Absolute Trust Page 4

  Rojas sighed. “We didn’t make friends with Corbin Jr., either. Either him or Daddy could be irritated with us.”

  “True.” Forte was starting to fight off a headache.

  Joseph Corbin Jr., Elisa’s stalker, was awaiting trial for assault and attempted kidnapping. He and his father had the means to get him out on bail. In the meantime, they couldn’t go after Elisa again, but they had the connections to go after someone close to Elisa.

  Or someone who meant something to all the people who’d become a part of Hope’s Crossing Kennels. Like Sophie.

  “Either is a possibility, and there’s a lot of potential threats from either direction.” Forte clenched his jaw. “I don’t plan to leave Sophie open to further ‘accidents.’ If we can convince her to leave town for a while, that’d be a good way to take her out of harm’s way.”

  “She’s not going to like that.” Rojas sighed. “Not arguing with you. It’s just that Sophie will listen and comply in an emergency. Now that there’s time for her to make decisions, she’s going to need to understand and agree with you before she decides to disappear, even if it’s only temporary.”

  Forte nodded. “We’ll make a case. In the meantime, we should probably talk to Elisa and Lyn.”

  “Or you could include us in your powwow.” Lyn smiled to take the edge off her comment. Cruz leaned back in his chair and held his arm out. Lyn stepped into the curve of his arm and placed her own around his shoulders, leaning against his chair.

  Elisa patted Forte’s shoulder as she circled around him. “Your meeting should include us today.”

  She gave Souze a quick scratch at the base of his ears before she dropped a kiss on Rojas’s cheek.

  Forte wasn’t going to argue. There would be times when he and Cruz and Rojas would need to speak privately, but this time it was more efficient to communicate with the ladies directly. They were all strong personalities, and he respected their judgment. Having their agreement would make protecting them much more effective.

  “We’re going to ask you ladies to take extra measures to ensure your personal safety.” Or at least he was asking, though Cruz and Rojas nodded in time to his statement.

  Both Lyn and Elisa were silent for a moment.

  “I’m not going to ask the obvious.” Elisa started to knead Rojas’s shoulders. “But I do want to know what you think could happen and why.”

  Watching Rojas’s guard ease at his lady’s touch, Forte was just a little jealous. Then again, both Cruz and Rojas were incredibly happy with their ladies. They were like new men. Still the friends he’d come through hell and back again with, but they were whole. They carried the scars on their souls from the various horrors they’d each been through, but they had healed in a way.

  It was like the kintsugi pottery Sophie loved at the museums. The pieces of pottery had broken, and instead of being trashed, they’d been repaired. Gold had been used to fuse the pieces back together and fill the cracks. The broken pottery was whole and had become something more for having been broken.

  Forte considered the situation. “More explosives are a possibility. Sophie’s car was parked in a public lot in broad daylight. It wasn’t left overnight. Whoever did it had brass balls the size of Manhattan.”

  He bit down on the last comment. Shit, he tried to be more respectful around the ladies.

  Lyn waved away his comment. “It’s okay. You’re worried about Sophie, and I’m inclined to agree with you even if I don’t know exactly what it would take to accomplish it. So what do you want us to do?”

  Forte glanced at Cruz and Rojas. They both gave him a nod. They were taking his lead in this. If he proposed something they didn’t agree with, they’d interject.

  “Probably best if neither of you drive anywhere on your own, especially if you’re going to leave your car parked for any length of time. Would you mind if one of us drove you, or if Gary and Greg brought you back and forth from Revolution?” It’d limit their outings for a while.

  Forte looked at Elisa in particular. He hated to limit her freedom only a few months after she’d definitively broken free of her ex-boyfriend’s influence.

  “I assume Boom will be asked to do the same.” Elisa looked from Forte to Rojas for confirmation. Rojas nodded. “That’s fair. Makes it harder to target one of us with the same attack, right?”

