One Man's Promise

“And you’re doing this out of the goodness of your heart?”

He appeared stung by the inference. “Contrary to popular belief, I am not utterly devoid of feelings. Clearly, you’re fond of the animal and he, likewise, is fond of you.” His gaze darted, and the subtle slide of presumably damp palms over his slacks did not escape notice. “A change in ownership is traumatic for any pet. I thought regular visits might lessen his anxiety.”

C.J. nodded. “Rags has stopped eating, hasn’t he?”

Richard deflated before her eyes. “Yes.”

“How long?”

“Four days.”

She sucked a shocked breath, let the air out with a hiss. “Four days? Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I’m telling you now.” His gaze narrowed. “Has he done this sort of thing before?”

She nodded absently, chewed her lip. “It’s his way of pouting.”

“You could have warned me.”

Flinching at the reproach, C.J. offered a limp shrug. “It didn’t occur to me. I mean, he’d already been with you for weeks and there hadn’t been a problem.” She raked her hair, wished the office was large enough for her to pace. “When can I see him?”

Richard stood, smoothed the suit coat that made him look considerably more dapper than the saggy jogging suit he’d worn over the weekend. She had to admit he’d cleaned up nicely. Very nicely.

He offered a brusque nod. “You can see him whenever it’s convenient.”

“My last class ends at six. I could be at your place by half-past.” When another curt nod indicated the timing was acceptable, C.J. broached a more sensitive subject. “What does Lissa think of this arrangement?”

With a pained shrug, he shifted to avoid her gaze. “Lissa loves Rags. She will do what is best for him.”

As he reached for the doorknob, C.J. touched his wrist. Her fingertips brushed bare skin, tingled at a tickle of soft hair. “Thank you,” she whispered.

His eyes darkened, black pupils expanding inside a ring of soft heather sage. For a long moment he said nothing, simply stared with an intensity that left her breathless. Then he blinked, nodded, opened the door and was gone.

C.J. stood there, vaguely aware that her knees were trembling. She touched her mouth, transferred the tingling from her fingertips to her lips. In a sense, it was their very first kiss. It would not, she decided, be their last.

Woman-and-dog reunion part deux was every bit as exuberant and joyful as the first had been. Rags shot out the front door barking madly, leapt into C.J.’s arms and covered her face with familiar wet kisses. C.J. laughed and sputtered, hugged his wriggling body so tightly it was a wonder the poor animal’s eyes didn’t bulge.

Richard Matthews watched from the open doorway with a peculiar look on his face, while his clearly heartbroken daughter stared through the front window with wide and haunting eyes. The image was pitifully sad and sobering.

C.J. gave Rags another hug, then whispered, “Go get your Frisbee.” The dog leapt down, dashed between Richard’s legs and disappeared into the house. Although C.J. spoke to Richard, she couldn’t take her eyes off the tearful child in the window. “I thought I’d take him for a run in the park, if that’s all right.”

“That’s fine,” Richard murmured, but C.J. wasn’t listening. She was mesmerized by Lissa’s pale face, the small, quivering mouth and eyes filled with yearning for a childhood denied her.

Just as childhood had once been denied another young girl. Images of the past marched through her memory, a thoughtful reflection of that other lonely youngster who’d watched from a sickroom window as her father and siblings played ball in the front yard. She remembered the pain, the longing, the resentment that festered into fury. She remembered the rage, the uncontrollable anger lashing out at those she’d loved the most.

Most of all, she remembered the loneliness.

Because C.J.’s own childhood, like little Lissa’s, had been one of isolation, medication and excessive parental protection. It had been a loving prison, but a prison nonetheless, and she’d spent her adult years overcoming—some would say overcompensating for all those lonely years and lost adventures.

Now C.J. saw herself in the reflection of the sad child behind the window. She understood how it felt to read terror in a parent’s eyes, to be shunned by other children. To be different.

She knew, she understood and her heart broke for that lonely little girl. And for this one.

“It is an outrage.” Clearly furious, Thompson McCade tapped the bowl of his pipe on a crystal ashtray. “You disappoint me, Richard.”

“I did what was necessary.”

“Necessary?” The imposing man strode across the room, seated himself in the extravagant recliner that he’d claimed as his own, and bit down on the stem of the unlit pipe so hard his teeth clicked. He fumed a moment before removing the pipe and cradling the unlit bowl in his palm. “Since when is it necessary to put the superficial desires of a stranger above the needs of your own child? Allissa is devastated by your callous disregard of her feelings, Richard, and quite frankly, so am I. Melinda would be horrified—”

“That’s enough,” Richard said quietly, although his jaw twitched in warning.

