Page 67 of Healing You
She swallowed nervously, looking away. “I'll go get us a couple from Elsa's.”
“Lex has free coffee right there—”
“I know.” Uh-oh. “I needed to ask Lila something anyway.” And before he could ask any more questions, she turned, running away from him. Away from Lex, in the direction of the diner.
From the other side of the park, Yvonne's authoritative voice cut through the early morning quiet. “No, no. We don't want the dogs crated. We want them in the pens, able to play and interact with potential adopters.” Steve watched her carefully, chuckling at that awesomely commanding tone. Appreciating the muscled lines of her strong legs peeking out of her running shorts and the way the race tank top she wore draped over her curvy breasts.
She looked up from behind a playpen she was setting up, Ruckus barking and doing figure eights around her feet. His leash, held loosely in her hand, wrapped around her ankles and she teetered before nearly going head over feet into the grass.
Steve ran to her, but by the time he reached her side, she'd already caught her balance and he ended up looking like an overzealous hero wannabe. Well, it was better to be an overzealous hero than an asshole wallflower who lets the girl face plant.
“You all right there?”
She gave an exasperated sigh, sending a chastising look to Ruckus. “Yeah,” she blew out the word on an exhale. “I love this dog, but he is a handful.”
Steve smiled at that. “So, adopting him myself as a way of showing my love would not be the ultimate gesture?” he asked playfully.
She dropped her cheek to her shoulder, giving him a humor-filled look. “If the ultimate gesture's goal is to have me never move in with you, then yes.”
The silence grew tense around them and she glanced down at the schedule that was pulled up on her phone. Her finger drifted to her mouth and she nibbled on her nail. “Well, I should, uh—”
“Why don't I take Ruckus for a little while?” he asked. “Give you a break and let you run the event. I'll even keep him while you run.”
“You're not running?” She looked surprised as her gaze darted back to his.
“Nah. After we—after last weekend, I gave my spot in the race to Dawn. I figured you could probably use someone here at the finish line with all the adoptable animals, anyway.”
“I have volunteers for that,” she said.
He pointed to the badge hanging around his neck that said VOLUNTEER. “I know. I could even keep Gatsby and Daisy for you, as well. We'll want Ruckus to be out here to get adopted, but Daisy and Gatsby could either hang with me or in the air conditioned offices,” he said, pointing across the street to his clinic.
Yvonne shook her head. “I left Daisy at home. I didn't want anyone getting the wrong idea and thinking she was adoptable. And Gatsby's going to run with me.”
Unease slid through Steve like a gardener snake through soil. Sure, Gatsby had been doing really well and running with Yvonne for the past month or so. But those were shorter runs. Three, four miles tops. Six miles was a lot to add to that on a hot day.
Her shoulders tensed. “That's okay, right? You said before that he was okay to run with me.”
Steve could feel that anxiety gripping his chest like a bony hand squeezing his lungs, but he forced a smile instead. He had to let go. Let the people he loved live their lives and not believe that everyone and everything around him might crumble just because something was out of his control. “Yeah, yeah. He should be fine. Just take it slow. Make sure he has lots of water.”
It was still for a moment as she stared down at Gatsby, laying in the grass a few feet away. “Are you sure?”
Steve took Ruckus' leash from her, flashing her a smile. “You guys are gonna knock 'em dead.” Bending down, he gave Gatsby a quick pat to the head, taking an extra second to feel the base of his jaw where the dog's lymph nodes had previously protruded. Nothing. No swelling, and he seemed to be happy and in good spirits. “Have a good run, Gatsby,” he whispered, then guided Ruckus back over to where he was setting up the swag stand full of race day T-shirts to purchase along with the Maple Grove Animal Rescue bumper stickers and buttons. It was still a little dark out, but the sun was peeking over the horizon, edging its way up. Across the street in his clinic's parking lot, he saw Dawn getting out of her car. She was decked out in running gear, fully equipped with her phone strapped to her arm as she jogged up to him, giving him a quick hug hello.
“You ready to run my race for me?” he asked.
She nodded, scanning the various dogs that they had saved together with Yvonne a few weeks earlier. “Wow, she did an incredible job. These all look like totally different dogs.”
“I know. I can't believe she found so many fosters in such a short amount of time,” he said, giving Dawn a nudge. “I know you foster now and then for a couple of days. Maybe you'll finally make one of those permanent?”
She snorted. “Oh, yeah. My cat will love that.”
Steve grabbed a spare adoption form off the table and handed it to her. “Just in case you change your mind.”
She snatched it out of his hand, folding it and slipping it into her arm band. “I'm going to go say hi to Yvonne.”
A sliver of the sun slanted over the peaked mountains in the distance... Mount Washington. Despite her declaration of going to say hi to Yvonne, Dawn didn't move. Didn't leave his side. “You're a wreck without her,” Dawn said. “Even more now than you were in veterinary school. You miss her.”
Yeah. That wasn't anything that Steve hadn't realized a million times over that week. She made herself vulnerable to him in a way he never had to her before. She'd practically begged him to stay last weekend when he came by to check on her after the engagement party and he'd left her again. And even after that, she had still found it somewhere deep inside of herself to be kind to him—to be friendly and not hold a grudge. He needed to make it right. He needed to find a way to give something incredible back to her. “I screwed up,” he said. It wasn't about the confusion from when they were teens anymore. This was about now. About last weekend, and about his inability to handle their relationship when things got tough.
