Page 10 of Yorkie to My Heart (Friends of Gaynor Beach Animal Rescue #6)

Jeremy

“Wally is truly a remarkable dog. He was brilliant. Just...perfect.” I grinned as the pooch eyed me. Almost like he didn’t believe I could be so effusive. And he wasn’t wrong in his skepticism. I wasn’t used to heaping praise on anyone, let alone a canine.

Well, maybe Raphael and Thaddeus. I was capable of complimenting them even when they might not be entirely worthy. The marker incident last year came to mind. Thank God for steam cleaning.

“Yeah.” Phillip said the word quietly.

“What’s wrong?” I cocked my head.

“Just…” He gestured between Wally and me.

We stood outside my front door as I removed the sticky note and unlocked the door.

“Just…” I prompted him, hoping he’d open up.

“He was so happy with the kids. I can’t give him that. I mean, I can’t even crouch down, let alone locate multiple children who will want to play with him.”

He entered my house with Wally after I beckoned him in. He bent over to unclip Wally.

Who promptly made a beeline for the water bowl in the kitchen.

And I was willing to admit, only to myself, that I might’ve checked out Phillip’s ass.

He looked at himself in the mirror and saw someone very different from whom I did.

Clearly. Because where I saw plenty to hold on to and run my hands all over, he made it clear he saw only someone who didn’t meet society’s stupid standard of perfection.

Of beauty. Or even acceptable. Fat shaming was one of the final acceptable prejudices.

Some people liked looking down on overweight people and would congratulate themselves on not looking like that . That attitude made me so angry.

“Did you say something?” Phillip met my gaze.

“No.” I toed off my sandals.

“You…sort of growled.”

I chuckled. “That was my stomach—I’m hungry. I was going to grill up a couple of burgers. Can I convince you to join me?”

Uncertainty crossed his features as he squinted his nose. “I better not.”

“Because of the company or the food choice? Because I’ve got asparagus I plan to grill, bean salad, and fresh strawberries.” Laying it on too thick? Seeming to be judgmental? I just didn’t know.

“Well…maybe a small burger?”

“Great. I have ground beef, and you can tell me the size you want. It’s lean and I tend to mix it with an egg and garlic. Any problems with that?”

“Not great for my breath.”

No, you can’t make a kissing joke.

“Well, as long as you’re not a vampire, I think we’re good.” I gestured toward the kitchen.

He headed that way.

A clearly exhausted Wally had made his way to the solarium and flaked out on his bed.

Phillip finally grinned. “He did awesome, didn’t he?”

“Yes. Look, if you take him for a walk in the park during the day or early evening, I know he’ll meet kids and adults and other dogs. He’s got such a great smile and a clearly pleasant disposition. People can’t help but be drawn.”

“But I’m a stranger in town.”

I headed back into the kitchen. A low wall partitioned it from the solarium—my favorite room in the house.

The dome of windows was lovely in every season.

Nothing like sitting there reading a book on a stormy afternoon with the rain pelting the glass.

“You’re a stranger today. Well, you were this morning.

How many people met Wally?” I counted quickly.

“We were there for almost an hour, so I’d say a good twenty or twenty-five.

Some who just waved while others stopped to greet him.

You’re right, he did awesome. Next time, some of those people will approach.

They should ask permission before petting Wally, of course.

And it’s always up to you whether you’re okay with it or not. ”

“Why would I not be okay with it?”

I scrunched my nose as I considered his question.

“In this town? I can’t imagine…but that doesn’t mean Wally might not react out of character for him.

Not every dog loves every person. My Dalmatian had a guy she couldn’t stand.

Turned out he was beating his wife. Did the dog know that?

Of course not. Did they sense the menace?

Possibly. If Wally ever shows and sign of discomfort, you just say it’s not a good day and you move on.

You never owe someone an explanation.” I glanced at the dog who was fast asleep.

“He’s really chill. The little kids poked his stomach a couple of times.

I mean, we watched closely, of course, but a stray finger escaped. He would just lick them.”

Phillip chuckled. “Yeah, that doesn’t surprise me.”

I pulled everything I needed out of the fridge. Then I washed my hands and pulled out a separate cutting board and bowl to prepare the raw meat. “Are you okay with well-done burgers?”

“Yeah.”

I startled as he’d come up beside me.

