Chapter 2
Two
T he clinic lobby stretched pristine clean with gleaming white tiles, hand-scraped wooden slat benches, and a shelving unit on one end fully stocked with bags and cases of prescription pet food. Norah needed to buy some for the dog if they couldn’t find his owner right away.
Framed picture windows took up the front wall, with the blinds raised halfway to let in the sunlight. The sharp scent of antiseptic mingled with the faint odor of wet dog fur, a musky contrast to the salty beach air outside. The lively Christmas decorations were all whimsical and pet-themed.
“Oh my goodness!” the tall, willowy redhead behind the reception desk exclaimed. Her name tag identified her as Vanessa Hatcher.
Vanessa hopped up, came around the counter, and kneeled in front of the dog. He looked up at her with ‘love-me’ eyes and wagged his tail. “What a beautiful boy!”
“Isn’t he just? Somebody’s missing this guy. He’s well-behaved, friendly, and in great shape,” Norah said.
“No doubt.” Vanessa ran the chip reader over the dog. She tried twice more, moving the dog’s head from side to side, and then shook her head. “Rats! Not chipped.”
Norah exhaled and dropped shoulders that had crept up to her ears. A chip would’ve made this much more straightforward. “So much for crossing my fingers.”
“I know.” Vanessa wrinkled her nose and unbuckled the dog’s collar. She checked both sides for information. “Nothing here either.”
“Bummer. His family must be frantic with worry.”
“No worries.” Vanessa leaned over the counter to find her cell phone. “I’ll snap a couple of pics, and we’ll get busy networking this guy. Smile,” she told the dog and photographed him. “Okay, y’all, follow me to the exam room.”
In the hallway, a bulletin board covered in photos of the clinic’s patients hung near the front counter. Norah didn’t have time to stop, but she caught a glimpse of the framed art along the way—pencil drawings, colorful and whimsical, of cats, dogs, guinea pigs, hamsters, birds, lizards, and a lop-eared rabbit. The collage stirred old memories of her parents’ pet rescue efforts.
Vanessa stopped at an open door and gestured for Norah to step inside. Freckles dotted Vanessa’s nose under the fluorescent bulbs. “Dr. Gray will be here in a sec. Can I get you anything?”
“Thanks, Vanessa. I’m fine.”
Except for the part where Dr. Gray would be here soon. Those words bumped hard into her anxiety.
Norah sat on the long bench against the back wall. The dog took his place in front of her, resting his chin on her knee. She stroked his head, and he let out a soft whimper, nudging her hand with his nose, asking for more petting.
“Aww. If you hadn’t found this poor guy, he would be spending the holiday alone,” Vanessa said and then left the room.
Norah leaned down and nuzzled the dog’s face. “That makes two of us, huh.”
Seconds ticked by, turning into minutes. Norah’s pulse drummed along with the clock. The dog dropped to the floor, chin on his paws, one of them resting on Norah’s sneaker. He snored.
Must be nice .
She took a deep breath, but it didn’t help. She cleared her throat, shifted from side to side, stretched, and then drummed her fingers against her thigh. She caught herself biting her lip, a nervous habit she had outgrown years ago. Or so she thought.
How long had the dog been on his own?
She was just about to open the door and ask Vanessa for some water when she heard voices outside the door. Two male voices. Neither sounded like Matt.
She leaned over her knees and whispered to the dog, “This is ridiculous. I’m forty-four, you know. So what if I haven’t spoken to Matt in twenty years? We’re adults now. Being alone with him shouldn’t be a big deal.”
The door opened, and before she could straighten, a deep masculine voice filled the room. “Hello, Norah.”
Pulse jumping at her wrist, she raised her head.
The Matt she once knew was still there but different, too. Same height, same build, same dark hair, though threaded with silver now. He had a beard now, and navy-blue eyes studied her intently.
“Matt.” Her voice wobbled, her mouth suddenly dry and her throat tight. Twenty years since they’d seen each other, and they were alone.
With a dog between them.
How fitting.
Matt leaned against the edge of the counter, his arms crossed over his lab coat, his ankles crossed too. He wore black-framed reading glasses. A warm smile spread across his face like a leisurely stroll. His lab coat looked crisp and white, although the Christmas sweater underneath wasn’t so clean. A stethoscope lay draped around his neck, and a pen peeked from his breast pocket.
His smile widened, and his dimples showed through his beard. His teeth, straight and white, made the smile even better because it reached his eyes. He looked happy to see her.
And she was happy to see him.
Her earlier anxiety faded. Yes, it had been ages, but their history felt irrelevant now, except for the part that they hadn’t resolved.
