She’d started her life over, and she was damn well entitled to her privacy.
She pushed herself up, shut down the laptop.
“I’m going to take that long bath, drink that stupid tea. And you know what? We’re going to book that damn villa. Life’s too damn short.”
Eight
Though her puppy classes invariably kept Fiona’s mood up, tension lingered, an endless echo of memories and loss.
Kati Starr, persistent if nothing else, called shortly after eight a.m.
One glance at the caller ID had Fiona letting the machine take it. She deleted it without listening, but the call itself lodged in the back of her neck like a brick.
She reminded herself her clients deserved her full attention.
Simon was late. Of course. He pulled in while the rest of the class ran through the basics.
“Just pick it up where we are,” she said coolly. “If we’re not interfering too much with your busy schedule.”
She moved away to work with each of her students individually, demonstrating how to discourage the exuberant Great Dane pup, who promised to be massive, from jumping up—and the perky schnauzer to stop crotch sniffing.
When they began to work off leash, she sighed as Jaws raced away to chase a squirrel—and led a stampede.
“Don’t chase them!” Fiona pushed a hand through her hair as Jaws did his level best to climb the tree the squirrel skittered up. “Call them back. Use your return command, then order your dog to sit. I want all the dogs back to their handlers and sitting.”
What she wanted took time and persistence—and some hands-on.
She reviewed sit and stay, individually and as a group, careful to keep her tone detached whenever she had to address Simon.
With leashes on, she worked on the stop and drop.
The class that usually amused and warmed her had a headache carving dully just above the brick at the base of her neck.
“Keep up the good work.” She ordered up a smile. “And remember: positive reinforcement, practice and play.”
As always, there were comments, questions, a story or two that had to be shared with her by one of the clients. Fiona listened, answered, stroked and petted. But felt none of her usual pleasure.
When Simon lingered, letting Jaws off leash to run with her dogs, Fiona decided it was fine. She’d deal with him, and eliminate a minor problem on her list.
“You’ve got a bug up your ass today,” he said before she could speak.
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me. And you look like hell.”
“You have to stop throwing all these pearls at my feet.”
“Did that guy in California kill someone else?”
“I don’t know. Why would I know? It has nothing to do with me.” She jammed her hands into the pockets of her hooded jacket. “I’m sorry for the women, for their families, but it has nothing to do with me.”
“Who’s arguing? You weren’t listening, not really, when Larry started on about how his supermutt figured out how to open doors or when Diane showed you the picture of her toddler drawing with crayons on the bulldog. I’d say that’s your version of having a bitch on. So, what’s the deal?”
“Listen, Simon, just because I kissed you, sort of—”
“Sort of ?”
She set her teeth. “That doesn’t mean I’m obliged to share the details of my life with you, or explain the reasons for my moods.”
“I’m still stuck on ‘sort of,’ and wondering what would be actually.”
“You’ll have to keep wondering. We’re neighbors and you’re currently a client. That’s it.”
“A definite bitch on. Well, enjoy.” He whistled for his dog, which naturally brought the whole pack.
When Simon bent down, ruffled and praised, Fiona sighed again. “He’s doing well on the return. He doesn’t get stay yet, but he’s doing well in most areas.”
“He hasn’t eaten anything I needed to worry about in the last couple days.” He clipped on the leash. “See you.”
He got halfway to the car when she called his name.
She hadn’t planned to, couldn’t think why she had. And yet...
“Do you want to take a walk? I need to walk.”
“A walk? Where?”
She gestured. “One of the perks of living in the woods is being able to walk in them.”
He shrugged, crossed back to her.
“You’d better leash him,” she said. “Until you’re confident he’ll obey the stop command. He might take off after a rabbit or deer and get lost. Come on, boys, take a walk.”
Her dogs fell in happily, then ranged ahead. Jaws pulled on the leash.
“Wait,” Fiona ordered, sympathizing. The dogs paused, continuing at a slower pace at her signal when Jaws caught up.
“He thinks he’s one of the big guys. It’s good for him to get out like this, explore new territories, respect the leash, respond to you.”
“Is this another lesson?”
“Just making conversation.”
“Do you ever talk about anything other than dogs?”
“Yes.” Irritated, she hunched her shoulders, lapsed into momentary silence. “I can’t think of anything right now. God, I wish spring would hurry up. There, that’s other than. I can bitch about the weather. But it’s a nice day, so it’s hard to. Still I wish it would get warmer faster, and I want the sun to stay out till ten. I want to plant a garden and chase the deer and rabbits out of it.”
“Why don’t you just put up a fence?”
“Then I don’t have the entertainment value of chasing the deer and rabbits, do I? They’re not afraid of the dogs, which is my own fault because I trained the boys not to chase—oops. Dog talk. I love the way it smells in here.”
She took a deep breath of pine, grateful the headache had backed off a bit. “I love the way it looks—the lights, the shadows. I thought I’d be a photographer, because I like light and shadows, and people’s faces and the way they move. But I don’t take very good, or interesting, pictures. Then I thought I’d be a writer, but I bored myself so I suspect I’d have flopped at that one. Except I like to write—for the blog or the newsletter, or little articles about, you know, the thing I’m not talking about in this conversation. Then I thought I could coach track or be a trainer but... I didn’t really have a center, I guess. I’m not sure you’re required to have a center when you’re twenty. Why don’t you say something?”
“Mostly because you haven’t shut up.”
She blew out a breath. “That’s true. I’m babbling useless conversation because I don’t want to think. And I realize I asked you to come so I wouldn’t think or start brooding. I don’t have a bitch on. I have a brood on, and it’s entirely different.”
“Comes off the same to me.”
“You’re a hardass, Simon. That shouldn’t be appealing to me.”
They moved through a clearing where the trees soared overhead, beefy giants that sighed like the surf where their tops met sky.
“Why Orcas?” she asked him. “Of all the places to live.”
