The Art of Wag (9 page)

Tracy reached out and touched Kat’s forearm. “I’m so sorry. That doesn’t sound good. I hate to ask this after what happened, but would you be able to board Roxy again? It would only be one night. This Friday I am supposed to go to a meeting in the city.”

The expression on Kat’s face was impassive and hard to read, but after an uncomfortably long pause, she finally said, “Okay. It will be fine. I’ll talk to Joel.”

Tracy let out the breath she’d been holding. “Thank you so much! I’ll bring her by here on Friday morning.” She’d already mentally spent the $500 Rob was supposed to give her. Rent, food, an oil change for The Turd before winter. Maybe a new coat too.

Tracy left the house before Kat could change her mind. She rushed down the steps through the driving rain and got into the car, where Roxy was contentedly snoozing in the back seat. Tracy turned the heater on full blast, listening to the engine warm up in its sickly, sputtery way. At least the stupid thing started. If it got any colder, the car was going to stage a rebellion.

She turned around in the seat to look at the dog. “Listen here, Roxy, you need to get over this kitchen thing.” The dog raised her head. “Yeah, don’t look all innocent at me. I found out what you did. And no matter what you think, it was definitely not funny.” Roxy wagged the tip of her feathery tail lightly. “No. I don’t think they like you. Right now, I’m pretty sure I don’t like you. And you had
better
be a good dog on Friday.” Roxy put her head down and closed her eyes.

Tracy sighed. The word was getting out about Roxy. Soon no one in Alpine Grove would be willing to take this dog off her hands, even for a weekend. She’d never be able to take a vacation again. Not that she could afford one. She could be trapped here forever.

Kat closed the door and leaned back against it. Having Roxy out of the house was a relief. Joel was going to kill her for letting Tracy drop the dog off again on Friday. Linus came over and leaned his large body against her. She stroked the smooth fur on his head. “Yeah, Big Guy. I know. I have to tell him. Let’s go downstairs and get it over with.”

Linus wagged eagerly and charged down the stairs. Kat followed more slowly and significantly less enthusiastically. She leaned in the doorway of Joel’s office. Linus settled into a spot on the floor next to Lady, who was curled up in a tight furry ball. Joel was sitting at his computer, frowning at the monitor. His left hand was grasped around his right forearm, holding it up against his stomach. He looked over his shoulder at her. “Is Roxy gone?”

“Yes. She’s Tracy’s problem again. Are you feeling any better?”

“I’m okay.”

“You don’t look okay. You have a death grip on your arm. Shouldn’t you go to a doctor?”

“I hate doctors. I’ll just take some more aspirin. It’s fine.”

Kat walked over and stood behind the chair, putting her hands on his broad shoulders. “How do you know your arm isn’t broken?”

He looked back up into her face. “You realize you’re being a nag about this, right? It’s just a bruise. I’m fine.”

Kat scowled. The macho thing could be so annoying. “I am not being a nag. I’m just worried. If you broke your arm, you might need a cast or something. It could get worse.”

“It’s not broken. If it were, when it happened, my arm would have swollen more and been a lot more painful.”

Kat ran her fingers through the hair that was curling down past his collar. “How do you know? Have you broken a bone before?”

“Yes.”

She trailed her index finger behind his ear. “Would you care to share that story?”

“No.”

“Are you sure you’re okay? You seem, um, grumpy.”

“Pain makes me grumpy.”

Kat bent to kiss his cheek. “I’m sorry.” She patted his shoulder. “Since you’re obviously not in a talkative mood, I’ll just share this little tidbit before I go back upstairs. Roxy is returning on Friday.”

Joel swiveled the chair around to face her. “You’re kidding, right?”

“No. I caved. It’s just for one night. I promise I’ll keep her attached to me or in her crate. Really.”

Kat walked back upstairs followed by Linus, Tessa, and Chelsey. When had Joel broken a bone? She’d make it her mission to find out sooner or later. But right now she had enough other things to worry about. Time for some escapist reading. She settled onto the sofa with her novel. The dogs all flopped on the floor for their evening nap. The phone rang and Kat jumped up. After navigating the canine obstacle course littering the floor, she grabbed the receiver off the ancient harvest-gold wall phone and was greeted by her friend Maria’s voice on the other end of the line.

“Hey girlfriend, what’s up?”

Kat sat down at the table. “Just another hopping night in Alpine Grove. How’s the new place? Better than Melrose?” Maria had just moved to a new apartment. The prior complex where she’d lived had been so filled with neighborhood drama that she’d taken to referring to it as Melrose Place.

“So far, so good. I’m glad to be outta Melrose, that’s for sure. I got those weirdo Dungeons and Dragons dudes in the mail room to help me move my stuff. It’s amazing what twenty-two-year-old fantasy nerds will do for a slice of pizza. I’m thinking they don’t get out much.”

“Uh, no. When I worked there, that skinny guy Duncan used to have a creepy way of staring at me.”

“I know. When he was lifting boxes, I thought he was gonna kill himself because he wasn’t looking where he was going. I had to have some words with him. I told him, ‘listen here, they’re boobs. Fifty percent of the population has them. I have them. Get over it.’ Actually I think I embarrassed him, if you want to know the truth.”

“So did he stop the creepy staring?”

“Not really. But these guys probably don’t get an up-close look at a fine woman like me very often, so I couldn’t blame them too much.“

Kat leaned back in her chair and put her feet up on another one. “So now that you’re all moved into the new place, have you returned to the job quest?”

