by Jenny Penn
“That’s very interesting Mr. Jackson, but I have a different idea.” Then she’d slide a folded napkin across the table with an address and instructions to ask for Kitty Anne Kat. “Be there. Seven o’clock.”
Then she’d get up and walk slowly away, making sure to swish her ass with every step. Matching her mental instructions with actions, Kitty Anne glanced back over her shoulder to watch her rump roll in the mirror and assure that she was getting her walk right, but instead of worrying over the swish of her hips, she froze as her gaze connected with the man spying on her through the door that was now cracked open.
It probably would have been a good idea to scream and run. Kitty Anne actually did do those two things, but she didn’t flee or cry out in terror so much as bellow in outrage and swipe the broom out of the corner as she took off after the large man who thundered down the hall with a heavy-bear-like charge.
He hit the back door, and it flew open, only to snap back and smack Kitty Anne right in the face. She plowed into it, trying the same move the big man had so effortlessly pulled off, but she didn’t have his girth, much less his heft. Instead of the door flying back open, Kitty Anne went wheeling backward as her nose mushroomed with an intense pain that had her cursing.
By the time it dulled down to an ache, she could hear the tires screeching through the parking lot. Kitty Anne managed to get the door open and catch one final glimpse of the pickup truck tearing out of the drive. That was all she needed.
Chapter Two
The next morning Kitty Anne woke up nice and early, spending an extra half-hour on her already hour-long grooming ritual to make sure she looked her best. She glued on individual eyelashes and picked out a royal blue dress that not only showed off her figure but also made her eyes shine.
Not that anybody bothered to notice, thanks to her never-fail-to-impress push-up bra. It worked magic, assuring that every guy she passed glanced at only one part of her anatomy. As her mother had always said, there wasn’t anything a large set of breasts couldn’t get out of a straight man.
She hadn’t meant it as a compliment, but Kitty Anne had taken it as one. Boobs—that was her secret superpower. They were the greatest one of all. They worked on all men, even cops. A half-hour after walking into the police station with a tag number, she’d walked back out with a name.
George Davis.
All it took to find out the rest was looking him up online and realizing he hailed from Pittsview. A quick call to Rachel and there wasn’t almost anything Kitty Anne didn’t know about the infamous GD. As a reporter for the one-paper town, Rachel knew just about everybody, and there wasn’t anybody, apparently, who didn’t know GD.
He was that kind of guy. A good one, a friend to all, he’d attended almost every church in town at some point and worked hard as a private investigator. Most importantly, he was a Cattleman, rumored to be a higher-up in the little sex club all the Cattlemen belonged to. From what Rachel said, Cattlemen always came in pairs.
Cole normally teamed up with a guy named Kyle, but Kitty Anne couldn’t be blamed for thinking that GD was filling in for him. That didn’t seem to concern Rachel. Kitty Anne, on the other hand, was a little unnerved but didn’t intend to back down.
Neither, apparently, was Mr. Davis. He showed up exactly at four that afternoon when she got off of work to shadow her all the way back to the monthly rental motel where she stayed. Kitty Anne let him stew in the parking lot as she got ready for her date with Cole and even pretended not to notice him as he followed her to the bar.
He was still waiting when she got done with Cole, who had agreed to meet her the following night at the brothel. That victory fueled Kitty Anne’s growing sense of excitement, and she couldn’t resist confronting GD. Besides, it seemed ridiculous to pretend as though she hadn’t noticed him following her back to the motel.
Stepping out of her small car, Kitty Anne turned toward the back of the parking lot instead of toward her room and began marching her way across the asphalt to where GD had pulled his big pickup truck into a spot. She kept her chin up, her shoulders back, making every step a stomp and assuring that she looked strong and powerful. Still, she ended up feeling weak and dainty as the big man climbed down out of his truck.
He was huge…and handsome.
Not a petite girl, Kitty Anne liked her men tall and strong enough to make her feel like a woman. GD fit that bill. Dressed in a pair of softly faded jeans that clung to the powerful muscles thickening his thighs and a T-shirt that rippled with the flex of his perfectly cut chest, the man was like a walking wet dream.
