by Kelly Moran
“Tux?” An exaggerated WTF expression crossed his face. “Let me get this straight. Not only was I railroaded into participating in a bachelor auction, but you’re making me wear a monkey suit to boot?”
“Not me, the committee. I didn’t even know you were taking part until an hour ago. Honest. It doesn’t matter to me what you have on. I’m sure the bidding women won’t mind, either. You could wear nothing for all I care.” Shoot, just shut up. “I mean, not nothing. Of course, you should have something on. That would be really indecent otherwise. You might even get arrested for being naked.” Holy custard, Ella. Stop. Talking. “Then again, you might get way more bids if—”
Like in the hallway, he threw his head back and laughed. Louder, longer, and with a very large hand over his abdomen. “Still nervous, huh? Tell you what. I’ll wear the tux if you take the cat with you.”
“What?”
“She needs a home, and here isn’t it. My complex doesn’t allow pets.”
“Yes, it does. I live across the street and we can have pets. The buildings are owned by the same company.”
“Really?” He frowned. “Since when?”
“I moved in three years ago, so at least since then. I have a cat. They just made me put down a security deposit first.”
“Ha! You do like cats and you can take her with you.”
“Er, no. Only one pet per apartment. But that means you can keep her.”
He made a slashing motion. “Hell to the no. I don’t want the responsibility. Besides, I’m at the fire station at all hours. I don’t have time for a cat.”
“Why did you get her then?”
“I didn’t. She was a rescue from my shift today. I tried every damn living, breathing person in a twenty-mile radius to unload her. No takers.” He straightened. “You don’t read the town’s Tweets or follow the Pinterest boards? The Battleaxes posted all over the moment it happened.”
“I do, but I haven’t been online today.” She glanced around. His deep brown leather sofas looked cozy and were nicely complimented by nature art on the gray walls. He had a few books lying around and a half-dead fern on the table, but his apartment was pretty minimal as far as décor went. Seemed a little empty, actually. Lonely. “You should keep her. Cats are independent and very loving.”
He sighed and rolled his head. “I don’t have a choice until I find someone. Man, I don’t know the first thing about taking care of a cat.”
Before she knew what she was doing, her mouth started moving two beats ahead of her mind waving the caution flag. “I can help.”
Chapter 3
Jason rolled his lips over his teeth in an attempt not to laugh. One Ella Sinclair sat blabbing in his passenger seat while he drove his truck up the mountain road to a neighboring town for pet supplies.
“I would definitely suggest a few toys. Kittens are playful and need diversions or they’ll find their own amusement like your plant. Except that’s half-dead, so probably not a biggie. Oh, and a scratching post. Your furniture will thank you. Litterbox, of course. Plus a food and water dish…”
Damn, but she was adorable. He didn’t normally go for brunettes, especially chatty ones, but he might make an exception in this case. She’d interrupted his irritation meltdown earlier and had replaced it with one laugh after another. He doubted she even knew she was one helluva welcomed distraction. She seemed the completely-unaware-of-her-sexiness type of woman. A little too wholesome for him, perhaps, yet the girl next door vibe was appealing somehow.
Strange, that.
Regardless, he’d liked her on the spot. “Thanks for offering to help. I appreciate you as a sidekick to pick out some things. We had a dog growing up, but it’s been years. I know zilch about cats.” He’d been kinda hoping to keep it that way, but luck had made other plans.
“Oh, no problem at all. I wasn’t doing anything tonight anyway, just going to watch some TV or whatever. I’m a pretty boring person.” Like she’d done outside his apartment, she slapped a hand over her cherubic face in a why-did-she-say-that/she-should-be-quiet-now combination. “That sounded pathetic. I suppose I am, though. Most people go out on Friday nights. Not me. I binge Netflix. I bet you had a big date or plans.”
“Not particularly, no.” He wondered what it was about him that made her so nervous. He always considered himself easygoing and laid back. “Sounds really nice to me. The staying in part, I mean. Not pathetic at all.” Honestly, he couldn’t recall the last occurrence he’d lounged on his couch during free time and done absolutely nothing. Of course, that would mean him tolerating his own company, or his own thoughts, which was a whopping nuh-uh. “What shows are you into?”
