Undeniable (Always Book 3)

by Lexxie Couper

  His answering woof told me in no uncertain terms to hurry the fuck up.

  I crossed the empty waiting room to the bathroom. I felt good. Like I’d been mainlining whatever it was Brendon was on to be so positive. Now, if only it would hurry up and be 10 am so I could get my butt into the Telco shop, get a US SIM and get Chase on the phone. I could have called her on the clinic’s phone, I know, but it was late now and I didn’t want to wake her if she was asleep.

  Pushing open the bathroom door, it occurred to me I could probably just ask Brendon to get her to call or text me on his phone. As awkward as that would be, at least we could communicate. The first step.

  I pulled my phone from my back pocket and quickly tapped out a message to Brendon: Sorry for texting so late, but when you see or speak to Chase next, can you get her to text or call me on your phone? Even if it’s tonight. I can’t get a US SIM until tomorrow morning. Thanks, dude.

  Feeling like I was thrumming, I slipped my phone into pocket. And then jerked my head around at the soft tap of knuckles on glass.

  My throat seized up.

  Chase stood on the other side of the main entry door, looking at me.

  For a moment – just a moment, but a bloody stupid moment – I didn’t move. Stood rooted to the spot, staring at her. The exterior lights played with her hair, turning it to a halo of vivid cyan blue that was almost surreal.

  I blinked. Was she really there?

  Let me in, you over-protective moron, she signed, lips curling into a devilish smile.

  A short, startled laugh burst from me. Well, if you’re going to be that way . . . I signed back, staying exactly where I was.

  Well, most of me was staying exactly where I was. My heart was well and truly on its way to thumping itself out of my chest.

  If you don’t let me in I can’t show you how sorry I am for being a moron myself, she signed.

  Sorry, I signed back, forcing my expression to be serious and aloof. But the only people allowed in here this time of night are those coming to see their animals.

  Her eyes narrowed.

  Their not-dying animals, I continued. I know I stumbled over the word dying. For some reason my hands were shaking. Maybe because I was on the verge of bursting into song and dancing around with sheer joy. Mind you, I’m not that good a dancer. If I had done that, Chase might very well have bolted.

  She frowned. And then the frown turned into an expression of hesitant hope. Her hands moved: Do you mean . . .

  Yep.

  “Fuck yeah!” her muffled shout came through the glass. What wasn’t muffled was the sheer delight in her voice.

  I grinned.

  She grinned back. And then a heartbeat later, signed, Well? Are you going to let me in?

  I ran to the door, unlocked it and yanked it open. Before she could ask or say whatever her mouth was opening to ask or say, I hauled her to my body and kissed her. It might have been a tad presumptuous, but fuck it. She was here, not with Donald the Dude, and I was going to kiss her.

  The heavy glass entry door whacked into my back, knocking us both off balance. Laughing, still holding each other, we moved away from the door. It took a second for us to regain balance, another second to stare into each other’s eyes, and a third to return to our kiss.

  And holy hell, did we kiss each other. Our tongues and lips and teeth spoke of every desire and passion and need we had. I completely lost myself to the wonder of her lips on mine, far more potent because I had spent a great deal of the day thinking it was never going to happen again.

  When we finally tore apart, the separation lasted barely a second before I cupped her face and kissed her again. And again. Over and over. I couldn’t get enough of her lips, of her smell, her taste.

  Finally, all too aware that if we didn’t stop we’d end up breaking the laws of decency right there in front of the animal hospital, under the glaring entry lights, I dragged my mouth from hers.

  “So . . .” I said, catching my breath. “That just happened.”

  Chase laughed. Raking her fingers through my beard, she closed her eyes and smiled. “Yes, it did. And it was wow. So much wow.”

  “Wow is an understatement.” I wanted to ask her what had happened between her and the Douchebag. The need to do so itched at the back of my skull like a hive of ants. I ignored it. Just. She may have just made fun of my over-protectiveness, but I wasn’t prepared to push the point. Not yet, at least. Not until I finished basking in the fact she was here with me now.

  I smoothed my hands up and down her back and waited for her to look up at me. “How did you know I was here?” I asked.

