Listen to Your Heart - Fern Michaels [1]
The little dog picked up the toy and trotted over to her bed on the corner of the porch. She settled the Beanie Baby between her front paws and proceeded to lick its face. It was a toy she loved and was rarely without. Tears burned Josie’s eyes at the little dog’s devotion to her cuddly toy. She should think about getting Rosie a playmate. Something that was alive and breathing. Another dog, or possibly a kitten. It was something to think about.
Not that she didn’t have enough to think about. She had plenty of things on her plate, perhaps too many things. Mardi Gras was looming, and she was booked solid for two straight weeks. Then Easter and the usual round of spring parties that led the way to Mother’s Day, the busiest time of year. This year they were going to have to hire extra help. She winced when she thought what the extra help would cost her in the way of payroll taxes. They already had four employees, two full-time and two part-time. They were going to need at least four more people to carry them through the summer months. All thanks to Gourmet Party’s center-spread article.
One article in one glossy magazine, plus their newly designed Web page, and their business had taken off like a rocket. She’d been beating the bushes for a solid year to bring in business—business that had been lost with her parents’ death—and now she was so busy she had to turn business away. Dupré Catering’s reservation book was full.
Josie saw the car turn into the driveway before Rosie growled. She heard the car door close and then she saw him: a giant of a man, in a business suit. She blinked at his easy stride, noting his dark hair pulled back slickly into a short ponytail. He stopped in midstride, looked down at the ladybug stepping-stones, then looked around, the tiny cottage directly in his line of vision. He closed his eyes and shook his head as though he were shaking off a mirage. When he realized he was still standing on the ladybug walkway and the cottage was still there, he stepped carefully on the next stone until he was at the foot of the steps leading to the porch.
Good-looking. “Can I help you?” Josie asked as Rosie yipped her way to the top of the steps and growled.
The giant looked down. “Is that a real dog?”
Great body. “Yes. Her name is Rosie. Can I help you?”
The giant placed his right foot on the bottom step. Rosie backed up and lunged. Josie flew off the chair just as a whirlwind of motion streaked up the ladybug walkway and onto the porch. She whirled and was knocked sideways as the tornado crashed into the window boxes, sending them flying through the air. Geraniums and petunias, their clumps of dirt dotted with vermiculite, scattered in all directions, littering the green porch carpet with thousands of specks of white. Rosie’s little bed sailed between the rails of the porch, the Beanie Baby flying through the air to land in front of the huge boxer bent on destroying the cottage. Josie watched in horror as the dog’s big behind slammed through the screen door. She saw her favorite coffee mug—the one with the cluster of butterflies painted on the side—crash on the front steps. The hanging ferns swung crazily as huge paws swiped at them, finally sending them out into the yard. And then, the ultimate horror, as the huge dog ripped at Rosie’s beloved Beanie Baby, causing Josie to give voice to a primal shriek. “Call off your dog, or I will let her rip out your throat!” Later she might laugh at Rosie’s vicious hold on the man’s pristine white shirt collar. “Look what you did! Stop it this minute! Bite him, Rosie! He ruined her baby! Do you see what he did! She loves that toy. She carries it around all day and sleeps with it. It’s worn in. It can’t he replaced. Call off your damn dog this minute! I have a gun! I’ll get my gun! Give me my dog! Do you hear me? Give me