Need You for Keeps (2 page)

She shook once and waited for him to release her hand. When he just stared at her, she snatched it back. “And I’ll try to stay out of your hair, but I can’t promise anything.”

His mouth twitched. “You do that.” He clipped a leash on Domino and tipped his hat. “Have a good day, Shay.” They started for the door.

“Wow, thanks for all that protecting and serving,” she said, sure he was just yanking her chain.

“Anytime,” he threw over his shoulder.

“Wait,” she hollered after him. “What about letting me out?”

“Call the other guy. You know, the one you’re voting for. Make him earn that support you’re so eager to throw his way.”

“Thank you for your support,” Shay said, handing a discreet paper bag to the next customer and putting the money in her cash box.

“I can’t believe how many people showed up,” her friend Harper Owens said, taking in the line of women stretching across the grass field. A line that made it impossible for Shay not to smile.

“Me either. Although I think it’s Emerson’s bottomless Salty Chihuahuas that have people roughing the heat.”

Emerson stepped out from behind her food cart with a cold pitcher of said Salty Chihuahuas and snorted. She wore her hair short, an even shorter black skirt that was covered in a million zippers, and a tank top that said
PITA PEDDLER STREATERY
across the chest. Her red Converse hi-tops, matching lipstick, and bite-me attitude made Emerson appear every bit the tough troublemaker of their trio.

Shay had met them at the farmers’ market a few months ago. She had been doing five-dollar pet-icures, Harper was working a kids’ art table, and Emerson was passing out baklava samples. The triple-digit day had scared off the crowd and had them bemoaning their poor sales under Emerson’s food cart umbrella. Two hours and three batches of the gooey Greek dessert later, the trio was cemented.

“I think it’s the half-naked men,” Emerson said, gesturing to the tray she balanced on her hand. Behind the two full pitchers of her trademark tequila-infused cocktail sat a stack of cups that read
BOTTOMS UP
right above a picture of a magnificent butt in nothing but a pair of red boxer briefs.

“Good point.”

Naked hotties and free booze were just smart business tactics in a town where a good portion of the female population carried a senior discount card. But today’s turnout was more than Shay could have hoped for, especially since summer was showing her nasty teeth. It was late morning and already the heat hung thick on the valley floor, bringing with it the sweetness from nearby vineyards. Not that a little heat could stop today from being a success.

A solar storm couldn’t have stopped today. Because just like the sun would rise each morning and set each evening, the women of St. Helena would do anything to get their hands on St. Paws’ extended edition Cuties with Booties calendar. And Shay was the town’s only supplier.

Last year, kitten and puppy season had been brutal, so Shay, wanting to raise awareness of the staggering number of homeless pets, started
Cuties with Booties, a pet-adoption blog. Each week she paired one of St. Helena’s sexiest working men with a pet in need. Contractors, vintners, service men, even a forest ranger—all barefoot while their partners-in-crime wore their work boots.

Cuties with Booties had gone viral in a matter of days, helping Shay place nine pets with their forever families and raising enough donations to help offset spaying and neutering costs for another dozen. It also made local stars out of the men brave enough to pose and the animals who’d captured the town’s hearts. The women of St. Helena had even started up a fan club, Booty Patrol, printing off the photos of the pets—and men—and asking for their paw prints.

This year Shay had bigger dreams, and with the blog’s success putting her on the map as the patron saint of St. Helena’s strays, she regularly received calls from people needing help finding an animal a good home or from the local shelter when its facility was maxed out.

But it seemed that for every one she placed, another two would appear on her doorstep, and her heart had already outgrown her house. Not to mention her checkbook.

Every life counts
, she reminded herself, which was why turning away a stray broke her heart, so she was determined to find a way to place more pets. Her current goal was twelve animals over the next twelve months. With Bark in the Park right around the corner, Shay was certain she’d place the four foster dogs currently residing in her home by the end of the summer. The seasonal doggie roundup acted as a place where locals could socialize their four-legged kids and would allow Shay to introduce potential families to her dogs. Dogs that, when adopted, would provide her the extra space she needed to foster more pets. Only more fosters meant more vet bills, more food, and more money.

Money Shay didn’t have access to.

But she did have access to the most adorable
and
adoptable pets on the planet. And together with some of St. Helena’s finest first responders, wearing not much more than their work pants and a smile, she’d hoped that the Eighteen Months of Cuties with Booties calendar would raise enough to cover the costs of twelve animals.

Shay turned to her friends. “Peggy is being super supportive.” Peggy wasn’t just her landlord, she was also the owner of Paws and Claws Day Spa, which made her Shay’s boss. “She even offered to let me have a few calendar signings at her shop, including one with Warren and then a big meet-and-greet with the cuties the weekend after Bark in the Park. A ‘men behind the dogs’ kind of signing, where we sell all kinds of autographed calendars and swag. I already have several of the guys from the calendar lined up to do signings with their featured pet.”

Shay smiled at the long line of women that wound through the park to the steps of town hall, all waiting to get their hands on the anticipated calendar.

Cuties with Booties was going to make her dream a reality. She just knew it. Helping those otherwise overlooked souls was something Shay not only understood, it was what drove her. Everyone loved kittens and puppies. Who wouldn’t? Not many looked twice at a sweet older dog with bad vision and gas problems. Once they reached a certain age, their likelihood for placement dropped dramatically, and during puppy and kitten season the chances of placement were slim at best.

“With that many hot dawgs in one place, every lady in town will show up with their pens. And checkbooks,” Harper said, handing a calendar to the next customer—followed closely by a Salty Chihuahua. “I bet your applications will go through the roof.”

That was the plan. “Then I just have to come up with the money to cover the cost of the new fosters.”

