by Melissa West
The night air was cool for spring, but Charlie hadn’t thought to grab a shirt before heading out the door. No matter; it wouldn’t be the first time Doc Baxter had seen him without a shirt on. Sadly. At least this time, he had on shorts instead of boxers. A shudder worked through him at the memory. And not the good kind.
Charlie had not been home a month after the Jade disaster when he’d decided the fix to the crushing weight on his chest was a distraction. Or a few distractions, as happened to be the case. And one such distraction landed him at the house of a new lady in town and absolutely no idea what the hell her name was. He’d made it through just fine, but finally she asked him to whisper her name in her ear, which should have been a red flag anyway because she kept trying to direct his game. Put a hand here, kiss me there. Then the name thing came up, and he tried to run with sweetheart, which resulted in a look, and his brothers had always said he had too honest a face. Well, sure enough, she tossed him out on his ass, without his clothes.
He’d left his truck in town when she insisted on driving—another red flag—and so he had no choice but to make the trek in his boxers, a full-on walk of shame in plain view of anyone in town who cared to look. And he’d almost made it home, but Doc Baxter was out late on a call to the Carlisle farm. He pulled over to offer Charlie a ride, and the rest was history.
Up until that moment with Henry in his arms, Charlie had managed to steer clear of the town’s old vet beyond a few passing hellos and nods, going as far as paying his niece to take Henry to the vet so he wouldn’t have to endure the look of judgment from Baxter. But desperate and all, tonight, he didn’t have a choice.
Charlie unlocked his truck and opened the back seat, gingerly laying Henry down and patting his head. “You’re going to be fine, boy.” And then as if the universe wanted to give him the finger, the dog pulled back, his head jerking as a guttural sound rumbled from his throat, and then he puked all over the seat.
“Ah, shit.” Charlie scrambled around in search of a towel, something, but coming up empty, had to run back into his house, grab some stuff to clean up, and then try to move Henry, but the poor dog groaned louder and Charlie thought Screw it. “The truck will live. Let’s get you to Baxter.”
He dropped down a few more towels onto the seat and floorboard and then jumped into the driver’s seat, shifted into reverse, backing into the small turnaround to the left, then sped down his long driveway, cursing himself in that moment for wanting to live so far away from the road. And town.
In the moment, he’d wanted peace and quiet, a place where he could go to think. But now, Henry was making that guttural noise again, and Charlie feared what this might mean. Was he poisoned somehow? A virus? Could dogs catch Zika? There had been a lot of mosquitos around lately.
Taking a sharp left turn, he straightened the wheel and prepared for the long stretch of road that was Hwy 243, which led directly into Crestler’s Key city limits. There wasn’t a single traffic light or stop sign to deter him, until he passed the official WELCOME TO CREST-LER’S KEY sign, and then he took the next right onto Riding Lane and pulled into Baxter’s office, grateful to see a light still on inside.
Charlie parked in front of the main door and jumped out. The air was heavy for spring, cloud cover mixed in with the stars in the black sky above. Another hour, and that ominous sky would be pouring down on all of Crestler’s Key. As if on cue, a boom of thunder hit from miles away.
Opening the left back door of his truck, Charlie scooped up his best friend, who thankfully was still awake, giving him hope, and he pushed the door closed with his leg, then set out for the front porch. Baxter’s old dog wasn’t anywhere to be seen, which made Charlie wonder if he should have called before he came. Maybe the light was on, but no one was home. Why hadn’t he called? Now, his cell was in the truck, so he’d have to go back, try to juggle Henry in his arms, open the truck door, get the cell, and then close it back before he could come back to this point.
Frustrated and praying God was listening, he rapped on the door several times. “Come on.”
No sounds came from inside, and Henry’s eyes closed in agony. Charlie’s heart clenched.
He knocked again, harder this time, over and over, his head dropping. “Come on!”
“Settle down, I’m here, I’m here.”
Hope burst inside Charlie at the voice, but it wasn’t the cottony voice of Doc Baxter that met his ears. And it wasn’t Ms. Tracy. He thought back to what Lucas had told him at lunch, about Lila joining the vet office, and as if it’d been there all along, a memory bubbled up.
