Sheltered Hearts (A Hidden Hearts Novel Book 2) Read online

  Contents

  Sheltered Hearts

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1: Jessica

  Chapter 2: Mitch

  Chapter 3: Jessica

  Chapter 4: Mitch

  Chapter 5: Jessica

  Chapter 6: Mitch

  Chapter 7: Jessica

  Chapter 8: Mitch

  Chapter 9: Jessica

  Chapter 10: Mitch

  Chapter 11: Jessica

  Chapter 12: Mitch

  Chapter 13: Jessica

  Chapter 14: Mitch

  Chapter 15: Jessica

  Chapter 16: Mitch

  Chapter 17: Jessica

  Chapter 18: Mitch

  Chapter 19: Jessica

  Chapter 20: Mitch

  Chapter 21: Jessica

  Chapter 22: Mitch

  Epilogue: Jessica

  Epilogue: Mitch

  Acknowledgements

  Resources

  About the Author

  A Final Note

  Preview of Current and Upcoming Releases

  Preview of Hearts of Jade

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1: Jade

  Chapter 2: Declan

  Preview of Identity of the Heart (A Hidden Hearts Novel #1)

  Chapter 1: Rogue

  Chapter 2: Ivy

  Chapter 3: Tristan

  Preview of Love Claimed

  Dedication

  Chapter 2: Jaxson

  Preview of Love Naturally (A Hidden Beauty Novel #4)

  Chapter 1: Madison

  Chapter 2: Trevor

  All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems – except in the case of brief quotations in articles or reviews – without permission in writing from its publisher, Mary Crawford and Diversity Ink Press. Copyright protection extends to all excerpts and previews by this author included in this book.

  This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  All brand names and product names used in this book are trademarks, registered trademarks, or trade names of their respective holders. I’m not associated with any product or vendor in this book.

  Published on March 28, 2016, by Diversity Ink Press and Mary Crawford.

  ISBN-13:978-0692664643 (Diversity Ink Press)

  ISBN-10:0692664645

  ASIN:B01AAI5KD8

  To everyone whose hearts

  have been stolen by your perfect

  match of a different sort—

  I write this book in loving memory of my service dogs:

  Molly, Boris and Caleigh.

  THE LADDER SHAKES PRECARIOUSLY UNDER my feet as I reach up to fill the hummingbird feeder. For the life of me, I don’t understand why Mrs. Bathwell decided that the hummingbirds need to be fed on the highest peak of the rafters. I adore the birds, but this feeding ritual makes absolutely no sense. As a big drop of the bright red syrup splashes on my cheek, the silent cursing that I’ve been doing under my breath becomes not so silent. Immediately, I apologize even though there isn’t anyone outside within blocks. Every other sane person on the planet is asleep at six-thirty on a Sunday morning in this sleepy suburban enclave. I can’t seem to outgrow my Midwestern farm work ethic nor my pastor’s granddaughter morals no matter how long I’ve been attending college in sunny Florida.

  As I screw on the last feeding spout to the hummingbird feeder, something catches my eye. I’ve seen that suped-up car before. It was the same one that was racing from the scene where the senior citizen couple was spray-painted with a swastika the other day in front of the local market. Unfortunately, the license plate is partially obscured and they are driving too fast for me to see what it says. It looks like it’s not a Florida license plate or if it is, it’s not the traditional plate. The only thing distinguishable about the car is that it looks like a sports car of some sort, but it’s just grey. Grey and loud — very loud. It is so loud that at first, I don’t realize that there is another sound disturbing the early morning quiet.

  I can’t identify the odd sound, so I take the risk and stand on my tiptoes on the wobbly ladder to try to see over the tall privacy fence. Did I mention that heights aren’t really my thing? I really wish that Ivy was here. She was once a cheerleader and she’s used to being tossed in the air. I’ll keep my five-foot-nothing-self firmly on the ground, thank you very much. From this vantage point, I can just barely see over the fence, but unfortunately I don’t really see much. Still, I can hear a rustling sound in the bushes and an odd sound, almost like moaning.

