Accidentally All Of Me

by Parker, Ali

  We arrived at his vast estate. The gates slid open, and I drove up toward the house. It was tacky, really, but the enormous mansion that he’d had built for himself seemed to suit him down to the ground. I could never have imagined myself living in a place like that, but maybe I was just being a snob. Perhaps there was a lot to be said for just kicking back and letting yourself indulge in all your worst, craziest whims as you got older. He certainly seemed to be happy, after all.

  He was waiting by the door for us when we pulled to a halt outside the house, and he instantly crouched down and held his arms out to Winnie as soon as he saw her approaching.

  “Hey, Winnie!” he called to her, and she practically leaped into his arms and gave him a huge hug. I was surprised that she didn’t break him. He was starting to look really frail these days, and I just hoped to God that he was going to be with us a little longer yet. He had his bad days, days when he knew that he couldn’t handle seeing any of us, but most of the time, he pushed himself to spend as much time with us as possible.

  “It’s so good to see you,” I said to him.

  He got up and extended his hand to mine. I shook it. It was funny. He could still be so formal in some ways, especially when it came to me. It was just how he had been raised, I supposed, to treat men like they were the rulers of their respective kingdoms.

  “You too, son,” he replied. “Hope you’ve been taking care of my little Winnie for me!”

  “I’m not little!” Winnie protested.

  He shook his head. “You’re tiny,” he replied firmly. “So minuscule, I can barely see you. You know that?”

  She giggled, and the two of them took off into the house and left me standing there in the doorway like they always did. I grinned after them. I didn’t mind a little peace and quiet. I’d had a busy week, and I wanted to make sure that I actually got some time to catch my breath amongst all of it.

  I couldn’t stop thinking about Raina, though.

  In fact, she had been all that was on my mind since the end of that date we had shared together. God, I couldn’t stop thinking about her—about the way she looked in that dress, about the way she laughed at my jokes, about the way she sipped on her wine and listened while I talked to her.

  Maybe it was just because it was the first date that I had been on in a long time, but I felt like we’d had some real connection there, even if neither of us had planned to get involved with someone at this point in our lives. She had obviously felt differently, though. I couldn’t blame her. This had hardly been my choice, any more than it had been hers, but still, it could have been fun to take her out again.

  Now, it looked like the only chance I would get to see her was if I asked her for her expertise on what kind of dog I should be getting my niece.

  I headed into the kitchen where Angela was busily pulling together something that smelled totally delicious. Her grey hair was scraped back into a sensible bun at the back of her head, and her sharp blue eyes were focused on the pan in front of her.

  “You want some help?” I offered.

  She shook her head without taking her eyes off the pan. “You go spend time with the two of them,” she told me. “I have this under control.”

  I laughed. “All right, all right, I can take a hint.”

  She was always the one totally in charge when it came to life at this place. It might have been a huge house, but she was in control of every inch of it. I couldn’t imagine having to spend this much time focused on other people, but then, I supposed I was doing that with Winnie pretty much every single day. Just because I didn’t get paid for it didn’t mean that it wasn’t hard-ass work.

  When I headed through the house to find them, I could already hear Winnie’s voice announcing the details of what kind of dog we were going to get. I paused for a moment to listen, shaking my head with amusement.

  “And he’s going to be a boy,” she said, apparently not noticing me standing in the doorway. “And I’m going to call him Charlie, and I’m going to take him for walks to the dog park every single day, all by myself.”

  “Are you now?” I asked, and Winnie whipped around. She was sitting on the floor, going through a pile of books that George must have laid out for her ahead of her arrival. She loved to read, and he loved to get her any kind of book that he spotted that she might have liked.

  “Winnie was just telling me all about this dog that you’re going to get for her,” George explained.

  I crouched down to take a look at the books that she was going through. “Were you now?”

  He chuckled. “And it sounds like you’re still as much of a pushover as normal.”

  I shrugged. I didn’t want her to get her hopes too high. “I said that I would think about it,” I replied.

  He grinned at me. “Yeah, I’m sure you’re just going to think about it,” he replied, and he winked in Winnie’s direction.

  She wiggled from side to side on the spot, happy as a clam, knowing that she had probably gotten me just where she wanted me.

  And the truth was, she might just have done it—if only so I could get a chance to see Raina again.

  Chapter 10

  Raina

  Ugh.

  Days like this made me second-guess exactly why I had been so excited to take this on as a career. After all, I was elbow deep in a pile of dog crap that looked as though it could have sunk a small boat if it had all been dumped in at once.

  But this was how I had to test for worms, and that was just the way it had to be. I had to grit my teeth and remind myself that I loved my job, and nothing was going to change that. Not even a big pile of dog shit.

  “Raina?”

  My attention was drawn by Hannah’s voice coming around the door, and I glanced over to see her standing there with the phone in her hand.

  “Call for you,” she told me, and she waggled her eyebrows pointedly in my direction.

