Hero of Mine Read Free Page B

taste his cold, matter-of-fact explanation had created in her mouth. “It’s not fair. Some of these animals have never known kindness or been trained—”
    â€œAnd it sucks, believe me, but I can’t take every dog. There are too many good ones to waste time on the ones who might bite a child one day. If I don’t do my job right, and one of our dogs attacks someone, the whole program could get shut down. And then we aren’t helping any dogs.”
    Dani understood, she did, but having him act so casual about it rubbed her the wrong way. How could he be so callous?
    He parked the van in the same spot as before, and as he killed the engine, he turned.
    â€œLook, I’m sorry if I’m coming off like an asshole, but if I can’t hold it together and make the tough calls, then I can’t do this job. I have a friend who’s a vet, and he worked in shelter medicine for years. He told me once that in shelter medicine you get hard or you get out, because otherwise, all the bad shit you see is going to haunt you.”
    â€œYou honestly think that people in shelter medicine no longer care about helping the animals?” she asked.
    â€œIt’s not that they don’t care, it’s that the system has worked against them for so long, they’ve learned to triage, just like a doctor in the emergency room. Just like your lab coat guy.”
    â€œWait, so you agreed with him about euthanizing Fugly?”
    â€œNo, that is not what I’m saying. I am saying that I understand how some people get to the point where it’s less heart-wrenching to essentially turn off their humanity.”
    Dani opened her door and got out, turning to face Tyler. “Maybe that works for people like you, but I don’t have an on and off switch. I feel things and I empathize, and if that makes me weak to some people, then they can go to hell.”
    She slammed the door with a bang and headed for the front of the building, waiting for the sound of his van door opening or the heavy tread of his boots.
    But he didn’t come after her, at least not in the time it took her to get inside and find Suzy had made it in for her shift.
    â€œOh, thank God you’re here,” Dani said. “There is a guy from Alpha Dog Training Program, and he’s going to be evaluating the dogs scheduled for euthanasia today, but I need to get Noah before my mom has a meltdown.”
    â€œYeah, yeah, go, I’ll handle the guy.” Suzy was an average brunette a few years older than Dani. “Hey, is he cute though?”
    Cute? Cute was for puppies and kittens, not six-foot-tall men with broad shoulders and male-model faces.
    Dani grabbed her purse out of the locked desk drawer and glanced out the front office window. Tyler was just getting out of the van, looking a little bewildered. He probably wasn’t used to women yelling at him and then running away from all that sexiness.
    â€œCute is not the word I would use,” she said.
    Suzy’s shoulders slumped as she misinterpreted Dani’s meaning, and she used the opportunity to sneak away. The last thing she wanted was another interaction with Tyler.
    Dani exited through the back door and got into her car. As she turned the key, the engine sputtered, an issue it had been having lately, and she groaned. Running her hands over the dash, she tried to coax it in a low, husky voice. “Come on, baby, work for me, and I promise I’ll get you a tune-up soon.”
    Several seconds ticked by, and Dani tried the engine again. As the car came to life, Dani gave a little thank-you to the car gods and headed out toward Carmichael, a suburb of Sacramento next to Citrus Heights. Her parents had lived in the same house since they got married, and she knew the way there even on autopilot. Which meant that her mind wandered a bit as she tried to imagine where she was going in the next few years.
    If it was up to her mom, Dani would go out