Chapter 1
I named him Aslan.
The only thing about him that deserved the lionesque name was his size. He was 120 pounds of homely looking mutt with a stubborn streak as long asGone with the Wind, and I loved him with all my heart.
“Aslan! No!” I tugged his leash as he attempted to chase a soccer ball whizzing across the field.
Aslan gave the ball one last wistful glance and then trotted back to the rest of the pack.
It wasn’t easy to walk four dogs at once, especially when one of them had as much energy as Aslan. But the gods had blessed me with a gift. I was a wrangler of dogs, a whisperer of puppies, a…volunteer at the Mossy Oak Canine Rescue Center, with a lime-green T-shirt to prove it.
Every Sunday I chose four lucky pups to take on a walk. I tried to rotate the dogs, but Aslan nearly always made the cut. He’d been adopted from the shelter a few times and brought back because the owners couldn’t handle him. I couldn’t help but sympathize with him. My parents had kicked me out at seventeen, and I’d been roaming ever since, never finding anywhere that felt like home. Mossy Oak was a great town in the North Carolina mountains, but I was sure I’d get the itch to move soon. Moving was what I did.
Every week I walked the rescue dogs at Ginger Cake Acres—a sprawling park teeming with life no matter what the weather. After an hour spent meandering along the paths with the dogs, I felt rejuvenated.
I was a natural-born dog walker, and it was great money for a side gig. My job at the bookshop would have been enough to pay the bills if I wasn’t in debt to the frizzed ends of my naturally curly hair.
“Aslan!” I cried as he tugged on his leash to chase another errant ball. “No!”
But this time, I was too late. The wiry mutt was on the loose. In a flash, Aslan was gone, tearing across the field in pursuit of the ball.
“Hey!” A woman sitting on a nearby bench scrambled to her feet. “Your dog is heading straight for my daughter!”
Aslan ran across the field, heading straight for a little girl sitting under a tree.
“He isn’t dangerous,” I assured the woman, who clutched her phone as if ready to call emergency services. “He’s just annoying.”
“My daughter is afraid of dogs.”
Aslan dropped the tennis ball in the little girl’s lap, and she looked up from her book, startled. Aslan stared at her, tongue lolling. The little girl’s face light up, and I knew she’d fallen for his charm.
“She doesn’t look scared,” I said.
The girl picked up the ball and threw it. Aslan darted after it, and the sound of girly laughter floated across the busy playground.
Her mother didn’t seem to recognize the sound. “She looks…”
“Happy?”
The woman nodded, watching her daughter with teary eyes. “I haven’t seen her laugh in so long.”
“Aslan has a way with people,” I said, bending the truth a little. Aslan’s way with people was to annoy the heck out of them until they couldn’t take him anymore and returned him to the shelter. Three times he’d been adopted. Three times he’d been returned.
I gave a sharp whistle to call Aslan back to the pack. He trotted over reluctantly. The little girl watched him, then returned to her book, a frown reclaiming her pixie-like features.
“He’s kind of funny looking,” the woman said as I grabbed Aslan’s leash. “What kind of dog is he?”
“Who knows?”
She arched a brow at me, eyeing me and Aslan with equal curiosity. “You have a lot of dogs.”
I laughed. “They aren’t mine. They’re from the rescue center. I walk them every Sunday on my day off.” I smiled and offered her Aslan’s leash. “Wanna walk Aslan for a minute? I’ve got my hands full with these guys.” I had a beagle, a Labrador, and a poodle waiting patiently to finish their walk. I could handle them with ease, but I had a feeling the woman needed a walk as much as the dogs did.
“Aslan?” Her eyebrow arched higher.
In response to his name, Aslan turned his head to look at her.
“He’s kind of cute, I guess.” She shoved her phone in her bag and took the leash. “He made Summer laugh, and I’m grateful.”