  I furrowed my brow. I hadn’t been expecting a call. “Hand it over,” I told her, snapping off the gloves and quickly stepping out of the room before the perfume of dog shit got stuck to my clothes for good. “Hello?”

  “Hello, Raina?” A familiar voice came down the line.

  I practically jolted on the spot, as though I had been electrocuted. There was no way. Could that really be him?

  “Harry?” I murmured.

  “Yeah, sorry to disturb you while you’re at work,” he said. “I don’t mean to intrude, but I was hoping that I could pick your brains about something.”

  “I’m all ears,” I replied, and I had to bite back my grin of excitement. I was hearing from him again. He was actually reaching out to me.

  “I was hoping I could see you again this weekend, if you’re free,” he told me.

  I opened my mouth in shock. The last thing I had been expecting was for him to bother actually getting in touch again after I had blown him off like that.

  “Not a date,” he told me quickly. “But I need some help. My niece wants to think about adopting a dog, and I suppose she’s twisted my arm about this enough that I have to at least think about it. I figured I could do with some expert advice on what kind of dog to get, and you’re the only expert in this field that I know, so...”

  “Oh!” I exclaimed, more than a little surprised. “Yeah. Right! Of course.”

  “Do you think you could spare the time?” he asked. “I don’t want to intrude if you’re busy, of course.”

  “No, no, I would love that,” I blurted out. “I mean, uh, yeah. Yes, I can totally find the time for that if you need some help.”

  “That’s awesome to hear,” he replied warmly. “When do you think you might have the time to catch up with us?”

  I planted the back of my hand on my cheek and felt the heat already beginning to build there. Okay, so I wasn’t doing the best job at keeping my cool, but I was finding it hard to care. It was just good to hear from him again.

  “Oh, uh, I think I could do this Saturday?” I suggested. I should have checke
d my calendar first, but I could always change the plans later. I just didn’t want to miss out on the chance to spend some time with him again. It felt like weeks since we had last seen one another, even though it had only been a couple of days.

  “That would be ideal,” he said. “Where should we meet you?”

  “I work at this dog shelter downtown that I think could be a perfect fit,” I replied. “You want to meet me there? I can text you the address, if you want to give me your number...”

  “You know, you could just come out and ask for it,” he said playfully.

  I felt myself beginning to flush an even deeper red.

  “Kidding, kidding,” he assured me.

  I managed the squeak of a laugh. Oh my God, why am I being so freaking awkward? Was it because I’d just had my hands in a pile of dogshit and now I was talking on the phone to the man I hadn’t been able to get out of my head for the last few days?

  “I’m sure we’ll be able to find a dog that suits the two of you down there,” I told him, speaking quickly so that my nerves didn’t get the best of me. “It’s a great shelter. I know the woman who runs it. She’s amazing. She works so hard.”

  “You’ve got me sold,” he promised me, and I realized that I was babbling. I clenched my fist by my side and tried to pull myself back into reality.

  What the hell was going on with me? Had I always been this spectacularly odd with the guys that I had feelings for? No, feelings was too strong a word for what I had toward him. Intentions? Maybe. Maybe that made a little more sense.

  I realized I had all but checked out of the conversation and quickly jumped back in.

  “Uh, so, yeah, I guess I’ll see you and your niece on Saturday?” I finished up, hoping that I had managed to leave this conversation with something close to a shred of dignity. I could just put it down to work stress, though, right? He wouldn’t be able to guess that I was practically quivering with nerves at just hearing his voice again.

  How was it that even down the phone, he could get me all flustered and overheated? I needed to get myself together. I needed to—I wasn’t sure, but I needed to do something. Maybe get off the phone and stop sounding like such a blundering idiot?

  “I guess you will,” he replied. How could he sound so cool? He was talking like he had the world in the palm of his hand, and me right there with it.

  “Catch you later,” I replied, and I practically cringed when I heard how breathy and overly interested my voice sounded. Oh my goodness. Was that really what I was like when I was around him? I had hoped that I might be able to keep myself together just a little better than that, but it seemed like I had lost the ability.

  We made sure to exchange numbers and said our goodbyes, and I hung up the phone and stared at it for a long moment. All my thoughts about work and worms and dogshit had vanished right out of my head. I was going to see him again. I was going to see him again.

  It was like I had thrown that thought out into the universe with enough force that someone had actually heard it and made it come true for me. What did they call it? Manifesting? Yeah, I had manifested this into being, and now it was true.

  Of course, I knew that it was far from a date or anything like it. We were just meeting up. That was all. He was sensible to ask for someone else’s help in choosing his first dog. These things were so easy to get wrong if you didn’t take time and energy to get them right, especially when you had a little girl in the picture, too. He was reaching out to me because, like he’d said, he needed my expert opinion.

  But he could have just turned up at a shelter and gotten the help that he needed. He must have known that. And yet, he had still called me up and asked to see me again. And against all my better judgment, I was actually looking forward to catching up with him. Even if it was in a professional capacity.

