by Snow, Nicole
Finally, I’ve always given a big hell no to romance, and that’s how it’s gonna stay.
Half the ladies in Dallas see that as a challenge.
They think I’m one more rock-hard, closed off caveman who traded his badass card for a dad card, and every last one of ’em are wrong.
Many have come calling with flirty smiles and lipstick so bright it burns the eyes.
All have failed.
When I say I’m a bachelor whose life begins and ends with his girls, his bar, and his best friends in that order, I fucking mean it.
Shame some women still don’t get the message.
Gotta admit, before today, I did a pretty good job of obeying my rules like gospel.
As I climb the stairs to my room, I cringe because the cracks are forming, annoying and unwelcome as a hairline fracture.
Even if it’s just for a day, Willow and Bruce are threatening my resolve with critters and drama.
Thank fuck the romance rule is solid as marble.
A shiver stabs me then, so fierce I roll my shoulders.
Willow’s face flashes through my mind like lightning—damn her—for the first of many times this restless night.
3
Tiger Fight (Willow)
Even though the clock beside the bed said it was after three when I’d climbed between the sheets that smell like freshly cut flowers and sunshine, by seven o’clock, I can’t stay in bed a second longer.
I’m too worried.
My mind keeps spinning in all directions simultaneously.
Priscilla and Niles Foss must know Bruce and I are gone by now, along with the laptop. I’d snatched that, too.
A damning indictment of everything wrong at Exotic Plains.
That’s what I want to believe, anyway, if I can find someone who can break through the password encryption for proof, hopefully.
And I’m going to need plenty of rock-solid proof to save my own butt from a prison cell when—not if—the law steps into this.
Right now, I’m running on pure jittery instinct. Too wound up to sleep and too worried to try.
I climb out of bed, make it up real quick, and then tiptoe into the bathroom.
Once I’m showered and dressed, the reek of adrenaline gone, I head for the barn to check on Bruce.
He’s still sleeping inside the trailer Grady backed into the barn through the big sliding metal door, but I can see paw prints. He was up during the night, pacing, without putting much weight on his injured front foot.
I should’ve waited until this morning to feed him, but I hoped if I could get some food into him last night, then he’d sleep like the huge baby he is.
The ache in my heart makes me look away.
This is way out of the ordinary for him. Other big cats wouldn’t adjust nearly as well. They’d be pacing all the time, anxious and growling and afraid, hurt paw or not.
But Bruce? He takes it in stride, trusting the situation as long as I’m with him.
Trusting me.
One more reason why I can’t let him down, not for anything.
He’s such a unique animal. Personable, tender, and entirely gorgeous. Even his markings are a living masterpiece, from the layered orange and creamy white fur to the charcoal-black stripes cutting through his coat in sharp, slashing intervals.
He groans in his sleep, opening a lazy eye, glancing at me for a second before he’s out like a brick again.
“Sleep, big guy. Just a little longer until we sort this crap out,” I whisper.
Huffing out a worried breath, I walk to the gate that separates the center of the barn from other areas around the old, empty farm.
No exaggeration, the building is put together like Fort Knox. Even while I’m terrified my luck could run out any hour, I have to admit I couldn’t have picked a better place to crash-land for the night.
Or a better stranger to crash into.
Grady and his fortress of a barn are a double miracle.
The center of the building, where he backed the trailer in, is a large space that runs the length of the barn with big, heavy sliding metal doors. On both sides of the area are walls of cement blocks, broken up with metal gates every five feet for entrances into cement block stalls.
There’s also a sweeping storage room, which is where I left the ice chest, my next worry.
It’s got just enough meat for one more feeding before I’ll have to scramble for Bruce’s meals. Next to the storeroom is a set of stairs leading to the loft overhead.
Yeah, I couldn’t have dreamed up a better place to house Bruce overnight. I’m also happy about the row of windows near the ceiling, where plenty of sunlight spills in.
A tiger needs natural light, and lots of it. The lack of it at the refuge bothered me from the start.
His pen there was cave-like and cramped, and they barely gave the poor cat enough caged-in space to step on the grass in his minuscule enclosure outside. It was more mud than anything else.
I worried about muscle atrophy from day one, and that’s not counting the effect on Bruce’s moods or the other poor animals there in similar condition.
Opening the door leading outside, I exit and make sure the latch is secure before walking back to the house.
If the barn is an unexpected fortress, the old farmhouse is almost too normal—and I mean it in the best way.
The place looks picture-perfect by day.
All stark white with a green metal roof, a huge front porch, and gabled dormer windows on the second floor.
Those cute windows are framed with wide shutters, each painted a rustic red. There’s even a tall brick chimney running up one side.
The room I slept in must’ve been a back porch once from the looks of it. A sliding glass door off the dining area is how I’d walked outside, and I use the same door to reenter. Very quietly, because the handsome owner must still be sleeping.
I can’t help smiling because Grady reminds me a little of a big cat himself.
