“It’s okay if you’d prefer not.” He schooled his expression to carefully neutral. She was important to helping Atlas and he didn’t want her to feel uncomfortable working with him just because he’d asked her on a date. Dumb idea anyway.
She bit her lower lip but had the grace to look him directly in the eye. “You’re a very nice man, David. And I can’t thank you enough…”
He held up his hand. “No need to thank me.”
He’d slam his own head into a wall before letting her accept a date with him as a thank-you for what any decent person should’ve done for her. Interested in her? Yes. But everything in him rebelled at the idea of pressuring her. He liked his women willing and he didn’t exactly have a problem finding them. This just needed to quit being so damned uncomfortable.
“I’d like to keep things at the professional coworker level…and friends. Is that okay?”
How could he say no? He wasn’t an absolute dick. And besides which, his priority was Atlas. The dog needed for them to work well together and David wasn’t about to let his hormones screw anything up.
“We’re good.” He gave her what he hoped was a reassuring smile. “Totally professional and no hard feelings.”
She let out the breath she’d been holding and gave him a small, unsure smile.
He pushed the fries closer to her and handed her a napkin. “Have another fry. You’ll need the energy this afternoon working with our friend here.”
*
“Agility?” Lyn studied the course. It wasn’t the standard agility course she was used to seeing but rather a more rugged course. There were items specific to K9 training like the broad jump, catwalk, and brick wall jump. The Catch-A frame was completely new to her. The car door jump and window jump were actually painted in more realistic colors as opposed to the standard white. The equipment was familiar to her but not part of her usual clientele’s goals.
David took the lead off Atlas. “He can do all of it. Easily. The question is whether he wants to.”
She nodded. A dog learned exponentially faster with internal drive. Incentive could help too, but a trainer learned to align training with the natural drive of the dog for the best results. Which meant finding a situation in which the dog wanted to perform a particular action.
At the moment, Atlas was sitting next to David and not even looking at the agility course. Not interested.
“What’re we using for incentive?” She’d used treats usually for clients, but the K9 and military trainers didn’t always have the same practices.
David pulled a tennis ball from his pocket. Atlas watched the slow arch of the ball as it crossed the distance between them. Lyn was happy she caught it. It would’ve been insanely embarrassing if she’d dropped it considering how much time David had given her to catch it.
“He gets this after completing each exercise.” David lifted his chin toward the ball in her hands. “Then we’ll see if we can get him to do the whole course for the ball.”
She raised her eyebrows. “That’s assuming a very fast learning curve.”
He shrugged. “This is all review for him. He used to run a course like this for the sheer joy of doing it. If we get him back into a mood to do it at all, I don’t think it’ll take long for him to demonstrate how easy this is for him.”
She laughed. Atlas did seem to have his fair share of pride. “Okay.”
“Walk to each obstacle and give the command. Let’s take them one at a time and see how much he needs to obey.”
“Obedience.” She frowned. “We haven’t confirmed he’s consistently obedient yet.”
Only a few commands this morning and during lunch. Every time, she’d seen the pause, the consideration, as Atlas had decided whether he wanted to obey.
“He’s still got solid obedience.” David spoke with utter confidence, almost irritating. “There’s a delay but he doesn’t ignore commands. He just doesn’t care enough to execute immediately.”
She frowned. The delay in behavior might not be a big deal in the civilian world. Some regular owners might not even think twice about the delay even if it became a habit. But…he could be testing her. “The delay isn’t acceptable for military work.”
David shook his head, no hint of whether he’d been leading her to saying so or not. Just responding. “Not at all. But then, at his age, he might not be redeployed at this point. It really depends on how well he comes through this.”
So cold. Matter of fact. She kind of hated David a little bit for the way he casually talked about Atlas like that. As if it was all about practicality and not about an injured soul.
Her heart ached for Atlas. Part of her wanted to cut him slack, let him have the leeway in his training to ensure he’d be allowed to retire and enjoy life here. But Atlas was a working dog. He might not be happy no longer working. It had to be up to him. Find his balance again and working might be what he lived for.