by Selena Kitt
Stuart. Goddamnit. Where in the hell was he? That was all she needed, for Stuart to finally show up, drunk, probably high, and make a scene.
“Said he was at the ranch waiting for you?” Kai’s hazel eyes had a twinkle in them she hadn’t noticed before. “I’m pretty sure it was a booty call.”
Jules glared at him, feeling mortified, fighting the feeling.
Stuart was at the ranch? And she’d been waiting here for him all night? She was going to wring his neck when she got home. And then… well, then she’d probably make him sleep it off on her couch, because she wouldn’t want him to drive home in his condition. They could talk in the morning. Whatever Stuart wanted from her—and she knew it likely involved what little money she had left—could wait until then.
“Booty call?” Jules snorted. “The nineties called, they want their outdated slang back.”
Kai’s mouth twitched again but before he could say anything, Aric was nudging her.
“Jules, you’re up.”
She hadn’t heard the D.J. call her name. Barb had insisted she put her name in to sing tonight—to offset some of the less-talented and very drunk karaoke going on. Jules had agreed, but she had been far down on the list and figured Stuart would show up long before she actually had to get on stage.
“Jules, go!” Barb showed up behind her, grabbing her by the shoulders and steering her toward the stage. “Don’t keep them waiting!”
“You’re evil,” Jules hissed under her breath, glaring at Barb over her shoulder as the older woman pushed her toward the stage steps.
“Sing for him,” Barb said, looking thoroughly pleased with herself.
Sing for him? Jules almost laughed out loud. What was this, the middle ages? Should she curtsy and offer to take off his armor, too? Not that the thought of stripping Kai of his, er… armor, was an unappealing metaphor.
But she really didn’t have time for this. Stuart was waiting.
“Don’t be shy.” The D.J. smiled as he handed her the microphone and pointed at the teleprompter. He wasn’t Aric’s regular guy and she didn’t know him. He obviously thought she needed instruction. “The words are all there, and you already know the song, right? You’ll do fine. Just have fun.”
Jules sighed and took the mic, looking out at the crowd. The lights on the stage made it hard to see anyone past the first few rows, which was fine with her. She couldn’t see Barb or Aric—or the sexy, insufferable Kai. So she’d sing the Adele song she’d chosen and then get the hell out of there. After all, she liked singing. She sang to the horses all the time, strange as that sounded.
The music started, a soft, slow plucking guitar, and she frowned, looking at the D.J. and then at the screen, where the first words were displayed. Her stomach dropped when she saw this wasn’t the heartbreaking Adele lament she’d chosen. This was a very sappy, romantic seventies song. She knew it—thank God—mostly because her mother had played it a lot. It had been her parent’s “song,” the one they’d fallen in love to, the one they’d first danced to at their wedding.
She couldn’t sing this song. There was no way.
“Ahem.” Jules covered the mic and leaned over to talk to the D.J. “This isn’t my song… I mean…”
“Go on,” he mouthed, rotating his finger to fast-forward her. “Sing.”
Goddamnit.
Jules took a deep breath, looking out at the expectant crowd. She didn’t have a choice.
“The first time ever I saw your face…”
The crowd applauded immediately, whooping and hollering as soon as she uttered the first few notes. It was an incredibly slow song, full of emotion, and she couldn’t have hurried it along if she tried. The music took her over instantly and she found herself transported by the words, and the audience went with her. The entire bar, which had been lively and rocking just moments before, was now almost silent.
Everyone was watching her, which normally would have been uncomfortable, but when she was singing, it didn’t matter. She closed her eyes and there was no shame or embarrassment or fear. The rest of the world went away and it was just her and the music. She gave everything in the moment, with each breath.
The words cracked her open. It was the song her parents had fallen in love to, after all, the one they’d danced to on every anniversary, and it couldn’t help but move her. Damn Barb—of course she’d known.
