Page 24 of The Enemy's Daughter

“Because I love it here. There is a lot of good that happens here. You probably don’t see it because you’ve seen me cry, but there are a lot of pets, yours included, that are looked after. Taken care of, and loved. That’s really important to all of us, that they’re loved.” She took a deep breath. “I’ll be okay. This just hurts more than normal. He had a good life, a great one, and horrible thugs took it away from him. You know.”

He knelt in front of her, running his hands up and down her thighs. “I’m not leaving you alone. I’m going to stay by your side. I’ve got Buster in my car.”

“You don’t have to worry about me like this. I’ll be fine.”

“I’m not taking no for an answer. We’re going to go out, and I’m going to take care of you. No questions asked.”

She smiled. “I talked about you today at lunch.”

“You did?” he asked.

“Yeah, with my best friend Rebecca.”

“I hope you told her good things.”

“I did. Or at least she told me to trust in this, and to trust in you, us.”

He reached up to push a strand of hair out of the way. “I hoped you’d trust me by now.”

“We barely know each other.”

“Does that really matter?” he asked. “Can’t you just go with what you feel?” Alaric didn’t even understand why he cared. This wasn’t about making Bella feel happy. This was about getting what he wanted.

“I don’t know, Blue. I really don’t know.” She touched his cheek, her thumb caressing his skin.

Help her.

When she was no longer crying, and seemed to get her wits back, they made their way back out to the main reception.

“You’re going home,” Deidre said. “Don’t even try to fight me. You’ve dealt with enough for one day.” She turned to him. “I can trust you to look after her? Take care of her?”

“Yes, of course.”

He waited for her to grab her stuff from the staffroom, and then took her out to his car.

“Can I see Buster?” she asked.

“Sure.” He went to the trunk of the car, opening it up.

The pup was wagging his ass and pressing against the cage. “Oh, he’s so sweet.”

Opening the cage, Alaric caught him up in his arms, taking the licks on the face.

“He’s telling you he loves you. You’re his family, Blue.”

There had to be a way to get her to know his real name. He was tired of being called Blue. That wasn’t who he was.

Staring into his dog’s eyes, or his pup’s, he wondered what he was going to do with him once all this was over.

“Here, have a cuddle,” he said, handing him to Bella.

A lot of what he was doing was starting to get blurred. This had never happened to him before. He never lost sight of what he wanted or how he wanted to get it done.

“Sweetie, you are so beautiful. You really are.”

“If you love dogs and cats and rabbits so much, why don’t you ever get one?” he asked.

“I work, and it feels wrong getting a pet just to send him to a kennel or something to be taken care of. When I’m ready there’ll be no stopping me.” She kissed Buster’s head. “I bet you’re going to be spoilt this Christmas. Do you celebrate it?”

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