Her Valentine Sheriff

He was giving off mixed signals all over the place—which he clearly wasn’t going to acknowledge. And if he wouldn’t, she couldn’t.

“So we’re good, then?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am.” His voice was low and gruff, and his gaze turned so dark that his stormy blue eyes took on an almost black hue to them.

She wasn’t going to solve any of their problems this way. Maybe the best thing to do was to bring out the big guns—

—or more specifically, the Bullet.

Chapter Two

Eli’s chest tightened almost painfully as he followed Mary through the front room and into the den. In his opinion, it was more of a kennel than a living space. There were several crates, the smaller stacked on the larger, but they were all empty. The dogs who’d greeted him at the door were lounging on fluffy pillows of various shapes, colors and sizes, all of which looked as if they had been haphazardly tossed around the room. Chew toys, ropes, tennis balls and rawhide bones littered the floor.

The whole place was messy. Lived-in. And distinctly feminine. Everything from Mary’s choice of floral wallpaper to the soft pastel curtains screamed woman, unlike his own apartment, which was meticulously clean and simply furnished with only the bare necessities in mahogany and stainless steel. Not much in the way of decor, other than a couple of family pictures on the wall. Eli didn’t require too many things to live comfortably.

Besides, he liked clean. Uncluttered. Mary apparently felt differently.

He didn’t know what he’d expected the inside of Mary’s house to look like, since he knew she shared her space with all her dogs. He supposed he hadn’t really considered it at all.

In any respect, this wasn’t it. These pups looked as if they were living the lives of royalty, not as if they were working animals. He surveyed the dogs. The Chihuahua wasn’t a K-9, formidable attitude notwithstanding, but he supposed some of the other dogs could be.

In addition to those he’d seen in the front room, there were three other large canines—one a creamy yellow color but otherwise identical to Sebastian, a gray dog with whiskers and a lot of fluff on its legs and another that looked a little like Lassie from the old television show.

He wondered which of them would be his. To his relief, they were not overly intimidating. None of them seemed as if they could be a police-trained K-9, either, not that he really knew how to assess one.

“If you’ll follow me to the back patio, I’ll introduce you to your new partner. He’s in the yard getting some exercise with some of the other pups.”

“There are more?” The question was half tongue-in-cheek jesting and half utter bemusement. “How many dogs did you say you have again?”

Mary glanced back and smiled. “Too many. I’ve lost count.”

Eli shook his head and chuckled. “I’m not surprised.”

She stopped at the sliding glass doorway and turned to face him, gesturing back toward the den. “You’ve met Goliath,” she said, pointing to the Chihuahua. “The gray one is a standard schnauzer—Periwinkle. I call her Perry.” Upon hearing her name, the schnauzer pricked her ears. “And of course I have my SAR dog, Sebastian. He’s a Labrador retriever, and he pretty much never leaves my side.” She took a breath and smiled, making a sweeping gesture that encompassed both the den and the yard. “The rest of this sorry lot I’m either fostering or training.”

“SAR?”

“Search and rescue,” she elaborated.

“I see. And my dog?”

“Bullet. He’s a Dutch shepherd. That’s him right there,” she said, aiming her finger to the far corner of the yard.

Eli’s gaze shifted to where she’d pointed, his shoulders tensing as he silently observed Bullet, a mostly black-furred dog with a bit of tan on his face and legs. He was trotting around the perimeter of the wooden security fence as if he were staking his claim on it. The dog circled a few of the obstacles in the yard—a balance beam, a chute and a couple of jumps—punctuating his sniffing with an occasional ominous bark.

Bullet was definitely more what Eli had imagined in a K-9, both in aggression and demeanor. Eli was pretty sure bad guys wouldn’t want to run into the sharp-toothed end of this dog. He wouldn’t.

He steadied his breath, trying not to think of another dog, another time, a terrifying episode that had resulted in permanent bite marks and gashes on his right forearm and shoulder. He had many scars on his body, everything from the sharp edges of an angry bull’s horn across his ribs to the ragged pucker of a knife wound on his chin. Yet comparatively, those had been easier to heal, emotionally speaking. He didn’t dwell on them.