They were playing in the woods behind Lucas’s house and he had gotten stuck in the barbed wire fencing that surrounded one of the farms. No choice of what to do, Lucas went for help, only to return with Lila, a smirk on her face.
“You boys sure are stupid,” she had said. Then when he decided he didn’t need a girl to help him out. Certainly not Lucas’s sister, with her brains too big for her britches and her continuous need to call out Charlie’s lack of smarts. Forget that. So, he tried to yank himself free, only to get caught more, the barbed wire curling into the flesh of his arm, until he was near tears.
“Settle down, I’m here,” she’d said, her touch matching her tone for the first time. He was twelve then and she was ten, but when her gaze hit his, so impossibly blue, he wasn’t sure how to look away. Suddenly, he wasn’t as concerned with the cuts in his arm and more with making his lungs remember how to function.
Now the animal hospital’s door cracked open, and Charlie’s eyes fell on the person on the other side.
“Charlie?”
For a moment, Charlie forgot why he’d come, forgot his sick dog, forgot his own freaking name. Because the Lila before him wasn’t at all the thin, too tall for her age, too smart for her own good girl he remembered. Oh, no. This person, this woman, she was something else entirely. Which made him wonder if maybe this wasn’t Lila at all.
His gaze fixed on her face. High cheekbones, golden-tan skin, round eyes so blue they made you lose your mind for a second. Full, pouty lips slowly spread into an easy smile, and her once-short black hair now cascaded to her waist in effortless waves that called to his fingertips to comb the strands, to pull them gently, so her chin would lift and he could see if that mouth tasted as good as it looked. Finally, he pulled his attention from her face down to the rest of her and—“Wow.”
She bit her lip in an obvious effort to keep from laughing. “Charlie. . . ?”
“Yeah?”
“The dog?”
As if he’d been shaken from a trance, Charlie startled back, narrowly dropping Henry, who groaned in his arms, and guilt punched him in the gut. “Henry’s dying or something. Can you help?”
Her grin spread, so close to laughter it was embarrassing, but Charlie couldn’t make his brain work properly. “Come on in. Room one, there.” She backed away, holding open the door, and pointed inside to the hall and the number one sticking out from the door.
The office was quiet, no one else around. No one to see the fear Charlie felt, both over Henry and the woman before him, a woman he had once thought he would recognize anywhere, and yet there she stood, a stranger.
“Baxter, you’re just going to have to get over yourself, I’m doing this,” she said, and Charlie craned his neck in search of the old vet. But beyond the parrot calling away in his cage by the front desk, there was no one else in the place. No one besides him and Lila.
“Are you talking to ghosts or something? ’Cause I don’t think old Baxter is here.”
Lila flashed him a grin that hadn’t left her face since she saw him. Her cheeks reddened. “No, sorry. I talk to myself a little.” She shrugged. “Okay, a lot. Nervous habit, and you know what they say about old habits?”
Charlie set Henry on the exam table and took a step back, before running his hands through his hair. “No, can’t say that I do.”
Her eyes hit his, and then flipped down, holding on his bare chest. “Some o
ld habits die hard.” She cleared her throat. “So what’s going on with . . . ?”
“Henry VIII, but I just call him Henry.”
Pausing mid-motion, her hand still hovering over Henry, she glanced back at him. “Seriously?”
“Yes, seriously,” Charlie said, pulling back with mock offense. “What’s wrong with his name?”
A genuine smile crept across her face as she went back to work inspecting Henry, and Charlie tried in vain to keep from questioning everything she was doing. All he could think was that if he were puking sick, he sure wouldn’t want the doctor poking him in the stomach.
“Didn’t you once have a lab named Alexander the Great?” She continued her inspection, and when Henry groaned, Charlie placed his hands on his head, his stomach muscles tightening.
“Yes. When did you say Baxter was getting here?”
“A history of choosing bad pet names. Interesting.” She peeked at him again, waiting for him to defend his choice of names, but what could he say? Who the hell wanted a dog around named Fido or Sam? No one with imagination, that was for sure. “I didn’t say when Baxter would be here, mainly because I don’t have the faintest clue. He’s at Carlisle Farms.”