Jules opened her eyes and saw Kai leaning on the stage, watching her, utterly transfixed. Seeing him startled her, as close as he could get without getting up there with her. He looked like he wanted to—not just climb up onto the stage, but climb inside her, wear her like a second skin. The intensity of his gaze both thrilled and scared her.
Thankfully, there was a break in the song in that moment, or she would have faltered. She caught her breath, swallowed, and glanced back at the screen. But she knew the words by heart.
“The first time ever I saw your face…”
And just like Barb told her to do, Jules found herself singing to him. Part of her resisted, but another, deeper part, was simply unable to help it. The man watching her wanted her to sing to him—just him. His eyes drew hers, magnetic, hungry. He wanted more of her, all of her. He looked at her like he could devour her in one enormous gulp.
The audience, still listening with undivided attention, disappeared completely.
Kai was the only person in the room. And she sang directly to him, for him. His eyes glowed, so alive it was like they were on fire, as if he could make her burst into flame with just his gaze. Something was happening—her voice had hypnotized him, and his gaze had sparked kindling buried somewhere deep inside of her. It burned now, hot, fast, making her cheeks red and her voice tremble with heat.
When the song was over, the last note held just a little too long, because for some reason she didn’t want it to end, even though she hadn’t wanted to get up there and sing in the first place, the crowd burst into applause, most of them standing, stomping their feet, demanding an encore.
“Jules! Jules! Jules!” A chant rose up in the bar as she handed the mic back to the D.J. and rushed toward the steps.
The spell was broken. There was no way she was going to sing another one, not tonight. Not with him here. Watching her. Setting her body on fire with his eyes alone.
But she couldn’t avoid him as she practically ran off the stage. He was right there, a hand at her elbow, keeping her from fleeing.
“Where did you learn to sing like that?” His voice was low, almost accusatory. Kai looked angry, not pleased by her performance.
“I’ve always been able to sing like that.” She kept the quiver from her voice and managed to gather enough strength in her trembling limbs to shake him loose.
“I’ve never heard anything like it.” He shook his head, looking bewildered, his mouth turning down at the corners.
“You should watch more American Idol.”
She turned to go but he grabbed her arm again. Glancing up at him, she expected words, but it seemed he was speechless. Those piercing eyes went right into her, though, and she squirmed, feeling as if he could see far more than she wanted him to.
“If you don’t mind?” She glanced down at the hand on her arm. His left one. No ring. Why did that thrill her so much? “I have to answer that booty call now.”
He scowled at that, but let her go. She fled, not saying a word to Barb when she called after her. Jules practically ran to her car, taking deep gulps of cool, summer air, hoping to extinguish the fire that had suddenly been lit in her belly.
CHAPTER TWO—Jules
Jules usually got up at the butt crack of dawn, mostly by necessity rather than inclination. She wasn’t really a morning person by nature, but running the ranch and taking care of the the horses required early-to-bed and early-to-rise hours.
Staying out at the bar until after midnight was not the norm and she’d been exhausted by the time she returned to the ranch. She found Stuart had already gone, leaving her a note on her kitchen table. He had a key
to her place, and used it whenever he wanted.
The note read:
Sorry, got tied up. Thought you’d have given up on me and come home. Needed gas money. Grabbed some out of the cookie jar. Need to ask you a big favor. Talk soon? Love ya, Stuart.
Of course, big favor meant he needed money. And not just the fifty bucks or so she kept in the cookie jar. Disgusted with him, and herself, Jules hadn’t even bothered brushing her teeth or otherwise getting ready for bed. She just tugged off her jeans and crawled in.
She slept like the dead until an insistent knock on her front door woke her at some ungodly hour. On a weekday, when she hadn’t spent most of the night in the bar, she would have been up already. But it was Saturday, her alarm was off, and she’d been looking forward to sleeping in. At least until eight or nine in the morning.
The doorbell rang and the knock came again. Pounding this time, not really knocking. She groaned, rolling over and searching the floor blindly with one hand for the jeans she’d discarded the night before.
Pound. Pound. Pound.
