The pretty brunette was becoming a minor obsession. I looked for her in the morning, when she drank her coffee on the patio, and I looked for her again at night. She flitted around her kitchen as if listening to music and I frequently saw her working late at the desk in her bedroom. I told myself I was just keeping tabs on a single woman living alone in the city. I was looking out for her, really. That was another lie. The truth was she fascinated me, from the way she moved to the smile I saw on her lips when she sat in the sun. And truthfully, I enjoyed her sassy notes, and her pencil sketches showed remarkable talent. Jackson was right. She really was a goddess. I shook my head. Man, I needed to get out more.

Knowing all this, I also knew that the right thing to do, of course, would be to close the drapes and walk away. I knew that. Just because my tenant left her curtains open, it was not an invitation for me to look in at her. Like right now, I could see her nestled in her chair in her living room, reading a book by the fire, and it looked so damned cozy and inviting that I—

I blinked. Once. Twice. I did not just see that. Damn it! Yes, I did. I squinted. Maybe I was wrong. I wasn’t wrong. As I watched, a black-and-white feline sauntered from the patio outside, through the open French door, to hop up onto the red throw on the sofa of the guest house. My tenant looked up from her book and smiled as if greeting a friend. I had to be seeing things. Nope. As I watched, it lifted its hind leg and licked its butt.

There were no two ways about it. Despite my detailed list of rules, which clearly stated no pets, my tenant had acquired a cat. A cat!

Annabelle

13

Shockingly, things did not improve between me and Carson after the altercation at the elevator. Okay, it wasn’t really an altercation, not even a tiff or a squabble, still every time I saw him that week, my shoulders ratcheted up around my ears. I hated conflict just like I hated tension, and Carson West was causing me to feel both. It was also why I’d been stalling talking to Sophie about Miguel’s relationship with Carson. I loathed feeling uncomfortable and did not want to make anyone else feel that way either. The whole situation was exhausting, and I was so far out of my league in dealing with this sort of nonsense that I just wanted to curl up in a ball on my couch and down an entire bottle of wine.