The corner of Sebastian’s lips twitched upward. “Fine. I’ll get his leash.”
Seriously? What the hell was I doing? I had needed a visit to Dr. Emery to discuss my actions surrounding a little girl who had written to Santa. What did pretending to be a dog trainer who taught commands in German warrant, then? Being institutionalized? Lord, how the hell did I get myself here?
Sebastian came back with the leash and handed it to me. I was surprised when he softened his tone and extended his hand. “I apologize. I didn’t introduce myself. That dog just gets the best of me sometimes. I’m Sebastian Maxwell, and I assume you must be Gretchen.”
Gretchen. Of course! Because the woman not from Germany who trains in German would logically be named Gretchen. I put my hand into his large one and shook. The minute my skin made contact with his, my pulse took off like a runaway train. When his grip tightened around my hand, it sent a shock of electricity up my arm. Great, more unsettling behavior to discuss with Dr. Emery—though it did make sense that I lit up like a Christmas tree, since I was damn Santa Claus. I’d need a loan to pay for my therapy sessions after today.
Pulling my hand back, I focused on getting the hell out of there. Apparently, I’d be taking my new student with me. I managed to clasp the end of the leash onto Marmaduke’s collar and did my best impersonation of a professional animal handler. “Okay. So I’ll be back in an hour.” I tugged at the giant dog’s collar, and amazingly, he followed. Just to solidify that I was totally losing it, I turned back at the top of the steps and smiled at Sebastian Maxwell. “Danke.”
After I said it, I started to question whether that was even German for “thank you” or not. Oh well, too late if it wasn’t. Marmaduke bolted down the stairs, and I had to run to keep up. At the bottom, I stood my ground and yanked hard on his leash.
“Whoa . . . ,” I said.
Shit. Whoa? That was for a horse and in English, wasn’t it? I looked over my shoulder and back up the stairs, hoping Sebastian had gone back inside and hadn’t heard me. Of course, I had no such luck.
Sebastian stood at the top of the stairs watching me. He looked really damn skeptical.
Yeah, you and me both, dude. You and me both.Marmaduke and I went to a nearby park that had a doggy run, which meant I could let him off the leash in the fenced-in area while I googled dog training.
I spent a good half hour reading up on the basics of schooling a dog on obedience and then asked Google for reasons to train a dog in German. Surprisingly, it was more common than I would’ve guessed. Many people trained dogs in the native language of the breed. And who knew . . . a Great Dane wasn’t actually Danish—it was of German descent. So that made sense, I guess. Plus, training in a foreign language made it easier for the animal not to get confused when others used common words near them. I also looked up a couple of words for basic training in German. Sitz, pronounced zitz, meant “sit.” Platz, pronounced plah-tz, meant “down,” and nein, pronounced nine, meant “no.” I figured Marmaduke desperately needed those three words in his life.
The one good thing about a big puppy with a lot of energy was that he wore himself out pretty fast. Once he seemed more subdued, I took him out of the doggy area and went and found a quiet tree to sit under and work on training him.
He laid his enormous body across my legs. I petted him as I spoke. “So, Marmaduke, tell me about the people you live with. Is Sebastian as much of a jerk as he seemed like back at the house? He’s definitely not anything like I’d expected him to be after hearing about him from Birdie.” When I said “Birdie,” Marmaduke started to wag his tail. I wanted to see if it was a coincidence or not. So I waited until his tail stopped wagging and then talked to him a little more. “Yeah. So I expected a really nice guy, maybe soft-spoken, even though he’s clearly a big dude like you. But Sebastian’s kind of a meanie, isn’t he?”
Nothing. Marmaduke just kept looking at me, but his tail didn’t budge.
“I really hope he doesn’t talk to Birdie like the way he spoke to us.”
The minute I said “Birdie,” the dog’s tail took off wagging. I smiled and scratched his ears. “Yeah, I get it, buddy. I could tell she was really special just from her letters. I’m glad you’re there to protect her.”