  She shook her head. “I didn’t. My plan was to drive to the last place I saw you, then ring Brendon and have him tell me where you were.”

  I chuckled. “I love your impulsiveness.”

  “And my sarcasm?” she asked. “I think I just sarcasmed my way out of ever being a student at SDSU again.”

  A hot lump filled my throat but I smiled all the same. “I love your sarcasm.”

  She chewed her lip, a hesitant uncertainty falling over her face. “Do you?”

  “I do.” I searched her eyes. “And your courage and your independence and your strength.”

  “Independence?” she repeated, her voice catching. “You know that’s a big one for me, don’t you? I mean, I’m not a little girl who can’t look after herself. I’m allowed to make my own decisions. And I’m definitely allowed to run across a busy road if I want, and you’re not allowed to freak out and try to protect me.”

  “You know I’m likely to do just that,” I countered. “And it has nothing to do with your hearing and everything to do with me being terrified you might get hurt. Hell, I’d freak out if Brendon tried to sprint across that road you took on. Might not shout at him though. More likely to punch the bastard in the jaw for freaking me out.”

  She watched me. I could see her mind working.

  “You know,” she went on, the words slow, considered, “if someone is being horrible to me, I’m perfectly okay with taking care of it.”

  Donald the Dude. We were talking about Donald the Dude. His name didn’t need to be mentioned to know that.

  Anger and jealousy threaded through my happiness. I swallowed. The need to be flippant, to toss out a joke instead of address those emotions, crushed down on me. “And if I want to take care of it?” I finally said. “If someone is being a dick to the woman I love, I’m allowed to let them know, right? And to tell them to fuck off? Or is that being too protective as well, because if it is, Chase, I . . .” I stopped, shaking my head. My pulse thumped in my ear, a cannon of drilling volume.

  “I should have told you sooner I answered Perry’s call,” I said, stepping back from her and rubbing at the back of my neck. “It was wrong of me not to.”

  She caught her bottom lip again. “It was.”

  Dragging my hand up into my hair, I clawed at my scalp.

  It’s okay to get angry, Brendon had said. You don’t have to smother everything in a joke. But a lifetime of suppressing any agitation I experienced, of keeping my calm and not getting ruffled . . . it was hard to not fall back on that. Especially when I suspected things needed to be said that would hurt. Both her and me.

  “Why did you answer his call, Cade?” she asked, her stare holding mine. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “Why didn’t you just tell him it was over, Chase?” The question – the accusation – burst from me before I could stop it, or cut it off with a self-deprecating joke. “Why did you go to his place? After everything we’ve . . . Fuck, I don’t . . . I don’t know . . . You . . .” I broke off again, jerking my gaze everywhere around us but to where Chase stood, watching me. “After everything that happened between us, why did you go to his house?”

  “I had to,” she said, the words husky.

  Hot disappointment sheared through me. I finally looked at her. “And?”

  “And I’m here, aren’t I?” she said. “I’m here with yo
u. Not there with him.”

  Here with you. A rush of concentrated relief and joy at those words flowed through me. Followed by an undeniable need for clarification. “You told him it was over? To stop calling you. You told him you’re done with him?”

  She nodded. “Yes. Quite emphatically, in fact. There was shoving involved.”

  I sucked in a sharp breath, my fists balling. “He shoved you?”

  “No, I shoved him.” A frown knitted her eyebrows. There and gone just as quickly. “For a while he didn’t want to take the hint. And then I laughed at him.”

  I should have been listening to her. I should have focused on the “laughed at him” part of her declaration. Instead, I was seeing red, and there wasn’t a joke or witty comment to be had. “He touched you? Tried to . . . to what? Force you?” Rage turned my blood hot. I ground my teeth. “I should have dealt with the prick when I was on the phone with him.”

  Chase’s jaw clenched. Dark tension flared in her eyes. “Why? Because I wasn’t capable?”

  “No,” I almost shouted. “Because I love you. Don’t you get that? I love you and I hate the idea of anyone, anyone, upsetting you or hurting you. I hate it. I hate that I did it, I hate that Perry did it, I hate that your father does it. The whole point of being in love with someone is to make sure their life is the best life it can be. It’s not about being selfish. It’s not about how great that person makes your life, it’s about making their life wonderful. And I couldn’t do that. I didn’t do that for you. I yelled at you and I betrayed you and I made jokes when I really wanted to scream.”

