Chapter Two #2
But they were standing close enough that he got her scent all over him.
Something sweet, like the cookies she baked.
Something that reminded him of rosemary, or thyme.
He wanted to tip his whole body forward and press his mouth to her collarbone, and he could envision that with such specificity that he was actually surprised to find himself still standing straight.
Kitty, of course, seemed as oblivious as ever.
“This will be great. We can get married. We’ll agree on a period of time, live together through that, and then go our separate ways.
Obviously we can renegotiate if circumstances change.
” She said that last part as if she was considering all the angles.
Maybe just thinking out loud. “You know, like if you meet some girl or something. But to be honest, I don’t think it will take very long to convince Izzy and Alessandro that they’re being ridiculous. ”
He had that sensation of spinning again, which made sense. Because really, he was still reeling.
“Flattered as I am to be the random man you ran into on the street and chose for this position, I have to think that there is someone else who’s better for the job of playing this part.
” Finn found he really didn’t like thinking about that, but he kept his gaze steady on hers just the same.
“You’ve been here a while now. There must be some local boys who can handle this kind of task. ”
She was already shaking her head. “No, that’s why you’re perfect.” When he continued to gaze at her, she sighed. “Everyone in Cowboy Point knows that I’ve never given any of the local men a second glance. Or even a first one. I cook them food. That’s the extent of it.”
“You must have dated someone.”
Though he realized when he said that out loud that he was entirely too invested in her answer.
She gave him a look he couldn’t quite interpret.
“The point is, no one would believe that I was swept away by passion and married one of them. Because when would this sweeping have occurred? Or the passion, for that matter. That’s the thing about a town like this, if you don’t know already.
Everybody knows everything about everyone. ”
Finn nodded. “So that brings me to another question. If everyone knows everything about everyone, how do you convince your landlords that what we have going on is real as we decide to play this game? If we decide to play this game.”
“I told you. We’ll have to live together.” She pointed back over her shoulder. “My sisters and I live in the big house. There’s tons of room. I doubt you’ll notice any difference from Dr. Ramona’s apartment.”
“I need to make sure I’m following this.
” Finn crossed his arms over his chest and settled his weight on his heels so he could really fix his gaze on her.
“Not only am I marrying you in this scenario, but only for a year or so. I’m also moving into a house with you, my fake wife, and my two fake sisters-in-law.
” He blew out a breath. Not because he was specifically attached to the apartment he found to rent, though he did like it.
But because it had obviously failed to occur to Kitty that he might have a different take on what she found so reasonable.
“I’m still not clear on why you chose me, but I’m even more unclear on what’s in this for me. ”
“Oh.” She considered that, shoving her hands into the deepest pockets of her overalls.
That made it impossible for him not to notice that she had also shoved what looked like a to-go coffee cup from his sister Helena’s coffee cart into one of the other pockets.
“What do you think we should get out of something like this?”
“That’s a very interesting question.” This close to her, he could see things that weren’t evident from across a counter or back in the kitchen at the pizza place.
Like the dusting of freckles over her nose.
He’d seen them before, but this close, he could count them.
“If we’re calling it a job, is there a salary? ”
“You won’t have to pay rent,” she fired back. “How about that?”
“That is a consideration,” Finn drawled. It wasn’t. He’d been saving all his money for years now, planning to feed it all back into the land when it was his. Just like Jimmy had encouraged him to do. And wasn’t that a stroke of luck? Because if that hadn’t happened, he would have nothing.
As it was, with his bank accounts full, he still felt a little bit more like the walking wounded than he cared to admit.
“I can give you room and board,” Kitty told him, as if this was an actual negotiation they were having. “And then, when you’re ready to go off to your next cattleman adventure, we’ll call it even, divorce neat and clean, and be done.”
“Neat and clean is not the way I’ve ever heard a divorce described, I have to tell you,” he pointed out.
“That’s because most people make everything very messy.” Kitty was starting to sound impatient now and Finn was fascinated. “Look. I’m not going to pretend that the whole town hasn’t been talking about your family situation, because of course they have.”
“Fair enough,” he said. “Speaking of messy.”
She nodded. “If it makes you feel any better, my parents never cheated on each other, or ran around, or any of the things that your father did. But that didn’t make them any less toxic.
Which is actually a very kind way to describe what it was like between them.
What it’s still like between them, probably.
We got out of there the minute Indy turned eighteen and we never went back.
So when I tell you that I know what messy is, I do. That’s never going to be me.”
And Finn was a rational, reasonable man. He had been a good foreman because he kept himself calm in all situations and never made his decisions rashly.
So he didn’t know why the hell it seemed so tempting to just say yes, jump in, and take whatever part of Kitty this ridiculous enterprise might give him.
But that wasn’t him, no matter how much he wished it was.
So he nodded instead. “Okay,” he said.
Her whole face brightened. She even smiled, and that almost turned him around on the spot. It was a close call.
“What do you mean by okay?” she asked, clearly excited.
“I mean okay, I’ll consider it,” he said.
That smile, that he was fairly certain was now seared onto his bones for all time, dimmed a few watts. “For how long?”
“As long as it takes for me to come to a decision,” he replied steadily, the way he had replied to too many ranch hands in his time.
“I’m not particularly impulsive, Kitty. The only impulsive decision I can recall making in recent memory was coming here to Cowboy Point because my sister decided it was time to introduce our side of the family to our siblings.
I take my time. In my experience, quick means shoddy—and I can’t abide shoddy work. ”
Her expression dimmed further, and up came that frown, right on cue. “You’re going to have to give me a timeline.”
“Do you have other candidates lined up?” he asked, mildly. Very mildly, because that was a notion he didn’t care for much at all.
Kitty sniffed. “No, but I have to look for some if you’re not interested.” She eyed him in a manner he could only call baleful. “You have two weeks.”
“Do I now?” he asked, with a laugh. “Two whole weeks?”
“It only makes sense,” she retorted. “Nobody likes to drag things on forever, Finn. It’s called decisiveness.”
He was getting the very clear picture that she imagined he was some kind of drifter, or ranching dilettante—whatever that was—who also couldn’t make up his mind to save his life.
Something that was so funny that he considered reaching out to every man he’d ever worked with on the ranch so they could get a good laugh out of imagining that somebody would misread him like that.
But her freckles were distracting. Her mouth was right there. And he had to keep reminding himself that it was one thing to find a woman catastrophically pretty and quite another to jump in and marry her just because that would let him play the hero.
If there was one thing that Finn would never allow himself to do, it was to jump into anything without thinking it through, because that would make him no better than his father.
So he nodded to the woman in front of him, who apparently really wanted to be his wife—in name only, he was pretty sure, but still—and took a step back.
“Two weeks, then,” he said. “Give or take.” And he even thumbed his hat at her, to amp up the cowboy a little. “I’ll be seeing you around, Kitty.”
Then he stepped around her and continued on down the road toward the General Store, where he was meeting his brothers. Who he did not intend to share Kitty’s proposition with, thank you.
Some things a man had to ponder on his own.
But he did have the distinct pleasure of feeling her frown as he went, aiming it square at his back the whole way across the road.