Puppy Love

by

Victoria Pade

---

Chapter One
 

"It's 7:30, Charlie," Zelda McAffry said to her Jack Russell terrier as she hurried to the kitchen.
Charlie followed on her heels, taking his position at the sliding glass door. Zelda landed at the sink, and trained her eyes through the window above it onto the back door of the house directly behind hers.
Like clockwork, the man who lived there came outside as he had every morning of the two weeks Zelda had lived there so far.
He was tall, he had short dark hair, Adonis good looks, and the best buns she'd ever seen. Pure eye candy dressed in running shorts that exposed thick thigh muscles and a T-shirt that clung to impressive pectorals and bulging biceps.
Charlie started barking his head off just as he did every day. Zelda ignored him, feasting on the sight of magnificent male pulchritude as her neighbor did his pre-run warm-ups on his back porch.
"Wow," she muttered on a sigh when the man finished and went through the gate to the side of his redbrick house.
"Okay, now you can go out," Zelda told Charlie, moving to the sliding door to open it so the terrier could charge into the glorious June day.
Charlie wasn't out there more than a minute, though, when he spotted a squirrel on the other side of the four-foot chain-link fence that separated their two yards. He took off to bounce on his hind legs in addition to his frenzied barking.
Zelda opened the sliding door again and yelled, "Charlie! Stop!"
But Charlie didn't stop. Instead, he jumped high enough to actually catch his front paws on the top rail of the fence and pull himself over it.
"Oh, no!" Zelda ran out after the dog, shouting Charlie's name as she did.
Charlie didn't pay any attention to her. Instead, once the terrier realized he was in new territory he lost interest in the squirrel and made a beeline for the house, where he disappeared through the doggy door as if it were meant for him.
"Charlie! Come!" Zelda called firmly.
But Charlie didn't reappear.
Zelda didn't know what else to do but follow the same path through the doggy door. She got down on her hands and knees and poked her head through the flap.
And there was Charlie all right, watching for her as if he'd been expecting her to do just that.
"Come out here," Zelda said in no uncertain terms.
Charlie backed up a few feet and sat down.
"I mean it! Get over here!" Zelda said, pushing forward and forcing her arms through so she could try to grab her dog and make a getaway before her neighbor ever knew she'd been there.
But Charlie just moved farther away, cocking his head to one side as he did.
And that was when Zelda made a tactical error.
She lunged for the dog.
And got stuck but good.
"Oh, great," she wailed.
Just then she heard a deep, rich voice from outside say, "What the hell is going on?"

Chapter Two

Karmic retribution. That's what it had to be, Zelda thought. Every morning since she'd moved to Denver from Kansas City she'd made it a point to watch her backyard neighbor as he did his prejog warm-ups on his back porch. She'd been admiring the perfect specimen of a man on the whole, but she'd been particularly enjoying the sight of his rear end.
And now there she was, stuck in his doggy door, presenting her posterior while her upper half was inside his house as she tried to reach her recalcitrant pooch, Charlie, who had availed himself of the minientrance.
"I know this looks bad," Zelda called in answer to her neighbor's "What the hell is going on" when he'd prematurely returned from his run to find her like that. "But I'm your neighbor from behind and my dog jumped the fence and ran in here. I was trying to get him out but I got stuck."
"Or maybe you're just an inept burglar and I'm lucky to have you incapacitated while I call the cops," the man suggested in a tone that might have been angry or might not have been. Zelda couldn't tell.
"Do I look like a burglar?" she countered before she recalled what part of her he could see. "Scratch that," she added, realizing only after the words were out how they sounded. "I mean, never mind what I look like. My name is Zelda McAffry and I assure you I live in that house right behind you. I just moved in. And I could use some help getting out of here."
"Mm-hmm," he said noncommittally.
"Really, I'm not a burglar," she assured. "I'm perfectly harmless. I'm just stuck. And getting very uncomfortable."
Her neighbor didn't say anything to that and she didn't know if he was contemplating whether to call the police or how to help her. She just knew that he was out there, ogling her derriere.
"Please?" she said as if that were the magic word he was waiting for.
"I honestly don't know what to do except to try to give you a shove," he finally said, apparently giving up the whole burglary theory.
"Go ahead and shove," Zelda said.
"That means my hands on your —"
"Just do it!" she ordered.
So he did. He put his big, warm hands on her sweatpants-clad butt and pushed.
And two things happened. She didn't budge and she liked the feel of his touch. More than she should have.
"Don't be so gentle," she advised, trying to ignore her response to him.
"I could hurt you."
Not any worse than her pride was. "It's okay. Just put all your strength into it and push."
"You're sure?"
"Positive."
So that was what he did. He put the force of all those muscles she'd been admiring into shooting her into the dining room, where she landed with an extremely unladylike thud.
And then she heard him put a key in the lock to open the door, and she knew she was about to have to face him — the jaw-droppingly handsome neighbor in front of whom she'd just humiliated herself.

Chapter Three

Zelda was not thrilled to meet her hunky neighbor for the first time by being stuck in his doggy door and having to get unstuck by him pushing her rear end through it. But she hadn't had a choice.
She and her Jack Russell terrier, Charlie, were inside the neighbor's house, and within moments of getting to her feet from his dining room floor and grabbing Charlie to keep him from attacking, there he was.
He looked even better up close than he had from the distance of her kitchen window, where she'd watched him prepare for his jog every morning. But good looks didn't matter to Charlie. The moment he saw him, the dog went into a frenzy of barking.
"Shh, Charlie! Be quiet," Zelda commanded as she smiled nervously, held out her free hand and introduced herself properly.
Her neighbor accepted her hand, warily keeping an eye on Charlie as he did. "Max Greer."
Zelda had some difficulty ignoring the lightning bolts that the touch of his hand sent sizzling up her arm.
"I'm sooo sorry about this," she said. "Charlie was chasing a squirrel and he jumped the fence and then forgot the squirrel and ran in here. I didn't know what else to do but try to get him out. I love him, but he's not very friendly with strangers."
"No, he doesn't seem too friendly," Max Greer agreed.
"He used to be. It isn't his fault that he's skittish now. But I couldn't leave him for you to find when you got back from your run. He might have bitten you."
Max's expression turned curious. "How did you know I was out for a run?"
"I saw you leave when I let Charlie out." Zelda had prepared that excuse in advance in case she was caught spying on him one of these mornings. Then she added, "It was a pretty short run."
"I forgot my cell phone and came back for it."
"Ah."
Zelda had been planning to approach this man the next day, at any rate, and now that she was there she thought maybe she should broach the subject she'd wanted to talk to him about rather than waiting.
"I've never seen your dog outside," she said as a segue.
"I don't have a dog. The door was put in for the pets of someone else who lived here for a while."
Zelda was dying to know if the someone else had been male or female, but she couldn't ask. Instead she said, "But you have been around dogs in the past?"
"Unfortunately."
Uh-oh. Not a good sign. "You don't like them?"
"I used to like them. Then I had my fill."
That didn't improve things much. But Zelda was in such a bind. "Could you get unfilled for a really short time?"
Something about the way she said that made him smile. If she'd thought he looked good before, it was nothing compared to the way a grin lit up that face.
"Could I get unfilled?" he repeated.
"It's just that I saw the doggy door and figured you must like animals and I had a favor to ask."

Chapter Four

Zelda had only just met her drop-dead gorgeous neighbor Max Greer and already she knew he was a bit of a tease. A charming tease whom she was about to ask for a favor.
"You see, I've only been in Denver for two weeks. I moved here from Kansas. And I work from home so I haven't met anyone yet. But I have to go back to Kansas to close on the house I sold before I left and I couldn't get flights there and back in the same day. That means I have to be gone overnight and Charlie can't be left in a kennel with strangers, so I was hoping —"
"You want me to watch your dog?" Max finished for her, not sounding at all enthusiastic.
"Yes," Zelda confirmed.
"How am I not a stranger? Just because he barks at me every day?"
So he'd noticed.
"No, you're a stranger, too. I was just hoping that I could persuade you to get to know him this weekend before I leave on Monday so you wouldn't be a stranger anymore."
Max's sterling silver eyes went from Zelda to Charlie and back to Zelda. "Let me get this straight. You want me to spend my weekend getting to know your dog so I can take care of him while you're out of town."
"Right. And I'll make it worth your while."
His great smile returned with a hint of devilishness around the edges. "And how would you do that?"
Some very wicked images of her own came to mind, but Zelda resisted them. After all, she already knew Max Greer wasn't a dog person, and while she might be in the position of having to trust him with Charlie for a short time, she knew better than to expect anything more involved than that.
"Money?" she blurted out in answer to his question. "I'll pay you for your time this weekend and for watching Charlie."
"And if I don't need your money?"
He was just giving her a hard time and she knew it. "How about I buy you the best dinner in town, complete with wine and dessert?" she offered.
"And will I have your company over dinner?"
"Sure, if you want it," she said breezily, as if the idea didn't make her heart skip a beat.
Max studied her face as he seemed to think about it.
Then, more to himself than to her, he said, "It just might be worth it."
"So we have a deal?"
"Let's just say I'll give you some time this weekend to see if Charlie will stop baring his teeth at me. And if he will, then okay, I'll dog-sit for you. But the dinner is going to cost you big."
"I'll start saving up."
"I have office hours tomorrow morning but I can give you tomorrow afternoon."
"That would be great," Zelda agreed, curious about what he did to have office hours on Saturday morning. But rather than be nosy, she said, "And again, I'm really sorry about this whole getting stuck in your doggy door thing."
He just nodded his head.
But still Zelda went away wondering if her impression was right — that he just might not have minded all that much.

Chapter Five

"Dog-sitting? You? The guy who said if he never saw another dog, cat, ferret, rabbit, turtle, or pot-bellied pig as long as he lived it would be to soon?"
Max was having lunch that afternoon with his business partner and best friend. He'd told Chad about his morning's activities with Zelda McAffry and Charlie. And what he'd agreed to do.
"Yeah, I'm the guy who said all that," he confirmed. "Which is why, since she moved in and I saw she had a dog, I've kept my distance."
"But then she gets herself stuck in your doggy door and you changed your mind?"
"I met her and liked her."
"Description," Chad demanded.
Just thinking about the way Zelda looked made Max smile. "She's not too tall — maybe only three or four inches over five feet. She's thin but not too thin — just right. She has long, straight blond hair to the middle of her back. Big, electric blue eyes. Peaches-and-cream skin. A perfect turned-up nose. Great teeth —"
"Always a factor."
"And she made me laugh." Max paused, sobering some before he said, "But I'm still not wild about the whole dog thing. Plus the dog isn't wild about me, either."
"Oh, wonderful," Chad said facetiously. "I can already see this isn't a match made in heaven. Maybe you can get bit a couple more times."
"Zelda is hoping I can get to know the dog and vice-versa before she leaves him with me."
"Which means what?"
"That I'm seeing them both this weekend."
"Bingo! I knew you had something up your sleeve. What you mean is, you're seeing this Zelda this weekend."
Max just grinned his confirmation of that. "But I'm still torn. You know after Prue and her pet menagerie, I swore off anybody with animals of any kind. And not only did I mean it, this particular dog has been driving me nuts since they moved in. It barks at me and growls and acts like it wants to tear me to shreds every time it sees me in the yard. I've even had an estimate on a six-foot wooden fence to block it out."
"But still you agreed to take care of it just so you can get up close and personal with its owner."
"Couldn't help it. She seems pretty special," he said, thinking about how adorably flustered Zelda had been when she was stuck in his doggy door. About the lilting sound of her voice. About how much he'd wanted to go on talking to her this morning. About how he hadn't been able to think about anything but her ever since.
"Still," Chad warned, "don't forget how it was with Prue — love me, love my pets. And you didn't love her pets."
"No, I didn't," Max conceded.
"And given the ultimatum to choose you or them —"
"That part you don't have to remind me of."
"I'm just saying to be careful. No matter how hot you are for this woman, she's already got one strike against her."
"Mmm," Max agreed.
The trouble was, Zelda also had the biggest, bluest eyes he'd ever seen….

