Page 9 of Texas Scandal

“Yes, sir,” he said. “We are good to go.”

The ride to Tiernan’s house was quiet. He didn’t expect much talking in the presence of the driver, but he could also see the wheels turning in Melody’s mind. Tiernan wasn’t too far off from spinning out mentally, considering his thoughts kept looping back to the body found on his property. Loki was home alone, too. The Lab mix had no idea he’d uncovered a dead body—lucky him. Still, Tiernan had been away for hours. Loki needed to go out. He needed attention.

The driver stopped in front of Tiernan’s porch. After thanking him for the ride home, Tiernan slipped out of his side and came around the back of the vehicle to open the door for Melody. Once again, sparks flew when she took his hand as she climbed down. She suppressed a yawn for the third time in ten minutes. All the adrenaline from the day would be wearing thin by now.

After Tiernan closed the door, the driver pulled away. Tiernan reached for Melody’s hand and then linked their fingers. As soon as he unlocked the door to his home—using a key to enter was something he’d never done before—he stepped beside Melody to intercept an overenthusiastic Loki. At one year old, the rescue dog still had more puppy energy than brain development to stop his impulses. The ball of excitement and energy barreled toward them from his spot by the sliding glass doors across the room in the dining area. The main living area was open concept. He didn’t need a whole lot of privacy considering he lived alone.

Tiernan dropped Melody’s hand and stepped in front of her to shield her from Loki. When her hands came up to his back, her nails dug into his shoulders and she hunkered down behind him, he realized she was afraid.

“I probably should have warned you about this guy, but he doesn’t have an aggressive bone in his body,” he reassured as Loki put on the brakes and skidded toward them on the rug. His big paws got away from him, as usual, causing him to bowling ball slide into Tiernan’s shins.

“It’s fine,” she said with a tone that said anything but. Tiernan had learned the hard way those two words strung together oftentimes meant the opposite.

He bent down and scratched Loki’s belly. Melody backed into the corner. His heart went out to her.

“Go ahead and make yourself comfortable,” he said to her before leading the Lab outside by the collar.

Loki did his business almost immediately. Accidents inside the house had been few and far between in recent months. Tiernan picked up a tennis ball from the basket on the small porch, and then threw it. He repeated the game long enough for Loki to burn off some of his energy—energy that was never in short supply with the breed.

By the time he walked inside again, Melody was perched on a bar stool at the granite island in his kitchen. Muscles corded, breathing shallow, she looked ready to jump at the slightest noise. She white-knuckled the wooden stool as Loki bolted toward her.

“Loki, sit,” Tiernan said in a calm but direct voice. To his surprise, Loki did. After running out Loki’s energy, it was about a fifty-fifty shot as to whether the dog would listen. “Behave.”

“I got bit as a kid, so big dogs still scare me even though I know all dogs aren’t like my neighbor’s,” Melody confessed.

“I’m sorry that happened. Loki’s energy can be over the top,” he responded. “But I can assure you that he would never bite, not even playfully.”

She nodded, her gaze still locked on to the dog. When someone had a bad experience early on with an animal, trying to convince them not all dogs were out of control was useless. Tiernan hoped she would stick around long enough to see that Loki wasn’t a threat, and maybe change her mind about animals. Or at the very least plant a seed. Loki might be a hot mess at times but Tiernan couldn’t imagine his life without him.

“Give me a sec to get him squared away,” he said to her as he crossed the room toward the pantry where he kept dry food.

“Do whatever you need to,” she said.

Tiernan filled the dog’s bowl and then topped it off with half a can of wet food. “Steak and rice today, buddy.”

“How old is...he...right?” Melody asked. “He’s a boy.” There wasn’t a whole mess of confidence in her tone about Loki’s sex.

“Yes. He’s a boy,” Tiernan confirmed. Loki had already hopped up and resumed his position as Tiernan’s shadow. “The shelter where Loki came from found him digging through the trash at a construction site, searching for food.”

Her face twisted in a grimace. “Poor baby.”

“He’d been underweight as a three-month-old, but they got him in time before he was completely malnourished,” he continued.

“Do they know where he spent those early months?” she asked.

He shrugged. “It’s anyone’s guess according to the volunteer. There were no others like him found in the area. No lactating mother anywhere, either.”

“Sounds like someone might have abandoned him after taking him away from his family,” she said as some of the tension lines eased in her forehead and the corners of her mouth curled into a frown. An emotion passed behind her eyes as she glanced over at Loki, a mix of compassion and heartbreak. “I’ve heard of people driving out to the country to drop off puppies or dogs they no longer want.”

Tiernan gritted his teeth before nodding.

“He was flea bitten and scared, but his heart was still open to learning and trusting. Many more weeks in the old environment fending for himself could easily have changed that,” he explained. “Which would have been a shame because his heart is as big as the Texas sky.”

“It’s surprisingly easy to become so broken by life that you can’t ever get back to that innocent trust again,” Melody said before compressing her lips like she’d just given away more than she probably should with the statement.

“All I know is the minute those big brown eyes looked up at me from behind the plexiglass, I knew I’d found my next best friend,” he said. “No more dumpster diving for this guy. Only the best. A comfortable place to lay his head down every night and someone who will make sure he never suffers again.”

“He’s lucky to have you,” Melody said with a small crack in her voice that caused him to wonder about her background. A sound like the one she’d just made came with a backstory, one he hoped she’d stick around long enough to tell him.

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