  I scramble off the ladder as quickly as I can and start running toward the sound. It suddenly occurs to me that A.) I’m wearing old ratty cutoffs that no self-respecting woman should be wearing in public. B.) My feet are bare. C.) I don’t have the lick of sense that God gave me — as my grandfather, Walter would say. I don’t know what’s in those bushes, and I don’t even have my cell phone with me. My grandfather and I don’t always see eye to eye. Yet in this case, he would really have a point. I don’t even know what I’m doing out here at this ungodly hour in the morning. I always make fun of Ivy for not having very many street smarts. Really, I think her bad habits have rubbed off on me. I know better than to do what I’m just about to do.

  I start to turn on my heel and head back home when a flash of brown and black catches my eye. What’s even more alarming is that there is some red and silver mixed in with that. “Oh, hell no!” I mutter to myself. As I sprint back to my house, I say a silent prayer of thanks to my grandmother who thought it was important for me to be well-rounded and made me pick a sport to play in high school. If it hadn’t been for my introduction to running on the track team, I would’ve never made it. If left to my own devices, I would happily be a confirmed couch potato.

  I open my back door and I’m confronted by the mess that is my kitchen. I don’t know why I thought it was a good idea to try to teach myself to cook vegetarian food. I was born and raised on a farm. Maybe I should just accept my roots and move on. I don’t think vegetarian cooking is my thing — as is evidenced by the fact that I used every bowl and pan in my entire kitchen. Right now, the most critical question on my mind is how to quickly locate my phone. I’m not really sure where I left it. It could be anywhere in this colossal mess. When I spot my spiral notebook sitting in the middle of the fallout in the middle of my kitchen table, I remember that I stuck my phone in my school backpack for safekeeping. I run to my bedroom to grab it. I snag my tennis shoes from in front of the front door as I go by and slide them on, but in the process, I practically knock myself out on the stairway banister. Let’s just say grace isn’t exactly my middle name.

  Backpack in hand, I run back toward the scene. I punch Rogue’s number into the phone. When she answers the phone, it’s clear that I’ve roused her from a deep sleep.

  “I’m so sorry, Rogue. I forgot that you guys are on vacation. How is the Grand Canyon? If it’s the crack of dawn here in Florida, it must be the middle of the night there.”

  “Oh, it’s all right. I’m not really sleeping all that well anyway. Tristan and Isaac are working on a big case and he’s clacking away on the computer and it keeps me awake. What’s up?” she asks, barely disguising a yawn.

  Her question immediately brings me back to the crisis at hand. “Rogue, I think this could be really bad. There’s a
hurt dog in my neighborhood. It looks pretty serious. This isn’t like back home where we just called the big animal vet or even when I lived in New York City where I knew all the vets at the walk-in clinics because I would take them so many rescued kittens from my neighborhood. I don’t know what I can do here. I’m by myself. I don’t even know if anything is open on the weekends. Everybody I know in this state is out of town right now. I don’t have any medical knowledge. What if I can’t help the poor thing? Even if I could call my grandpa, he would probably just tell me to shoot it. He would say that it’s all part of the cycle of life and God intended it to be that way. I don’t really even know what to think — besides, I can’t shoot a gun in the middle of town. I mean, I know how to shoot a gun; I was raised on a farm. That’s not really the issue here…” I ramble. “Can you ask Tristan if he knows anybody? Maybe I should call Ivy. Marcus knows everyone—”

  I’m only half paying attention to my own blathering as I try to find the dog. He’s not in the same spot that I left him. My panic level starts to rise. What if I can’t find him and he’s walking around injured? The injuries looked really bad when I saw him before. He was actively losing blood. Blood. That’s the secret. I’ll just look for a blood trail; he must be leaving a pretty substantial one. His injuries looked pretty serious.