A wet dream that liked to share his ladies with his buddies.
Kitty Anne’s steps faltered as she felt a sudden wave of heat leave her almost light-headed. This couldn’t be happening. She was always in full control when it came to men. Then again, normally her heart wasn’t beating around like a jackrabbit’s on a sugar rush. Hell, her palms were sweating.
Sweating!
It was gross and weird. Worst of all, Kitty Anne had a sick feeling GD knew exactly what kind of effect he was having on her. Given the smirk tugging at the big man’s lip, she suspected she was wearing her thoughts on her face.
Quickly she tried to school her features into a look of disdain as she glanced back down his length, pointedly taking note of the scuff of his boots, the size of his belt buckle, and the cowboy hat that he managed to make look sexy instead of cliché. Of course, that had a lot to do with the sharp cut of his jaw. It matched the rough drawl of his accent as he greeted her with a hint of amusement lightening his deep tone.
“Evenin’, beautiful.” He actually tipped his hat at her in a sign of polite respect as she came to a stop before him. “Can I help you with something?”
He could help her with a whole lot, but Kitty Anne kept that opinion to herself as her inner voice snapped at her to stiffen up and not only meet his challenge but destroy it.
“Yes.” Crisp and sharp, that answer whipped out of her with a strength that disguised the quiver of lust trying to weaken her defenses. “You can tell me what you were doing last night breaking into the library.”
“I’m sorry, but I’m not sure what you are talking about.” The twinkle in the man’s smoky gaze belied the earnest quality of GD’s denial and warned Kitty Anne that she was dealing with a man who had no problem lying.
“Is that right?” Kitty Anne smiled. She was going to enjoy the next moment. “You know, I can prove it was you.”
“Is that right?” GD mimicked back as he imitated her smile and smugly surprised tone perfectly. “You know, I think you’re going to have to.”
“Fine.” Kitty Anne paused to straighten up and savor the moment as she slowly revealed the ace up her sleeve. “Your license tag number is 892 GKY…Mr. Davis.”
“No, it isn’t.” GD didn’t even hesitate to deny her.
“Please.” Kitty Anne snorted as she stormed around him. “Why are you even arguing when all I have to do is look and see that—”
Kitty Anne shut up as she stared at the license tag hanging on the back of the truck. The vanity plate didn’t even have numbers. She didn’t know what the hell was going on, but that didn’t change the fact that she knew what she’d seen last night. It had been his big face in the mirror. This big truck careening out into the street. It just hadn’t been that tag on the back of it.
“Would you care to say it out loud for me, beautiful?”
Kitty Anne’s gaze lifted and narrowed in on GD as she watched him fight back his laughter. He wasn’t doing a good job of it, and damn his hide, he was even better looking when he smiled.
Kitty Anne closed her eyes and forced herself to breathe deep and focus. She was not going to be conned by either a hot body or a double-dimpled grin. Neither was she going to be undone by the infectious nature of his amusement. The man was up to something, and she wanted to know what.
“I’m not sure—”
“No.” GD cut her off with a slow shake of his head. “That�
�s not it. Come on now…say it with me….You. Are. Wrong.”
“I am—”
“You are wrong.”
“I—”
“Wrong.”
“Fine!” Goaded into losing her composure for a moment, Kitty Anne gave into temptation and all but spat at him. “I am wrong. I am wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong! There? Are you happy now?”
“Happy?” GD nose wrinkled as he snorted. “Far from it, but we’ll get there.”
“We’ll get nowhere, not until you answer some questions, like just who the hell are you? Why are you watching me? Why did you break into the library? And why shouldn’t I call the cops on your ass right now?”
Changing gears, Kitty Anne went on the offensive, wagging a finger and advancing on him with each question. She didn’t let up until she’d poked him in the chest. He glanced down to stare pointedly at her red-painted nail before glancing back up.
“I’m sorry, beautiful. I have no idea what you are talking about.”
