In Your Arms: A Small Town Love Story (Safe Haven Book 1) by Erin Sloane

straightened. “That’s not how it works.” Her voice was steady but her poker face had vanished with the last pack shuffle. They’d played cat-and-mouse for nearly an hour. She had to finish the interview without raising suspicion.
    “So why don’t you tell me how it works.”
    “Because, Janine, I’m an animal behaviorist. I can share as much information about dog behavior and rehabilitation as you’d like to know. But that’s about it.”
    “Strange. It doesn’t matter who I ask. Nobody can come up with the thirty-two dogs.”
    Marlo pushed back. “So, do you have any questions about rehabilitating dogs?”
    Janice stood. “I think we are done. You’ve been most helpful.”
    Christ, I hope not, Marlo thought as she watched them leave the office. She waited at the office door to make sure the trail of dust that followed their car continued out to the road. She didn’t trust them not to return to the property and take the photos they really wanted.
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    “ R ack ’em up .”
    Adam passed his pool cue over to Butch. “I’ll sit this one out. You have a go, mate.” He went back to the table and took a slug of beer. He’d returned to Halo Peak late that afternoon and gone straight to the police station to organize his notes. Now he was playing pool with a bunch of guys from the station when what he really wanted to do was drive out and visit Marlo.
    He’d put a handbrake on his emotions. That attraction between him and Marlo was something he hadn’t experienced in years, but Marlo was too vulnerable to mess about with. He hadn’t phoned her. Not that he didn’t want to. Hell, he’d spent the entire day with his hands mentally cuffed to stop from doing that.
    The days in Richmond had been harrowing. Several deep pits in a wooded area each held the bodies of up to fifteen dogs in various stages of decomposition. Some had been bound with wire, others had horrendous wounds. The bodies had been taken away for necropsies but clearly, old age had not taken these dogs.
    He still carried the scent of death and decomposition on him, which was overwhelming his senses, and he wanted to be free from that before he saw Marlo again. Her focus had to be on the positive side of rehabilitation.
    The property had similarities to what he’d seen in New Zealand, but on a much grander scale—if that’s how you wanted to describe the ability to house more dogs and create more pain and chaos.
    On arrival in Richmond, he had taken a moment to envision how it had been for Justice. He could picture him chained to a car axle, pacing in a short weary arc. The boredom would only be relieved by random jolts of anxiety as he smelled the fear in the other dogs and heard the petrifying sounds of abuse. He would always be on edge because whenever a human appeared it could mean food, fresh water, a beating, or it might be his turn to fight.
    Justice had every reason to be angry. That he chose to withdraw until he was safe and well enough to tune back into life was true testament of the courage in the breed and the stoic temperament of the dog himself.
    On the second night in Richmond, Adam had battled the urge to phone Marlo, and finally called Mae instead. If he couldn’t talk to Marlo, he could still talk about her. From Mae he was hoping for the merest hint of encouragement that would give him permission to go to Marlo. Instead he struck Mae’s maternal desire to shelter Marlo and all he’d managed to get out of her was that Marlo’s upbringing had been forty-grit rough. Through Marlo’s late teens, Mae had been her guardian.
    “That’s public record,” Mae had said to remind him that she didn’t intend to be indiscreet. Adam was no wiser for the conversation, but right before they finished Mae added one more nugget: “For a number of valid reasons, Marlo’s leery of cops. I thought you should know.”
    So much for his shit-hot interrogation techniques. Oh, and thanks for the encouragement.
    He rubbed at the day-old