The Belle and the Beard by Kate Canterbary (carter reed TXT) 📗

"All set," she said, pushing to her feet.

I stared. How could I not? She was a gorgeous pain in the ass.

I reached for my mug to keep my hands busy. It was mostly empty and I required two to three full cups of coffee to get going in the morning but there was no way I was doing the kitchen tango with Jasper again. "Thanks."

"I must thank you properly for your assistance yesterday. I had no intention of needing it but you rose to the occasion nonetheless. I'm sure Midge admired that about you."

We shared a glance over the banana bread. Neither of us made a move toward it.

"Midge had a lot of opinions about a lot of things," I said. "It seems you managed well enough over there last night."

She sighed as she tossed the paper towels in the trash. "I managed just fine. Believe me, I've worked with worse."

I didn't see how that could be true but I wasn't going to argue with her. No more than I already was. "I take it the bats have moved along?"

"Bats, yes, though a cat scared a decade off me last night," she said, a breathless laugh in her words. "Appeared out of nowhere."

Now, that—that wasn't fake. I wasn't convinced it was real but it wasn't another empty smile or canned comeback. "Little black cat with a white triangle on his chest? Looks like he's wearing a tuxedo?"

She shook her head as she lifted her mug. "It was dark. I didn't get a good look."

"If it was a black cat, it was probably Sinatra."

"Is he yours?" she asked between sips.

"No, he lives in the forest." I tipped my head toward the back windows. "Midge named him Sinatra for the tux. Apparently his eyes look a little blue in the right light too."

Since I couldn't look at her face or her neck or her skirt, I dropped my attention to the banana bread in front of me and broke off the most edible corner I could find. Edible was too optimistic a term. It tasted like burnt cardboard with a strange, hot-garbage-esque finish.

"Mmhmm. Does he make a habit of inviting himself indoors? Because I need to prepare myself for that."

"Not usually, no. I've only seen him in the yard. Sometimes he'll come sit on the deck. Months will go by without seeing him. Once it was almost a year."

"And you're sure it's the same cat?"

"I'm not sure about anything but Midge was convinced. She knew his markings. I think she left food for him on the back steps but then she kept getting raccoons hanging out on her porch. At least that's what she told me when I moved in here. That was the first thing she said to me. 'Don't feed the cat because he only sends his raccoon friends to eat.'"

Jasper drummed her fingers on the mug. "How old is this cat?"

"No one knows."

"No one knows?" she repeated, a twang of irritation in her voice.

There was definitely something wrong with me because I enjoyed the shit out of that. "He's been around since before I moved in five years ago. Midge mentioned seeing him on and off for years before that. She figured he liked hanging around here because this place hadn't been occupied for fifteen or twenty years so there were plenty of mice." I shifted to drop the knife into the basin of the sink. I didn't need Jasper grabbing that thing again. "Surprised you've never heard about him, seeing as you were so close with Midge. She had a ton of stories about that damn cat."

If Jasper was fazed by these comments, it didn't show. She grinned at the old barometer and tide chart stationed below the clock on the wall opposite the kitchen. "What a curious bit of history. I get a house and an occasional cat."

"You're sticking around, then. You're not just visiting. You're here to stay."

Jasper's eyes brightened. "You seem very concerned about this."

"I'm not concerned. I'm making conversation, just like you," I replied with a wave toward our mugs. Mine was still miserably empty. "You're the one who invited yourself over."

"Which I did to acknowledge your help yesterday."

"Which you've done." I shoved my hands into my pockets. They were safer there. They wouldn't wring her lovely neck there. "Clearly there's something else you want."

She took a step forward, propped her hands on her hips. "I'm being neighborly. You should try it."

I matched her step. "And what the fuck did you think I was doing yesterday?"

A noise rattled in her throat, something strangled and hoarse. I loved that noise—and I had the privilege of hearing it in its purest form now that we were standing toe to toe. "You thought you were interrupting the commission of a crime."

"You had a fucking crowbar, Jasper." I folded my arms over my chest. "What was I supposed to do? Hand you a muffin basket?"

The gold in her eyes flashed. "A muffin is always preferrable to mansplaining."

We stared at each other for a long moment. A few strands of her hair brushed against my forearm. It was nothing, but those sensations still rippled over my skin and down my spine. And lower.

"Yeah, so, anyway, what is this?" I asked, tipping my chin toward the dish. "It's a lot of things but it's not banana bread."

"It certainly is," she snapped. "I mashed those bananas myself."

"And what else did you throw in with those bananas?"

"The usual things. Flour, sugar, eggs, vanilla. Stuff like that."

I gestured to the loaf's squat, dense appearance. "Some part of that went wrong."

"I don't know what went wrong," she replied. "I followed the recipe. The grocery stores are a nightmare, of course, but—"

"What do you mean, the grocery stores are a nightmare?"

"They're just impossible to find," she said, touching her fingers to her temples. "I swear, I drove in the same circle for an hour just to get to the store."

I peered at her. "Are you talking about the rotary?"

"The traffic circle," she said.

"The