“So that’s your story?” Kitty Anne pulled her hand back, finding her agitation oddly deflated by his obstinateness.
“And I’m sticking to it.”
“Then let me help you out.” Never one to give up, Kitty Anne was more than willing to try yet another tactic—honesty. “You’re a friend of Cole Jackson’s, right?”
“Guilty.”
“He sent you out here to check me out, didn’t he?”
“Maybe.” GD shrugged.
“Maybe you like what you see.” In fact, Kitty Anne knew he did.
“Maybe.” The hint of amusement lightening his tone matched the sparkle in GD’s eyes as he clearly waited for her next move.
“And maybe you’re interested in having a little fun,” Kitty Anne suggested with her own slow drawl.
GD eyed her, openly admiring her curves and sending a pleasant rush of anticipation through her veins as his gaze darkened in a look she recognized all too well. He was trying to imagine her naked, but he didn’t need to paint a fantasy. She was more than willing to let him take a ride, but on her terms.
“Maybe.”
“It’ll cost you,” Kitty Anne warned him.
“Everything always does,” GD agreed easily enough, completely unfazed by her suggestion.
“Especially for a Cattleman.”
That caught his attention, and GD studied her for another long moment before responding. This time his tone held a hint of hesitation. “Yeah? And what do you know about Cattlemen?”
“Just that you’re willing to pay to play.” Which was pathetic at so many levels, but Kitty Anne kept that opinion to herself. After all, she was trying to entice Cole to do just that. “And that you’re cheap. That you guys like to split the bill between buddies. Of course, you think the money gives you a right to name the rules of the game.”
“And you don’t?”
“I think I’m worth more than you can afford and don’t charge damn near enough for the pleasure I can show a man.” That was the God’s honest truth.
“I’d ask what kind of pleasure, but I’m guessing that would ruin the surprise.” GD eyed her with a look that sent another flash of heat firing off through her veins. “And I do enjoy a good surprise. Tell me something, beautiful, you hungry?”
There was something about the way he asked that question that had Kitty Anne’s mind churning with an image of hot, sweaty bodies writhing in ecstasy and her cunt going soft with a need to make that fantasy a reality because she was betting that there wasn’t anything small about the big man.
“I might be in the mood for some meat.” Kitty Anne smiled as he all but drooled over her words. “You want to go make a sandwich?”
That offer had GD hesitating as his gaze narrowed on her smile. He knew she was teasing. Kitty Anne knew she was playing fire. GD didn’t take her bait, though. Instead, he just nodded.
“I’ll follow.”
GD agreed but didn’t make a move to climb back into his truck. Standing there, he watched her walk away. Kitty Anne knew he was enjoying the sight, too, thanks to the extra little swish she put in her step. She swooshed her ass at him, a silent temptation that, maybe, if he was a good boy, she’d let him get a piece of.
One thing Kitty Anne knew for sure. This was going to be fun.
* * * *
Twenty minutes later, Kitty Anne closed her menu and looked up at the man staring back down at her in shock. The waiter had a kind of dumbfounded expression as he glanced from her to GD, who had relaxed back into his side of the booth, unable to help but smile as Kitty Anne’s order grew longer and longer.
Far from thin, the girl wasn’t fat either, but still, he didn’t believe for a moment she intended to eat everything that she’d asked for. He had a sense he was being measured by the fatness of his wallet…or, at least, that was what she wanted him to believe. It was part of her image and her challenge, but GD didn’t flinch.
Though he couldn’t help but be amused as the kid cleared his throat and tried to ask politely if the lady was ordering for both of them. GD would have answered him, but Kitty Anne beat him to the punch with her snort.
“Really?” She shot the boy a look as though he’d asked the stupidest question. “Do you honestly think that is enough food for that man? Look at him!”
GD smiled, refusing to take the insult as he offered the boy a perfect response, the one that assured she’d eat every single bite of her meal or risk being discovered for the fraud she was.
“I’ll just have the soup of the day with a large Cobb salad,” he ordered and knew instantly that the waiter understood.
