Hennessey's Handler (Protect and Serve #4) - Pandora Pine Page 0,6

tonight?”

Mike’s Pub was a sports bar across town. It had been our place since the Sox won the 2004 World Series. “Sox versus Yanks tonight. I wouldn’t miss it. You buy the first round.”

“Don’t I always?” Nate’s good-natured grin was back.

“Not when you’ve got your head tangled up with Pedro. Or was it Marco?” I rolled my eyes. Nate was always picking up guys at the bar. Hot exotic guys, to be precise.

“His name was Enzo. Made one hell of a lasagna but was a dud otherwise.” He shrugged casually as if to say there were other fish in the sea.

“That’s what you get for picking guys up at a bar. He was drunk when you met him. Did you ever see him sober?” It wasn’t like me to be so judgmental, but I lived my sex life vicariously through Nate and these one-and-dones weren’t cutting it for me. I knew they weren’t cutting it for him either.

Nate grimaced. That meant no.

I wasn’t a teetotaler by any means, but I hated messy drunks. If the only way a guy can hit on me was because he’d had a few drinks, then I’d rather he walked on by. “I’ll see you at seven. Minus Enzo.”

“He’s long gone…” Nate began.

“And hard to find!” I chimed in with the second half of our favorite homerun call. “Ahab, come!” I knelt in front of the dog, who wore a jolly grin. “We made it by the skin of our teeth. You know that, right?”

Ahab licked the side of my face.

“Yeah, you know it all right.” I hooked up his leash and led him to the SUV. After the dog was loaded into the cargo hold, I spent a few minutes packing away his things. It was hard to believe sometimes that this was my life.

I was raised in my father’s house after he divorced my mother. She moved to Arizona after the marriage ended, and I’ve only seen her a handful of times since my fourteenth birthday. Those handful of times were funerals. She only flew in for the time it took to put in appearances at the wake, funeral, and mercy meal, and then Bette Rowe was on the red-eye from Logan to Phoenix.

I’d had dreams of going to college and becoming a doctor or a social worker, but my father was having none of that. I was his unwilling partner in his breeding business. He handled the high-end part of the business, like finding bitches and studs to breed with his prize-winning shepherds, entering various dog shows, and selling the valuable pups while I was on shit-patrol. I fed the dogs and did their laundry too. Yes, dogs have laundry.

It wasn’t until that infamous dog show where Conan and I met Nate that my life started to turn around. I’d invited Nate for a sit-down meeting with my father, who, ever the businessman, saw a money-making opportunity. Not all of the pups were suitable show dogs. Usually, he sold the rest at competitive prices in the pet trade. Potential search and rescue dogs fetched a higher asking price, no pun intended.

A contract was drawn up and I was off shit-patrol. I took classes to learn how to train dogs for search and rescue and how to be their handler. Once Conan was trained and ready to rock and roll, we auditioned for Nate and K9FIND. I’d been a member of his team for the last fifteen years. I would always be grateful to Nate for seeing something in me that I’d never seen in myself: potential.

Over the course of my career, my dogs and I have rescued over a hundred children, nearly fifty people suffering from dementia and Alzheimer’s, and umpteen lost hikers. We were always on call. Most calls for our services came in at suppertime or on holidays. No matter the day, time, or weather conditions, I was always there to answer the phone when it rings.

A large cardboard box was sitting up against my back door. I parked the SUV in my driveway and let Ahab out. He raced to the box, sniffing and barking happily. He knew exactly what was in the package. Treats and training equipment. We got shipments like this once a month from our favorite pet delivery service.

I scooped up the box and let myself into the house. My father had wanted me to stay with him and the dogs at his house, but three years ago, after I turned twenty-five, I came to the