Page 36 of Doctor Holliday

“I’m a little bit of everything right now,” she admitted.

“Everything good?”

“Everything good,” she repeated with a nod.

Keaton pushed himself up just enough to reach for the top sheet to cover them. He stopped when he realized she was still wearing the boots.

“Take off your shoes and stay a little while?” He looked up at her.

“Please.” She laughed as he slid down her body and knelt at her feet. “I love your body.”

Keaton locked eyes with her as he lifted her leg and unzipped the first boot.

“That all you want from me?” he teased as he gave a gentle tug and pulled the black leather from her foot. He dropped the boot and cupped her calf in his hand. Lucy stared at him for a few moments and finally shook her head.

“I really don’t think it is,” she whispered. “This feels like it could be more.”

Keaton removed her other boot, grabbed the top sheet, and then lay back beside her again.

“Should I not have said that?” she finally asked him.

“It does feel like more.” His voice was gruff. He rolled onto his back and urged her to curl into him. Lucy rested her head on his chest. “And I’m a grown man, lying here beside you, afraid to say the wrong thing and jinx whatever this good thing is.”

“Can I ask you something?”

Keaton covered her hand with his on his chest. “You can ask me anything.”

“What happened between you and Ruby’s mom?”

“Money.”

Lucy nodded against his chest, as if that said it all.

“We started fighting about bills. And money. It bled into her job being more important than mine. She claimed she was supporting us, and I was bleeding the piggy bank dry.” Heshrugged and draped his arm around her waist. “Money was tight sometimes, but not all the time.”

“Once you start picking about that kind of thing, it grows, though,” she said quietly.

“It does. And it did.” He nodded. “It got so bad, we fought about what to fix for dinner or who left the TV remote in the kitchen. It was ugly enough that it was bad for Ruby.”

“I get it.”

“What about you?” He lifted his head and brushed a kiss over her hair.

“Mmm.” She sighed. “Married a guy I was in medical school with. We had fun for a while, ya know? But, once we were married, and especially after I got pregnant, he didn’t want me to finish school. Didn’t want me to work. He even made comments that he was the better student, that he would be the better doctor. So it made sense that I should stay home with Callie.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah. We weren’t married long. I love my daughter fiercely, but I wasn’t about to give up my school and career plans.”

“You shouldn’t have to. You shouldn’t have to change who you are for anyone.”

“And I won’t.”

He heard the subtle, but firm warning in her tone. While Keaton had no intention of asking Lucy to change anything for him, he did wonder how far she would go with him, how deep she mightfall. Or if he was walking into a relationship where they lived separate lives and occasionally spent time together.

After the divorce, after Alyssa was gone, he never thought of marriage again. His main focus had been Ruby, and he would still do anything for his daughter. But Ruby had proved to be resilient, and splitting up with Alyssa had been the right thing for their daughter. Alyssa was happy; they were amicable enough that he was glad she was happy. Ruby was thriving. So maybe now it was okay for Keaton to think about his future and what his happiness looked like.

But did he want marriage? Did he want someone to pal around with for movies and dinners out? Or did he want someone to come home to at night, to share his days with, to hold while he slept?