The kid broke into a quick smile, no doubt thinking that he’d gotten caught up in something personal between them and that they’d ordered each other’s dinner. He’d switch the plates when he delivered them. GD would correct him then, and Kitty Anne would learn that he took all challenges very seriously.
“Right away, sir.”
“That’s all you want?” Kitty Anne pressed, holding up the waiter by refusing to relinquish her menu. Instead, she scowled at him and offered GD one more opportunity to retreat. “You sure you don’t want a dessert, at least?”
“I’m fine, beautiful.” That he was. In fact, he was enjoying himself. “Besides I believe in eating healthy.”
“Oh, screw that,” Kitty Anne muttered to herself as she released the menu, allowing the nervous teenager to scurry away as she took direct aim at GD’s comment. “When I’m hungry, I want to eat.”
“I can tell.” GD could also tell that she worked out. Unable to resist running another quick look down her svelte frame, he shifted in his seat as he felt his dick begin to swell. “You are a very beautiful woman, if you don’t mind me saying so.”
“And why would I mind a compliment?” Kitty Anne retorted, her full and pouty lips curling into a smile that would have made a weaker man pant.
GD just shrugged.
“Because I’m guessing your fiancé wouldn’t care for it.” GD hesitated, letting that taunt sink in before pressing even harder. “And that you actually care for him.”
“What can I say?” Kitty Anne asked, batting her fake eyelashes coyly at him. “He’s rich. That makes up for a lot of failings.”
She was truly impressive. GD knew there was no fiancé, rich or otherwise, and the woman had to know he probably knew. That didn’t stop her from daring to not only lie to his face but to threaten him with those lies.
“And in whatever ways he doesn’t measure up, I can always find another to fill in.” Kitty Anne glanced up and away toward the waiter carrying back the plate of cheese sticks she’d ordered.
As GD predicted, the kid brought two plates and set one down in front of him, earning a dirty look from Kitty Anne, who actually had the audacity to pull the appetizer over to her side of the table and away from GD. That was the first sign he had that he was wrong about the motive behind her order.
The second sign was the fact that she managed to eat all six deep-fried and breaded chun
ks of cheese in less than five minutes. Kitty Anne wolfed through her food with an abandon that had him shifting in his seat again. Maybe it was an act, and it was kind of funny to imagine her practicing eating, but the truth was the woman made devouring food look sexy as hell.
“So…” GD tried to focus back on the subject and not on wondering if Kitty Anne would make the same blissful expression when she swallowed a dick whole, as she did when she almost swallowed a whole cheese stick.
“You like a variety of meats, huh?”
That drew Kitty Anne’s attention from her plate to him, and she blasted him with a deep, soulful look. GD could sense her weighing her options before she shrugged.
“I’m not a one-meat kind of girl.” There was a grimness to that comment that held a warning he chose not to hear.
After all, GD wasn’t planning on confining Kitty Anne to just his bed. He knew just who would make a perfect match to their threesome. While a lot of names came to mind, not a single one of them was worthy of his Venus. That was a problem better solved later.
“So how many meats do you keep in your pantry?” GD pressed, enjoying the frown Kitty Anne shot at him. Her strong, elegant features scrunched up with a sour expression as she rebuffed him.
“That’s a rather personal question, don’t you think?”
“Not given what I’m planning on doing to you,” GD promised, letting the hunger sink into his voice as his gaze narrowed on the swipe of her tongue. It licked out to catch the crumbs lingering on her lips, making him tense with a need he knew she was intentionally provoking.
“I haven’t agreed to let you do anything to me,” Kitty Anne shot back, but she had. It was there in her eyes and the way she watched him.
“Why not?” GD cocked a brow and went for the fatal blow. “I got fifty dollars in my pocket. What will that buy me?”
Kitty Anne stiffened up instantly at that insulting question, and by rights, she should have thrown the saucer of marinara still sitting in the middle of her plate right in his face. She thought about it, but then she appeared to remember the game they were playing, and instantly, her features relaxed into a look smug enough for GD to sense that he was about to lose.