Matched(23)

And this one here-this one needed an unconditional friend as bad as Will did. "Wanna go for a drive, pup?"

Wrigley's tail wagged. His whiskers twitched, and he raised his head, those soulful eyes asking if Will meant it.

Wasn't any doubt.

Will meant it.

"Get a move on, then," Will said. "Can't get in a truck if you don't get up off the floor."

Wrigley stretched his neck. Gave a sniff. Seeing what Will was made of, Will figured.

He waited.

With a heavy dog-sigh, Wrigley scooted into sitting position, showing off the white stripe that started on his neck and covered his belly.

Pepper inhaled a soft breath.

Wrigley, though, got a hint of stubborn in his expression. I'll sit for you, he seemed to say, but I ain't making any more effort till you prove you mean it.

Will pulled his keys out and dangled them. "You coming?"

Wrigley sniffed at the keys, but he didn't move any farther.

"Oh, don't tease him," Pepper said. "You can't-there's an application and a waiting period and-"

"And there's some perks to being a superstar," Will said.                       
       
           



       

"But you-what will you do with him while you're on the road?"

Will slanted a look at her. "He goes with me."

"You can do that?"

"Course. Took Bandit out with me for years. Saffron didn't mention it?"

"Actually, she didn't talk much about you," Pepper said.

Will put a hand to his heart. "Aw, now, that's cruel. Blow to a man's ego."

Pepper's grin was as familiar as her sister's. "You weren't Dylan." She gestured to Wrigley. "What will you do with him until you go out on the road?"

Take him home. What Lindsey would do when Will brought a dog into her house until he went on the road-Will felt a smile creeping on.

Kick him out of her house, that's what she'd probably do.

Might could be some goodness in that too. Comfortable as he was getting, as much writing as he was getting done, he wasn't likely to leave on his own. And this morning had reinforced the idea that he needed to get out before he got too attached again.

"Won't be a problem," Will said. "He trained?"

"Of course he is."

Wrigley echoed the answer with a disgusted snort. He watched Will. Waited.

"Fixed?" Will asked.

"Yep."

"You go on and get whoever you need to so I can take my new friend here for a ride."

"Saffron did mention your ego," Pepper said, but she couched it with a friendly grin, and she went to the door into the next room and waved through the window to one of the ladies.

"Hear that, Wrigley?" Will said. "We're breaking you out of this joint."

Wrigley stood, gave a full body shake, and then nosed Will's hand. And an hour later, Will's wallet was relieved of a hefty donation, and he had a new best friend sitting in his passenger seat.

Life was looking up.





Chapter Ten



PEPPER HAD BEEN right-Wrigley wasn't much into balls or Frisbees, or maybe he had enough common sense to want to stay inside where it was warm. The pup was curled at Will's feet in Lindsey's sunroom Thursday evening, listening to him noodle out a melody on the Yamaha. Paisley had called to say hi to the family's newest canine, and then Aunt Jessie had called and squealed like a grandmama after Will texted her Wrigley's picture. But when Will asked what Aunt Jessie and Sacha were doing, Aunt Jessie had clammed up and said she needed to go, because Donnie was taking her out to the Pork'n'Fork for dinner and she still needed to get herself gussied up.

Left Will with a sinking in his stomach. He had few memories of being six years old, but the ones he had were vivid. Second biggest was Sacha bringing him Vera. The biggest was of him lying in that twin bed on the squeaky springs, listening to Sacha telling Aunt Jessie she could do this, she could raise two babies. That Will and Mari Belle were her destiny. That a place like Pickleberry Springs helped their own, and that Sacha would be there too. That Aunt Jessie wasn't alone.

Will had little enough left in his life that made him feel like the regular ol' country boy he was at heart. His family might not have been conventional, even by Southern standards, but something being off with Aunt Jessie and Sacha-that didn't help.

But tonight, he had his dog and his music. He told himself Aunt Jessie and Sacha were probably fine, just being girls who sometimes needed their space. And this time next week, he would forget anything felt off, that the best thing he could do for all of them was to get back to normal himself. The Yamaha wasn't worn in the right spots like Vera had been-no scratches or scars or evidence of life yet-but she'd do.

