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“LOOKS LIKE FLOWER is the belle of the ball,” I told Dom as I watched his new pet gallop around the section of the local dog park reserved for medium-sized and large dogs, filling up her dance card. Sexy Beast and I were, alas, relegated to the small-dog section on the other side of the chain-link fence.
As recently as a year ago, SB had wanted nothing to do with others of his species. His original owner, Irene McAuliffe, hadn’t believed in canine socialization—or canine grooming, but that was another story. Since becoming SB’s guardian, I’d made a point of regularly exposing him to other dogs, and he’d made admirable progress.
Four other pint-size pooches and their humans occupied the small-dog section on this Saturday morning, and I’m proud to say Sexy Beast was on chummy, butt-sniffing terms with all of them—the dogs, that is, not the humans, whose butts, sadly for him, were out of reach. The weather was still mild, and the sky was overcast.
My ex stood on his side of the fence, his anxious gaze never leaving his newest family member, now cavorting with a chocolate Lab, a Weimaraner, and a Saint Berdoodle. Yeah, that’s right, someone had the bright idea of crossing a standard poodle with a Saint Bernard, and I have to say, it was the sweetest thing ever, a hundred-pound brown-and-white fluffball with thick, curly fur and a lovable personality.
“What do I do if she bites another dog?” he said. “Or a person? Maybe a child?”
“She’s not going to bite anyone,” I assured him. “Look at her. She’s having a blast. The folks at the animal shelter tested her temperament, remember? There were no issues.”
Dominic Faso, at thirty-nine years of age—that’s right, he’s a few months younger than I—had never before owned a dog. He’d never felt the lack of one until his recent breakup with Bonnie Hernandez, which meant he was also breaking up with her magnificent reddish-blond standard poodle, Frederick. Frederick was everything my own poodle wasn’t. Not only was he big, but he was a champion, in both agility and retrieving. He’d even saved some kid’s life once, so the story went.
My ex-husband was a notorious serial bridegroom. He didn’t know how to be alone. If adopting a canine companion meant he might not be so quick to turn his next swipe-right date into Mrs. Faso the Fourth, then Flower will have helped him as much as he was helping her by providing a loving forever home.
I was Flower’s number-one fan, and had been since the moment I’d spied her curled up in the rear of her kennel at the noisy animal shelter. Dom had insisted I accompany him yesterday to help him select his new pet, because I “know so much about dogs.” I suspected the real reason was that I’d steadfastly declined all his invitations to dinners, plays, concerts, and what have you. The clever man knew me well enough to know I wouldn’t refuse to help him adopt a rescue animal.
I know you want to know about Flower. She’s a one-year-old mix of several breeds, two of which are unmistakable. Right off the bat, this young lady’s spooky blue eyes stamp her as part Siberian husky. The short hair and tricolor body—black saddle, white chest and belly, and floppy tan ears—scream beagle. She probably owes her long legs and white face to her husky mom or dad, but without knowing who else contributed their doggie genes to the mix, it’s hard to say for sure.
Flower has a distinctive appearance and, more important, a sweet, frisky disposition. Dom welcomed her into his life with the same full-hearted joy, tinged with a dose of nerves, with which he’d greeted the births of his three children. I knew the nerves would dissipate in short order and that these two would be good for each other.
Enough about Flower. What you really want to know is what happened when I phoned Detective Cookie Kaplan from the pub Thursday night. Well, she’d tried to put me off at first, not wanting to encourage my unproductive meddling, until I finally got it through her thick skull that this was an example of productive meddling. “Don’t touch those martini glasses,” she’d said. “I’ll be right there.” Fifteen minutes later the evidence had been bagged (paper, not plastic, thank you very much), labeled, and spirited away for crime-lab voodoo. Cookie had promised an update, but I figured I’d have to chase her for it. If I didn’t hear anything by Monday morning, I’d start nagging her.
Sexy Beast ran over to me for reassuring scritches and good-boy praise, before racing off to rejoin his tribe of itty-bitty lapdogs with delusions of Rottweiler. Meanwhile, Dom was frowning worriedly at his new pet while she play-wrestled with the Saint Berdoodle.
I reached across the fence to massage his stiff shoulders. “Relax, Daddy. She’s doing just fine.”
He offered a lopsided smile. “This is all new to me, this dog stuff.”
“I know, but you’ve got to chill or Flower will pick up on your tension and rip out your throat while you sleep.”
“Oh, is that how it works?” he asked.
“Trust me,” I said. “I’m the one who knows all about dogs. You said so yourself.”
He watched Flower for another few moments before turning to look me in the eye. “I’ve been going for counseling, Janey.”
My surprise must have shown. In all the years I’d known Dom, he’d never been the type to seek help in figuring himself out. Not that he was a stranger to self-reflection, he’d just never seen the need to involve a professional.
