Lulu eagerly greeted me with a wagging tail as I walked through the door to my home. Lulu was a pit bull with a heart of gold who I had adopted from a local animal shelter four years ago despite everyone trying to talk me out of it.
“Do you know how dangerous pit bulls are?”
“That’s no dog for a pretty young woman like you. Get something a little classier, like a poodle or a Yorkie.”
“Pit bulls are a lot to handle. Do you plan on having children someday? Do you want to bring them into a household with an aggressive animal?”
And on and on the criticism went. Yet, I couldn’t be deterred. From the moment I laid eyes with Lulu, whose eyes were nearly the same shade of blue as mine, I knew she was my doggy soulmate. Once the papers were signed, and I brought her into my home, she had been nothing but a bundle of love and joy. And although she can be protective when necessary, I had yet to have any serious aggression problems with her. Lulu was living proof, as far as I was concerned, that with proper love and care, there was no such thing as a bad dog. The worst she had ever done was chew up a couple pairs of my old sneakers when she’d been left in the house too long while I was at work.
After jumping up and down and covering me with doggy kisses, Lulu spun around in a circle exactly three times
before running to the back of the house to retrieve her leash. She seemed particularly eager to go for her run, or perhaps she sensed my need to blow off some steam. The day’s shift at the hospital had not only left me exasperated and irritated, but with plenty of pent-up frustration as well.
“Just give me a second to change clothes, Lulu,” I said, heading for my bedroom. She skipped behind me, her nails clicking on the wooden floor.
I pulled a t-shirt and shorts from my drawer and gratefully shed my hospital scrubs, kicking them into the corner of the room with the rest of my clothes that needed to be washed. Seeing how tall the pile had grown, I felt a twinge of embarrassment. Living alone had changed my habits quite a bit. Back in my younger college days, when I regularly had roommates and occasional booty calls, I wouldn’t have been caught dead with a pile of dirty clothes lying in a visible spot. But now, especially after particularly busy shifts at a military hospital, I would shed my clothes and sometimes could barely muster the energy to kick them into the pile.
While I loved almost everything about being a nurse, the one thing I considered the biggest inconvenience was the surplus of dirty laundry it regularly created. It seemed that wearing scrubs would reduce my laundry pile, but that was not at all my reality. I quickly learned that they were called scrubs for a reason; they needed constant scrubbing. Every week, I was bound to come home with some kind of disgusting mystery fluid dried up somewhere on my clothing. Hence, nursing was not for those with delicate stomachs.
“No, Lulu,” I said, seeing that she had been just moments away from jumping into my ever-growing pile of dirty scrubs. “That’s not lady-like, you know.”
She tilted her head at me as I slid on my jogging sweatshirt. When I stepped into my running shoes, she excitedly jumped up onto her hind legs, knowing it was finally time to go.
“You certainly lack patience sometimes, girl,” I said, giving her a quick scratch behind the ear. “Okay, let’s go.”
CHAPTER 5
Kylie
Lulu and I began our daily run to the park and back. The evening weather was perfect—there was a comfortable breeze in the air and it was neither too warm nor too cool. The only unfortunate thing was that the perfect weather conditions permitted my mind to wander in ways I wished it wouldn’t. And by that, I meant it kept wandering in the direction of Dr. Max Lewis.
Once again, his delicious features drifted through my mind. Unfortunately, they were also accompanied with Megan’s words regarding my less than satisfactory love life.
She was right. Although I loved Lulu dearly, it would have been nice to occasionally have some company of the human male variety. But I’d been so engulfed in my work, I’d dutifully pushed dating off the menu. While I tried to pretend it didn’t bother me—that my decision to remain single was entirely by choice—I knew that deep down, a part of it was because I was still so scarred from my ex. The heartbreak he’d forced me to endure was part of the reason I had wanted a dog in the first place; I had been desperate to find unconditional love in whatever form I could get it.
Troy. He had been good looking too, albeit not as hot as Max Lewis. Nevertheless, I had been so smitten with him that I hadn’t seen, or perhaps had ignored, all the warning signs. Troy had been very charming in the beginning, showering me with roses and chocolate, romantic dinners, and fun outings. And then suddenly, he began to change.
It started because he hadn’t been supportive of my career ambitions. He’d obviously viewed me as the marrying type, but made it quite apparent that if we were going to be together, he fully expected me to give up my dreams and instead become a dedicated house-wife. Now, I know there’s nothing wrong with being a house-wife; raising a family is one of the most important jobs in existence. Many women dedicate their lives to it and I have nothing but respect for them. But that’s just wasn’t the lifestyle I envisioned for myself.
For as long as I could remember, I’ve always wanted to work in the medical field. I was obsessed with hospital-themed television shows and had known since I was a little girl that it was the lifestyle I craved. So when suddenly given an ultimatum between a man and my career, I easily chose my career.
Of course, the choice became a lot easier when Troy turned violent about my decision, deciding to try literally knocking some sense into me. When it happened, the first time, I convinced myself it was an accident and he hadn’t meant it. When it happened, the second time, I figured he was the problem, not me. He was the one who needed help and I had contemplated whether I needed to stick around to ensure he received it. But then one night, I’d had a dream about my grandmother. It was so vivid, I could practically smell her home—a mixture of baked goods and lavender. We’d been sitting at the dining room table, and she’d been giving me the warm smile she always reserved specifically for her grandchildren. Then she reached across the table, took my hand and said, “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me three times, then I’m the damned fool.”
When I woke up, I knew without a doubt that she was watching over me and trying to send me a message. I knew then that I’d most certainly be a fool if I didn’t take her advice. So I broke up with Troy shortly thereafter.
Oh boy, did he try to win me back. He made every pretty promise in the book—swore he would never lay a hand on me again for as long as he lived. I can still hear his voice pleading with me. “Kylie, baby, I won’t do it again. You know how much I love you. I will never hurt you again, I swear. I swear, baby. I swear. I’m not going to hurt you again, as long as I live.”
I smiled, looked him straight in the eyes and said, “No, you won’t hurt me again for as long as you live because this is the last time you’re going to see me in your pathetic life. Goodbye.”
It was one of the smartest and most satisfying decisions I had ever made. Sometimes, I still shudder at the thought of what my life would have been like if I hadn’t left him. I would have probably been living behind a white-picket fence with an unhappy household full of kids—all of us afraid and terrified each night when Daddy came home. I had certainly dodged a bullet by leaving Troy.
Nevertheless, I’d become lonely in the aftermath. There hadn’t been a single man to catch my eye though. Not until Dr. Max Lewis. Yet, something told me he had caught my eye for all the wrong reasons.
The thought of him coincided with a random man in a parked car catcalling at me. At the sound of his whistle, Lulu growled.
“Good girl,” I said. “Let’s go.” We were halfway to the park.
Looks. Just like the creep who’d just whistled at me, my attraction to Dr. Lewis was all about looks because I hardly knew anything about him. And the little I did know about him hadn’t exactly been flattering. I could still recall his haughty tone in the way he had chastised me while working on the gunshot patient. The mere memory still made my blood boil. It was people like Dr. Lewis that gave doctors a bad name.