Page 11 of Pugs & Kisses
He drove up Carrollton Avenue toward the small place he’d rented on Bayou St. John. He had never seen more creative photography than the pictures that had been used in the ad for this short-term rental. It was half the size he’d anticipated and the floors creaked if he looked at them too hard.
The only upside was that it faced the water.
Bayou St. John was a far cry from Bayou Cane, Lake Boeuf, and the other spots he grew up swimming and fishing in, but he would take what he could get.
The real estate agent he’d hired had several condos on Lake Pontchartrain for him to tour next week.
If he was going to move back to Louisiana, he damn sure was going to have a view of the water.
As soon as he entered the house, Bryson dropped to his haunches and held his arms out for Bella, the sable and white papillon who had been abandoned at one of the clinics where he’d done his clinical rotation.
She jumped into his arms, gave him the required lick on the chin, then started barking up a storm.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Bryson said, smoothing down the hair on her butterfly-shaped ears. “I told you it was going to be a long night.”
He plucked a treat from the jar he kept on the table next to the door. He had another in the kitchen and in his bedroom, because if there was one certainty in this house, it was that Bella would get her treats.
He carried her into the bedroom and sat her on her dog bed—there were also living room and kitchen dog beds—and changed out of his suit and tie.
Bryson grabbed a pair of sweats and a T-shirt from one of two suitcases that lay open on the floor.
He was determined not to be in this Airbnb long enough to unpack, but he also knew he could only live out of suitcases for a couple of weeks before he started to get antsy.
Bella barked.
“No more treats,” Bryson said. “I wasn’t that late.”
He glanced over at the lumpy mattress, hating the thought of sleeping on it but knowing he should turn in for tonight.
He’d made plans to have a walk-through at the surgical hospital tomorrow, which was open twenty-four hours, seven days a week.
He didn’t want to waste time learning the place when he started on Monday. He wanted to be able to jump right in.
But he also knew if he got in that bed right now, he would spend the next two hours staring up at the ceiling. He was still too wired from his LMVA presentation and hanging out at Cooter Brown’s.
“Come on, girl,” Bryson said, scooping up Bella. He grabbed a can of blackberry sparkling water from the fridge and took Bella out to the small front porch.
As he settled into the worn wooden rocking chair, he could admit that the view of downtown earned the house another notch in the plus column. The crown of the old Hibernia Bank Building was lit up in purple, gold, and green to usher in the Mardi Gras season.
Bryson leaned over and whispered in the dog’s ear. “We’ve gotta get out of this neighborhood before Mardi Gras, Bells.”
He would rather run his nails down a chalkboard than deal with the crowds that would descend on this neighborhood and those that surrounded it in a few weeks. Maybe he would be able to convince his parents to stay home for five minutes so they could have a proper visit during that time.
He pushed off with his foot, sending the chair on a gentle rock.
Trailing his fingers through Bella’s soft fur, Bryson leaned his head against the back of the rocking chair and finally allowed his mind to go to the place he’d been fighting to keep it from for the past two days.
He closed his eyes and called forth the image of Evie in that simple sweater and jeans.
It had been hanging out on the periphery of his consciousness, waiting for the chance to torture and entice him.
It shouldn’t have come as a surprise that she was as beautiful as ever, yet the sight of her had nearly done him in. He should have been better prepared for the moment he first saw her; he’d known he would run into her eventually. He would probably run into her boyfriend soon too.
Boyfriend? It had been eight years. No doubt they were married by now. Probably even had a couple of kids.
His muscles flinched.
He had never allowed himself to go there, and he sure as hell didn’t want to think about it tonight. Or ever. He didn’t want to spend a single brain cell pondering what it was like for Evie to give birth to Cameron Broussard the Second.
He’d purposely avoided any information about them after he left LSU, knowing that news of their wedding would shred him. Even years later, the thought of that asshole having the heart of the amazing girl Bryson spent a summer falling in love with galled him.
And therein lay his problem.
He’d fallen in love with her, but she had been another guy’s girl. The one guy who chapped his ass more than any other.
Of all the men for her to choose over him, his asshole of an ex-lab partner was, by far, the worst.
“You don’t know if she chose Cameron over you,” Bryson said.
He hadn’t given her the chance to choose. Instead of talking to Evie like an adult after his confrontation with Cameron just before the start of the fall semester, he’d ghosted her like a coward, hauling ass to Tuskegee.
He drank down what remained of his drink and crushed the can with his fist.
Well, there was nowhere for him to run now. He was here, and so was Evie.
“Welcome home to me.”
Bryson held Bella to his chest, pushed up from the rocking chair, and went inside.