Page 36 of A Furever Home (Gaynor Beach Animal Rescue #8)

ARTHUR

I was going to have nightmares about the moment Cheyenne and I rounded the corner and saw the hulking shape of Harvey pinning Brooklyn against the doorframe.

Nightmares in which my damned leg was shackled to a cement block and I couldn’t run, couldn’t get there to help him, which was what it’d felt like.

But we’d survived, and it was Harvey who’d had to run.

Brooklyn gazed up at me, his hazel-green eyes so dilated they looked black, his face so pale that a few unnoticed freckles stood out. “I’ve got this,” I told him, hoping I was right.

The way he relaxed and a little color came back into his cheeks made me feel ten feet tall.

I grabbed Cheyenne’s arm as she looked ready to sprint after Sadie. “Wait, give me Twain. You go inside, get Eb. She’s more likely to come to him than to any of us. Grab a bunch more treats too and a couple of slip leads, in case. And flashlights since it’ll be dusk soon. Hurry!”

She nodded and rushed toward the house. That young woman had a ton of courage. Facing down a six-foot tall hulking creep trying to drag her away with him, sassing him back, and barely a moment later, she was focused on her dog.

No one was hurting Cheyenne on my watch, ever .

I told Brooklyn, “You deal with the cops. You have the guardianship petition in progress. And you own the house.”

“Okay. But Sadie…” He glanced down the street as a cop car came into view, lights flashing, siren echoing.

“If Cheyenne and I can’t catch her before you’re done, we’ll be grateful for your help. Fingers crossed, though.” I ached at the panic lingering in his eyes and wished I could put my arms around him, but the cop pulled up at the curb and got out, looking our way.

“Good luck.” Brooklyn stepped toward the street and my moment to offer any kind of comfort was gone.

Later. I’ll hug the hell out of him later.

Cheyenne sprinted back out the door with Eb bounding happily beside her at the unexpected walkies. At least one of us would get a bonus out of this mess.

“Here.” She passed me some treats, a flashlight, and one of the slip leads. “Now what?”

“Now we see if this is going to be easy or hard. I’ll keep Twain, you keep Eb. We’ll head the way Sadie went. Come on.” Normally, I’d swap for the bigger dog, but my leg was on fire after the mad dash to get to Brooklyn. Cheyenne would probably do better than I could.

I hobbled down the sidewalk, looking around.

Twain heeled obediently, even though he no doubt wanted to sniff everything in sight, and I spoke to him in my happy training voice.

“Good boy. Heel! Clk,clk. ” I clicked my tongue in approval, a sound Sadie might already recognize. “Treat!” I passed him a bite.

Following my lead, Cheyenne did the same for Ebony.

“ Clk, clk. Treat.” I passed Twain another bite. “Speak!” He bayed his surprisingly deep beagle bark and I rewarded him.

“I don’t see her,” Cheyenne murmured sadly. “She could be anywhere.”

“Easy, now. Happy voices.” I made my tone manically cheerful, in contrast to my words. “She was scared, so she’s going to run a bit before she stops.”

“Do you think she’s hurt?” Cheyenne was less successful at faking cheer, but she was trying. “Harvey threw her, the motherfucker. I wanted to claw his eyes out.”

“She wasn’t limping. Hopefully she’s fine. And she got him good with those little grubby fangs.”

“He was bleeding ,” Cheyenne noted with relish. “I want to, like, buy Sadie steak for the rest of her natural life.”

“You hear that?” I called to the bushes and front steps we were passing. “Come on, Sadie. Steak for life, baby. Treats, girl. Expensive treats.” I clicked and rewarded Twain again.

Near the end of the long block, Twain suddenly paused in trotting beside me and peered off to the right, his beagle nose twitching. Could be a rabbit, or a piece of paper, but…

I asked Cheyenne, “Can you crouch down? Look under that hedge? If I try, I’m not going to get up again without a forklift.”

“Sure.” She squatted, fending off Eb who took that as an invitation to lick her face. “I don’t see—no, wait, yes. There she is!”

“Okay,” I said. “I’m going to let Twain go meet her, real slow.

” I knotted the slip leash to his regular leash to make it longer and tossed a treat toward where Sadie was hiding.

“Get it, Twain.” He happily trotted three steps and snarfed it.

I tossed the next one farther. “Get it.” Then tossed one deep under the bushes. “Get it, Sadie.”

“She’s just looking at it,” Cheyenne reported. “Not coming out.”

“She’s scared, poor baby,” I said with the cheer of a used-car salesman unloading a lemon. “Such a good girl. Okay, get it, Twain.” He had no problem going to the end of his double leash and under the edge of the bush. I tossed some more treats that way, and Twain snorfled happily.

