you’d let me bring him.”

“We could have at least talked about it,” Jason told her. “I would have brought a crate for him.”

“Oh, that’s okay. He likes being close to me.” She checked on him now, caressing his head. His two front paws stretched out and started kneading, but his eyes stayed shut.

“I’ll check us in and pull around to the back. We’ll take him out and walk him with Scout and Hank before we go to our rooms.”

Kitten had grown up surrounded by dogs. Jason thought it was silly that Brodie trained the cat on a leash and harness. Now he was grateful. And the cat obviously didn’t mind riding in a vehicle.

He got their room keycards. The hotel had adjoining rooms on the first floor near the exit. The outside area for pets was decent grass. The entire place was nice and quiet, with few vehicles in the parking lot.

The guy at the front desk told Jason breakfast started serving at 6:00 a.m. A hot breakfast with sausage, biscuits, gravy, scrambled eggs—the works. The rooms were clean and comfortable with mini frigs, microwaves and plenty of space to prepare the dogs’ meals. Brodie even approved of the arrangement, asking if they could keep the door between the rooms open.

Despite it being after midnight, Jason texted Hannah to let her know they were okay and settling down for a few hours of sleep. He thought about texting Taylor, but stopped. They were nowhere near a relationship that accepted or expected texts at two o’clock in the morning.

Dogs, cat and Brodie were all settled down. Everything seemed good until Jason woke up to Scout nosing him. He could hear a low whine, and immediately he worried the dog was sick.

But the whine wasn’t Scout. It was coming from the next room.

—43—

“Brodie?” Jason tapped on the open door before sticking his head around the doorjamb.

Scout wasn’t as polite. He rushed into the room like he had been going back and forth for a while. He was panting when he looked up over his shoulder at Jason, as if wondering why Jason wasn’t following him.

The bedcovers were all mussed up. A corner lamp was on, but Jason couldn’t see Brodie in the bed or anywhere in the room. He thought she might be in the bathroom. Then he heard the low-pitched whimper, and he realized it was coming from the floor on the other side of the bed.

“Brodie, are you okay?”

He had pulled on jeans over his boxers, but he was barefooted and bare-chested. He stepped slowly across the room. Hank’s big head poked out from around the bed. Scout nuzzled him, then looked back at Jason.

As soon as he could see her, his stomach dropped. Brodie sat in the corner, her back against the wall, her knees up against her chest with Kitten snuggled tightly in-between.

At first, Jason thought something was wrong with the cat. Maybe she’d left him in the backpack for too long during the drive. But even Kitten was looking at him, imploring him to do something. The whimper wasn’t coming from the cat either. It was coming from Brodie as she rocked back and forth.