Page 46 of Base Block

“I know you were interested in Maverick,” he said. It was weird that he was talking about that after I’d heard the dog last night…I had never believed much in signs, but I did stop.

“They caught him,” he told me. “He’s at a shelter.”

“Did the owner leave for Turkmenistan?”

He nodded. “She’s long gone. I tried the number that she left but it isn’t working and the email I sent bounced back,” he said. “It’s funny because she used to get so pissed if anyone looked wrong at that dog, but she was the same way about her car, nasty and crazy. She kept accusing me of throwing rocks at it and I was like, lady, you drive on the road! Your paint job will get scratched, but that’s normal.”

He kept talking about exterior damage but I interrupted. “Where did they take that dog? Is there more than one animal shelter around here?” I asked.

He thought there were a few but wasn’t exactly sure and later, when I had a free moment at my desk, I looked that up. One of them had pictures of adoptable dogs on their website, big ones and little ones. Some were cute, I could allow for that. Some were scary looking and reminded me of the stray that had chased me on Callum’s street. In my memory, that dog had huge, yellow eyes and fangs that dripped. Maybe my memory wasn’t the most reliable.

When I left the office, I felt good about accomplishing stuff but also a little strange. I had gotten another message from an anonymous account, the fifth or sixth one saying basically the same thing. “Roxy, I know this is you,” it had read today. “Why are you ignoring me? We’re friends, girl. Don’t be a bitch.” Everyone in my former life had called me by that name so these DMs could have come from any of them, but I was sure that Sage was the author and I wanted her to leave me alone. She wasn’t understanding that I was done with that former life, and I had gone back and forth over whether to answer her and tell her so. In the end, I hadn’t. I had blocked her, just like I had with the other accounts she had messaged me from before. That didn’t mean she would stop and I didn’t know what she wanted. I couldn’t pick her clothes anymore or fix things when she argued with Millie. I wasn’t going to smooth over her issues with Damian, either. I was done with all of them.

On my way home, I drove past one of the animal shelters that I had looked at online. Before I thought about it too much, I found myself turning into the parking lot and then walking towards the door. The employee at the desk was nice and said that no, not all the animals were on the website. “We have a lot right now and we’re stretched thin,” the woman told me. “Are you looking for someone in particular?”

“Yes,” I said. “A dog named Maverick. He’s black and brown, and he’s big. But he seems friendly.”

“Oh, yes,” she said. A funny expression crossed her face. “I know Maverick. Are you wanting to adopt him?”

No, I wasn’t, so I shook my head. “Could I see him? I just think it wasn’t fair how his owner left him and moved to Turkmenistan. I don’t know why people act that way with dogs. And cats, probably, and also kids. I don’t know why people don’t take care of their babies.”

“Turkmenistan? That’s too bad. I’m always thankful that there are different people who are willing and able to step up for the animals. And kids,” she added.

“Or sometimes, it might be the same person,” I offered. “It could be that one person wasn’t able to do the right thing before, but now she is.”

“Sure!” she said, nodding. “That’s great, too. I can take you back.” She gestured towards a door and I walked over.

Later, I waited for Callum to come home, ready with some dinner if he wanted it and also excited to see him. He was happy to see me, too, which I knew because he told me. “This is the romance I was talking about,” he said, inhaling deeply. “A quiet house, you smiling, plenty of food. I’m glad to see you.”

He ate, even though they’d already had dinner at the stadium, and he asked me about my day at work. That wasn’t the topic that I wanted to discuss with him, though.

“It was all fine,” I said briefly. “And then, on the way home, I went to an animal shelter. Maverick is there.”

“That dog? The one who knocked you down?”

I nodded. “I think he remembered me. When he saw me, his tail practically wagged off. It’s harder for them to adopt out big dogs like him,” I explained. “They’re a larger expense because of how much food they eat. They might need someone to give them extra exercise and training.”

“Maverick needs training,” he said, nodding. “Flexible voice control, my ass.”

“He already caused some problems at the kennel but they would only say that he’s exuberant. I think he knocked somebody down there, too, because the woman who worked at the desk rubbed her elbow as she talked about him. He’ll be even harder to adopt and—I filled out an application.”

He paused with his fork partway to his mouth. “What? You want to adopt a pet?”

“I kind of want to adopt him, that particular pet. I think that what happened to him is so unfair,” I said. “He is a nice boy. He was so happy to see me.”

“How would we control him? He’s a hell hound, right?” But then he started nodding a little. “It could be good to have companionship. We also could train a dog to guard the house when I’m gone.”

I thought about trying to make him fierce. “I would prefer a companion.”

“I didn’t think that you liked dogs that much, and Maverick? In particular?” he wondered.

“We could go back and look at all the dogs there. There’s no rush and it doesn’t have to be him. We’d have to work through a whole process in order to adopt, so there’s plenty of time to think about it. And he would be my dog, that I would take care of. You wouldn’t have to bother with him.”

“He’d be in our house. He’d be our dog, and we’d both be bothering. Right?”

“We can think about it,” I said again. Sometimes, other people needed to step up. Callum and I could be those people.

Chapter 10