But come the hell on. Kat might not be considered fashion-model material—in fact, as far as he could tell, there wasn’t a speck of makeup on her. She definitely marched to her own music, with that row of tiny silver hoops climbing all the way up her ear and the chunk of her hair she’d colored bright pink, but her uniqueness only made her more enticing. The blue-sky eyes and sun-freckled nose that accompanied her offbeat look just begged to be appreciated. Add to it the wild tumble of multihued blond hair framing her face and those tan, muscular legs tapering downward from the short little sundress she’d traded for her running gear . . . Christ, he was pretty sure he’d have to be dead to not look at her.
Unless Gabe caught him looking at her. In which case, Jesse would need a toe tag in very short order.
“You really didn’t have to do that tonight,” Kat said, and her words yanked him back into place on her threshold. “I was speaking kind of figuratively when I told Gabe I wanted a lock as soon as possible.”
Jesse shook his head, blanking his thoughts and his expression as he passed the keys over. “I promised your brother I’d do some work around here to earn my keep. Plus, it’s smart to have an extra lock on your door, and the hardware store on Main Street had everything we needed. It was easy.”
“Well, thank you. I appreciate it.”
“Yes ma’am.”
She winced, although it was slight enough that most people might not have noticed. “I know the whole ma’am thing is reflexive, but really. I’m just Kat.”
“You’re also Gabe’s sister,” he said, while his inner voice tacked on and the daughter of a colonel. Really, he couldn’t come up with anyone more out of bounds if he’d made it mission critical. “I’m pretty sure you outrank me.”
A burst of laughter popped from her lips, sizzling a direct path to his gut. “I know you’re the expert, but I’m pretty sure civilians don’t outrank anybody. Really. Just Kat.”
Although he was tempted to argue with her, he got the feeling it would be a losing battle. “Okay, Just Kat. You got a broom in your kitchen closet?”
“I suppose I asked for that,” she mumbled, her sandals clicking over the linoleum as she crossed to the narrow door next to the white enamel beast of a refrigerator. Propping the closet open, she scrunched up her brow and peered inside. “Oh, hell.”
“Everything okay?” Jesse asked, concern percolating through his veins.
But Kat just shrugged and turned toward the nearest kitchen cupboard. “There’s a spider.”
His head whipped back in total shock. Shouldn’t she be screaming her face off or something? “In the closet?”
“On the broom handle, specifically. Aha!” She snagged a plastic cup from the cupboard shelf and shut the door with nothing but purpose in her pretty blue stare.
What, was she going to offer the creepy little thing a beverage and a snack before its flight to its final destination? “Don’t you want me to kill it?”
“Of course not!” Her cheeks flushed, and Jesse added one more entry to the list of things about her he found wildly sexy. “I’m going to put him outside.”
He almost laughed, until he realized she was serious as a sledgehammer. “You know if you do that, the spider’s only going to come back in, right?”
“Maybe. But he’s not really hurting anything. I just need him off my broom.” Kat reached back into the storage closet, her stack of gold bracelets climbing up her forearm with a jingle as she maneuvered both hands past the door. “See?” She extracted the cup, victorious. “Brown wolf spider. No great shakes.”
Jesse took an involuntary step back, his heartbeat kicking to DEFCON 4 at the sight of the insect clinging to the top edge of the red plastic. “Jesus Christ. That’s not a spider. It’s a rhinoceros.”
Kat’s laugh sounded suspiciously like a snort. “He’s a little bigger than most, but let’s not get crazy.”
“Are you crazy?” Jesse stepped in, taking the cup from her to beat a direct path to the sliding glass door. The damn thing had to measure nearly two inches across, and even though they weren’t deadly, wolf spiders could still bite. “Anyway, how do you know it’s a he?”
“Because he’s not wearing a skirt?” Kat ventured, following Jesse out into the cool night breeze flowing over the back deck.
“Very funny.” He took the handful of wooden steps leading to the yard with brisk precision before placing the cup on its side in the tall grass by an oak tree.