Chapter Six

When the knock sounded on Zelda's back door at nine o'clock Friday night it startled both her and Charlie. Charlie launched into his protective bark and Zelda peeked through the drapes.
Max Greer was standing on her patio outside and she immediately pulled the curtains, pretending that she didn't feel pure delight at the opportunity to see him again.
"Charlie! Stop!" She commanded the terrier to quiet his barking as she opened the door.
"Hi," she greeted with a question in her voice.
"I know it's late," Max responded to the unspoken query. "I just got home and ordered a pizza for my dinner. Then it occurred to me that you might want to share it."
"Believe it or not I've been unpacking boxes and I haven't eaten yet tonight either," Zelda said. "Pizza sounds good."
"Great. It should be here in about ten minutes and I'll bring it over."
He turned and went back across the yard, doing a sexy leap over the fence that Zelda drank in the sight of before she closed her door and made a mad dash for her bedroom.
Off came her flannel pajama pants and T-shirt, and on went a tight pair of hip-hugger jeans with a brown tank top and a sheer shirt over it. Then she charged into the bathroom to yank the scrunchie out of her hair, brushing it smooth. Next she dabbed on a little blush, swept her eyelashes with fresh mascara, and applied a hint of her new mauve lipstick.
She barely made it back to the kitchen in time to answer Max's second knock on the door.
"You didn't have to change," he commented as she let him in — again over Charlie's loud complaint.
"I was kind of grimy," she said as if changing hadn't been at all about him. He looked good himself, though, in a pair of jeans and a plain beige mock turtleneck T-shirt.
"We can eat at the dining room table," Zelda suggested with a nod in that direction after she'd again chastised Charlie into silence.
Zelda brought plates, silverware, napkins, and glasses of iced tea to the table to join Max, who was keeping as wary an eye on Charlie as Charlie was keeping on him.
"No big date for a Friday night?" Zelda asked then, obviously fishing for information as they served themselves slices of pizza and started eating.
Max smiled a half smile. "No, no big date."
"Is that because your significant other just couldn't make it?"
"It's because I don't have a significant other."
Zelda relished that explanation much more than she should have.
Then Max said, "What about you? Anybody waiting in the wings back in Kansas?"
"Nope. Charlie's the only man in my life."
Max gave the terrier a look out of the corner of his eye that reminded Zelda that he wasn't enamored of her beloved pet and that she should only proceed with caution.
But in spite of that, she heard herself say, "So, tell me a little about yourself."

Chapter Seven

"You want me to tell you a little about myself." Max repeated what Zelda had just said to him as they sat at her dining room table late Friday night sharing a pizza he'd brought over. "What do you want to know?"
Zelda refrained from saying everything. "You could tell me what you do for a living, for starters," she suggested, wishing she were even slightly less interested in this man who so obviously didn't love her dog.
"I'm an orthodontist."
"Ouch!"
Max laughed. "It's not that bad."
"My fondest memories are not of my orthodontia."
"But you ended up with a beautiful smile."
"Well, there is that," she said as if it didn't thrill her to hear he thought so. "Do you have your own practice?"
"I'm in with my best friend, Chad Thompson. We grew up together, went to college together, even went to dental school together."
"And tomorrow morning is your Saturday to work?"
"Actually, we both work on Saturday mornings. We have a clinic in downtown Denver for kids whose parents can't afford braces."
"That's nice," Zelda said, impressed by him and thinking that it redeemed him somewhat for not being a dog person.
"What about you?" he asked then. "What is it you do for a living that has you working out of your house?"
"I'm a technical writer."
He laughed again and Zelda liked the sound of it far too much. "A technical writer? As opposed to writers who have no technique?"
"Playing with semantics, are we? No, not as opposed to writers who have no technique. I write brochures, pamphlets, prospectuses, instruction booklets, things like that. Technical stuff."
"No great American novels?"
"Maybe someday. But in the meantime, an occasional charity pizza just won't keep me going. Plus I like sleeping with a roof over my head."
"In other words, even writers have bills to pay."
"Exactly."
"But this wasn't a charity pizza," he pointed out. "I was just looking for an excuse to see you again."
He'd said that in such a way that she wasn't sure if he was teasing her or not. But they'd finished eating by then and rather than giving her a chance to find out, Max glanced at the grandfather clock in the corner of the dining room and said, "I'd better get some beauty sleep. Saturdays are always early days and for some reason I have the feeling I'd better be on my toes for tomorrow afternoon's dog training."
"No doubt about it," Zelda agreed as she and Charlie walked him to the back door.
"Thanks for the pizza," she said when they got there.
"My pleasure."
He paused then, studying her with those penetrating eyes of his.
And Zelda suddenly found herself wondering if he might kiss her good night.
She knew it was a silly thought. After all, they'd only just met that morning. But it didn't seem to matter when she was fighting the wish that he would.
He didn't, though. Instead he broke off eye contact and left with a simple "See you tomorrow."
And along with the need to dispose of the pizza box once he was gone, Zelda was left to dispose of some pretty potent — and totally unfounded — disappointment, too.

Chapter Eight

"Okay, I know this sounds crazy but the dog psychologist said —"
"The dog psychologist?" Max repeated what Zelda had just said, his tone full of disbelief.
Zelda, Max, and Charlie were in Zelda's living room on Saturday afternoon, ready to begin Max's getting-to-know-Charlie session. Zelda's first goal was to get Charlie comfortable enough with Max so the terrier would at least not go into his frantic mode every time he saw their neighbor.
"I know," Zelda conceded. "Taking a dog to a shrink is a bit much. But I was trying to get him resocialized."
"Resocialized?"
"It's a long story. Anyway, if you would just get down on the floor with him, on his level, so you'll be nonthreatening."
Max studied her, his expression a combination of incredulity and amusement. "Is this just a way to get me to my knees?" he said with a hint of lasciviousness in his tone.
Zelda smiled back. "As a matter of fact, it is. For Charlie's sake."
Max chuckled. "You know, I wouldn't do this for just anybody," he said. He didn't get down on his hands and knees, though. He sat on the floor with his legs crossed Indian fashion.
Zelda — who was holding Charlie — set the terrier down. And Charlie immediately growled at Max.
"Don't make eye contact," Zelda instructed. "Let him come to you."
"Is he going to sever a limb?" Max asked as if he were only half kidding.
"He'll probably sniff you, but he'll be tentative about it at first, until he knows you won't grab him or hurt him. Nonthreatening, remember?"
Charlie did just that, checking out Max by slow increments, growling as he did. And the entire time Max stayed still, letting the dog do as he pleased.
"It's a positive sign that he's getting closer and closer," Zelda said.
Finally Charlie sat down in front of Max, reducing the growling to only intermittent grumblings.
"Now what?" Max asked.
"Say hi to him in a quiet, calm voice that's kind of high-pitched — dogs like high voices."
"You want me to be a falsetto?"
"And tell him he's a good boy," Zelda confirmed.
"Are you just trying to make me make a fool out of myself? Are you secretly taping this?"
"Dog psychology — that's all this is. If I get a little entertainment out of it, well, all the better," she teased.
"I'll do it. But only if you say you'll have dinner with me tonight. Without Charlie."
"Don't hurt his feelings."
"Say you will or else," Max warned.
"Nonthreatening," Zelda reminded.
"Say you will or else," Max repeated in a ridiculously high voice that made her laugh.
"Okay, yes, I'll have dinner with you tonight without Charlie. Now use that voice on him."
"Not a chance." But Max did tell Charlie he was a good boy in a soft, soothing tone that sounded much better.
"Now hold your hand with your fingers curled so it looks like a paw and slowly reach it out to him without actually touching him so he can sniff that."
Max looked at her suspiciously and shook his head, again in disbelief. "This better be worth it," he said with a glint of pure wickedness in his eyes.
Very appealing wickedness that made Zelda look all the more forward to dinner alone with him.

Chapter Nine

Max had told Zelda that he was taking her to an upscale Mexican restaurant called La Loma Saturday night, after their first round of getting her dog familiar with him. So she dressed in a pair of black Capri pants and a white sweater set. She twisted her hair at the back of her head, held it there with chopsticks, and left a spray of ends at her crown. Then she applied blush, mascara, and lipstick — all slightly heavier for the evening.
Max came to her front door to pick her up this time, looking very spiffy in charcoal gray slacks and a black silk shirt with a banded collar.
He drove a red sports car and his manners were impeccable — he held the door open for her at the curb and again in the restaurant parking lot, and he even helped seat her when they were shown to a table.
"I recommend the margaritas and the green chili on anything," he told her as they glanced over the menu.
Once they'd ordered, his attention was so focused on her that Zelda felt as if he didn't realize there were other people in the place.
"So how'd I do today?" he asked.
Zelda knew he was referring to how things had gone with Charlie. "I think it went okay. Charlie stopped growling at you and showing you his teeth."
"And he didn't take off my hand when I tried to pet him at the end. Don't forget that."
"True," Zelda agreed. Then she said, "What about you?"
"What about me?"
"Feeling any warm, fuzzy feelings for my dog?"
Max laughed. A bit uncomfortably, Zelda thought. "As dogs go, I guess Charlie is...a dog."
Zelda laughed at that even though the joke wasn't heartening. "In other words I don't have to worry about you fighting me for custody of him."
"My lawyer is out of town."
"And you haven't been won over to the dog lovers' side of the fence."
He let that go unanswered and instead said, "What do we do with him tomorrow?"
"I thought we'd try a walk to the park, along with more of the stuff we did today. Charlie loves the park and maybe he'll love you for taking him."
Max looked dubious but he didn't voice his doubts. He just said, "I promised to baby-sit my niece in the afternoon. Does Charlie hate kids, too?"
"He's wild for kids. How old is your niece?"
"Four. And she likes parks, too."
"I'll bring a ball for her to throw for Charlie. They'll both get a kick out of that," Zelda said. "But for some of the time I should probably take your niece to the swings or something and leave you and Charlie to play catch so he connects you with having fun, too."
"Ah, more doggy psychology. It takes a lot of work just to leave your dog overnight," Max commented then.
"It didn't used to."
But Zelda didn't want to go into that and she was spared the need when their food arrived.
Once their waiter had left, Max said, "Okay, no more dog talk. The day belonged to Charlie but tonight belongs to me."
"Down, boy," Zelda teased at the devilish wiggle of Max's eyebrows.
But under the surface she was only too happy to have the subject of Charlie closed so she could get to know more about the great-looking guy she was with. The guy who seemed to make her every nerve ending come alive just with a glance of those gorgeous eyes.
Even though he still didn't seem to care for her dog.

Chapter Ten

"So do you have just the one niece?" Zelda asked Max over burritos smothered in green chili when they'd put a moratorium on talk of Charlie to enjoy their Saturday night date.
"Tiffany — who will be with us for Get-Charlie-Acquainted-with-Me Sunday — is my only niece. But I have five nephews."
"Wow. From how many brothers and sisters?"
"One of each. My brother has two sets of twins, believe it or not — four boys. And my sister has Tiff and a one-year-old baby boy. But since I don't do diapers, our folks are keeping Tommy tomorrow afternoon."
"So your parents are still living?"
"Alive and well and usually traveling in their motor home. What about yours?"
"There's just my mom. She's the librarian at the same elementary school I went to as a kid," Zelda said.
"And what about brothers or sisters? Nieces or nephews?"
"I have one sister and she's pregnant for the first time. The baby is due Christmas day. There are three other dogs in the family, though. All Jack Russell terriers. My mother has two and my sister has Charlie's brother."
Max rolled his eyes. "You really are dog people, aren't you?"
"We love our puppies," Zelda confessed.
Dinner conversation continued in that vein, without there ever being a lull or an awkward silence. Max was just so easy to talk to. Or listen to, since he talked as openly as Zelda did.
The problem was, before she knew it, it was nearly midnight and Max was walking her to her door to end the evening.
"Would you like to come in for a nightcap?" she asked, hoping he would say yes.
But he didn't and she was afraid the sound of Charlie barking from inside the house was the reason.
"I'd better not," Max said. "Tiff is being delivered to me at eight in the morning and I was hoping to get in a little gym time before that. Besides, Charlie's probably already mad at me for taking you away tonight."
Zelda unlocked her door but didn't open it. Instead she turned back to Max with thoughts of kissing once again dancing through her head.
"Thanks for dinner. Again," she said, trying not to get her hopes up.
"Any time," he answered in a voice that was suddenly quiet, more intimate. He was looking into her eyes, searching them, and Zelda was held in that silver gaze. Then, without warning, he leaned forward and actually did kiss her. Softly at first, as if he were testing the waters.
But the waters were just fine and Zelda let him know that by kissing him back, even raising a hand to that hard chest she'd been memorizing from afar since she moved in.
Then he deepened the kiss and oh, was he good at it! His lips were parted just so and warm against hers as he brought one big hand to brace the back of her head and laid the other along the column of her neck where he made tiny circles with his thumb that sent tingles raining all over her.
But all too soon the kiss was over and he said good night, leaving her to slip into her house alone.
With only the memory of that kiss and the longing for much, much more.

