Finding Forever (Living Again #4) (2 page)

She opened her mouth and attempted to speak, but a harsh noise escaped instead. She looked over at the table at the water, and Lacey took a small straw full and put it on her mom’s lips and tongue. She swallowed, her mouth curling in a weak smile.

“I love you, Mom,” Lacey choked out, losing the battle of keeping her emotions in check.

Her mom lifted her hand and caressed her cheek, and she leaned into her like she always did. Even though she had been in a hospital bed for a long time now, she could still smell her smell; the one that comforted her, loved her, and made her feel better when she was sick.

“Happy Birthday, Lace,” she whispered, her voice cracking a few times. “My big girl.”

Lacey sobbed, tears streaming down her face. She had remembered. Tears began leaking from her mom’s eyes too. Even though she didn’t look the same as she did two years ago, her body ravaged by sickness, she was still her mom.

“Mommy,” she said, something she hadn’t called her in years.

“I’ll love you forever,” she whispered in response, her eyes closing with the effort it was taking her to talk. Lacey wanted to lay on her mom’s chest and beg for her to stay, not to leave her here like this. But she couldn’t. She knew it wouldn’t do any good. No one was listening. Not even God. But how would she take care of her dad and her sister? What were they all going to do without her mom?

Her mom’s eyes blinked back open and she smiled thinly. “Enjoy your life, baby girl. You can do anything…” Her eyes closed, and she didn’t move.

Lacey watched her face, frozen until she was shaken from her trance by the beeping of the machines in the room. Why were they so loud?

“Code Blue, room 133. Code blue.”

Before she knew it, the room was full of people and she was pulled against the wall by her dad, who held her in his strong arms as the alarm was silenced and the wires were removed.

“Don’t do that!” she screamed at them, fighting to break free of her dad’s hold. “She’s just sleeping! Don’t turn that off! Help her! She needs medicine!”

“Lacey, she’s gone,” her dad repeated over and over, his mouth touching her hair. “She’s not in pain anymore, honey. She’s gone.” She kicked and screamed. She had just told her Happy Birthday. They were wrong. She wasn’t gone.

“Mommy!”

Lacey traced the outline of her mom’s face on the picture on her nightstand, wishing for the millionth time that she was here to see her as a grown up. So many times, she wished she could pick up the phone and ask her for advice, but she’d been unable to do that for fourteen years today. Lacey wondered, as she always did, if her mom could ‘see’ her, if she knew who she was as an adult. She hoped that she did, and she often talked to her like she could, because to believe she was just
gone
was something she couldn’t fathom. It had gotten easier over the years, but never better. The hole that her mom left by dying was something that could never be filled by anyone. Not her ‘barely functional’ dad, her well-meaning sister, her grandparents, aunts, no one.

When she had walked across the stage with her doctorate in Veterinary Medicine, she pretended her mom was in the audience, dabbing her eyes. When she started her first day at Kindness Animal Hospital, she wished that she could call her mom and tell her how nervous she was. But she had settled with talking to Aubrey, her little sister. Aubrey was twenty-two to Lacey’s twenty-six, and had just graduated from college with her teaching degree. She moved in with her boyfriend Jacob and was looking forward to the next part of her life. She constantly harassed Lacey about finding someone to spend her life with.

Lacey wished it was that easy for her. She had her share of boyfriends over the years, but she never wanted anything very serious. She had goals, and none of them included being tied down to a serious boyfriend or marriage. Seeing what her dad went through after her mom died, and still to this day, showed her that sometimes love hurts more than it helps. She could say she’d never been in love before, and that was on purpose.

Her best friend Samantha, who had turned country superstar over the last few years, had just had her baby girl recently after a whirlwind romance with her bodyguard, Ellis Warner. Lacey knew they were meant to be, but even their relationship hadn’t been without some major drama. She just couldn’t put herself through that kind of emotional trauma. She was content with just focusing on her new career. She had always loved animals; it was something that she and her mom had shared. Growing up on the outskirts of Nashville, her parents had a lot of property and her mom had taken in just about every stray animal that needed a home. She and Lacey would feed, bathe, and love all of them, and Lacey knew from a very young age what she wanted to do when she grew up.

Now her dream was a reality. She had worked her butt off to graduate top of her class, and had gotten the job she had wanted for years, at the top veterinary practice in Nashville. She had only been there a few weeks now, but it already felt like home.

Her phone rang and she jumped, the picture frame clattering face down on the nightstand. Seeing that it was her sister, she accepted the call, straightening the frame.

“Hey, Aub,” Lacey said.

“Lace,” Aubrey said back, and neither sister had to say a word. They both knew what they were feeling. Even though Aubrey had been only eight and had been sheltered from a lot of what had happened, she missed their mother with every fiber of her being as well. “Happy Birthday. Same time, same place?”

A tear trickled down Lacey’s cheek. Today, like every anniversary over the last fourteen years, Lacey would visit the Cumberland River, where her mother’s ashes had been set free. She would listen to the breeze rustle the trees, the water lap the shore, and the wildlife moving on as if nothing had ever happened. Aubrey sometimes joined and other times didn’t, but Lacey never missed. Not once.

“I’ll be there,” Lacey answered softly. “Right after work.”

