“Which owners?”
“The ones who took possession of the dog. They’ve moved into town.”
“Interesting,” he said. “Well, I still need to get back to the old place where the dog disappeared.”
“And you’ll have easy access because it’s for sale, and nobody’s living there,” Badger said.
“Did the owners say why they moved?”
“His wife didn’t like the country living.”
“So why did they want a dog then?”
“Maybe she thought it would make her feel safer. I don’t know,” Badger said. “We can’t ever count on what people think.”
When he hung up, Caleb nodded. “Strange.”
“What’s that?” Laysha said lightly from beside him. He explained what happened with the family. “So maybe they got rid of the dog so that they could move into town and not deal with him? Because no way you could take a big dog like that to live in a small apartment.”
“All they had to do was refuse it,” he said. “A long list of people want to adopt a War Dog.”
She shrugged. “Save face maybe? Or maybe they were involved in something they had to get out of—fast.”
“Well, I’ll get the couple’s current address from Badger.” And he quickly sent Badger a request. “I’ll talk to the family, and then I will follow up on their original place of residence.”
“Well, I’ve got the next few days off because of all the overtime I’m owed,” she said, “so, if you want anybody to ride along, let me know.”
Chapter 3
Later that evening Laysha walked into the kitchen to see Caleb sitting at the table on his phone again. She raised an eyebrow. He smiled, put the phone down, and said, “The rental truck is being delivered in an hour.”
“Good,” she said. “You ready for dinner then?” And she lifted a basketful of fresh veggies she had pulled from her garden.
He grinned. “Absolutely,” he said. “I’ll probably take a drive out tonight, although I might leave it until early in the morning.”
“You do you,” she said comfortably, as she walked into the kitchen and filled the sink with the basket of vegetables. She washed the carrots and the fresh lettuce that she had.
Caleb noticed that she also had two steaks marinating. “Do you want me to light the barbecue?”
“Please do,” she said. She quickly prepped the veggies, including chopping bell peppers to go into a big salad. She also had a tin foil packet of sliced potatoes, and, as soon as the barbecue was up to temperature, she put them on first.
“This brings back a lot of memories too.”
“Used to be a lot more than just the two of us back then,” she said.
“But I like it just being the two of us,” he said. “It’s the good part about the group back then.”
“That’s because the group back then included a lot of crazy people.”
“I know,” he said with a sad smile. “Times change though, don’t they?”
“They absolutely do.” She smiled. “I’m happy being alone.”
“Are you?” he said in surprise. “You always looked to be somebody who liked people.”
“Yep, I do like people,” she said, “but, at some point in time, you also realize that you aren’t really who you are meant to be until you have spent time alone to figure out who that is.”
“Now that’s deep,” he said with a grin.
“Maybe.” She shrugged, thoroughly enjoying having him back in her world again. She knew it wouldn’t be for long, and he certainly wouldn’t stay just because she asked him to. And no point in asking him to because it was not where his heart lay.
Not long thereafter, as she sat down to a hot-off-the-grill barbecued steak, she lifted her glass of wine and said, “To us.”
He immediately picked up his glass and echoed her cheer. “I forgot,” he said, looking around, “how I feel when I’m here.”
“Because it’s easier than remembering,” she said.
He looked at her, startled.
“Then remembering the hard parts.” She shrugged and continued, “I went through the same thing. I walked away from so much of what was important to me because I thought what I was creating was more important. Instead it was just different. And walking away was easier because going back hurt. Plus, it seemed like I’d spent so much time and energy to walk away from what I’d had that it didn’t make any sense to go back to it.”
“And how does it feel now?” he asked curiously.
“It feels right,” she said. “As if I had walked away from something that I shouldn’t have, and I’m grateful to circle back here, to have it again now.”
He studied her, slowly nodded. “Maybe that’s what this trip is all about,” he said. “If Jackson and Sarah are happy together, should I hold it against them? No. Obviously your news startled me, and I’m glad to know it ahead of time,” he rushed to say, “but it does give me something to think about that I had hoped not to.”
“Well, how quickly you deal with it will also tell you how much you actually care about it,” she murmured.
He nodded slowly. “And again, something I hadn’t really thought about.”
“Nope. But that’s the … the troublesome part of all this, isn’t it?” she said. “We tend to get into a rut, and we think that we’re done, but we really aren’t.”
He laughed. “No hardship in being here with you right now,” he said. “I have to tell you that.”
“We were best friends,” she said, “and I’m so happy to see you now.”
“Did you have a bunch of friends from that era, or did you get a new friend group after your marriage broke up?” he asked.
She gave him a lopsided grin. “No, everybody from the past had moved on. I’d separated because it was the right thing to do, and everybody else had their new worlds. People were getting married. People were moving away,” she said. “The old group wasn’t there anymore. And then, of course, when I did get divorced, nobody understood, and nobody seemed to realize what was going on. I think we made some people uncomfortable, and the friends he had before we got married, he still had, whereas I didn’t,” she said. “So, when I came back to my old home, this house,” she said, “I started all over again. I was alone, and I didn’t really know what to do about it at first.”
“I think that’s part of that whole acclimation process, isn’t it? Because I didn’t come back anymore as well. I moved out, put everything in storage, and it’s still in storage,” he said with a shrug. “And I’ve done as much overtime work as I can. Times off, I travel.”
“You always had the travel bug,” she said. “Is that out of your system yet?”
“It’s out,” he said. “I still like doing things, keeping busy, but,” he said, “I no longer have that … that push. Back then that was the push to get away from everything in my life that I hated.”