Page 96 of Finding His Redemption

As if he were part of a team again.

Part of a family.

His throat tightened, and he had to clear it before speaking. “What now?”

Ghost closed his laptop with a click. “Now we get some sleep. We hunt in the morning.”

The meeting broke up. Ghost, X, River, and Jonah said their goodnights and headed to their bunks. Bear went outside to take King to the kennel for the night. Anson hit the shower. And Boone stayed behind, studying the whiteboard, hands hooked in the pockets of his jeans, gaze unreadable.

Jax stood, his mind going back to Echo. He needed to shower off the stink of the jail, but then he should check on her. Maybe even sleep out there in the kennel with her if she had withdrawn too far back into her shell in his absence…

But as he headed to the door, Boone stopped him with a single word. “Thorne.”

He turned.

Boone studied him for a long moment. “If you feel like running, don’t.”

Jax nodded. “I wasn’t planning to.”

Boone’s mouth twitched, almost a smile. “Good.”

chapter

twenty-eight

When Jaxfinally made it out to the kennel to see Echo, she had gone back to cowering in her corner.

“My poor girl,” he murmured and unlatched the door. “I’m here now. I’m sorry I had to leave, but I’ll always come back.”

That might not be entirely true, but he’d cross that bridge when he came to it.

He sat down in his usual spot against the wall, expecting he’d have to start from scratch again, but the moment his ass hit the concrete, Echo whimpered and crawled into his lap, nuzzling her face against his.

And her tail wagged for the first time.

In the three days since, she had blossomed before his eyes. The ranch vet, Lila Garrison, said it was because he’d come back, and nobody had ever done that for Echo in her entire life. He hadn’t broken her trust.

Still, he couldn’t believe the progress. She was now a completely different dog. She’d gone from trembling in the corner again to following him around the ranch, meeting the other guys, dogs, and animals. She wasn’t a fan of General Mayhem—but, really, who was? She liked Jonah, Bear, Walker,and Anson, though she wasn’t sure about Anson’s wolfhound, Bramble.

She tolerated River, but gave X the side-eye every time he got close. The smart girl didn’t fall for his charm any more than Mariah had that night at Nessie’s.

As for the others, she hadn’t made up her mind about Boone or Ghost yet, and she avoided Cinder, who was one of the most aloof dogs Jax had ever met. Like owner, like dog.

Echo preferred napping beside King, that overgrown marshmallow of a dog, when she was out of her kennel, and she loved the jerky Bear was constantly sneaking them both.

But, most of all, she loved the horses.

Jax watched her from his perch on the fence rail, coffee mug warming his hands in the morning chill. The blue merle had her nose pressed to the kennel gate, amber and ice-blue eyes fixed on the horses in the pasture beyond. Her whole body vibrated with something that looked almost like... excitement.

“She’s got horse fever,” Jonah said, settling beside him on the fence. “Seen it before. Some dogs just take to ‘em.”

“She’s been watching them since sunrise.” Jax took a sip of coffee. It was bitter and strong, the way Anson always made it, and made him miss Nessie. She always made his coffee just right.

“Might be good for her. Horses are calming,” Jonah said with the easy confidence of a man who’d spent his whole life around livestock. “Want to introduce her?”

Jax studied Echo’s posture. Alert but not rigid. Curious instead of hypervigilant. She’d come so far, further than he’d dared hope when he’d first seen her cowering in the back of her kennel.

“Yeah,” he said. “Let’s try it.”