NFH 02 Perfection (12 page)

"Sorry's not good enough, Zoe. You
signed a rental agreement that clearly stated no pets, but you went
and got one anyway."

"I know," she said
unhappily.

"Good. Then you can bring it right
back to where you found it," he told her.

"I-I can't do that," she said quietly,
shooting another look over her shoulder at the dog.

"Where did you get him?" he demanded,
already reaching for the dog. He pulled the good size puppy into
his arms, ignoring the tail wagging against his leg and the little
puppy licks he was giving his neck.

"The shelter," she answered, twisting
her hands together.

"Good," he said, heading for the
door.

"Where are you going?" she demanded,
following him out into the short hallway.

"The shelter. Where else?" he asked,
heading down the stairs. Anyone else and he would have told her to
pack her shit up and move out, but this was his little tenant and
he didn't like the idea of tossing her out. So the only choice of
course was getting rid of the puppy, who was currently tickling his
neck with its whiskers.

He heard her gasp behind him. "You
can't do that!" she cried, running around him and plastering
herself against the door.

"Watch me," he said, heading for the
backdoor only to find his path once again cut off.

"No, I'm serious," she said, holding
up her hands to stop him. "As much as I would like a dog I wasn't
going to keep him, but I couldn't leave him there."

"Why the hell not?" he asked, getting
mildly annoyed now with the bullshit. "You're not keeping this dog,
Zoe, so get the hell out of my way."

"No!"

"Zoe," he bit out between clenched.
"Move your little ass right now or I swear to god I will put you
over my knee."

"Look, I knew I couldn't keep him, but
I also couldn't leave him there. They were going to put him down
today. I was just trying to buy some time so I could find him a
nice home," she said in a rush, reaching out to pet the dog almost
as if she couldn't stop herself.

"Aw, hell," he said, dropping his head
back and closing his eyes. She just had to go and say
that.

"I knew you wouldn't be happy and I
did leave. I really did, but halfway to my car he started crying
and barking and I just couldn't leave him there," she said,
sounding close to tears. "I'm really sorry, Trevor."

There was no way in hell he was
opening his eyes and taking the chance of seeing her cry. Crying
from any other woman usually just irritated the shit out of him,
but for some bizarre reason the thought of Zoe crying damn near
unmanned him. He knew it probably had something to do with the fact
that Zoe was the only woman he'd ever been flat out rude to and
that in the grand scheme of things her feelings shouldn't matter,
but they did.

With a resigned sigh he put the dog
down and stood up, happy to see that Zoe wasn't crying. She looked
a little nervous, but he could handle that better than
tears.

"I'll help you find someone to take
the dog," he started, only to have Zoe cut him off with an excited
little squeal and smile that he refused to find adorable. Although
he may have noted that certain assets bounced when she got excited,
but he pushed that observation from his mind and focused on the
problem at hand.

"I'll help you find him a home, but
you're not keeping him, Zoe. If we can't find someone to take him
in a week then he's going back to the shelter," he warned
her.

Zoe wringed her hands
together once more as she looked quickly down at the dog and then
back up at him. She gave him a firm nod. "He's cute. I don't think
we'll have any problems finding a
good
home for him," she said, making
him damn near sigh.

"Whoever wants him can have him, Zoe,"
he said, holding his hand up to stop the argument that he knew was
coming. She wanted the dog to have the perfect home and he just
wanted it out of his. "That's the deal. Take it or leave
it."

She pursed up her lips and arched her
brows in that stubborn expression of hers and he waited for the
argument he knew was coming and wanted to avoid. It was late and he
wanted to crash, but not before she read to him some more and if
she was pissed at him then that might not happen.

Not that he'd admit this to anyone,
especially Zoe since it would give her a hold over him, but he
really looked forward to their nightly ritual. It was so much
better than watching television where he usually just vegged out
until he could barely keep his eyes open. Listening to Zoe read was
relaxing and enjoyable. He found himself hanging on her every word,
ready for more and at the end of the night he usually had to stop
himself from begging her to read just one more chapter and
surprisingly it had very little to do with the book, although he
did enjoy parts of it.

"I think he has to go out again," Zoe
said, walking over to the coffee table and picking up a-

"Why the hell are you putting a hot
pink leash on him?" Trevor demanded, outraged on behalf of the poor
dog.

Zoe frowned up at him as if he were
the crazy one. "It's just a leash. Besides it was the last one the
pound had to give out," she said, shrugging like it was no big
deal.

"You can't put a male dog on a hot
pink leash, woman."

"Why not?"

"Because he's a man," Trevor said,
exasperated. "What's next? A pink sweater?"

She shrugged sheepishly. "I think he
looks cute in pink."

The dog whimpered near the door,
drawing their attention. "Alright, I'm coming," she said, walking
over to the dog and clipping the leash onto a really cheap thin
collar that wouldn't do.

"Do you know if the convenient store
on Washburn sells dog food?" she asked, looking over her shoulder
at him.

"He doesn't have any food?" Trevor
asked, wondering why she took the damn thing when she clearly
didn't know what the hell she was doing.

"I gave him the baggie of food they
sent home, but I don't think that was enough," she said, frowning
as she stumbled over the dog and opened the door.

She really didn't have a clue, he
decided. "You don't want to feed him any of that shit they sell at
convenient stores. I'll look and see what I can find here, but
you're going to have to run out tomorrow and get him some proper
supplies."

"Proper supplies," she repeated with a
look that said she had no idea what the hell she wasn't supposed to
get.

