A Gift Of Grace. Inglath Cooper
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excited yipping drew Grace’s attention. Five round-bellied puppies were conducting a wrestling match in the middle of the run. “Oh!” Grace bolted over and squatted down to peer through the chain-link door.
Teresa smiled. “Aren’t they cute? They’re eight weeks old as of yesterday, so they can be adopted now, too.”
“Oh, Mama,” Grace breathed.
“They’re adorable,” Sophie said.
“Would you like to play with them?” Teresa asked.
Grace nodded. Teresa opened the door, and they all bounded out into the aisle, tumbling over one another. Grace giggled and ran after them. They played for several minutes while Sophie and Teresa watched with smiles on their faces.
“Do you want to take one of the puppies, Grace?” Sophie asked.
Grace looked up from the concrete floor where she sat with three of them climbing up her lap. She looked at the puppies and then at the older dog who had yet to get up from her position at the back of the cage.
“Why does Lily look so sad?”
“Lily has been here a long time,” Teresa said.
“Is she sad because nobody’s picked her?”
Teresa lifted one shoulder and sighed. “No matter how well we take care of them, it’s not the same as having a home.”
Grace glanced down at the wiggling puppies on her lap, then back to Lily who was gazing at her with eyes devoid of any expectation. Grace remained silent for several moments. And then said, “Mama, can I see Lily?”
“Is it all right, Teresa?”
“Of course.” She put the puppies back in their cage where they continued their wrestling. She opened Lily’s door and looked at Grace. “You can go in and pet her. She’s really good with children.”
Grace walked to the back of the run, squatted and rubbed Lily’s long coat. “She’s soft.”
“I suspect she has some cocker spaniel in her. And some type of setter, judging from her coat. She’s a very sweet dog. Probably the most undemanding one here.”
Lily’s tailed thumped once. Grace kept rubbing her. After a few moments, Lily stood up, her head low, tail tucked.
Grace glanced back at the puppies, then looked at Sophie. “I want to pick Lily, Mama.”
Lily raised her head and licked Grace’s cheek.
“Lily, it is,” Sophie said. “Let’s take her home.”
LILY NEEDED A COLLAR and leash, a doggy bed and a bone to chew on.
So proclaimed Grace, along with her desire to buy them at the place where Noah lived.
“I want to tell him about Lily, Mama.”
There were other places they could have gone Lily-shopping, other places that were closer than Tucker’s. But Sophie reasoned that Grace liked the yellow Lab, and why shouldn’t they give the store their business when its owner had been nice enough to haul that hay out to their house for them?
After Sophie got back from her morning classes on Monday, she changed clothes, brushed some fresh powder across her nose, put on a medium-pink lipstick she usually only wore at night.
Halfway down the hall, she turned back to the bathroom, pulled out the rubber band that had anchored her hair at her neck, brushed through it a few times, started to put it back up, then at the last second, left it loose around her shoulders.
CALEB SPENT MOST OF the day at the store, working in the office upstairs and watching the register out front while Macy went to lunch.
It was almost one-thirty when the front door dinged. Sophie and Grace Owens came in and stood on the other side of the counter. A hot and cold blast of emotion washed over him.
“Afternoon, Dr. Owens,” he said, aiming his voice toward steady and even when everything else inside him rocked like a dingy on storm-churned seas.
“Hello,” she said.
“Hay bales hold up?”
“Yes. They did.” She cleared her throat, a small, feminine sound that somehow stood out in contrast with her precise, no-nonsense manner. “Thank you again for bringing them out. And, please, it’s Sophie.”
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