“I’m not very picky. I guess I prefer a lot of action or paranormal. Crime shows are neat. I like to try to solve the mystery before the show ends and it reveals everything.”
Yep. Adorable as hell. “And do you? Solve the mystery?”
She shrugged. “Sometimes. It’s the ones I can’t figure out that are the most entertaining.” Rubbing her hands over her jean-clad thighs, she focused out the passenger window, seemingly unsure of herself.
Darting his gaze between the road and her, he took in her profile while she wasn’t paying attention. She had to have some Hispanic or Native American in her DNA due to her golden-bronze skin tone and her dark hair. It was all that gorgeous hair he’d noticed first when she’d stood on his doorstep. Silky and straight, it fell to the middle of her back. It smelled like ginger cookies, and the whiff he’d inhaled as he’d helped her to her feet at his apartment hadn’t been nearly long enough to satiate the sudden craving. He couldn’t remember her eye color. He was willing to bet they were dark, too, but she had a slight arch on the bridge of her nose and a wide mouth that offset her round cheeks in a way that made her both uniquely pretty and barely noticeable in the same fractured beat. One of those women a man had to look twice at before fully appreciating.
And she had curves. If he had one weakness for the female anatomy, curves were it. Give him ample breasts and a round ass and hips he could hold onto. She filled those jeans like the second coming.
Again, her personality kept triggering his reaction to hit the pause button on his interest. If she found him so intimidating that she rambled constantly and the good girl routine wasn’t an act, then he needed to keep himself reined. All of his previous partners knew he was the great time guy, nothing more. A little fun and done. No one got hurt. Women like her tended to seek forever.
“What about you?” She faced him, and how about that. Her eyes were light brown with amber flecks, proving his assumption wrong. It was a mystery why he hadn’t retained that tidbit to memory. They were pretty.
“Hmm?” Not that he minded a wonderful distraction, but he swore she’d asked him something.
“TV shows. What do you like to watch?”
Right. “Sports. Baseball mostly, but I can get into hockey or football if coerced. I don’t mind those thirty-minute sitcom comedies.”
“I don’t know much about sports. Once, when I was twelve, my uncle took me to an Oregon Ducks game.” She laughed, the pitch indicating she was hanging onto nervous by a thread. “I had no clue what was going on, but it was so much fun just the same. I rarely got out to do things like that. It was so nice of him to make time. We ate hot dogs and popcorn until I felt like I’d burst.” Another laugh. “When we got home, my aunt chided us for how long we were away and that I ate nothing healthy. It was worth it. They even won the game in the bottom of the ninth with a home run.”
He nodded, his smile slipping. What did that mean, the not getting out much part? She’d made no reference to a mother or father, either. “You lived with an aunt and uncle?” Where were her folks?
“Yeah.” She cleared her throat. “My mom’s sister and her husband. I went to stay with them after my parents died.”
Well, that’s shitty. “How old were you?”
“Nine.”
Damn. “I can relate. My dad died when I was t
en. Sorry for your loss.” At least he still had his mama, who he loved more than oxygen and was still, to this day, the only woman to whom he’d commit.
“Same to you.”
The distance in her voice gave him heed, but a glance at her only offered her profile and a glimpse of a guilty despondent expression. He’d let the topic drop if it bothered her. Wasn’t as if he was a fan of dredging up the past anyway. Some wounds never fully healed, no matter how much time passed.
In silence, he drove the rest of the way to the pet outlet store and cut the engine. Once inside, he pushed the cart up and down the aisles while she set items in at a rapid rate, giving him a tutorial on why he needed each one. By the time they were finished and on the road again, the bed of his truck was at max capacity.
The tenant across the hall was just leaving as they were coming, and he nodded to the forty-something gentleman he’d never actually spoken to as he passed. And, since he was a desperate man, Jason turned toward him, nearly plowing over Ella with the momentum.
