Chapter 5
Garrett
I walked into the house I shared with Rhys and Rhett, barely feeling the key when I turned the lock. Not sure how I’d made it home, because my head wasn’t on the drive over from the shelter, nor was it here. I walked down the hall, seeing the shelter, the poor old pup, Bronson, and…
Her.
I could see why the shelter had her working for them. I’d walked in ready to adopt a cat, but as soon as I locked eyes with that cutie, the simple, easy to look after, far more self-sufficient cat idea was shoved aside. There was only her. Bronson’s eyes were trained on his mistress, and I had never felt such a moment of empathy with an animal. He stared at her like she was his whole world, and why the hell not? No doubt his fascination with the girl was for completely different reasons, but I saw that cloud of red hair and freckles, bloody freckles, her brown eyes almost hidden by her glasses, and was drawn closer.
Her babbled response, the way she delivered Bronson’s story in a great rush, it made clear that a cat was no longer in the cards. The guy needed out of that shelter now, and there was part of me that could never say no to a damsel in distress. Made me a good nurse, because helping people was pretty much the job, but his story? As she told it, I saw every abuse victim that had come through our emergency department, the bruised and the battered, and my teeth ground together. I’d have taken the dog even if he didn’t like me, but feeling him snuggle up against me. My hand had hovered, not wanting to freak him out, before giving his stout flanks a stroke. That memory had me grinning as I walked into the kitchen to find my flatmates working on dinner.
“Well, look at you.” Rhys smirked at the sight of me. “All smiley because you got to choose your kitty cat today.” He looked around me. “Where is the bloody thing, anyway?”
“We’re getting a dog,” I blurted out.
“What—?” Rhett started to say, looking up from the dining table where he was going through the bills.
“A dog? Fuck yes!” Rhys left the stir fry to sizzle as he ran over and bumped knuckles with me. “I told you dogs are better than cats. We can take it for runs on the beach and out to the park?—”
“And what do we do with a dog when we’re all scheduled on at work?” Rhett was a firefighter, so he had a weird schedule, just like I did.
“He can come into the gym with me,” Rhys said.
“You weren’t offering that when I was talking about getting a cat,” I replied.
“What the hell would a cat do at a gym?” Rhys spluttered. I’m fairly sure you could ask the same question of a dog, but I made no comment. “What kind? Do you have a picture of him?”
I pulled out my phone and showed him the photos I’d taken of the dog, but as I did so, a scrap of paper fell on the floor. I went to pick it up, but Rhys was already there.
“And what do we have here…?” He unfolded the paper to see the number. “A phone number, written down on actual paper? Damn, that’s old school. Your nana write her number down? Or one of those old ladies that keeps ‘having a fall’ to get to go to the ED to see you?”
“Better than the dudes that keep ‘falling on cucumbers in the shower.’”
Rhett flexed his fingers to make air quotes.
“It’s neither of those things.” I grabbed the piece of paper from Rhys’ hand and stored it safely in my phone case. “It’s a girl’s number.”
They wanted to give me a hard time, I saw that in an instant, but the usual rambunctious bullshit died a swift death. We didn’t get to joke about girls anymore, not after our last disastrous break up. We thought we were so smart, proposing to get into a poly relationship. Firefighters and health care professionals, they could live a pretty lonely life with the weird shift hours and demanding jobs. I’d never been able to devote enough time to a girl to keep her around, and Rhett was the same. Rhys was married to the job but wanted someone to lavish all that frenetic energy on, and so we’d proposed finding a girl that we all liked who’d be interested in a poly relationship.
Only for it to end so badly the three of us had barely dated since.
“The girl who has been looking after the dog I applied to adopt.” I held up the photos and Rhys’ grin was immediate. “She said she’d be happy to help settle him in.”
“A pittie?” Rhys was like a kid at Christmas, his whole face lighting up. “Shit, the stir fry!” He lunged for the wok, taking it off the heat.
“Are you sure we want a dog like…?” Rhett’s brows drew down. “What happened to him?”
I knew then he was feeling the same thing I was. Dogs were so fucking pure. We’d taken wolves and turned them into perpetual puppies that loved us more than they did their own parents, and some people abused that blind loyalty.
“Bait dog,” I replied, not needing to explain.
He and his team had stumbled onto an illegal dog baiting ring when answering an emergency call and he was shaken for weeks by what he saw.
“He needs a home?” I nodded. “Alright.” He looked around the house as if seeing it for the first time. “So we need to clean up, make the place look respectable for when they do an inspection. The shelter is going to come by and make sure the place is safe for the dog, right?”
“Bronson,” I replied. “His name is Bronson.”
“Bronson.” Rhys nodded as he started to spoon the stir fry onto bowls full of brown rice. “That’s a good strong name. I fucking love pitties. They’re total units of dogs.”
“He’s really soft.” I stared the two of them down. “If you think you’re gonna get some big tough guard dog, think again. We’re going to need to take things slowly with him. He’s gone through a lot of trauma…” My smile was back again as my mind raced ahead. “And I think we’re gonna need to talk to the girl at the shelter for some advice about how to acclimate him.”
“Doggie therapy date, huh?” Rhys said, then pushed a bowl my way. I glanced at the contents, mentally calculating the macros. I wasn’t competing at the moment, but I didn’t like to lose my gym gains in the down season. “Well, seeing as we’re talking about girls, I met someone today.”
“What?”
Rhett and I stared at him.
“This fucking smokeshow barrelled into me and spilled her smoothie all over my chest when I was coming out of the showers. She’s new to the gym and built just the way I like ‘em.”
His fork landed in his bowl with a clatter as he traced the shape of the woman in the air.
But I knew what she would’ve looked like.
Curves for days, soft enough to sink your fingers into, then your cock, once she was gasping after her first, second, third orgasm. Pretty too, with a ready smile and freckles… I shook my head, realising I was transposing Katie into Rhys’ story.
“She nearly tore my towel off trying to clean the mess up and nearly came face to face with not-so-little Rhys,” he continued. “I didn’t give a damn about the smoothie, especially as I was about to make a mess of my own if she kept touching me like that.”
“Still having issues with premature ejaculation, mate?” I said, cocking an eyebrow.
“So we’re doing this?” Rhett seemed far too serious as he looked from one to the other of us, but that was what he was like. “We’re dating on our own now?”
When Rhys’ smile faded, mine did too.
“I mean, it’s been years…” I shoved my phone back in my pocket. “It didn’t work, so I guess we need to go back to dating on our own.”
A sharp nod, that was the only response we got from Rhett as he reached for his food and carried the bowl out the back, onto the deck that overlooked the grass.
“Reckon he’s OK?” Rhys asked, coming to stand beside me.
“He will be.” I poked the stir fry, collecting a mouthful of meat, veg, and rice on the fork. “I mean, he’s been crushing on that girl that was dating that dickhead he works with for ages. Maybe this will be the push he needs to make a damn move.”
I needed to take my own advice. After we had dinner and cleaned up, then spent an hour or so making sure the backyard was inspection ready, I retreated to my room. Katie’s number was inputted in my phone first. There was no way I was losing that, but my thumb hovered over the new contact, switching between making a call or sending a text. Text, I decided that texting was less invasive.
Hey, this is Garrett from the dog shelter. Just wondering if you wanted to go out for coffee? I wanted to end the message there, making clear this was a date, but… What if she blew me off? Had a boyfriend? I frowned hard at that idea. We could talk about how to help Bronson adjust if my application is successful. My thumb tapped send, not letting myself overthink it, and then, I waited to see how she would respond.