  Maybe the ladies were picking up too much vocabulary from them. Guilt pinged in Forte’s chest and he struggled with it. He valued their presence at Hope’s Crossing Kennels and what they did for his friends. He didn’t want to be a darkening influence on their personalities. And he definitely didn’t want to bring more danger into their lives by association.

  Forte sighed. “Most likely, the next time will be different, but there’s no need to leave any of you vulnerable to it. Atlas has some military explosives experience. Souze doesn’t. His training is specifically Schutzhund—search and service oriented.”

  Atlas had been a military working dog for the Air Force. He and his handler had been assigned to various military units, including work with Navy SEALs. There weren’t many dogs like Atlas, with multiple skill sets. As excellent as many working dogs were, they usually focused on a particular set of training. Scent dogs could specialize in explosives detection, live human search, narcotics, and more. Training them to recognize more than one category of scent and differentiate enough to know what they were actually being asked to find in a given situation wasn’t standard procedure.

  It was doable, though.

  Haydn was specifically an explosives-detection dog.

  “We’ve got one or two other dogs in training with an aptitude for explosives detection,” Forte said finally. “We can make use of their training if we need to. In the meantime, we’re asking you to limit how much you all go out, and when you do leave, check in with us often. Maybe every half hour?”

  Lyn’s eyebrows raised, but she didn’t voice an objection.

  Elisa nodded. “I can text. I don’t think we need to make it a phone call every time, do we?”

  Forte shook his head. “Couldn’t hurt to call if you’re gone a while, though.”

  “For now,” Lyn agreed.

  “So now that’s settled.” Alex pulled out his smartphone. “We’ve got at least one potential client coming on site tomorrow to stay in the guest cabin.”

  Forte groaned. He’d forgotten.

  “Beckhorn sent him, saying he was good people,” Cruz added.

  Cruz’s friend at Lackland Air Force Base didn’t give his recommendation lightly. Beckhorn knew dogs and men. He was sending them a good potential owner for one of the dogs they’d trained up.

  “He’s staying about a week, right?” Forte struggled to remember the details. “Looking to bond with one of the GSDs for search and rescue, some specialized attack work.”

  It was a hard truth when it came to training dogs for military and law enforcement: These dogs would need to protect themselves and their handlers.

  Cruz nodded. “I can meet with him and get him settled until we know more about Sophie’s situation.”

  Forte sighed. “That’ll do for the next twenty-four hours or so.”

  Rojas pitched in, too. “Once we know more, we’ll plan accordingly.”

  * * *

  Sophie looked around at her hospital room with its single chair, utilitarian tray table, and off-white micro-blinds. It could be so much more comforting with some sheer curtains and maybe a simple quilt.

  Judicious attention to details could make a big difference. And right now, she could use those to cheer herself up.

  Her car was blown to pieces. Literally. And she didn’t have it in her modest budget to buy a new one unless she delved into the one special nest egg she’d promised herself she’d never touch. If she’d lived directly in Philly, the loss of her car might not have been as big an issue. Walking was absolutely feasible in the city. Or if she’d lived directly in New Hope, it would also have worked out somehow, because one could walk from
end to end of the small town. But no, her apartment was in the middle of suburbia, where it took ten to twenty minutes to drive anywhere, much less walk there, and the commute to her job was a minimum of thirty minutes by car.

  Now that she’d had her visit with the radiologist, she’d had a good look at her ankle. Even if it wasn’t broken, it’d be a while before she could do anything but hobble from point A to point B. Driving, even if she had a car, would’ve been insanely awkward.

  Fantastic.

  “Anyone hungry in here?” Brandon was back at her door.

  Her heart skipped a beat the way it always did when she saw him. It didn’t matter whether it’d been days since she’d seen him or minutes. The man had an impact on her, and she’d be damned if she let him know what he still did to her.

  Brandon was a kind man, even if he had the hardened-soldier thing going on. He wouldn’t let their friendship continue if he knew he broke her heart every time she saw him.

