His dark eyes were unreadable. “Riley said you needed help. There’s no way I would go to the mall today, so I came here instead.”
Bonny crossed her arms and glanced at me. “He’s been here all day. Only took one break, as far as I could tell. We got everything done on my list, and then some.”
Bonny was as tough as old leather, and it took a lot to impress her. I could see the begrudging respect in her eyes and in her tone. It shocked me.
Logan handed the scooper and bucket to Bonny and wiped his hands. “I’m heading home. Can you sign my sheet?” He pulled out the folded timesheet and handed it to me with a pen.
I laughed and said, “I’ll gladly sign it.” I smoothed it out against the fence post. He had already marked today’s date and filled in “eight hours.” I crossed off eight and wrote sixteen instead.
“You earned it.” I handed it back to him. “You’re welcome to stay for dinner. I’ve got enough leftover Thanksgiving food to fill the Grand Canyon.”
“Stick around and eat,” Riley insisted. “I want to hear about all this work you supposedly did.”
Logan removed his ballcap, ruffled his messy black hair, and pulled it back over his eyes. “Already raided the fridge an hour ago. Turkey was delicious. Same for the green beans. I’ll be at the mall on Sunday.”
He gave me a mock salute punctuated with a sexy smirk, then hopped in his truck and drove away. The red glow of his tail lights faded down my driveway.
While Riley and Harper collected the donation jars from my truck, I invited Bonny to stay for food. Instead of answering, she just smiled at me.
“What?” I asked.
“I’ll leave the three of you to have fun together,” she said.
I laughed it off. “I’m just trying to get rid of all my leftovers.”
She gave me a pointed look. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
I grabbed the remaining donation jar from my truck and led the boys through the front door. “Please excuse the mess. If you couldn’t tell, a bunch of dogs live here.”
“This isn’t bad,” Harper said.
Riley nodded. “Seriously, you should see the ranger huts we live in. This place is spotless by comparison.”
The five small dogs were barking in their enclosures in the room adjacent to the garage, so I went in there and let them out. They ran past me into the living room. A chorus of barks drifted through the house.
“The smaller the breed, the bigger the bark,” I said. “Most of them are harmless, but Taco, that brown Chihuahua, might snap at you.”
Slinky stayed between my ankles for a moment, then cautiously approached the men. Harper got down on his knees and gently extended his hand for the dog to sniff. Within seconds, Slinky was rubbing his head against Harper’s hand and weaving between his legs like a snake. He even gave a playful little jump with his front legs.
“I’ve never seen Slinky with so much energy!” I said. “He likes you.”
Harper laid down on his back so Slinky could climb up on his chest. “I’m a dog person. Riley is a cat person.”
“Woah, that is not true,” Riley replied.
“You had cats growing up. You never had dogs.”
“Because my sister was allergic. We couldn’t have dogs. I’d totally adopt one now, but it doesn’t really work with my job.”
Harper sighed. “Yeah, that’s the one drawback to what we do.”
Riley looked out the window into the back field. “This place is really cool. Lots of room. It used to be a farm?”
I picked up one of the Chihuahuas to stop her from barking. “It was my grandfather’s farm. I inherited it from him when he died. The rest of my family wanted to sell it, but he specifically left it to me in the will.”
“It’s great you turned it into something worthwhile,” Harper said. He was still rolling around on the ground with Slinky.
I went to the kitchen and began pulling out plates of food from the fridge. Logan had made a sizable dent in the turkey platter, but there was still plenty remaining for the rest of us. I put the dish in the microwave and threw a tin of dinner rolls in the oven to reheat. Then I pulled two bottles of wine down from the wine rack above the fridge.
“What should I open—red or white?”
Harper got up and smoothed out his red hair. “I’ll take either.”