Page 3 of Ruff and Tumble

There was so much about this speech to unpack that Hailey had no idea where to start.Of courseshe knew who he was. The idea that she could live in Seattle and be ignorant of the man who pretty much dominated sports and news headlines for six months out of every year was ludicrous. Even more ludicrous was the idea that he knew who she was.

She was nothing. A nobody. A blip on the cosmic human radar.

“Um, okay?” Not her most articulate response, but at least she was making all the right sounds. “It’s nice to meet you?”

He gave her hand one last squeeze before finally letting go. With another of those dazzling, dimpled smiles—this one for Penny’s benefit—he said, “I’ll have her back by second lunch, I promise. She and the dog both.”

Penny waved her hand. “Keep her all day if you want to. All week. No one around here will miss her, I promise.”

That wasn’t true, but not because Hailey was particularly beloved. There were only about five more weeks until the Puppy Cup aired, which meant the number of things she had to do were enough to make a grown woman cry. In fact, shehadcried. Several times. If things today kept moving along these lines, she might even do it again.

“Thanks for the show of support, Penny, but I doubt it’ll take much more than an hour.”

Hailey took a moment to turn off her computer before grabbing her oversized bag and Bess’s leash. The golden retriever was so overburdened with her pregnancy that she wasn’t likely to make a break for it, but Hailey needed to feel like she was in control ofsomething. This wasn’t how her life was supposed to work. She showed up to her job on time every single day. She went home and took care of whatever foster dogs were living with her at the time. Sometimes, she broke tradition and ordered takeout on the way.

Men like Cole Bennett—peoplelike Cole Bennett—didn’t seek her out for anything unless they needed someone to pick up their mother from the airport or book an appointment for a massage.

“Now that I’m thinking about it, Ihaveheard of second breakfast,” Cole said as they made their way past the reception desk. He seemed indifferent to the fact that everyone from the television production office was watching them, but Hailey felt like she was drowning in thoughts and emotions.

Foremost among them was that she’d never be able to live this moment down. Everyone she worked with knew how she felt about Cole Bennett—how closely she followed his career, how many of his jerseys she owned, how he was her first pick every year in the office fantasy league. For the rest of her working life, she’d be asked about everything he’d said and done, the way he smelled at close proximity.

Like clean sheets sprinkled with evergreen. Like a warm bed in the forest at dawn.

Hailey had to shake her head to clear it. This was neither the time nor the place to start thinking about this man in association with a bed. She needed to focus on the regular movements of her feet and the elevator in the distance. As long as she could make it to the elevator, she’d be fine. It was all downhill from there. Or downstairs, at the very least.

She chuckled at her own terrible pun.

“Did I say something funny?” Cole asked as they reached the elevator doors. He pushed the button and leaned against the wall as they waited for it to arrive, heedless of the receptionist pretending to water a plant behind him.

Since it was obvious he was doing his best to strike up a conversation, Hailey tried to think of something—anything—to say, but her mouth seemed to have grown temporarily detached from her brain.

“Something in my teeth, maybe?” he prodded.

The idea of something so ordinary happening to this man only increased her surreal sensation. “You’re all clear,” she said, the words wavering slightly. “Not that I would mention it if you weren’t.”

“That’s not very nice. What if my shirt was on inside out?”

“Um.” She did her best not to stare at the shirt he wore under his blazer. It was artfully faded and tight across his chest. She could even make out the faint line of his nipples underneath. “It’s not.”

“Or there was toilet paper stuck to my shoe?”

“I’m sure someone else would point it out.”

He studied her for a long moment. The building’s elevator always ran slow, but this was becoming interminable. “You’re a very odd woman,” he eventually said.

The words themselves bordered on an insult, but the way he said them didn’t. Hailey didn’t know if it was her heightened awareness of him that did it or if there really was something caressing about the way he spoke, but she felt a warm glow overtaking her. This was happening. She was having a conversation—an admittedly strange one, butstill—with Cole Bennett. Who was about to drive her to the veterinarian. With her pregnant foster dog. In his own car.

“I’m not odd,” she protested, feeling faint. “I’m not anything, really.”

It was closer to the truth than he would ever know. Hailey had always walked a carefully mediocre line. She was never the most beautiful woman in any room. She’d always gotten average grades in school. She was good at her job, it was true, but should she disappear tomorrow, Jasmine would find a replacement and forget she existed within the week.

She was so busy ruminating on how mortifying it was to be so wholly without appeal that she didn’t realize—until Cole cleared his throat—that they’d been standing in silence for well over a minute.

She glanced up to find him smiling at her in a way that made her heart stop.

“I don’t think anyone will care if we chat while we wait for the elevator,” he said, a teasing lift to his perfectly molded lips. “We can talk about anything you want.”

“Um…” She willed the elevator to arrive, but she could hear it crunching to a halt several stories away. The stairs would have been a faster route, but Bess was in no condition to drag her six babies down all that concrete.