Page 17 of Cole

“Yes, it is.” Annie had never introduced Nyla to anyone outside of her close circle. “Her name is Nyla.”

“What breed is she?”

“She’s a Tervuren, which is a part of the Belgian Shepherd family.”

“She must be a great guard dog,” Cole said.

Annie nodded. “I definitely feel safe when she’s around.”

“I’d love to meet her someday,” Cole said. “Unless she’d tear me apart.”

“She wouldn’t,” Annie assured him. “Unless I told her to.”

Cole’s brows lifted. “So she’s trained to attack on command?”

“Yes.” Annie didn’t see any sense in lying. “But I’ve never found it necessary to use that command, and I hope I never do.”

“I hope so too.”

“Do you have a dog?”

“No. I travel too much to have one. Maybe someday.”

As their conversation continued, Annie started to work on putting together Cole’s order. She was a bit surprised that he wanted to chat the way they were, but she wasn’t going to end the call.

“Here’s one of the gifts,” Annie said as she held up a tissue paper wrapped bundle that she’d secured with a logo sticker and some ribbon.

“Hey! That looks great. Better than I ever could have done.”

“The tissue paper will match one of the colors of the items. This one is the pink and yellow set, and I’ll put the purple and green one in purple tissue.”

“Is this an extra charge?” Cole asked.

“Nope. I wrap all the orders I get in similar ways.”

“Your customer service level is through the roof. People who buy from your site must be very happy.”

Annie shrugged. “I don’t get many complaints.”

“But some peopledocomplain?”

“Yes, but almost all of those have had to do with shipping issues. Sometimes the delivery service isn’t perfect.”

“That’s not your fault, though.”

“There are people who don’t seem to realize that.” Annie glanced at Nyla as she tensed on alert just before the front door opened.

“Hey, Annie!” Benji’s voice floated up the stairs. “Can I come up?”

“Yep.”

“Is that Benji?” Cole asked.

“It sure is.”

Benji was up the stairs quickly, though he came to an abrupt stop when he spotted her phone where it was attached to the stand. “Is thatCole Halverson?”

“Yep. It sure is.”

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