She let out a sigh, crossing her arms in the same protective stance she’d been knotted into when he’d caught a glimpse of her going back and forth with Gabe through the sliding glass door earlier. “Okay, so I don’t know for sure that he’s a he. But I do know that it doesn’t feel right to squash him to death just for hanging out in my storage closet. Not to mention, it’s terrible karma.”
“Karma,” Jesse repeated, and Kat lifted a single hand as if she could sense the argument brewing in his mouth.
“Yes. Karma. Listen, I know the spider can probably get back inside if he wants to, and no, I don’t want a whole kitchen teeming with them. But this is a lake house in the middle of the woods. There’s going to be wildlife. And if I only see a spider inside every once in a while, putting him back outside just feels like the right thing to do. Not that I expect you to understand, but . . . it just does.”
Her fierce posture coalesced into a much softer shrug, and Jesse couldn’t decide which troubled him more. The fact that he actually did get the rationale behind Kat’s spider-saving philosophy, or that he was turned on down to his steel toes as she explained it to him in the moonlight.
Damn it, this was Gabe’s sister. The only daughter of a colonel who’d served in the Army for as many years as Jesse had been alive. A woman with a vacation house and a career in a medical field that likely required more than one advanced degree.
He needed to redirect. Now.
“Okay then.” Jesse about-faced, going back to retrieve the now-spiderless cup from the weeds. “As long as we’re good out here, I can sweep up your threshold for you.”
“That’s it? You’re not going to argue or make fun of me?” she asked, half-defiant and half something else he couldn’t quite place in the shadows. The trees rasped overhead as the breeze picked up, shifting her hair around her face, and damn it, he was all too tempted to tease her just to find out if she gave as good as she got.
But flirting with her simply wasn’t an option. No matter how much her desire to preserve life made sense to him.
And no matter how hot he found the challenge coming out of her mouth.
“No. I’m not going to argue, and I’m not going to make fun of you.”
He passed the cup back over, and the breeze chose just that moment to kick back up, lifting the hem of her sundress softly over her thighs. The musky jasmine scent of her skin mixed with the honeysuckle growing rampant in the yard beyond, and Jesse broke ranks with his impulse control, stepping in close.
“But I promised to keep you out of harm’s way. If I see anything dangerous in the lake house, all bets for playing it safe are off, Just Kat.”
Kat stared at the back of her Toyota Prius with one hand on her hip and a whole lot of unfettered heat in her veins. But despite trying to blame her state of warmth on the beautiful midmorning weather, she couldn’t deny that the dark and sexy look Jesse had given her last night as he’d delivered his parting words had left behind a forbidden thrill she couldn’t shake.
Which meant that she was hot and bothered, because in that moment, keeping her distance from Jesse had been the last thing on Kat’s mind.
“Ugh.” She reached into her trunk and dislodged one of the boxes with a healthy yank. While yesterday’s flood had left her temporarily homeless, it had also offered up the opportunity for her to make good on her promise to her brother. What she really needed was to channel her energy into fixing up the duplex, creating a home away from home so she had a place to belong.
God, she could still feel Jesse’s
stare on her skin.
“Need some help?”
The voice attached to the image in Kat’s mind startled her clear off the gravel path, and she wheeled around with an ungraceful yelp.
“Whoa! Sorry.” Jesse stepped in to steady the box in her grasp about two seconds shy of launch. “I thought you saw me coming up the path.”
“Oh, no. I, um . . . must’ve been lost in thought, I guess.” Kat swallowed hard and prayed that the subject of said thoughts wasn’t as obvious as the blush she felt trailing over her cheeks.
“I wasn’t expecting you to still be here,” Jesse said, stepping back to give her more personal space now that she’d regained her hold on the box in her arms. “But if you give me a second to clean up, I can help you bring this stuff inside.”
