Читать книгу Blame It On The Dog - Amy Frazier - Страница 8

CHAPTER THREE

SUNDAY MORNING, Selena stood outside Drew’s closed bedroom door about to make yet another attempt at talking with her son. Yesterday when they’d come home, he’d given her the silent treatment. All afternoon and evening. He’d even refused a visit to Margo’s Bistro, and, with his adolescent hollow leg, he never passed up a chance to eat one of Margo’s magnificent creations. This morning he hadn’t come out of his room. And, although she’d told Quinn to butt out of her business, she couldn’t stop thinking about his words, couldn’t help worrying there might be some truth to them.

“Drew, may I come in?”

When silence met her request, she cracked the door in case her son wore headphones and hadn’t heard her. He lay across his bed, drawing, a cereal box tipped precariously on the edge of the nightstand, headphones nowhere in sight. Axel, ignoring his dog bed on the floor, lay across Drew’s pillows, four enormous paws in the air.

She took a step into the room. “I’d like to talk to you.”

“About what?”

“Anything you want.” Sitting on the corner of the bed, she noticed an Axel-like superdog, complete with cape, dominated her son’s drawing. Action-hero Axel vanquished a legion of robots who all bore a remarkable resemblance to Jack Quinn.

“I don’t want to talk about anything,” Drew said.

“Not even yesterday?”

He shook his head.

“What about school? We’ve been so busy lately we haven’t had a chance to catch up. Anything I should know?”

He gave her a scathing look, one that told her in no uncertain terms he saw right through her nosy ploy, but he refused to answer.

Okay. About now, she could use some advice from her friends with kids on finessing words out of a reluctant twelve-year-old. Without that advice, she’d have to resort to her usual, not always successful candor. “When you walk Axel alone…does anyone give you a hard time?”

“You think?” Over his shoulder Drew glanced at his dog taking up most of the bed.

Even asleep, snoring peacefully, the beast looked like…well, a beast. Knowing what he was like in motion, Selena honestly doubted anyone messed with Drew in Axel’s company. But something was bugging her kid.

Where did the child who shared everything with her go?

The doorbell rang, waking Axel. It was probably Maxine. They were supposed to work on logistics for the SFSU installation. Maybe in a grandmotherly role, Maxine could get something out of Drew. When Selena got up, so did Axel, who knocked the box of cereal on the floor, spilling its contents amidst the other preteen disorder.

The doorbell rang again, sending the dog into paroxysms of barking on his way to the door.

“I’m coming, I’m coming!” She pushed Axel out of the way. “If you’d remembered your key, we wouldn’t have to go through—”

She opened the door not to Maxine, but to Jack Quinn.

As Axel barked and reared up on his hind feet, Quinn took a half step forward. Chest high, broad shoulders back, with a lock of dark hair falling over one eye, he looked more than a little intimidating. Axel must have felt the same because, amazingly, he stopped barking, put all fours on the ground and turned to leave. Quinn didn’t let him. Before either Selena or Axel knew what was happening, the man reached out and secured the dog’s collar, placed a firm hand on his rump, then put him in a sitting position. When Axel attempted to stand, Quinn merely put out his hand and uttered a quick, quiet, but commanding, “Hut!” Axel stayed. Moreover, his look went from stunned to adoring.

“How did you do that?” Selena asked, rather stunned herself.

“I’ve been trying to tell you it’s not rocket science.” He held out a DVD. “Maybe if Drew looked at this—”

“I’m willing to talk, but not in the apartment.” She looked over her shoulder to see if Drew had come out of his room. In his present state of mind, who knew how he’d react to Quinn’s unexpected visit? She took the DVD, put it on top of the tall bookshelf next to the door where Axel couldn’t get it, then pushed Quinn out onto the landing. She followed, shutting the door behind her.

Axel, on the other side, snuffled at the crack under the door. Knowing it wouldn’t be long before he started to howl, Selena grabbed Quinn’s arm and propelled him down the stairs, no easy feat as he was a tall, solidly built man. On the way down, they met Maxine coming up.

“I’ll be back in a minute,” Selena said before she had to make introductions.

Even so, in passing, Maxine gave Quinn the once-over as she did with all Selena’s dates, then flashed a thumbs-up.

As if.

