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“Look, Joe,” Cassie said, trying to appease the man. “You of all people know how difficult it is to deal with my mother.”
When the officer paled at the mere mention of such a trying experience, Cassie pointed to the tiny white bichon frise, who was now scampering across the yard to join forces with the enemy. “Well, I’m warning you. No one in this entire neighborhood will be safe when Lenora Collins finds out her famous show dog crossed paws with the first stray mutt who came along. She’ll blame me for not watching Duchess more closely. And she’ll blame you for allowing some nasty mutt to roam free through the neighborhood.”
Joe’s heavily browed eyes immediately grew wide with concern. Sending a quick glance over his shoulder, he absently patted his holster as if he might need the gun for his own protection. “But y-your m-mother is still in Europe, isn’t she, Miss Collins?” Joe stammered.
“Yes, but I can’t keep Lenora in Europe forever, Joe,” Cassie said, and sighed. “And if we don’t get that mutt out of here before he does any more damage, we’ll all be buying tickets to Europe to save our own lives.”
Joe dragged a meaty hand over his face, then pointed to the woo-some twosome who were currently engaged in what appeared to be another premating ritual. “You mean that little white dog out there is the one who just won all those awards in New York City?”
Cassie nodded, glaring at the poodle-looking paramour whom she’d vowed to protect and keep safe in her mother’s absence. The little witch was her mother’s pride and joy, but now that the current diva of the dog world had succumbed to the charms of a mutt whose only credentials seemed to be an overdose of testosterone and an attitude, Cassie suspected those dog-food and pet endorsements her mother planned to glean from winning Westminster would disappear faster than a pack of antacids at a federal tax audit.
“Man, I don’t blame you for being upset, Miss Collins, but—”
“Oh, I zoomed way past upset when I found them doing an intimate bunny-hop across the backyard,” Cassie interrupted. “Now, are you guys going to help me catch the mutt before they engage in another close encounter of the fur kind, or aren’t you?”
Both men seemed a bit embarrassed by her graphic outburst, but the Barney Fife lookalike finally stepped forward to take up the challenge. “I’ll help you catch him, Miss Collins. I’ve always been good with dogs.”
Cassie held her breath as the lanky officer left the sunroom and strolled across the yard in the perpetrator’s direction. To Cassie’s surprise, instead of leading the officer on another exhausting game of hide-and-seek through the trees, the scruffy little scamp inched toward him and sniffed at the man’s outstretched hand. In a flash, the officer snatched the mutt up. Mission accomplished, he returned to Cassie’s side with the little bandit tucked safely under his arm.
“Peanuts always work,” he said proudly, sending Cassie a wink. “I always keep loose peanuts in my pocket for between-meal snacks.”
Cassie shuddered at the sight of the lint-covered peanuts the mutt was happily munching from the officer’s hand, then looked around the yard for the other half of the dissolute duo. Obviously sated by the wild display of carnal acrobatics Cassie had witnessed earlier, the little floozy trotted obediently toward the house in search of her lover. Cassie grabbed the pampered pooch and marched Miss Duchess into the sun-room. When Cassie placed Duchess in her traveling crate and fastened the latch, the shameless hussy actually had the nerve to look annoyed.
When Cassie joined the officers back on the patio, she smiled and said, “Thanks, guys. Now you need to help me find this mutt’s owner. And when you do, I want you to make an immediate arrest for violating the neighborhood leash law.”
Both men exchanged nervous looks. Joe actually laughed. “Hey, you’re not really serious about making an arrest over this, are you, Miss Collins?”
Cassie frowned, but let out an exasperated sigh. “Probably not, but it really would serve the owner right if I did. If that dog has left Duchess with a litter of mongrel puppies, I’ll be facing a death sentence.”
“Hey, I really sympathize with your predicament, Miss Collins,” Joe mumbled, “but I sure wouldn’t want to be the one to make the arrest.”
