She pressed her lips together, obviously annoyed. “Welcome to the building,” she said in a tone that was anything but welcoming. She turned her back on him and jammed her keys into the lock.
When she opened the door, a tiny fur-covered ball of energy scampered through the threshold and raced across the landing and directly into Matt’s apartment.
“Hey! Come back here.” Courtney dropped her groceries and followed the kitten. “Aramis, what’s the deal?” she said as she chased the cat into a corner of the living room, where it arched its back and hissed while simultaneously raising its hackles and fluffing its tail.
Matt strolled up to Courtney and gently placed his hands on her shoulders. She stiffened, but whether out of surprise or sexual awareness he couldn’t tell. Her bones felt small under his hands, and she smelled delicious. He longed to place one kiss on the nape of her neck, but he resisted. Instead he gently moved her aside and let go.
“I can handle this,” he said, hunkering down. “Hey, kitty, kitty,” he said in a high voice guaranteed to attract the cat.
The kitten sat down and looked away for a moment and then made a show of washing himself behind the ears. After a minute, Aramis turned and walked with as much grace as a kitten could have toward Matt’s outstretched hand. He scooped the furball up and scratched him behind the ears. Aramis rewarded him with a deep-throated purr that was almost too big for such a tiny kitten.
“I have a surprise for you, buddy,” he said as he crossed the room to the bathroom door. Your brother’s here.” He opened the door, squatted down, and let the kitten go. Aramis scampered forward with a couple of loud meows and then pounced on Porthos, who’d been napping.
“You got a cat?” Courtney asked from behind.
Matt stood up, closed the bathroom door, and then leaned back on the doorframe. “Is there something wrong with a guy having a cat?”
Courtney’s big blue eyes widened with a look that was so sexy it almost melted Matt where he stood. “No. I’m just surprised about you having a cat.”
“I told you before, I’ve always had cats. The first thing I did after I signed the lease was visit the bookstore and adopt Porthos. Although I’m going to change his name. I was thinking of calling him Shredder, after the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles villain. Although, if I’m going to have two cats, I’ll have to rethink. Maybe I’ll name them both for members of the League of Justice.”
“Two cats?”
He made a great show of shrugging. “Clearly Aramis likes it better over here.”
The muscles along her jaw tensed. What was it about Courtney Wallace? He enjoyed teasing her, which was a little perverse, because he never teased or lied or played games.
“Okay, fine. But in my opinion, single guys with cats are kind of creepy.” Courtney turned and started for the door.
“You know, Courtney, maybe you should stop reading Cosmo.”
She whirled around to face him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
He pushed away from the doorframe. “Just that you have this tendency to put men into judgmental boxes, like some wild-eyed feminist. I’m all for feminism, but I draw the line when women try to shame men for stupid stuff. I’ve seen the magazine articles with ten reasons why dating a guy with a cat is a big mistake. But it’s an idiotic meme.”
“Well, for the record, I don’t read Cosmo.”
“Okay, but can we agree that it’s a stupid meme?”
“Sure. When you give me back my cat.” And with that, she turned and marched from his new apartment with her delicious hips swaying.
He ought to give the cat back, but he decided on the spot to keep Aramis and give him a super-manly name like Ra’s al Ghul, the leader of the League of Assassins in the Batman comics.
* * *
It didn’t take Arwen long to determine that Jefferson County had waived the fines once GB Ventures purchased Dogwood Estates. It made sense, since the buildings would be torn down. But something about the situation bugged Arwen.
So she spent three days at the county courthouse looking up deed records and matching them up with fines assessed by the Jefferson County building inspector. A troubling pattern emerged: Over the last eighteen months, the number of fines had increased threefold. And yet revenue from fines was down over the same period because the landowners were selling out instead of paying up. GB Ventures appeared to be the main beneficiary, snapping up the land at bargain-basement prices.
The properties in question were old, falling-down eyesores. Most folks in Jefferson County would probably see no problem with getting rid of them. But to Arwen, the pattern suggested an abuse of government power. And since only one company seemed to be buying up these properties, Arwen smelled a rat.
Was the County Council engaged in some kind of graft that involved GB Ventures? She didn’t know. But it was troubling enough for her to compile her findings and put it all in a memo, which she planned to share with Matt on Thursday morning.
But right now, at the end of a long day, Arwen just wanted to forget the ugliness she’d unearthed by spending the evening at the Jaybird’s Wednesday open mic.
She wasn’t planning to perform tonight, and she was having supper all by herself since all her married friends were pregnant and suffering from morning sickness that lasted all day, and Courtney was at the hospital with Sid. She sat at the bar, nursing a margarita and listening to Kent Henderson play “Tennessee Stud” for the umpteenth time.
“A penny for your thoughts?” Rory said as he dried glasses behind the bar and hung them in the slots above.
“I’m trying not to think at all,” she said.
Rory gave her a wicked grin. “I can arrange that, lass.”
What a shame he was working tonight. If he’d been another customer, she might have flirted with him. “I’ve already got my margarita,
