"If only you could take him while we try to find him a new home."

He knew where she was going with this, and it was vital he cut her off at the pa.s.s. "Sophie, I just got a dog." Though looking at Mimi, he knew that wasn't entirely true.

"Please, Vince, couldn't you give him a try? He's probably lost, and his owner is desperate to find him.

I will put an ad in the paper and make posters to put in public places. Please?"

He stared down into eyes that were big and blue and full of appeal. He dropped his gaze to avoid saying yes to absolutely anything only to find two pairs of brown eyes staring up at him, as though they knew it was all up to him. He'd stared down angry teamsters, managed to hang tough in the face of threats ranging from legal action to physical violence, and he'd never wavered. But when Sophie looked at him with naked appeal in her eyes, he had trouble thinking, never mind saying no to her.

The Doberman had protected his girls when he hadn't been around to do it, and at least the Doberman looked like a dog, acted like a dog, and smelled like a dog; maybe he'd rub off on Mimi.

Still, Vince wasn't a pushover, and he was determined not to act like one.

He glared at the woman and the dog going dopey-eyed underneath her stroking hand-something he'd like to try sometime. "Is he house trained?"

"He's a very intelligent animal," she said in some indignation, but not answering the question.

"You want my opinion, you'll let the animal control people deal with him," the super said.

"No one asked for your opinion," Sophie said, indignation deepening her French accent.

A few more tense seconds pa.s.sed before he gave in to the inevitable. "All right," he said."All right. But it's for a trial only. If that dog messes in the house or does anything I don't like, he goes to the pound. That is not negotiable."

She nodded, her eyes s.h.i.+ning.

"All right," he said, knowing when he was beaten. "I'll take him in until we find him a home."

Of course, he was too evolved a man to hope that if he took in the dog at her request Sophie would be so grateful she'd sleep with him.

No, herealized, when she squealed with delight and kissed him full on the mouth, he wasn't evolved at all. He hoped she was grateful.Very, very grateful.

The super sent him a disgusted look as though Vince had let down the entire male gender.

With the scent of Sophie still in his nose and the taste of her on his lips, Vince didn't much care.

"Yermaking a big mistake," the large guy said and stomped away. Mimi yapped at his retreating back, as though to say, "anddon't come back."

The Doberman added a deep growl. "They're going to tag team us, aren't they?" Vince said to Sophie."Tinkerbelland G.o.dzilla."

" No," she a.s.sured him. "They'll be company for each other. It will be much better, I'm certain."

"They'll probably be terrible tonight, what with the Doberman settling in and everything. Probably it's too much for one person. You should definitely stay the night."

She smiled athim, the kind of smile that he bet went a lot of the way toward earning the s.e.xy reputation French women enjoyed. "I'll sleep better knowing he's guarding you and Mimi," she said, and walked on, the Doberman trotting at her side.

Vince wasn't one to blow his own horn, but he had been a wrestling champ in college. He'd worked as a bouncer at a hotManhattanclub one summer. He did not need protection.

Unless it was from one much too s.e.xy Frenchwoman who had somehow added another dog to his increasingly crowded life.

Three days ago he'd been a single man, living a bachelor existence in the greatest city in the world.

And since his aunt's funeral, his happy household of one had quadrupled. He looked at his three companions.One fourteenmillion dollar poodle, one very s.e.xy French nanny who'd managed to get mugged, alienate his super, and saddle him with a homeless Doberman, and the stray mutt himself, who might or might not be house trained, not to mention dangerous or psychotic. There might be a very good reason why a dog known to have a fierce disposition was homeless. And yet, the Doberman had helped save Mimi and Sophie. Vince believed in returning a good deed with interest.

He sighed and fell in with the other three.

So, the four of them walked the block to where he garaged his vehicle and piled into his dusty SUV. The Doberman leaped into the back without a second's hesitation, but Mimi, naturally, wasn't a jump-in-the-back kind of dog. She sat on Sophie's lap the entire way as he headed south.

Sophie lived in an efficiency sublet inGreenwich Village, he learned. As he pulled up in front of a renovated town house, the kind that had been broken down into tiny apartments, he realized that he was well chaperoned. Getting invited up to her place was not going to be an option.

Perhaps that's why she suddenly stiffened and said, "Oh,merde." She'd turned her head and was looking out the window. He followed her gaze and saw a gaunt-looking man about his own age sitting on the red concrete steps.

