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“I’m so glad my dear friend Jim referred you to us. If the therapy is successful, perhaps you’ll allow us to include some of the details of Gen’s work in our papers? We treat lots of pets, but a working dog is extra special to us.”
She understood how clinical trials worked, but it had given her an ember of hope Dr. Singh and his team seemed to care about Gen’s prognosis at a more personal level. Hope she desperately needed as the treatment took its course and Gen seemed to get worse.
“It will seem that way, at first,” Dr. Singh had reassured her. “It will be hard on her system, but we’ll keep a close watch, and we should start seeing improvement soon.”
The Raptors scored, Scott connecting with Finn in the end zone off a solid screen play and a beautiful spiral pass into the back corner. One foot down, two, and then sliding out the back, ball clutched in his cradled arms.
“I should be there,” she told the dog in her lap. “He invited me to go, but I... I couldn’t imagine leaving you.”
Gen’s tail thumped once against her thigh, her wide eyes gazing up at the face of the person she loved most in the world, and if Gen had a voice, she’d be saying,Yes, you should be there. He loves you as much as I do.
Wrapping both arms around Gen, Abby buried her face in the dog’s ruff and breathed in her scent. “I love you, too, girl.”
Gen pressed herself closer, as she always did when Abby needed her. She stretched toward Abby’s face, slow and weak, but Abby bent toward her dog, and tears flooded her eyes when Gen’s jaw worked for a moment until she could take a lock of Abby’s hair in her teeth and pull. Abby couldn’t help the half-sob that escaped. Even being eaten alive from the inside out, Gen couldn’t stop being a therapy dog.
The game ended. The Raptors had been strong; the Texans struggling with injuries to several key players. The muscles in Abby’s cheeks contracted in a way they hadn’t in weeks. As the last few seconds ticked off the clock, she smiled.
Next Saturday, they’d be playing in Kansas City.
Thirty-Two
“I MEAN, IF you want to go, I’m game. Tickets are going to be expensive, though.”
Abby hummed. “I know.Reallyexpensive. But I don’t mind paying.”
“Girl, if you don’t say yes when Scott finally asks you to marry him, I’m gonna smack you upside your pretty blond head, you know that, right?” Abby could picture the stern expression on Kelly’s face, even through the phone.
“Funny, my best friend said the same thing when I told her.”
Actually, Cara had demanded when she’d hurry up and askhim; none of this waiting around for Scott to get his act together. Girls ran the world, now, in the twenty-first century.
“Okay, then, you find tickets, I’ll find flights, and we’ll go surprise the boys.”
Abby hung up, glanced at Gen, curled at her feet, then slid her laptop across the bar.
“Six-hundred dollars? You’ve got to bekiddingme.”
Gen lifted her head, cocked it to one side, then settled it back on her paws, as if to say,Well, itisa divisional playoff game.
“I know, girl. And it’s the Chiefs. I’m afraid to go; their fans are rabid.”
She clicked the buy button, then sent the information on to Kelly.
Picking up the phone again, she found Scott’s number and dialed.
“Hey, Abby. What’s up?” The hesitancy in his voice stabbed at Abbys heart. She’d failed him—and Dylan—so badly.
“Hi Scott. I was, umm, wondering if Gen and I could come by tonight. Maybe eat dinner with you guys? If... if it’s okay?”
He didn’t answer right away, and enough time passed for anxiety to bubble up in Abby’s chest, then, “Yeah, sure. That sounds good.”
Relief flooded through her, but tension followed on its heels, again. She’d been an awful girlfriend; she owed Scott an apology. She only hoped he’d be willing to accept it.
Gen had eaten an entire bowl of canned food as an early dinner, and now she pulled Abby toward Scott’s door, breath huffing in her throat as her collar pressed against her neck.
“Gen, heel, girl.”
The dog pranced, circled, but obeyed, falling into step beside her. Hope sprang up anew in Abby. Gen’s palpable excitement at seeing Dylan mirrored her old self, as if she’d never been sick at all.