“I want to help. I…” He winced. “I don’t know much about food…stuff.” He waved his hand around.

“Sure.” Make sure he knows it’s no big deal . “I’ll get out of the way so you can wash your hands. And if you pet Wally, feel free to wash them again.”

“Yeah, that makes sense.”

He squirted some liquid soap into his hands.

I showed him how to use the touchless faucet. “I renovated this place two years ago. I could’ve upgraded houses, but I love the charm of this house and the friendliness of the neighborhood.”

“I thought everywhere was friendly in Gaynor Beach.”

I placed a cutting board in front of him, added a package of fresh strawberries, a colander, and a knife. “You want to wash the fruit thoroughly. Then you call pull the green stems off. Finally, you chop.”

He eyed the knife as if the thing was going to jump up and attack him.

“Why don’t you do the washing and then I can show you how I chop?

There’s no wrong way, okay? I mean, we can eat the berries whole.

They just happen to be a little big. Although I don’t care if juice runs down my chin.

” And I’d so love to lick it off your neck if it happens to run down.

God, I had to stop thinking of him this way.

We’d barely known each other three days.

He hadn’t shown the least sign of being interested in me as anything other than a friend.

Also, given he was clearly one of Anthony’s clients, he might also be in a precarious position.

Finally, being a patient of Dr. Martin’s usually meant some kind of issues.

He needed space, not me wanting to take him to my bed.

“I’m not really into making a mess with my food.” He met my gaze with uncertainty, his green eyes appearing a shade darker than I remembered.

“Then we chop.” I grinned. “Now what size would you like your hamburger?”

“Not too big?”

“I can do that.”

And I did. I showed him how I made the burger, explained—when he asked why I used a different cutting board for the garlic—about cross-contamination and foodborne illness.

I showed him how to chop strawberries and how to make a three-bean salad.

By no means was I a gourmet chef, but I realized immediately he had no idea about any of this.

Had he never cared for himself? I supposed plenty of people made it into their twenties without knowing how to cook, but I worried about him over next door by himself.

If he needed help, I was all about offering it.

I just had no idea how to figure out what he needed and not seem overbearing.

We enjoyed our meals in the solarium with the nice air conditioning. The day outside was quite humid and really hot. Not a breath of wind off the ocean. Conversation meandered through very innocuous subjects. I didn’t ask any pointed questions, much as I was dying to.

He didn’t offer up any great insights as to why he was living in James’s house. No clues as to where he’d been before or even what his plans were now. He’d mentioned a visit to the library—and meeting Scott.

Clearly Scott had made a positive impression on Phillip, for which I was glad. The man needed to know people would be there to support him if he reached out for help.

I would be there to support him, if it came to that. I could only hope he’d have the willingness to reach out.

We washed the dishes together, and then Wally rubbed against Phillip’s leg.

“Does he need to go out?” I eyed the dog who’d snored throughout entire meal, not even rousing to the scent of well-cooked burgers when I brought them into the house after grilling them on the barbecue.

“Yeah.” Phillip placed the last plate in the dishwasher. “We need to get going. We’ve imposed enough.”

“No imposition.”

“It’s a workday.”

“It’s a Friday.” I corrected him with a smile. “I’m the boss, and I make my own schedule. I have my phone on me at all times in case of a crisis and, as you can see, there hasn’t been one. Look, I know it’s still hot out, but how about a stroll down to the boardwalk? We can even go to the beach.”

Phillip glanced out the window. “I really don’t…not today. I’m super tired.”

Having no idea what he’d done before meeting us at the park, I couldn’t even begin to argue. “Tell you what, why don’t we go early in the morning? Before the sun’s too high. I’d enjoy that.”

He eyed me. “Don’t you need to run?”

“I can go for a run tonight when the heat dies down. My training is flexible right now because I don’t have any marathons in the next month.”

“Right. A marathon. I couldn’t walk a mile, let alone run twenty-six miles.”

My knee-jerk reaction was to tell him I’d show him how.

Fortunately, I reined that instinct in. I didn’t know his health status.

I didn’t know his physical or emotional state.

And becoming a marathon runner was grueling.

I barely managed, and I’d been doing this for years.

“Yes, twenty-six miles is brutal. But…do you want to walk a mile? We can see how close you get to that tomorrow. You have good walking shoes.”