Not like his inexplicable, irrational fear of dogs. Experts even had a scientific name for it—cynophobia—which didn’t help him a bit. He couldn’t get over it, no matter how hard he tried.

He swallowed hard, his muscles rigid as Mary called for the K-9 to come forward.

“Bullet, volg.”

Bullet obeyed the command immediately, coming to heel next to Mary’s left side and sitting on his haunches, looking up at her expectantly for his next instruction. She reached down and scratched him under the chin. “Who’s my good boy?”

That was apparently code for at ease, for the dog bounded forward, barking playfully. After a moment, he approached Eli, circling his legs and sniffing him. Eli stood perfectly still, staring down at the dog and waiting for him to—

What? Chomp his leg off? Go for his throat?

His imagination was getting the best of him, and it certainly wasn’t helping him with this situation. He had to get over his nerves.

Like yesterday.

“Can I touch him?” Eli asked tentatively.

“Absolutely. He’s yours, you know.”

Eli reached forward, allowing Bullet to sniff at his fingers before he scratched the dog behind the ears.

“Good boy,” he said to the dog, and then paused abruptly as Mary’s words penetrated his muddled brain. “Wait. What do you mean, he’s mine?” He straightened, mental alarms pealing in his ears. “He belongs to the police department, right?”

Mary’s gaze widened, and her lips pursed, accentuating her cheekbones. She must have realized he was staring at her, because she immediately dropped her gaze. Her heart-shaped face turned a pretty shade of rose.

“The department paid for him, yes,” she answered after a tentative pause.

“Good, then.” Relief washed through him. For a moment he’d had the unnerving picture of having to take the dog home to live with him. Thankfully that wasn’t the case. “So now what?”

“Now we train.” Mary straightened, resuming the professional demeanor with which she’d met him at the door. “Since it’s Friday afternoon, I suggest we break for the weekend and pick this up first thing Monday morning.”

“Train? I was given the impression that the dog already was trained,” he said, cautiously running a palm down Bullet’s neck. Eli jerked his hand back when Bullet raised his head. “Isn’t he a certified K-9?”

“Oh, Bullet’s trained,” Mary replied, her chuckle softened by the kindness mingling with the amusement in her gaze. “I was talking about you.”

* * *

Mary paced the front room, glancing out the window every few minutes, waiting for Eli to arrive for his first official training session with Bullet. It seemed as if the weekend had dragged on for a lifetime, but Monday morning had finally come, and Eli was due soon. They’d agreed on eight o’clock to start, and it was only half past seven, so it wasn’t as if he was late. She was just anxious to see him again—to get started on the real training process. It was an exciting moment for her and for her newly established Rapport Kennel.

If nerves over her business weren’t enough to make her antsy, she couldn’t seem to be able to get Eli out of her mind. It bothered her more than she cared to admit—because if she were being honest, this wasn’t all about work. It was about the man she was working with.

Eli. The man who for years had filled her dreams, as hopeless as they were. Mooning over a man who hardly knew she even walked the planet. But that was long ago, when she was an awkward teen. She’d been over him for years.

He was her past. Except now, he wasn’t.

He was very, very present.

If she could have framed the expression on his face when she’d teased him about training him and not the dog, she would have hung it over her fireplace, where she could appreciate his handsome mug every time she walked by. Of course that might be a little problematic to explain to visitors, since it was none other than her very own sister who had jilted him for another man only a week before their wedding.

Not exactly the kind of picture a woman ought to place on the mantel, even in her mind and even in jest.

She was still angry at Natalie. At the moment, they weren’t on speaking terms. It grated on her, knowing that in Natalie’s tinted reality, Eli had been nothing more than the last in a long string of broken hearts. Her sister had always been a bit of a narcissist, but her selfishness had hit an all-time high with this one. Without a word of explanation to anyone, she’d left the state with a wealthy fellow the family had never even met. It was cruel, even for her.

How could Natalie have done such a thing? And to Eli, of all men? He deserved so much better than that.

He was a decent guy through and through. He didn’t purposefully snub anyone, not even in high school, when he was the handsome and sought-after star running back on the football team. He went out of his way to make folks feel welcome—even going so far as to take pity on an awkward ninth-grade girl standing alone in a shadowed corner of her first Sweetheart Social.