A vein pulsed on McCade’s forehead. “How dare you speak to me like that? Melinda was my daughter, my only child—”

“She was my wife.” With some effort, Richard unfurled his fisted fingers, reminded himself that his daughter was in the kitchen with her grandmother, close enough to overhear. He lowered his voice. “I’ve asked you before, and I’m asking you again to refrain from using Lissa’s mother as a club with which to beat me into submission each and every time we have a disagreement. I’m perfectly willing to listen to your opinions, Thompson, but Lissa is my daughter, and I will make the final decision as to what is or is not in her best interest.”

A flush of red fury crawled from McCade’s beefy neck to a face flexing with indignation. He was an impressive man, barrel-chested and large in stature, with a thick shock of gunmetal gray hair and a bulbous nose that would have been clownish if not for the piercing, pitiless intensity of eyes that demanded respect, but rarely bestowed it. Thompson McCade was not accustomed to argument. He was a man to be reckoned with, ruthless, relentless and powerful.

He was also a royal pain in the butt.

“I’ve made my decision,” Richard repeated calmly. “Either Lissa learns to share her pet, or she’ll have to give him up entirely. The choice is hers.”

“That is grossly unfair.” McCade’s face darkened to a worrisome purple. “I won’t allow it.”

Richard heaved a weary shrug, chose not to point out that when it came to this home and this family, McCade was not in a position to allow or disallow anything. The older man clearly understood that, although ego prevented him from acknowledging any limitation of the power upon which his entire self-image had been built.

So Richard let his father-in-law sputter and rant without contradiction. He didn’t agree with the man’s point of view, but he didn’t exactly disagree with it, either.

In truth, Richard didn’t care for the current situation any more than McCade. He loved his daughter dearly, understood how wounded she was by her pet’s affection for the athletic blonde with a pocket full of dog biscuits and a boisterous laugh that McCade would most certainly label as bohemian. Richard hated to see his child so unhappy, but he certainly couldn’t disregard the needs of a helpless animal. It wasn’t Rags’s fault that Lissa was overindulged and selfish. In a sense, it wasn’t Lissa’s fault, either. Richard blamed himself.

“Daddy?”

Richard blinked, turned just as Lissa scampered from the kitchen to clamber into her grandfather’s lap.

She beamed hopefully. “Do I get Rags back, Daddy, do I, huh, do I?”

From the corner of his eye he saw Sarah McCade hovering shyly in the kitchen doorway, wringing her wrinkled hands. “Of course you get Rags back, punkin, just as soon as Ms. Moray returns from the park.”

“Then I won’t ever have to share him again, right, Daddy?”

Richard sighed as McCade’s eyes narrowed in warning. “We’ve already been through this, Lissa. Ms. Moray will be visiting with Rags two evenings a week, and have him all day Saturday.”

Horrified, the child spun on her grandfather’s lap. “But you promised, Gramps, you promised that you’d make Daddy give me my dog back.”

To Richard’s surprise, Sarah McCade, who rarely said anything beyond “good morning,” and even then felt guilty about verbalizing the observation, suddenly stepped forward. “Sweetheart, we talked about this in the kitchen. You don’t want your doggy to be sad or sick, do you?”

The child’s chin jutted stubbornly. Tears leaked from her eyes. “Gramps promised.” A small wheeze, then a louder one followed by an interminable, rasping gasp.

Richard nearly moaned aloud.

“Look what you’ve done,” McCade boomed. “Now she’s having an attack. Sarah, get the child’s medication.”

The woman hovered frantically before dashing off to do her husband’s bidding. She’d barely left the room when her gasping granddaughter glimpsed a familiar form dashing across the front yard. “Rags!” the child shouted, then leapt from her grandfather’s lap and shot across the room, her asthma attack instantly and miraculously abated. She yanked open the front door, clapping gleefully. “Rags, Rags!”

The animal literally flew through the door,. greeted Lissa with a series of joyous kisses, then dashed into the kitchen. Lissa ran after him, nearly knocking into her bewildered grandmother, who’d just emerged clutching the child’s inhaler.

Richard stood, offered his mother-in-law a thin smile. “Thank you, Sarah, but apparently Lissa is feeling much better now.”

On cue, Lissa leaned out of the doorway with an exploding grin. “Rags is eating, Daddy, he’s gobbling up everything in his dish!”

“That’s nice, punkin,” Richard murmured, distracted by the breathless woman hovering in the doorway with a grass-stained Frisbee clutched in one hand. He took a step toward her, jerked to a stop as Sarah McCade hurried past, gushing.