How could Maxine see this man as anything but the thorn-in-her-side he’d become?

She pushed Quinn through the downstairs doorway onto the sidewalk. “What’s going on?” he asked.

The chill morning fog had yet to lift, and she wore nothing but a long-sleeved tee. To keep warm, she’d either have to jump up and down in front of Quinn like a woman gone mad or walk. “Let’s walk,” she said.

“Let me buy you a cup of coffee.”

“No!” She didn’t want to sit down anywhere with this guy. It would appear too normal. Dare she say too much like a first date? She wanted to hang onto the idea that he was, at most, a necessary evil. “A short walk’s all we’ll need.”

“If you say so.” Without asking, he took off his jacket and draped it over her shoulders.

She didn’t want him to be thoughtful. And she certainly didn’t want him to smell good. As his jacket did. Of leather and sandalwood. She tried to shrink from the lining which still held the heat of his body.

“Is this a bad time?” he asked.

“Yes. No. I don’t know.” After Maxine’s appraisal, Selena was now all too conscious of Quinn’s looks. He was handsome in a brooding, tortured-hero sort of way. What the hell was going on? This guy had already reduced Axel to a tail-wagging zombie. Now he’d reduced her to a blithering idiot. She nearly ran into a busker setting up his boombox, laying down plywood and a tip jar, getting ready to dance for the Sunday morning brunch crowd.

Jack observed Selena trotting erratically beside him and wondered what had her so on edge. “I know I should have called,” he said, “but I thought the DVD was important. It’s a documentary on the psychology of dogs. It shows the natural order of things in canine packs. I thought if you watched it with your son—if he got the information in a nonthreatening way—maybe he’d be willing to see what I have to offer.”

When she didn’t speak, he added, “Axel isn’t a difficult case. We could take care of most of his issues with one session in the park. You saw how he responded just now in your apartment.”

“Ah, yes, about that…what planet did you say you were from?”

He felt a laugh begin in his chest. A strange sensation. “You need to watch the DVD, then I’ll answer all your questions at our next session.”

“You seem certain there will be a next session.”

He wasn’t certain. He was making it up as he went. To prolong the walk. With her. “It depends on Drew. Kids his age are usually fascinated with animals. Use the DVD to draw him into the process.”

“So now you’re an expert on kids as well as dogs. Do you have any of your own? Kids, that is.”

“No.” He didn’t want to get into the fact that he wasn’t sure he should have kids. He hadn’t had the best of father models. “Let’s just say I think both Drew and you really want what’s best for Axel…but neither of you wants to admit what you’ve been doing hasn’t worked out the way you’d like.”

“Are you always so sure of yourself?”

He could have asked her if she was always so defensive, but he didn’t want to risk driving her away. “I know dogs. And I’ve worked with enough dog owners to understand their reservations.”

“Their reservations until they discover the ‘truth’?” She stopped and faced him, defiance making her eyes sparkle. “The ‘truth’ according to Jack Quinn?”

Refusing to be baited, he stood his ground. “Watch the DVD. Then we’ll set up an appointment. I know Drew’s in school, but what’s your schedule like? Late afternoons or early evenings good for you?”

She turned and headed back in the direction they’d just come. “My work schedule’s flexible.”

“What do you do? If I know what my client does, I can often find a more relevant way to explain what I’m trying to accomplish.”

“I’m an installation artist.” She said it as if she didn’t expect him to understand what that was.

“Installations. Temporary works? Like those prayer cairns that appeared for a few weeks last summer on Baker Beach?”

She stopped dead in her tracks, her eyes wide. The fog had formed minute droplets in her hair and on her eyelashes, making him think of a land of fairies and sprites and impish spells. She took his breath away.

“D-did you have anything to do with them?” he asked, trying to regain his composure. “The cairns, I mean.”

“Yes.” For the first time she looked at him with real interest. “You knew what they were?”

“Sure. I’ve lived in Asia.” Though he’d been surprised to see the dozen or so piles of rocks at intervals along the San Francisco coast. They’d appeared as if by magic. Sticks anchored in the rocks bore pennants—scraps of cloth really—on which were written prayers, poems, quotations. There was nothing to explain them, but many people who saw them added to them. “I even tied on a few thoughts of my own. I liked the idea of good vibrations being swept across the entire country on the wind.”

