Page 15 of Look What You Made Me Do

“Jake,” Pete interrupted as he entered the bar area, “your damn dog’s howling.”

“You have a dog?” Ella asked, straightening.

“Kind of.”

She blinked, wondering if she’d consumed more alcohol than she thought. “You kind of have a dog?”

“He’s a stray who’s been hanging around. I don’t suppose you know anyone in the neighborhood who could take him do you?”

As a matter of fact, she did. She lived at stray central. She opened her mouth to say as much then shut it again. She didn’t feel like doing him any favors tonight. Which was irritable and bitchy but she just didn’t care.

“Why don’t you take him home?”

“No pets allowed in my building.”

Of course not. She supposed he lived in some posh penthouse somewhere. A place where everything was marble and leather and designer pooches that fit in handbags were fine but dirty strays did not belong.

As if he knew she was prevaricating, he leaned in a little. “Come on, Ella.” He waggled his eyebrows. “You owe me one.”

She blinked as his meaning. Since when had their down and dirty liaison in The Rusty Nail been transactional?

Since he had a stray dog to offload, apparently.

“He’d be a great watch dog,” he cajoled. “Protect two vulnerable women living by themselves. He’s got a helluva bark and a menacing personality.”

Ella held his gaze for a moment, ready to make some quip about his assumptions but there was little point. Daisy and Iris would never forgive her if she didn’t volunteer to take the dog in so that was that.

Resigned, she drained her glass in two swallows and said, “Show me.”

4

“Cerberus?” Ella looked from the dog to Jake to the dog.

“Uh huh,” he confirmed, squatting to give him a pat.

The dog looked up at her, wagging his tail in apology, as if even he knew the name was rather ambitious. She may not have been expecting three heads but she’d been expecting more than a skinny Jack Russell cross.

She couldn’t have been more surprised had it been a Chihuahua called Satan.

“This is the watchdog with the menacing personality?”

Cerberus gave a well-timed pathetic tremble as Jake nodded again. “Underneath this flea-bitten exterior lurks the dark heart of a ninja dog.”

Crouching beside Jake, she scratched behind a soft, floppy ear. “Ninja dog, huh?” Cerberus angled his head to allow Ella more access and gave a shudder of ecstasy which made her smile. “What do you say, boy? Want to come live at my house?”

Cerberus whined his agreement and Ella sighed as she ran her hands down the length of his body. “Okay, then.”

“Thank you.”

The soft words were heartfelt and Ella glanced at Jake. Which was a big mistake. Their heads were close and, out of the neon gloom, his features were sharp and defined.

As a teenager Jake had been good-looking. But as an adult, with that careless smatter of face scruff, his broadly angled face and a set of acre-wide shoulders, his attraction had matured into a lethal weapon.

He was a man now.

A man who, two years ago, had taken her to his bed and systematically reduced her to a pile of quivering goo.

Of its own accord, her gaze dropped to his mouth and her breath hitched as she remembered how masterfully he’d kissed her that day. The thrill of it tingled through her lips even now and the air in the alley became heavy with anticipation.

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