Not Just The Girl Next Door. Stacy Connelly

for the poor dog.

      “Well,” the older woman mused, “there is someone.” Spotting another volunteer walking up the gravel parking lot with a gorgeous yellow Lab, Birdie said, “Excuse me for one moment.”

      After speaking to the young woman, Birdie returned to Mollie’s side. “Come with me. There’s something you should see.”

      Leading the way back down the hall toward the visitation room, Birdie stopped at the large viewing window. As she stepped up to the glass, Mollie looked for Chief in his corner, but the dog wasn’t there. Instead, he was sitting in the middle of the room, gazing adoringly at a gorgeous blonde.

      “He doesn’t even look like the same dog,” Mollie said, amazed by the change in his demeanor. Though his ears were still back and his head bowed in typical submissive behavior, Chief had stopped shaking. She might have even seen a hint of a tail wag across the linoleum floor. “Who is that in there with him?”

      Birdie grinned. “That is Charlie.”

      “Charlie.” Mollie took a closer look at the large dog circling the room with her nose pressed to the ground and her tail swishing through the air. “Isn’t she the dog Claire and Matt were considering for his niece before Ellie ended up falling in love with Sparkle?”

      Claire Asher, a teacher at the local middle school and fellow volunteer, had recently gotten engaged to her one-time high school sweetheart, Matt Fielding. The two of them had reunited while helping Ellie train Sparkle.

      “Yes. Matt’s sister wanted a smaller dog. I’m starting to think that might be just as well, seeing how Chief is so attached to Charlie. Bunny is hoping we can find someone to adopt them as a pair, but with larger dogs, that’s not as likely.”

      Adopting them out together would be ideal. So, too, would fostering them as a pair. Not that Mollie had arrived at the shelter with any intention of fostering Chief. She was supposed to be there only to offer her assessment. But hadn’t she known within minutes of meeting the shy dog that the shelter wasn’t the best place for him? As she watched Charlie lower her chest almost to the floor with her tail wagging wildly behind her in a classic play bow, Mollie knew having the happy-go-lucky Lab on her side would make working with Chief much easier.

      Mollie sighed. She’d never been able to turn away from a dog in need. She smiled in memory of her first dog, Shadow. Her parents had never allowed animals in the house, so the stray that she and Zeke Harper rescued had ended up living at his house a few doors down. Mollie had spent almost as much time over at the Harpers’ as she had at her own home.

      Of course, not all of that had been about spending time with Shadow...

      Pushing the thought from her mind, Mollie turned her focus to the shy shepherd. “Chief needs a quieter environment and to spend one-on-one time with a human to get over his fear.”

      “So you’ll take them—I mean, him,” Birdie corrected quickly.

      But Mollie wasn’t fooled. Knowing it had likely been the older woman’s plan all along, she sighed. “I’ll take them both.”

      * * *

      Mollie knew she’d made the right decision as soon as she loaded Charlie and Chief into her SUV. Chief balked when she led him toward the back hatch, lowering his head and thrashing against the leash. Mollie had anticipated having to struggle to get the good-sized dog into one of the crates she’d borrowed from the shelter. Charlie, however, sailed over the lowered tailgate and settled right in. Clearly afraid of being left behind, Chief followed suit.

      “You’re going to be my right-hand dog, aren’t you, Charlie?” Mollie asked as she left Spring Forest behind and headed toward the rural outskirts north of the small North Carolina town.

      Four years ago, when Mollie had been looking for a home of her own, she’d known she wanted a place in the country. Dog training could be on the noisy side, and she hadn’t wanted any next-door neighbors to complain. Plus, she knew she’d need plenty of outdoor space for distance training as well as agility work.

      Her tiny house on its large lot was perfect.

      She wrinkled her nose a little at the thought. Okay, it was perfect for the dogs. She still had some work to do—maybe even a lot of work to do—before the place would be perfect for her. And she really did have a plan for the needed repairs and improvements and upgrades. Somehow, though, time tended to get away from her, which led to dozens of half-finished projects and an overwhelming number of idea boards on Pinterest.

      “Don’t you worry, though,” she told the dogs. “You guys come first.”

      She’d get around to those repairs soon enough and—

      Mollie braked a bit harder than she’d intended as she caught sight of a familiar sleek black sedan parked off to the side of her house. Her heart instantly skipped a beat. She hadn’t expected to see Zeke today. She’d texted him after Birdie asked her to swing by the shelter. So for him to show up unannounced, at a time when he knew she wouldn’t be around, only meant one thing.

      Her pulse picked up as she opened the driver-side door, and Mollie had to remind herself that she was annoyed with him. How many times did they have to have this conversation?

      “Hey, Moll.” Walking around the side of her house like he owned it, Zeke Harper greeted her with a smile. “How did it go at the shelter?”

      Mollie tried to glare at him. She really did. But as he lifted a muscled arm to wipe the sheen of sweat off his forehead, annoyance wasn’t exactly the emotion sending a blast of heat through her body. Dressed in a navy T-shirt and well-worn jeans with—heaven help her—a leather tool belt around his narrow hips, Zeke Harper looked more like the hot host of a DIY show than like the respected psychologist he was.

      Trying to keep her voice, her blood pressure and her hormones from blasting sky high, she asked, “What are you doing here, Zeke?”

      He hitched a thumb over one broad shoulder. “I thought I’d get a jump on replacing those rotted steps on the back porch.” A smile he didn’t try all that hard to hide tugged at his lips. “You were off to such a good start, tearing them out like you did.”

      Mollie’s face heated. She’d felt quite proud of herself as she’d torn out the rotting wood steps, risers and stringers. Since then, she’d made several unsuccessful attempts at cutting the new stringers but could never quite get the angle right. So she had moved on to another project and contented herself with knowing she was getting her lunge work in every time she came in from the backyard.

      “I was going to finish them,” she said.

      “Sure you were, kid,” Zeke said happily as he threw an arm around her shoulders. “But what are friends for?”

      Mollie cringed a little, enough so Zeke noticed and quickly removed his arm. “Sorry, I guess I am kind of sweaty.”

      “You know I’m not afraid to get dirty,” Mollie challenged.

      As their gazes met, for a brief second the atmosphere around them seem to change, to shimmer with an electric charge like the air right before a storm. His hazel eyes, normally so full of teasing and laughter, darkened, and Mollie’s heart fluttered in her chest.

      But then he blinked, and whatever she thought she’d seen disappeared. “You had a three foot drop-off at the edge of the porch. That’s not safe.”

      Overprotective concern. Now that emotion she immediately recognized and the curious flutter sank to her stomach like a stone.

      Kid, she reminded herself as she swallowed hard. Friend. That was how Zeke thought of her. The little sister he’d never wanted.

      He had teasingly dubbed her with the title long ago, and even though she’d never thought of him as a big brother, a part of her clung to the designation like a shield. Anything to keep the man she’d fallen in love with years ago from ever learning about her hopeless crush.

      “You