A treat in his hand, Matt came closer and crouched beside the stray. “And hello to you, young man.”
His hands moved with ease. His voice, warm and reassuring, carried the slightest touch of the Southern drawl Norah recalled.
The dog took the biscuit Matt offered, gulped it down, nudged Matt’s fingers as if asking for another treat, sniffed at Matt’s pocket, and barked softly.
“Good boy.” Matt rubbed the dog’s head.
“Vanessa said you found him on the beach.” He stood while the dog crunched his treat.
Norah shared her story, and her mind drifted to a summer afternoon years ago. They had been at the lake, laughing as they tried coaxing a stray dog into Matt’s rickety old boat. The memory of his sun-warmed skin and the sparkle in his eyes as he wrapped the scared pup in a towel washed over her. That day, she first realized her feelings for him went beyond friendship, a realization that thrilled and terrified her.
“He seems pretty young,” Norah said, shaking off the memory.
Matt nodded and continued checking the dog’s knees, hips, abdomen, and spine. “Two years old, max, and he’s in great shape, other than this bump on his nose.”
“Somebody’s missing him,” she said.
“And vice versa.” Matt grabbed his tablet, made notes, and then gathered supplies to clean and treat the wound. “Vanessa’s checking with shelters in the area and spreading the word through a network of clinics.”
Matt cleaned the dried gunk from the wound, talked to the dog, and used his penlight to examine the cut. He stepped into the hallway and called for Chris. “I’m going to glue the skin closed. Easier and less stressful than stitches.”
“How long will this take?” Norah asked.
Chris, tall, muscular, and looking to be in his late twenties, entered the room. He crouched to secure the dog while Matt glued the wound shut.
“Can you hand me the otoscope?” Matt tilted the dog’s head, examining his ears. “Looks good. No signs of infection or mites.” He palpated the dog’s abdomen. “Spleen feels normal. No masses that I can detect.”
Chris jotted down notes as Matt dictated his findings.
Finally, smiling at the dog, Matt finished up and straightened to answer Norah’s question. “If nothing pops up right away, maybe a week. Could take longer.”
Norah let that sink in. Hmm.
“In the meantime…” Matt said.
Uh-oh. Norah spied the gleam in his eyes, the arch of his brow, and his grin and knew what was coming.
“You up for fostering?” he asked.
She knew well the time and energy it took to foster a dog. Even without her siblings coming to stay, she was slamming busy. “I guess there aren’t any rescue groups in Christmas Beach anymore?”
He shook his head. “Not since your parents retired. They’re all in New Orleans.”
“What about your kennels?”
He shook his head. “We’d have room if it weren’t Christmas, but right now, we’re booked solid.”
All the holiday travel. Norah hadn’t considered that. She had room, sure, but did she have the energy for it? “I suppose I could do it for a few days. I’ll need to buy food?—”
“We’ll give you everything you need for the week. Do you have a bed?”
“I have blankets, sheets, and towels.”
“Perfect.” Matt rubbed his hands together, almost gleeful. “Now all he needs is a name.”
Norah looked from Matt to the dog. “He might have some Irish setter in him.”
Matt caressed the bump on the front of the dog’s head. “The signs are there. I’d be curious to know if his family did a breed test.”
“Do people really do that?”
“Some do. Especially if folks are worried about allergies or breed abnormalities.”
She studied the dog. “Paddy?”
“I like it.” Then Matt added the name to the dog’s chart. He poked his head out the door. “Vanessa, can you gather the supplies Norah will need to foster?”
“Sure thing!” Vanessa hollered back.
“C’mon, I’ll walk you to your car.” Matt motioned toward the front of the building with a head tilt.
Norah hesitated. “First, can I ask you something?”
“Of course,” Matt said, closing the door.
Why was she bringing this up? She should tell him never mind, but she didn’t. “Isn’t it strange that we’ve known each other this long, stayed out of touch, but can still pick up where we left off?”
Matt leaned back, arms crossed. “You mean like when you’d come home on breaks from school?”
Yes, but no. It wasn’t like that anymore.
Not after the last break when Norah returned for her junior year, and he left for Pennsylvania to attend his first year. When she came home for her first winter break, she was nineteen and Matt seventeen. By the time she graduated college, she was twenty-two, and he was twenty.
For some reason, those few years had made a world of difference back then.
But definitely not now.
Oh no. Not now.
The air between them crackled with unspoken words and shared history. When Matt leaned over to hand her Paddy’s leash, his arm brushed against Norah’s, sending a jolt through her. Their eyes met over the dog’s head, and Norah jerked her gaze away, afraid of what Matt might see on her face.