  Ugh. Pull it together, Sophie. You’re usually better than this.

  Then again, she’d been blown up and rolled across asphalt, then poked and prodded at the hospital. Maybe she was entitled to a judicious amount of internal whining, so long as Brandon didn’t know about it.

  “You’re still here?” She kept her words light, but hearing them, she clamped her mouth shut. They had come out sounding like she didn’t want him there. And that was absolutely not the case.

  Brandon entered the room anyway. Since she was still sitting up, she managed to glimpse Haydn trot into the room on three legs.

  “Before you freak out and ask what happened to Haydn, he’d been wearing his prosthetic long enough. I decided to take it off before it rubbed him raw.” Brandon skirted around the end of the bed and set a tray down on the table. Then he started to wrestle it into position closer to the bed so the tray was comfortably over her lap. “Standard chicken and veggies for dinner, but I managed to get you an extra helping of the red Jell-O.”

  Sophie leaned to one side to get a better look at Haydn. “He’s okay on three legs, right? I’ve seen videos online of animals who can move around great on three legs, even two.”

  Brandon chuckled. “Figures you’d like those videos. Yes, Haydn can get around just fine on three legs in a lot of cases.”

  Haydn appeared at the side of the bed. Maybe she was projecting on the dog, but she sort of thought he looked happy to see her. She was definitely glad he was there.

  Thinking about Haydn was a lot better than thinking about her current situation. “Then why does he need the prosthetic?”

  “Will you promise to eat if I explain it to you?” Brandon sounded more amused than annoyed to her. But then again, it was Brandon. If he was too irritated, he’d just leave. He never did anything he truly didn’t want to do.

  She nodded solemnly.

  He huffed out a laugh. Reaching across the bed to touch the edge nearest Haydn, he gave another quiet command. Haydn reared up and placed his good paw on the edge of the bed. His other front leg ended a couple of inches below the joint, the shorter fur covering most of the stump.

  “Haydn has a partial amputation.” Brandon gently touched the place where Haydn’s leg ended. “If he was older and not as prone to the level of activity he’s been used to, then he might have been fine without a prosthetic. He can move along for short distances easily in a limited amount of time.”

  Sophie tipped her head to one side. Haydn, watching her, mirrored her. She couldn’t help but smile. “He seems so energetic.”

  “He is.” Brandon hesitated. “Haydn, af.”

  The big dog returned to the floor. His fur was so dark, he looked truly black in the hospital room lighting.

  “The amount of weight he’d put on his good leg was a big deciding factor. The more he tries to do, the more stress will be on the good front leg. The prosthetic will help in turning or moving from side to side.” Brandon tapped the tray.

  Sophie picked up a spoon and started eating her Jell-O. He narrowed his eyes at her, so she widened hers in response. “What? There’re two servings. I can have one before and one after the standard stuff.”

  He shook his head. “No matter what, it’s important to make sure the prosthetic is a good fit or he’d try not to use the leg. Then it’d be dead weight.”

  “Huh.” She didn’t even worry about talking around a mouthful of sweet. “He can’t go back to active duty, though, right?”

  “Correct.” Brandon’s expression went neutral, which was his version of sadness. “But he can still be active. He lives to work. He wants to work. This is the closest I’ve seen him to his old self since he came back to Hope’s Crossing, based on the videos they sent with him.”

  “But he doesn’t have a forever home yet.” She ached for him. “Poor pup.”

  “He is an adult working dog, Sophie.”

  She wrinkled her nose at Brandon. “He’s lost probably the most important person in his world. And now, anyone he gets used to might be gone again in a few weeks. It’s really tough for animals.”

  Her father would’ve said it was just a dog. But then, her father had spent most of his life in South Korea. Perspective on pets differed from culture to culture, and her opinions varied widely from her father’s in a whole lot of ways. Brandon was another example.

  She and her father had never been in agreement about Brandon.

  “You both must be tired, though.” Her thoughts were wandering down weird paths. The fatigue must be getting to her. Or the pain medication. “You two should go back to the kennels and get some rest.”

