She licked my wrist.
I admonished, “It isn’t exciting. It feels exciting because we spent a whole two hours together without any shouting or alternate verbal devastation. But we must remember,” I held her face in both hands and looked in her brown eyes, “Coert does not like us.”
Midnight whined and shuffled a little toward me on her belly.
“Okay, you’re right. He likes you. Very much. You were a very good girl when he put your collar and lead on and you just sat right down at his feet at the pet store. That was very smart of you to show what a good girl you could be. That’s why he’s the sheriff, and still he stole that doggie treat right there from that canister and gave it to you. But it wasn’t really stealing since he told them at the cash register he did it then he paid for it.”
Midnight panted.
She remembered the doggie treat.
Or maybe she remembered Coert giving it to her before he bent over her to give her a full body rubdown, murmuring in his deep voice, “That’s a very good girl.”
It was a long time ago but I remembered when he gave me a full body rubdown, and he might not have said I was a good girl but he showed he felt that way and I liked it a whole lot.
“It’s not good I’m having these thoughts five minutes after he texted to say he’s coming over to install my peephole,” I muttered.
Midnight kept panting.
I looked into her intelligent eyes and decided to change the subject.
“Tomorrow, we’ll go for a walk around the fence so you’ll get to know your new home. And after Coert brings down the bad guy . . . again . . . we’ll take walks on the coastal path. Does that sound good?”
Midnight just kept panting.
So I raised my voice an octave and asked, “Does that sound good, girl?”
She gave a soft, “Ruff.”
“Yes,” I said. “That sounds good.”
I straightened, moved to the fire and then grew worried about the fire.
Patrick had several fireplaces in his house in Denver as well as several in his cabin outside Vail. He loved having fires and he’d taught me how to build them. Thus, since I moved into the lighthouse, I had fires every night. It made the space seem even more warm and cheery, not to mention it provided heat, which was needed in Maine for certain.
But looking around the room with its big, plush, chocolate couch that dominated the space, the club chair and ottoman squeezed to the side, the thick throw rugs over wood floors, the heavy iron light fixture that hung in the middle of the room, the curved, dramatic iron candleholders, the décor in warm earthy tones with deep blues intermingled, that fire burning made it look like a seduction scene.
All I had to do was light some candles and put on Barry White, and Coert would walk through the door and then he’d walk right back out of it.
I looked to Midnight. “I shouldn’t have started a fire.”
She tipped her head to the side.
“I mean, we got along for two full hours and maybe even longer but only because both our lives are in danger.”
Midnight just stared at me.
“He’ll go back to hating me once he catches Lars.”
Midnight got up, jumped off the couch and made her mostly graceful, part lumbering way toward me.
Watching her, I refused to think about her back leg. This was because I was rich. I could hire my own investigator. I could find the owners she’d had who’d hurt her. And I could shoot them with the gun Coert was going to give to me.
But if I did, Coert being a good policeman would catch me and I’d go to jail and then who’d take care of Midnight?
She snuffled my thigh with her nose and I bent over her to give her head another rubdown. “Okay, I won’t go shoot your ex-owners. But I’m not saying I won’t dabble in voodoo curses.”
She licked my wrist again.
Approval.
Voodoo curses it was.
She then went on alert, her head jerking to stare at the wall, and I jumped when she then made an almighty racket, barking ferociously at the wall.
Coert was there.
Or somebody was.
Best early warning, indeed.
Midnight made her way to the door, still barking but doing it louder, faster, more ominous.
A knock came on the door and she stopped barking and started growling, teeth bared, as I followed her there, cautious, cooing to her and telling her it was all right.
She tried to shuffle me away from the door so I took hold of her collar and whispered, “Good dog. Good Midnight. You’re such a good girl. But it’s okay. We’re okay.” Before I called out, “Who’s there?”
“Coert!” Coert shouted.
Midnight started barking again but I kept a firm hold on her collar, gently pushing her back as I reached long to the bolt and kept shushing her with, “It’s just Coert. You know him. He’s okay.”
I turned the knob, and with my hand still on Midnight’s collar, I held tight as the door opened. Coert looked to me, to my barking and growling dog, and then he immediately crouched low.
“See. It’s Coert. He’s friendly. You know him. He’s nice. We like him,” I said to Midnight.
“Good girl,” Coert murmured, slowly lifting his hand toward the dog. “Takin’ care of Cady. Good girl.”
“He’s nice,” I said. “See?” I shuffled to him but held on to her collar. “He’s friendly. He’s here to look out for us.”
Midnight made a growling, cautious approach toward Coert with me. The growls started intermingling with whines before she did a few sniffs of his fingers, more, got closer then bumped his hand with her nose.
He scratched behind her ears, still murmuring, “That’s it, Midnight. Make sure it’s all good for Cady.”
I let her collar go when Coert engaged his other hand, they got to know each other again and finally Coert said to the dog, “Now get back, girl. Gotta get my tools and get this door shut on the cold.”
He straightened slowly and moved her back a bit before he turned toward the door, grabbed a big toolbox and a plastic bag he’d set on my front step, brought them in and closed the door.
It was then, his eyes came to me.
“Hey,” he greeted.
“Hey,” I replied.
God.
It came out breathy.
I tried to mask that by stating while indicating Midnight with a hand, “Obviously, she works.”
He glanced at the dog before looking back to me and saying, “Yeah.”
We stood there staring at each other.
Okay, now what did we do?
Coert knew the answer to that because he lifted the bag and toolbox and said, “Best get on this.”
“Right,” I mumbled.
“I got peepholes, Cady, but I also got the stuff to give you a speakeasy.”
“Sorry?” I asked.
“A speakeasy,” he repeated. “I’ll cut a box, make a door, weatherproof the edges and put it on hinges with an inside bolt so you can open it and look out. Better range of vision than a peephole, and you get your guy to put something decorative on the outside, looks nice and’ll fit this place better than a peephole.”
I knew what he was talking about and he was right. Peepholes were for hotels. Those little doors were much nicer and you’d expect one at a lighthouse.
But I also considered this with some surprise.
Back in the day, Coert hadn’t given any indication he was a man who had a toolbox the size of the toolbox he had right then. He was not that fixer-upper, dig-in-and-sort-problems kind of guy. The truth was, we hadn’t been together long enough for anything to get fixed up, and the entire time we’d been together, we’d lived together in his friend’s place so it wasn’t exactly ours to change anything. But still, he just didn’t seem like that sort.
Years had passed, I knew. You lived and learned how to deal with things that came along, I knew that too.
But it still surprised me he could cut speakeasies into doors.
And this knowledge settled on me like a weight. A weight that drew out the lightness I’d felt earlier when we’d talked (for once without it being ugly) about what we’d been through that long time ago.
Obviously I’d told Patrick all about it. I’d also told Kath and all the girls. I knew Pat and Mike and Daly knew too.