Like Cats and Dogs by Kate McMurray (interesting novels in english .TXT) 📕

Caleb laughed. “Don’t we?”

He couldn’t read her facial expression, but she managed to twist it into a smile. “Let’s go.”

He trailed her back into the main room, where the party was still in full swing without them. The blond woman who worked as the event organizer glared at Caleb, which seemed about right. Evan bent his head to talk to Lauren out of Caleb’s earshot.

He should probably just leave the party. Bow out before he gave anything away about what had just happened between him and Lauren in a closet. He did want to get to the bottom of whether or not Lauren was offended and dodging him or if she really didn’t care what he said. Maybe she actually liked it when he criticized her, which was kind of fucked up. Then again, he’d kind of started it with the whole fighting-with-you-turns-me-on thing.

He could wait for Lauren and try to talk her upstairs or back to his place, but that felt an awful lot like something a boyfriend would do.

He sought her out in the crowd. Now she was talking to someone Caleb didn’t know, laughing as if she’d just heard the funniest joke, and he knew she would be just fine here.

He turned to leave. On the way out, he paused near the woman handling adoption paperwork, who he thought might be named Yvette or Monique or something French. He said, “I’m Caleb Fitch. I’m one of the vets from next door.”

The woman smiled. “I know.” She pointed her pen at his T-shirt.

“Right. I just wanted…to let Lauren know I had to leave, but I think this is a great event. I hope it ends up being as successful as it looks.”

“We’ve found forever homes for four cats so far.”

“That’s great! Just, um, tell Lauren I had to go. I’ll see her soon. Okay?”

The woman gave him an odd look, but she said, “Okay. Have a good night. Dr. Fitch.”

Chapter 14

“I’m happy to report,” Paige said the next afternoon, “since it may have gotten lost in the alcoholic haze at the end of the party, that six cats were adopted. Trey from Pet Kind is bringing over five new cats this afternoon.”

The Cat Café staff was sitting in the cat room for a staff meeting-slash-postmortem on the event. They’d raised nearly $1,000 for shelters as well. Brian Randolph had made quite a significant contribution, which Lauren found curious.

Lauren nodded. “We did a great job, team. That was our best adoption event yet.”

“It was the alcohol,” said Monique.

“That’s cynical,” said Paige. “I mean, free drinks obviously got some people in the door, but it didn’t open their wallets or convince them to take a furry friend home.”

“Do we know anything about the new cats?” Lauren asked.

“Trey emailed me some stuff,” said Paige. “If I remember correctly, three are girls, two are boys. All are adults, but I don’t think any of them are older than four.”

“Sounds good. All rescues?” asked Lauren.

“Yeah. Trey always picks good cats for us.”

Lauren tried to picture this Trey. Paige was much better at maintaining relationships with Brooklyn shelters and rescue organizations. Trey was a familiar name, but Lauren couldn’t remember what he looked like. Tall, skinny, bearded maybe. Probably. That described half the men in Brooklyn.

“Does anyone else get sad when the cats leave?” asked Victor. “I miss Callie. It won’t be the same around here.”

“I do miss the cats,” said Lauren. “But they’ve all gone to good forever homes. That’s the goal here. We can be sad that six cats have left, but also happy they will be well cared for.”

“Anyway,” Paige said. “Huge success. People are already asking about the next one. I’ve got it penciled in for August. Maybe we can do some kind of summer theme.”

“Great. If that’s all, I’m calling the staff meeting. Get back to work, everyone.” Lauren stood. She was pleased with the adoption event results, but she was feeling a little off her game.

She should really stop telling herself that Caleb wasn’t the issue. Because he was on her mind and had been all day. Because they had once again argued, this time with plenty of witnesses, and then they’d had mind-blowing sex in a closet. Lauren wasn’t even mad about the fight—she suspected he’d picked it precisely so they would have sex somewhere nearby. That didn’t bother her. What bothered her was that Caleb could make her feel that amazing and then just…bail. Because not ten minutes after they’d reemerged from the back, he was gone. All he’d left was an incoherent message from Monique that became “he said to say hi” in the game of telephone her staff played.

Why would he just leave?

Well, probably because they weren’t actually dating and he didn’t actually owe her anything.

“Boss? Hello? Earth to Lauren.”

Lauren looked up. Paige was looking at her expectantly.

“Sorry, I spaced out. Guess I didn’t sleep enough last night.”

“Oh, really? Did someone at the party catch your interest?”

“Not because of sexy reasons. Did you ask me a question?”

“Yeah, I just… Well, I was talking to Lindsay last night, and she brought up again that if we have that kitchen on premises that is just a big empty space right now, we really should use it. I was wondering if we could revisit the plan to hire a pastry chef.”

“Yes, I want to. Let me put some numbers together and have a talk with Diane. Who…wow. How is it that lately, I just have to say a person’s name aloud, and they appear?”

“Unknown superpower?”

Diane breezed over. “Hello, my girls. I heard the adoption event last night was a smashing success. Sorry I didn’t get to talk to you much. I fell into conversation with a fellow who wants to run for city council. I figured I’d offer him some encouraging words.”

Lauren laughed. “Well, we found six cats new homes.”

“That’s great news. The party was a delight. You girls do good work. And Victor does, too.” Diane fluttered