Ain't She Sweet (Seven Brides for Seven Mothers #2) - Whitney Dineen Page 0,13

to get a new-to-me baler.

My big plans for my off season now entail updating my master bathroom. I’ve never been a fan of the Pepto-Bismol pink tile, which I’m pretty sure is original to my hundred-year-old farmhouse.

While I can’t afford to do much, I am going to get rid of that disgusting color, even if the only thing I can afford to replace it with is white paint and vinyl flooring.

I’ve decided to DIY the project in an effort to save money. With YouTube in my back pocket, how hard can it be? After parking my truck, I’m momentarily distracted by a medium-sized box sitting in a nearby shopping cart. It’s barking.

I walk over to it, wondering why the heck there’s a dog in a box in the hardware store parking lot. There are no cars nearby; it’s literally sitting out in the middle of nowhere. I gingerly open the top, not knowing what manner of beast is inside. I don’t particularly want to spend the day getting a rabies shot.

The sweetest pair of chocolate-brown eyes greets me, and the barking immediately turns into soft cries. Someone left a puppy out here! I wonder if the box fell off the back of a truck. Although, it probably wouldn’t have landed so neatly in a shopping cart.

I pick up the young dog who doesn’t look any older than a month or so. I’m assuming she’s a girl because she’s wearing a pink collar. She looks like a furry chicken nugget, with curly reddish hair. I pick her up, intent on taking her into the store so they can keep her safe until they decide what to do with her.

Once inside, I go straight to the customer service counter.

“Hey, James, what’s up?” Manny Franco and I went to school together from the time we were in third grade when his family moved here from Colorado.

“Hey, Manny, I found a puppy in the parking lot.” I hand the little bundle in my arms over to him without mentioning that she’d been abandoned. Maybe he’ll fall in love with her and take her home.

Of course, that doesn’t seem likely when he takes a giant step backward and demands, “What do you want me to do with it?”

“I thought you could keep her until her owners come back for her.”

He nudges his chin forward in the direction of the dog. “She got any tags on that collar?”

I run my fingers under the pink nylon. “Doesn’t look like it.”

“Then as far as I’m concerned, she doesn’t have any owners. She’s a stray.”

“She’s got a collar on,” I argue.

Manny holds his hands up in front of him like this is a stick up. “Take her to the pound. I’m not keeping a dog here.”

“I came to get stuff for a bathroom remodel. I don’t have time to go to the pound before my afternoon meeting.” Plus, it would break my heart to be the one to leave her there.

“Then put her back in the parking lot,” he says heartlessly. “Seriously, dude, I’m not in the dog business.”

I’m so annoyed, I don’t even say goodbye; I just turn around and put the furry bundle I’ve been carrying into a shopping cart and head toward bathroom fixtures. The puppy cries the whole way.

By the time I get to flooring, an employee is running after me calling, “Sir! Sir! You need to wipe up after your dog.”

I turn around and watch as he drops sheets of paper toweling on top of several little puddles in the aisle behind me. I look at the puppy who immediately, if not manipulatively, cocks her head to the side as if to say, “Who, me?”

You have got to be kidding me? I don’t own a dog because I don’t have time to care for a dog, yet here I am, wiping up pee right next to the ceramic tile I hope to be installing in my bathroom in the next couple of weeks.

When I’m done, I search out a trash can to throw away the wet rags. I want to go back to the tile, but the puppy is crying so loudly people are starting to stare.

Bathroom shopping is not going to happen today, so I pick up the dog, abandoning the cart, and carry her out to my truck. Obviously, I’m not going to put her back into the box I found her in. I guess that means I’m taking her to the pound. A zing of sadness shoots through me at the