He wouldn’t remember that particular incident, of course.

But she did.

She’d never forgotten any of the kind things he’d done for her over the years. To be honest, if only with herself, she’d have to admit that her feelings for Eli had shaded every romantic relationship she’d had over the years. No other man could compare to him, or at least to the man she’d built Eli up to be in her mind. It wasn’t fair to the men she’d dated, and it definitely wasn’t going to make working with the man Eli was now any easier.

He could hardly live up to perfection, and that was pretty much what she’d made him out to be.

Past tense. That part of her life was over long ago. She was over this. She was over him. She had to be. Now more than ever. How else would she be able to endure working with him every day?

And she was going to work with him. It might have come as a complete shock to her when Captain James had arranged for the two of them to work together in the new K-9 unit, but she wasn’t about to turn down the opportunity she’d been praying for. If she presented a competent K-9 unit to the Serendipity Police Department, she’d be able to use that reference to get other clients in surrounding small-town areas, places that might otherwise not be able to afford to train such units. It was her dream to run a full-time training kennel, and she found she couldn’t give it up, not even to spare Eli the discomfort of having to work with his ex-fiancée’s sister.

She sank into the plush forest-green easy chair in the corner of her living room and folded her legs, wrapping her arms around her ankles. Resting her forehead on her knees, she closed her eyes and offered her heart to God in prayer.

She didn’t realize how much time had passed, but at eight o’clock precisely, Eli knocked rhythmically on the door, shave and a haircut, two bits.

She was ready, and she hoped he was equally prepared for his first real lesson with Bullet. He’d seemed a little aloof about the dog on Friday.

She opened the door and smiled in greeting, and he simply marched past her.

“Let’s do this,” he said over his shoulder, already halfway to the den.

No Hello.

No Good morning.

No How was your weekend?

Just a curt Let’s do this, in a voice that, while not what she would term callous, was nevertheless, in Mary’s opinion, a little rough around the edges. Or maybe she was being oversensitive, and he was ready to get down to business.

“Okay, then,” she answered blithely, tamping down her own emotions. Eli was probably nervous. She decided to cut him a break—this one time. She passed him, heading through the den toward the backyard without glancing around to see if he followed.

She didn’t have to. She felt his gaze drilling into her back and knew he was scowling. What was up with that? Had he fallen off the wrong side of the bed? Eaten soggy cereal for breakfast?

As she stepped outdoors, she paused a moment, enjoying the sight of Bullet playfully barking and chasing Periwinkle and Sebastian around the yard. The dogs always made her feel better.

Eli was still staring at her, waiting for—something. For his training to begin, she supposed.

“Bullet, volg,” she called crisply, bringing the dog to heel.

“Do I have to talk like that—in another language?” Eli asked, stepping beside her and crossing his arms over the wide expanse of his chest. “What is that, anyway? German?”

He was so close, and so big, that she had the impression he was invading her personal space. She wished it didn’t rattle her, but it did.

“You’re close. It’s Dutch. And, yes, I’m going to be teaching you a few Dutch words. Bullet is trained to respond to the language, though he knows most commands in English, as well.”

“It figures,” Eli groused, his brows lowering over startlingly arctic-blue eyes. “Dutch language for a Dutch dog. Just what I need. My partner and I not only have communication problems, we don’t even use the same language.”

Mary chuckled and laid a hand on his arm. “Bullet isn’t really Dutch, and that’s not why we use the language. He was bred right here in Texas. The foreign words help us—and the dogs—stay in the zone.”

He shrugged one shoulder and quirked his lips. “I thought I was done being forced to learn new languages when I graduated from high school.”

“I promise it’s not as painful as you’re making it out to be. Only a few words and they’re fairly easy to pick up. You’ll have a good time working with Bullet. Before you know it, it’ll feel like it’s all fun and games for you—probably the best time you’ve ever had on the police force. K-9 is at least as exciting as guns and knives.”

Eli scoffed and shook his head, and Mary raised her eyebrows. Frustration burned deep lines of aggravation in her chest.

