Free Trust Me by Melanie Craft Page A

is my job, isn’t it?”
    Carly hoisted the bag, staggering slightly under the weight. “You’re looking at a woman who lifted an eighty-pound Rottweiler
     onto an X-ray table today. When I say help me with the dog food, I don’t mean do it yourself, I mean help me.”
    “Eighty pounds?”
    “Well, maybe seventy,” she amended breathlessly. “He was only a year old. And one of the technicians might have given him
     a little boost from the back. You know how it is.”
    Max lifted the bag from her arms. “Find something else to do. I’ll handle the food.”
    Carly, feeling a twinge in her lower back, didn’t argue.
    She had left the dogs outside in the fenced backyard while she was at work, and when she opened the kitchen door, she found
     them all sitting eagerly on the porch, having heard activity in the kitchen and surmising that it was dinnertime.
    They looked faintly disappointed when, instead of letting them in, Carly stepped outside and closed the door behind her.
    “Soon,” she said, to the array of wagging tails and curious stares. “Ten minutes. I don’t think Max needs another dose of
     you guys right now. You can be a little overwhelming to people who aren’t used to pets.”
    Henry’s back lawn had been carefully landscaped for privacy, and the artful, though overgrown, border of trees and shrubs
     girdling the expanse of grass almost disguised the fact that a city street lay just beyond the hidden fence. It was a dog
     paradise, complete with a small pond for splashing, and judging from the condition of the dogs’ coats, there had been a lot
     of splashing that afternoon.
    “You’re a mess,” Carly said sternly to the group, and was met with several wide grins. She threw a tennis ball for them for
     a while, then checked back into the kitchen and found all four bags of food stacked neatly in the pantry. There was no sign
     of Max.
    He still hadn’t appeared by the time the dog pack was crunching happily at their bowls. Was he waiting for her in the car?
     Carly was puzzled. Either he disliked dogs more than she had thought, or something strange was going on. She considered it
     as she walked back down the long hall. It seemed unbelievable that he had never been in Henry’s house before. What kind of
     bizarre relationship would keep him from ever visiting his grandfather, yet leave him as the old man’s trustee?
    To her surprise, Max was not waiting in the car, or anywhere out in front of the house. Carly called his name, but there was
     no answer, so she went back inside. She walked through the entry hall into the huge, echoing living room. The velvet drapes
     were closed, as they usually were, and the room was dim until Carly flipped the switch that illuminated the central chandelier.
     Glittering crystal light fell in ripples over the ornate furniture, but the room was empty.
    She frowned, walking forward. “Max?”
    There was light coming from the dining room, through an opening between the tall wooden doors. She called again and heard
     the creak of old floorboards, then his voice.
    “In here.”
    The dining room drapes were open, and the evening sunlight streamed in to illuminate the heavy mahogany table and chairs.
     Max was standing silently in front of a wall of framed oil portraits, and the tension in the set of his shoulders warned Carly
     to approach cautiously.
    “What’s going on?” she asked.
    He didn’t look at her. “Pauline was right,” he said. “I do have the Tremayne eyes.”
    Astonished, Carly followed his gaze to a picture of Alan Tremayne, Henry’s son. In the portrait, he was standing in front
     of one of the old oak trees in the backyard. He looked young, like a college student, with long light brown hair and sideburns,
     in the style of the early sixties. Alan had been killed in an accident, many years ago, and that was all Carly knew about
     it. Henry did not talk about his personal life, preferring to focus their afternoon discussions on neutral