“I’m coming!” Jules yelled, yanking on her pants and buttoning them as she hurried, barefoot, out of her room and into the kitchen. Like most old farm houses, the main door opened into the kitchen and every room centered around it.
Pound. Pound. Pound.
She unlocked the door and pulled hard. It was warped with age and it stuck.
If she’d had time to think, she would have assumed it was Stuart knocking. But that didn’t make sense. He had his own key. But she never would have expected the sight that greeted her on the front porch.
“These are for you.” Kai shoved a cardboard box at her and she had no choice but to take it. The man’s face was a storm cloud of anger as he pushed his way into her kitchen, slamming the door behind him.
Jules looked down into the box, drawn by the sound it was making, and saw it was filled with kittens. She quickly counted them and came up with the number eight. They meowed and scrambled over each other, trying to scale the side of the box.
One of them, a precocious orange kitten, used his sibling’s head as a springboard, and managed to get his paws hooked on the edge of the box. Jules unhooked him and gently placed him back into it, which she set on the kitchen table before turning to face her unexpected morning visitor.
“Don’t look at me like that.” Kai shook his head, scowling at the mewling and vibrating box. “Wasn’t my idea. Barb made me. She said you needed barn cats and these don’t have homes.”
“Just what I need.” Jules rolled her eyes, leaning over to peer into the box again. They were awfully cute. “One more thing to take care of.”
“Do you have any Band-Aids?” Kai held up both hands and Jules saw he had scratches all over his hands and arms. He still wore the same clothes she’d seen him in the night before. Had he slept at all? Had he stayed up all night?
“You poor thing.” Jules reached out to take one of his hands, turning it over and inspecting his wounds. “Ravaged by kittens.”
“They’re vicious.” Kai gave her a sheepish look. “Far worse than you think. You better put them on the floor or one of them is going to get hurt. They jump right out of the box.”
Sure enough, the orange one was once again peeking over the edge, and Jules heard his back feet scrabbling, looking for purchase, so he could climb out. She swiftly put the box on the floor, tipping it so the kittens had free reign. Then she went around closing doors, so they couldn’t go into any other rooms.
“I’ll go get something to bandage you up.” Jules glanced over her shoulder and grinned. “Sure you’ll be okay alone with them?”
“Very funny.” Kai scowled, an expression Jules found rather amusing. “I’m bleeding all over your floor here.”
Jules squeezed past the door, gently keeping a curious white kitten out with her foot before closing it behind her. She washed her hands and grabbed the first-aid kit out of the bathroom, squeezing back into the kitchen to find Kai at the sink, washing the blood off his hands and arms. One of the kittens was playing with his shoelace, while another was investigating his pant leg, his whole head stuck up inside.
“They seem to like you.” Jules put the first aid kit on the kitchen table and opened it. “Sure you don’t want to keep them?”
“Contrary creatures. Worse than women,” he muttered, patting his wounds dry with a paper towel and tossing it into the garbage before making his way over to the kitchen table. This wasn’t an easy task with kittens swarming around his feet. “Cats love me. And I’m not a cat person.”
“Even kittens?” Jules inspected his wounds. Most of them were surface scratches, but there were a few on the backs of his hands that were deep, and one on his arm that looked like puncture marks. Tiny little kitten teeth had made those, she was sure of it.
“Okay, they’re cute, I guess,” Kai conceded, watching as she cleaned his scratches with hydrogen peroxide on a cotton ball.
“Millions of YouTube watchers can’t be wrong.” Jules turned one of his hands over on the table. His fingernails were clean, finely manicured. He wore no rings, and there was no tan line, in spite of the bronze color of his skin. Of course, Barb wouldn’t have tried to set her up with a married man. But it was always better to be safe than sorry.
And why was she even thinking about this? Barb’s silly matchmaking plan was just that. Last night’s set-up had failed, but not to be deterred, Barb had sent Kai over just a few hours later. With a box of kittens, no less!
“This place—your ranch,” Kai started, making a face when she used her finger to rub antibiotic ointment into his wound. “What’s it worth?”