  The tray moved away, and she realized she’d managed to eat half the meal. “Don’t eat my second Jell-O.”

  The bed started to collapse slowly behind her, lowering her back to a reclining position without laying her flat. It was much more comfortable.

  “It’s okay for you to rest, too.” Brandon’s voice came softly, right next to her ear.

  She turned, found herself nose to nose with him. His eyes were still a deep green. “Why did you stay so long if you need to rest?”

  “Because, Sophie,” he whispered, “you hate hospitals. I’d never leave you here alone when you hate being here.”

  He remembered. But he was Brandon. He always remembered.

  Chapter Four

  Ready to go home?”

  Sophie sat forward and immediately started to press buttons on the guardrail at the side of her hospital bed. “So ready! Tell me you brought pants.”

  “We did not bring pants.” Lyn sounded way too cheerful about that.

  “You’re kidding, right? I can’t wear the outfit I was wearing yesterday.” The clothes in question were folded neatly in a plastic bag and sitting on the one chair in the room. Her very cute shoes were tucked away under the same chair. She wasn’t going to be wearing those shoes any time soon, either; not with her right ankle and foot encased in a medical boot. “You know what? I don’t care. I’ll walk out of here with no pants on.”

  She struggled harder with the guardrail.

  Lyn sighed, gesturing to the wheelchair behind her in the hallway. “You mean roll out of here.”

  Sophie didn’t even respond. She just started to wrestle with the damn thing, trying to lower it by brute force. Which she apparently didn’t have a whole hell of a lot of today.

  “Whoa, whoa. Let us help you with that.” Elisa hurriedly set down the tote bag she’d had slung over her shoulder and crossed over to study the guardrail. “These things usually have a button to make it simple.”

  “That’s the problem.” Sophie blew out a breath in frustration. “This one’s modern enough to have a lot of buttons. Every one of them does something nifty, but I’m too stir-crazy to sit here and figure out which button does the exact thing we want it to at this very moment.”

  Lyn laughed outright. “Patience is not one of your virtues.”

  Elisa snickered.

  Sophie narrowed her eyes at both of her friends. “No, it’s not. But normall
y I can at least pretend it is. I’m just so done with this place.”

  She’d slept in this morning. Something she never did. When she’d realized the time, she’d almost panicked. But when she’d called in to work, they had seemed surprised she’d called in at all. Her boss had told her to take the time she needed, of course, and that they’d talk when she returned to the office. She’d ended the call with a very bad feeling.

  Yesterday had been an afternoon off at her boss’s suggestion, one she’d started with an excursion for some retail therapy. She’d planned to splurge and binge on some sweets, then maybe go over to the kennels and indulge in a massive round of stress baking. All to avoid thinking about the recent change in climate at the office and her doubts about the career she’d chosen.

  She’d only accomplished the one thing on her list, and even that was for naught. The tea set couldn’t possibly have survived the explosion. Her day had been completely hijacked in a way no one could’ve anticipated.

  Kind of like her life.

  If she believed in signs—and she did to a certain extent—then she’d figure yesterday was a big one. Change. Things were changing in abrupt, hurtful ways, and she wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do next.

  At the moment, she had no desire to do anything but get home, curl up on her sofa, and sulk.

  “Sophie? What’s wrong?” Elisa had lowered the rail, and Sophie hadn’t even noticed.

  “Sorry.” Sophie dredged up a small smile, not wanting to worry Elisa.

  “Do you want to talk about it?” Elisa stepped to one side as Sophie carefully swung her legs over the side of the bed.

  Elisa had escaped an abusive relationship. Her ex had not only been an intelligent, calculating person, he’d been a man of influence and financial means. It’d taken a combination of courage and wits to not only survive being with him but also to leave. As a result, Elisa was hypersensitive to changes in mood in the people around her. She could walk into any situation and immediately gauge the temperature of the personalities around her.