Her expression was nothing short of dumbfounded.

“Although I work with animals,” he said, “I don’t live in a cave.”

For a fleeting moment, she seemed embarrassed. Or guilty. “Most people’s first thought when they hear installation art is dying a river green on St. Patrick’s day.”

“What do you tell people like that?”

“I tell them, no, it’s more like getting the sea lions to lounge in the sun on Pier 39,” she said, her tone biting.

“I would think that’s performance art,” he replied, unable to resist the urge to needle her a little.

“You know the difference?”

“It’s not a hard distinction to make. But I do have an aunt who’s an art historian. You need to cut most people more slack, though. It’s not as if your occupation’s an easy one to grasp at first.”

She stared hard at him as if she didn’t quite know how to take him.

“Do you have anything around the city now?” he asked.

“Actually, I do. The owner of Tryst, the new restaurant in SOMA, asked me for a sidewalk installation. He wanted someone dining inside a Plexiglas cubicle, twenty-four/seven. I told him with a name like Tryst, his restaurant deserved something more subtle. More mysterious.”

“So what did you come up with?”

“A visual novella, so to speak. I used the cubicle and put a table and two chairs inside.” As she spoke, an unabashed enthusiasm lit her features, clearing away all wariness. “The next day a glass of wine and a woman’s handbag appeared at one place. The day after that, a second glass of wine and a man’s umbrella hooked over the other chair. Yesterday some grainy photos appeared thrown on the table. Looked like a private eye might have taken them with a telephoto lens. A man and woman caught in the act. Tomorrow the butt of a revolver will appear from the woman’s handbag. The man’s chair will be tipped over. Tuesday police tape will appear around the cubicle. And by Wednesday, the whole thing will have disappeared.”

He laughed aloud.

“I am having fun with that one although I have to make the changes in the dead of night.”

“Alone?” He suddenly felt protective.

“No. There’s no shortage of art students in the area who help me on a project by project basis.” She suddenly grew distant, as if she’d shared too much. “So…now you know something about what I do, how do you propose to translate what you do into my language?” Challenge underlined her every word.

“I don’t know. Yet.” He took a chance with a smile. “You might be my toughest case.”

“Tougher than the spitz?”

“Yeah. I can’t muzzle you.”

Her mouth dropped open, then she walloped him on the arm as his brother had many times when they were kids fooling around. Amazingly, the tension between them eased.

“So you’ll watch the DVD with Drew?” he asked.

“We’ll see.” She started back toward her apartment.

What did it take to get her to promise—or even agree—to anything?

When he caught up to her, she seemed to make an effort to stay a half step ahead. Heaven forbid he should lead in any way. Headstrong woman. But there was a slight upturn to her mouth, a relaxation in her shoulders. He sensed she didn’t dislike him quite as much as she had before.

Progress.

As he followed her back to her apartment and his truck, he thought that, in the brief discussion of her work, he might have discovered a chink in that fortress wall she’d built around herself. The glimpse of the interior didn’t reveal dark neuroses or unclaimed baggage, but a clear, strong light that highlighted this woman’s need for self-expression and the pride she took in the results. He liked what he saw. A lot.

AFTER A DISCONCERTING Monday morning meeting with Drew’s teachers—apparently the mention of bullying got you a school interview as quickly as the mention of chest pains put you at the head of the line in the emergency room—Selena needed a dose of Margo’s Bistro. And lunch. She was starving. As was everyone else in SOMA it seemed. There wasn’t an empty table in the café. It was so busy Margo and Robert were trapped behind the counter, and their two servers were set on fast-forward.

Resigning herself to take-out, Selena suddenly heard her name called. “Over here!” Derrick waved from a corner table where he sat with Bailey. “Join us!”

“Oh, yes!” The comfort of friends.

Derrick was a contract lawyer and former single dad. He was the only male regular in their inner circle, but he’d been man enough to admit he didn’t have a clue about how to raise his two daughters. Until Bailey.

Having made her way through the crowded room, Selena plopped into the chair Derrick pulled out. “Why don’t we ever see you anymore?” he asked. Directness had always been one of Derrick’s many admirable traits.

“You’re seeing me right now. That’s one of the reasons I love Margo’s Bistro. It provides a public service in reuniting lost friends.”