He bit his lip and color crept into his cheeks. “Anthony helped me buy a high-quality pair. I told my doc back in LA I’d start walking. I told Arthur too. He made me promise to exercise Wally regularly. But I don’t know if Wally could walk a mile.”

“Good point. Why don’t I calculate one mile—so half a mile there and back. We’ll head out, and if you or Wally starts to tire, we turn around and come back. And if Wally can’t make it, we call a cab. Or I come home and grab my SUV and scoop you two up.”

“I don’t…” He sighed. “I don’t even really have a concept of what a mile is.

I mean…no, I don’t. Where I grew up? Everything was in eight square blocks.

Our house, the grocery store, the school, and the gas station where I worked.

Sometimes I would go to the next biggest town, but we always needed a car because it was almost an hour away.

I have no conception of what that is in miles.

And in LA…” He winced. “I didn’t get out much.

Or at all.” He whispered that final sentence.

“Okay.” I wanted to pull him into a hug at his expression of misery. “Why don’t you take Wally outside to do his business, and then we can hop into my SUV and drive half a mile? So you can get a sense?”

“I walked home from the library.”

I did some quick calculations in my mind. “Okay, so let’s drive that as well to see how far that was. More than a mile, I promise. And you’re still in one piece.”

He appeared to perk up at that with a little smile teasing his lips. “Really? Yeah, okay.”

“Let’s get Wally out first. We can gauge how you two are doing in the time it takes him to poop and go from there. Let’s take a bottle of water. Plenty of the vendors along the boardwalk have bowls of water for dogs.”

Wally perked up. Apparently he understood he was a dog.

I snagged my water bottle, filled it with cold water, and headed for the door. “Oh, we should wear baseball caps. Do you have one?”

He shook his head.

“Well, I happen to have quite a few. Do you mind wearing a Dodgers’ cap?”

“Nope. We didn’t have a team in Oregon, and since I never watched television, I didn’t even know about the Mariners.”

Although I continued to make my way to the front hall—because my caps were in a basket in the closet there—that brought me up short. What kid wasn’t raised on baseball? And didn’t know the closest team? And never watched television? None of your business. Let him come to you…if he wants to.

“Ah. Being halfway between San Diego and LA, I always had divided loyalties. In the end, my dad convinced me to side with LA.” I yanked two caps out of the basket.

“I should’ve offered you a choice—LA or San Diego?

” I dug a little farther. “I also have LA Kings, San Francisco Giants, and Oakland Athletics…”

“The Kings?” His eyes flashed bright. “I love hockey.”

“Great.” I handed him the cap and plopped the Dodgers one onto my head. I eyed his glasses—which most of the time I didn’t even notice since they fit his face perfectly.

And man, I found glasses super sexy.

“Do you have your sunglasses with you?”

He shook his head.

“Let me see…” I dug around in the basket and retrieved a pair of clip-ons.

“Maybe not the best, but my mom’s always forgetting hers.

The glasses she wears are a highly specific and very expensive prescription, and she doesn’t want to spend the money getting a pair of sunglasses made as well.

So she keeps clip-ons. Except she often forgets them. ”

“So these are your mom’s?”

I hesitated, but only for a moment. “I have three of them. So I’m gifting one to you.” I hadn’t intended that…but it made all the sense in the world. One couldn’t live in SoCal without keeping sunglasses handy.

“I didn’t mean?—”

“Well, I did. Mom will be tickled pink.” One of her traditional expressions she liked to trot out. “I can pick up another five at the store the next time I’m there.”

When he hesitated, I indicated his glasses.

He removed them and handed them to me.

I affixed the clip-ons, pleased to find the fit just about perfect.

Or so you tell yourself.

“You ready to go?”

Phillip nodded.

I eyed his pasty-white skin. And came to a quick decision. “We need sunscreen. I’ll apply some while you get Wally organized and then we swap.”

He didn’t appear convinced, with a little furrow in his brow.

“Skin cancer is a thing. So’s a bad burn. The sun is full force right now. I rarely run when it’s this hot—unless I’m training for a hot-weather location. And I always wear sunscreen.”

“Don’t you sweat it off?”

“Waterproof.” I snagged the bottle, squeezed out a large dollop, and started slathering myself.

Phillip licked his lips.

I tried not to read too much into that gesture.

He put on his sunscreen.

I tried not to ogle.

We headed out.