  Chase stepped toward me. I fisted my hands in my hair, watching her.

  “I’ve loved you from the second I saw you, Chase,” I said. When had someone lined my throat with hot sandpaper? “It’s lame and corny and you can roll your eyes all you like, but it’s true. And I know I’m probably going to piss you off a lot because I will try and protect you when you don’t want me to, but I can’t help that. Just like I can’t help being in love with you.”

  I stopped. My breath squeezed from my lungs in shallow breaths. I felt giddy.

  “And I swear,” I croaked, my voice little more than a scratch, “if Donald the Dude calls or texts you one more time I will find out where he lives and shove his phone up his arse.”

  “I don’t need you to protect me, Caden,” she said, looking up at me. I can only assume she’d read my lips because there wasn’t a hope in hell she could have heard me. “But I think . . .” She touched her fingers to my chest. “But I think I’m going to like that you want to.”

  I swallowed.

  A smile curled her lips, small, almost shy, but a smile. “I’m going to tell you that I love you now, Caden O’Dae. Promise you won’t freak out? Or make a lame joke?”

  My pulse detonated in my throat. “Promise.”

  Happiness danced in her eyes. “I love you.”

  Drawing in a steady breath, I smoothed my hands over her hips. My heart pounded in my throat, my ears. “I’m going to kiss you now.”

  “If you don’t,” she said, “I may have to beat you.”

  I kissed her. Quite a bit.

  When our lips finally separated, I cupped her face in my palms and smiled down at her. “We can make this work.”

  She smiled back. “We can.”

  Releasing a ragged breath, I smoothed my hands up her back. “So, want to go in and say g’day to Doofus?”

  Hesitation fell over her face. “Is he okay? Really okay? Or ‘vet boyfriend who doesn’t want to upset his girlfriend’ okay?”

  Boyfriend.

  Girlfriend.

  Do you have any idea how I felt hearing those words? I don’t think I’ve got a hope of describing it, to be honest.

  “Really really okay,” I answered. “He’s still got some recovering to do, but he’s going to make it.”

  “Yes!” She launched herself from the ground, wrapped her legs around my hips, and her arms around my shoulders, and kissed me again. This kiss fell somewhere between we’re-going-to-be-arrested, and stolen-but-meaningful. Plus it had the added advantage of Chase’s sex being very close to my groin. Those kinds of kisses are bloody awesome.

  When it ended, I threaded my fingers through hers and grinned. “Let’s get in there,” I said as I turned to open the door.

  Only to find it locked.

  “Shit,” I muttered, a second before Chase chuckled and tapped me on the shoulder.

  I looked up from the door handle and burst out laughing. There, on the other side of the glass, perched on the reception counter watching us, was Dr. Randolf Simmons. And sitting beside him, grinning at us in interminable doggy happiness, a plastic protective cone around his neck to stop him messing up his stitches, and a new bright blue collar, was Doofus.

  Randolf regarded us, expression completely serious, and then his wide face broke into a wide smile and he lifted his hand and gave us a thumbs up.

  Veterinarians. We’re a very special breed.

  Ten

  “What counts is not necessarily the size of the dog in a fight – it’s the size of the fight in the dog.”

  ~ Dwight D Eisenhower

  Chase

  After the reunion to end all reunions – and I’m talking about my reunion with Doofus, who I had been convinced was going to die and take my heart with him – we sat on the waiting room floor together, his head in my lap, while Caden and Dr. Simmons talked veterinarian stuff, Doofus’s progress, and his treatment.

  Whenever I stopped patting him to answer Amanda’s text (yes I’d got to LA okay and yes, I’d found Caden and yes, we were together together), or to answer Mom’s text (yes, I was okay and yes, I was in LA and yes, I was coming home eventually), Doofus would give my hand a nudge and I’d pat him again.

  It was nice. More than nice. I was lovely. I couldn’t wait to take him home. To introduce him to Tanner. To love him the way he deserved to be loved.