  I start to feel pretty light headed. Rogue’s voice on the other end of the phone is like a splash of cold water. “Jessica, take a deep breath. You survived the streets of New York when you were just a kid. You can deal with this. Just take it step-by-step.”

  “You’re right, I’ve survived tougher stuff than this. I need to pull it together.” I hear a sound off to my left and I whisper, “Gotta go!” before ripping the earbuds out of my ears and stuffing the phone back in the backpack. As I do, my hand brushes across the snack I had thrown in to my backpack for my last late-night study session. Perfect. It’s almost as if fate has intervened. I quickly unwrap the pepperoni stick and jam it into my pocket. I don’t suppose the puppy is going to care much if it’s a little stale and from a discount store.

  My heart is pounding. It’s been a while since I’ve been around any animals, let alone one that’s been injured. I haven’t gotten a really good look at this one — other than to know that I saw blood. I don’t even know if this dog is feral or aggressive. The outright insane nature of my mission hits me again — I watch all of those rescue shows on Animal Planet; I know better than to try to do this by myself. I don’t have anywhere else to turn. It’s a choice between letting this dog suffer or having backup. I forge forward because I really have no choice at all. With grim determination, I crouch down and duck into a hole in the hedge.

  This is one situation where being the size of a small third-grader is going to help me. I curse my lack of foresight, as I have to dig out my cell phone from my backpack again to use the flashlight. After I start the flashlight app, I can see that the poor dog has wedged himself up against a cement foundation and a wood fence. He has nowhere else to go and he’s shaking violently. As I adjust the flashlight so that I can see where I’m going, I make a horrifying discovery. Duct tape. Lots and lots of duct tape. I’m surprised that he can even breathe. No wonder I had a hard time recognizing the sounds coming from this pathetic creature. It’s amazing that he was able to vocalize anything at all.

  I edge toward him with a little less trepidation than I had before because obviously he can’t bite me — actually, he might be a she. I haven’t actually checked, come to think of it. He just looks so scruffy that he reminds me of that character from the movie I saw as a kid, Benji. Obviously, my plan to bribe the dog with treats won’t work since the poor puppy can’t open his mouth. I creep up beside him and quietly sit down. It’s really cramped quarters in this little hiding spot. It’s a good thing that one of my favorite hobbies as a kid was to cram myself into the smallest possible spaces in my grandparents’ old farmhouse and see how long it took people to find me. It drove my grandparents crazy, but I often would spend hours curled up with a good book or an old chunk of charcoal and a pad of paper before anybody managed to locate me.

  Slowly, I ease my hand over to him and start to stroke the scuff of his neck. Much to my shock, he rolls over and looks up at me with pleading eyes. Scratch that, she looks up at me with pleading eyes as if asking me to scratch her tummy. As I pull my hand back to scratch a different area, I notice that it’s covered in blood. I can’t believe that she’s still so trusting after suffering such egregious maltreatment. I unclip my student I.D. from my backpack, remove the lanyard and hook it to her collar. Of course, her collar doesn’t have any I.D. on it. I suppose it’s too much to hope that she actually has a microchip. This dog seems to have run out of hopes and prayers an awfully long time ago, I decide as I glance at her concave rib cage and thinning coat. I wonder how long she’s been roaming around without any place to call home. It just makes me so sad and angry that I can’t even form the thoughts or words to describe my outrage. Why do people even bother to get dogs if they’re not going to take care of them? It boggles the mind.

  When I try to stand up, she tries to brace me. The ludicrousness of that situation is not lost on me. This dog is injured enough that she should have difficulty standing up on her own. Yet, she’s willing to try to help me. There is something hauntingly beautiful about that simple gesture.

  I carefully maneuver us under the hedge so that I don’t injure her any more. Intellectually, I thought I was prepared for what I was going to see — but, there. just. aren’t. words.

