With Valor And Devotion. Charlotte Maclay

the loveliest breasts….

      He snapped the lock closed on the cabin door. It was time to get home, where he’d probably have to spend the whole damn night taking cold showers.

      He carried his gear to his pickup, dropped it in the back and made the trip to Paseo del Real in record time, pulling into his carport at the rear of the apartment complex where he lived.

      Mostly singles and young couples—thirty-somethings like himself—lived in the adults-only, two-story garden units, enjoying a communal swimming pool in the center courtyard and tiny patios off each apartment that gave them some privacy for barbecuing and entertaining. Sometimes tenants organized a potluck in the community room, but mostly the guys watched the girls—and vice versa—around the pool. The resulting romantic relationships revolved so fast, they were as hard to keep track of as the subplots in a Tom Clancy novel.

      He entered the courtyard through the back. As he approached his unit, his footsteps faltered. In the muted lights that edged the flower beds he could see that someone was sitting on his front steps. A small someone.

      “Randy?” he questioned, frowning. What the hell was the kid doing here?

      The boy jumped to his feet. His hair was mussed, his eyes big and sad, and he looked like he’d just lost his best friend. Mike felt a punch to his gut.

      “They’re gonna…k-kill Suzie,” Randy stammered.

      Mike dropped his gear to the sidewalk, kneeling in front of the boy. “Who told you that, son?”

      “Shane. He’s a big kid and knows s-stuff like that. He says the p-pound is gonna put a big rope around her neck and p-pull—” Randy wiped his forearm across his face. “You gotta stop ’em, mister. You promised—”

      Closing his eyes, Mike took a deep breath. It didn’t matter that the animal shelter put animals down more humanely than with a noose. This was Randy’s dog they were going to kill. Mike had promised the mutt would be okay, and he sure as hell hadn’t gone to the trouble of rescuing Suzie just to have some bureaucrat put her to sleep—which they’d probably do if no one bailed her out of the pound soon.