towels, please? A lot of towels. Put some in the tumble dryer to warm them.’
‘It’s Nikki,’ she said numbly.
‘Nikki,’ he repeated, but he still didn’t look up.
The dog took a staggering step forward and then stopped. Enough. Gabe lifted him into his arms as if he were a featherweight, and the dog made no objection. Maybe he knew he was headed for Gabe’s fireside.
Nikki headed for towels.
But, as she went, she carried the image of Gabe, a big man with his armful of dog.
He was making her heart twist.
It was the dog, she told herself fiercely. Of course it was the dog.
Only the dog. Anything else was ridiculous.
She did not need hormones.
Horse was freezing. It hadn’t been raining, yet he was soaked—had he been standing in the water all night?
Nikki fetched her hairdryer. Gabe sponged the worst of the salt crust from his coat, then towelled him dry as she ran warm air over his tangled fur. The big dog lay passive, hopeless, and Nikki felt an overwhelming urge to pick him up and hug him.
He was so big … She’d have to hug him one end at a time.
She also wanted to kill whoever had abandoned him. To do something so callous …
‘Your cop friend said he was thrown from a boat.’
‘He’ll still feel loyal to the low-life who did it to him,’ Gabe said grimly. ‘I’d guess that’s why he’s been standing in the shallows howling.’
She sniffed. She sniffed more than once while she wielded her hairdryer, and she had to abandon her work for a bit to fetch tissues. She couldn’t help herself. The emotions of the night, the emotions of the past two months, or maybe simply the emotions of now, were enough to overwhelm her. This gentle giant being betrayed in such a way …
She’d set towels by the fire for Gabe to lay him on. With her hairdryer and Gabe’s toweling, they dried one side of him. Then Gabe lifted him. She replaced the sodden towels with warm ones and they dried his other side.
Gabe spoke to him all the time. Slow, gentle words of comfort. While Nikki sniffed.
Gabe’s words were washing over her, reassuring her almost as much as the dog. His kindness was palpable. How could she ever have thought he’d ignore a dog in trouble on the beach? His hands stroking the dog’s coat … his soft words …
He was a gruff, weathered fisherman but he cared about this dog.
He’d been rude and cold to her the day they’d met. Where was that coldness now?
She tried to imagine Jonathan doing what Gabe was doing now, and couldn’t. And then she thought … what was she thinking? Comparing Gabe and Jon? Don’t even think of going there.
Um … she was going there. Gabe’s body was just a bit too close.
Gabe’s body was making her body feel …
No. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
Focus on dog.
The big dog’s body had been shuddering, great waves of cold and despair. As the warmth started to permeate, the shaking grew less. Gabe was half towelling, half stroking, all caring.
‘It’s okay, mate. We’ll get you warm on the inside as well.’
‘Do you think he got the steak?’
‘I’m guessing not,’ he said. ‘Not in the state he’s in—the food would have warmed him and he wouldn’t be so hopeless. There’s all sorts of predators on the beach at night—owls, rats, the odd feral cat. I’m guessing that’s why he’s here. He came back round the headland looking for the steak, then when we were gone he followed our scent. There was nowhere else to go.’
‘Oh, Horse.’
Grown women didn’t cry. Much. She concentrated fiercely on blow-drying—and realised Gabe was watching her.
‘Horse?’ he said.
‘I’ve been thinking of him all night,’ she said. ‘In between worrying that I killed you. A dog that looks like a horse. A landlord who might have been dead.’
‘Happy endings all round,’ Gabe said wryly and she cast him a scared look. She knew what he was going to say. She was way in front of him.
The vet.
‘Do you have any more steak?’ She couldn’t quite get her voice to work. She couldn’t quite get her heart to work. But she wasn’t going to say the vet word.
‘No. You?’
‘I have dinners for one. Calorie controlled.’
‘Right, like Horse needs a diet.’
‘I’ll bring four.’
They worked on. Gabe hauled on a T-shirt and jeans and so did she, but the attention of both was on the dog. Hostilities were suspended.
The dog was so close to the edge that the sheer effort of eating seemed too much. By the look of his muzzle, he’d been sick. ‘Sea water,’ Gabe said grimly as he cleaned him. ‘There’s little fresh water round here. If he’s been wandering since the van crashed he’s had almost a week of nothing.’
That was a lot of speech for Gabe. They should take him to the vet, Nikki thought, but with the vet came a decision that neither of them seemed able to face. Not yet.
Save him and then decide. Dumb? Maybe, but it was what her gut was dictating, and Gabe seemed to be following the same path.
Gabe was encouraging the dog to drink, little by little. He found some sort of syringe and gently oozed water into the big dog’s mouth. Once they were sure he could swallow, Nikki shredded chicken, popping tiny pieces into Horse’s slack mouth and watching with satisfaction as he managed to get it down.
Slowly.
‘If we feed him fast he’ll be sick and we’ll undo everything,’ Gabe said. He sounded as if he knew what he was doing. How come he had a syringe on hand? Had he coped with injured animals before?
He was an enigma. Craggy and grim. A professional fisherman. Broad, but with muscles, there was not an inch of spare flesh on him.
He flashed from silence and anger, to caring, to tender, just like that. His hands as he cared for the big dog were gentle as could be; rough, weathered fisherman’s hands fondling the dog’s ears, holding the syringe, waiting with all the patience in the world for Horse to open his mouth.
Horse.
Why name a stray dog?
Why look at her landlord’s hand and think … and think …?
Nothing.
She should be back on her side of the house right now, enmeshed in plans for the air conditioning system for a huge metropolitan shopping centre. The centre had been the focus of an outbreak of legionnaires’ disease. Their air conditioning system needed to be revamped, and the plans needed to be finalised. Now.
Her plans were urgent—even if they bored her witless.
And Gabe should be fishing. He obviously thought that was urgent.
But nothing seemed more important than sitting by the fireside with Gabe and with Horse, gradually bringing the big dog back to life.
They were succeeding. The shuddering ceased. The dog was still limp, but he was warm and dry, and there was enough food and water going in to make them think the worst was past.
So now what?
The dog was drifting into sleep. Nikki glanced briefly at Gabe and caught a flash of pain, quickly suppressed. His head? Of course it was his head,