by Fiona Lowe
Relief swept across his face. “Thanks, sweetheart. I appreciate it. Are you working tonight?”
“No, Wednesday’s my night off.”
“How about I brush Benji for you and you go talk to your mom. Then, after supper, you and I take a ride and brush up on your roping.”
She grinned. “It’s a date.”
Leaving her dad at the barn, she found her mom on her knees weeding the vegetable patch. “Hi, Mom.”
Bonnie turned, but her welcoming smile immediately twisted to a grimace and she pressed her hand to her stomach.
She extended her hand to help her mom to her feet. “You okay?”
Bonnie ignored her hand and stayed put. “It’s just a twinge. I turned too fast.”
She thought about what her dad had said and kneeled down next to her and started pulling weeds. “Do you get twinges often?”
Bonnie didn’t reply.
She suddenly got a flash of memory from Saturday—her mom standing with her hand pressed to her right side at the branding lunch. “Mom? Do you?”
“Okay, Miss Pushy, I do get them now and then. Usually when I twist or stand up too fast.”
“In different places or always in that same spot?”
“Pretty much around here.” She kept her hand pressed near her hip. “I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about.”
Katrina would have thought so, too, except for her dad’s comments and the fact that now she thought about it, her mom had seemed less energetic for a few weeks. Come to think of it, her face looked thinner. “Have you been feeling nauseous at all?”
Her mother shrugged. “Little bit.”
“Feeling tired?”
Bonnie sighed. “It’s horrible. I feel like I’m wading through mud. I used to have so much energy. It’s probably the change and there’s nothing I can do. I’d feel uncomfortable going to see Doctor Stanton.”
“Why?”
“I’m a fifty-five-year-old woman and he’s a young man. If it’s the change, then . . .” Her voice trailed off.
She sat back on her heels, thinking how she could reassure her. “Mom, it might not be menopause, but either way, it’s a good idea to have some tests done. There are a number of things it could be, including a grumbling appendix or irritable bowel syndrome. I really think you should go see Josh and get his opinion.”
“You think he’s a good doctor?”
Josh Stanton might drive her crazy in many different ways, but there was no arguing that the man was a good clinician. “Mom, after Saturday, everyone in the district knows he’s on top of his game.”
“That’s very true. Perhaps I should go see him.”
“Wow, you must be feeling bad,” Katrina said with a grin, bumping her mom’s shoulders with hers.
Bonnie laughed. “I guess I’ll make an appointment.”
“Good idea. Sooner rather than later. Either way, you need a checkup.”
Her mother pressed the trowel into the rich, fragrant soil and gave her a long, penetrating look. “You can’t take the nurse out of you, honey, so why are you trying?”
Because I’ve made such a mess of my life. “Actually, I’m going to volunteer in Ecuador.”
“Good heavens.” Her mother visibly startled. “That’s a very long way from both Philadelphia and Bear Paw.”
And that was the general idea.
—
JOSH stepped out into the chilly morning air because, hell, he’d been up half the night and watching the sunrise seemed to be the only payoff for a crappy night. Plus, it would kill some time until his landlord arrived.
Katrina.
Landlord.
In a fit of frustration, he’d called her half an hour ago when he’d been woken up yet again by one of the many problems with the damn house. It had been eight days since Sam’s accident, and during that time, he’d only seen her at the diner surrounded by townsfolk. Their conversation had been excruciatingly polite and hadn’t ventured beyond how he wanted his coffee and the damn weather. It was the exact same conversation he had with most people in Bear Paw. The weather and their state of health. God, he missed the flirty banter.
You miss real conversation.
I don’t miss being told what to do.
Now he was single, he had a choice. It made no sense to put up with difficult women, and Katrina ticked every single box on the “difficult” spectrum.
You’d have sex with her in a heartbeat.
I was the one who said no. He gave his subconscious the metaphorical bird.
And that was the dumbest thing you’ve done since you got here.