  “Who was it?” Hannah asked, wandering back into the room to grab the phone from me.

  I shrugged. “Just a friend,” I replied, knowing that if I gave her any more than that, she would pounce on the chance to try and marry me off. I wasn’t sure what it was about me that gave off that vibe, but it seemed like so many people were so eager to get me all married off and set up and settled down.

  Was I really that much of a mess that they thought I needed it that badly? I would need to look into that and work out what it was that drove people to get so involved in my love life.

  But still, seeing him again? That was going to be fun. I could hardly wait. Maybe I could actually conduct myself with a little grace and decorum. Maybe I could tell him that I had been wrong to turn him down and that I had been thinking about him all this time and wanted to see him again. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

  I had the whole rest of the week to get through before I could answer any of those questions, and I needed to keep my head in the game first and foremost.

  “You have a Pitbull mommy outside who needs your help,” Hannah told me. “If you’re done with the pile of poo?”

  “I’ll take anything over that,” I replied.

  She grinned and hustled me through to the waiting room, where a frazzled-looking woman was carrying her heavily pregnant dog in her arms.

  “I think my baby needs help,” she announced to me urgently.

  I lifted my hands to soothe her. “All right,” I replied. “If you can just take her into the room right there, I’ll get started.”

  The rest of the day rushed by in a haze. I ended up having to give an emergency C-section to the dog in question, and it was a lot more stressful than it had to be, given that her owner was practically hanging over my shoulder the entire time.

  I understood it, though. This was her child, as far as she was concerned, and she wanted her well more than anything in the world. I was always pleased when I saw people this dedicated to their pets, even when I could have used a little space from them.

  Finally, we got all the puppies delivered safely and the Pitbull mommy resting up and under sedatives to help her deal with the pain. The woman, Andrea, practically slumped against the wall in relief when I told her that we had everything under control.

  “You have no idea how scared I was when I brought her in here,” she told me. “I’ve never been here before, but you guys were the nearest vets, and I didn’t want to leave her any longer than I had to.”

  “You did the right thing,” I assured her. “Really. She’s going to be just fine. I can promise you that.”

  “You’re a lifesaver,” Andrea told me, and she threw her arms around me and gave me a tight hug. She was practically shaking.

  I patted her shoulder and glanced toward Hannah for a little assistance. I had to clean up and check up on the other pets we had in today. As much as I would like to comfort everyone who came in here with a sick dog, I had other work to do.

  “All right, why don’t you come take a seat, and I’ll make you a coffee?” Hannah asked the woman.

  I closed the door behind Andrea and let out a long breath. It had been a crazy day. One of the craziest we’d had in a long time. And not just the C-section. It was the fact that I was going to have a chance to see the guy I hadn’t been able to get out of my head.

  Sure, he’d said it wasn’t a date, but I would take what I could get.

  And a meeting with him again in just a few days was more than I’d expected.

  Chapter 11

  Harry

  By the time we were ready to leave for the shelter, I was pretty sure that Winnie was going to pop with excitement.

  Maybe I should have kept it under wraps that I was planning this trip, just for the time being. She was so excited she was barely able to keep herself together. I was glad to see that she was looking forward to this, but there was also a nervous part of me that was concerned that she wasn’t going to take it well if we couldn’t find a little furry friend for her to walk away with at the end of today.

  She had spent the whole week researching breeds, training, dog food types, and everything that anyone could possibly need to know
about the dog that they were taking in. Every mealtime had been a chance for her to hit me with another huge stack of information, another pile of everything she had learned.

  She was taking this seriously, at the very least, but I was getting a little overwhelmed with everything that I needed to take in to be a remotely good dog owner.

  But still, that didn’t mean I wasn’t excited about seeing Raina again. I had been thinking about her all week long, probably dedicating as much space in my brain to her as my niece was to the dog she wanted to adopt.

  I hadn’t expected Raina to agree to it, much less expected her to offer to take time out of her day to take us to this shelter so she could help us choose a dog that suited us best. I was touched by the effort—and a little pleased by it, too, taking it to mean that she wasn’t totally trying to get rid of me the first chance she got.

  She had texted me the name of this shelter that we were meeting her at, and I spent a little longer than I actually had to getting ready that morning, long enough that even Winnie noticed that I was hanging out in front of the mirror more than I might have normally.

  “What are you spending so much time getting ready for?” she asked, practically hopping from foot to foot with excitement.

  “Well, if we’re going to be getting a new member of the family, it’s the least I can do to try and make myself look nice, isn’t it?” I pointed out. She didn’t need to know that this was all about Raina and my chance to see her again—and hopefully do better this time around than I had on my date.

  Raina was meeting with us to do me a favor. That was what I had to keep reminding myself. Not to get with me, or hook up, or anything like that. To do me a favor because I had asked her for help in making a big choice in my life. The least I could do was respect that and not come at this like it was another date.