  The sight of her juxtaposed against the bright sunny Florida morning is enough to make me retch. If I thought it was horrifying to witness when we were plastered up against the side of the building underneath the hedge, when it’s exposed under the bright sunlight, it’s the makings of a Stephen King novel. They must have used a half a roll of duct tape on this dog. As I look closer, I can see that at one point, her paws were taped together, but she somehow managed to chew them apart. Even more appalling, it appears that at some point in her young life, probably pretty recently, someone has set fire to this dog’s tail. She has raw, open wounds on what should be a thick, bushy German Shepherd tail.

  I don’t even bother to hide the tears that are streaming down my face. Who in their right mind would do this to any creature — let alone in this quiet, good-natured German Shepherd who is looking up at me with hope filled eyes? I look into her deep, chocolate brown eyes and stroke her ear as I say, “For the time being, I’m going to name you Hope.”

  Instantly, I regret that I said anything to her because she starts to wag her tail and it thumps painfully on the ground. I coax her into a standing position and start to lead her back to my house. Hopefully, this won’t be an ordeal. She’s not a very substantial German Shepherd; she’s mostly gangly legs and paws at this point. However, if she wanted to make my life difficult, she definitely could. Surprisingly, she doesn’t seem to be fearful at all. She falls in right behind me as if she’s been heeling for her whole life. As we walk the few blocks to my house, I contemplate what I’m going to do once I get there. I’m not forbidden under the terms of my lease to have a dog, but it’s definitely not encouraged and my cat, Midnight, might have a big issue with Hope. He’s been the king of my castle since I rescued him. I don’t think he’ll take too kindly to sharing — especially cross species. Those wounds look deep and somewhat infected. I don’t have any way to treat them. I’m a Theater Arts major, minoring in History, I don’t have any knowledge about this kind of stuff. I know how to put on Band-Aids when I cut myself with a box cutter when I’m building scenery, but that’s about all I know.

  The enormity of the challenge ahead of me hits me as I unlock my front gate. My cute little Jeep convertible is parked in the driveway. It’s a daunting reminder that I am far over my head. After my Chevy Chevelle died in the middle of the interstate, Tristan and Rogue surprised me for my birthday and got me a vehicle. Neither of them thought that it was extraordinary to buy someone a car fo
r their birthday — which at that time was bizarre, especially since Rogue used to object every time Tristan spent any money on her, but I guess having an engagement ring on your finger changes everything. Still, it’s hard to be cynical when I’m the beneficiary of their generosity. I look down at Hope. Her wounds are still seeping and even if they weren’t, I’m not sure she has the agility to climb all the way up into my vehicle because I’m not sure how much she hurts right now. Even if I can get her into the Jeep, I’m not sure where I would take her.

  I look up animal hospitals on my phone and only one facility is open this early on a Sunday but it’s a few miles away. I cross my fingers and hope that I can get her into my vehicle. Hope seems to sense my nerves. She rests her head against my thigh and lets out a big sigh. I reached down to pet her and am once again horrified by the duct tape on her muzzle. I decide that I can’t wait any longer and I tie Hope to my roll cage while I run into the house to get my car keys.

  Fortunately for me, the concept of a car ride does not seem foreign to Hope. She hops right in to my Jeep and asserts herself as my copilot as she happily sticks her head out the window. I guess it’s a good thing that my vehicle is dog friendly. I reach over to pet Hope and I’m dismayed when my hand encounters a fresh trickle of blood. I know that my grandpa preaches that all sin is forgivable, but I sometimes wonder if they should be. Right now I’m not feeling like I should leave the vengeance to the Lord, if you know what I mean.

  “MITCH, I THINK YOU OUGHT to come see what just pulled into the parking lot,” Stuart yells across the warehouse where we keep all the extra bedding.

  Something in his tone warns me that he’s up to something, so I ask, “Are you asking me to evaluate something with two legs or four?”

  “Well, Buddy I think that might be the question of the day,” Stuart quips. He quickly turns serious as he says, “For the moment though, I think the one with four legs needs the most urgent attention, and if the one with two legs is responsible for the condition of the one with four legs, then you can kiss the one with two legs goodbye.”