"What I'd like is to curl up with you and sleep for about a week,” he said without opening his eyes. “Since that's not likely, I'll take the tea."

She crossed the room and checked the electric kettle; there was enough water for one cup.

"You're darn right it's not likely."

"There's a good reason I didn't show up for dinner."

"You don't owe me any explanations. Jorge told me you'd called, and he fixed me a chile relleno with a new sauce he's working on and he ate dinner with me and it was fine."

"I would have called you myself, but I was in the middle of something."

"Look, it's okay. I understand-things come up.” She pulled a ceramic mug from a shelf on the wall behind the wingback chair. “Lots of things, apparently, since that was three weeks ago.” She put a teabag in the cup and poured water over it.

"Do you read the newspaper?” Aiden asked and straightened in his chair.

"Are you trying to change the subject?"

"I'll take that as a no.” He took the mug of steaming tea. “Because if you did read the paper or watch the local news, you'd know there's been an epidemic of tainted pet food. We've got cats and dogs both going into kidney failure. All of us have been working round the clock, and we've still lost eight dogs and four cats."

Harriet could see the toll that loss had taken etched into the lines on his face. “I don't know what to say."

"I'm sorry,” he said. “I shouldn't be ragging on you. I should have found a minute to call. There's no reason you should know what's going on at the vet clinic."

"I knew DeAnn's dog had been in the hospital, but I didn't realize you had so many others."

"We have no way of predicting how bad this is going to get. I don't think we're out of the woods yet, but we've had a little slow-down this week. It's probably temporary, but Dr. Johnson decided to go ahead and send me and one of the assistants to Angel Harbor to do a spay-neuter clinic he agreed to months ago."