“You must be Ms. Moray,” she murmured, pumping the startled woman’s free hand. “I’m so happy to meet you. I’m Lissa’s grandmother—”

“Sarah!” McCade boomed.

The woman flushed, fell silent, backed away clasping her hands as McCade studied C. J. Moray with undisguised contempt. “So you’re the one.” There was no mistaking the disdain in his voice.

To her credit, C.J. cocked her head as though sizing the older man up, then offered a smile that was somehow sincere and cautious at the same time. “You must be Lissa’s grandfather. I’m pleased to meet you.”

Richard stepped between them before McCade could say something even more blatantly rude. Cupping C.J.’s elbow, he ushered her to the porch. “I’m sorry about that. I wish I could tell you that beneath that gruff exterior beats a heart of gold, but the only thing beneath that gruff exterior is a gruff interior.”

Her laugh was soft, smoky. Enticing. “I understand.”

For some odd reason, he believed her. “Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For everything.” He was mesmerized by her smile, hypnotized by the amused sparkle in her dark eyes. This was without doubt the most intoxicating woman he’d ever laid eyes on. She was also the most perceptive, a thought that was soon to be proven yet again as she gazed past his shoulder.

The sparkle drained from her eyes, replaced by a tender warmth that was, oddly enough, even more alluring. “Hello, Lissa. It’s nice to see you again.”

With some effort Richard followed her gaze, saw his daughter on the porch looking sullen and angry. She jerked a thumb at the Frisbee C.J. held. “Leave that here,” she commanded. “It belongs to Rags.”

Still smiling, C.J. held the Frisbee out until Lissa stomped down the steps to retrieve it. “Is Rags the first dog you’ve owned?”

Lissa paused, issued a sharp nod that was more an expression of annoyance than agreement.

“Pets can be difficult, can’t they?” Lowering herself, C.J. sat on her heels so her face and the child’s were on the same level. “Having a dog is kind of like having a naughty child and an irritating kid brother all at the same time. Except, of course, my irritating kid brother never drank out of the toilet. At least, I don’t think so. He was pretty weird.”

Despite an obvious intent to remain angry, Lissa couldn’t prevent a smile from tweaking the corners of her tightly clamped mouth. “Do you have lots of brothers?”

“Two, one older than me and one younger. I also have two older sisters.”

“You musta had lots of fun playing and stuff.”

“Yes, we had fun. Sometimes we hurt each other’s feelings and made each other mad, but we never really meant to.” She paused a beat before adding, “Just like Rags never meant to hurt your feelings or make you mad. He loves you very much.”

The child’s lip quivered. “Then how come he wants to go play with you?”

“Because he loves me, too. Dogs have room in their hearts to love lots of people.”

“Uh-uh.” A look of disbelief.

“It’s true, cross my heart.” She drew an invisible X on her chest, flashed a dazzling smile. “You love Rags, don’t you?”

Lissa sniffed, nodded.

“And you love your daddy, too, just like you love your grandpa and your grandma?” C.J. waited for the child’s limp shrug. “How would you feel if someone told you that you had to choose only one of them to love, and you weren’t allowed to care about anyone else ever again?”

Another limp shrug. “Bad.”

“Of course you’d feel bad, but even more important, you wouldn’t be able to do it.” C.J. hesitated, then took the child’s hand, sandwiched it between her own palms. “You couldn’t stop loving your daddy or your grandparents just because someone told you to, and Rags can’t stop caring about me, either, but that doesn’t mean he loves you any less.”

To Richard’s astonishment, Lissa bent to whisper something in C.J.’s ear. The child smiled, then laughed. A moment later the two females were giggling madly, whispering like old chums. If he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes, he wouldn’t have believed it. His sullen, selfish child was engrossed in clearly joyful conversation with the very same woman she’d demonized only moments ago.

C.J. stood suddenly, skimmed a glance at Richard. “Rags and I are taking a nature hike on Saturday. Would it be all right if Lissa came along? You’re welcome, too, of course.”

“Please, Daddy? I wanna go, I really, really do. Please?”

Richard’s initial instinct was to refuse. Outings with Lissa were difficult, tension-filled affairs that must be tediously prepared for with medical precision. Still, there was something fascinating about C. J. Moray, her vibrancy and infectious zest for life, the ease with which she’d transformed his sulking daughter into a happy, hopeful child.

“Absolutely not!” Thompson McCade loomed in the doorway, red faced and furious. “I will not have my granddaughter traipsing through muck and mud until her lungs explode. I will not allow it.”

All doubts dissipated instantly. If McCade was dead set against something, then Richard was dead set in favor of it. He met his father-in-law’s angry stare with one of cold determination, but it was C.J. to whom he spoke. “What time Saturday?”

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