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excuse as he glanced at the innumerable ratty chew toys strewn about the floor amid even more laundry and several half-eaten sneakers. “What else?”
“He jumps on people.”
Drew moved a few steps away from the wall. “I don’t mind when he jumps on me. He’s only playing. He’s not vicious or anything.”
“Oh, no. Just the opposite,” Selena added. “He’s awfully cute. You’ll see. And affectionate. But he doesn’t know his own strength, so you can’t expect Mrs. Bierdermeyer, who’s eighty-six and walks with a cane, to be as enthusiastic about his advances. We don’t want to break Axel’s spirit, but we don’t want him to break Mrs. B’s hip.”
“Mrs. Bierdermeyer is a neighbor?”
“Yes.”
“Do you only see her when you take Axel out?”
“Yes.”
“So you’re saying he’s out of control even on a leash.”
Selena tilted her chin imperiously upward. “We don’t expect him to heel every minute if that’s what you’re getting at.”
“Ah.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I think it’s time I met Axel.”
Selena narrowed her eyes. “Drew, please, let him out of the bathroom.”
As the boy disappeared behind a partition, Jack stood to assume the calm, in-charge stance he used when meeting any new dog. “I’m going to observe. Pretend I’m not here.”
“I don’t think that will be poss—”
The apartment shook as a furry juggernaut burst into the room and caromed off the walls and furniture with Drew in hot pursuit.
“Axel, no!” Selena jumped up and joined the chase.
She’d described the dog as “cute.” It wouldn’t have been the description Jack would have used for the mixed breed. He loved dogs, but he didn’t idealize them. This one in particular. The shaggy head of a terrier sat on the tan, barrel-chested body of a chow, punctuated by a chow’s high, plumy tail. A herder’s very long, strong legs completed the incongruous picture. Make that motion picture.
In a tangle of paws and feet, the boy wrestled the dog to the floor. It was obvious Axel loved every minute of the roughhousing. Finally, Selena snagged his collar. When Drew rolled out from under him and headed for the sofa, Axel followed, dragging Selena. The boy, the woman and the dog collapsed on the sofa with the dog stretched across both owners’ laps, his tongue lolling from a mouth wide open in a silent canine laugh. It was clear who was in charge here. The queen had been dethroned.
“I can help you,” Jack said simply.
Selena laughed, and the sound was music. “We don’t care how he behaves inside! We just need a few training techniques so he can fly under the radar and not get in trouble when we take him out.”
Looking at the absolute disarray in the apartment, so different from his own spare living quarters, he begged to differ. Animals and humans alike could benefit from order, routine, stability. Memory flickered. Of his own childhood with a military stepfather. As a boy he hated the constant moving, the impermanence. Ironically, what kept him from feeling lost and adrift in his movable world was the discipline his stepfather brought to the household. It was obvious how Axel handled the turmoil. Jack wondered how Drew handled it.
Selena cleared her throat.
“Ah…about Axel…” he said, unaccustomed to being caught off guard. “You have to exercise discipline before you exercise affection. I can teach you how.”
“You mean we have to be cruel to be kind?” Selena’s brief smile faded as she stroked Axel’s floppy ear. “No, thanks.”
“I’m not talking about cruelty. In any form.” He wondered why the words discipline and submission had pushed this beautiful woman’s buttons. “I’m talking about the natural order of things. In the animal world. Don’t project human issues on your pet.”
Too late he realized he’d been focusing on Selena to the exclusion of Drew, and that Drew had noticed.
Glaring at Jack, the boy pushed Axel off his lap and moved closer to Selena. Like a feisty little junkyard mutt protecting his territory. “I don’t know, Mom,” he said. “Maybe we don’t need a dog shrink.”
Jack ignored the insulting tone of voice. There was no mention or evidence of a Mr. Milano. By this kid’s behavior alone, Jack would bet Drew had been the man of the house for some time. The dog needed help, sure, but not enough for Jack to step into the middle of possibly touchy family dynamics. The stepson of a man who’d never let go of the step distinction, Jack knew what it was like to guard from intruders the little bit you thought you owned.
He pulled a business card out of his pocket and handed it deliberately to Drew. “It’s your dog, your decision,” he said before moving toward the door. He could see Axel in the kitchen, rummaging through an overturned trash bin. “Call me if you change your mind. The fee that went on your charge card was for my standard three sessions. After today’s consultation, if you decide to go elsewhere, I’ll refund the price of two.”
As he descended the stairs from the apartment, he thought of the woman above. In the five years since his wife Anneka’s death, he’d worked with many women in an effort to rehabilitate their usually spoiled dogs. In the past year he’d begun to date. In all that time he hadn’t met one woman who aroused a personal curiosity, no one for whom he regretted saying a final farewell. Until today.
Warmed by, but distrusting, this instant attraction to Selena Milano, he pushed through the building door to cool, moist air, into the neighborhood changing from bustling daytime business to early evening social. Normally a solitary man, he found the sounds of music, the smell of food, the shouts from neighbor to neighbor jarring. If Selena interested him, why not ask her out? He knew why. Her son. Although Jack might be drawn to the woman, he’d be a fool to pursue even the most casual relationship in the face of the boy’s obvious antagonism.
CHAPTER TWO
WITH THE MOUTHWATERING aroma of tamales floating up from the taquerías across the street, Selena sat on a stool on the roof of her building, checking the fabric samples laid out in the open. They were for an upcoming installation on the campus of San Francisco State University. The theme was tolerance, and Selena envisioned scrims stretched taut on enormous frames planted in the earth. On one side would be a picture and personal statement by an ordinary person, describing a small, everyday act of tolerance. On the other a visual pulled from the headlines showing the stark reality of intolerance. She wanted the contrasting images imposed on opposing sides of fabric to highlight what little lay between the two directions. She didn’t have the whole ideological thing worked out yet. Or even the execution. Right now she and Maxine, her assistant, were testing fabrics to find the one most likely to stand up to both the printing process and four weeks of San Francisco’s ever-changing weather.
Drew had taken Axel for an after-school walk—well, run—in the park. For the past few days, he’d been committed to burning off some of his pal’s energy. Neither Selena nor Drew wanted to have to bring back Jack Quinn and his boot-camp ideas. Trouble was the outings seemed to be stoking Axel’s energy levels, not diminishing them.
With a groan, Maxine stood up. “I have to move around. You want some coffee?”
“Please. I made a fresh pot before we came up.” Blowing on her hands, Selena watched Maxine head for the door to the stairway to the apartment below. Although it was probably fifty degrees, up here you caught the brisk winds off the Pacific. Coffee sounded good.
Maxine had been Selena’s art teacher in high school. And when Selena had come back to San Francisco, pregnant, her old home sold, her parents off saving the world, Maxine had helped her find her first job at a community center, teaching