“Sorry, sweetheart.” He looked over her shoulder. “Hey there, sir. You wouldn’t be in the market for a kitten, would you?”
The guy laughed, shaking his head. “Even if I was, I’d adopt elsewhere. I don’t need that meddling threesome after me.”
Jason straitened and adjusted the box of litter in his arms, smacking his thigh with a grocery bag of cat supply crap dangling from his arm in the process. “Come again?”
The gentleman scratched his cheek. “The Battleaxes. Isn’t that what your generation calls that trio? The mayor and her sisters? Anyway, they put word out on the street to say no if you tried re-homing your bundle of joy.”
They did what now? And for what purpose? “Why?”
“No clue, but congrats. Wouldn’t want to be you.” Chuckling, the guy headed down the hall and out of sight.
Case closed. Slam the gavel. There was no doubt Jason had landed smack in the center of the Battleaxes’ radar.
Damn it to hell. Now what? What right did they have messing with his life and wiggling things around? And just who did he piss off enough to have Karma slap him this hard? Torn between wanting to punch something and needing to scream, he eyed Ella.
“Cats are great pets?” She blinked innocently at him, making her statement-like question even cuter.
“Apparently.” He frowned.
She grinned, lopsided, wrinkling her nose, and with arched brows by way of encouragement.
Unable to help it, he laughed at her attempt to lighten the situation. “All right. Let’s unload, shall we?”
Inside his apartment once more, she was a flurry of motion. She kind of reminded him of a one-woman pit crew. Except he was getting the feeling she was on a time limit, and not one set by herself. As if she had to hurry because he wanted her gone. Not true.
While she set up a litter box in his spare room-turned-office, he stood in the doorway and watched, nodding that he understood to scoop once a day and yada-yada. The kitten had climbed him five minutes ago like the tree he’d rescued her from, was now sitting on his shoulder, and he absently petted her, smiling at Ella who’d begun assembling a cat stand by the window. Honestly, she should work for NASCAR.
Expelling hearty sigh, she straightened, brushing her hands together. No wedding ring. Interesting. “I think you’re all set. I’ll get out of your hair.”
“You’re not in my hair.” Though he wouldn’t mind those slender fingers of hers in his strands. Such a turn-on, women who did that. “Thank you very much for the assistance. This was above and beyond.” She’d whipped out what seemed like an all day task into a mere hour.
“Oh, well… I don’t mind.” For the first time since the hallway encounter with his neighbor, she looked at him instead of around or through him. A double-take, then a triple, and she grinned. Authentically, this time. “That’s so sweet.”
He eyed the kitten on his shoulder, purring like an engine. “She sure likes heights. Found her in a maple today in that subdivision by the park. I guess this means I have to give her a name, huh?”
“Probably a good idea.” She laughed.
He liked the sound when it wasn’t inflicted with nervous tension and he instantly wanted to get her to do it again. “Suppose Frosty is taken.”
Ah, yes. Another laugh. “She’s not cold. Look at her, all cuddled snugly with you. How about Cotton?”
She was shaking her head in denial even as “Naw” passed his lips. He struggled to come up with something white by way of a name. “Olaf?”
Ahhhh, yesssss. That particular laugh. From the gut and it filled the room. “What’s with you and snowmen?”
“They’re white. I’m not very creative.”
Smiling, she hummed an adorable noise of deep thought. “Something white, something white. How about Ghost?”
“As in Casper?”
“I was thinking Jon’s direwolf in Game of Thrones.”
Her sexy factor just upped ten notches. “Nice. I like it.”
“There’s always Lotus, a lovely flower.” She tilted her head. “ Or…Luna, Daisy, Birch, Ivory, Creampuff, Storm. Oh, Storm from X-Men! She was my favorite. You could call her Tofu, I suppose.”
“Tofu?”
She shrugged. “It’s white.”
For the hundredth time in a handful of hours, he laughed. She was something else. “How is it we’ve never met before, Ella Sinclair of the Redwood Ridge Event Committee?”
Another shrug. “I don’t get out much.”
