On a bright autumn day, Flynn Marlowe lost his best friend, a beagle named Barley, while out on a hike in Seattle’s Discovery Park. On a cold winter day, Mac Bowersox found his best friend, a lost, scared, and emaciated beagle, on the streets of Seattle. Two men. One dog. When Flynn and Mac meet by chance in a park the next summer, there’s a problem -- who does Barley really belong to? Flynn wants him back, but he can see that Mac rescued him and loves him just as much as he does. Mac wants to keep the dog, and he can imagine how heartbreaking losing him would be -- but that's just what Flynn experienced. A “shared custody” compromise might be just the way to work things out. But will the arrangement be successful? Mac and Flynn are willing to try it ... and along the way, they just might fall in love.

Lost and Found

“And I fell hard for this man. But he was never therefor me. Part of it wasn’t even his own fault. He was ambitious, wanted to make detective before he was thirty. And it was a tough job. Seattle was a lot rougher around the edges back then. So even when he was with me, which wasn’t all that often, really, he worked so hard, he really wasn’t. You know what I mean?”


Mac nodded. He just wanted to go up to his room and read.


“I finally had to let him go, even though the passion was red-hot, over the top, blazing.” She laughed. “And I really think I loved him. But we needed to part. That same fire that got me so worked up could have burnt me up as well.” She looked pointedly at Mac. “I said good-bye to him. To protect my own heart, you see.”


Chapter 33