“Good job, sweetheart,” she told him. “You eat that and keep it down, and we’ll try a second helping, okay?”
Again, his ears perked up and he looked up at her. Then he bobbed his head in what she would have been prepared to swear in court was a nod before returning to his food.
“You are definitely not a stray. You’ve had training, for sure,” she murmured. “I wonder…”
She took a deep breath and opened up to what she thought of as her second, more valuable, gift. With the same senses that allowed her to recognize and communicate with ghosts on an almost-telepathic level, she could connect with animals. Not in words, precisely, but through an emotional connection. She had never been quite sure how to label it, but the fact was that she could reassure and rehabilitate animals who had suffered trauma…even those that the rest of the world was prepared to give up on.
She knew she needed to get to work tending to everyone else—they were loudly making their demands known—but she couldn’t resist trying.
Hey, sweet boy. You’re going to be safe now. I don’t know what happened to you, but we’ll find out if you’re okay at the vet and if you have a microchip, and we’ll get you back home if you’re just lost, okay?
When she projected the emotions associated with the word “home,” the dog stopped eating, dropped into a crouch, flattened his ears against his head, and stared up at her. Sudden waves of terror lashed out from him so powerfully that they made her recoil, and he lifted his lips away from his teeth, baring unusually long canines. A low growl spilled out of his throat, but it was definitely fear, not aggression, causing it. She knew that as well as she knew her own name.
“Okay, okay. No home. We won’t take you anywhere. You will stay here, and you will be safe. Do you hear me?”
The growling stopped, but he still crouched in a fight-or-flight pose, the waves of fear receding but still there.
I promise you. You will be safe. I will protect you and care for you. Do you understand?
The dog suddenly wiggled his body like he was shaking off water. Then he returned to his food as if okay now that the crisis had passed.
Alice felt a sharp stab of pure rage that anyone had treated this sweet boy so badly as to cause that kind of bone-deep fear. But then she closed her eyes, took a deep, centering breath, and returned to calm. Animals were extremely sensitive to variations in mood. If she went out to the main room in this state of agitation, she’d have a growling, hissing, snarling riot on her hands.
When she was calm again, she walked out to the large space at the heart of her shelter. “Hello, my darlings. I’m home. How is everyone tonight?”
The shelter was at capacity with twenty—now twenty-one, with the new addition—cats and dogs, four guinea pigs, two rabbits, and a ferret. And Marigold. Alice walked up and down the rows, giving a bit of attention to each, projecting waves of peace, and looking for signs of distress. Then she started in on feeding, giving them a late second dinner, carefully modulating food choices depending on their needs. Some, like Petunia the pug, were so emaciated from being loose in the wild, probably abandoned, that they had to be carefully fed with special foods and nutrients to avoid the sickness and regurgitation of refeeding syndrome.
Others, like Cleopatra the Persian cat, had specific needs that depended on the illnesses or injuries they were recovering from. Cleopatra’s fur was only now beginning to grow back after the house fire she’d been caught in had burned her so badly she’d nearly died. Her family, financially devastated by the fire and their lack of insurance, had moved up north to live with a relative who was desperately allergic to cats, so they’d believed they’d had no choice but to let her go. The veterinarian who’d taken Cleo in had called Alice as soon as the situation became clear. Dr. Geary had donated her time, but Little Darlings needed to pick up the cost of the medicines and other expenses Cleo had incurred during her stay at the hospital.
Alice winced at the thought. She’d need to find a way to raise more money soon; a rescue group couldn’t succeed without the help of kind and generous people who donated money, time, and supplies. Some people at the event that evening had promised donations, which would help. She did her best with what she had and didn’t take any salary at all, but her roof needed repair, and food and medicines for the animals were always a priority.
The animals under her care had all been through difficult times. The rescue community knew her place as a special resource for damaged or severely injured or traumatized pets, and they sent her their most fragile. Cats, dogs, the very occasional wild animal, like Marigold—there were wildlife rescue organizations that were far more able to provide the special care that such animals needed, but those who’d been kept as pets, like Marigold, had somewhat different requirements.
Hamsters, guinea pigs. She’d even taken in her first ferret, just the day before.
All of them wanted and needed love and attention—even those who were too afraid to realize it. Even those who claimed they needed nobody. Alice didn’t even try to pretend that she didn’t include herself in that number. She’d been fiercely alone for so long, but what wouldn’t she give for the chance at a real connection?
The answers came too quickly: her freedom. Her safety. Her life. Those were all things that she wouldn’t give up for a temporary fling that would probably go bad. Except…Hunter’s face popped into her mind again.
Those moments she’d been in his arms…she’d suddenly realized why people fell into bad relationships. There were times when soul-deadening loneliness smashed into intense attraction, and even she, who had to protect herself at all times, had felt the sweet, deceptive urge to succumb. To turn her face up to Hunter’s and ask him to kiss her.
Or, even better, for her to kiss him.
She laughed at how utterly fearless she was in the safety of her own mind and opened the crate to another wounded being who liked to pretend he needed no one. Ajax the German shepherd mix. She fed him and sat cross-legged on the floor of his kennel to give him the ear scratching he loved. He pretended to be aloof, sitting regally with his head held high, facing slightly away from her, until she paused in the ear scratches. Then he glanced at her and scooted closer until he was practically in her lap. Ajax had been rescued from a dog-fight ring, and his scars proved that he’d been through some very hard times. He’d been with her for four months, and it had taken her every bit of the first three to get him to trust her. Now he was finally receptive to attention and beginning to believe he wouldn’t be put back in danger at any second. His second-favorite activity of the day, close behind runs in her fenced-in yard, was listening to the schoolkid volunteers when they came to read stories to the animals.
He was still a volatile combination of wariness and a poignant need for attention, and she suddenly realized that she’d sensed the same cocktail of emotions in Hunter Evans.