After receiving a release command from Evie, all four dogs surged forward, licking and rubbing against Kalista until she was laughing at their exuberance.
“Sorry, they love people. This is Lancelot, Gawain, Percival and Galahad.”
Kalista’s eyes widened. “You named your dogs after knights of the Round Table?”
“Yep, all four of them are trained for search and rescue, so it seemed fitting. They are my best guys.” Evie walked over to rub two of the dogs on their backs. She loved her dogs, and relaxed when she saw how comfortable Kali was surrounded by the cheerful animals. Wanting to distract them, she pulled out four tennis balls from a small bag hanging at her side, holding two in each hand. “Hey, guys! Go get’em!”
She hurled the balls across the yard and Kalista watched the dogs fly after them, then turned back to look at Evie’s home. “I have to tell you, your house is absolutely amazing.”
“Thank you. I really love it, too.” Evie waved her hand toward the building. “I live in the main part of the house. The right wing belongs to my cousin, Francesca, and the left, my cousin Beckett. Francesca is an author so I can go days without seeing her, and Beckett is our resident veterinarian. He works at the clinic in town three days a week, but the rest of the time he can be found in his office here over at the kennel.”
“I thought you have three cousins who live here,” Kalista said.
“Hunter, my oldest cousin, lives over at the boarding house. He says he wants to be available if any of the guys over there need anything, but I think he is more comfortable over there because he’s a former soldier, too. Truthfully, I think he does a good job connecting with the guys that stay here, even if he doesn’t talk much. Did Hammer tell you what happened to him?”
“No, he didn’t.”
Evie shrugged. “They don’t talk about that kind of stuff much. Hunter was a Navy SEAL, and he was in a pretty bad explosion when he was overseas. I don’t know exactly what he was doing, he doesn’t talk about that stuff, but he was badly burned on one side of his body.”
“Oh my God. I’m so glad to hear he made it home.”
“So am I,” Evie said with feeling. “My parents died when I was still a teenager, but my aunt and uncle didn’t hesitate to move their family here to take care of me. My cousins were great, and we became close almost instantly. When I talked to them about starting this place, everyone supported the idea. Now, we all get to do something we love. Even my uncle, Tony, and Madeline work at the kennel. They live in that house over on the other side of the pond.”
Kalista looked across the pond and saw a smaller ranch house. It warmed her heart to think of Jared’s mother in a happy relationship after what she went through with Jared’s father. Pushing those distressing thoughts aside, she opened the trunk of her car and took out a large canvas bag that held three gallon-sized plastic containers filled with dog treats. “I was really excited about coming to see you about the upcoming adoption event. I made three kinds of treats to start us off.”
She had taken care to do a little research online before she tweaked the recipes until she was happy with the results. Becca and Anna had helped her make the treats over the last few days, but some unexpected help had come from Anna’s nephew, Nathan Diaz.
The sixteen year old had recovered from his ordeal with his mother’s abusive boyfriend, and had started attending classes at the local high school. When the school day was over, Nate had started coming in to help out in the bakery. With his brother Shane still in the hospital, it seemed best to keep the teen occupied. He had offered to clean the pots and pans in the back of the shop, and had learned to work the register in the front. He had a good work ethic, despite how screwed up his home life had been before he’d moved in with Anna, and he had been very grateful when Kalista officially offered him a part-time job.
Over the last week they had noticed an increase of young girls visiting the shop. Nate was a handsome young man, with a dark, brooding attitude that automatically drew those young girls to him like forbidden fruit. It seemed odd that the young man wanted to work in the bakery with his bad boy demeanor, but he was a natural in the kitchen and seemed to like what he was doing.
He had taken an interest in helping to make the dog treats and had even been the one to suggest a yogurt-based frosting to make the treats cute and appealing. He had muttered that he had looked online at some pictures of homemade dog treats, and it had been sweet how he’d blushed at her praise. Once they’d had a plan, Nate, Anna, Becca and Kalista had a blast baking the samples for today’s meeting.