The back door knob clicked. Without hardly giving it a thought, Will switched from his noodling to strumming a song his buddy Tyler Blue had written, "Rain Dance," about a guy who fell in love with a girl while watching her dance in the rain. Will had seen Lindsey dance in the snow, but not the rain.

He wanted to though. See the carefree side of her she'd had when they met. See her face light up, her smile glow. That all-wet part wouldn't be half bad either. The lady would be sexy as hell all wet.

He clapped a hand over the strings and plunged the room into silence.

Didn't need to be thinking about Lindsey in the rain. Or Lindsey being happy, or Lindsey being sexy. He was packed and ready to go. He'd been planning on clearing out before she got home, leaving a thank you note, but he'd wanted one more afternoon in a comfortable house before he and Wrigley set out to find a new place to crash.

Working on that new song, he'd lost track of time.

Been a long time since that happened. It wasn't a love song, wasn't a hate song. Simply a song about hanging out, drinking beer, loving life. Good old-fashioned country music. Inspired here.                       
       
           



       

His fingers itched to strum again, but he set the guitar aside instead.

He made to stand, turned to the door, and there she was, shuffling through the kitchen, barefoot. Her light hair was tied back so tight it looked painted on, her skin paler than it should've been, exhaustion etched in the slope of her back and shoulders.

Will started toward her. The chair next to her clattered, and she yelped. "Ow!"

That would hurt. Stubbed toes sucked. "You okay, lawyer lady?" He leaned in the doorway, watching her turn those tired brown eyes toward him, sizing him up as though she was deciding if he was asking about her toe or her day.

"I'll live. Thank you." She set another plastic bag on the table. "Leftover Chinese if you're hungry."

He'd planned to grab something on his way to a hotel, but Chinese sounded decent. So did company, even though he knew better. She turned toward the stairs with a barely noticeable limp in her gait.

"Eat any babies today?" he said.

She pinned him with a suspicious side-glance. He shouldn't have asked. Didn't need to get more attached. But she'd let him stay here for two nights and days now. She'd offered him dinner last night, let him raid her fridge, bake cookies, brought him dinner tonight. She hadn't offered anything else. He hadn't asked.

But she'd been friendly, if guardedly so. Not starry-eyed. No agenda. And he'd been on the lookout for an agenda. Best he could tell, the biggest difference between the woman standing here and the girl he'd known fifteen years ago was life experience.

"No babies," she said finally. "And despite the Queen General's best attempts, I didn't play matchmaker for her daughter either. I did, however, help save a village of dinosaurs from sweet and sour meteor-droids. For purely selfish reasons, I promise. Dinosaurs taste almost as good as babies."

The Queen General. She was that Marilyn lady that the folks in Bliss had mentioned a time or two. Supposed to be scary. His team told him they'd fielded three phone calls from her already inviting him to welcome receptions and offering him a key to The Aisle, which he figured was what a town like Bliss did instead of offering keys to the city. He wanted to ask about the matchmaking part, but it wasn't his business what she did or didn't do with her gift.

Even if Mikey was hanging his hat at the home of one Miss Dahlia Mallard.

"Don't seem likely, you and that Queen General lady running in the same circles," Will said.

"My father is special friends with her. We have family dinners on occasion."

"You want, I can have my psychic talk to him about that."

The corners of her mouth wobbled until she gave in and put her pearly whites on display. With her lips spread in a full-on smile, he got that funny feeling in his belly, right under where his heart started drumming one of those painful-but-good beats.

"That's very kind of you," she said. "But I've got this one covered."

He didn't doubt it. "What I hear about that Queen General lady, even a baby-eater like you might could need some backup with that one."

"Don't tell me the great Billy Brenton is afraid of a crazy old lady from a little town in the middle of nowhere."

"I grew up in a little town in the middle of nowhere. I know what those crazy old ladies can do. Darn right I'm scared."