“Me, neither,” interjected Barney Fife’s twin. “He wasn’t real happy the last time we had to serve him with a complaint.”
Hands on her hips now, Cassie sent both men a puzzled look. “You mean you guys already know who owns this mutt?”
Barney swallowed, sending his pronounced Adam’s apple roaming up and down his throat several times before he managed to spit out the answer. “The little fellow belongs to Nick Hardin. You know, that radio talk-show host who’s caused all the trouble since he moved into Biltmore Forest.”
Hearing that Nick Hardin owned the mutt responsible for her current nightmare affected Cassie like a slap across the face. She immediately reached for the wiry terrier and snatched the little Casanova from the officer’s grasp.
“I really do appreciate your help, boys,” she told her cohorts, then sent both officers a sinister smile. “But if Nick Hardin owns this guy, I’m going to pay him a visit he won’t soon forget.”
“Give him hell, Miss Collins,” Barney said on a giggle.
“You can count on it,” Cassie promised, then turned on her heel and headed for the garage with the relieved security officers trailing after her.
After waving goodbye to her obliging dream team, Cassie opened the door to her silver Lexus sedan, placed the black-and-white scoundrel on the passenger’s seat, then slid behind the wheel.
“So, you belong to the famous Nick Hardin, do you?” she said, looking over at the mutt who was responsible for turning her peaceful Saturday morning into a full-blown disaster. “Well, thanks to you, my scruffy little friend, we’ll see if your obnoxious master still has a sense of humor after this vulture picks his bones clean for the damages you’ve caused this morning.”
IT TOOK LESS THAN five minutes for Cassie and her hostage to make the short trip to the old Tudor mansion Nick Hardin had purchased some six months earlier. When she reached the gate to the aging estate, Cassie pulled into the winding driveway that led up to the house. She had always loved the charm of the old place, especially the brilliant rhododendrons and the multicolored azaleas that lined both sides of the driveway. The old Jeep and the big Harley-Davidson motorcycle that were parked haphazardly in the driveway, however, looked as out of place as the radio talk-show host had been since he moved into her neighborhood.
Eager to give the cocky old coot an up-close-and-personal look at the legal system he was always complaining about on his stupid radio program, Cassie switched off the engine and grabbed the furry scamp sitting next to her. Marching straight to the front door, Cassie paused on the stoop and pressed the doorbell long enough for the blast to wake the dead. When her adversary failed to appear from within his fortress, Cassie reached for the bell again, but the squirming captive in the crook of her arm saw his chance and wiggled from her grasp.
“You come back here this minute,” Cassie yelled.
The naughty little maverick bounded around the side of the house and Cassie dashed after him. Charging through the back gate in hot pursuit, she almost had the miniature monster in her grasp, but a loud splash from the backyard pool brought her to a sudden stop. When she looked up, her eyes widened in disbelief as the lower half of a nude male body slipped beneath the surface of the shimmering blue water.
Ignoring her own gasp, Cassie willed herself to move, but the instincts that kept screaming run didn’t relay the message to her addled brain fast enough. Before she could flee, a bronzed phantom with an upper torso reminiscent of the Incredible Hulk’s broke the water’s surface gracefully with muscled forearms stretched out before him.
Cassie watched in awe as Adonis himself made long, purposeful strides across the water in her direction. This can’t be Nick Hardin, she kept assuring herself, but she’d never actually seen Nick Hardin before, not even a picture of him. It was his politically incorrect attitude that led Cassie to believe he would be much older than this Greek god she had just caught in the buff. In fact, the mental picture Cassie had always put with that deep baritone voice on the radio was one of a middle-aged hippie who was still trying to cling to the lost age of sex, drugs and rock and roll.
Please, God, let this Chippendale refugee be Nick Hardin’s pool man, Cassie prayed silently, aware that the naked stranger was now swimming dangerously close to the shallow end of the pool.