“What prompted that?” I asked. I figured if he didn’t want to talk about it, he wouldn’t have brought it up.
“You and me,” he said.
“Oh.” I’d expected it to have something to do with Bonnie. After all, they’d been engaged for more than a year, if you didn’t count a two-month hiatus last summer.
“I messed up so badly with you,” he said. “I was so young and so damn sure of myself. I didn’t realize what I was giving up. All those years we could’ve had...” He closed his eyes briefly, shook his head.
“It wasn’t just you, Dom,” I said. “We were both to blame.”
“No,” he said, firmly. “I was the one who insisted I didn’t want children. What did I know? A stupid twenty-one-year-old kid.”
All these years later, our painful arguments were still fresh in my mind. We had plenty of time to start a family, I’d told him. I was happy to wait, but I needed some assurance that eventually we’d have at least one child. His response was a flat refusal: Fatherhood was not for him.
And if you’re thinking this was a conversation we should have had before saying I do, you’re not wrong. I guess I’d just assumed Dom and I were on the same page about this, as we’d been about nearly everything else up to that point.
Couldn’t I compromise, he’d asked back then, for the sake of our marriage? If compromising meant I could never satisfy my all-consuming desire to become a mother, I’d said, then no, I didn’t have it in me to live with that kind of so-called compromise.
“And the rest is history,” Dom said, with a smirk at his own stubborn, youthful self. “As soon as our divorce was final, I had three kids by two wives, all while I was still in my twenties.”
“They’re wonderful kids,” I said.
“No doubt about it. I’m ashamed to say that if Lana and Meryl hadn’t taken the decision out of my hands, then Kari, Ivan, and Jon would never have been born.”
“Then maybe it was meant to be,” I said, “our breaking up so you could bring them into the world.”
“I refuse to think that way.” His expression turned to one of excruciating longing. “I will never stop loving you, Janey, never stop wanting to marry you again, to make those babies we should’ve had back then. I can’t put it any plainer.”
I swallowed hard, forcing myself to meet his intense gaze. Ever since our divorce, I’d fantasized about hearing those words. No, that’s not accurate. During most of that time, I’d have loved nothing more than to undo what I’d considered to be the biggest mistake of my life. The past year, however, had been instructive, a time of personal growth, as hokey as that sounds. I hadn’t lied when I’d told Martin it was over with Dom. That didn’t mean it was always easy to sort out my emotions.
When I didn’t respond, he cleared his throat. “Anyway, it’s been good, talking to this counselor. He’s helping me to see everything more clearly, to identify things in my life I might want to work on.”
“Such as...?” Over Dom’s shoulder I watched Flower and the chocolate Lab play tug-of-war with a rope toy.
“I know it seems like I rush into relationships,” he said. “That’s because, well, I rush into relationships. I get antsy without a significant other.”
I didn’t want to think about all the years I’d avoided meaningful relationships while yearning for a second chance with my ex. I forced myself to say, “You know I was always hoping we’d get together again. I wasn’t very good at hiding it.”
“I know.” He looked away, then back at me. His voice was thick with self-reproach when he said, “I guess I figured you’d always be there.”
Humiliation clogged my throat. “Conveniently waiting, in the unlikely event you failed to find someone better. Younger. Prettier. With a respectable career and a sense of style.”
“Janey—”
I held up my hand. “No, I get it. I was the fool for sticking it out for so long, with no encouragement from you.” Well, not no encouragement. Dom had doled out just enough positive reinforcement to keep my hopes up. Did he realize he was doing it? I didn’t know, and at this point, I could honestly say I didn’t care.
It was over.
He reached across the chain-link to take hold of my hands. “I’m not proud of how I treated you. I’m working on it, working on myself. I want to be the man you need me to be.”
I pulled one of my hands free to stroke his smooth-shaven cheek. That was one of the things I’d missed the most—simply touching him. “I want you to do that work, Dom. I’m glad you’re sorting through your issues.”
He saw it coming. “Don’t, Janey.” He squeezed my other hand.
“It’s too late for us.” My eyes stung. I refused to let one tear fall. “You know I’ll always care about you, but it’s too late for us.”
Sexy Beast, like most dogs, is downright telepathic when it comes to his human’s feelings. I felt his little feet on my leg and welcomed the interruption. I picked him up and dried my eyes in his warm, curly fur.
Dom took a step back from the fence and stood watching Flower, his gaze so unfocused I wondered if he actually saw her running in circles with her new packmates.
A newcomer, a handsome brindle-coated boxer, streaked past Dom, eager to join in the fun. A female voice I recognized called out, “Be a good boy, Jackson. Don’t hump everyone else this time. That’s not the way to make friends.”
In the next instant, Georgia Chen spotted me and sprinted over to the fence. “Jane! Oh my Gawd, you’ll never believe what happened! They arrested Amy!”