Chapter Eleven

Sunday at noon Zelda went into her kitchen to fix herself lunch before she and Charlie spent the afternoon with Max. But on her way to the refrigerator she passed the window over the sink that gave her a panoramic view of the rear of her neighbor's house. And there he was, on his patio, with the niece he'd told Zelda he was baby-sitting today.
Zelda couldn't resist taking her favorite spy position at the window over the sink to watch the two of them. It was quite a scene. They were apparently having a tea party that the little girl — whose name was Tiffany — had set up. After all, Zelda doubted that Max had arranged for his niece to sit in one of his lawn chairs and himself to sit on a small step stool behind their respective TV trays.
Max was a big man and his knees were nearly to his chin while Tiffany's feet dangled at least a foot from the ground. But she was sitting very primly, drinking from a miniature teacup, and, from the way it looked, urging Max to do the same.
Zelda had to smile at the sight of Max's large fingers delicately grasping the tiny handle of his cup. It was all so sweet. And even from a distance Zelda could tell Tiffany was taken with her uncle.
Not that Zelda could blame her. She was pretty taken with Tiffany's uncle, too. Even though she didn't want to be.
Yes, he seemed like the perfect guy. He was kind and intelligent, he was funny and even-tempered. He was incredible-looking and so sexy he made steam rise off her skin.
But despite the fact that he obviously liked kids, he still wasn't crazy about Charlie. And to Zelda, Charlie was like her child.
So she was torn.
It would have been easier if he wasn't as terrific as he was. If he was just some plain, ordinary, boring guy. Some plain, ordinary, boring guy who didn't turn her on.
But he was definitely not plain or ordinary or boring. And boy, did he turn her on!
That simple kiss they'd shared the previous night had left her every sense awake and alive. She hadn't been able to sleep until the wee hours of the morning because that kiss had replayed itself in her mind a million times. The feel of his mouth against hers. His lips slightly parted. The taste of him. His hand cupping her head. The hardness of his pectorals where she'd pressed her palm to his chest...
Zelda lost herself all over again in just the thought of it. She wished that wasn't the case. She wished what was happening to her, what was happening between her and Max, wasn't happening. He was stirring things inside her that she didn't want stirred by someone who didn't love her dog as much as she did.
"So put on the brakes," she advised herself aloud.
But as she watched him mimic his niece by dabbing at the corners of his supple mouth, Zelda just couldn't help the swell of emotions inside her.
Or the driving need to be with him again as soon as possible.

Chapter Twelve

As planned, Zelda, Max and Max's four-year-old niece, Tiffany, took Charlie to the park Sunday afternoon. Tiffany was an adorable little girl with coal-black hair and bright green eyes who clearly adored her uncle.
She was enamoured of Charlie, too, and walked ahead of the grown-ups to be beside the Jack Russell terrier as they all headed for the small park not far from home.
"Did you enjoy your tea party earlier?" Zelda asked Max, who was holding tight to Charlie's leash.
Max smiled and glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. "Saw that, did you?"
"When I went into the kitchen to make my lunch. How come you got stuck sitting on the step stool with your knees up around your ears?"
"Because Tiff was the princess, so of course she had to sit on the throne. I was just her slave, Dagworth."
Zelda laughed. "Dagworth? So if I call you that will you be my slave, too?"
"Maybe," he said with a wicked undertone. "But I might want more than a tea party from you."
"Guess you better just be the dog-sitter then," she countered. But the innuendo was enough to send goose bumps up her arms.
When they reached the park Zelda taught Max how to get Charlie to obey simple commands. Then she took Tiffany to the jungle gym and left Max to throw the ball so Charlie could fetch it. Charlie loved the game and it went a long way in making him like anyone who played it with him.
As Zelda watched the two, she came to the conclusion that Max was good enough with Charlie to put to rest her qualms about leaving Charlie with him. She felt confident that Max would treat her dog well for the short time she was gone.
He just wasn't likely to get down on the floor to cuddle with him or play tug-of-war. And while Zelda told herself that was okay for a single night, it didn't seem to bode well for anything beyond that overnight dog-sitting. And that gave her some sharp pangs she tried to ignore.
After Max had thrown the ball for Charlie for a long while Tiffany got to take over that duty for a few tosses before Max suggested they walk a little farther down the street to a small shop that sold gelato.
Tiffany jumped at the idea but was incorrigible when it came to slipping Charlie bites of the wafer cookie that came with her bowl of ice cream. Still, it was a nice afternoon and by the time it was over Zelda was even more impressed with Max's skills with kids.
"You'll make a good dad someday," she told him as he handed Charlie's leash to her and gave Tiffany a piggyback ride home.
"Are you suggesting something? Because I have the night free," he joked.
But Zelda ignored that second innuendo and instead said, "Good, because I'll need to run you through Charlie's routine and show you all his stuff so I can just hand him over to you in the morning."
"Do I get dinner, too?" he said as if she'd propositioned him.
"Burgers and fries?"
He pretended rapture. "You do know the way to my heart. I can never say no after something like that."
Zelda laughed. "Maybe I was wrong and you are a bad man."
"Nuh-uh," Tiffany said to voice her disagreement.
Max leaned over to whisper in Zelda's ear, "But I can sometimes be persuaded to be bad." Then he straightened up and said, "I'll be over as soon as Tiff gets picked up."

Chapter Thirteen

For Sunday evening's dinner with Max, Zelda opted for spaghetti, meatballs, salad, and bread rather than the burgers and fries she'd told him they were going to have. As she set the table it occurred to her that they'd eaten dinner together every night since they'd met.
She didn't regret it. In fact, what she thought she was likely to regret was not having dinner with him every night when she returned from Kansas and they went back to their respective schedules and routines.
But she still had tonight, she reminded herself, deciding not to ruin it by thinking about the future.
"You brought wine to have with burgers and fries?" Zelda commented when Max arrived at seven and presented her with the bottle.
"I thought we'd both earned it after a day of kids and dogs. Besides, now that I'm here, it isn't fast-food burgers and fries I'm smelling. It's something Italian."
She confessed that she'd cooked, and they decided to run through the last of her instructions for Charlie's care before they really put the dogs and kids part of the day behind them.
But once Zelda had completed all the feeding and sleeping information, they sat at her dining room table — lit by two long white candles — and concentrated on each other.
"So tell me why there's no Mr. Zelda McAffry," Max encouraged.
"There almost was. About a year ago. I was engaged to a stockbroker."
"But you didn't go through with it?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because of Charlie," she answered.
"You broke off your engagement because of your dog?" Max said in a neutral tone that didn't fool Zelda for a minute.
"Because of Charlie and what Terry did to him and what that said about Terry."
"Explain?"
Zelda took a deep breath.
"When we got engaged Terry moved into my house. He hadn't shown much affection for Charlie but he'd seemed to tolerate him and so I didn't think it was a problem. But after about a month of living together Terry's true colors started to show — primarily with Charlie. He was impatient. He lost his temper easily and would scream at Charlie until Charlie cowered behind a chair. He'd throw things at him. He'd leave Charlie outside no matter what the weather — things like that. I was hoping Terry would get used to Charlie and mellow out but instead he only got worse. Then one day I caught him literally kicking Charlie out the door. He broke one of Charlie's ribs."
"What a jerk!"
Zelda appreciated the very real outrage in Max's voice. "Physically Charlie was okay but by then he was so fearful of men that his whole personality had changed —"
"Which is why he needed resocializing."
"Exactly. And as for Terry, well, he was history with me."
They'd finished eating by then and Max insisted on helping with the cleanup. Zelda would rather have stayed at the table, looking at his handsome face but she was going to have to get up at four a.m. to make her flight the next day so she knew she shouldn't drag out the evening.
Still, as she began to wash the dishes and hand them to Max to dry, she was intent on doing a little inquiring of her own, so she said, "What about you? Why isn't there a Mrs. Max Greer?"

Chapter Fourteen

"Why isn't there a Mrs. Max Greer?" Max repeated the question Zelda had just asked him as they washed and dried the dishes after sharing Sunday dinner and a bottle of wine. "I considered marriage once. About two years ago. But instead I decided to try the whole living together thing first."
"And it didn't work out?" Zelda probed.
"I think if it had only been the two of us, it might have."
"Did she have kids?"
"Animals."
"Bad kids?"
Max laughed. "No, I mean she really had animals. Four dogs, three cats, two rabbits, a ferret, a box turtle, and a snake."
"She had a lot of animals."
"A lot."
"And you didn't like them?" Zelda assumed.
"It's not as if I hate animals. I even went out of my way to accommodate them — that's where the doggy door you got stuck in came from. But it just got to be too much. All the hair and dander and mess. The smells. Having animals in bed with us. On the furniture. Fighting with each other. Getting out of the yard. Getting sick. Biting me. Prue was never interested in letting me get used to her pets slowly — it was all or nothing. Finally I had my fill. I said it's the animals or me — choose."
"And she chose the animals."
"She chose the animals," he confirmed.
"And you swore off pets for good," Zelda added.
Max didn't answer that readily but she thought that pause was pretty telling in itself.
Finally he repeated, "I really had my fill of critters."
He would probably never know how sorry Zelda was to hear that.
But he softened the blow somewhat by saying, "But one thing I can swear to — no matter how bad it got, I never kicked or hurt a single one of them. So you don't have to worry."
After Zelda had explained to Max that her former fiancй's kicking Charlie had ended their relationship, she appreciated that reassurance. Although since she hadn't seen any signs that Max had the temper Terry had had she wasn't concerned that he would harm Charlie.
"I trust you," she told him.
The dishes were all done by then and as Max set the dish towel on the countertop he said, "I should take off so you can pack."
"I don't need much for just overnight," she said by way of hinting that she didn't want him to go.
But Max headed for the back door anyway and Zelda had no choice but to follow him.
Once he reached the door, though, he turned to face her.
"Thanks for dinner," he said, taking her hand to squeeze for emphasis.
"Sure," she said, distracted by his touch and the rush of warmth that ran through her.
"I'm going to miss you," he said then in a husky voice. "Seems strange since we've only known each other a few days, but it just hit me."
He was looking so intently into her eyes that she was melting rapidly beneath his gaze and the touch of his hand, and she didn't even answer him. She just tipped her chin up to him as he leaned in to kiss her.
But unlike the night before, there was no hesitancy even from the start. This kiss started out full of passion as Max wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close. His mouth opened over hers and his tongue came to tease her tongue.
But then the kiss was over, and she was light-headed and weak-kneed, and had to fight not to beg him for what her body was craving.
As if lingering might make it impossible for him to leave at all, Max said a raspy, "See you in the morning," and left.
And Zelda deflated against the door he closed after himself, wondering how she was going to survive even two days without him.…

Chapter Fifteen

"There you go, Charlie, dinner is served," Max informed the terrier Monday night when he set the dog dish on his kitchen floor and then took his own cartons of take-out Chinese food to the table.
Charlie was lying with his head between his two front paws. He moved only his eyes to look from Max to the dog dish and back again, staring at Max rather than showing any interest in his evening meal.
Max interpreted. "That's right, it's just you and me tonight. Zelda is back in Kansas and we're on our own."
Charlie merely went on looking at Max with sad eyes.
"Yeah, I know, things aren't the same without her, are they? It makes sense that that's the way it is for you. But what about me? Why should everything seem so drab and colorless and boring just because she's not here? Last week at this time it didn't matter that I didn't know her and now here I am, feeling all down in the mouth just because she's gone."
Charlie continued to ignore his food and Max realized he wasn't enjoying his, either. He pushed the cartons away. "Wish I knew what the hell was going on with me," he confided to the dog. "Three lousy days — that's how long I've known her and here I am, pining for her as much as you are."
Except that the three days he'd known Zelda had been anything but lousy. They'd been great. So great that he couldn't remember when he'd felt as good. So great that he'd spent every minute that they'd been apart looking forward to seeing her again. So great that now that he knew he wasn't going to see her, even getting out of bed didn't seem worth the bother.
"She's something, your mom is," he informed Charlie. "She's bright and beautiful and she makes everything a little better just by being around. In case you hadn't noticed."
Charlie finally got up but he didn't go to his dish. Instead he came to stand beside Max as if he'd understood what Max had been talking about and since he felt the same way, they'd forged a kind of bond.
Max reached down to pet the terrier, laughing wryly as he did. "We're quite a pair, aren't we? Moping around like two lovesick puppies."
Lovesick? Was that what he'd just said? He couldn't be lovesick after only three days. Was he out of his mind?
Maybe. What other explanation could there be for sitting at his kitchen table feeling low because Zelda wasn't with him? Or for dog-sitting — of all things — for her? He actually had another animal in his house, at his feet, and he was petting it — that was so unbelievable it had to qualify as insanity. Especially when he'd sworn off pets and people with pets and ever having another pet in his house.
"I could be in some trouble here, Charlie," he said then.
As if to reciprocate the comfort Max had given him, Charlie jumped into Max's lap and licked his face.
And it actually made Max smile and feel a little better.
"Oh yeah, I'm in trouble.…"