She finished the call as quickly as she could and finished getting ready, trying but failing to keep the sadness off of her features. Looking in the bathroom mirror, she saw her cerulean eyes sparkling; her mom’s eyes. They were framed by dark eyelashes and long, dark hair. She ran lip gloss, powder, and mascara over her face and slipped into her scrubs with the dogs on them. Giving herself one more glance, she sighed. Today was going to be a long day, but she was going to spend it doing what she loved, and she knew that her mom would be happy about that.

“Dr. Russell, we’ve got an emergency on the way in that Dr. Jenkins would like you to assist on.” Lacey looked up from her chart at the veterinarian assistant, Chloe.

“What kind of emergency?” Her heart fell to her stomach as she thought of what it could be. She hated emergencies.

“Dr. Jenkins didn’t say. He just said to come get you and have you meet him in Room 1.”

Lacey shuffled her papers back together and followed Chloe down the hall to the room. She glanced towards the front door, wondering what she was going to see.

“Dr. Jenkins? Chloe said you needed me?”

He looked up and smiled at her. Dr. Jenkins was the lead veterinarian here, and had been practicing medicine longer than she had been alive. He reminded her of a kind, old grandpa, but she learned right away that he was sharp as a tack and she could learn a lot from him. She was lucky he had taken to her and she spent any time she could around him.

“Yes. I have a Rottweiler coming in that was hit by a car. He’s a regular patient and is three years old. Mr. Tucker called in and said that he has a compound fracture of his leg, so we’re going to have to prep for surgery.”

“What’s his name?”

“Max. He’s an easy going fella, though we want to be sure that he stays that way, since he’s in pain. He should be here any second.”

As soon as he said that, Lacey heard commotion from the waiting room and the door swung open to the exam room. A man, whom she presumed was his owner, carried the massive dog in his arms. She jumped into action, assessing Max as he whimpered. His femur on his front right leg was splinted, she assumed by the man who had brought him in. She muzzled Max, just a precaution, as Dr. Jenkins moved around the dog. Lacey knew he was checking him for shock, as that was something serious they saw often with compound fractures resulting from car accidents. They were also going to have to worry about infection, after they got the bone put back together.

Dr. Jenkins gave Max a shot, and the dog’s body relaxed as the pain subsided. It was then that Lacey was able to step back and take a deep breath. Her adrenaline was high, as it always was when she saw an animal hurt or in pain. She was glad to see that it wasn’t as bad as it could’ve been, though it was still serious.

“Is he going to be okay?” Mr. Tucker spoke up. She could hear the anguish in his voice, and she realized in the flurry of stabilizing Max, she had forgotten about him even being in there.

Finally looking at him, she had to fight to keep her mouth from dropping open at the sight of him. Her eyes took in the work boots, the body that jeans and a tee shirt couldn’t hide, and felt a blush creeping up her cheeks. His tanned, toned arms flexed as he wrung his hands, his chiseled face serious. When her gaze reached his eyes, she thought at first that she gasped out loud, but thankfully she didn’t. His eyes were light blue, his hair a sandy, dark blonde. It looked tousled, like he had been running his hands through it.

He was probably somewhere around her age, obviously did something right with a body like that, yet hadn’t even glanced at her. That was rather refreshing, to see a guy like him that probably had women falling at his feet so worried over his animal.

“Brantley, Max was lucky. It seems that he is uninjured except for his leg, and he hasn’t lost too much blood thanks to your quick action. I’m going to have to do surgery to repair his leg, then monitor him for a few days for signs of infection. Can you tell me what happened?”

Brantley
. That was his name. Brantley Tucker. Even his name was sexy. And that was nothing she should be thinking right now. He was here for them to help Max, not have her drool over him. She struggled to keep focused on the words Dr. Jenkins was saying as her mind went off on a tangent.

Brantley’s eyes flicked to her momentarily, then back to Dr. Jenkins. He noticed as well and gestured towards her.

“Where are my manners? I’m sorry. Brantley Tucker, meet Dr. Lacey Russell. She will also be part of Max’s care.”

Lacey lifted her eyes to meet his, forcing a smile on her face. “Sorry to meet you under these circumstances.”

Brantley nodded, his face grim. “It’s Brant. Thank you for helping take care of Max. He means a lot to me.” He cleared his throat, and she knew he was fighting emotion. For some reason, that made her stomach flip, and she fought against her own rising emotion.

He turned back to Dr. Jenkins. “We were at home, and Max wanted to go out. He never needs a leash, he’s the best dog I’ve ever had and just stays right in the yard. He was just kind of walking around, enjoying the sunshine. I walked away for just a minute to go inside and grab a drink when I heard the screeching tires. When I ran outside, I saw him lying in the middle of the road, not moving.”

“Did the driver stop?”

Brant shook his head. “I never saw it. Whoever did this just drove away and left him there to die.”

Lacey bit her lip, anger surging through her veins. Who would do such a thing to a helpless animal?

“Did you call the police?”

Brant shook his head. “No. I just picked him up and rushed him here. I-I wasn’t thinking. I just wanted him to be okay.”

Dr. Jenkins smiled, placing his hand on Brant’s arm. Lacey just watched, like an outsider looking in. She had never felt so tongue-tied in all her life. “He’s going to be okay. You did the right thing, getting him here right away. We’re going to take him into surgery. Do you want to wait in the waiting room, or do you want me to call you once he’s out?”

Brant looked down at a sleeping Max. He ran his hand over his big head, and Lacey had to look away to keep the tears at bay. What was
wrong
with her? What was it about watching him with this dog that made her such a hormonal mess?