I breathed out an incredulous laugh. “You think I’ll back down?”
His eyes were center-of-the-flame blue, and I hated them. I hatedhim. “I guess we’ll see. See you tomorrow, boss.”
My mouth hung open as he strode out of the building.
Ness sprinted back into my office the moment the door slammed closed. She skidded to a halt in the doorway. “What happened to your hair? Did you make out with him?”
“Ness,” I sighed. “No, of course not.”
“Looks like you did.” She came around my desk, wincing as she tried to smooth down the wild strands around my face. “This is how my hair looked after my no-sex make-out session with Christian last night.”
I swatted her hands away. “Muriel already told me how I handle this entire ... situation will basically be the deciding factor if she lets me take over officially.”
“No making out, then,” Ness stated on a disappointed sigh. Her lips curved in a sly smile. “Can we still look, though? His ass is perfection.”
I smacked her arm as she laughed. “No. No looking at his ass.”
“You are no fun when you’re in boss mode. If we can’t even look, what are you going to do with him?”
Through the window in my office, I had the perfect vantage point as Archer crossed the parking lot with long strides of his legs. Just before entering the truck—not some gleaming monster straight from the showroom, but something a few years old, dirt covering the bottom half—he paused, staring out into the tree line of the wooded area surrounding the shelter.
Did I believe him about the dog? I wasn’t sure.
The timeline matched up. We’d had sightings of Bandit, as I’d started calling him when he evaded every single live trap we’d set, for the last two weeks. Based on the state of his coat, he’d been on his own for longer than that.
If it were that simple—wet roads and an animal’s shadow—why wouldn’t he tell the press that? The shelter didn’t have the budget for exterior cameras. It was enough of a stretch to install them inside, but it was the easiest way to monitor the kennels after hours. Our neighbors in the mini-mart across the street had them, but they’d been down for maintenance the night of the accident, so there was no way to prove or disprove his story.
The truth of it was, I didn’t want to believe him. My anger hadn’t quite dissipated. It still boiled dangerously close to the surface, seeing something I loved and had worked so hard for come within four feet of being damaged far, far worse.
Four feet. That was how close the car had been from the front edge of the kennel. To breaking down walls, to driving straight into the room with all the dogs.
Into Scout and Daisy and Edgar and Sherlock and Pip. Into the others too. It would have been devastating. If he’d hurt a person by veering in the other direction, it would have been even worse.
That was why it didn’t matter if I believed his story or not.
Because the consequences weren’t simple either. Not for us, and not for all the kids like Gavin who looked up to this guy because he was big and strong and could throw a ball down a field. They idolized him, and now they had a mug shot to add to the pictures on their walls.
Just because he hadn’t killed someone didn’t mean he should get off the hook easily. And yes, he had money to throw at the problem, but it wasn’t what the judge wanted.
The entire point was that this guy learned his lesson. And apparently, I was the one in charge of what lesson he learned. I thought about what I’d told Gavin when he was so upset about this. About not judging too quickly and not hating people we didn’t know.
The best part of adulting is the ability to ignore your own advice sometimes. Parents’ prerogative and all that.
I was judging. He was arrogant and rude and thought I’d roll over and make this easy on him because we’d had one stupid night where he managed to get his hand down my pants. His judgment of me gave that embarrassment and shame an angry edge, and it was hard to recognize as it pumped through my body.
“Remi?”
I didn’t turn to face Ness. Instead, I kept my eyes on Archer as he slid into the driver’s seat of the big vehicle.
Damn it, he really did have a great ass.
“What am I going to do with him?” I asked.
“That is the question of the day.”
“I’m going to make him miserable.”
Chapter Five