Kat’s breath clattered to a stop in her overtight lungs. She’d been so preoccupied trying not to dump her belongings on the driveway that she hadn’t noticed the tool belt slung over the waist of Jesse’s work-faded jeans.
Or his distinct lack of a shirt. Holy crap, it was a million degrees out here.
“I don’t want to keep you,” she chirped, tamping down the desire in her belly once and for all. “I’ve only got a handful of trips, and then I’ve got to get to work.”
She’d blocked off this morning to unpack the last of the things she’d been able to salvage from her waterlogged apartment, and in reality, her first client wasn’t on the books for another two hours. But she’d meant to give Jesse his space as they shared the duplex, and getting in his way wasn’t really on Kat’s big, fat list of woo-hoo! He was a nice enough guy, but she’d been around enough military men to know the type. Strong. Silent. Set in their ways.
And stubborn.
“It’s no trouble at all,” Jesse said, refusing to budge even an inch. “I’ll just be a second.”
He turned toward the nearby path to lower his tool belt to the makeshift work area he’d set up, and the move revealed an intricate tattoo that stopped round two of her argument in her throat.
“Oh, wow.” Kat took a handful of automatic steps forward in an effort to quell her instant curiosity. The design scrolled across Jesse’s back, the heavy black outline filled in with smaller pops of color. A pair of strong yet flawlessly detailed wings spanned from shoulder blade to shoulder blade, with a bright red four-armed cross set directly where they met. The swirling curves of a medical caduceus stemmed off from the lowest point, laddering down the corded muscles of Jesse’s back to end at four words scripted in a bold, bright blue.
US ARMY COMBAT MEDIC.
“I didn’t know you’re a medic too,” she said, surprise bouncing back through her rib cage. Although no one had been shocked when Gabe had followed in their father’s footsteps to enlist at the ripe old age of nineteen, he’d certainly thrown everyone for a loop when he’d decided to complete his training as a medic rather than climbing the ranks to become an officer. Kat had been so proud that he’d found a way to work toward his dream job of becoming an emergency physician.
The colonel? Not so much.
Kat cleared her throat, ungluing herself from her thoughts. “So did you and Gabe do combat training together?”
“No.” Jesse propped his chin on one shoulder to slide a glance at her as he answered. “I enlisted when I was twenty, and Gabe’s got three years on me. We crossed paths in Uruzgan Province, then again in Zabul.”
“He’d just moved to Riverside when he did that tour in Zabul,” Kat said, her thoughts tumbling back wistfully. She’d relocated to Pine Mountain not long after, so they could be close.
Jesse nodded. “I was born and raised in Pine Mountain, so it was cool to meet someone from a familiar place.”
“Wait . . .” Kat calculated the math on Jesse’s age versus his time in-theater, her eyes going wide. “You’re, what, twenty-seven? How long were you overseas?”
“You don’t pull any punches, do you?” he asked, and although there was no heat to the question, there was plenty on her face. She’d never met a soldier who was fast and loose with the details of his active duty, and the colonel had taught her far better than to break unspoken protocol and pry, even out of curiosity.
“I apologize. It was rude of—”
“I did three tours, but I opted to take extra training and teach combat lifesaving in my off-time. So I was gone for a little over six years,” Jesse said, just as plain as the sunlight on her shoulders. He turned back to face her, pulling a T-shirt over his head and taking the box from her hands as he gestured toward the porch. “And don’t apologize. I don’t mind the question.”
Grabbing another box from the trunk of the Prius, she followed him to the sun-faded steps leading up to the duplex. “You didn’t come back home at all for six years?”
“I was Stateside plenty in between deployments. The Army’s not too keen on burning people out.”
“So you just didn’t come back to Pine Mountain,” she ventured.
“No.”
Jesse capped off the word with a solid measure of silence, and whoa. Looked like Kat had found a question he did mind. “Well, I can certainly appreciate the medical aspect of your specialty,” she said, and he embraced the change in subject full-on.
