The Doctor Next Door. Victoria Pade

before she’d settled on the pale yellow sweater set she had on.

      She’d told herself it was nothing more than hometown hospitality that prompted her to wait to order her dinner until Boone’s promised call, telling her he was on his way. And to order at least three times more food than she would have ordered for herself.

      Her rehearsed invitation for him to come in must have seemed as innocent as she’d intended it to, though, because Boone merely accepted it by stepping inside.

      “I don’t know what she was like before, but I’m betting she’s her old self,” he said as he did.

      Charlie, he’s talking about Charlie, Faith had to remind herself, realizing only then that telling her about her dog’s health was likely why Boone had accepted her invitation. That it was purely business. As it should have been. She was simply showing him hometown hospitality and he was simply showing her the courtesy he probably offered every pet owner. That’s all there was to it, that’s all there should have been to it. It had nothing to do with attraction of any kind.…

      “Come in and sit,” she invited, leading him from the door that opened into the living room to the black leather sofa and the matching white leather chair that Charlie had already jumped up on.

      “Charlie, you know you aren’t supposed to be on that chair,” she said when she spotted her schnauzer sitting proudly in the middle of it. “Please get down.”

      Charlie glanced up at her but didn’t budge. As usual.

      “Charlie, down,” Boone said from behind Faith.

      Charlie hopped down.

      “She listened to you,” Faith said in amazement.

      Boone sat in the chair Charlie had vacated but made no comment before outlining the progression of her dog’s health in the last twenty-four hours.

      Faith wondered if she was a terrible pet owner, but she was only half listening as she took in the sight of Boone.

      For someone who had been attending to a farm-animal emergency, he looked remarkably good. He had on semidark blue jeans, a completely unwrinkled crisp white dress shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows and buffed and polished cowboy boots. Plus his longish hair was clean, his dauntingly handsome face was freshly shaven and he smelled like spring rain—a cologne she wasn’t familiar with but liked more than she wished she did.

      Had he gone home to shower and shave before bringing Charlie? she wondered suddenly.

      If he had it was more likely because whatever had kept him busy today had left him in need, that it had nothing to do with her. She told herself this to keep from feeling unduly flattered. Just because she had found thoughts of him impossible to shake didn’t mean he’d had the same problem with thoughts of her. Why would he have?

      “…no dry food—canned food only—for the next week to give her mouth a chance to heal. Nothing but soft treats, too. But other than that, she’s perfectly healthy and full of personality,” Boone was saying when Faith realized he was wrapping up his account of Charlie and that she’d better pay attention.

      The doorbell rang again just then and Charlie leaped into action just as she always did—running for the door, barking so loudly it was jarring.

      “You’re expecting company—that’s why you’re dressed up again,” Boone said.

      He still thought she’d overdone it? And she hadn’t even worn the pearls that usually went with the sweater set…

      “I’ll take off,” Boone added over the ruckus.

      “No!”

      Faith regretted the urgency in her voice and hoped the noise her dog was making camouflaged it. Then, forcing nonchalance again, she said, “That’s just dinner. Remember? I told you I’d ordered Chinese food.”

      Charlie continued to bark and Faith raised her voice to beg the dog to stop.

      As with the chair, Charlie ignored her and continued the rant at the door.

      “Charlie, no. Come,” Boone said, not raising his voice at all.

      To Faith’s amazement, the dog stopped and instantly rejoined them in the living room.

      Where Boone stood. “I should go and let you eat,” he said.

      “There’s a ton of food,” Faith countered in a hurry, standing, too. “Since it’s my first time I wanted to try a little of a lot of things. Then I’ll know from here on what’s good and what isn’t. If you haven’t eaten, you could stay.…”

      The second invitation she’d rehearsed. Had it sounded unplanned? Or had she just given herself away?

      Hoping to cover her tracks if she had, she made up a reason and added, “Maybe you can tell me what kind of spell you’ve put on my dog to get her to behave.”

      “You seriously want me to have dinner with you?” Boone asked, once again not addressing her astonishment over his control of her dog but showing some of his own astonishment at her suggestion.

      “Seriously,” Faith confirmed. “Unless you have plans…” Which could have been why he’d come looking—and smelling—as good as he did.

      “I was just going to pick up something to eat on my way home.”

      “So you might as well stay,” Faith said, feeling an inordinate amount of satisfaction to learn that he hadn’t intended to see anyone but her tonight.

      “You’re sure?” he asked as if this might be a trap.

      “I’m sure,” she confirmed, wishing he didn’t still seem so wary of her as she went to answer the door.

      Charlie didn’t run along beside her and try to rush out the minute she opened it. That came as another surprise. As she accepted several bags of food she looked back to see the schnauzer calmly sitting at Boone’s feet.

      “We could eat on the coffee table,” Faith said when she turned back to Boone, “but we won’t have any peace from Charlie. She’ll have her nose in everything and she’ll steal whatever she can reach. So we’re probably better off in the kitchen. Just don’t ever leave your chair not pushed in or she’ll jump up there, too, and help herself.”

      “Really.…” Boone said, following her as Faith went around the half wall that was the only separation between living room and kitchen.

      “There’s no dining room,” Faith continued, feeling the need to outline her humble surroundings for no reason she understood. “The whole place doesn’t amount to much,” she said as she unloaded the sacks onto the round bleached-oak pedestal table that was just large enough for two spindle-back chairs. “There are only two bedrooms, two baths, the living room, the kitchen and that tiny laundry room that leads to the garage.” She pointed to her left where the washing machine and dryer could be seen through the connecting doorway. “I didn’t think I’d end up here for any extended period of time, so when my ex-husband wanted me to find a house to buy for us to use whenever we visited, I just looked for something that offered the bare necessities.”

      “Why not stay with family when you visited?” Boone asked, seeming far more at ease than she felt as she went for plates and utensils and then opened cartons of food.

      “My ex-husband refused. Oddly enough, we lived with his family in Connecticut the rest of the time, but he said the only way he was coming here was if we had somewhere to stay that wasn’t with my family. Then again, he only came with me twice, anyway. But I guess it’s good that I have the place now.”

      She sorted through what she’d ordered, trying to figure out what was what. Boone had eaten at the restaurant in the past so he helped before settling on his favorites while Faith took a spoonful from each carton in order to validate her story about ordering so much so she could try a little of everything.

      She also poured them both