Chapter Sixteen

"Okay, I'm all checked in and they'll be boarding in about twenty minutes," Zelda told her sister Kate on Tuesday afternoon.
Kate had taken her to the airport and was waiting with her at the gate.
"You must really like Denver," Kate said then. "You're so anxious to get back."
"I'm just worried about Charlie. This is the first time I've left him since the whole Terry deal."
"Uh-huh," Kate said as if she weren't buying that for a minute. "And I suppose it doesn't have anything to do with that guy you haven't stopped talking about since you got here?"
"I haven't talked about Max that much."
Kate laughed. "Enough so that you know who I'm referring to even without my telling you."
"Oh, you're full of it," Zelda claimed as if her sister were talking nonsense.
"No, you're full of this guy."
"He's just my neighbor. And if he's been on my mind it's only because he's taking care of Charlie and I'm worried about it."
"Hasn't sounded like worry."
"Well, that's what it is. He's just a nice man who agreed to help me out of a bind even though he doesn't like dogs. Or pets of any kind."
"Like Terry."
"He's not as bad as Terry was. Max isn't mean to Charlie —"
"He'd just prefer it if there wasn't a Charlie."
"Yes," Zelda conceded, hating that it was true and just how much of an obstacle that was for her.
"And if there wasn't a Charlie? Would you admit that you really — really — like this guy?"
"I'm not denying that I like him."
"But Charlie is a great big wrench thrown into the works," Kate persisted. "So does that mean there's no future for you and the neighbor?"
It surprised Zelda to find how sharply her sister's conclusion jabbed at her. Certainly it was something she'd thought herself since meeting Max, but hearing it out loud, said by someone else, made her want to refute it.
She fought the urge but wasn't completely successful and ended up saying, "I don't know."
"You don't know if you would submit Charlie to another guy who doesn't like him?"
"No, I know I won't do that."
"Then you don't know what? If this guy doesn't like dogs and you won't have a non dog-person around Charlie long-term, then there's no future with the neighbor, is there?"
"Maybe Max will learn to like Charlie," Zelda said hopefully.
"You thought that about Terry," Kate reminded.
"What do you want me to say?" Zelda asked her sister more snappishly than she'd meant to.
"Hey, don't get mad at me. I'm just trying to find out what's going on with you and what the possibilities are."
"Nothing is going on with me," Zelda said, cooling her tone. "I've only known Max for a few days. Yes, he's incredible-looking. Yes, he has a body to die for. Yes, he's funny and fun to be with and smart and accomplished and he kisses so well that my toes curl. Yes, I like everything about him except that he's not crazy about animals and doesn't want them around. And as long as that's true, we're at opposite ends of the spectrum and that's that."
And if she couldn't help wishing things might be different?
Then maybe she just had to remember that wishing didn't make it so.
Although some wishes did come true, didn't they?

Chapter Seventeen

At six o'clock Tuesday evening Zelda drove straight from Denver International Airport to Max's house rather than to her own. She told herself it was the quickest and easiest way to pick up Charlie. And that was true. It was just that she was also trying to pretend that seeing Max wasn't a factor.
But deep down she was every bit as excited to see her neighbor as she was to see her dog.
So her first thought when she parked at Max's curb and he rushed out his front door was that he was as eager to see her. Except she didn't understand why that handsome face of his was so tense.
"He's gone," Max announced before Zelda had managed a hello.
"Who's gone?" she asked dimly.
"Charlie. I got home from the office a few minutes ago, let him out the back, and went in to change clothes. Charlie started barking his head off and I looked out the window to see why. He was chasing a squirrel and he went right over the front of the fence after it."
It took a moment for that information to sink in.
"And you didn't go after him?" Zelda demanded, looking up and down the street for signs of Charlie but finding nothing.
"That's what I was coming out to do right now."
"Instead of the minute he went over the fence?"
"I had to put on pants, Zelda."
Zelda fought the instant image of Max without pants. "Did you see which way he went?" she said as panic began to rise within her.
Max pointed to the west. "If you want to go home, I'll look for him."
"I already trusted you with him and you've lost him. You go home and I'll find him myself."
"I didn't do this on purpose, Zelda," Max said, shocked by her reaction.
But Zelda's fears were multiplying by the minute and she didn't have much control over what was going through her mind or coming out her mouth. "I know you don't like him. Are you sure you didn't see him go over the fence and take your time going after him so he'd be long gone?"
"You don't believe that," Max said, his own tone heating up.
"I believe I left my dog with you and now he's gone."
"And do you not believe that he's getting farther away every minute you waste accusing me of something ridiculous?"
"Oh, now I'm ridiculous," Zelda shouted.
But he was right that she was wasting precious seconds so, without saying more to Max, she headed up the street, calling Charlie's name, watching for him, making the clicking sound that Charlie always mistook for a squirrel's chattering and usually brought him running.
But by the time she'd reached the cross street — with Max a silent partner right beside her — she still hadn't so much as caught a glimpse of Charlie, and her panic level was rapidly increasing.
And then another horrible thought popped into her head and before she'd thought better of it, it also rolled out off her tongue.
"Are you sure you didn't take Charlie to the dog pound yesterday after I left for the airport?"

Chapter Eighteen

"Did you really just ask me if I took Charlie to the pound yesterday when you left for the airport?" Max repeated the question Zelda had blurted out.
She'd arrived home to find Max rushing from his house, claiming that Charlie had just jumped the fence chasing a squirrel. But they couldn't find him and unreasonable fear had taken over in Zelda, putting all kinds of bad thoughts in her mind.
"You think I got rid of your dog and then just waited for you to come home to pretend he ran away?" Max continued in disbelief.
"I don't know what to think."
"Well, I don't know how the hell you could think that. In the first place it isn't something I'd ever — ever — do. And in the second place, the damn dog actually grew on me. I even let him sleep in my bed last night and I came home for lunch today to play with him so he wouldn't be lonely."
A part of Zelda believed him. But another part of her was so scared, so worried, she just couldn't think straight. All she knew was that the dog she loved like a child was lost and Max was responsible for it. That she'd left her pet with a man who had told her from the get-go that he didn't like dogs and maybe she'd been so enamored of his good looks and personality and sex appeal that she'd discounted his feelings for Charlie when she shouldn't have.
But rather than making things worse by saying something else she might regret, she didn't answer Max. She just went on searching for Charlie, calling his name, desperate just to find her dog.
And then she did. She spotted Charlie between two houses, nosing at the fence.
"Charlie! Come!" she commanded.
Charlie's ears perked up and he paused to see who was calling him before his tail wagged wildly and he ran toward them.
Right to Max.
Max picked him up as if Charlie were his dog. "Hello, trouble," he said affectionately, yet still sounding frustrated and relieved, too.
Then he handed Charlie to Zelda and said, "Well, would you look at that? He wasn't at the pound after all. He must have just jumped the fence a few minutes ago the way I said he did."
"Okay, maybe I was a little out of line. But —"
"A little out of line? You had me arrested, tried, and convicted of unlawful dog disposal, and you were ready to string me up yourself."
"I knew you didn't like him" was all Zelda could think of to say to defend herself.
"Then why did you leave him with me?" Max said, obviously the angrier of the two of them by then.
But apparently he was too angry to even allow her to answer because before she could, he said, "Look, I've already had experience with someone who put animals before people. I don't need a repeat of it."
Then he turned and walked back the way they'd come.
And Zelda was left with nothing but her dog, helplessly watching Max go and taking with him any hope for more of what they'd begun over the weekend.

Chapter Nineteen

For a time Zelda just stood on the street, watching Max walk away. She'd only returned from her trip a short time before to find Max rushing outside to search for Charlie, who had jumped the fence. But in her panic over the thought of her dog being lost, she'd said some harsh things to Max.
He'd gotten angry. Very angry. And even though Zelda knew she'd played a part in it all, she was slightly taken aback herself to see Max's temper. A temper that had thrown her into memories of her former fiancй's outbursts.
So she didn't go after Max. In fact, she stayed where she was — far up Max's block — holding tight to Charlie until Max was nearly to his house.
Only then did she head for her car where it was parked at his curb.
"I don't want someone who yells at me any more than I want someone who yells at you," Zelda informed Charlie along the way.
Of course she'd been the one to start the shouting, a contrary little voice in her head reminded her as she reached her car and put Charlie inside. But still she didn't go up to Max's house. She got behind the wheel and drove around the block to her own place.
Only, once she was home again and Charlie was safely carrying around his toy beaver as he always did when he first came in, Zelda began to cool off. She began to calm down.
She began to have regrets. It was pretty crummy of her to have gotten so furious with Max, she thought. After all, she knew for a fact that Charlie could go over the fence in the blink of an eye. He'd done it on her watch, too. That was how she and Max had met.
And apparently Max had been good to Charlie while she was gone since Charlie had run to Max instead of to her when they'd finally found him. Obviously Charlie was not only no longer afraid of him, Charlie liked him.
Plus now Max liked Charlie, too. He'd told her so.
But what had she done almost the moment she'd arrived on the scene? She'd accused Max of not going after Charlie fast enough when he'd seen the terrier jump the fence. And worse, she'd even suggested that Max might have taken Charlie to the pound to get rid of him and was only pretending that Charlie had run away.
Zelda cringed when she recalled that now. Max had done her a huge favor by dog-sitting for her. He'd spent most of his weekend complying with her request to let Charlie get familiar and comfortable with him. But had she thanked him for all his trouble? No, she'd attacked him.
So she had to admit that maybe Max had had cause to lose his temper with her. Maybe it wasn't a show of the kind of short fuse her former fiancй had exhibited too often.
"Do you think I really blew it?" she asked Charlie.
But even though Charlie was busy with the beaver and ignored her, Zelda still realized that she really had been unfair to Max and that she couldn't just let it go at that.
Even if it wasn't going to be easy to face him again.

Chapter Twenty

Zelda hoped no one was watching as she lifted Charlie over the fence that divided her property from Max's and then set about climbing over it herself. It wasn't the most graceful thing she'd ever attempted.
She put her foot into the chain link about halfway up and hoisted herself to a sitting position on the top rail. She had every intention of swinging her legs onto Max's side and hopping down.
There was only one glitch. She didn't lift her second leg high enough and her cuff got caught.
"Oh, great," she muttered, trying to retain her balance and free herself at the same time.
As she did, Charlie made a beeline for Max's house and, rather than wiggling through the doggy door as he had before, he sat there and barked until Max appeared.
"Thanks a lot," Zelda said under her breath as a still angry-looking Max came outside.
"Stuck again?" he asked.
"I'm afraid so," she admitted reluctantly.
Max had reached her by then. He did a quick survey and pulled her pant leg free so Zelda could finally drop down on his side of the fence.
"I would have brought Charlie's things over," he said then, clearly assuming that had been the purpose of her attempted visit.
"That's not why I'm here."
"No?"
She would have liked a better segue but since it was too late for that, she plunged in. "I'm here because after I thought about it I realized that you have every reason to be mad at me. I totally freaked out and I was wrong to say what I said to you. I can tell you were good to Charlie by the way he's acting with you now and I had no business accusing you of not taking care of him or taking him to the pound. I'm sorry."
For a long moment Max didn't respond and Zelda worried that she really had ruined things with him. She was afraid he was going to say her apology was too little, too late, and that she should just stay on her own side of the fence and leave him alone. And really, she wouldn't have blamed him if he had.
But then he said, "I overreacted, too. I was upset myself that I'd lost Charlie. I don't really think you're like my animal-crazed ex."
"So we're okay?" Zelda hazarded.
Max finally cracked a smile. "No, we're better than okay."
He took her hand and pulled her into his arms, kissing her there and then to prove it. A deep, passionate kiss that was almost too intimate for the outdoors.
And when the kiss ended he remained holding her, smiling down at her. "But I think we'd better consider putting up a higher fence around the perimeters of both yards to keep that mutt inside. And maybe we could just get rid of this stretch in the middle. I don't think I want anything coming between us from here on."
It was music to Zelda's ears. "Charlie will be in and out your doggy door," she warned.
"And what about Charlie's mom?"
"I'd rather not use the doggy door, if it's just the same to you. I'm kind of tired of getting stuck and needing you to rescue me."
Max laughed. "I'm happy to do it. But that isn't what I meant. I meant what does Charlie's mom think about tearing down fences so nothing comes between us?"
"Charlie's mom likes that idea. A lot."
"Good. Because I don't know about you, but I think thanks to Charlie we have something worth hanging on to here."
It was Zelda's turn to smile. So big it almost hurt. "Me, too."
Max kissed her again, a kiss full of promise of things yet to come. But in the middle of it Charlie barked at them, wanting some attention.
They ended the kiss and both glanced down at the terrier, but it was Zelda who said with a grin, "Sorry, Charlie, you had your turn — now he's mine."
 