“How long have you been a physical therapist?” He balanced the box in his arms on one shoulder while he leaned in to palm the front doorknob, holding the door open for her before stepping back to let her lead the way to her threshold.
Kat’s cheeks prickled at the unexpected gesture, and she eked out a smile in thanks as she headed toward the kitchen with her box. “I got my Doctor of Physical Therapy two years ago in June.”
“You’re a doctor?” The question rode out on a hint of surprise, but Kat was used to the drill.
“Technically, yes, but it’s a PhD, not an MD. I went straight from Stanford into a doctorate program for physical therapy, but I did some extra studies in alternative healing practices. I’m lucky in that I was able to work with patients throughout that process. So I’ve been helping people through their injuries in one capacity or another for about five years now.”
“What are alternative healing practices?” Jesse asked, falling in behind her to lower the box on his shoulder to the kitchen counter. This was where Kat usually got the eye-rolling, nay-saying bit from people, especially if they had a medical background. Even Gabe, who Kat knew respected both her experience and her expertise, still made fun of her from time to time.
With Jesse’s specialized training as a medic, not to mention his six years of eating, sleeping, and breathing all things Army, this was going to go over like a pig roast at a vegetarian convention.
She scooped in a deep breath. “I rely on a lot of Eastern schools of thought in my therapy practice. My primary focus for alternative therapy is acupressure and acupuncture, although they’re not the only techniques I’ve trained in.”
“Acupuncture, like with needles?” Jesse’s light brown eyes tapered just slightly, but it was enough.
Kat stiffened, short fingernails digging into the bed of each palm. “Yes. As it turns out, they’re not just for making voodoo dolls.”
Okay, so it came out a bit more defensively than she’d intended. But if there was one life lesson she knew by heart, it was that the best defense was a good offense. She’d long since grown accustomed to backing up her belief in Eastern healing practices.
Just like she’d long since learned to stand her ground over being different from anyone else. Much to her father’s chagrin.
“So what are they good for, then?”
Jesse’s stare was perfectly calm and perfectly unreadable, and his question sent a hard shot of confusion through Kat’s veins.
She threaded her arms over the front of her yellow tunic top. “I’m sorry?”
“I doubt that.” The quirk of his lips canceled out any accusation the words might’ve carried, sending Kat’s surprise into a tailspin. “I’m not a big fan of needles myself, but I get the fact that sometimes you’ve got t
o stick people to make them better. So explain it to me. How does acupuncture work?”
Kat hesitated before finally saying, “Acupuncture actually refers to several different techniques that stimulate anatomical points in the body, although the most widely familiar method involves the use of flexible, hair-thin needles. And despite Western phobias, it’s not like getting a bunch of shots. In fact, if it’s done properly, acupuncture should never hurt.”
“Ah. You use the needles to manipulate places like pressure points, then?”
She nodded so enthusiastically that a tendril of hair broke free from the loose ponytail at her nape. “Technique placement is very precise and it depends on the injury or condition, but yes. That’s the broad-strokes idea. The practice relies on modifying the flow of energy through the body to help it heal.”
Jesse leaned against her kitchen counter, although his shoulders still knotted into the taut line of someone who’d stood at attention for the last six years. “I did a round of combat training with a guy who held a black belt in Tae Kwon Do. Some of those pressure-point moves are no joke.”
“Same means, different end,” Kat agreed, her heart tapping an excited rhythm behind her breastbone. “Acupuncture channels the same kind of energy through the body, only the purpose is obviously to heal rather than to incapacitate.”
“Yeah, a few of the techniques I learned are definitely incapacitating,” he said, although his expression suggested it might be the biggest euphemism he’d ever let past his lips. “What’s the pressure point back here? The one that makes your whole arm go limp?”
Jesse straightened one arm, running his opposite palm up the back of his triceps muscle, and familiarity put a grin on Kat’s face. “Right above your Golgi tendon?”
“That’s the one. One tap to that thing, and my arm was like Silly Putty. And believe me, I tried to fight it.”
Just One Taste Page 3