Not wanting thoughts of Ashley or his father to intrude on his day, he focused on the sun instead, which was just peeking over the horizon and spreading its orange and gold fingers across the sky. The morning star was still visible—it’s white light bright and refusing to be dimmed by wisps of cloud.
He automatically turned toward the mountains—their craggy grandeur always made him look and tempted him to start walking. He really must arrange to get to Glacier National Park now summer was only a week away. What was the point of enduring Bear Paw if he didn’t use the one advantage this godforsaken place had over Chicago?
As he stood gazing at the snowcapped peaks, it took him a moment to realize there was no wind. God, he’d forgotten what it was like to stand outside without needing to lean forward, and he found himself grinning.
You used to get excited about the opening of a new restaurant and now you’re excited about lack of wind?
Irritated by the thought he might be starting to obsess about the weather like every other damn person in this town, he turned at the rumbling sound of Katrina’s pickup, happy to channel all his disgruntled energy onto the person inside.
The old rust bucket pulled to a stop, and to add insult to injury, she jumped out all perky and fresh after a full night’s sleep. She grabbed a wire cage out of the truck. “Morning, Josh.”
He dispensed with pleasantries. “There are rodents having a rave party in my roof.”
“I do believe you mentioned that at five thirty-two,” she said, her very kissable mouth twitching at the corners as her foot hit the first porch step. “Alliteration before seven in the morning. Well done.”
“I’ve had hours to think about it,” he said grumpily, resisting the sneaking temptation to smile at her teasing. “Be grateful I didn’t call you at one oh-five, three twenty-seven or four fifty-six. Do you have any idea how loud the scratching and scurrying is?”
“Haven’t had our coffee yet, I see.” She handed off the toolbox to him before walking into the house.
“I need sleep, not coffee.” He followed her inside, feeling hard done by. “It was bad enough being called into the ER for a tourist who’d decided that despite putting up with the pain of an infected toe for one entire week, she couldn’t wait another eight hours to see me at the clinic but had to have it treated at midnight.”
A flash of sympathy crossed her face. “I’m sorry you had a lousy night, Josh, but I didn’t purposefully release rats, raccoons or opossums in your roof just to piss you off.”
He didn’t want to be placated. “So you say.”
In stark contrast to Ashley, who was always impatient with him when he was overtired, Katrina laughed. A full-on, body-shaking laugh. In the face of that, his chagrin started to fade.
She continued to stand in the kitchen and eyed his coffee machine. “Poor Josh. It’s a crappy start to the week. Let’s have coffee first.”
He shook his head. “No way. All I want is for you to commit mass murder.”
“Oh. Okay.” She didn’t move and all her teasing suddenly vanished.
“Come on. Chop-chop. They’re breeding up there by the minute.”
Slowly, she pushed off the counter and headed toward the stairs.
Was he imagining it or was she dragging her feet? She usually did everything at top speed. He followed her, not complaining at all about the fact she wasn’t bounding up the sta
irs but walking them very slowly. It gave him more time to enjoy the view of her sweet behind. “So how come you’re up so early, anyway?”
She took each step one at a time. “You mean apart from being woken up by you? I’ve got a lot going on with work and getting ready to go to Ecuador.”
“Ecuador?” Unexpected disappointment rolled in his gut. “As in South America Ecuador?”
She threw a grin over her shoulder. “There’s more than one?”
“Very funny. Be nice to the guy who got no sleep. Why are you going there?”
“To be useful.”
“Can’t you be useful here?”
But she didn’t reply. She’d cleared the landing and was walking into his bedroom. She stopped in front of the small door that led into the roof space, and putting down the cage, she opened the door and handed him a flashlight and a container. “This is the bait. Put it where you see scats.”
He recoiled. “I’m not crawling in there.”
“Why not?”
“It’s dark, full of cobwebs and God knows what.”
Her green eyes lit up with a dare. “Oh, so you called a girl to do it?”