Why was the man being so contrary today? He was acting like a toddler who didn’t want to eat his vegetables. It didn’t add up for a man as normally well tempered as Eli Bishop to be so unreasonably grouchy—not without a good reason.

But what reason could he have? Something was certainly stuck up his craw. Was he that uncomfortable working with her?

She sighed inwardly. She wouldn’t blame him if he was. She wasn’t feeling entirely composed herself. But the two of them would have to find a way to overcome the awkwardness between them, or they’d never be able to see this project through to completion—and that had to happen. It had to happen.

Could she bring up the source of the uneasiness between them? Force the issue? Address the elephant in the room—the one by the name of Natalie?

She cringed. While it would probably be better to bring their issues out into the open, the truth was, she was a bona fide, full-fledged chicken—just hear her cluck! She could no more mention Eli’s relationship with Natalie than she could make the Earth orbit backward around the sun.

“We’ll start with some basic commands, and then we’ll play a few games,” she instructed, consciously shoving her own emotions to the side and hoping Eli would do the same. She would have plenty of time to mull over their issues later, when he wasn’t around to pick up on it. “Use volg to bring him to heel on your left side.”

“V-log.” Eli stumbled over the word. Bullet cocked his head, clearly interested in the strange man, but he didn’t respond to Eli’s voice as he had with Mary’s. That was to be expected. Eli had to learn to give the commands with authority, and Bullet had to learn to trust Eli. It would just take time.

Mary took two large steps backward, away from Eli, giving Bullet a subtle hint to focus on the man before him. “It’s volg. Try it again.”

“Volg,” Eli commanded in a low, firm voice, fisting his hands as he spoke. Bullet circled around him and sat perfectly at his left heel. Eli glanced up, his surprised gaze meeting Mary’s. A smile crossed his lips. “Now, that’s better.”

Her stomach fluttered and pride welled in her chest, though she wasn’t certain whether it was from Eli’s reaction or Bullet’s successful training. “Sure. See? It’s not so bad. You just have to practice the new words until they become second nature to you. Probably a lot like your job—working through the ranks, learning as you go.”

“Yeah,” he agreed soberly. “Working through the ranks.”

After applying the heel command successfully several more times, Mary taught Eli the words for stay, come, sit and down. Bullet, of course, already knew the commands. Eli fumbled through the Dutch, but he was a quick learner, and clearly determined to make it work between him and his new partner, which was exhilarating for Mary to watch.

Yet even in their best moments, there was some silent but unsettling subtext within the interchange between the dog and the man. It wasn’t anything so blatant that she could immediately pinpoint the problem and correct it, but the exchange wasn’t as flowing and straightforward as it should have been. Mary couldn’t quite put her finger on what was off about it, but something was wrong.

She took her cues from Bullet rather than Eli. The dog occasionally shied sideways, which was unlike the well-trained K-9. Bullet’s skittishness suggested his handler was agitated, and Mary watched Eli closely, looking for signs of anxiety. His expression was sober and his jaw set in determination, but she didn’t necessarily think that was cause for concern. Eli had always been a bit of a perfectionist. Clearly he wanted to be successful in his new endeavor. There was nothing wrong with focus and resolve. But sometimes when Eli would mix up his commands, the dog didn’t know how to respond and returned to Mary’s side, which only served to set Eli’s face into a deeper scowl and widen the distance between him and his new K-9 partner.

How was she going to get him to relax? He’d been so laid-back in high school. She remembered him as the guy who always had a smile on his face, and his nature had been easygoing and friendly. But that was only her teenage love-struck observation. Maybe that wasn’t his true personality at all...at least, not anymore.

People grew up. Things changed. And she couldn’t say it was the first time he hadn’t met her expectations. When he’d become engaged to Natalie, Mary had assumed he’d join in their family life and culture, but that had never happened. Serendipity was a small town with country ways, and family was a big deal here. Yet it hadn’t appeared to matter to Eli.

Maybe he wasn’t the way she had imagined at all.

Maybe he was still bitter and frustrated from being jilted only one week before the wedding.

Maybe he didn’t like this situation.

Maybe he didn’t like her.