Damn Carlisles.
“Right. But you’re trained and stuff? Lucas said you finished vet school, so you’re good to do this, right?” Charlie cringed as she pulled out several metal things that looked a lot like torture instruments and went to work checking Henry’s eyes and ears and generally making the poor dog all the more miserable.
She smiled. “So let me get this straight, only a man can be a veterinarian in your eyes? Not a woman? Or if a woman is, she couldn’t possibly be as trained as the man.”
“Wait, wait, wait. I didn’t say—”
“Sure you didn’t. You just thought it.” She set down one of her torture devices with a slight bang, but when she turned on him, she was still grinning. “As chauvinistic as ever. Just like that name you used to call me. Tiny. Again, what kind of name is that?”
Charlie bit back a grin at the memory of the name and the first time he’d used it. They were outside on the old tire swing and were talking about climbing the big oak it hung from. She had wanted to join Charlie and Lucas, but Charlie had told her she was too tiny to climb the tree. She punched him in the stomach and asked how tiny she looked now, causing her brother to break out in fits of laughter. The name stuck. “Hey, I’m not—”
She tossed up a hand. “Save it. But your sweet dog here is going to be fine. I’m guessing he ate something he shouldn’t have. Maybe in the yard? He should be all better in twenty-four hours, but if not, bring him back in to see me.”
“You mean to see me.”
Their eyes fell on Baxter, as grumpy as ever, and standing in the doorway with a glare at Lila that made Charlie step between them on instinct to protect her. Sighing loudly, she huffed and walked around him.
“I can take care of myself,” she murmured.
“What exactly do you think you’re doing?” Baxter screamed. “Trying to get me sued!”
Lila flinched, and Charlie’s face split with a grin. “Sure you can.” Then he went over and scooped Henry back up, and started for the door. “Seeing as how Henry here will be fine, I’ll just let you two get back to . . . whatever this is. Baxter,” he said, nodding to the vet. Then his eyes shifted over to Lila. “Tiny.”
She crossed her arms, her eyes narrowing, and he couldn’t keep the laugh from escaping him or the smile from lingering on his lips long after he’d pulled away.
Chapter Three
After an epic browbeating by Dr. Baxter, and an impressive showing of calm, cool, and collected by Lila, she headed home. Though her “home” was less a home and more a rented apartment over Annie-Jean Carlisle’s garage. The older woman liked to stop by unannounced, but since she was part owner of AJ&P Bakery, she always brought over pies or cookies or freshly baked breads for Lila to try. Then she’d grill Lila about her life.
She suspected Annie-Jean, who had always been spunky, was not so much nosy as she was lonely. It made Lila wish she could find Annie-Jean a man. In fact, she was adding that to her list.
At the next stop sign Lila paused, because it wasn’t like anyone was coming from one of the other directions anyway, and pulled her planner from her bag. She flipped to her CK goals page and read through the list.
1. Beg Dr. Baxter to hire her. Success! Or . . . kind of. Of course, he still insisted that she was going to get him sued and that she couldn’t actually touch an animal. But in time, she’d impress him with her charm. Or if that didn’t work, she’d call Mrs. Baxter.
2. Find a place to live. Sort of a success. Annie had agreed to let her live there as long as she needed, but Lila hoped to be in her own place within the next six months. She wasn’t vying for love anytime soon, maybe ever, but she sure couldn’t imagine bringing a man back to Annie’s house, when Annie might pop in without warning.
3. Scout out a place to open her own business. She needed a solid year in at Baxter’s to really learn what Crest-ler’s Key’s business traffic was like, but in that year she intended to explore all her options, get her financing in order, and then she’d let Baxter know she was quitting. Of course that was assuming he didn’t fire her first. And that she acquired some regular clientele. See item 1 about charming Baxter.