The memory of her lush and curvaceous body pressed up against him sent his blood pounding. “No, I called a very capable woman.”
“So you’re happy for me to let it slip at the bar that you’re scared of a few rodents? You do realize that the men of this town will never drink beer with you again.”
“They love me now for saving Sam, so they’ll forgive me my weak city ways.” He grinned, enjoying the fact that for once, he was ahead in the game. “Besides, there was a case of bubonic plague in Oregon not that long ago and that’s a bit too close to Montana for my liking.”
“Oh, right, but you’ll let me catch it?”
She definitely didn’t want to go into the roof space, and hell, he didn’t blame her one little bit, but he was having too much fun teasing her to let her know that. “Should you get the plague, I’ll be happy to treat you with antibiotics.”
“So reassuring,” she murmured, looking at the door and chewing on her thumbnail. “Are you sure you’re not feeling at all emasculated by letting me go in there?”
He shook his head. “There are many ways to be a man in the modern world, Katrina. Saving lives is my thing, and that’s pretty heroic.”
“So is going into that roof. What if we flip a coin?”
He laughed at the hope on her face. “There’s no deal to make here, Katrina. You’re my landlord, so face it: You have to go in there. And you know it because you came wearing your glasses.” Glasses that make you look incredibly sexy. Somehow, he stopped himself from reaching up and tucking some stray hair back behind her ear. “By the way, good to see you’re being so OSHA compliant because there’s likely a lot of dust in there.”
Her in-charge demeanor faded and the totally together woman who faced down anything cracked. “But it’s dark, and full of cobwebs and things that go bump in the night.”
Her sudden vulnerability caught him tight, like a lasso, and he had a crazy need to let her off the hook. “So just call someone. Surely there’s a pest control guy in Bear Paw.”
Horror streaked across her cheeks. “I can’t call Ralph. Only townies use pest control. Ranchers bait and trap and I’d never live it down.”
“I swear this town has more crazy rules about who does what than anywhere on the planet.” He took in her woebegone expression and, as much as he hated the idea, knew what he had to do. “What if I come in with you? I have no clue how to set up the cage, but if you do that, I’ll spread the bait.”
Her face filled with gratitude. “You’d really do that?”
“I’m as shocked by it as you are,” he said, wanting to see her smile.
“Thank you. You’re a good guy, Josh.”
“Not that good,” he said, putting on his best Mafia-style voice. “This is a favor I can call in at any time.”
A scurrying noise made them both look down, and a mouse ran between Katrina’s legs. She screamed and jumped onto him, wrapping her arms tightly around his neck and locking her legs around his waist. “Close the door,” she squealed. “Close it now.”
He staggered at the unexpected weight but managed to keep his balance as he kicked the attic door shut against other wandering rodents.
“Where did it go?” Katrina asked anxiously, lurching sideways to look.
Her abrupt movement, in the exact opposite direction from his, sent him tumbling backward onto the bed, bringing her down with him in a tangle of limbs.
Still clinging to him like he was driftwood in a choppy sea, her huge, green eyes stared at him from behind those sexy librarian glasses. “Sorry,” she wailed. “Are you hurt?”
He did a quick mental inventory of pain and drew a blank. “Given our track record, surprisingly, no.” He could still feel her heart beating hard and fast in fear against his chest, and he automatically wrapped his arms around her for reassurance. “What was all that screaming like a girl about?”
She bit her lip. “Sorry. I’m fine with mice in the barn or outside even, but inside they freak me out. There was a field mouse plague when I was a kid, and they were everywhere, including in my bed. Ever since then—” She shivered again and her body rubbed his from chest to thigh.
He groaned as delicious sensations thrummed through him.
She stilled. “What’s wrong? Did I hurt you?”
“Not how you think,” he managed to grind out as he went hard, his erection pressing determinedly against her thigh.
She must have felt him because her eyes darkened to the color of moss.
Weeks of sexual frustration peaked, overruling every logical argument about Katrina that he’d been telling himself.
