# Chapter 28: The Dog Who Taught Her to Believe Again
Hello, fellow readers and listeners! Welcome back to another chapter review of *Searching For Someday* free digital audiobook. I’m your narrator, and today we’re stepping onto a chilly front porch under moonlight, where a dog on wheels, a guarded woman, and a lawyer who thinks he’s seen it all collide in one quietly explosive scene. This chapter may not take us across oceans or into danger, but it does something far more powerful: it cracks open Kate’s heart and lets Slade see the fierce, wounded, beautiful truth inside her.
We begin with Kate rising to her feet and giving Slade a hard look. She tells him plainly: this is Robert, and she needs to take him out. The bathroom is down the hall to his right. Simple enough—except Slade is still processing the sight before him. Robert glides toward the yard on a cart, his wheels spinning madly where his back legs should be. Slade has never even known such a thing existed, let alone seen a dog use one. The image is startling, humbling, and strangely heroic.
Slade quickly uses the bathroom, then steps out onto the front porch to join them. Robert finishes his business under the tree, then breaks into a canter, running round and round the trunk. Kate’s laughter echoes in the chilly wind. It’s a sound that cuts through the cold—bright, real, and unguarded. For a moment, the world is just a woman, a dog, and the moon.
Then Slade asks the question that changes the temperature. “What happened to him?”
Kate’s shoulders stiffen. She tells him she found Robert half dead on the side of the road. He’d been thrown from a car. The vet thinks he managed to crawl out of a ditch and was then hit a second time, crushing his back legs. The story is brutal, the kind of cruelty that makes you angry at the world. But Kate delivers it with a controlled steadiness that hints at deeper scars.
Slade asks, “And you saved him?”
She lifts her face, moonlight soaking her skin until it gleams like pearl. Her pale pink lips purse in the timeless symbol of a kiss. But her answer isn’t romantic. It’s raw. “No. We saved each other. I just helped get him the medical care he needed to stay alive. He deserved someone to believe in him.”
Slade studies the stubborn tilt of her chin and wonders about her secrets. Why would a vibrant, beautiful woman like Kate need saving? Something is locked up inside her, and the lawyer in him screams with the challenge of delving deeper. He pushes: Why? Robert wasn’t her dog in the first place. Didn’t the vet suggest putting him to sleep because of the extensive injuries?
That’s when the barriers burn away. Red-hot anger flares to life. Kate leans in, her white-gold hair a hellish halo around her head. She fires back: Putting Robert down would have been the easy road, right? No medical bills, no responsibility, no mess. Maybe people deserve more than what’s easy. Maybe there are too many imperfect people out there—people with disabilities and problems no normal, sane individual would ever want to take on. Her eyes glitter, her pale skin flushes, and her voice trembles with the depth of her emotion.
Then she says the words that land like a blade and a balm all at once. Maybe they’d be worth a chance. When she looked into Robert’s eyes, she saw more than a dog with a disability. She saw a beautiful spirit who needed someone to give him a chance—someone who’d been heartbroken so many times before but still had enough courage to take a shot on her. He was willing to try and trust her. She blinks as if fighting tears. She didn’t care about the money, the time, or the sacrifice, because what she got back was so much more. You don’t need to be thrown away if you’re partially broken. Robert made her believe again. And she doesn’t care how stupid Slade thinks she sounds.
Slade locks down every impulse burning through his body to yank her into his arms and kiss her—to feel the burn of her skin, the softness of her mouth, the muskiness of her scent. He is humbled by the gift she’s given without even knowing it. Another layer shifts, settles, and reveals a piece of her inner core. This woman fights for what—and who—she believes in. She is a fierce mama bear who protects her dog and believes in the goodness of a soul. Her magnificence floors him. But she needs time to process what she’s admitted. And he needs time to regain his balance.
So instead of kissing her, he speaks softly. “I don’t think you’re stupid. I think Robert’s gift in this life was meeting you. I think he’s a lucky son of a bitch.”
Surprise flickers in her eyes. She pauses, then says, “He is technically a son of a bitch, isn’t he?”
“Funny.” Slade tugs at a stray lock of her hair. “Can I have that bottle of water now, or are you kicking me to the curb?”
Her lip quirks. “One bottle.”
The wheels whir as Robert follows them inside. Kate removes the cart, freshens his water, and turns to ask, “Bacon or peanut butter?”
Robert barks twice.
“Ah, a change-up tonight. Good choice.” She plucks a peanut butter dog treat from the bag and gives it to him. With a gentle motion, as if he were taking it from a baby, Robert closes his teeth around the treat and drags his legs behind him to settle on the woven mat.
Slade asks, “Did he really understand you?”
“Sure. I ask him questions all the time. We have a code; one or two barks will be his choice.” She opens the refrigerator and hands Slade a chilled bottle of Poland Spring. “It’s a long drive back.”
And with that, the chapter leaves us suspended between warmth and distance—Slade holding a water bottle, Kate standing in her kitchen with her broken-but-beloved dog, and the night pressing in with everything still unsaid.
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## Reader’s Impressions & Star Rating
This chapter hit me straight in the chest. It’s intimate, quiet, and yet so revealing. Kate’s speech about Robert is one of those moments that defines a character—her compassion, her stubborn hope, her refusal to let anyone be discarded just because they’re imperfect. And Slade’s reaction is equally important. He doesn’t try to fix her or mock her. He listens. He is humbled. He sees her. The chemistry between them is electric, but it’s the emotional intimacy that truly shines here. The humor—Robert being a “son of a bitch,” the bacon-or-peanut-butter code—keeps the chapter from becoming too heavy. It’s a beautiful balance of pain, tenderness, and hope.
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Rating: 4.9 / 5 Stars
## Next Chapter Prediction
The line “It’s a long drive back” feels like a gentle goodbye, but I don’t think Slade is ready to leave Kate’s orbit—not after what he just witnessed. I predict the next chapter will show Slade wrestling with everything he learned: Kate’s secret wounds, her fierce loyalty, and his own growing feelings. He may try to retreat into logic and law, but Robert and Kate have already cracked his armor. I also suspect we’ll learn more about what—or who—broke Kate in the past, and why she understands being “partially broken” so deeply. There may be a moment where Slade chooses to stay, or returns sooner than expected, proving that he, too, is willing to take a chance on something imperfect and real.
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