"Problem?" he asked, his own hackles rising.

"Gregory." She sighed."My ex." She sat there for another moment, then gave Mimi a kiss on top of her head, and reached for the door handle. "I'll see you in the morning."

Vince ignored her and got out of the car.

Gregory looked as though he didn't get out much. He was pale, and his eyes had the look of an angry, bitter man.

"What do you want?" Sophie asked when he rose from the steps to lounge against the black wrought-iron railing. Vince noticed that his expression transformed when he gazed at Sophie. He was obviously still in love with her.

"I want to talk to you."

She rubbed her arms. "Your probation officer called on Wednesday. You missed your appointment again."

He dropped his gaze and shuffled his feet on the cement step. A garbage truck roared by before he answered. "I was busy."

"You've got to stop seeing those men, Gregory. They'll only get you into more trouble."

"They're my friends," he insisted.

"Then I no longer am your friend." She shook her head sharply. "Don't come here again," she said, and hurried up the steps.

Her ex grabbed her arm as she tried to pa.s.s. "Let me come up and we can talk."

Vince had listened to enough. "Sophie told you to go."

"Yeah? And who the h.e.l.l are you?"

"Her friend."He motioned behind him. "Get in the car and I'll drop you somewhere."

"Why don't you f.u.c.k off?"

Sophie was inside by this time, which was all he cared about. He trod deliberately up the stairs until he and the deadbeat ex were on a level. He had a good six inches on the guy and probably eighty pounds.

"I look after my friends. I hear you've been anywhere near thisstreet , and I'll be on you. Get it?"

Gregory exercised his impressive vocabulary by repeating his last line. Vince didn't move, simply pulled out his cell phone.

"Who are you calling?"

"The police.They might be interested in talking to you about rescheduling your appointment with your probation officer."

Gregory knocked the cell phone out of his hand and turned and ran.

Vince caught the phone andrepocketed it, then hung around awhile before heading back home. He hadn't been able to protect her from getting knocked down today, but he could sure as h.e.l.l keep the weasel chef away from her.

Sophie had been wrong about the dogs being company for each other. After he got them home, the Doberman launchedhimself on the pink princess bed and stretched full out as though unable to believe his luck. Vince did his best to encourage Mimi to shack up with her new buddy instead of him, but it was hopeless. She stayed in her princess bedroom while he was in there, but as soon as he went into his own room, he heard the click, click, click of her nails on the hardwood as she followed him, springing like an oversized flea onto his bed and heading straight for his feather pillow.

He was going to wake up in the morning smelling of Joy again.And not for the right reason.

Six.

"Now that you have a love interest, we must update your image," Sophie said to Mimi the next day.

"No, don't give me that pathetic look. We must speak English when Sir Galahad is around. It's all he understands."

Mimi whined, but Sophie was firm. "When I fell in love with an American, I learned English ... Of course, that did not have a happy ending, but you may be luckier in love."

She put the leads on both dogs, delighted now that Vince had bought the leather and chain leash. Really, the man must be clairvoyant. He'd bought the perfect leash for Sir G the day before they met.

He was much more intuitive than he knew, that Vince.

"Now, I don't want to hurt your feelings, but you can't go around with blue hair and be consideredaucourant. The look was fine when you lived with old ladies,naturellement , but now you have Vince to think about, and the Doberman. You have to update,heh ?"

Mimi looked unconvinced but trotted happily on one side of her, while Sir Galahad strained against his leash on her other side. "Look," she finally said in exasperation. "You are bigger. Your legs are longer, but Mimi can't keep up. She only has little legs. Now, you must behave."

After that it was better. She'd cancelled Mimi's standing hair appointment, deciding that any salon that would give a French poodle a blue rinse didn't need Mimi's business. Instead, they went to a place that Sophie herself patronized. It was run by an ex-patriot Frenchman who was brilliant with scissors. Most of the salon's staff had learned their craft inParis.

Mimi was in her element. Surrounded by French people who cooed and fussed over her, she made no protest when her fur was colored back to white.

"I don't suppose ..." Sophie gestured vaguely to where the Doberman stood with his nose against the door, leaving a big s...o...b..r mark on the gla.s.s.

"Sophie,monange , you know I love you, but the poodle is a fellow countryman, andcertainement one helps one's own. The Doberman can go to the doggroomer around the corner."