To her relief, he stopped when the water was still waist-high, ran a hand through his unfashionably long hair, then stared back at Cassie with eyes the color of midnight. “Well, good morning,” he called out boldly. “I’d given up hope of the Biltmore Forest welcoming committee dropping by, but if you’re the representative it was well worth the wait.”
The second she heard that too-familiar baritone voice, Cassie felt a searing flush spread straight to the center of her cheeks. Squaring her shoulders, she sent him the type of icy stare that she usually reserved for the courtroom. “You’re Nick Hardin?” she managed to say, already knowing the answer.
“Guilty as charged,” he admitted with a cocksure grin. “And you are?”
“Sorry to disappoint you, Mr. Hardin, but I’m definitely not the welcoming committee,” she informed him curtly, then pointed to the black-and-white half breed who was running up and down the edge of the pool, yapping at his master. “I brought your dog home, because…”
“Hey, if the mutt’s been in your garbage, I’m sorry,” Nick interrupted. “I found the little bandit at a garbage dump when he was only a pup. It’s a bad habit of his I can’t seem to break.”
The overwhelming knowledge that the degenerate dog had credentials even worse than she imagined instantly erased any curiosity Cassie had about the part of Nick Hardin’s body that was still under water. “Oh, I assure you, your dog’s crime is much more serious than raiding trash cans,” she remarked tersely. “Your mutt, as you call him, dug a hole under my fence this morning and accosted a world-champion show dog.”
Cassie watched an amused look cross his painfully handsome face while he digested her statement. At about the time Cassie decided Nick Hardin was actually contemplating the seriousness of the situation, he burst out with the same gregarious laughter he’d exhibited when she called to complain about his stupid lawyer jokes.
How dare he laugh about his own negligence! Reaching for the first thing that caught her eye, Cassie grabbed a towel from a nearby deck chair and flung it in her tormentor’s direction. “If I were you, I’d get out of the pool and get dressed, Mr. Hardin,” she informed him curtly. “I doubt you’re going to find things so funny when we discuss the extensive lawsuit I intend to file against you.”
NICK CAUGHT THE TOWEL easily, but remained in the center of the pool, watching his exquisite guest stomp back around the side of the house. He’d always been a sucker for cutoffs, and this lady had a delectable little fanny that filled out the short cutoff jeans to perfection.
When he’d first surfaced from his dive, Nick decided his fuzzy head from his night out with the boys the previous evening was responsible for conjuring up the vision of loveliness he found standing beside his pool. When he started swimming in her direction, however, the shocked deer-in-the-headlights look she gave him convinced Nick that his visitor was real.
In no longer than it took to shake the water from his face, he had absorbed every detail of her more-than-pleasing appearance. She was literally stunning, even in cutoff jeans and a baggy T-shirt that had Run for Fun splashed across the front. Not that the loose-fitting T-shirt concealed her well-endowed bosom from Nick’s prying eyes, because it didn’t. No more than her extremely short cutoffs kept him from committing her long, perfectly shaped legs permanently to his memory.
The only problem seemed to be her age. Though her manner of speaking and the way she carried herself suggested she was older than she looked, her teenager-type attire and her slightly askew ponytail made Nick suspect she was barely past twenty. Enticing or not, women on the low side of twenty were much too young, even for a thirty-something rake such as he.
Pulling himself out of the pool, Nick wrapped the wet towel around his waist, then wandered into the house, oblivious to the dripping water that trailed across the expensive parquet floors. The last thing he needed to start his weekend off was another irate neighbor. He had left the rat race in Atlanta, seeking peace and solitude in the Blue Ridge Mountains, only to find when he arrived in Asheville that he’d traveled back in time fifty years. The upper-crust socialites who shared his lovely locality had been appalled by his long hair, outraged by his refusal to adhere to their silly rules and dress codes, and mortified by the big Harley-Davidson that had always been Nick’s pride and joy. Now it seemed even his choice of pets didn’t meet with their approval.