Pity. She’d said that once before. “Why?”
“I’m socially awkward.”
He disagreed. Feverishly. “I happen to find you charming. All right, you pick. Storm or Ghost?”
She opened and closed her mouth as if unable to keep up. “She’s your kitten.”
“And you were instrumental in getting her settled. Besides, your name choices are better than mine.”
“Um, okay. I’d say Storm fits her personality, especially the way she darts like lightning when playing.”
A nod, and that was that. He plucked the kitten from his shoulder and held her in front of his face. “You shall hereby be known as Storm. Or Damn It if you claw my curtains.” Setting her on the floor, he sighed. “Are you hungry? I haven’t eaten. We could order takeout.”
“It’s not a good idea to feed her people food. She could get the runs.”
Have mercy, this woman. “I meant you. Would you like to stay for dinner?”
Stock still, she blinked at him in the silence as if she didn’t compute. “Like a date?”
“More like a thank you meal. I prefer to take my dates out in public as a courtesy.” Though he was damn tempted, he still wasn’t certain it was a good idea to venture that path with her. Ninety percent of the reason being because he actually liked her thus far. A lot.
“Oh, duh.” Nervous giggle. “Why would dinner be a date? That’s silly. I’m sorry.” More nervous giggling. “Of course, you wouldn’t be asking me out.”
He did not care for that response. Not even a little bit. “Why wouldn’t I ask you out?”
“Because I’m not the type of woman men date. It just doesn’t happen very often. Getting asked, I mean.”
He couldn’t decide if she was that clueless and being serious or if he’d gone and tripped her anxiety again and she was rambling. “Why don’t you get asked out often?”
Hell, if he weren’t a capricious serial dater, he’d be out with her right this second trying to round first base. She wasn’t his typical conquest, though, and he didn’t hurt feelings as a rule. He might be a player, but emotions weren’t a game.
Her expression registered somewhere high on the mortification scale, even if her eyes held a world of grief. “Dating leads to anxiety. Anxiety leads to babbling. Babbling leads to no second date.” She cleared her throat and looked away, her cheeks pink. “I can be annoying.”
That didn’t explain why she didn’t get asked out on first dates, but he let that detail
slide. He wasn’t a violent man, at least he never considered himself particularly hostile by nature, yet he wanted to get his hands on whatever dickhead put the idea that she was annoying in her head. Because she wasn’t.
“I believe I said I find you charming. That would be the opposite of annoying.”
That earned a trace of a smile. “Thank you.”
Progress. She accepted compliments. And rare that she didn’t fish for them. “Sooooo, dinner? Chinese? Italian? Mexican? I draw the line at sushi.”
“I should really be getting home.”
“I thought you said you didn’t have plans. Unless you have to go feed your cat. If that’s the case, you can run over and come back. I’d like to thank you for your help.”
Not meeting his eyes, she nodded slowly as if understanding something he didn’t and was disappointed in the outcome. “You don’t need to thank me. I was happy to do it.”
All right. Different tactic. “What’s your cat’s name?”
“Er…Xena.”
“Ha. Really? Why?”
“She has black fur like Xena’s hair and when she meows, it sounds like her warrior cry. You know, that alalala-yiyiyi she does. It…” She tilted her head. “Why are you grinning at me like that? You asked.”
“I did, yes. And I’m amused and impressed by the answer.” He crossed his arms in a take no prisoners stance. “I’d like the pleasure of your company for dinner, Ella. Choose. Chinese, Italian, or Mexican takeout. My vote is Italian.” Because it would take the longest for delivery.
“Are you sure that—”
“Yep.”
“Because I totally don’t mind—”
“I’m positive.”
She let out the most delicate of sighs. “Italian, then.”
“Good choice.”
A smile. “You picked it.”
“Every once in a blue moon I have a good idea.” Like being clever enough to get her to stay. And over a meal an hour later with his small kitchenette table between them, he slid his spare key across the formica with one finger. “So you can get in to help with Storm on the nights I work late. If you want to, that is, or wouldn’t mind.”