“You know what I mean.” He and she had been friends before he hooked up with Bailey. “You haven’t come around our place since the wedding.”

“Geez, I thought I’d give you guys some privacy.” That wasn’t it, however. Things had changed. Derrick’s priorities—his focus—had changed, and rightfully so. Bailey and the girls were his world. Selena felt uncomfortable intruding. “So, how come you’re both here in the middle of a Monday?” she asked.

“Oh, I had errands in the city,” Bailey replied, a twinkle in her eyes, “and I thought I’d meet my hubby for…lunch.”

Selena didn’t know why they were at Margo’s. By the glow on both their faces, they looked as if they’d already had “lunch” at the Marriott.

A server appeared, a new one Selena didn’t recognize. The café was such a revolving door of part-time and temporary college help Margo should apply for intern program status. “The special of the day—”

“I’ll take it,” Selena cut in. “I’m ravenous and whatever Margo makes is terrific. How about you two?”

“We already ordered,” Derrick said as the server disappeared. “So why are you here?”

“I don’t want to take up your time with my kid problems.”

“Excuse me?” Bailey feigned disbelief. “When we’re at Margo’s the official language is Kid. Spill it.”

It was as if someone had popped the top of a shaken soft drink. Selena caught them up on Axel and Sam and Quinn and Drew and the appointment this morning.

“Middle school is cruel,” Derrick said. He should know. His oldest was at that between stage, too. “Is Drew being bullied? What did his teachers say?”

“They said the school has a zero-tolerance policy and a student-teacher-parent conflict resolution committee to handle problems. Drew’s never brought an issue before the committee, but his teachers say he isn’t very assertive. They say he hovers at the fringes of all the groups. He doesn’t seem to have found his niche yet. Lord knows the arts department saved me in school.”

“Football, here,” Derrick said.

“Academics for me,” Bailey added. “But that was high school. Drew’s not there yet.”

“No, and it’s tough being a seventh grader who looks like a sixth grader. Even his teachers noted he’s small for his age and quiet. That in itself has made him, on occasion, a target of teasing, some jostling. Some adolescent ostracism in the cafeteria. Not overt bullying, but unpleasant and potentially damaging nonetheless….” Her eyes welled up, stopping the flood of words.

Bailey reached across the table to lay her hand atop Selena’s.

“His teachers told me…” This wasn’t easy. This was her baby. “To…to try to get Drew to open up. I’ve tried. But he’s shutting me out. They suggested I get him into a group extracurricular activity to build his self-esteem and encourage social skills. How could I have raised a child with low self-esteem?”

“It’s the age,” Derrick said comfortingly. He grinned. “Plus San Francisco. I just read a great quote. Something about the city dwellers having an existential angst that comes from straddling a fault line.”

Selena laughed despite her pain. “You’re good friends,” she said, dabbing at her eyes with a napkin.

“Hey, we’ve been there,” Bailey said. “And with kids, you know we’ll be there again. And again and again and again. You’ll be there for us.”

Derrick turned serious. “Maybe working with this Quinn guy would be helpful. Male role model and all.”

“Oh, please.” Selena was just starting to feel better. She didn’t need to find out the light at the end of the tunnel was a locomotive. “He’s opinionated and unbending. In a word, insufferable. Not qualities conducive to letting Drew shine.”

“But if he knows what he’s doing with dogs, if he really can get Drew to control Axel, think how good Drew will feel. About himself.”

Selena looked squarely at Derrick. “What do you know about dogs?”

Derrick threw his hands in the air. “In a word? Zip. Call this guy.”

Realization dawned on Bailey’s face. “I think Drew’s not the only one with issues here. What really gives, Selena? Is this man, perhaps, attractive?”

“Only if you’re a dog. And don’t say it.”

“Come on. What does he look like?”

“I didn’t notice. His alpha-male personality obscured any other impression he could have made. I think he has a head—very large, I can tell you—two arms, two legs. More than that, who knows?”

“I don’t believe you.” Bailey nudged Derrick under the table. “I suspect you find him attractive, but I also think, if he’s as strong-willed as you say he is, you know you couldn’t wrap him around your little finger the way you do all the guys you choose to date. And that’s what bothers you.”