Eb whined, a line of drool dropping from his lip.

“Give Eb a bite,” I told Cheyenne. “Good boy. Treats! All the treats! Then toss some more her way.”

She did as I suggested, peering under the screening foliage. “She’s not moving. Wait, she just took the closest one. Good girl! Good Sadie!”

Bite by bite, aided by Twain’s enthusiasm and Eb’s loud chomping, we drew Sadie out of her hiding spot.

When she and Twain were done eating side by side, I called Twain to come.

He obeyed, tail up and wagging, and Sadie clung to his side.

Her ears and tail were down, but she stuck to her canine buddy.

“I’m going to walk Twain toward home,” I said. “Let Eb follow if he likes. Let Sadie get well past you, then reach down and snag the end of the leash she’s pulling.”

It took a couple of false starts, but we got the two smaller dogs headed past Cheyenne, with Eb sniffing and pacing alongside Sadie. Cheyenne stood back as they moved away from her. One step, two, three…Cheyenne bent and snatched up the end of Sadie’s leash.

“Yes!” She grinned at me, eyes bright, the leash tight in her fist.

The world wobbled around me and I braced my cane, then sat down, right there on the sidewalk. The hard thump on my butt went almost unnoticed in my head-rush of relief. No loose dogs getting hit by cars. Thank God!

“Are you okay? Should I call Brooklyn?” Cheyenne bent over me.

Eb decided it was my turn for a facewash.

“I’m fine.” I nudged Eb off me, took a couple of breaths, and used his sturdy shoulder along with the cane to help myself to my feet.

The vertigo was still there, but mild enough I stayed upright.

“A little dizzy. It happens.” Sadie was hanging back, ears down.

“Give baby girl more treats, huh? Sorry I scared you.”

“Me or Sadie?” Cheyenne tossed some sausage bites. “Because yeah, don’t do that again.”

“It’s not half as bad as when I first hit my head a couple of weeks ago.

” I realized with everything else going on, I hadn’t focused on my symptoms, but they were better.

I hadn’t had a spin-till-you-puke episode in days, and this one didn’t feel that severe.

“I’m just glad it didn’t happen in front of Harvey. ”

“Ugh. Yeah. I was glad you were standing there swinging the cane and looking fierce.”

“Fierce, that’s me,” I said, not meaning it one bit. Although I would’ve hit him if I could’ve, for Sadie and Cheyenne.

“Do you need help?”

“Nah. Give me a few minutes.” The episodes of vertigo were shorter again, too, which hopefully meant they weren’t going to turn into vestibular migraines. I’d read up on those, and they sounded horrible. I leaned on my cane and breathed.

Cheyenne stood beside me, crooning to the dogs and tossing treats, while swaths of glorious sunset colors flooded the Gaynor Beach sky in the west.

“How are you doing?” I asked Cheyenne after a bit. “That must’ve been rough for you.”

“I don’t want to think about it.” She shifted her weight foot to foot.

“Now we’ve caught Sadie, I can say I’m not sorry she ran off, except for how scared she was.

” She glared down the block to where three cop cars sat at Brooklyn’s curb, lights flashing although the sirens were now off.

“She got me out of there. I don’t want to talk to the cops. ”

“I understand that, hon, but I think it’s inevitable.

Harvey tried to—” At the last minute, in the hope of keeping nightmares down, hers and mine, I changed kidnap to “—make you go with him. The cops need to know about that. Best-case scenario, they pick him up and we never have to see him again, except in handcuffs.”

“God, Dad’s going to be furious with me if I get Harvey arrested.”

I braced against another swoop of vertigo. Eb leaned on my thigh and his solid bulk helped ground me. “You do realize that’s pretty messed up? That your father would be less mad at Harvey for dragging you across the country against your will, than at you for stopping him.”

Cheyenne gave a wet laugh. “Honestly, if I had to stop him, Dad would rather I whack him on the head with your cane than bring the cops into it.”

“Too bad, so sad. This is California, not some redneck town in upstate New York. Harvey wants to come here and act like a thug? He’ll get treated like one, under the law.”

“But what if…” Cheyenne’s voice dropped to a shaky whisper. “What if the judge doesn’t agree? What if they send me back to Dad next week? Mr. Cavannah said the biggest risk is that judges don’t like to break up families without a strong reason.”

“Your recording is a strong reason. Harvey showing up and being a vicious asshole, instead of sending your brother Denver, is a strong reason.” I closed my eyes, which didn’t help the whirling feeling, so I opened them.

Cheyenne was shaking her head, like she wasn’t convinced.