“With the second mortgage, and oh, wait, the third, too—probably somewhere below zero.” Jules snorted, peeling open a Band-Aid. She glanced up to see him watching her, those flecks of green in his hazel eyes fascinating her. The warmth of his hand against hers, even during such an innocuous task, flooded her with an uncomfortable heat. “I’m kidding. Sort of. It’s probably worth half a million on the market. There’s a lot of land. But I don’t want to sell.”
“And what is it you do here, exactly?” He flexed his fist when she was finished smoothing the Band-Aid over the back of his hand. “Barb says you’re like some sort of horse whisperer? Do you do therapy on horses?”
She laughed, reaching down to lift the orange kitten onto her lap. He was trying to scale her leg, digging his tiny claws in.
“I’m not a horse psychiatrist.” She scratched the kitten briefly behind his ears, feeling him purr, wondering if they had fleas. She’d have to take them to the vet. “I do equine therapy. It’s using horses as therapy for people.”
“That’s a thing?” Kai raised his eyebrows as she went to work on the back of his other hand. He shrugged when Jules gave him a quelling look. “Sorry. I don’t know anything about therapy. With or without horses.”
“Yes, it’s a thing.”
The orange kitten, clearly the leader and most adventurous of the bunch, bridged the gap between their knees and ended up on Kai’s lap.
“This is the little monster that did most of the damage.” He looked down at it, frowning.
“I think you’ll live.” Jules held his hand in hers as she rubbed ointment into the deepest scratch on his hand. “Pretty sure you’re not gonna bleed out in my kitchen.”
“So, uh...” Kai cleared his throat, using his other hand to scoop up the kitten on his lap and place it on the floor. “Would you mind showing me around?”
“I told you—ranch isn’t for sale.” She smoothed the final Band-Aid over his hand and began cleaning up. “And it’s mortgaged to the hilt. So whatever financial advice you’ve got for me, I’m pretty sure it’s going to be useless.”
Kai cocked an eyebrow. “Don’t underestimate me.”
“Why, do you have a magic wand?” Jules closed the first aid kit and went to throw away the Band-Aid wrappers. “Because unless you’re my fairy godmother—err—godfather? Bad analogy. Anyway, u
nless you can create something from nothing, I don’t think you can help.”
“I have some ideas.” Kai watched as she stopped to scoop up a black and white kitten who was using its claws to pull dishtowels off the racks. “Why shoot me down before you’ve even heard me out?”
“Because this isn’t about the ranch.” Jules sighed, sitting back in the kitchen chair, the kitten cuddled in her arms.
“What do you mean?”
“You’re not here to help me with the ranch.” She looked pointedly at him. Could he be that dense? Didn’t he see what Barb was up to? If he’d known her longer than a week—and clearly he had—then he had to know her penchant for matchmaking. Didn’t he know a set-up when he saw one?
“You think I have an ulterior motive?” Kai’s mouth twitched in amusement.
“I have no idea.” Jules nuzzled the kitten with her cheek. She really didn’t need barn cats. Barb had obviously used them as an excuse, and Kai as a delivery boy, to put the two of them in the same room together again. The woman was unstoppable. “But I know that Barb does.”
“Oh.” He did smile then, the first time she’d seen him smile, and it was rather charming.
“I’m just not interested in being paired up.”
“With me? Or with anyone?”
“Oh, it’s nothing against you.” She let the kitten climb down out of her arms to join its siblings on the tile floor. “You seem like a nice enough guy.”
“Well, thanks.” He smirked. “I think.”
“It’s just that she’s been trying to set me up for years. I’m over it.”
“Hm.”
“Hm?” she repeated, seeing the way he was looking at her. She couldn’t help remember the night before, with him so close. Their knees were almost touching under the table. “What does hm mean?”
“I’m just wondering if maybe you’re not over… something else.” He didn’t look away when she glared at him, anticipating where this was going. “Or someone else.”
“You don’t know me.” She got up, turning her back on him to wash her hands at the sink. “You don’t know anything about me.”