“You’re fighting panic?” She inched the question out slowly, quietly, as though its impact would be less that way.

  No such luck. She saw him scowl, and he still avoided even glancing over at her as he said, “And I’m winning.”

  She hoped so. She really hoped so.

  But if he had to struggle so hard every time he went up, at what point did he decide flying wasn’t fun anymore? At what point did he just give up? Not just on flying but on everything? On life?

  Telling herself that Greg wasn’t a quitter, that he was the last person who would ever give up on anything, helped, but only for a moment.

  She’d thought the same thing of Michael. Had been certain of it.

  But her brother had lost what he’d loved most. His independence. His ability to control his mind. His career. The things he’d had left—including her—hadn’t been enough.

  Chapter Eleven

  Walking into Duke’s room with Wendy could have felt awkward, but it didn’t. It felt as though she’d already been there. As if she fit.

  “Hey, bro, I brought Wendy with me today,” he said and promptly grew uncomfortable, as the familiarity with which he said her name made it sound as though he’d brought her up to Duke before.

  When in fact, Greg had been preoccupied with Jedi, who, vested and on his leash, was standing beside him at attention.

  “Hey, Duke.” Without missing a beat, Wendy walked up to the chair in which the unresponsive man sat, touched his hand for a second, as though in lieu of a handshake, and then stepped back.

  Wendy’s seeming ease, the naturalness with which she handled Duke’s condition, hit him, hard. She’d handled it perfectly. Almost too perfectly. It was as if she’d been there before.

  It was possible that it was just from her experience volunteering with Pets for Vets, but for the first time, he wondered what had gotten her involved in the organization. Was there a veteran in her own life who had struggled in the aftermath of a tour overseas? The facets of the woman, things he should have known, could have surmised, just kept presenting themselves to him. Like someone slowly regaining consciousness after a long sleep, he couldn’t seem to see clearly enough.

  Jedi nudged his hand. Reminding Greg that he had a specific purpose that morning. Yanking himself immediately to his goal, he walked the dog up to Duke’s chair and told him to sit.

  And then, keeping the end of Jedi’s leash in hand, he moved over to the seat he generally occupied, while Wendy sat in an armchair over in a corner by Duke’s bed.

  “I generally update him on sports scores, the news, that kind of thing,” he said then, struggling to find his footing in the strangeness.

  “This is your visit, Greg, your call,” Wendy said. “I’m just here to observe Jedi’s behavior.”

  And so he sat back, pulled up the week’s baseball stats on his phone, starting with the Red Sox, and gave his buddy the rundown—with commentary. Jedi sat, back straight, right where Greg had left him, watching Greg.

  How did you get a trained dog to give service to a new person instead of the one who’d trained him? That was a question he was going to be asking the second they got out of there.

  He wanted to believe that that was the issue—that Jedi was only responding to him. But he feared that the issue went deeper. Maybe Jedi wasn’t responding to Duke...because Duke just wasn’t emitting anything for the dog to pick up on.

  No emotional shifts.

  No changes in equilibrium. So with nothing to respond to, the dog was waiting. He’d sit until Greg gave another command.

  Reminding himself that one of the goals of the morning’s activity was Jedi’s training and experience, he left the young dog on command as he scrolled through some current affairs and read them aloud to Duke.

  He was a quarter of the way through a piece about a self-propelled car when he caught a movement from Jedi out of the corner of his eye. A relaxation of his stance. Breaking eye contact on Greg. Maybe he was tired? That would be only natural. The pup had made it nearly half an hour at attention. Proud of him, Greg glanced at Wendy, expecting her to look pleased, as well.

  Instead, expression serious, intently focused, she was watching Jedi.

  Looking back, Greg froze, not even breathing as he watched the dog nudge Duke’s hand. And then push his head up underneath the limp palm.

  He could hardly believe it. Couldn’t explain it. Had some physiological movement or response inside Duke triggered Jedi’s action?

  Could that really be possible?

  Yeah, his friend breathed and sometimes swallowed liquids and soft foods. He blinked and slept and processed waste. But Jedi wasn’t trained to react to any of those automatic actions that everyone did.

  More likely, the dog had just gotten bored, was looking for attention.

  Because he was still in training. Not ready to go into service yet.

  Still, Greg watched it play out, as silent as Wendy now, waiting to see what happened. He didn’t speak, didn’t want his voice to distract Jedi. The dog was still sitting, so technically, still on command.

  It was like Greg’s own life was in the mix as he watched, rooting for a dog. Rooting for his friend, despite the odds against him.

  Duke’s finger moved.

  Wait a minute. Greg stared, unblinking.

  Had he just seen that?

  The slight lift had been almost imperceptible. He wondered if Wendy had noticed it. Didn’t want to look away even to get a measure of her response.

  There. It happened again. Two fingers this time. Very clearly moving on the dog’s head, while Jedi sat, completely still, with his head where he’d shoved it under Duke’s hand.

  Heart pounding, Greg couldn’t tear his gaze away. Was loath to speak, to break the spell, to interrupt whatever was going on between dog and injured soldier.