Silly, I know, but the comparison kinda hits you in the face.
He’s big, tough, totally built, and a little scary on the outside...but deep down?
I already sense a walking teddy bear.
That’s where the similarities end, though.
Because if I’m being honest, Bruce doesn’t scare me one bit. And Grady’s intimidating good looks and snarlypants style are only scary because he’s scary hot.
Back in my room, I peel off my boots and socks, but decide lying back down would be useless now that I’m wide awake, so I return to the kitchen instead.
The house is clean enough despite its discord. No cobwebs, dirt, or trash piled up, but it’s a bit cluttered, like things just haven’t been put away for several days.
I smile, remembering how Grady’s skin had a hint of red behind his thick scruff last night when we’d first walked in. I saw it out of the corner of my eye.
He shouldn’t be embarrassed.
I know all about single men raising daughters. It was tough on my dad, and I can only imagine how much harder it would’ve been if he’d had two of me to deal with.
A tiny giggle burbles up my throat, knowing the damage double Willows could’ve done to Dad.
I raised plenty of teenage hell all by my lonesome, thank you very much.
Double trouble would’ve sent him to the nuthouse.
Orderly to a fault—as my father describes me—I walk to the sink that’s piled high with dishes.
Cleaning up a few plates is the least I can do to thank Grady for his hospitality, taking me in after midnight along with—you know—a freaking full-grown tiger.
Dad also says I’m impulsive and too stubborn to know what’s good for me. Maybe so, but he loves me anyway.
I also know that had I called him, told him to send Grady thousands of dollars, Dad would’ve questioned me up and down. But in the end, he’d send the money.
Not because it’s ever happened before, of course, but because he trusts me. I don’t make a h
abit of running off with exotic beasts without one hell of a good reason.
And thank the holy stars this is a first. I don’t want Dad involved.
Sure, I’ll tell him when it’s all over, someday when he’s knocked back a few glasses of good wine and my life is awesome. He’ll be drunk and laughing so hard he’ll always wonder if I’m making the whole thing up...
But until then?
I shake my head.
Priscilla and Niles Foss were way too interested in my father to begin with. They knew I was the Peter Macklin’s daughter, and if I’d had my head screwed on sooner, I should’ve seen them chasing after the connections I had right from the start.
Even when they started fishing, I’d made it a point to say I don’t have any connections to researchers or wildlife refuges around the world.
My father does. Not me. Being his daughter doesn’t work like that.
A cold chill whips up my spine, making me work faster to chase the bad thoughts away.
I keep finding things to do like a domestic goddess.
Bye-bye, dishwasher. You’re unloaded, reloaded, and started.
Spotless dishes dried and put away—with everything located where I’d expect.
That tells me a woman organized this kitchen once upon a time. Perhaps his wife’s style stuck around, or maybe his mother stepped in?
My heart sinks.
Big Daddy hasn’t had an easy run, that’s for sure.
I can’t help feeling a little sorry for him.
Been there, done that, and seen what it does to a man.
After wiping down the counters and appliances, I take glass cleaner to the little fingerprints on the sliding glass door and then sweep and damp mop the tile floor.
I hit the living room last and fold up the clothes piled in a chair, all little girl stuff. I stack them in sorted heaps and then give the room a quick dusting before mopping the hardwood floors.
All in all, the house is in great shape for one growly man and two likely rambunctious little girls.
Even for its age, the place is structurally sound and looks like it’s been beautifully kept up over the years.
Yes, I appreciate old things. I love their souls and I like to see them taken care of.
The fireplace on the far wall of the living room completes the whole scene, and the marble around it makes me think it, too, was refurbished recently. It’s flipping gorgeous.
Black-and-white marble makes up the hearth, and the bricks going up the wall have the shimmer of a white oil-based paint.
The mantle for this fireplace is a large slab of wood, a foot or so square.
When I check my dust rag after swiping the top, I’m once again convinced this home is normally very neat and tidy. Hardly any dust at all turns up from the mantle.
Yep, Grady was telling me the truth when he said things were messy because he hasn’t been home much lately. Not that I’d thought he’d been lying, but...it’s nice to confirm what I already suspected.
He’s an overall decent small-town guy who offered to help me out.
Thank God. Who knows where Bruce and I would be right now if he hadn’t been at the bar last night to bring us home.
I plump the pillows on the furniture, and then satisfied with the room, I walk back to the kitchen. Having discovered the laundry room a few paces away earlier, I rinse out the dust rag and hang it over the edge of the laundry sink.
Back in the kitchen, I look at the microwave.
Cool. I’ve done all I can and it’s only nine o’clock. I suppose I could start opening doors, cleaning other rooms, but that would be intrusive even to my impulsive, stubborn, must-make-everything-spotless mind.
Still, I can’t resist opening the pantry door.
It could use a little reorganizing, but I tell myself to chill, ignore it. I’m on my way out as I notice the canister marked COFFEE.
