The Lucky Dog Matchmaking Service Read Online Free PDF Page B

way—beautiful, flawless, and enviable. She had no doubt called up a sales associate in an upscale boutique, outlined her gift requirements, and tasked the employee with selecting and delivering the actual item.
    Lara lifted the lid to reveal a buttery-soft calfskin handbag with brass hardware and a designer logo prominently displayed on one side.
    It was lovely. It was classic. It was eerily similar to the bag her mother had sent her last year—the one Bugsy, a high-strung Weimaraner mix, had snatched off the hall table and gnawed to shreds in a bout of separation anxiety.
    Justine gave people what she thought they should have, rather than what they wanted. And that went double for her daughter. For Christmases and birthdays, Justine sent hand-painted silk scarves, bejeweled stiletto sandals, and Italian cashmere. Lara stowed all of these luxuries in their original boxes on the very top shelf of her closet, for fear they’d be chewed up or desecrated by dog hair.
    In return, Lara gifted her mother with generic, practical standbys like candles and cookbooks. Justine would accept these graciously, but they both knew that these items, too, would be relegated to a darkened closet shelf.
    “You don’t like it?” Evan prompted as Lara blinked down at the bag nestled in tissue paper.
    “It’s gorgeous.” She ran her palm along the smooth, cool leather. “But I wouldn’t dare use it. This thing probably cost eighteen hundred dollars.”
    “For a purse ?” He looked incredulous.
    “My mom’s bag collection could pay for a small house,” Lara said. “The high-end stuff’s pricey. And do you know what happened to the Prada she gave me last year?”
    “Someone mauled it?” he guessed.
    “Bugsy,” Lara confirmed. “Two days after I got it. He ate half of it, then spent the rest of the night throwing up.”
    Evan glanced at the dogs milling around in the backyard, then shook his head. “For eighteen hundred dollars, you should be carrying that thing all day, every day. Heck, you should use it for a pillow at night. Maximize your cost-per-wear ratio.”
    Lara closed the box and set it aside. “I’ll just take it out and wear it when we see her on Mother’s Day.” She turned her attention to the other package, a huge, heavy carton.
    “Oh my God. Honey, look!” She gasped as the box flaps unfolded to reveal a purple plastic behemoth with cyclone technology and a HEPA filter. “The vacuum of my dreams.”
    The holy grail of pet hair removal. Not as expensive as the handbag, to be sure, but exactly what she wanted.
    Then she came to the card:
    Happy Birthday, La-la! You’ll always be my little girl.
    She dropped the paper as if scorched, and Evan picked it up, scanned the text, and returned her look of alarm.
    “Oh no.” She stood up and backed away from the vacuum. “What does he want this time?”
    “Maybe he just wants to say happy birthday?” Evan suggested, but his voice lacked conviction.
    “Yeah, right. ‘You’ll always be my little girl’?” Lara scoffed. “A Dyson? He definitely wants something. Something big.”
    Evan didn’t refute this. He himself had grown up in an absurdly functional family: His mother packed his lunch every day, his father coached his Little League team, and everyone said grace at the dinner table before passing the potatoes and chatting about their days. When he and Lara first started dating, he’d urged her to take the initiative and call her father if she hadn’t heard from him in a while. Then Lara’s father, Gil, had started campaigning in August for Lara and Evan to come to his cabin in the mountains for Thanksgiving. He’d painted such a lavish, Norman Rockwell picture of communal family cooking and eating that Lara had finally agreed, rearranged her work schedule, and found a pet sitter for the dogs. Then, while she was packing her suitcase the night before, Gil called and apologized, explaining that he had decided to spend the holiday with his new