Chapter Four
What the ever-lovin’ hell was she doing in this classroom?
Jessie had taken a seat in the second to last row, like she was part of the damn class, and Allison had introduced him and had him talking before he had a chance to call her out.
“There are ten ‘stages’ to our training program,” Garrett said, forcing himself to concentrate on the syllabus in front of him and not the redhead in the back. Not really red, he thought. Not quite strawberry blond. More like gilded auburn, exactly the color of Fletcher, a retriever he’d had during the years he started PetPic.
He’d loved that dog.
And he had to stop comparing her to dogs. Because dogs could be trusted. Magazine article writers, not so much.
“Is that the only time?” The question came from a young man in square, horn-rimmed glasses in the front row. Dan. Or Dave. Or Don.
Or damn it, Garrett never forgot a student’s name. “Excuse me?” It was the best he had for the complete loss of concentration.
“Is that the only time we’re actually hands-on with the dogs, in the afternoon after classroom training?”
He pulled himself back together, forcing himself to answer. Then he focused on his notes, walked them through the class overview, answered more questions—which the object of his concentration problems did not ask because she shouldn’t even be there—and managed to introduce the next speaker, a gifted dog behaviorist, Duane Randall, who would go over the basic study of canines.
Normally, Garrett would leave the classroom at this point and go back to his office, into the training areas, or work on finding homes for rescues. But nothing was normal about today. Nothing was normal about the arrival of Jessie Curtis, journalist and onetime acquaintance.
Was she friend or foe?
He slipped into the seat behind her, the rows staggered so he could see her face and whether she wrote on the pad of paper they’d supplied. Notes about him? For a story?
After a moment, she threw a glance over her shoulder and added a smile.
“What are you doing here?” he asked in a harsh whisper.
She flinched a little, probably because of how gruff he sounded, and lifted a shoulder. “Your dad suggested I listen in.”
“Why?”
She swallowed and turned at the front of the classroom, intent on Duane’s talk. “For a story…I might do.”
As he suspected. He slipped out his phone and tapped the screen, ignoring incoming messages to go right to the Internet. He typed in “Jessie Curtis,” but nothing of any interest came up.
Maybe she wasn’t that big of a journalist. He looked up to study her profile again, and as he did, memories of the teenager she’d been drifted back. He could easily see that girl now, of course, although her face had changed, and she’d matured from pretty to really pretty. Nicely defined cheekbones, a sweet jawline, and an upward tilt to eyes enhanced with thick dark lashes.
She hadn’t had that hair color as a kid, he thought. It had been blonder then. And she hadn’t had that body, either, though she’d been on her way.
And there was that night in the old kennels. The whole evening came tumbling back as he looked at her. He’d noticed her at dinner. Really noticed her as a girl, not Molly’s ever-present friend. He vaguely recalled that something bad had happened and Mom was trying to make Jessie feel better. She was moving away and not happy about it.
Something earth-shattering that he, an almost-eighteen-year-old boy with raging hormones and a short attention span, didn’t care about. But when Molly announced it was the first night of summer, which meant the traditional game of Manhunt after dark, he didn’t pass on a silly game of hide-and-seek all over Waterford Farm. No, he finagled his way onto Jessie’s team, picked her as a partner, and…
It had taken about ten minutes of mindless chatter in the darkened kennels, with dogs barking and kids hollering outside, before they’d kissed. She’d been as ready as he was, though they didn’t take it too far. First base, he thought with a rueful smile, and that had been enough to keep him awake all night with the mother of all boners.
Looking away before another one decided to show up, he clicked on the search bar again, this time typing in “Jessica Curtis reporter.”
And there was the gold mine of links. Jessica Jane Curtis, staff writer, Inside the A List.
He clicked on a link and cringed.
Inside the A List? That was where she worked? A cheeseball website that did “deeply personal profiles” of famous people? And, God, look at that. She’d written dozens of those profiles, with plenty of household celebrity names peppered in the mix and a few people he’d never heard of.
His stomach clenched.
He tapped on the name of a woman who had lost weight on a reality TV show and slid past the picture and headline—and byline of Jessica Jane Curtis—to read the opening paragraph.