The End

Puppy Love

by

Victoria Pade

---

Chapter One
 

"It's 7:30, Charlie," Zelda McAffry said to her Jack Russell terrier as she hurried to the kitchen.
Charlie followed on her heels, taking his position at the sliding glass door. Zelda landed at the sink, and trained her eyes through the window above it onto the back door of the house directly behind hers.
Like clockwork, the man who lived there came outside as he had every morning of the two weeks Zelda had lived there so far.
He was tall, he had short dark hair, Adonis good looks, and the best buns she'd ever seen. Pure eye candy dressed in running shorts that exposed thick thigh muscles and a T-shirt that clung to impressive pectorals and bulging biceps.
Charlie started barking his head off just as he did every day. Zelda ignored him, feasting on the sight of magnificent male pulchritude as her neighbor did his pre-run warm-ups on his back porch.
"Wow," she muttered on a sigh when the man finished and went through the gate to the side of his redbrick house.
"Okay, now you can go out," Zelda told Charlie, moving to the sliding door to open it so the terrier could charge into the glorious June day.
Charlie wasn't out there more than a minute, though, when he spotted a squirrel on the other side of the four-foot chain-link fence that separated their two yards. He took off to bounce on his hind legs in addition to his frenzied barking.
Zelda opened the sliding door again and yelled, "Charlie! Stop!"
But Charlie didn't stop. Instead, he jumped high enough to actually catch his front paws on the top rail of the fence and pull himself over it.
"Oh, no!" Zelda ran out after the dog, shouting Charlie's name as she did.
Charlie didn't pay any attention to her. Instead, once the terrier realized he was in new territory he lost interest in the squirrel and made a beeline for the house, where he disappeared through the doggy door as if it were meant for him.
"Charlie! Come!" Zelda called firmly.
But Charlie didn't reappear.
Zelda didn't know what else to do but follow the same path through the doggy door. She got down on her hands and knees and poked her head through the flap.
And there was Charlie all right, watching for her as if he'd been expecting her to do just that.
"Come out here," Zelda said in no uncertain terms.
Charlie backed up a few feet and sat down.
"I mean it! Get over here!" Zelda said, pushing forward and forcing her arms through so she could try to grab her dog and make a getaway before her neighbor ever knew she'd been there.
But Charlie just moved farther away, cocking his head to one side as he did.
And that was when Zelda made a tactical error.
She lunged for the dog.
And got stuck but good.
"Oh, great," she wailed.
Just then she heard a deep, rich voice from outside say, "What the hell is going on?"

Chapter Two

Karmic retribution. That's what it had to be, Zelda thought. Every morning since she'd moved to Denver from Kansas City she'd made it a point to watch her backyard neighbor as he did his prejog warm-ups on his back porch. She'd been admiring the perfect specimen of a man on the whole, but she'd been particularly enjoying the sight of his rear end.
And now there she was, stuck in his doggy door, presenting her posterior while her upper half was inside his house as she tried to reach her recalcitrant pooch, Charlie, who had availed himself of the minientrance.
"I know this looks bad," Zelda called in answer to her neighbor's "What the hell is going on" when he'd prematurely returned from his run to find her like that. "But I'm your neighbor from behind and my dog jumped the fence and ran in here. I was trying to get him out but I got stuck."
"Or maybe you're just an inept burglar and I'm lucky to have you incapacitated while I call the cops," the man suggested in a tone that might have been angry or might not have been. Zelda couldn't tell.
"Do I look like a burglar?" she countered before she recalled what part of her he could see. "Scratch that," she added, realizing only after the words were out how they sounded. "I mean, never mind what I look like. My name is Zelda McAffry and I assure you I live in that house right behind you. I just moved in. And I could use some help getting out of here."
"Mm-hmm," he said noncommittally.
"Really, I'm not a burglar," she assured. "I'm perfectly harmless. I'm just stuck. And getting very uncomfortable."
Her neighbor didn't say anything to that and she didn't know if he was contemplating whether to call the police or how to help her. She just knew that he was out there, ogling her derriere.
"Please?" she said as if that were the magic word he was waiting for.
"I honestly don't know what to do except to try to give you a shove," he finally said, apparently giving up the whole burglary theory.
"Go ahead and shove," Zelda said.
"That means my hands on your —"
"Just do it!" she ordered.
So he did. He put his big, warm hands on her sweatpants-clad butt and pushed.
And two things happened. She didn't budge and she liked the feel of his touch. More than she should have.
"Don't be so gentle," she advised, trying to ignore her response to him.
"I could hurt you."
Not any worse than her pride was. "It's okay. Just put all your strength into it and push."
"You're sure?"
"Positive."
So that was what he did. He put the force of all those muscles she'd been admiring into shooting her into the dining room, where she landed with an extremely unladylike thud.
And then she heard him put a key in the lock to open the door, and she knew she was about to have to face him — the jaw-droppingly handsome neighbor in front of whom she'd just humiliated herself.

Chapter Three

Zelda was not thrilled to meet her hunky neighbor for the first time by being stuck in his doggy door and having to get unstuck by him pushing her rear end through it. But she hadn't had a choice.
She and her Jack Russell terrier, Charlie, were inside the neighbor's house, and within moments of getting to her feet from his dining room floor and grabbing Charlie to keep him from attacking, there he was.
He looked even better up close than he had from the distance of her kitchen window, where she'd watched him prepare for his jog every morning. But good looks didn't matter to Charlie. The moment he saw him, the dog went into a frenzy of barking.
"Shh, Charlie! Be quiet," Zelda commanded as she smiled nervously, held out her free hand and introduced herself properly.
Her neighbor accepted her hand, warily keeping an eye on Charlie as he did. "Max Greer."
Zelda had some difficulty ignoring the lightning bolts that the touch of his hand sent sizzling up her arm.
"I'm sooo sorry about this," she said. "Charlie was chasing a squirrel and he jumped the fence and then forgot the squirrel and ran in here. I didn't know what else to do but try to get him out. I love him, but he's not very friendly with strangers."
"No, he doesn't seem too friendly," Max Greer agreed.
"He used to be. It isn't his fault that he's skittish now. But I couldn't leave him for you to find when you got back from your run. He might have bitten you."
Max's expression turned curious. "How did you know I was out for a run?"
"I saw you leave when I let Charlie out." Zelda had prepared that excuse in advance in case she was caught spying on him one of these mornings. Then she added, "It was a pretty short run."
"I forgot my cell phone and came back for it."
"Ah."
Zelda had been planning to approach this man the next day, at any rate, and now that she was there she thought maybe she should broach the subject she'd wanted to talk to him about rather than waiting.
"I've never seen your dog outside," she said as a segue.
"I don't have a dog. The door was put in for the pets of someone else who lived here for a while."
Zelda was dying to know if the someone else had been male or female, but she couldn't ask. Instead she said, "But you have been around dogs in the past?"
"Unfortunately."
Uh-oh. Not a good sign. "You don't like them?"
"I used to like them. Then I had my fill."
That didn't improve things much. But Zelda was in such a bind. "Could you get unfilled for a really short time?"
Something about the way she said that made him smile. If she'd thought he looked good before, it was nothing compared to the way a grin lit up that face.
"Could I get unfilled?" he repeated.
"It's just that I saw the doggy door and figured you must like animals and I had a favor to ask."

Chapter Four

Zelda had only just met her drop-dead gorgeous neighbor Max Greer and already she knew he was a bit of a tease. A charming tease whom she was about to ask for a favor.
"You see, I've only been in Denver for two weeks. I moved here from Kansas. And I work from home so I haven't met anyone yet. But I have to go back to Kansas to close on the house I sold before I left and I couldn't get flights there and back in the same day. That means I have to be gone overnight and Charlie can't be left in a kennel with strangers, so I was hoping —"
"You want me to watch your dog?" Max finished for her, not sounding at all enthusiastic.
"Yes," Zelda confirmed.
"How am I not a stranger? Just because he barks at me every day?"
So he'd noticed.
"No, you're a stranger, too. I was just hoping that I could persuade you to get to know him this weekend before I leave on Monday so you wouldn't be a stranger anymore."
Max's sterling silver eyes went from Zelda to Charlie and back to Zelda. "Let me get this straight. You want me to spend my weekend getting to know your dog so I can take care of him while you're out of town."
"Right. And I'll make it worth your while."
His great smile returned with a hint of devilishness around the edges. "And how would you do that?"
Some very wicked images of her own came to mind, but Zelda resisted them. After all, she already knew Max Greer wasn't a dog person, and while she might be in the position of having to trust him with Charlie for a short time, she knew better than to expect anything more involved than that.
"Money?" she blurted out in answer to his question. "I'll pay you for your time this weekend and for watching Charlie."
"And if I don't need your money?"
He was just giving her a hard time and she knew it. "How about I buy you the best dinner in town, complete with wine and dessert?" she offered.
"And will I have your company over dinner?"
"Sure, if you want it," she said breezily, as if the idea didn't make her heart skip a beat.
Max studied her face as he seemed to think about it.
Then, more to himself than to her, he said, "It just might be worth it."
"So we have a deal?"
"Let's just say I'll give you some time this weekend to see if Charlie will stop baring his teeth at me. And if he will, then okay, I'll dog-sit for you. But the dinner is going to cost you big."
"I'll start saving up."
"I have office hours tomorrow morning but I can give you tomorrow afternoon."
"That would be great," Zelda agreed, curious about what he did to have office hours on Saturday morning. But rather than be nosy, she said, "And again, I'm really sorry about this whole getting stuck in your doggy door thing."
He just nodded his head.
But still Zelda went away wondering if her impression was right — that he just might not have minded all that much.

Chapter Five

"Dog-sitting? You? The guy who said if he never saw another dog, cat, ferret, rabbit, turtle, or pot-bellied pig as long as he lived it would be to soon?"
Max was having lunch that afternoon with his business partner and best friend. He'd told Chad about his morning's activities with Zelda McAffry and Charlie. And what he'd agreed to do.
"Yeah, I'm the guy who said all that," he confirmed. "Which is why, since she moved in and I saw she had a dog, I've kept my distance."
"But then she gets herself stuck in your doggy door and you changed your mind?"
"I met her and liked her."
"Description," Chad demanded.
Just thinking about the way Zelda looked made Max smile. "She's not too tall — maybe only three or four inches over five feet. She's thin but not too thin — just right. She has long, straight blond hair to the middle of her back. Big, electric blue eyes. Peaches-and-cream skin. A perfect turned-up nose. Great teeth —"
"Always a factor."
"And she made me laugh." Max paused, sobering some before he said, "But I'm still not wild about the whole dog thing. Plus the dog isn't wild about me, either."
"Oh, wonderful," Chad said facetiously. "I can already see this isn't a match made in heaven. Maybe you can get bit a couple more times."
"Zelda is hoping I can get to know the dog and vice-versa before she leaves him with me."
"Which means what?"
"That I'm seeing them both this weekend."
"Bingo! I knew you had something up your sleeve. What you mean is, you're seeing this Zelda this weekend."
Max just grinned his confirmation of that. "But I'm still torn. You know after Prue and her pet menagerie, I swore off anybody with animals of any kind. And not only did I mean it, this particular dog has been driving me nuts since they moved in. It barks at me and growls and acts like it wants to tear me to shreds every time it sees me in the yard. I've even had an estimate on a six-foot wooden fence to block it out."
"But still you agreed to take care of it just so you can get up close and personal with its owner."
"Couldn't help it. She seems pretty special," he said, thinking about how adorably flustered Zelda had been when she was stuck in his doggy door. About the lilting sound of her voice. About how much he'd wanted to go on talking to her this morning. About how he hadn't been able to think about anything but her ever since.
"Still," Chad warned, "don't forget how it was with Prue — love me, love my pets. And you didn't love her pets."
"No, I didn't," Max conceded.
"And given the ultimatum to choose you or them —"
"That part you don't have to remind me of."
"I'm just saying to be careful. No matter how hot you are for this woman, she's already got one strike against her."
"Mmm," Max agreed.
The trouble was, Zelda also had the biggest, bluest eyes he'd ever seen….