From the den, he grabbed the faded polo shirt and jeans he’d worn the night before, then tossed the dripping towel into the sink on the well-stocked wet bar that took up one side of the sparsely furnished room. Droplets of water still clung to his lean, muscular body, but Nick donned his clothes without toweling off, then slipped his feet into a pair of well-worn Birkenstock sandals. After raking his fingers though his sun-streaked hair, he pulled the wet mass to the back of his head, then used a leather strip he pulled from the back pocket of his jeans to secure his hair in a short ponytail.
His first instinct was to throw the irate beauty off his property, but Nick decided maybe it was time he took a more amicable approach where his fellow neighbors were concerned. He had, after all, invested a huge chunk of his financial reserves in the aging estate he now called home. If spreading a little harmony around the neighborhood could give him a reprieve from the scorn he’d been receiving to date, showing his good side might make life in Biltmore Forest a little more pleasant for everyone concerned.
“Stay,” Nick told his unwanted shadow when the frisky terrier followed him faithfully down the hallway to the front door. “It appears you’ve already caused enough trouble for one day.”
MINUTES LATER, NICK found his exquisite visitor propped against the luxury sedan that was sitting in the driveway next to his classic ’47 flat-fender Jeep. Arms folded stubbornly across her chest, she still wore the same surly look on her face. Nick hooked his thumbs in the pockets of his jeans, then sauntered down the steps in her direction, wondering if he still had what it took to cajole his agitated visitor into a friendlier mood.
He attempted his most winning smile. “I was just getting ready to fill the espresso machine. If you’ll join me, maybe we can discuss this dog situation over a cup of coffee.”
Lifting her chin defiantly, his visitor glared in his direction. “This isn’t a social call, Mr. Hardin. Everything we need to discuss can be discussed right here.”
“Well at least drop that ‘Mr. Hardin’ crap,” Nick said, trying to get at least one smile out of his attractive guest. “I’m Nick.”
“And I’m what I think you referred to as a vulture on your program several weeks ago,” she replied, ignoring his outstretched hand.
Nick paused, vaguely remembering the incident. But he stifled a laugh when he recalled the entire situation. “Ah, so you’re the attorney who didn’t particularly care for my joke about…”
He watched her aqua-blue eyes immediately turn a shade darker and several degrees colder. “About vultures and lawyers?” she quizzed, finishing his sentence.
Nick grinned in spite of himself. “Hey, I’m sorry you didn’t particularly care for that joke, counselor. But like I told you when you called, you can always tune me out if you don’t like my program.”
“Oh, I’ve tuned you out, all right,” Cassie retorted. “I suspect hundreds of other women who don’t care for your chauvinistic attitude have done the same.”
“Chauvinistic?” Nick moaned, pretending to be hurt. “Hey, you’re way off base on that one, counselor. You see, I’ve always been extremely fond of women.”
“As long as they’re barefoot and pregnant, and know their place, you mean?” she challenged.
Nick flinched. In all fairness, he could understand that his lawyer jokes, and now the incident involving his dog, might be responsible for launching a bumblebee up the legal eagle’s attractive little behind. But he was quickly growing weary of being attacked in his own driveway. Determined to make his snotty visitor vanish as quickly as she’d appeared, Nick deliberately let his coal-black eyes travel over her body with a look that even this uptight attorney couldn’t misinterpret.
And only when she flinched did Nick break his ill-mannered leer.
“Sorry if my appraisal made you uncomfortable,” Nick lied. “But since you’re already barefoot, I was just trying to imagine the pregnant part.”
Cassie gasped and looked down at all ten of her hot-pink polished toes. In her haste to get retribution for the heinous crime Nick Hardin’s dog had committed, she had completely forgotten that she left home looking like some reject from a bargain-basement sale. She hadn’t even realized that she wasn’t wearing shoes.
