Gotcha! Read Free Page B

but, gradually, she seemed to calm down. Mace continued to croon soft words in her ear.
    Mace looked at his $1.38 million Maybach Landaulet, which generated 543.1 horsepower. Lola was certainly going from rags to riches. He grinned, something he hadn’t done in a very long time. He opened the door and set the dog down in the front seat. He threw her gear into the back and slid behind the wheel. He buckled up and set Lola on his lap. He babbled nonstop to the dog until she relaxed and curled into a ball on his lap. “Don’t you worry, little lady, you’re mine now. I’m going to take good care of you, and I’m not going to feed you those rabbit-poop pellets Connie Toulouse gave us. We’re going to stop at the first place we come to when we get out of Manhattan and get you some real food. Later, we’ll adjust your diet after the vet checks you out.”
    It was almost noon when Mace peeled into a fast-food stop in New Jersey and went through the drive-through. He ordered basically one of everything, then pulled the ultra-luxurious high-end car over to a shaded area. Lola sniffed at the bag of food but didn’t move. In the end, Mace fed her by hand. She ate daintily and looked up at him with soulful brown eyes. She had completely stopped shaking by then. After eating as much as she wanted, Lola sat up, put her paws on Mace’s shoulders, and licked at his face. Mace could feel his eyes mist over. After hugging the dog, he opened the car door.
    Lola cringed. “No, no, we’re just going to go over there under the tree. I’m going to carry you. It’s okay, Lola. Shhh,” Mace said as he cradled the dog against his chest.
    Once they were under the tree, Mace sat down on a bench and lowered Lola to the ground. “I think this is where you pee or something since you just ate and drank. You have to do it.”
    Lola tilted her head to the side, listened to the words, and squatted. “Good girl! You . . . ah . . . have to do anything else?” Lola tilted her head again and moved off to the base of the tree, where she proceeded to do the something else. Mace laughed. When she was finished, he scooped her up, and they were back in the car within minutes and on the way south to God only knew where.
    By late afternoon, Mace and Lola had entered the state of Virginia. He stopped for the night at a roadside campground whose sign said that dogs were welcome. The cabin was a far cry from the Ritz, but not only was it clean, it even smelled clean.
    In the lobby of the main cabin, Mace picked up a road map and took it with him back to his cabin. He spread it out on the floor and told his dog, “Pick a place, Lola.” He never knew if Lola had understood him or not, but she obligingly planted a paw on the map. Mace looked down and laughed. “Okay, Lola, Alabama it is!”

Chapter 2
    J ulie Wyatt looked down at her dogs and wagged her finger. “Listen up, you guys. I am just going to the market and bank, and I’ll be back in an hour. You chew even one string, and you both get punished. Bark once if you understand me, twice if you plan on defying me.”
    The two Chesapeake Bay retrievers looked up at their mistress and barked. Once. Julie laughed. “Yeah, right! Listen to me, Cooper. I know you have separation anxiety when I leave, but I am coming back.” Then she looked over at Gracie, who was swishing her tail importantly. “Bite his ear if he starts chewing, Gracie.”
    Normally, Julie took the dogs with her when she ran her errands, but the A/C in her truck was on the sluggish side, and the big dogs had trouble with the high humidity. So she was leaving them behind.
    Outside, on her flower-bedecked veranda, Julie looked at the golden day, then at her yard. Yep, with all the rain they’d had lately, her four-acre yard was beginning to look just like Jurassic Park. She groaned when she thought about how much extra she was going to have to pay the gardener just to trim everything up before it got out of control.
    As she looked