  And so he sat, moisture filling his eyes, and watched a miracle happen.

  * * *

  They weren’t even out of the facility before Greg was on the phone with someone named Julie.

  Julie?

  Holding Jedi’s leash as they headed toward the front door, she told herself that she had no business being hurt—or even surprised—that Greg had a woman he’d call to share the incredible breakthrough they’d just witnessed.

  The man was inarguably gorgeous. He was also intelligent, compelling, kind, rich... Of course he had women. She used to tease him about it all the time, and he’d never once denied it.

  Just because he’d never mentioned this Julie or having a special woman in his life...

  But why would he feel the need to mention any of that to her? The most she’d ever gotten him to admit was that he wasn’t interested in settling down, but it had been quite a while ago that he’d said that. Maybe this Julie had changed his mind.

  Either way, it was none of her business. He was helping her train a dog for service. Just like he helped her out by delivering dogs up north. She was the one who was making more of things than were there.

  And whether he shared the miracle they’d shared with her first, or someone else, it was the miracle that mattered.

  He’d hung up by the time they were strapped in to his SUV and on the road. They kept talking about what Duke’s response to Jedi could mean as they sped down the highway toward home.

  Her and Jedi’s home.

  “The doctor said not to get your hopes up,” she reminded him, even as she tried to rein in her own hopes.

  What they’d seen—a catatonic man trying to pet a dog—was unlike anything she’d ever witnessed before.

  And she would never, ever forget it, either.

  “I know. But I know it’s more than that. All these years, and no other voluntary movements...and you could tell Dr. Robbins was eager to get in there.”

  Greg had called the doctor minutes after Duke’s hand had moved on the dog. Tests were going to be run and compared to others of Duke’s brain-wave results. They’d examine technical things. Scientific things.

  But science couldn’t explain a dog’s ability to sense things.

  Or a man’s need to bond with animals...

  “Julie’s on her way there now.” Greg’s words cut her thoughts off midstream. For a moment, she was filled with confusion. Why would Greg’s woman friend—

  “She sits by Duke’s side every single night, for at least an hour. For years, she’s been sitting there, certain that her brother was still in there...”

  Her brother.

  Emotion flared in Wendy, through her, heart constricted with sadness, and hope bringing happy tears to her eyes.

  Julie was Duke’s sister. Not Greg’s girlfriend.

  He hadn’t said so. But she knew.

  And it didn’t even matter as her entire being was usurped by a whole flood of emotions from an entirely different source—a sister with an injured veteran brother who was still alive...

  On one hand, she felt a pang, wishing she could be that sister, but she pushed quickly past that and reached for the joy that lay behind it—a joy far more personal than what she’d been feeling since seeing Duke’s fingers move on Jedi’s head.

  Duke was a veteran.

  And a brother.

  She helped veterans by providing service dogs to them. She didn’t think about their families.

  But this one had a sister.

  And they’d just given her hope.

  As emotion overwhelmed her, she turned. “You did good work today, Jedi,” she said, hiding herself behind praise for the dog and petting him, because sometimes even the handler needed a bit of service.

  * * *

  Jedi had sensed something, some emotional change, stress maybe, in Duke. He’d distracted Duke by connecting with him physically. And Duke had responded.

  Greg wasn’t one for drama. He relied on facts.

  But he just knew.

  His friend wasn’t completely lost to them. He wasn’t going to kid himself that he’d have Duke back as he’d once been, but a new future had just opened up for his fallen brother.

  Thoughts flew all during the drive home, interspersed with the memory of Jedi pushing his head under Duke’s hand. Of Duke’s fingers moving. Seconds was all it had taken.

  And he kept seeing those seconds, over and over.

  Kept hearing Julie’s voice as he’d told her. The break. The thanks she could barely utter through her tears.

  The hope.

  The relief.

  He took it all on, soaked it in, was brimming with it as he followed Wendy into her house, Jedi, off his leash, bounding in ahead of him.

  She had her meeting.

  The responsibility for Jedi’s afternoon training session was on Greg, but it was hard to concentrate on the tasks that had to be done.

  As pumped up as he currently felt, he needed a long run through the forest on his property. Or, more realistic with his leg, a couple of hours on the machines in his home gym. He needed...

  Walking in Wendy’s front door, with the sun shining in through the sliding glass door leading to the backyard, he didn’t see that she’d stopped midstride, turning toward him, and he nearly barreled into her. He didn’t, of course.

  He was a man in control, not a bull.

  But he didn’t immediately back up, either.

  He heard part of his name on her lips, but when her gaze met his, so close, she fell silent, mouth open, words there, but not given utterance.

  The connection between them seemed almost to vibrate with intensity. They’d witnessed an incredible thing that morning. Just them. No one else had seen...

  Some probably wouldn’t believe.

  But they knew.

  “Thank you,” he said, his throat tight with emotion again.

  “I didn’t do anything.” She kept studying him, as he did her. Searching each other? But for what?

  “You introduced me to Jedi. Saw value in taking him to see Duke...”

