Like Cats and Dogs, Kate McMurray [miss read books .TXT] 📗

jerk. That you were jaded because of your divorce. And the last couple of weeks, I thought I saw some of the old you. We had fun together. You even seemed happy sometimes. But maybe I was wrong. Maybe you really are this cold, stoic jerk. You wanted to get your rocks off and nothing more.”

“Come on, Lauren. It was more than that.”

“But you’re not willing to give me much more than that. So just…whatever it was we had? You didn’t want it to be a relationship, so it isn’t. We’re done here. Please leave.”

“Lauren…”

“Don’t try to argue that this is anything more than it is. We had a good run. I had fun. No hard feelings. But get out.”

“So you’re giving me an ultimatum. A real relationship or nothing at all.”

“That’s exactly what I’m doing. And I hate to give you an ultimatum like that, but I can’t keep pretending the in-between is working. So I’m calling it off. We’ll each go off on our merry ways. You can go be bitter somewhere else.”

“It’s over.”

“If it ever even started.”

Caleb nodded once. They got along great between the sheets but not out of them. That wasn’t something to stake a future on. Especially not when he couldn’t trust that Lauren wouldn’t one day break his heart just as Kara had. “Fine. Nice knowing you.”

Then he let himself out.

Chapter 23

Caleb woke up to Hank licking his face. He laughed for a moment, then pushed Hank aside. “That’s enough, boy.”

A quick glance at the clock told Caleb his alarm wasn’t set to go off for another fifteen minutes, but attempts at falling back to sleep proved futile.

Lauren’s words from the day before echoed in his head. He’d made the right decision, though. She wanted to change the terms of their relationship, and he hadn’t been ready for that. He didn’t want to be in a relationship at all.

Then why was he so sad?

He got up and tried to shake it off. He went for a run with Hank, taking his usual route through the neighborhood, then around Cadman Plaza near the courthouses, then back home. He passed a lot of the same joggers he saw every morning, and in a lot of ways, the morning felt routine. But also totally different.

After his shower, he got dressed in his typical work uniform of khakis and an oxford shirt. He slipped into his comfortable loafers—comfy shoes were a must for any veterinarian, since he spent so much time on his feet—gave Hank a few more pets, snapped the leash on, and then he and Hank walked out the door.

He followed his usual route to work. He walked this way three or four mornings a week, and often passed the same people. He tended not to register people’s faces, but he knew all the dogs along this route. There was a black Lab mix with white feet that pulled an old lady in a housecoat around the neighborhood. There was a huge brown chow chow that looked like a bear; Caleb never saw the owner because he was always so startled by the dog. A teenage girl walked a Shiba Inu around Borough Hall every morning and a middle-aged guy who always looked tired walked a German shepherd closer to Whitman Street. Vet clinic patients stopped him on the street sometimes to say good morning.

When he got to Whitman Street, he paused near the café entrance. He’d been getting coffee there the last few mornings so he could say hello to Lauren in the mornings, which seemed silly in retrospect. Since Hank was with him, he decided to take his chances with the coffee in the vet clinic waiting room.

Hank made himself at home in the lobby. He nagged Rachel and the other vet tech on duty to pet him and entertained patients as they came in.

“I used to work at a vet clinic that had a cat who lived in the lobby,” Rachel told him. “It’s kind of fun having a dog. You should bring him more often. He could be, like, our mascot.”

“I might just do that,” said Caleb. He hadn’t thought through the decision to bring Hank today, he’d just done it, but he supposed he needed a little companionship.

His morning included a cat with behavioral issues and a dog with a splinter in his paw. Everything felt very routine, except it didn’t, because he wouldn’t be seeing Lauren today and there was no potential for them to hook up tonight and he was quite disappointed by that.

Well, more than disappointed, if he was honest.

It was a cat-heavy day. He was giving a booster shot to a tabby cat that afternoon when the thought entered his head that maybe he’d been hasty with Lauren. Maybe he should have just done what she wanted and seen where their relationship might have gone. But, no, he’d been right, he wasn’t ready for that.

This was verified later when a woman came in with an orange cat. Caleb didn’t recognize her at first, until she said, “I’m so glad I found you. You were the only vet Stanley could tolerate.”

“You were a patient at the old clinic in Manhattan?”

“Yes. Coincidentally, I just moved to Park Slope, and this is not so far from there. I was sorry to hear you closed. What happened?”

“Ah, well, my wife and I got divorced. My wife-slash-business partner.”

“Oh, right, the other Dr. Fitch. I never liked her. Stanley used to hiss at her something awful.”

Caleb peered at Stanley. He sat with his paws tucked under him on the stainless-steel table, his eyes half-closed, looking perfectly calm. Caleb stroked his back.

“I like this practice, though,” Caleb said, and he meant it. “The other vets here are all very nice and good to work with. Because this is a bigger practice, they have more resources.”

“And you’re right next to the Cat Café. My friend, Nancy, and I have been going there once a week. It’s delightful. Have you been there?”

“I have.”

“The manager