Page 8 of Save the Date
Twenty minutes had passed. But nobody else had spotted the puppy. Reluctantly, she started jogging back toward Bloom, breathing heavily and sweating profusely.
Bert had the van pulled around to the front of the shop by the time she got back. “Anything?”
“No,” Cara said, near tears. “Look, just wait here. I’m going to take the van and see if I can spot her.”
“Cara? Lillian has called back twice, and now Torie’s started calling. And her wedding director wants to know why we aren’t already out at the church. You know it’ll take us thirty minutes to get out to Isle of Hope.”
“Stall ’em,” Cara said. “I can’t let Poppy just wander around downtown. She’ll get hit by one of those tour buses, or run over by one of the horse-drawn carriages. And even if somebody does find her, they won’t know who she is, because she’s not wearing her collar. Please, Bert?”
Bert shrugged and went back inside the shop to try to mollify their clients.
Cara drove east and north this time, trolling the side streets, leaning out the window of the pink-and-white-striped van, calling her puppy’s name, straining for a familiar glimpse of curly white fur, but to no avail. While she cruised, her cell phone rang and pinged and buzzed, with incoming calls, texts, and emails, all of which she ignored.
She was backtracking toward the shop, turning up Habersham at East Charlton, when she saw a tall, bare-chested man dressed in nylon running shorts and expensive-looking running shoes, tugging a medium-sized, furry white dog by a piece of rope. He was walking down the lane behind Charlton.
“Poppy!” Cara cried. She veered left and into the lane.
“Hey!” she called to the man. She leaned out the open window of the van. “Excuse me, that’s my dog.”
He was in his mid thirties—the man, not the dog. His dark hair was pushed back from his forehead and his chest gleamed with perspiration. Even in her extreme distress, Cara noted that he was seriously ripped. The man glanced down at the puppy, then back up at Cara.
He frowned. “The hell it is. This ismydog.”
“No.” Cara put the van in park. “Honestly. That’s Poppy. My goldendoodle.”
“No,” he said impatiently, starting to walk away. “This is Shaz. Unfortunately, this ismygoldendoodle.”
Cara climbed down out of the van and hurried after him. “That’s impossible. There aren’t that many dogs like this in Savannah. I had to go all the way to Atlanta to find mine. And that oneismine.” She searched in the pocket of her shorts and held out one of the doggie treats she always carried. “Here Poppy.”
The puppy looked up at Cara and wagged enthusiastically.
“Shaz!” the man said loudly. The puppy looked at him and wagged her tail even harder.
“See?”
“She does that with everybody,” Cara said, desperation creeping into her voice. “She’s never met a stranger.”
“If she’s yours, where’s her dog tag?” the man demanded.
“Back at my flower shop, on West Jones. A customer came in, and he tried to grab Poppy as she made a break for the door, but Poppy managed to wriggle out of her collar.” She waved the treat under the dog’s nose. “Here Poppy,” she coaxed. “Come to Mama.”
The puppy’s ears pricked up, and she lunged toward Cara, but the man pulled her back.
“See?” Cara said triumphantly. “That’s Poppy.”
“No,” he said, wedging the now wriggling puppy firmly between his calves. “That’s a cheap trick. And this is Shaz. She’d kill her grandma for a dog treat.”
“If that’s your dog, where’s its collar?
“In my truck, back at my house. I was just taking her to the groomer, whom she hates, and the truck window was open, and she jumped out the window and took off. Come on, Shaz.” He started walking away, and the puppy trotted obediently at his heels.
“Poppy,” Cara called, near tears. “Come here, girl. Time to go home.”
“Nice try,” the man said, glancing back over his shoulder. “But I don’t have time for this. Good luck finding your dog.”
The puppy gave one backward look, but the man was jogging again, and the dog followed right on his heels.
Cara jumped back behind the wheel of the van. “Hey,” she hollered out the open window. She beeped the horn. “Come back here.”