The first thing you notice about Sarah Schavonne are the secrets in her eyes.
The secrets in her eyes?
“That might be a question for Garrett,” Duane said, yanking Garrett to attention. “Can you address that part of the class since you teach it?”
At his moment of hesitation, Jessie turned and looked right at him, a sly smile lifting the corner of pink lips. “Financing a dog training business,” she whispered so softly only he could hear it.
“Of course,” he said quickly, knowing he should thank her with at least a silent look, but his phone, displaying her inane writing, was still burning his palm. “We have one whole day on how you set up the business, what you need to get started, approximate investments, everything.”
“You’d know that,” the hipster in the front row said. “You’re the guy who started PetPic, right?”
Just in case Jessica Jane Curtis didn’t know, but of course, she did. “Yep.”
“Really?” Another woman, Marilyn, sat up with interest. “Wow, I’m on PetPic! I mean, it’s all ads now. But some of the pictures and videos people post slay me.”
“Oh, I know.” An older man in the front row turned around. “That’s what made me fall in love with dogs and know exactly what I wanted to do when I retired.”
“Glad to hear,” Garrett said, looking back at his phone as much to end the conversation and derailment of the class as to read more brilliance from Jessica Jane Curtis, journalist.
“I adopted a dog that someone posted,” announced a kid who barely looked twenty, obviously not reading Garrett’s social cue.
“That’s great.” Garrett didn’t look up. “That’s one of the reasons I started the site.”
It certainly wasn’t the first time he’d heard stories like this, and he couldn’t help the swell of pride that the idea had made people happy, saved some dogs, and made himself and his siblings more than comfortable in the process. But this wasn’t the time or place.
“What a fantastic legacy to have so young,” Jessie said, still turned to look at him. “I’d love to know more about it.”
Wouldn’t you just?
He held her gaze for a long minute, trying for a glare but getting a kick in the gut—and lower—that had to be because he didn’t completely believe her or trust her. Surely that gut reaction wasn’t because her eyes were an evocative combination of fierce and fearful that wouldn’t let him look away. And, no, it couldn’t be because they’d had a half-hour grapple almost twenty years ago and he still remembered how sweet and soft and sexy her body had been.
No, his gut was on fire because she was a writer for a tabloid-type website who’d waltzed into this place without enough class, grace, or ethics to come clean with him about that.
“Can I talk to you after class?” she asked sweetly.
“No.”
He stood and walked out of the room without caring how rude it was. He’d already let himself be crucified to protect someone he loved. He wasn’t about to put himself in that situation again.
* * *
His departure felt like a slap, making Jessie reel.
Apparently, he’s a real son of a bitch.
Well, at least Forbes got that much right. But then Dr. Kilcannon’s words came back to her, and she tried to dig below that gruff—and sexy—exterior. Although he might be handsome and built and love dogs, if he was a son of a bitch, then he wasn’t sexy to her. She hated guys like that.
Except, this morning? With Lola? He hadn’t been anything like that.
She slipped her handbag off the back of the chair and stood, making Duane turn to her. “I’m a guest,” she explained. “Thanks for a great class.”
She left through the same door Garrett had, determined to find him to tell him why she was there and that she was leaving. Unless…
No.
Pretty crystal-clear answer.
Outside the back of the classroom, she scanned a huge open field she hadn’t yet seen, spotting two men throwing something to a German shepherd.
Neither one was Garrett, unless he’d changed into a dark T-shirt, but she could make out that one had very dark hair and a tall, lanky build. Could that be Liam? Next to him, running around with the dog, was a young man with chestnut hair and a bit more muscular build. Shane?
He glanced at her, then tossed a long red stick in her direction. When the dog ran after it, he followed, getting close enough that she could make out his features. He stared hard, and the corner of his mouth lifted in a half smile.
Definitely Shane, she thought. Still handsome, still flirtatious. And she didn’t want to get into it with one more member of the Kilcannon family, so she nodded and turned away before he got any closer, heading back to the central training pen.
There, six dogs were barking and running, and several people were blowing whistles and yelling commands, but none was Garrett.