  Finally, Caden’s gaze found mine and he gave me a smile. “Any chance you’re ready to get going? Or do I have Buckley’s of dragging you away from Doofus?”

  Before I could answer a frantic woman started banging on the glass door, a writhing cat in her arms. She was rightfully frantic because her cat – the fluffiest white Persian I’ve ever seen – had somehow got its head stuck inside her daughter’s Mr. Potato Head.

  Both Caden and Dr. Simmons hurried to the door at the same time, expressions calm and determined. Watching Caden as he helped Simmons deal with the distraught woman and her very angry cat, I couldn’t help but notice just how relaxed and completely at home he was in the situation.

  It was clear he was born for this line of work. He loved me – to be honest, I think I’d known that for a while – but watching him work in the animal hospital, I realized just how much he loved being a veterinarian. Or almost one. He still had one year of his studies at Melbourne University to complete.

  That’s Melbourne, Australia. A country situated on the other side of the world from the US.

  Goddamn it. How the hell were we going to work this out? As far as long-distance relationships go, this was pushing it to the max. There was no way my wages at the exotic pet store would cover the cost of numerous international flights. Which meant we’d only physically be together whenever Caden could fly to America. And with the pressure he was under due to exams and studies I doubted he’d have that much free time to fly to the States.

  Trust me to go and fall in love with a guy who didn’t even live in the same country. A knot bigger than Mount Rushmore twisted in my belly.

  “Ready?”

  I blinked, the question bringing me back into the waiting area.

  Caden smiled down at me, duffle bag slung over his shoulder. “Randolf’s got the cat situation covered. We can go now.” He slid a grin at Doofus. “That is, if you can say goodbye to this guy for the night?”

  Doofus raised his head from my lap and let out a happy bark, his liquid brown eyes fixed on Caden. Tummy flutteri
ng, I let out a soft chuckle. I wasn’t the only one completely and utterly lost to Caden O’Dae.

  “Well,” I said, a warm sensation of happiness and anticipation rushing through me. “If it’s just the night . . .”

  Caden’s gaze found mine, a silent message in his eyes, one that detonated an excited fluttering in my girlie bits, before moving his attention to Doofus. “Okay, mate, time for you to go back to the recovery room.”

  Doofus let out a soft bark. His tail wagged faster. He started to get to his feet, and Caden dropped into a deep crouch, gently sliding his arms beneath his belly and ribcage and lifting him from the floor. Doofus’s tail continued to wag. He tried to lick Caden’s face, the plastic protective cone around his neck stopping him. I looked up at them both from where I still sat cross-legged on the floor.

  My future. Right there. For the first time in my life, my entire life, I knew exactly what I wanted. This Australian and this dog. It didn’t matter where we were going, as long as we were going together.

  “I love you,” I said, when Caden looked at me over Doofus’s shoulder.

  “I know,” he said, and then grinned.

  I threw back my head and laughed. Yeah, trust Caden to use a Star Wars quote in response.

  “Just let me put Doofus back in his cage,” he said as I got to my feet. “And I’ll let Randolf know we’re going.”

  I nodded. Inside, my tummy had turned to a cage of frantic butterflies. Not because I was nervous. There was nothing to be nervous about. Because I was excited.

  I knew.

  I freaking knew what was going to happen for the rest of my life. Caden and I were going to be together – somehow we’d work out the geography – and things were going to be awesome. I knew it. I felt it. In my heart.

  Wow. I mean . . . wow.

  “See you tomorrow, Doofus,” I said, giving him a gentle scratch behind his ear. He tried to lick me this time.

  Life was good. So good.

  Caden returned a few moments later, the strong scent of disinfectant and soap clinging to him. He crossed the waiting room floor to where I waited at the door, stopped directly in front of me, threaded his fingers into my hair and kissed me. My knees trembled. Have you ever been kissed so beautifully and perfectly that your knees tremble? I didn’t want it to end even as I wanted it to hurry the fuck up and end so we could get out of here. So we could get to wherever Caden was staying, and do what people who are in love do when they finally stop being idiots and admit that’s exactly how they feel.