Whatever was behind his shady mood, if he wanted this program to work, he’d have to get over it and put forth a little more proactive effort.

He’d—they’d—get a lot further if he would relax. Bullet wasn’t going to respond to inconsistent or turbulent emotions. The dog needed regular praise and enthusiastic feedback or all of the training in the world meant nothing. Bullet wouldn’t work unless he thought it was a game.

How to express that to Eli was another thing entirely. She’d trained plenty of dogs, but this was her first cop. She didn’t know how best to proceed, but she was fairly certain Eli wouldn’t respond to criticism, even if it was constructive.

She paused, examining her own thoughts and actions. Dumping all the training commands on him at once might not have been such a great idea. Just because she’d easily picked up Dutch didn’t mean Eli was going to. He’d been a jock in high school and had been good at math. She couldn’t recall his performance in English or in the Spanish class he’d taken.

What if learning a new language had proven difficult for him in the past? That would certainly explain a lot, perhaps even why he was resisting her every effort on his behalf. Her heart softened toward him. Maybe if she backed off instead of pushing him so hard, his relationship with Bullet would progress naturally. It was certainly worth a try.

“Let’s take a break from all this hard work. Why don’t you and Bullet play for a while,” she suggested.

“Play?” He turned to her and crossed his arms, another defensive gesture that set Mary’s teeth on edge. “What does that even mean? You make it sound like we’re fifth graders on a swing set.”

“Something like that.” Mary pinched back a sharp retort, refusing to be thrown by his cranky attitude and determined to work through it. She’d have to show him how much fun it could be to work with Bullet. She leaned down and scooped up a simple white bath towel that had been rolled the long way and strung together with rubber bands.

Eli arched a brow. “A towel? Really?”

Dog training wasn’t about expensive equipment and fancy gimmicks. Mary ignored him and waved the towel toward Bullet.

“Come on, boy,” she encouraged in the high voice she instinctively used with animals and children. “Come and get it.”

Eli observed her silently, his lips pressed, and his posture stiff, while she played tug-of-war with Bullet and then threw the towel across the lawn for the dog to retrieve.

“You want to give it a go?” Mary offered the towel to Eli but he didn’t grab for it. Instead, he took a step backward and jammed his hands into the front pockets of his pants. His lips curled downward. He wasn’t nearly so handsome when he frowned.

He shook his head. “If you’re only going to play with him, I think I’ll pass. It doesn’t look that complicated. You go on ahead. I’ll grab one of those lawn chairs over there and watch.”

Now it was Mary’s turn to frown. She was doing everything she could to encourage him. What was his problem?

“Eli, seriously. You are never going to bond with Bullet if you don’t personally interact with him. You guys are supposed to be a team, a unit. Dogs have different personalities just like people do. You have to learn his quirks and characteristics, and he needs to get to know your idiosyncrasies, as well.”

Eli scoffed under his breath, but loud enough for Mary to hear it. The man was thoroughly exasperating in every respect. He was certainly nothing like the guy she’d been putting on a pedestal all these years.

Maybe he never had been.

“Are you going to do this or not?” she demanded, at the end of her emotional rope and quickly losing patience.

“All right, already.” He snatched the towel from her grasp and tossed it across the yard in a long, high arc. “Nag,” he muttered crossly, under his breath.

“Somebody’s got to be,” she retorted, propping her fists against her hips. “Do you give Captain James this much grief?”

His eyes widened. “No, of course not. I—”

He paused. His frown deepened for a moment before he offered her a rueful smile. “You’re right, of course. I’m acting like a class-A jerk, aren’t I?”

His grin sent her stomach aflutter. “You said it, not me.”

“I’ll try to do better,” he promised.

“I’m sure you’ll be fine,” she assured him, surprised at the intensity of the relief that washed through her. She hadn’t realized how very much she didn’t want to have to butt heads with Eli. She could only pray things would go better from here, now that he’d checked his attitude. She’d just known he’d be the kind of man willing to own up to his mistakes, and it was heartening to be proved right.

Bullet sat on his haunches directly in front of Eli, wagging his tail. Eli tentatively reached for the towel and removed it from Bullet’s mouth. “Now, what did you say when you tossed this old rag for him?”