Chapter Six

When the knock sounded on Zelda's back door at nine o'clock Friday night it startled both her and Charlie. Charlie launched into his protective bark and Zelda peeked through the drapes.
Max Greer was standing on her patio outside and she immediately pulled the curtains, pretending that she didn't feel pure delight at the opportunity to see him again.
"Charlie! Stop!" She commanded the terrier to quiet his barking as she opened the door.
"Hi," she greeted with a question in her voice.
"I know it's late," Max responded to the unspoken query. "I just got home and ordered a pizza for my dinner. Then it occurred to me that you might want to share it."
"Believe it or not I've been unpacking boxes and I haven't eaten yet tonight either," Zelda said. "Pizza sounds good."
"Great. It should be here in about ten minutes and I'll bring it over."
He turned and went back across the yard, doing a sexy leap over the fence that Zelda drank in the sight of before she closed her door and made a mad dash for her bedroom.
Off came her flannel pajama pants and T-shirt, and on went a tight pair of hip-hugger jeans with a brown tank top and a sheer shirt over it. Then she charged into the bathroom to yank the scrunchie out of her hair, brushing it smooth. Next she dabbed on a little blush, swept her eyelashes with fresh mascara, and applied a hint of her new mauve lipstick.
She barely made it back to the kitchen in time to answer Max's second knock on the door.
"You didn't have to change," he commented as she let him in — again over Charlie's loud complaint.
"I was kind of grimy," she said as if changing hadn't been at all about him. He looked good himself, though, in a pair of jeans and a plain beige mock turtleneck T-shirt.
"We can eat at the dining room table," Zelda suggested with a nod in that direction after she'd again chastised Charlie into silence.
Zelda brought plates, silverware, napkins, and glasses of iced tea to the table to join Max, who was keeping as wary an eye on Charlie as Charlie was keeping on him.
"No big date for a Friday night?" Zelda asked then, obviously fishing for information as they served themselves slices of pizza and started eating.
Max smiled a half smile. "No, no big date."
"Is that because your significant other just couldn't make it?"
"It's because I don't have a significant other."
Zelda relished that explanation much more than she should have.
Then Max said, "What about you? Anybody waiting in the wings back in Kansas?"
"Nope. Charlie's the only man in my life."
Max gave the terrier a look out of the corner of his eye that reminded Zelda that he wasn't enamored of her beloved pet and that she should only proceed with caution.
But in spite of that, she heard herself say, "So, tell me a little about yourself."

Chapter Seven

"You want me to tell you a little about myself." Max repeated what Zelda had just said to him as they sat at her dining room table late Friday night sharing a pizza he'd brought over. "What do you want to know?"
Zelda refrained from saying everything. "You could tell me what you do for a living, for starters," she suggested, wishing she were even slightly less interested in this man who so obviously didn't love her dog.
"I'm an orthodontist."
"Ouch!"
Max laughed. "It's not that bad."
"My fondest memories are not of my orthodontia."
"But you ended up with a beautiful smile."
"Well, there is that," she said as if it didn't thrill her to hear he thought so. "Do you have your own practice?"
"I'm in with my best friend, Chad Thompson. We grew up together, went to college together, even went to dental school together."
"And tomorrow morning is your Saturday to work?"
"Actually, we both work on Saturday mornings. We have a clinic in downtown Denver for kids whose parents can't afford braces."
"That's nice," Zelda said, impressed by him and thinking that it redeemed him somewhat for not being a dog person.
"What about you?" he asked then. "What is it you do for a living that has you working out of your house?"
"I'm a technical writer."
He laughed again and Zelda liked the sound of it far too much. "A technical writer? As opposed to writers who have no technique?"
"Playing with semantics, are we? No, not as opposed to writers who have no technique. I write brochures, pamphlets, prospectuses, instruction booklets, things like that. Technical stuff."
"No great American novels?"
"Maybe someday. But in the meantime, an occasional charity pizza just won't keep me going. Plus I like sleeping with a roof over my head."
"In other words, even writers have bills to pay."
"Exactly."
"But this wasn't a charity pizza," he pointed out. "I was just looking for an excuse to see you again."
He'd said that in such a way that she wasn't sure if he was teasing her or not. But they'd finished eating by then and rather than giving her a chance to find out, Max glanced at the grandfather clock in the corner of the dining room and said, "I'd better get some beauty sleep. Saturdays are always early days and for some reason I have the feeling I'd better be on my toes for tomorrow afternoon's dog training."
"No doubt about it," Zelda agreed as she and Charlie walked him to the back door.
"Thanks for the pizza," she said when they got there.
"My pleasure."
He paused then, studying her with those penetrating eyes of his.
And Zelda suddenly found herself wondering if he might kiss her good night.
She knew it was a silly thought. After all, they'd only just met that morning. But it didn't seem to matter when she was fighting the wish that he would.
He didn't, though. Instead he broke off eye contact and left with a simple "See you tomorrow."
And along with the need to dispose of the pizza box once he was gone, Zelda was left to dispose of some pretty potent — and totally unfounded — disappointment, too.

Chapter Eight

"Okay, I know this sounds crazy but the dog psychologist said —"
"The dog psychologist?" Max repeated what Zelda had just said, his tone full of disbelief.
Zelda, Max, and Charlie were in Zelda's living room on Saturday afternoon, ready to begin Max's getting-to-know-Charlie session. Zelda's first goal was to get Charlie comfortable enough with Max so the terrier would at least not go into his frantic mode every time he saw their neighbor.
"I know," Zelda conceded. "Taking a dog to a shrink is a bit much. But I was trying to get him resocialized."
"Resocialized?"
"It's a long story. Anyway, if you would just get down on the floor with him, on his level, so you'll be nonthreatening."
Max studied her, his expression a combination of incredulity and amusement. "Is this just a way to get me to my knees?" he said with a hint of lasciviousness in his tone.
Zelda smiled back. "As a matter of fact, it is. For Charlie's sake."
Max chuckled. "You know, I wouldn't do this for just anybody," he said. He didn't get down on his hands and knees, though. He sat on the floor with his legs crossed Indian fashion.
Zelda — who was holding Charlie — set the terrier down. And Charlie immediately growled at Max.
"Don't make eye contact," Zelda instructed. "Let him come to you."
"Is he going to sever a limb?" Max asked as if he were only half kidding.
"He'll probably sniff you, but he'll be tentative about it at first, until he knows you won't grab him or hurt him. Nonthreatening, remember?"
Charlie did just that, checking out Max by slow increments, growling as he did. And the entire time Max stayed still, letting the dog do as he pleased.
"It's a positive sign that he's getting closer and closer," Zelda said.
Finally Charlie sat down in front of Max, reducing the growling to only intermittent grumblings.
"Now what?" Max asked.
"Say hi to him in a quiet, calm voice that's kind of high-pitched — dogs like high voices."
"You want me to be a falsetto?"
"And tell him he's a good boy," Zelda confirmed.
"Are you just trying to make me make a fool out of myself? Are you secretly taping this?"
"Dog psychology — that's all this is. If I get a little entertainment out of it, well, all the better," she teased.
"I'll do it. But only if you say you'll have dinner with me tonight. Without Charlie."
"Don't hurt his feelings."
"Say you will or else," Max warned.
"Nonthreatening," Zelda reminded.
"Say you will or else," Max repeated in a ridiculously high voice that made her laugh.
"Okay, yes, I'll have dinner with you tonight without Charlie. Now use that voice on him."
"Not a chance." But Max did tell Charlie he was a good boy in a soft, soothing tone that sounded much better.
"Now hold your hand with your fingers curled so it looks like a paw and slowly reach it out to him without actually touching him so he can sniff that."
Max looked at her suspiciously and shook his head, again in disbelief. "This better be worth it," he said with a glint of pure wickedness in his eyes.
Very appealing wickedness that made Zelda look all the more forward to dinner alone with him.

Chapter Nine

Max had told Zelda that he was taking her to an upscale Mexican restaurant called La Loma Saturday night, after their first round of getting her dog familiar with him. So she dressed in a pair of black Capri pants and a white sweater set. She twisted her hair at the back of her head, held it there with chopsticks, and left a spray of ends at her crown. Then she applied blush, mascara, and lipstick — all slightly heavier for the evening.
Max came to her front door to pick her up this time, looking very spiffy in charcoal gray slacks and a black silk shirt with a banded collar.
He drove a red sports car and his manners were impeccable — he held the door open for her at the curb and again in the restaurant parking lot, and he even helped seat her when they were shown to a table.
"I recommend the margaritas and the green chili on anything," he told her as they glanced over the menu.
Once they'd ordered, his attention was so focused on her that Zelda felt as if he didn't realize there were other people in the place.
"So how'd I do today?" he asked.
Zelda knew he was referring to how things had gone with Charlie. "I think it went okay. Charlie stopped growling at you and showing you his teeth."
"And he didn't take off my hand when I tried to pet him at the end. Don't forget that."
"True," Zelda agreed. Then she said, "What about you?"
"What about me?"
"Feeling any warm, fuzzy feelings for my dog?"
Max laughed. A bit uncomfortably, Zelda thought. "As dogs go, I guess Charlie is...a dog."
Zelda laughed at that even though the joke wasn't heartening. "In other words I don't have to worry about you fighting me for custody of him."
"My lawyer is out of town."
"And you haven't been won over to the dog lovers' side of the fence."
He let that go unanswered and instead said, "What do we do with him tomorrow?"
"I thought we'd try a walk to the park, along with more of the stuff we did today. Charlie loves the park and maybe he'll love you for taking him."
Max looked dubious but he didn't voice his doubts. He just said, "I promised to baby-sit my niece in the afternoon. Does Charlie hate kids, too?"
"He's wild for kids. How old is your niece?"
"Four. And she likes parks, too."
"I'll bring a ball for her to throw for Charlie. They'll both get a kick out of that," Zelda said. "But for some of the time I should probably take your niece to the swings or something and leave you and Charlie to play catch so he connects you with having fun, too."
"Ah, more doggy psychology. It takes a lot of work just to leave your dog overnight," Max commented then.
"It didn't used to."
But Zelda didn't want to go into that and she was spared the need when their food arrived.
Once their waiter had left, Max said, "Okay, no more dog talk. The day belonged to Charlie but tonight belongs to me."
"Down, boy," Zelda teased at the devilish wiggle of Max's eyebrows.
But under the surface she was only too happy to have the subject of Charlie closed so she could get to know more about the great-looking guy she was with. The guy who seemed to make her every nerve ending come alive just with a glance of those gorgeous eyes.
Even though he still didn't seem to care for her dog.

Chapter Ten

"So do you have just the one niece?" Zelda asked Max over burritos smothered in green chili when they'd put a moratorium on talk of Charlie to enjoy their Saturday night date.
"Tiffany — who will be with us for Get-Charlie-Acquainted-with-Me Sunday — is my only niece. But I have five nephews."
"Wow. From how many brothers and sisters?"
"One of each. My brother has two sets of twins, believe it or not — four boys. And my sister has Tiff and a one-year-old baby boy. But since I don't do diapers, our folks are keeping Tommy tomorrow afternoon."
"So your parents are still living?"
"Alive and well and usually traveling in their motor home. What about yours?"
"There's just my mom. She's the librarian at the same elementary school I went to as a kid," Zelda said.
"And what about brothers or sisters? Nieces or nephews?"
"I have one sister and she's pregnant for the first time. The baby is due Christmas day. There are three other dogs in the family, though. All Jack Russell terriers. My mother has two and my sister has Charlie's brother."
Max rolled his eyes. "You really are dog people, aren't you?"
"We love our puppies," Zelda confessed.
Dinner conversation continued in that vein, without there ever being a lull or an awkward silence. Max was just so easy to talk to. Or listen to, since he talked as openly as Zelda did.
The problem was, before she knew it, it was nearly midnight and Max was walking her to her door to end the evening.
"Would you like to come in for a nightcap?" she asked, hoping he would say yes.
But he didn't and she was afraid the sound of Charlie barking from inside the house was the reason.
"I'd better not," Max said. "Tiff is being delivered to me at eight in the morning and I was hoping to get in a little gym time before that. Besides, Charlie's probably already mad at me for taking you away tonight."
Zelda unlocked her door but didn't open it. Instead she turned back to Max with thoughts of kissing once again dancing through her head.
"Thanks for dinner. Again," she said, trying not to get her hopes up.
"Any time," he answered in a voice that was suddenly quiet, more intimate. He was looking into her eyes, searching them, and Zelda was held in that silver gaze. Then, without warning, he leaned forward and actually did kiss her. Softly at first, as if he were testing the waters.
But the waters were just fine and Zelda let him know that by kissing him back, even raising a hand to that hard chest she'd been memorizing from afar since she moved in.
Then he deepened the kiss and oh, was he good at it! His lips were parted just so and warm against hers as he brought one big hand to brace the back of her head and laid the other along the column of her neck where he made tiny circles with his thumb that sent tingles raining all over her.
But all too soon the kiss was over and he said good night, leaving her to slip into her house alone.
With only the memory of that kiss and the longing for much, much more.