Praying for patience, he gestured for
her to move her ass before the dog took a leak on his floor. "I'll
go with you to the pet store tomorrow, but after that you're on
your own," he said.

"Thank-
eek
!" she let out another adorable
squeak as the dog yanked her to the front door. "Toby!" she cried
and Trevor shook his head in disgust, a sissy name on top of a pink
collar. Poor bastard, he thought as he headed for Zoe's
kitchen.

A quick search through the mostly bare
cabinets had him scowling and the search through her practically
empty refrigerator had him fuming. He knew she hadn't forgotten to
shop or didn't have enough money to buy food. One look at the
insane price tag on the box of twigs some sick bastard had the
nerve to call food let him know that money wasn't the
issue.

She had no meat, no cheese,
condiments, juice, milk or anything with flavor. Instead, one
entire shelf in her refrigerator was stocked with bottles of spring
water and one drawer held a large bag of salad mix and half a
cucumber. The only real food in the fridge was the stuff she used
to make up his lunches and that only took up half a shelf and he
didn't need to look to know that she wasn't eating any of
it.

He shut the door with more force than
necessary and leaned back against it. She was starving herself and
he had absolutely no idea what the hell he should do about it.
After a minute of stressing out about it he decided that it wasn't
his place to do jack shit about it. She was a grown woman with a
level head on her shoulders. If she was hungry she'd eat. Shoving
his opinion on her would only cause problems that he didn't need at
the moment so for now he would let it go.

Chapter 11

"But that one's pretty!" Zoe pointed
out as Trevor simply sighed as he grabbed the pretty pink princess
dog toy out of the carriage and returned it to the
shelf.

"He's a male, Zoe. He needs man toys,"
he stressed, picking up a dull brown rope and tossing it into the
carriage along with a few, in her opinion at least, boring looking
chew toys.

She gestured to the pink princess chew
toy. "Couldn't we just get that and see if he likes-"

"No way in hell," he said, giving her
a quick swat on the ass to get her moving.

"Stop doing that,"
she hissed at him even as she started moving
before he could do it again, and she knew he would. He simply
shrugged as if it was no big deal and it probably wasn't for him,
but it was seriously screwing with her hormones.

It was just another reason for her to
get her butt in gear and do something about it and she would. Right
after she bought that really cute flowery pink bowl set for
Toby.

"Don't even think about
it," Trevor warned before she even got into grabbing distance. He
reached past her and grabbed two large metal dog bowls and placed
them in the carriage with the rest of the stuff that
he
picked out since every
one of her suggestions was met with an exasperated sigh and a few
muttered choice words.

"Fine," she said, making a mental note
to swing back this way after she finished with her other shopping.
The same shopping she was actually pretty nervous about. She'd put
it off as long as possible, but if she wanted to make some changes
in her life and meet a guy and hopefully have sex again before she
was eighty then she'd have to suck it up and do it.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing. Why?" she asked, stepping
past him and that gaze of his that made her feel like he knew what
she was thinking. What she had planned tonight was bad enough. She
didn't need him finding out about it and embarrassing her about
it.

Jumping back into sex by having a one
night stand wasn't exactly something she wanted to share,
especially with Trevor, who would never understand. It wasn't as if
she'd ever done it before or even planned to make it a habit, but
it was something that she needed to do. Not just because she really
missed and needed sex again or that she was sure she would die if
she didn't have any soon, which she was, but because she didn't
think her self-esteem could take the hit if she ended up dating a
guy only to have him run the hell the other way when he saw her
naked for the first time.

Her self esteem wouldn't be able to
handle a rejection of that level. Tonight was the tester. She was
going to find a man that she was relatively attracted to and take a
chance. If he took one look at her naked body and made a run for it
then she'd know that she had some more work to do before she
pursued any relationship. If on the other hand the man wasn't
repulsed and they had sex then she'd feel more confident about
moving forward with her life and her plans.

"Hey," Trevor said, lightly tapping
her on the nose.

"What?" she asked, slightly
startled.

"I asked if you saw the dog treats
anywhere. I think we went past the aisle," he said, craning his
neck to look around.

"They're probably back near the food,"
she said, already pushing the carriage that way. As she moved down
the aisle her eyes landed on a bottle of strawberry scented dog
shampoo.

Trevor muttered something as he
reached past her and grabbed a bottle of unscented green dog
shampoo and Zoe added another item to her ever growing list of
items to pick up later. She didn't know how long she'd have Toby
for, but she planned on making him feel special and loved until he
went to live with his new family.

She knew how it felt not to have a
real home and didn't want that for Toby. For as long as he was with
her she would make damn sure that he felt welcome.

***********

"Can I help you find something?" a
purely feminine voice asked.

He was barely able to draw his
attention away from Zoe's baggy jean covered ass as it wiggled
enticingly as she leaned over to search for the "perfect biscuits
for the little sweetie pie", her words, not his. Instead of telling
her to just grab the cheapest bag she could find the words caught
in his throat when she bent over. Hell, he couldn't even make out
the exact shape of her ass, but that hadn't stopped him from
licking his lips or imagining his hands and mouth exploring her
curves.

Holy shit he needed to get
laid.

"Sir?" that damn voice said again,
sounding almost hesitant this time.

He barely stopped himself from
cringing as it dawned on him that he'd just been caught ogling
Zoe's ass. At least he hadn't been caught by the guys at work, he
reassured himself as he turned his attention to the woman trying to
get his attention and nearly groaned.