Since there was a doggroomer nearby, Sophie was happy not to argue the point.

The Doberman, however, was less than happy when he reached his destination, but since they stocked dog cookies and bribed him freely, he consented to be washed and brushed.Anddefleaed .

While he was being groomed, she went back to Mimi and decided she looked so pretty when she was white again that her manicure needed redoing. They decided on a pale pink, and Sophie opted for the same shade herself.

That done, they picked up the other dog and walked home via the butcher so she could buy somefiletmignon for the dogs, and a T-bone steak for Vince. "Because he has been very good to us, and we want to give him something a little special." She decided to buy some wine to go with the beefsteak, added some green beans from the greengrocer and tiny potatoes.

On their return, the Doberman again began to pull on the lead, and, since she wanted time to cook and for the wine to breathe, she picked Mimi up and hurried along. She stopped to s.h.i.+ft the combined weights of Mimi, the groceries, the wine, and the straining Doberman when she heard a sound like popcorn popping.Pop, pop, pop . There was a thud as something hit the tree behind her and then she felt a sharp pinch in her upper arm. For a crazy second she thought she'd been shot, then noticed a thick splinter of wood had scratched her skin. A piece of tree bark clung to the cut which was bleeding slightly.

"MonDieu ,"she cried. Moving on instinct rather than conscious intent, she huddled Mimi closer and pulled them all around to the other side of the tree. It wasn't much of a refuge, but it gave her a moment to take in the fact that she'd been shot at. Her arm burned a little where the bark chip had scratched her, but she didn't even want to think how much worse she'd feel if the bullet actually hit her instead of the tree.

She fumbled in her bag, praying she could get to the cell phone before the gunman got another crack at her.

"Are you all right?"

She'd never been so happy to hear the sound of another human voice. A middle-aged woman with what looked like twin Spaniels ran to herside, pulled the cell phone out of Sophie's trembling grasp, and called9-1-1.

"Hold still, dear," the woman said, chattering to her that she'd learned first aid when her second husband developed heart problems. "He'd stop breathing, you see, and I had to learn to bring him back." While she chatted, she eased the splinter out of Sophie's arm and pressed a handkerchief- which she a.s.sured Sophie was clean-against the trickle of blood. Sophie's uppermost thought was that she'd been lucky enough to be hurt when possibly the only woman in New York who still used cotton handkerchiefs was in the vicinity.

Mimi trembled in her arms, or maybe it was her own trembling making the dog wobble, but Sir Galahad once more lived up to his name. Every hair on his body bristling, he stalked back and forth in front of them, a canine terminator.

Within a gratifyingly short time she heard the familiar peal of a siren. Before they arrived, she made a second call.To Vince. She suspected he was going to fire her. So far, in her short employment with him, she'd run into disaster twice.

But, contrary to her expectations, he wasn't upset with her, but frantic over her safety.

He acted a lot like the Doberman when he got home less than half an hour after she called. Having given a statement to the police, and refused a ride to the hospital, she was sitting with her feet up, Mimi curled in her lap and Sir Galahad pacing in front of the door ready to attack anyone who came after them. Sophie had the oddest feeling that he was chagrined not to have prevented her injury earlier.

The Doberman growled deep in his throat before she heard anything. Instinctively, she grabbed Mimi tighter, then relaxed whenthe I 'm-a-guard-dog-mess-with-me-at-your-peril growling changed to a puppyish whine and the dog wagged its stub of a tail.

Vince was home. She let out her breath and loosened her viselike grip on poor Mimi. Somehow she felt that everything would be okay.

Vince was so big and tough that her tension left her when he roared through the door with an absent pat for Sir Galahad and eyes only for her.

"Why aren't you in the hospital?" were his first words.

"There's no need."

"I came as fast as I could. My G.o.d, you could have been killed."

As he spoke, he crossed the room in a couple of fast strides and dropped to his knees beside her chair, studying the bandage a paramedic had applied.

"I'm fine.Really. It's just a graze."

"You were attacked. You are not fine." He touched her hand, her face, as though he could impart his strength to her. "You're pale."

"I had a shock," she admitted. "I'm so sorry."

"That b.a.s.t.a.r.d."Vince jumped to his feet. "I hope you're pressing charges."

"What are you talking about?"

"Thatp.i.s.sant who wants you back."

"You mean Gregory?" In truth, she'd never considered him as the one who'd shot at her.