4. Go to the shooting range and buy a gun. Or maybe a Taser. Or maybe just a can of pepper spray. Lucas had been on her ever since the incident in Charlotte that she needed to protect herself, that he wasn’t around all the time, and he’d feel better if she was carrying. The problem wasn’t that Lila didn’t know her way around a gun—her daddy and Lucas had insisted she learn how to shoot. But she wasn’t as well-trained or comfortable with them as Lucas. Plus, he just liked guns. They were interesting to him, fascinating, like a hobby. To Lila, they were a mistake waiting to happen, and she refused to carry one or even own one until that fear had been overcome. Which, let’s be honest, might never happen. She wasn’t anti-gun. She was anti-Lila-with-a-gun.
5. Call Charlie Littleton. She wasn’t sure why Charlie had found his way onto her list, but she knew that she wanted to see him. She wanted to see if he was still the free-spirited boy she remembered. Though he owned the farm with his brothers, she suspected that wasn’t his thing, and she was eager to learn what he was up to now. Even if he were Lucas’s best friend, and Lucas would freak out if he knew she was having any thoughts at all about Charlie. Of course, the calling hadn’t happened—yet.
But she had seen him.
Her thoughts drifted back to the hospital and seeing him outside on the porch, wearing nothing but a pair of gym shorts and worry on his face. Her attention went immediately to the dog, and for a beat she didn’t realize that he wasn’t wearing a shirt. But then he set Henry on the exam table and stepped back, revealing an impeccably built body, and suddenly Lila forgot how to breathe. Her eyes scanned down his bare chest, hills and valleys and contours in all the right places, and her brain refused to work. She was transported to that fateful day when she’d almost kissed him, that crush of hers taking over, and for a second, she thought he wanted to kiss her back, she could see it on his face, and her pitiful heart surged. But then he looked away, his head down, his eyes closed tightly before returning to hers, and she could see the rejection on his face long before he opened his mouth.
Shuddering, she forced her thoughts away from Charlie and his name and down to the number six, which had been empty. Quickly she wrote out her sixth goal and task.
6. Find Ms. Annie a man.
She was reaching over to put the planner back in her bag when a horn sounded from behind her and she jumped, her eyes darting to the rearview mirror, another memory bubbling up before she could push it back. Darkness. Someone approaching. Fear so real it sucked the oxygen from her lungs.
Her hands clenched around the steering wheel as the horn honked again, and then the door of the car behind her opened, and Lila started to ta
ke off, before she caught the person waving her arms frantically, and Lila’s fear-stricken face quickly switched to a smile. She pushed her own door open and stepped out, taking off, until she reached the woman and then they were talking all at once.
“When did you get here?”
“How did you know it was me?”
“I can’t believe you’re finally back!”
“I can’t believe it’s you!”
Hugging the woman tightly once more, Lila stepped back and peered down at her tiny best friend, Audrey, the spitting image of the famous Audrey Hepburn even all these years later.
“You scared the crap out of me.”
Audrey’s brown eyes narrowed as she pulled back.
“Lord, why would you be scared here? Did you forget where you are? This isn’t that big city life you had in Charlotte.”
Big city life in Charlotte? Most people wouldn’t consider Charlotte an especially big city. Midsized, maybe, but nowhere near the population of Atlanta or Boston or New York. Which was maybe why Lila never worried over her safety there, but she learned the hard way that insanity can live and breathe anywhere. In Crestler’s Key, though? Maybe not. She hoped not, but all the same she would be on her guard. Always.
Lila released her friend and ran a hand over her face. Audrey grabbed the hand and held it out, staring as it continued to tremble despite Lila’s strict instruction to stop.
“You’re shaking.”
The sky had long since turned dark, with gray storm clouds hovering overhead, the look ominous and threatening. Besides the occasional car passing in the distance, there were no other sounds around them. Perhaps, the occasional cricket or wind through the trees, but otherwise it was quiet, peaceful. Nothing about Crestler’s Key suggested danger, and Lila knew that, yet she couldn’t get her heart to slow down. In truth, it hadn’t slowed down in more than six months, and that single problem was one of the reasons she’d moved back to Crestler’s Key in the first place. She needed to find comfort, to remember how to breathe again, to close her eyes without fearing what she’d find when she reopened them. And only one place brought that kind of relief. Or more specifically, only one person.