“Don’t look at me like that unless you want me to kiss you, and believe me, I desperately want to kiss you. And when I say kissing, I mean I want to start with kissing and finish with sex. That’s sex without questions, no changing of minds halfway through, no talking unless it’s ‘oh yes, that’ or ‘do this’ or ‘don’t stop.’ Just two adults giving in to this insane attraction that’s sparked between us from the start and finally doing what we should have done days ago.”
He heaved in a breath. “Or not. The choice is yours and I’ll respect it whatever it is, but decide now and decide fast, because right now you’re killing me.”
Chapter 11
It took Katrina less than a minute to decide. She was lying sprawled on top of Josh with the evidence that he wanted her badly pressing into her thigh. God knows, she wanted him, and she was utterly exhausted by fighting it.
She’d never had sex without the relationship part, but as she wasn’t looking for a relationship and neither was Josh and she was leaving for Ecuador, it guaranteed there’d be no postsex awkwardness.
And the mouse had disappeared from the bedroom.
And he’d offered to go into the roof space with her, which was the sexiest thing he’d ever done.
She wound a finger through one of his curls. “Do you have condoms?”
He grinned at her and the next minute she was on her back and gray eyes full of desire stared down at her. “You’re not the only person who’s OSHA compliant, you know.” He reached for her glasses.
She put her hand on his. “I’m totally blind without them.”
“You don’t need to see me,” he said, his voice hoarse with need. “You only need to feel me.”
Her entire body liquefied and she pulled his head down to hers and kissed him. His now familiar mouth fitted against hers perfectly and she unexpectedly sighed. Crazy relief-filled sensations streamed through her, devoid of all urgency. She’d thought that with the weeks of sexual tension that had vibrated between them, she’d want him hard and fast, but right now, she didn’t want to rush a thing. She could lie here for hours luxuriating in the touch of his mouth romancing hers, and just let him kiss her.
She continued exploring his head, running her hands through his
hair and loving the soft way his curls captured her fingers. His peppermint and pine scent circled her, and she breathed in deeply, imagining they were outside in a forest of trees. His lips slipped from her mouth and she tilted her head back to give him plenty of access to her throat.
He pressed a series of featherlight kisses along her jaw and down her neck, making her feel as if she were floating on air. Her hands fell away from his head as if they didn’t have the strength to hold themselves up, and it was like being in a pleasure cocoon and she never wanted it to stop. His hair tickled her face as he reached the hollow at the base of her throat. He kissed it gently, reverently, and then he swept it with the tip of his tongue.
Every cell in her body snapped to attention with an electrifying whoosh of need. It vanquished every particle of blissful lethargy and she bucked underneath him.
He laughed and traced an X with his fingertip. “Erogenous zone number one.”
“I think it’s time I found some on you.” She reached for the buttons on his shirt, her fingers trembling as she tried to unbutton them in the small space between their bodies.
He sat up and whipped the shirt off over his head, and she immediately pressed her palms to his chest, loving the solid feel of him against her skin. “Let me see . . .” She walked her fingers from his diaphragm up his sternum and across to his nipples. She flicked them with her thumbs.
He jerked and his eyes darkened to charcoal gray.
She laughed. “Score. Now where else . . .” She skimmed his skin with the tips of her fingers, but when she reached his navel, he gently circled both her wrists and pinned them over her head with his left hand.
“One erogenous zone at a time, Katrina.” He pushed up her T-shirt and grinned at her bra. “Now, there’s a nice surprise.”
“What did you expect?”
He traced the line of lace that sat on the swell of her breast. “With the whole tool belt and work boot thing you have going on, which by the way I find incredibly sexy, I figured it would be plain.”
Brent had always insisted she wear lacy bras and thongs. In fact, many of his gifts had been just that, to the point she no longer owned any plain underwear. Most of her had wanted to throw it all away, but the practical country girl in her had settled on replacing each item as it wore out.