Baby, Hold On - By Stephanie Bond Page 0,21

test: Would the dog take it and run back to his bed, or would he go into tracking mode.

“Sheridan, this is Lacey,” he repeated, then gave the toy a shake.

Sheridan barked, then shoved his nose into the toy for a couple of big sniffs, and barked again.

Mike was almost weak with relief. “Sheridan, find Lacey. Find Lacey.”

Sheridan barked again, on full alert as he dropped his nose to the ground and began to sniff. This would be tough, Mike knew, because Lacey’s scent was all over the cabin. But the old Sheridan would keep sniffing until he found the freshest scent.

He watched his dog, his heart pounding against his breastbone. Sheridan circled and backtracked until he stopped at the front door and barked to be let out.

“Good boy,” Mike said. He texted Lacey the signal, then opened the door and bounded after Sheridan.

Outside it took the dog a few seconds to pick up her scent again, but he found it and was soon trotting down the asphalt. Mike called out encouragement as he followed behind. Several hundred yards later, Sheridan veered off the road into the brush and Mike realized Lacey had walked toward Timber Creek. When they emerged from the brush onto the bank of the creek, Sheridan walked up to the water, then balked.

Mike scanned the opposite bank, and caught a sliver of pink through a brush pile. “Sheridan, find Lacey,” he encouraged.

The dog loped back to him and whimpered.

“Sheridan, find Lacey,” he commanded.

Sheridan barked, then turned and went back to the creek bank. He hesitated, then jumped into the shallow water and half walked, half swam to the other side. Mike waded in and followed, his pulse beating furiously to see his dog returning to his heroic self.

Once Sheridan emerged on the other side, he paused only long enough to shake himself off, then found the scent again in seconds. When he found Lacey behind the brush pile, he barked excitedly. Lacey did her part, exclaiming happily and throwing her arms around him, praising him.

Mike waited, then walked up, his chest welling with pride. “Good boy,” he said, then offered Sheridan a special treat. Sheridan took it and chomped away, his tail still wagging.

Lacey rushed up and threw her arms around Mike’s neck. “We did it!”

His initial surprise quickly morphed into something else as her touch brought his hormones raging to the surface. He lowered his head to claim the kiss he’d been wanting all week, keeping it PG-rated as his mouth scraped across those soft, plump lips, although his body was pushing for R. When he released her, her eyes were wide, and he felt like a heel for crossing the line.

“Yes, we did it,” he said, pretending the kiss had been celebratory. “This is the best he’s been since Missouri.”

Lacey angled her head. “I sense a ‘but’ coming.”

“But,” he added, “these are perfect conditions, and Sheridan was working alone. A real-life crisis is much more demanding and distracting. Even the training facility will be more rugged than this little test.”

“But it’s progress.”

“Yes,” he agreed. “It’s progress.” Especially because Sheridan seemed to have forgotten about the toy. Mike wanted to throw the pink annoyance as far as he could, but he didn’t want to litter. Besides, Sheridan might perceive it as a game of fetch and then they’d be right back where they started. So instead he kept it out of sight under his T-shirt.

The trek through the creek had stirred up the thick Georgia red clay along the bottom. When the three emerged on the other side to return to the cabin at a more leisurely pace, they all had mud and debris hanging from them. Sheridan shook himself repeatedly, but the mud had hardened his coat by the time they’d reached the yard.

“Labs don’t need baths very often,” Lacey said, “but I think this is one of those occasions. We’ll see how he handles being immersed in water.”

“I wouldn’t mind hosing off, myself,” Mike agreed. And considering the wayward direction of his thoughts since that kiss, the colder, the better. He’d hoped his curiosity would be sated, that there would be no spark between them.

He was wrong.

When they reached the cabin, there were only a couple of hours of daylight left. He found a tub in the utility room and set it in the yard next to his SUV. Lacey added pet shampoo from a grooming bag she’d brought with her, then he filled it with water from the hose. Sheridan eyed the suds