Chapter Eleven

Sunday at noon Zelda went into her kitchen to fix herself lunch before she and Charlie spent the afternoon with Max. But on her way to the refrigerator she passed the window over the sink that gave her a panoramic view of the rear of her neighbor's house. And there he was, on his patio, with the niece he'd told Zelda he was baby-sitting today.
Zelda couldn't resist taking her favorite spy position at the window over the sink to watch the two of them. It was quite a scene. They were apparently having a tea party that the little girl — whose name was Tiffany — had set up. After all, Zelda doubted that Max had arranged for his niece to sit in one of his lawn chairs and himself to sit on a small step stool behind their respective TV trays.
Max was a big man and his knees were nearly to his chin while Tiffany's feet dangled at least a foot from the ground. But she was sitting very primly, drinking from a miniature teacup, and, from the way it looked, urging Max to do the same.
Zelda had to smile at the sight of Max's large fingers delicately grasping the tiny handle of his cup. It was all so sweet. And even from a distance Zelda could tell Tiffany was taken with her uncle.
Not that Zelda could blame her. She was pretty taken with Tiffany's uncle, too. Even though she didn't want to be.
Yes, he seemed like the perfect guy. He was kind and intelligent, he was funny and even-tempered. He was incredible-looking and so sexy he made steam rise off her skin.
But despite the fact that he obviously liked kids, he still wasn't crazy about Charlie. And to Zelda, Charlie was like her child.
So she was torn.
It would have been easier if he wasn't as terrific as he was. If he was just some plain, ordinary, boring guy. Some plain, ordinary, boring guy who didn't turn her on.
But he was definitely not plain or ordinary or boring. And boy, did he turn her on!
That simple kiss they'd shared the previous night had left her every sense awake and alive. She hadn't been able to sleep until the wee hours of the morning because that kiss had replayed itself in her mind a million times. The feel of his mouth against hers. His lips slightly parted. The taste of him. His hand cupping her head. The hardness of his pectorals where she'd pressed her palm to his chest...
Zelda lost herself all over again in just the thought of it. She wished that wasn't the case. She wished what was happening to her, what was happening between her and Max, wasn't happening. He was stirring things inside her that she didn't want stirred by someone who didn't love her dog as much as she did.
"So put on the brakes," she advised herself aloud.
But as she watched him mimic his niece by dabbing at the corners of his supple mouth, Zelda just couldn't help the swell of emotions inside her.
Or the driving need to be with him again as soon as possible.

Chapter Twelve

As planned, Zelda, Max and Max's four-year-old niece, Tiffany, took Charlie to the park Sunday afternoon. Tiffany was an adorable little girl with coal-black hair and bright green eyes who clearly adored her uncle.
She was enamoured of Charlie, too, and walked ahead of the grown-ups to be beside the Jack Russell terrier as they all headed for the small park not far from home.
"Did you enjoy your tea party earlier?" Zelda asked Max, who was holding tight to Charlie's leash.
Max smiled and glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. "Saw that, did you?"
"When I went into the kitchen to make my lunch. How come you got stuck sitting on the step stool with your knees up around your ears?"
"Because Tiff was the princess, so of course she had to sit on the throne. I was just her slave, Dagworth."
Zelda laughed. "Dagworth? So if I call you that will you be my slave, too?"
"Maybe," he said with a wicked undertone. "But I might want more than a tea party from you."
"Guess you better just be the dog-sitter then," she countered. But the innuendo was enough to send goose bumps up her arms.
When they reached the park Zelda taught Max how to get Charlie to obey simple commands. Then she took Tiffany to the jungle gym and left Max to throw the ball so Charlie could fetch it. Charlie loved the game and it went a long way in making him like anyone who played it with him.
As Zelda watched the two, she came to the conclusion that Max was good enough with Charlie to put to rest her qualms about leaving Charlie with him. She felt confident that Max would treat her dog well for the short time she was gone.
He just wasn't likely to get down on the floor to cuddle with him or play tug-of-war. And while Zelda told herself that was okay for a single night, it didn't seem to bode well for anything beyond that overnight dog-sitting. And that gave her some sharp pangs she tried to ignore.
After Max had thrown the ball for Charlie for a long while Tiffany got to take over that duty for a few tosses before Max suggested they walk a little farther down the street to a small shop that sold gelato.
Tiffany jumped at the idea but was incorrigible when it came to slipping Charlie bites of the wafer cookie that came with her bowl of ice cream. Still, it was a nice afternoon and by the time it was over Zelda was even more impressed with Max's skills with kids.
"You'll make a good dad someday," she told him as he handed Charlie's leash to her and gave Tiffany a piggyback ride home.
"Are you suggesting something? Because I have the night free," he joked.
But Zelda ignored that second innuendo and instead said, "Good, because I'll need to run you through Charlie's routine and show you all his stuff so I can just hand him over to you in the morning."
"Do I get dinner, too?" he said as if she'd propositioned him.
"Burgers and fries?"
He pretended rapture. "You do know the way to my heart. I can never say no after something like that."
Zelda laughed. "Maybe I was wrong and you are a bad man."
"Nuh-uh," Tiffany said to voice her disagreement.
Max leaned over to whisper in Zelda's ear, "But I can sometimes be persuaded to be bad." Then he straightened up and said, "I'll be over as soon as Tiff gets picked up."

Chapter Thirteen

For Sunday evening's dinner with Max, Zelda opted for spaghetti, meatballs, salad, and bread rather than the burgers and fries she'd told him they were going to have. As she set the table it occurred to her that they'd eaten dinner together every night since they'd met.
She didn't regret it. In fact, what she thought she was likely to regret was not having dinner with him every night when she returned from Kansas and they went back to their respective schedules and routines.
But she still had tonight, she reminded herself, deciding not to ruin it by thinking about the future.
"You brought wine to have with burgers and fries?" Zelda commented when Max arrived at seven and presented her with the bottle.
"I thought we'd both earned it after a day of kids and dogs. Besides, now that I'm here, it isn't fast-food burgers and fries I'm smelling. It's something Italian."
She confessed that she'd cooked, and they decided to run through the last of her instructions for Charlie's care before they really put the dogs and kids part of the day behind them.
But once Zelda had completed all the feeding and sleeping information, they sat at her dining room table — lit by two long white candles — and concentrated on each other.
"So tell me why there's no Mr. Zelda McAffry," Max encouraged.
"There almost was. About a year ago. I was engaged to a stockbroker."
"But you didn't go through with it?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because of Charlie," she answered.
"You broke off your engagement because of your dog?" Max said in a neutral tone that didn't fool Zelda for a minute.
"Because of Charlie and what Terry did to him and what that said about Terry."
"Explain?"
Zelda took a deep breath.
"When we got engaged Terry moved into my house. He hadn't shown much affection for Charlie but he'd seemed to tolerate him and so I didn't think it was a problem. But after about a month of living together Terry's true colors started to show — primarily with Charlie. He was impatient. He lost his temper easily and would scream at Charlie until Charlie cowered behind a chair. He'd throw things at him. He'd leave Charlie outside no matter what the weather — things like that. I was hoping Terry would get used to Charlie and mellow out but instead he only got worse. Then one day I caught him literally kicking Charlie out the door. He broke one of Charlie's ribs."
"What a jerk!"
Zelda appreciated the very real outrage in Max's voice. "Physically Charlie was okay but by then he was so fearful of men that his whole personality had changed —"
"Which is why he needed resocializing."
"Exactly. And as for Terry, well, he was history with me."
They'd finished eating by then and Max insisted on helping with the cleanup. Zelda would rather have stayed at the table, looking at his handsome face but she was going to have to get up at four a.m. to make her flight the next day so she knew she shouldn't drag out the evening.
Still, as she began to wash the dishes and hand them to Max to dry, she was intent on doing a little inquiring of her own, so she said, "What about you? Why isn't there a Mrs. Max Greer?"

Chapter Fourteen

"Why isn't there a Mrs. Max Greer?" Max repeated the question Zelda had just asked him as they washed and dried the dishes after sharing Sunday dinner and a bottle of wine. "I considered marriage once. About two years ago. But instead I decided to try the whole living together thing first."
"And it didn't work out?" Zelda probed.
"I think if it had only been the two of us, it might have."
"Did she have kids?"
"Animals."
"Bad kids?"
Max laughed. "No, I mean she really had animals. Four dogs, three cats, two rabbits, a ferret, a box turtle, and a snake."
"She had a lot of animals."
"A lot."
"And you didn't like them?" Zelda assumed.
"It's not as if I hate animals. I even went out of my way to accommodate them — that's where the doggy door you got stuck in came from. But it just got to be too much. All the hair and dander and mess. The smells. Having animals in bed with us. On the furniture. Fighting with each other. Getting out of the yard. Getting sick. Biting me. Prue was never interested in letting me get used to her pets slowly — it was all or nothing. Finally I had my fill. I said it's the animals or me — choose."
"And she chose the animals."
"She chose the animals," he confirmed.
"And you swore off pets for good," Zelda added.
Max didn't answer that readily but she thought that pause was pretty telling in itself.
Finally he repeated, "I really had my fill of critters."
He would probably never know how sorry Zelda was to hear that.
But he softened the blow somewhat by saying, "But one thing I can swear to — no matter how bad it got, I never kicked or hurt a single one of them. So you don't have to worry."
After Zelda had explained to Max that her former fiancй's kicking Charlie had ended their relationship, she appreciated that reassurance. Although since she hadn't seen any signs that Max had the temper Terry had had she wasn't concerned that he would harm Charlie.
"I trust you," she told him.
The dishes were all done by then and as Max set the dish towel on the countertop he said, "I should take off so you can pack."
"I don't need much for just overnight," she said by way of hinting that she didn't want him to go.
But Max headed for the back door anyway and Zelda had no choice but to follow him.
Once he reached the door, though, he turned to face her.
"Thanks for dinner," he said, taking her hand to squeeze for emphasis.
"Sure," she said, distracted by his touch and the rush of warmth that ran through her.
"I'm going to miss you," he said then in a husky voice. "Seems strange since we've only known each other a few days, but it just hit me."
He was looking so intently into her eyes that she was melting rapidly beneath his gaze and the touch of his hand, and she didn't even answer him. She just tipped her chin up to him as he leaned in to kiss her.
But unlike the night before, there was no hesitancy even from the start. This kiss started out full of passion as Max wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close. His mouth opened over hers and his tongue came to tease her tongue.
But then the kiss was over, and she was light-headed and weak-kneed, and had to fight not to beg him for what her body was craving.
As if lingering might make it impossible for him to leave at all, Max said a raspy, "See you in the morning," and left.
And Zelda deflated against the door he closed after himself, wondering how she was going to survive even two days without him.…

Chapter Fifteen

"There you go, Charlie, dinner is served," Max informed the terrier Monday night when he set the dog dish on his kitchen floor and then took his own cartons of take-out Chinese food to the table.
Charlie was lying with his head between his two front paws. He moved only his eyes to look from Max to the dog dish and back again, staring at Max rather than showing any interest in his evening meal.
Max interpreted. "That's right, it's just you and me tonight. Zelda is back in Kansas and we're on our own."
Charlie merely went on looking at Max with sad eyes.
"Yeah, I know, things aren't the same without her, are they? It makes sense that that's the way it is for you. But what about me? Why should everything seem so drab and colorless and boring just because she's not here? Last week at this time it didn't matter that I didn't know her and now here I am, feeling all down in the mouth just because she's gone."
Charlie continued to ignore his food and Max realized he wasn't enjoying his, either. He pushed the cartons away. "Wish I knew what the hell was going on with me," he confided to the dog. "Three lousy days — that's how long I've known her and here I am, pining for her as much as you are."
Except that the three days he'd known Zelda had been anything but lousy. They'd been great. So great that he couldn't remember when he'd felt as good. So great that he'd spent every minute that they'd been apart looking forward to seeing her again. So great that now that he knew he wasn't going to see her, even getting out of bed didn't seem worth the bother.
"She's something, your mom is," he informed Charlie. "She's bright and beautiful and she makes everything a little better just by being around. In case you hadn't noticed."
Charlie finally got up but he didn't go to his dish. Instead he came to stand beside Max as if he'd understood what Max had been talking about and since he felt the same way, they'd forged a kind of bond.
Max reached down to pet the terrier, laughing wryly as he did. "We're quite a pair, aren't we? Moping around like two lovesick puppies."
Lovesick? Was that what he'd just said? He couldn't be lovesick after only three days. Was he out of his mind?
Maybe. What other explanation could there be for sitting at his kitchen table feeling low because Zelda wasn't with him? Or for dog-sitting — of all things — for her? He actually had another animal in his house, at his feet, and he was petting it — that was so unbelievable it had to qualify as insanity. Especially when he'd sworn off pets and people with pets and ever having another pet in his house.
"I could be in some trouble here, Charlie," he said then.
As if to reciprocate the comfort Max had given him, Charlie jumped into Max's lap and licked his face.
And it actually made Max smile and feel a little better.
"Oh yeah, I'm in trouble.…"