“I liked it better when we were focused on Drew.”

Their lunches arrived just in time to interrupt this nasty detour. “So, how are the girls?” Selena asked in an attempt to refocus the conversation.

“Great!” Derrick said, tucking into his lunch.

“We’ve discovered the trick to keeping a twelve-year-old girl out of trouble,” Bailey added. “Keep her so busy she barely has time to breathe. Leslie’s trying out for the premier softball league, and we’re encouraging it even though it has a more rigorous schedule than the regular league. Anything to burn off preteen angst. And Savannah’s suddenly crazy for junior ballroom dancing, can you believe it?”

“How do you juggle work, school—” Bailey had just recently enrolled in a local business college “—and the girls’ activities?” Selena asked.

Derrick grinned. “We tag-team.”

There it was again. That pairs thing.

“Hey, speaking of teams,” Derrick added, “did you hear Robert wants to get a Margo’s Bistro softball team going this season? There’s a sign-up sheet at the counter.”

Maybe she’d join. Sometimes the solution to life’s little aggravations was to whack something.

Driving the short distance home, Selena admitted to herself her friends had come close to being right on two counts. Drew probably would benefit from a mastery of Axel, who outweighed him. And, although she didn’t want to waste time and energy exploring this troubling fact beyond acknowledging its existence, a very, very, very—did she mention very?—tiny part of her did find Jack Quinn attractive. But the truth didn’t make it any easier to take the next step. To entrust her dog, let alone her son, to Quinn’s regimented course of action.

She’d told Sam and the Animal Control officer they’d consulted a dog behaviorist, and that had assuaged the greengrocer’s rage. But she didn’t tell him Quinn hadn’t actually worked with Axel. If Axel’s behavior didn’t improve, Sam and the rest of her neighbors weren’t going to stay mollified.

But, oh, how Quinn had looked at her yesterday. As they’d walked in the intimacy of the fog, he looked as if, at any moment, he could have eaten her up. And she’d felt strong enough to resist until he’d told her he’d seen one of her installations. And he’d gotten it. He knew what it was. He even knew how he was supposed to interact with it without being told. A man that perceptive could prove dangerous.

Dangerous even without the addition of a hard body, a luxurious head of dark wavy hair and chiseled features. Not that she’d noticed what he looked like.

She was prevented from dwelling on the unnerving Mr. Quinn by the necessity of searching out a parking space. Even though her Honda Element was compact enough for even the most challenging San Francisco parking situation, she had to drive around before finally finding a spot two blocks from her loft. It might be time—she’d have to massage the budget—to look for a garage to rent. As she passed Nikki’s tattoo parlor, she heard her name. Again. This time the tone was different. Trouble loomed, for sure.

Nikki came running out of her shop. “Babe, you know I love you, but we have a problem.”

Now what? Drew was in school. Axel was in the apartment.

The body artist moved to the curb where her vintage Cadillac was parked in a space nobody else in the neighborhood ever—ever—used if they knew what was good for them. Lovingly, Nikki ran a hand adorned with Celtic runes over the Caddy’s right fender. Selena thought she saw scratch marks. Her heart sank.

“Maxine came by your place,” Nikki said. “Axel escaped.”

“Oh, no!”

“Don’t worry, we caught him,” Nikki replied, still caressing the car’s custom baby blue finish. “But not before he did this.”

Selena tried to think if her car insurance had any clause that would remotely cover Axel damage.

“I talked to Sanchez up the street,” Nikki continued. “He thinks he can buff it out. And he owes me. But if it needs a paint job—”

“I’ll pay.” There went any prospect of a garage in the near future. “You know I’m good for it.”

“I know you are, babe.” Nikki was toughness itself, but her words weren’t unkind. “But you gotta see to that mutt. Before something happens to someone who doesn’t love you.”

“I will,” Selena promised for the second time in only four days.

She knew how critical the situation was, but did Drew? Enough to put Axel in Quinn’s hands? Perhaps the very guy who pushed both their buttons was the one who’d already provided a nonthreatening opening. The DVD he’d brought over yesterday. On dog behavior. The one she’d put on the top of the bookcase and promptly forgotten. Maybe it was time to break out the popcorn for an after-school special. She loved Axel’s exuberance. She just couldn’t afford it anymore.