Crazy People: The Crazy for You Stories Read online

  The dog relaxed a little, and Quinn wondered if maybe she’d been taking the wrong tack, cooing and patting. Maybe the dog could sense the condescension in her voice the same way she could sense it in Bill’s. No wonder it was cowering under a truck.

  The cold crept through her coat and the knees of her gabardine pants, and Quinn shifted on the concrete, trying to find a warm place. There wasn’t one. “You know,” she said to the dog, “we could be having this conversation in my car. With the heater going.”

  The dog cocked its head at her, still tense but photogenic as hell.

  “I’m freezing my ass off here,” Quinn said. “Why don’t we go be cute in the car?”

  “You owe me. McKenzie.” Jason called as he jogged up beside her and dropped the bag on the ground. “Change is in the bag. I pass art for this, right?”

  Quinn unwrapped the first burger, breaking it in half and then in quarters as she talked to the dog. “Look, see, I’m a good person. Food.”

  She shoved the first piece under the truck as far she could and then moved her hand back, so the dog could come forward. It stared at the food, but it didn’t move. “It’s okay, it’s good,” she said, and felt Jason kneel down beside her.

  Jason peered under the van again. “It’s too scared to take the burger. We’re going to have to go get it.”

  “No,” Quinn said. “We can’t scare it more—”

  “Look, McKenzie, sometimes nice isn’t the way to go.” Jason talked to her like an equal, which should have been insolent but wasn’t. They were equals. They were saving a dog. “If it was hungry enough for the food to get it, we’d have it by now. This part isn’t working.”

  “So what’s your plan?” Quinn said.

  Jason ducked his head to look under the van again. “It’s cornered against the wheel and the tire. It can run out the front or this side, that’s all. We toss it the burger pieces, I go under and grab it while it’s distracted, and you stay down at the end in case I miss and it shoots out the front.”

  It wasn’t all that different from Bill’s plan, Quinn knew. But it was. Jason cared about the dog. “You got it,” she said and handed over the rest of the burger.

  Jason squirmed his shoulder under the van to throw the pieces toward the dog, and Quinn stumbled to her feet on the ice and went around to the front of the van. She looked under it in time to see the dog lean toward the meat. Jason’s hand shot out and grabbed the dog’s leg, and then all hell broke loose.

  This was one dog that didn’t want to be caught. The shrieking and yelping echoed under the metal van, and Jason cursed as he pulled the struggling dog out by one leg. Quinn caught the dog just as Jason yanked it all the way out. She scooped it into her arms and cuddled it to her as it squirmed. “Did you get bit?” she said, and Jason stood up, brushing ice and dirt from his letter jacket.

  “Nope,” he said. “That’s a polite little dog. Loud, though.” He picked up the bag and said, “There’s another burger in here to make friends with.” He ducked his head to look at the dog’s face. “Hey, you. You just found a nice lady to live with. Be nice, too.” He scratched the dog behind the ears even while it strained to be free, and then he grinned at Quinn as he handed her the bag. “See you.”

  Bill pulled up in her car as he was walking away. Jason said, “Hey, coach,” and kept on walking without looking back. Usually, the lifters fought to bask in Bill’s glory; here was another thing about Jason Quinn liked.

  “What was that all about?” Bill asked as he got out of the car, and Quinn said, “Jason got the dog out,” and slid past him into the drivers’ seat he’d just vacated.

  Bill chuckled. Quinn loathed people who chuckled, she decided as she clutched the struggling dog. Nothing like a supercilious laugh to really piss a person off.

  “Well, I’m glad you got the dog out,” he said, and she felt guilty again because he really was a nice guy.

  “I’ll call you later,” she said, trying to hook the door closed with her elbow, and he motioned her arm away and shut the door for her. “Later,” she mouthed through the window, and then let the dog go.

  It rolled into the passenger seat and then scrambled between the seats into the hatchback.

  “Look,” Quinn said. “There is food involved. And no more grabbing, I swear.” She opened the bag and tore a piece off the second burger and threw it back to the dog.

  The dog snarfed it down, gulping in its hurry.

  “Come here,” Quinn said, and put the next piece closer, within her reach.

  She heard voices outside the car, and turned to see Bill put his hand on the shoulder of one of the lifters. The kid looked toward the car, shook his head, and moved on. Bill looked back at her and shrugged and smiled. It took her a minute to catch on: he was trying to give her dog away. He thought he was helping, of course, but the dumbass was trying to give her dog away to a weight-lifter. Was he insane?

  The dog climbed into the passenger seat and whimpered.

  “Sorry,” Quinn said, and gave it another chunk of hamburger. “I got distracted.” The dog ate more slowly this time, watching every move Quinn made with what appeared to be grave suspicion but not terror. It was still shaking, but that was probably from the cold. Quinn turned the heater higher, knowing it was futile; CRXs are slow to warm up.

  “I’m supposed to meet people at four,” she told the dog as she fed it another piece of the burger. “Darla and Stephanie. I’m late. You weren’t part of my plan.”

  The dog ate the hamburger and then whined again until she’d fed it the whole thing. Not enough. It cocked its head at her, looking for more.

  “Very cute,” she said, and patted her lap. “Come here, kid.”

  The dog thought it over for a moment and then stood, its legs looking impossibly thin, nothing more than fur-covered bone.

  “I’ll get you more food soon,” Quinn said, and the dog whined and quivered until she reached over and lifted it onto her lap.

  Its shiny smooth coat was cold, no insulation to keep a body warm, and the dog shuddered against her, trying to get close to her heat. Quinn unbuttoned her coat and wrapped it around the dog’s shivering skinny little body until only its head poked out. “It’s okay,” she said again, and the dog looked up at her and then pushed its head under her coat, looking for complete warmth and safety.

  “I’ll take care of you,” Quinn said, and wondered who she could give this one to, who would be kind enough and quiet enough and loving enough and attentive enough to make this dog happy.

  Not a weight-lifter, that was for damn sure. Well, maybe Jason, but he hadn’t been interested. If he had been, he’d have said so. He’d only been in her second semester art class two days, but she already had a clear appreciation of Jason as somebody who got what he wanted. If he’d wanted this dog, she’d have been in his truck by now.

  Who else?

  Bill tapped on the window, and Quinn exhaled through her teeth in exasperation before she rolled it down. “What?”

  “I think I’ve found somebody to take the dog.” Bill smiled at her reassuringly. Daddy knows best. Quinn looked beyond him and saw the tramp from the parking lot.

  The man was old and looked as if he hadn’t had a bath since warm weather. His body stooped in a curve echoed by his red-veined nose, hunched in part from bad posture and in part to look into her car. Quinn held the dog tighter. The old man’s eyes were rheumy and his fingers poked through the holes in his gloves. This guy couldn’t take care of himself; how was he going to take care of a dog?

  “Do you have a place to stay?” Quinn asked him, feeling guilty that she was willing to rescue a dog and not a human being in equally bad condition.

  “Yes, ma’am.” The old man’s voice was gravely as he edged forward. “I’m staying in a nice little farm, out on the edge of town. That little dog would like it there.”

  Quinn drew back a little. This whole situation was weird. Why would a tramp want this dog? She shot a glance a Bill. “I think I’ll just