“Isn’t it, though?” Riley asked with a grin.
Chapter 4
Hours later the bell jingled on the front door of the animal hospital while Cristie finished making notes in the file she was working in so Sheryl could type in her notations when she came in the next morning.
“Well, if it isn’t the owner of my very first broken heart,” a deep, velvety voice said.
Cristie’s head jerked up and a brilliant smile lit up her face. “Kaiser!”
“The one and only,” he said.
“What are you doing here? I didn’t know you were home yet,” Cristie said.
“Got home this morning, and Buster just isn’t himself so I decided to bring him in.”
Cristie looked at the aging English Bulldog sitting at the end of a leash at Kaiser’s feet. “Hi, Buster Bee! How are you doing, sweetie?” she asked.
Buster, overweight, missing teeth, with his tongue hanging out of the space his missing teeth left, looked up at her and huffed a pitiful sigh before flopping down on the floor.
“Oh, my goodness. He’s pitiful,” she said, walking around the front desk to kneel down beside Buster. “Are you feeling bad, or are you just put out because how dare anybody bring you here?”
Buster looked up at her and opened his many jowled mouth to swipe up the side of her face with an overly slobbery tongue.
“Okay, now, I wasn’t going to complain when you showed him attention first because this is an animal hospital and all, but when he gets to kiss you before I do — that’s just not right,Cristie,” Kaiser said. “Besides, he’s not really sick. I think he’s just fat.”
“Well, fat doggies can sometimes get diabetes and that means they need insulin, so it could be a little fat and a little sick,” she said, as she stood up and hugged her cousin tight. “I missed you, you know?”
“No, I didn’t know, but I was hoping,” Kaiser said, pecking a kiss to her cheek — the one that Buster hadn’t claimed yet.
“Come on, let’s get a blood test from Buster and see what’s going on with him,” she said, taking a treat out of her pocket and showing it to Buster to get him to follow her.
Buster jumped up and trotted along happily behind her.
“See? Just wants more food,” Kaiser said.
“Don’t we all?” Cristie said.
“Really? You hungry?” Kaiser asked, as he followed her into an examination room and picked Buster up to put him on the exam table.
“Starving. I didn’t exactly get breakfast, and then I was too sick to eat lunch, so now that my mini nervous breakdown has tapered off, I’m starving.”
“Want to have dinner with me?”
She eyed him suspiciously.
“I swear, no funny stuff, just dinner and catching up,” Kaiser promised.
“Who’s your flavor of the week? Am I going to end up in some gossip rag described as the other woman who destroyed some poor actress’s heart because I shattered the budding romance she was cultivating with the ever popular and oh so charming MVP Kaiser Lyakhov?”
Kaiser laughed. “No promises you won’t get your picture taken, but there’s no flavor of the week. I’m getting more than a little tired of that. I’m thinking of going celibate.”
“Yeah, it does sound enticing about now.”
“Who’s got you in a tizzy? You do know I’m not above whipping his ass, right?” Kaiser asked.
“Hold Buster still while I get a blood sample,” she said.
“Got him,” Kaiser answered.
