Chapter 13

“She’s okay like this, isn’t she?” Harrison asked with a worried look at his lap, where Bubbles stood at full attention, her tongue lolling and her ears perked. “She doesn’t need to be in a…car seat or anything?”

Sophie barely managed to tamp down an unseemly giggle. For such a self-sufficient man, Harrison sure lacked confidence when it came to his puppy. “Do you feel comfortable with her on your lap?”

He cast a doubtful glance at the animal. “I don’t have any choice in the matter. She refuses to sit anywhere else.”

Sophie could have pointed out that, as a two-hundred-pound human being with opposable thumbs and a stare that could bring down a forest, he had the power to make Bubbles do anything he wanted—up to and including riding in a crate on the floor.

But Sophie didn’t. She liked that he was so much at the puppy’s mercy. It was sweet. It also made her feel as though she too might have a shot at worming her way into his heart.

“Then I guess that’s where she sits,” she said cheerfully. “If it makes you nervous, though, they do make doggy seat-belt harnesses that work just like ones for humans. I bet if you put one of those in, she’d wear it with pride.”

Harrison’s only response was a grunt, but Sophie didn’t let it bother her. Why would she? Grunting was one of his primary methods of communication. He could lose the capability of speech altogether, and she’d still be thrilled to sit next to him as his truck rumbled in the opposite direction of home.

This was what freedom felt like. Sweet, rebellious freedom—the kind that most people enjoyed in their teens, sure, but she wasn’t in a position to cavil the opportunity. She might be a decade too old for this kind of behavior, but that didn’t mean she regretted it. In fact, she was enjoying herself. Derek had driven off in his own car while she made arrangements with her family, leaving her to Harrison’s sole care. She’d left behind a worried mother, an oddly supportive Lila, and a winking Dawn—all of whom she loved to pieces and didn’t want to look at for another minute.

“No offense, Mom,” she’d said, “but I’m sick to death of you acting like I need to be taken care of all the time. Lila could decide to move to an off-grid remote island, and all you’d do is remind her to take sunscreen. Dawn once dated that cult leader, and you invited him to Christmas the next year. But not me. I sneeze one time, and all of a sudden it’s like someone ordered my headstone.”