ENDURING {Sequel to Everlasting} ❗️EDITING ❗️

Chapter 46

"Good boy." I praise in a whisper, slowly sitting on the grass not thirty centimetres from him.

I could see the dark eyes glaring at me, wishing for me to get just a little closer, so he can grab my face and shred it. On the plus side, Sarah isn't due until tomorrow morning, and Lucifer finally ate his first dish of dog biscuits today.

"I wish you didn't feel like you need to protect yourself from me...I won't hurt you." I quietly speak, moving slowly as I bring a second dish of biscuits towards him.

Instead of using my hands to give it him, I use a false hand. It's a training dummy hand, for dogs that are food aggressive.

Lucifer instantly snaps for the hand, snarling and fur raised viciously. A reaction I expected.

"No." I correct firmly, taking the food and the false hand as I get up and walk away.

It's a simple, calm correction that shows no aggression towards the dog.

I leave it ten minutes before heading back outside and returning to my previous position in front of him. This time I don't give him the bowl of food, I sit it in my lap, and place a biscuit on the dummy hand, and offer it to him.

Naturally he bares his stained canines, eyes narrowed into slits. I don't flinch, calming watching, waiting for him to realise that I'm not moving away, and I'm not moving closer.

I sit, for almost five minutes as his growls get louder and louder, saliva dripping from his mouth. Until finally his hunger gets the better of him, and even though he does continue to growl quietly, and watch me with beady eyes, he takes the food off the false hand.

"Good." I praise softly, only when he doesn't growl as he takes the biscuit.

Progress.

I'd wonder what made him so aggressive if I didn't already know. He was trained into this aggression, tormented and left to take his savagery out on other dogs. Three years isn't so easily fixed in one week.

I sit in front of Lucifer for over two hours, using the dummy hand and hand feeding him one biscuit at a time. Eventually he stops growling, and that's a good sign. He's beginning to see that food comes from the hand.

By the morning he'll probably be growling at me again, but he'll learn. He's just a stubborn big beast.

"I have to say, I'm impressed." Hardin says the moment I walk through the door, a hint of a smile on my face.

Perhaps I'm a little proud. Such a small simple thing, but it's the dogs way of showing signs that he can trust me, one day.

"I didn't think he'd eat." I admit, glad that he did despite not originally being up for taking him on.

"He has, you did that. You should be proud, I don't think that dog has ever had affection, or even attention." Hardin kisses my forehead endearingly, and I smile a little.

"Do you want to help me with Apollo? The jumping isn't going so well." I admit, hoping he'll help as I could use someone to hold Apollo with me.

"Lead the way." He agrees without hesitation.

Even though he doesn't say it, I think he loves Apollo as much as I do. Most mornings I wake to an empty bed, and when I go down to the horses Hardin is there finishing up. For someone that is so new to horses, he knows the routine.