Chapter Sixteen

"Okay, I'm all checked in and they'll be boarding in about twenty minutes," Zelda told her sister Kate on Tuesday afternoon.
Kate had taken her to the airport and was waiting with her at the gate.
"You must really like Denver," Kate said then. "You're so anxious to get back."
"I'm just worried about Charlie. This is the first time I've left him since the whole Terry deal."
"Uh-huh," Kate said as if she weren't buying that for a minute. "And I suppose it doesn't have anything to do with that guy you haven't stopped talking about since you got here?"
"I haven't talked about Max that much."
Kate laughed. "Enough so that you know who I'm referring to even without my telling you."
"Oh, you're full of it," Zelda claimed as if her sister were talking nonsense.
"No, you're full of this guy."
"He's just my neighbor. And if he's been on my mind it's only because he's taking care of Charlie and I'm worried about it."
"Hasn't sounded like worry."
"Well, that's what it is. He's just a nice man who agreed to help me out of a bind even though he doesn't like dogs. Or pets of any kind."
"Like Terry."
"He's not as bad as Terry was. Max isn't mean to Charlie —"
"He'd just prefer it if there wasn't a Charlie."
"Yes," Zelda conceded, hating that it was true and just how much of an obstacle that was for her.
"And if there wasn't a Charlie? Would you admit that you really — really — like this guy?"
"I'm not denying that I like him."
"But Charlie is a great big wrench thrown into the works," Kate persisted. "So does that mean there's no future for you and the neighbor?"
It surprised Zelda to find how sharply her sister's conclusion jabbed at her. Certainly it was something she'd thought herself since meeting Max, but hearing it out loud, said by someone else, made her want to refute it.
She fought the urge but wasn't completely successful and ended up saying, "I don't know."
"You don't know if you would submit Charlie to another guy who doesn't like him?"
"No, I know I won't do that."
"Then you don't know what? If this guy doesn't like dogs and you won't have a non dog-person around Charlie long-term, then there's no future with the neighbor, is there?"
"Maybe Max will learn to like Charlie," Zelda said hopefully.
"You thought that about Terry," Kate reminded.
"What do you want me to say?" Zelda asked her sister more snappishly than she'd meant to.
"Hey, don't get mad at me. I'm just trying to find out what's going on with you and what the possibilities are."
"Nothing is going on with me," Zelda said, cooling her tone. "I've only known Max for a few days. Yes, he's incredible-looking. Yes, he has a body to die for. Yes, he's funny and fun to be with and smart and accomplished and he kisses so well that my toes curl. Yes, I like everything about him except that he's not crazy about animals and doesn't want them around. And as long as that's true, we're at opposite ends of the spectrum and that's that."
And if she couldn't help wishing things might be different?
Then maybe she just had to remember that wishing didn't make it so.
Although some wishes did come true, didn't they?

Chapter Seventeen

At six o'clock Tuesday evening Zelda drove straight from Denver International Airport to Max's house rather than to her own. She told herself it was the quickest and easiest way to pick up Charlie. And that was true. It was just that she was also trying to pretend that seeing Max wasn't a factor.
But deep down she was every bit as excited to see her neighbor as she was to see her dog.
So her first thought when she parked at Max's curb and he rushed out his front door was that he was as eager to see her. Except she didn't understand why that handsome face of his was so tense.
"He's gone," Max announced before Zelda had managed a hello.
"Who's gone?" she asked dimly.
"Charlie. I got home from the office a few minutes ago, let him out the back, and went in to change clothes. Charlie started barking his head off and I looked out the window to see why. He was chasing a squirrel and he went right over the front of the fence after it."
It took a moment for that information to sink in.
"And you didn't go after him?" Zelda demanded, looking up and down the street for signs of Charlie but finding nothing.
"That's what I was coming out to do right now."
"Instead of the minute he went over the fence?"
"I had to put on pants, Zelda."
Zelda fought the instant image of Max without pants. "Did you see which way he went?" she said as panic began to rise within her.
Max pointed to the west. "If you want to go home, I'll look for him."
"I already trusted you with him and you've lost him. You go home and I'll find him myself."
"I didn't do this on purpose, Zelda," Max said, shocked by her reaction.
But Zelda's fears were multiplying by the minute and she didn't have much control over what was going through her mind or coming out her mouth. "I know you don't like him. Are you sure you didn't see him go over the fence and take your time going after him so he'd be long gone?"
"You don't believe that," Max said, his own tone heating up.
"I believe I left my dog with you and now he's gone."
"And do you not believe that he's getting farther away every minute you waste accusing me of something ridiculous?"
"Oh, now I'm ridiculous," Zelda shouted.
But he was right that she was wasting precious seconds so, without saying more to Max, she headed up the street, calling Charlie's name, watching for him, making the clicking sound that Charlie always mistook for a squirrel's chattering and usually brought him running.
But by the time she'd reached the cross street — with Max a silent partner right beside her — she still hadn't so much as caught a glimpse of Charlie, and her panic level was rapidly increasing.
And then another horrible thought popped into her head and before she'd thought better of it, it also rolled out off her tongue.
"Are you sure you didn't take Charlie to the dog pound yesterday after I left for the airport?"

Chapter Eighteen

"Did you really just ask me if I took Charlie to the pound yesterday when you left for the airport?" Max repeated the question Zelda had blurted out.
She'd arrived home to find Max rushing from his house, claiming that Charlie had just jumped the fence chasing a squirrel. But they couldn't find him and unreasonable fear had taken over in Zelda, putting all kinds of bad thoughts in her mind.
"You think I got rid of your dog and then just waited for you to come home to pretend he ran away?" Max continued in disbelief.
"I don't know what to think."
"Well, I don't know how the hell you could think that. In the first place it isn't something I'd ever — ever — do. And in the second place, the damn dog actually grew on me. I even let him sleep in my bed last night and I came home for lunch today to play with him so he wouldn't be lonely."
A part of Zelda believed him. But another part of her was so scared, so worried, she just couldn't think straight. All she knew was that the dog she loved like a child was lost and Max was responsible for it. That she'd left her pet with a man who had told her from the get-go that he didn't like dogs and maybe she'd been so enamored of his good looks and personality and sex appeal that she'd discounted his feelings for Charlie when she shouldn't have.
But rather than making things worse by saying something else she might regret, she didn't answer Max. She just went on searching for Charlie, calling his name, desperate just to find her dog.
And then she did. She spotted Charlie between two houses, nosing at the fence.
"Charlie! Come!" she commanded.
Charlie's ears perked up and he paused to see who was calling him before his tail wagged wildly and he ran toward them.
Right to Max.
Max picked him up as if Charlie were his dog. "Hello, trouble," he said affectionately, yet still sounding frustrated and relieved, too.
Then he handed Charlie to Zelda and said, "Well, would you look at that? He wasn't at the pound after all. He must have just jumped the fence a few minutes ago the way I said he did."
"Okay, maybe I was a little out of line. But —"
"A little out of line? You had me arrested, tried, and convicted of unlawful dog disposal, and you were ready to string me up yourself."
"I knew you didn't like him" was all Zelda could think of to say to defend herself.
"Then why did you leave him with me?" Max said, obviously the angrier of the two of them by then.
But apparently he was too angry to even allow her to answer because before she could, he said, "Look, I've already had experience with someone who put animals before people. I don't need a repeat of it."
Then he turned and walked back the way they'd come.
And Zelda was left with nothing but her dog, helplessly watching Max go and taking with him any hope for more of what they'd begun over the weekend.

Chapter Nineteen

For a time Zelda just stood on the street, watching Max walk away. She'd only returned from her trip a short time before to find Max rushing outside to search for Charlie, who had jumped the fence. But in her panic over the thought of her dog being lost, she'd said some harsh things to Max.
He'd gotten angry. Very angry. And even though Zelda knew she'd played a part in it all, she was slightly taken aback herself to see Max's temper. A temper that had thrown her into memories of her former fiancй's outbursts.
So she didn't go after Max. In fact, she stayed where she was — far up Max's block — holding tight to Charlie until Max was nearly to his house.
Only then did she head for her car where it was parked at his curb.
"I don't want someone who yells at me any more than I want someone who yells at you," Zelda informed Charlie along the way.
Of course she'd been the one to start the shouting, a contrary little voice in her head reminded her as she reached her car and put Charlie inside. But still she didn't go up to Max's house. She got behind the wheel and drove around the block to her own place.
Only, once she was home again and Charlie was safely carrying around his toy beaver as he always did when he first came in, Zelda began to cool off. She began to calm down.
She began to have regrets. It was pretty crummy of her to have gotten so furious with Max, she thought. After all, she knew for a fact that Charlie could go over the fence in the blink of an eye. He'd done it on her watch, too. That was how she and Max had met.
And apparently Max had been good to Charlie while she was gone since Charlie had run to Max instead of to her when they'd finally found him. Obviously Charlie was not only no longer afraid of him, Charlie liked him.
Plus now Max liked Charlie, too. He'd told her so.
But what had she done almost the moment she'd arrived on the scene? She'd accused Max of not going after Charlie fast enough when he'd seen the terrier jump the fence. And worse, she'd even suggested that Max might have taken Charlie to the pound to get rid of him and was only pretending that Charlie had run away.
Zelda cringed when she recalled that now. Max had done her a huge favor by dog-sitting for her. He'd spent most of his weekend complying with her request to let Charlie get familiar and comfortable with him. But had she thanked him for all his trouble? No, she'd attacked him.
So she had to admit that maybe Max had had cause to lose his temper with her. Maybe it wasn't a show of the kind of short fuse her former fiancй had exhibited too often.
"Do you think I really blew it?" she asked Charlie.
But even though Charlie was busy with the beaver and ignored her, Zelda still realized that she really had been unfair to Max and that she couldn't just let it go at that.
Even if it wasn't going to be easy to face him again.

Chapter Twenty

Zelda hoped no one was watching as she lifted Charlie over the fence that divided her property from Max's and then set about climbing over it herself. It wasn't the most graceful thing she'd ever attempted.
She put her foot into the chain link about halfway up and hoisted herself to a sitting position on the top rail. She had every intention of swinging her legs onto Max's side and hopping down.
There was only one glitch. She didn't lift her second leg high enough and her cuff got caught.
"Oh, great," she muttered, trying to retain her balance and free herself at the same time.
As she did, Charlie made a beeline for Max's house and, rather than wiggling through the doggy door as he had before, he sat there and barked until Max appeared.
"Thanks a lot," Zelda said under her breath as a still angry-looking Max came outside.
"Stuck again?" he asked.
"I'm afraid so," she admitted reluctantly.
Max had reached her by then. He did a quick survey and pulled her pant leg free so Zelda could finally drop down on his side of the fence.
"I would have brought Charlie's things over," he said then, clearly assuming that had been the purpose of her attempted visit.
"That's not why I'm here."
"No?"
She would have liked a better segue but since it was too late for that, she plunged in. "I'm here because after I thought about it I realized that you have every reason to be mad at me. I totally freaked out and I was wrong to say what I said to you. I can tell you were good to Charlie by the way he's acting with you now and I had no business accusing you of not taking care of him or taking him to the pound. I'm sorry."
For a long moment Max didn't respond and Zelda worried that she really had ruined things with him. She was afraid he was going to say her apology was too little, too late, and that she should just stay on her own side of the fence and leave him alone. And really, she wouldn't have blamed him if he had.
But then he said, "I overreacted, too. I was upset myself that I'd lost Charlie. I don't really think you're like my animal-crazed ex."
"So we're okay?" Zelda hazarded.
Max finally cracked a smile. "No, we're better than okay."
He took her hand and pulled her into his arms, kissing her there and then to prove it. A deep, passionate kiss that was almost too intimate for the outdoors.
And when the kiss ended he remained holding her, smiling down at her. "But I think we'd better consider putting up a higher fence around the perimeters of both yards to keep that mutt inside. And maybe we could just get rid of this stretch in the middle. I don't think I want anything coming between us from here on."
It was music to Zelda's ears. "Charlie will be in and out your doggy door," she warned.
"And what about Charlie's mom?"
"I'd rather not use the doggy door, if it's just the same to you. I'm kind of tired of getting stuck and needing you to rescue me."
Max laughed. "I'm happy to do it. But that isn't what I meant. I meant what does Charlie's mom think about tearing down fences so nothing comes between us?"
"Charlie's mom likes that idea. A lot."
"Good. Because I don't know about you, but I think thanks to Charlie we have something worth hanging on to here."
It was Zelda's turn to smile. So big it almost hurt. "Me, too."
Max kissed her again, a kiss full of promise of things yet to come. But in the middle of it Charlie barked at them, wanting some attention.
They ended the kiss and both glanced down at the terrier, but it was Zelda who said with a grin, "Sorry, Charlie, you had your turn — now he's mine."
 

The End