Clenching her fists to keep from slapping him, Cassie struggled until she finally regained her ability to speak. “If that was meant to shock me, it didn’t,” she huffed. “In fact, that’s exactly the type of statement I would expect from a man like you.”
Raising one eyebrow slightly, Nick grinned. “Hey, I hate to point out the obvious, but you’re standing in my driveway, counselor, I’m not standing in yours. If you find me so offensive, you can always leave.”
His comment brought an even deeper shade of pink to Cassie’s cheeks. “Oh, believe me, I’ll be more than happy to leave once we come to an understanding about the damage your idiot dog…”
“Let’s see. How did you so aptly put that before?” Nick interrupted, bursting out laughing again. “Didn’t you say he accosted…?”
“That’s exactly what I said,” Cassie snapped, cutting him off. “But your mutt didn’t assault just any dog. I’m talking about a priceless dog. A dog that would put a dent in any bank account. Even one as healthy as yours.”
She paused then, giving Nick a chance to comment on the significance of her statement. Instead, he remained silent, keeping his eyes fixed permanently on her full, moist lips. The same type of lips he would have preferred tasting and teasing, instead of watching them spout out a bunch of silly nonsense about some famous show dog.
“Since I’m sure you do little else than listen to your own voice on the radio,” Cassie accused, “you obviously failed to read the front page of the Asheville-Citizen Times a few weeks ago when they did a feature story about the local bichon frise who won Best-in-Show at the Westminster Dog Show in New York City.”
“Let me guess,” Nick scoffed, thinking that even the name of the damn dog sounded pretentious. “This…be-shon free-za, or whatever name you called the silly dog, just happens to be…”
“How clever of you to figure it out,” Cassie snapped.
Stalling for time, Nick let out a long sigh, then removed the leather strip from his ponytail and forced his fingers through his still-damp hair. “So let me get this right. Your fancy show dog didn’t bother to ask for credentials before she lifted her manicured little tail for the first stray male who came along, and you think that gives you the right to sue me? Get serious, counselor. How do I know my dog wasn’t in line behind some other hound who got to her first?”
“That’s so typically male!” Cassie shrieked. “That’s always a man’s first line of defense, isn’t it? Always try to pawn it off on someone else.”
Nick shrugged, unwilling to admit or deny the accusation. “Then what about calling in a vet if you’re so appalled that your dog didn’t hold out for a champion stud? I’ve heard they have this shot you can give…”
“You, Mr. Hardin, are even more disgusting than I imagined,” Cassie interrupted. “How brilliant of you to come up with a man’s second line of defense!” Shaking her finger wildly in his direction, Cassie added, “If you think for one minute I’d risk harming a priceless show dog and possibly prevent her from having champion puppies someday, you’re crazy.”
Unimpressed with her tirade, Nick leaned against the fender of the Lexus while the hyped-up attorney paced back and forth in his driveway, stewing over his unhelpful suggestions. He was tempted to grab her and hold her in a bear hug until she finally calmed down, but he was actually enjoying watching her flounce around his driveway with her fists clenched at her sides. Most women he met were all over him before he had a chance to say hello, but Nick already knew this sexy spitfire would probably scratch his eyes out if he even took a step in her direction. And the fact that she might intrigued him.
“And don’t you dare say something stupid, like requesting a doggy paternity test,” Cassie warned, wheeling around to face him again. “I caught your dog in the act, remember? And if I end up playing nursemaid to a litter of unregistered puppies, I intend to hold you and your worthless dog totally responsible.”
With that said, she marched to her car, opened the door and slid behind the wheel. “I’m taking Duchess to the vet the second I get back home,” she announced as she fumbled with the ignition. “I realize you have little use for legal advice, but it would be wise if you obeyed the leash law and keep that flea-bitten mutt at home where he should have been in the first place.”
