The Other Side Of The Door

2. Promotion

After two weeks of Lucy walking Kojo every morning, Tim insisted that he would be the one to take the dog out to allow her to sleep in, so he woke up early and went to his dog's bed in the living room to collect Kojo, but the bed was empty. He looked around the house, but there no sign of his dog. Just when he was about to check the yard, he realized there was one room he had yet to search. With a hand over his eyes to be respectful, he struggled to open Lucy's bedroom door. Through the small sliver between two of his fingers, he saw Kojo at the foot of Lucy's bed. "Come on, boy," he whispered to get is dog to leave, but he seemed to be far too comfortable resting with Lucy to have any interest in leaving. "Seriously? I'll give you a treat?" That did not inspire any movement. He dropped his hand away from his face in his frustration then paused, because she stirred, and he immediately felt guilty for going into her room and invading her privacy. She seemed to be sleeping deeply how she was laying on her back with an arm tucked behind her head. There was a serenity on her face he hardly ever saw when she was awake that drew him in to take a step towards her to get a closer look at her. Instinctually, Tim's eyes scanned what he could see of her body, which was not much due to the duvet folded over at her hips, but he stopped looking anywhere else when he took in the sight of her tank top, and based on how pronounced her nipples were through the thin material, she was most certainly not wearing a bra. Police uniforms left parts of her frame to the imagination, but the outfits she wore around the house did not, and he caught himself checking her out far too often for a man who was only supposed to treat her as a friend and roommate. He backed out of her room to get some space and tried to gesture for Kojo to obey him from the corridor.

Lucy opened her eyes and saw Tim waving his arms with a deep scowl on his face, and she was so confused that she scrubbed at her face as she asked, "What are you doing?"

"Trying to get Kojo out of your room. Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you."

"It's okay," she replied then yawned. "He was scratching at my door last night, so I let him in."

"He knows better than to try to sleep in a human bed. I thought I trained him better than that."

She sat up and Kojo trotted over into her lap. As she scratched behind his ears, she said, "I don't mind. I can't get enough puppy snuggles."

"You spoil him."

"Can you blame me? He's the best dog ever."

"He won't be if he has an accident in your bed. I've been trying to get him out of your room, but he's not listening."

"I thought you trained him to listen to you."

"Apparently, my orders aren't obeyed when you're around." To be fair, he broke plenty of his own personal rules for Lucy, so he could not exactly blame his dog for disobeying commands in favor of being nestled against her chest.

"Kojo," she cooed, "be a good boy and go to Tim. Go on, baby. Time for your walk."

He watched with a pout as the dog scampered off of her bed and into the hallway. She was flashing one of her brightest most victorious smiles, which changed Tim's mood almost immediately, because how could he be upset when Lucy was so happy?

"Are you sure you don't want me to take him? I don't mind," she volunteered again then stretched her arms over her head as she was truly starting to wake up.

He scolded himself for checking out how her tank top rode up on her midriff. He mentally cursed himself for constantly ogling her instead of just looking at her like a normal person.

"Tim? You can take care of breakfast, and I can take Kojo," she rephrased her words, since he had yet to respond.

"No, I got this, but don't worry about breakfast."