  “I’ve never seen anything like what happened this morning.” Her words sounded like a confession. As though, until that day, even she hadn’t known what the dogs they’d been working with could do.

  “I still can’t believe it,” he told her, and then, thinking of the moment again, the movement of Duke’s fingers, he grabbed her up, hugged her tight.

  The immense wave of emotion cascading through him had to go somewhere, and there it went from his arms to her body, in a maelstrom of relief. Of gratitude. Of awe.

  Of...something more.

  Her body against his, her breasts pressing on his chest...desire flared, hot and blinding. Meaning to pull back, he moved only far enough to meet her gaze. To see the fire burning in those expressive green eyes as he bent his head.

  Needing. And seeking.

  Her mouth. Her lips, parted. The softness of her tongue. He got lost, taking it all, giving as much back, hungry.

  So hungry.

  And excited.

  He kissed her softly at first, and then with more urgency, the newness of her taste igniting him further.

  She gave back as fully, pressing into him, her hands on his back pulling him into her, moaning and moving on him, her breath coming in gasps between their lips.

  Until they both just...stopped.

  If one or the other of them gave any indication of a slowdown, Greg wasn’t aware of it. He was kissing her one minute, just living it, and then he’d stepped back.

  And so had she.

  “Oh, God,” he said, running a hand through the strands of his hair. Smoothing his beard. “I’m sorry, Wendy. So sorry.”

  He should go.

  But he couldn’t go. She had a meeting. Needed someone to tend to Jedi.

  “What are you apologizing for?” Her breath was still a little uneven, but her tone was not. “Last I looked, there are two of us standing here.”

  Right, but he’d started it. “I swear, it won’t happen again.”

  Nodding, she straightened her shirt, before meeting his gaze again. Head-on. “I’m not worried about it, Greg,” she told him. “Whether it happens again or not...” She gave a shrug. “Neither one of us is looking for anything serious, we both know that, so it’s really okay.”

  Was she really saying it was okay if it happened again?

  If he’d made things awkward between them...

  “Seriously, Martin,” she said, grabbing up her satchel and keys. “No harm done. It was an emotional morning. We’re human...”

  Her gaze seemed to plead with him not to make too much of it. He couldn’t tell if her words were sincere or a cover for troubled feelings.

  But because he wanted things back to normal between them, he smiled, told her to have a good meeting, and let the relief flow.

  Chapter Twelve

  Meeting done earlier than she’d expected, Wendy gathered up her things and was getting ready to turn out the office lights on her way out, when there was a knock on her door.

  People in Spring Forest knew that she was always available. It was her unspoken promise to them—one of the conscious choices she’d made when she’d designed her new life, when she’d decided who she wanted to be. These people were her priority, and she would be there for them.

  So while she’d been filled with nervous energy to get home to Greg—she went back and forth on whether or not it was to release him from duty and get him out of her space for a bit or to maybe look into the possibility of trying on another kiss to see what happened—she ended up leaving the lights on and answering the door.

  Elise Mackenzie, the petite twenty-five-year-old woman who worked at Barkyard Boarding—an overnight and day-care facility for pets—stood there, smiling somewhat shyly. Wendy knew who Elise was, of course, but mostly because of her aunt, Regina Mackenzie, Spring Forest’s wealthy self-proclaimed do-gooder, with whom Elise lived. Regina was into everything. Elise, not so much. Wendy had only gotten to know the younger woman since Elise had started volunteering at Furever Paws after the shelter had drawn attention by hosting a puppy and kitten shower earlier that year. But what she knew, she really liked.

  In some ways, she and Elise had a lot in common. They kept to themselves when it came to one-on-one personal relationships. And both had lost their mothers before they were eighteen—Elise’s mother having passed away when she was just ten years old.

  That marked a girl, somehow.

  “I was wondering if I could speak to you for a moment,” Elise asked.

  Before Wendy could pull her door open farther or even give life to the smile starting to form on her lips, Regina Mackenzie came into view behind Elise. Stepping in front of the younger woman, she slipped past Wendy right into the office, leaving Elise to smile apologetically before following her aunt inside.

  “Hi, Wendy,” Regina said breezily. “I told Elise that we needed to include you on our list of visits today. You’ll want to get in at the very beginning on this one so you can get the most bang for your advertising buck.”

  Her advertising bucks were very few. There didn’t seem to be any need to waste money on ads when she had more clients than she could handle sometimes as it was. Whatever these women were selling, she wasn’t at all sure she was interested in buying—but courtesy dictated that she show them to a seat on the couch in the small sitting area in her office and offer coffee from the one-cup automatic brew machine on a cart along the wall.

  And felt bad when she was glad that they both declined. Normally she welcomed times just like these, where she sat with her friends and visited.

  Normally she didn’t have a man in her home who’d just kissed the socks off her.

  “Bethany told me that you’re aware of the ballooning medical and food bills at Furever Paws, especially since the influx of animals from the backyard breeder,” Regina started right in, sitting there regally in her summer dress.