Nick suppressed a laugh, then quickly placed his hand on the driver’s side door. Leaning down, he sent his beautiful but angry visitor a slow, seductive smile. “Hey, just for the record, counselor, it might ease your mind to know that our dogs may be better suited than you think.”
“Not in this lifetime,” Cassie assured him, grinding the Lexus into reverse.
“But didn’t you just say your dog’s name was Duchess?”
“What does that have to do with anything?” she snapped, taking the bait.
Nick laughed the same hearty laugh she had heard on the radio and by the pool. “Because my dog has a royal name, too. I named him Earl.”
“After one of your motorcycle-riding, beer-swilling friends, I’m sure,” Cassie shot back, then roared out of the driveway, coming dangerously close to hitting the big Harley Hog that was parked at the edge of Nick Hardin’s paved drive.
2
IN LESS THAN AN HOUR after she roared out of Nick Hardin’s driveway, Cassie drove into the parking lot of an elaborate brick building and pulled in beside a lone red Porsche, thinking that she should have taken her best friend’s advice and gone into veterinary medicine instead of law. Dee had been savvy enough to tap into the gold mine that surrounded the movers and shakers in the dog world. Limiting her practice to champion canines only, Dee wouldn’t have allowed a cur like Nick Hardin’s to place a grimy paw on the pavement in the parking lot, much less receive treatment at the chic canine facility appropriately known as Pedigree, Ltd.
Cassie hopped out of the car, dragged Duchess’s crate from the passenger’s seat, then hurried to the glass front door of the building that had Your Champion Is The Heart Of Our Business stenciled in gold letters across the front.
“Dee…we’re here,” Cassie yelled the second she stepped inside.
“Well, hello Daisy Mae,” Dee Bishop teased as she appraised Cassie’s appearance.
Cassie frowned at her friend’s attempted wit. She still hadn’t taken time to change from her shorts and T-shirt, but she had grabbed her sandals this time. “Don’t start with me, Dee,” Cassie warned. “I’ve already had a morning straight from hell and it’s only ten o’clock.”
“Well, your reason for dragging my butt in here on a Saturday better be a good one,” the tall blonde said as she pulled on a lab coat. “I don’t ruin my weekends for just anyone.”
“Spare me the poor pitiful-me act,” Cassie grumbled. “As much as my mother pays you to take care of this fancy dog of hers, I think you can afford the sacrifice.”
“Touché,” Dee conceded. “Follow me.”
Crate in hand, Cassie followed her friend down the hallway to the first doggy examining room. “I know I was vague on the phone, Dee, but I wanted to get here as fast as I could.”
Dee waited until Cassie placed the crate on the table before she unfastened the latch and gently lifted the tiny dog out. “Hey there, Miss Duchess,” Dee cooed. “What’s wrong, sweetie? Are you under the weather today?”
“No. She was under the sex-crazed terrier who lives down the street.”
Clutching Duchess to her breast as if Cassie had arranged for the lewd rendezvous herself, Dee glared in Cassie’s direction. “That isn’t even funny, Cassie. The champion sire your mother arranged for will be here on Monday. If you’ve allowed another dog to get to Duchess first, your mother will kill you.”
Cassie’s deadpan look spoke volumes. “Of course Lenora’s going to kill me, you nitwit. Why do you think I was practically in tears when I called you?”
Ignoring the shocked look on Dee’s perfectly made-up face, Cassie began pacing around the room, talking more to herself than to her judgmental friend. “Believe me, Dee, if you think I’m taking this lightly, you’re badly mistaken. I’m the one who insisted that I should stay behind to keep Duchess and make sure everything went as planned with those breeders from London. ‘I can handle it, Mother,’ I kept saying until I was blue in the face. And do you know what’s so funny?” Cassie added with a hysterical giggle. “For once, Lenora actually trusted me to have enough sense to take care of things. Leave it to me to screw it up and only reinforce my mother’s opinion that I’m not capable of doing anything right.”