Longing.
“Is that what we’re doing? Picking up where we left off?” she asked. “Or are we just talking about dogs?”
“Dogs are the best icebreakers,” Matt said, his smile pulling her back to the day they met when she was washing Goldie in the driveway. He showed up with a stray he found behind Home Depot and someone had told him her family took in strays. Goldie was so excited to see Matt and the new dog that she leaped from the tub, splashing Norah with sudsy water and soaking her T-shirt.
She smiled at the memory. They had been so young. So incredibly young. The weight of the intervening years settled between them like a wall.
“So now we’re breaking the ice?” she asked.
He might be correct, but was she overthinking things? She was here. He was here. A dog sat between them. It felt like old times in many ways, and yet new and unexplored.
Matt shrugged, and his lab coat rustled. “You’re still you. I’m still me. I’ve got a few more miles on these bones, though. I keep finding new gray hairs.” He ruffled the top of his head, leaving strands sticking up. The gesture was so familiar, so quintessentially Matt. Norah felt a pang of nostalgia for the relationship they’d lost.
“Hard to miss the grays mixed in with the black, but at least I’ve still got it all.” He chuckled.
She laughed, the tension easing. “Have you seen Nate since last Christmas?”
“You mean since he shaved his head because he couldn’t deal with losing his hair? I flew to Boston this past summer to go deep-sea fishing with him. Just for a long weekend. The buzz cut suits him.”
“It does.”
The clinical scent of antiseptic overwhelmed her, a reminder of how much time had passed and how different their lives were now. What were they doing here? She should go.
Matt chuckled and pressed a palm to his nape, a nervous gesture from his youth. “Did I ever tell you I became a vet because of your family?”
“What?” She glanced at him. Had she heard him right? His words caught her off guard, rousing memories of countless dogs running through her childhood home.
He leaned down to cup Paddy’s chin and stroked his head. The dog closed his eyes, tilting his head back as if to say more, more . Matt nuzzled Paddy’s face and glanced back at Norah. His smile lit up his eyes, sending a flutter through her chest.
“I’d never been around so many dogs before,” he said.
Memories flashed through her mind like a slideshow. “My parents were into dog rescue before the internet, and microchips made it easier to reunite lost pets with their families. We ended up adopting a lot of fosters. At one point, we had twenty-seven dogs on the acreage.” She didn’t know why she was babbling. Matt knew all this.
“I remember the time your dad crawled into a drainpipe to rescue puppies.”
“He crawled into worse places than that.”
“All for the love of dogs, and yet…” He looked at her, his eyes searching hers. “You haven’t been in here since I opened the clinic four years ago. Have you been taking your animals to New Orleans?”
She shrugged against a twinge of guilt. “I haven’t had a dog since high school. At first, it wasn’t practical—dorm life, then a loft apartment in New Orleans, but I honestly don’t know why I haven’t looked into adoption since moving here.”
That wasn’t true. Norah knew precisely why she’d stayed pet-free. All those dogs her parents had taken in meant countless moments of loss and grief. Dogs simply didn’t live long enough, and now, with no one to share that pain with, she couldn’t bear the thought of going through it alone.
“I do miss having a dog. I’ll definitely enjoy Paddy while he’s with me.” She scratched behind Paddy’s ears, feeling the comfort of his warm presence. “Can I ask you something else?”
“Shoot.” He leaned back, his posture relaxed.
“What made you pick Christmas Beach to open your practice? It’s a small town, and I’m sure you’d make more money in New Orleans, where your parents live.”
Was it because of me? Seriously? What an ego, Norah. Of course, he hadn’t set up his practice here because of her.
His eyes locked on hers, and her heart skipped. “I wanted a small-town practice. And my folks are just thirty minutes away.”
“That’s it?” Stop talking, you ninny!
His gaze stayed on her. “Christmas Beach didn’t have a vet. I saw a need and filled it.”
Oh. Okay. Norah hadn’t been a factor. What had she been thinking? Why would he move here for her? They’d been apart for decades.
Vanessa knocked on the door and peeked in. “I’ve got everything ready. Chris can load the supplies into Norah’s car when she’s ready.”
“Thanks, Vanessa,” Matt and Norah said in unison. All three laughed, and Paddy barked.
“I think the two of you are going to be a great fit,” Vanessa said, giving Paddy another biscuit.
“We’re just temporary,” Norah said.
“Still,” Matt said, “it’s nice to have company for Christmas.”
Then his eyes met hers, and Norah had the strangest feeling he wasn’t talking about the dog.