I vaguely remembered a biker gang being here the few times that I’d come to Benton, Louisiana with my parents, but I didn’t remember them looking like that.
“Well, they all look fairly healthy, Trance. I don’t see a thing wrong with them. I also think they can be weaned from their mother now, too. That means your training can start as soon as you want to. They’re perfect,” Zack informed Trance.
“Shit,” Trance said, sighing and rubbing his face with his hands.
“Daddy sad,” the boy said.
The boy looked a lot like his father with his blue eyes and curly blonde hair, and you could definitely tell they were father and son.
The littlest, though, was all of two year’s old at most.
He didn’t look like his father.
My best guess was that he looked like his mom.
Because he was the only one with curly black hair and pale skin. He resembled a porcelain doll, and he was currently looking me in the eyes, his the most brilliant green that I’d ever seen, and my heart stuttered in my chest.
“Daddy sad?” He asked me.
He touched my cheek, then leaned forward and threw his arms around my neck.
Stunned momentarily, I had to wait a few seconds for my heart to stop breaking.
If I had a kid, I would have wanted him to be just like this child.
But that wouldn’t be happening for me, and I’d decided to let it go.
“I don’t know why your daddy’s sad, baby. Maybe you should ask him that when you’re alone,” I told him gently.
He squeezed me tighter, pulled back, and gave me a toothy grin that consisted of large amounts of drool.
“Cookie?”
I smiled and shook my head. “No, I don’t have any cookies.”
“Daddy has cookies in the car,” the little girl reprimanded the boy gently. “And he told you not to talk to strangers.”
I decided not to point out that she’d done the same thing only moments before with the dog. Instead, I chose to stay silent as I stood and put some distance between me and all that cuteness.
The kids… not the man.
Not that he wasn’t hot as hell, either.
He just wasn’t my type.
Not that I had a type anymore.
I’d been thinking that Isaac was my type all these years… yet, here I was, single with no desire for any type.
“Good,” the biker man said. “I can’t wait to share that news with Viddy. She’ll cry.”
Zack snorted. “Your wife will have to let them go eventually. Aren’t you going to start training them for the police officers in Shreveport and Bossier? Seems you can’t do that if you don’t start giving them a little leash to run on.”
The man sighed.
“When our old dog, Radar, died… she never got over it. She still cries when she sees pictures of him, and she’s devastated that he’ll never get to know his grandbabies,” the man said softly.
“Well, Trance, I really would like to see these boys getting out for a little social attention. I’d love you to bring them to the puppy party this weekend. It’ll be good for them. If you end up deciding you’ll come, just give us a call the day before, so we can have enough food for all of them,” he said, standing up and offering his hand.
Trance took it and shook Zack’s back once before dropping it and saying, “Alright, guys, let’s start hauling ‘em out to the truck.”
One of the seven dogs was dropped unceremoniously into my arms, and I smiled at the little runt that Zack had been cooing over earlier.
“I like this one the best,” I said to no one in particular.
“He’s for sale if you want him,” Trance mumbled as we all walked out the door.
“What? Why?” I asked.
Hadn’t I just heard that he was going to train them to be police dogs?
“He’s the runt and the sickly one. We won’t be training him to be a K-9 officer. The other six will be. They have that drive. That one just likes to lay there and sun himself all day. Not saying that’s not a good thing, but it’s not a trait that makes a good K-9 officer,” Trance explained.
I blinked. “Really? So, how much for a lazy dog that likes to sun himself?”
“You can have him for nine hundred dollars,” Trance said as he started loading them up into the back of the truck.
I handed the one in my arms over reluctantly.
There was no way in hell I could afford nine hundred dollars.
“Ah,” I said as Trance took him without looking at my face. “I can’t do that right now. Plus, I’m not sure my brother’ll want another dog at his house.”
He nodded. “If you change your mind, Zack has my number.”
The kids were the next thing he loaded into his big ‘ol truck before he backed out of the vet’s office with me watching them leave.
That man had everything that I wanted out of life.
And it sucked that I’d never have what he had.
***
“Well, I’d love for you to take the job, Sawyer. It’s completely up to you, but I think you would really fit in well with our team,” Zack said as we walked out later that night.
I smiled.
“Thank you, Zack. I look forward to spending more time here and helping any way I can,” I said honestly.