She’d try the kennels. If he wasn’t there, then she’d say goodbye to sweet Lola and go back to the bed-and-breakfast and get some work done researching new subjects and editing a story before dinner with Molly. The Garrett Kilcannon experiment had failed.
In the kennels, the constant sound of barking echoed through the halls, but she could see how you could get used to it quickly. As she strolled down shiny white tiles past large pens and kennels, she stopped at a few and admired the dogs of all different breeds.
When she turned the corner, her heart tripped a little to see Lola’s gate open. Taking a few steps, she found Garrett exactly where he’d been this morning, on his knees, only this time he was holding a peanut-butter-covered finger in front of Lola’s mouth.
“How’s our girl doing?” she asked.
He didn’t look up but kept his attention on the dog, who was a few feet away, flat on her belly, chin on the floor. She looked up at Jessie and lifted her head about a quarter of an inch, then dropped it again. Too much trouble, Jessie thought sadly.
“Not good,” he finally murmured.
“You’re really worried about her, aren’t you?” She came into the kennel, far more certain that the two-legged creature would snarl at her rather than the four-legged one.
“She’s going to starve herself to death.” He sat up, grabbed a rag, and wiped his finger.
“Oh my God, no.” She lowered down next to him, achingly aware of her arm brushing his shoulder, bracing for a warning to get out. “Maybe I can help again.”
He turned to her, so close she could see the dark bits of navy in his blue eyes and the thick, thick lashes as he narrowed them at her. “I doubt she’d interest you. She’s not on the A-list.”
Damn. He knew. “I wanted to tell you.”
“Really.” He stared her down. “Before or after your exposé ran?”
“I planned to tell you immediately. Now.”
“Too late. Somebody really smart invented search engines and, what do you know, you’re all over the Internet as a crackerjack writer of tell-alls.”
“I really intended to tell you why I came.”
He turned away as if disgusted. “That’s why you sneaked onto the tour and into the classroom? Came slinking in here ready to ask questions that seem like small talk, friendly conversation from a family friend? Cozied up to a dog I need help with?”
Each word was like a razor blade over her heart, but that last accusation really hurt. “I told your father ten seconds after we sat down together.”
“Except I’m willing to bet a lot of money—which you no doubt will write about exactly how much I allegedly have—that my father is not the subject of your smarmy interview.”
“It’s not smarmy!” she shot back.
“Not telling me was.”
“I really didn’t have a chance. We talked for less than ten minutes, then I told your father and he thought…he thought I should…”
He held up a hand. “Save it, Jessie. I have absolutely no time or respect for liars.”
“I didn’t lie. And I told your father I wouldn’t lie. Ask him. He wanted me to see the facility, take a tour, and talk to you.”
“Done, done, and done. You can leave now.” He pushed up, but she honestly didn’t trust her legs to hold her, so she did exactly the opposite and lowered herself all the way to the ground and started petting Lola’s soft fur. Dogs were stress relievers, right?
“He thinks a better, kinder, more honest profile of you that focuses on what you do now and why you do it would be a good thing,” she said.
“Does he now?” He shifted from one booted foot to the other, but didn’t walk away.
She looked up at him. “If you read my work, you’ll see that I don’t write smear stories. I let readers see what makes a person tick, what motivates them, what inspires them. This place, this job you have, it’s inspiring. People think of you as some kind of dot-com millionaire recluse, and here you are…trying to get a rescue dog to eat peanut butter out of your hand.”
He just closed his eyes, silent.
“It’s not something you walk up to a person you’ve known since childhood and say,” she continued. “I wanted to establish a connection, but…” She snorted. “I’ve been told I’m not very good at that. Maybe he’s right.”
He loomed over her, his teeth clenched so hard she could see his jaw tense. After a long moment, he nodded, turned, and walked out. Again.
Man, he was good at the dramatic exit.
She sat very still, one hand on Lola’s head. It was time to leave Waterford again, but she didn’t want to yet.
“Hey, girl,” she whispered, lowering her head so that her forehead touched Lola’s. “I know how you feel.” She stroked her fur over and over again, the act as comforting to her as she hoped it was to the unhappy dog. “I know exactly how you feel.”