“The number of people willing to stand in the heat and plunk down a cool twenty for a calendar tells me that St. Paws will have enough to take care of as many fosters as you can handle.”

Emerson was right. With this kind of crowd, she would be able to afford more fosters than she’d originally thought.

“Who’s next?” Shay ushered the next customer forward.

To her surprise the next customer was neither a soccer mom nor an old biddy. A three-foot-tall girl with freckles and a mess of wild blonde curls flying every which way peeked over the edge of the table. She was maybe six, beanpole thin, wearing a faded sundress that was on the wrong side of vintage, and holding a beach bag that was twice her size.

“Well, hello,” Shay said when the girl just looked her at her with serious, assessing brown eyes. Shay glanced around to see who she was with, because surely the girl was too young to be there alone. But no one seemed to step up to the table to join her.

Shay shot Harper a questioning look. Harper managed the Fashion Flower, the only kids’ clothing boutique in town, which meant she knew just about every munchkin between two and twelve. Harper just shrugged.

Hoping a parent was nearby, Shay leaned forward, getting to eye level. “Are you here to pick up a calendar for someone?”

Goldilocks shook her head, her gaze dropping to the dog at Shay’s feet. She reached out a tentative hand, pausing briefly. “Is it all right if I pet your dog?”

“He’s not mine.”
Not anymore
, she thought, ignoring the ping of sadness that always surfaced when one of her lost ones found their forever home.

Just that morning, before the signing started, a young family had come specifically to meet Tripod and fallen in love. The feeling was mutual. They lived in a one-story home, which was a must with only three legs, and had an autistic daughter who would benefit from Tripod’s calm and loving demeanor. It was the perfect match for everyone involved.

“Tripod goes to his new family next week, but he’s friendly and loves belly rubs.”

On cue, Tripod, the star of today and an attention-lover, rolled over to expose his soft underbelly.

The girl had great animal etiquette. Kneeling next to Tripod in the grass, she stroked him gently, careful not to go near his face.

“Do you have a dog?”

She shook her head. “Grandma’s allergic.”

Too bad
, Shay thought, taking in the way the girl seemed to relax while petting the dog. It was the same thing that happened whenever Shay was around animals. There was something so healing about unconditional love.

“Is it a nice family? Tripod’s new one?” Goldilocks asked quietly, giving Tripod a belly rub that had his tongue lolling to the side in ecstasy and all three legs sticking up in the air like roadkill.

Tripod was a two-year-old shepherd mix who’d lost his front leg in a car accident when he’d been dumped on the side of the highway, then bravely bared it all for the cover of the calendar with a local deputy.

Just not the deputy Shay had wanted.

Then again, Shay had learned early on that the things she wanted either gave her a big butt or a broken heart, because the ones she really wanted never seemed to want her back. Or at least not for long. But Tripod had a chance at a lifetime of happiness. Shay had made sure of it.

“The nicest,” Shay assured her, but Goldilocks didn’t look convinced and Shay couldn’t blame her. People could suck, something Shay knew firsthand, which was why she screened all of her applicants thoroughly before approving any adoption.

“It’s a rule.” Shay handed Goldilocks a St. Paws flyer and pointed to the tagline at the bottom. “See, right here. Only nice families need apply.”

Goldilocks gave Tripod one last pat, then stood to study the flyer. She looked at every condition Shay listed, then read the most important part: “St. Paws pets are the ‘for keeps’ kind.”

“Yup.” That was the best part of what Shay did. She wasn’t interested in finding her animals another temporary stopover, so she took the time and care to ensure that each match ended in a lifetime of love and companionship.

“We only place pets with people who have big hearts,” Shay explained.

After a long moment the girl gave a small nod and extended the flyer. “Can I have it signed?”

Shay smiled. “Sure.” She reached across the table to grab the organic inkpad she’d brought for Tripod, but the girl shook her head.

“I want you to sign it.” She handed Shay a pen from her Mary Poppins–sized bag. “Right there.”

Shay took the pen and signed her name right where the dirty finger pointed. The girl looked at the signature, then at Shay and smiled. Big and bright, exposing a gap where she’d lost a tooth. “Someday I want to be a saint too.”

And didn’t that just make her week.

Shay swallowed hard as Goldilocks gave Tripod one last pet to the head and, tucking the signed flyer in her pocket, walked toward town hall. Shay was still collecting herself when two bony hands snatched a calendar off of the table.

Estella Pricket, the current president of the Companion Brigade, the local pet owners’ society, sucked on her teeth as she looked it over carefully. Estella was about four hundred years old, favored penciled eyebrows over real ones, and had jaws like a pit bull when it came to getting her way. That she was Shay’s neighbor only made it that much worse. “How did you pick the models?”

Shay looked at the back of the calendar, over all of the drool-worthy men, and waggled a brow. “I asked them if they wanted to take it off for a good cause and they said yes.”

“And all these years I’ve been suffering through coffee dates,” Emerson said, grabbing the calendar.

“At least you get coffee,” Harper argued. “I had every one of those cuties and their half-naked booties in a dark room and the closest I got to a date was one of them asking when the calendar would be released.”

Harper had donated her set design and photography skills to the cause in hopes of meeting a dark and dangerous bad boy wanting to give her an adventure she’d never forget. Too bad for Harper, the men of St. Helena had a hard time picturing the town’s good girl getting down and dirty.

“Maybe you should lose the cardigan and tights,” Emerson said before picking up her tray to make her rounds.

Shay laughed. Estella only scowled, which made her forehead fold over on itself and her lips purse out like she needed an EpiPen. It was enough to scare a ghost. The last time the woman had scowled like that in public was when Sheila Stanton mistakenly announced Estella’s prized Pomeranian as a papillon at last year’s Bark in the Park crowning ceremony.