“Yes I have. And I need resume help. That’s why I’m calling. You’re the writer. I am not having much luck getting across my personal abilities in this document. It’s too limiting. I need more flexibility, so I can express myself.”

“Resumes are about facts, not free expression.”

“Whatever. If I send what I have to you, will you look at it?”

“Sure. No problem.”

“So how’s the sexy engineer?”

Kat dropped her feet off the chair, leaned her elbows on the table and sighed. “I think he might have broken his arm, but he says he didn’t.”

“What did you two do? Do I even want to know this? Is it something kinky? Or some country-living thing? That rural life you’ve got going there is dangerous, you know. Farm animals weren’t involved, were they?”

“No. You know I only deal with dogs and cats. It’s a long story, but basically Joel had to take apart a cabinet and he hit his arm. He got kind of mad about the whole thing.” And he was still mad. Silent and surly was not a lot of fun to be around.

“That’s probably not doing much for your sex life.”

Kat sighed. “No. But thank you for your concern.”

“Speaking of your extracurricular activities, how’s Aunt Flo? Has she arrived at the station yet?”

Kat leaned her forehead on the table and stared down at her feet on the floor. “No. I don’t want to talk about it. And come on,
Aunt Flo
? Who even says that?”

“I was trying to be discreet. You’d prefer Cousin Red? Red tide? Woman trouble? Wait, you’re just trying to distract me. It’s not me you need to talk to about this, girlfriend. First you need to go to the drugstore and get the little tester thingie. Then, depending on what you find out, you need to bring the engineer in on your little secret. If Kat is having a kitten, he’s in a definite need-to-know situation.”

Kat sat back up. “I really don’t want to talk about...kittens. I mean we’re unbelievably careful. When it comes to the perils of unprotected sex, my family tree is filled with a lot of seriously poor role models. I’m completely neurotic about this particular subject. Why me?”

“Don’t freak out. You don’t know anything yet. Maybe you’re just late. Go to the drugstore. Promise me you’ll do it.”

“Okay. But I’m going to have to drive to some other town somewhere. Because you know someone will see me buying...that. There are no secrets in Alpine Grove. None.”

At the sound of footsteps on the stairs, Kat jumped up from her chair. “Oops, I gotta go.”

“Engineer alert?”

“Exactly. I’ll talk to you later, after I, um, well, you know. But I’ll let you know.”

“You’d better.”

Chapter 5

L
ater in the week, after a long day at work at the vet clinic, Tracy was sitting in her apartment watching the tiny TV with Roxy by her side. Even though Tracy had spent her day dealing with an extremely rambunctious Akita, it was still a luxury to not be working at the restaurant anymore. She finally was able to catch up on her sleep and felt better than she had in more than a year.

The phone rang and Tracy stubbed her toe on the box of paints on her way to answer it. Ouch. Now that she had more time, maybe she should clean up this place. Maybe tomorrow.

As promised, Rob was calling with details about the meeting on Friday. Tracy had already asked Shelby if she could freeload again. Her friend had been far more positive about the big meeting than Tracy was herself. Shelby thought it was a great opportunity, but Tracy wasn’t so sure. However, given her perpetually precarious financial situation, it was hard to argue with five-hundred bucks, so she wasn’t going to dwell on her doubts too much.

Rob sounded different on the phone. His voice was deep and pleasant to listen to, like a mellow radio DJ. He sounded less geeky and more like a grown-up, somehow. As he relayed the details, Tracy fiddled with the coat hanger wire she used to hold together an old lamp. The fix mostly worked, but sometimes it needed a bit of adjustment. Should she suggest To Rob that he leave his backpack at home for the meeting? Of course, that brought up a dreadful question: what was
she
going to wear?

Tracy closed her eyes and tried to focus on what Rob was saying instead of her broken lamp and meager wardrobe. “Okay, so you’ll pick me up on Friday at Shelby’s place. I’ll leave here early, in case traffic is bad again.”

Rob said, “That sounds good. I’ll pick you up, then we can go to lunch and talk a little more about the project before the meeting.”

“Well, maybe you could give me some information now. I have no idea what I’m supposed to be doing. What is this web site even going to be about? You said it is supposed to have real estate listings on it?”

“Yes, that’s part of it. The idea is that it will be a tourist destination site with everything that you need to know if you want to visit or move to Alpine Grove.”

“What? Alpine Grove? It’s about...here?” Tracy glanced at the windows of her apartment, which faced the street.

“Yes. It’s so great that you live there! You can bring a local perspective, since you know the area. That will help us sell the deal.”

“I’m not sure I’m a great advertisement, but it is my home town, I guess. I’ll try to smile and say nice things.” Even if there was no way to earn a living, it was a beautiful area.

Rob cleared his throat. “Do you have any pictures you could bring?”

“Maybe. I have snapshots I’ve taken on camping trips with my family and stuff. A lot of them are kind of old, though.” And kind of odd. But it would be hilarious to put a photo of her dad in his hippie garb online. It would serve him right for being such a jerk about the whole moving out thing.

“Please bring whatever photographs you can find. Maybe we can create some history pages. And if you have anything that shows some of the local attractions, that would be perfect. Isn’t there a waterfall trail or something?”

“Yes. Everyone knows about that and the lake, of course.”

“Not yet. That’s why we need the web site!”

Tracy looked at Roxy and rolled her eyes melodramatically at her. Oh brother. “Okay. I’ll go through my pictures and see what I can find. My mom owns the gift store in town and my father took some pictures of the area that he got enlarged to hang on the walls for decoration. I’ll see if I can grab some of those too. Some of them are pretty good.”