I could use a pick-me-up, and I bet he wouldn’t turn down a fresh pot as soon as he’s up, so...
Maybe I take a few seconds more than I really need when I drop the can back off after getting our coffee on.
Maybe I can’t stop myself from grinning when I enter the large walk-in pantry, flanked with lovely shelves on both sides.
Maybe I stare longingly at an antique pie-tin cupboard on the back wall.
No judging.
I’m only snooping a teensy bit, and only with my eyes.
The cupboard makes me smile. It’s a gorgeous old piece with glass upper doors, a porcelain counter, complete with a pull-out wooden rolling board, a flour bin, and punched tin doors on the bottom. It feels like a crime to hide away a piece of furniture this unique.
No, I’m not insane enough to move it.
But I do straighten things up a bit so its beauty is more noticeable.
I’m busy organizing the canned goods by variety, when I sense I’m no longer alone.
Eep. Last I checked, that’s the sound a woman makes in her own head when there’s a tall, dark, and insanely hot slice of man nearby.
Heat fills my cheeks as I slowly turn and see Grady standing in the pantry doorway, very much the lord of this manor.
His hair is damp like he’s just stepped out of the shower.
Oh, he definitely has.
I can smell a spicy soap mingled with raw testosterone from several feet away. He’s wearing black jeans over those lethal hips and a white-and-blue striped button-down shirt, which only makes him look more handsome than the tight, black t-shirt last night.
Sweet mother of alpha pearls!
“What are you? Some kind of witch who sweeps and mops with her broomsticks instead of throwing around curses?” He smiles, then glances behind him. “Looks like a whole platoon of maids came through here on a mission. You got a few stowaways somewhere?”
Is he for real? His silly, unexpected humor makes me laugh.
“I’m sorry,” I say hurriedly as I finish arranging the canned goods. “I had to keep my hands busy. Couldn’t sleep.”
“At all?” He lifts an eyebrow. “The room wasn’t comfortable?”
Those eyes like dark-brown amber almost glow when they’re open wide.
I’m not sure if he’s joking or not.
“No, I...I slept for a few hours. The bed was perfectly cozy.” I don’t tell him the nerves were all my fault.
He backs out of the doorway and opens a cupboard.
“How long have you been up?”
“About an hour and a half, probably. I’m not the kind to lie around. Once I’m up, I’m ready to rock and roll,” I say, looking at the ground. “And honestly, when I’m nervous, I like to clean. It takes my mind off the things I’d rather not think about.”
No easy confession, and I don’t tell him I think I could clean ten more of his houses right about now.
I walk out of the pantry then, closing the frosted glass door before looking at the clock on the microwave again. Grady looks up, beaming a warm smile at me.
He’d taken two cups out of the cupboard and finishes filling them both. Handing one off to me, he asks, “You did all this in an hour and a half?”
“I mean, there wasn’t that much. Just a little dusting and—”
“Dusting? You dusted, too? Shit. Because I see you did dishes, folded clothes, swept, mopped, organized the pantry, and made coffee. You must be a morning girl on steroids.” He sits down at the table near the sliding glass door and does a double-take that makes me grin.
“It was nothing. Really.”
“Jesus. You even got the fingerprints off the door, too,” he says slowly, his eyes flicking over the glass in awe.
“Guilty,” I whisper, nodding as my cheeks flare with heat.
I swallow a long sip of coffee, amazed by how observant he is, before saying, “The dishwasher’s still running. There’s some work I can’t take credit for, if it makes you happy.”
“Happy?” Grady tosses his head back, releasing a laugh that shows off his straight white teeth. “I owe you an hourly wa
ge, woman. My crew at the Bobcat doesn’t work half as fast as you.”
“Keep it. I think I owe you, remember? Bruce is sleeping like a kitten, by the way,” I say, slurping more coffee.
“Had time to check on your cat, huh?”
“That’s the first thing I did. Well, after I showered and made my bed.”
He chuckles again, a deep, resonate, weirdly pleasant sound.
“My girls could take lessons from you.” A frown forms as he stares at me. “How old are you, anyway?”
“Twenty-four.”
“And you’re a zoologist? Licensed and educated?” He nods at a chair across from him, motioning me with his big hand to take a seat.
I cross the room and do it.
“Yep. I have my master’s degree. I was going to keep going and snag my PhD, but my father suggested I should spend a few years in the field. Practical research working full time with animals before I commit myself to four more years of college.”
“You already did four years?”
“Six. My first four were for the bachelor’s, and the next two the master’s. I doubled up on courses that would count toward my PhD, so it’ll only be four more years instead of five to finish it.”
If I ever get the chance with an arrest record, I think glumly.
Grady lets out a loud whistle.
“That’s commitment. Major respect,” he tells me.
I shrug. To me, it was just life. I did what I had to.
He traces a thick, calloused finger around the top of his coffee mug, intermittently staring at me.
God. His gaze alone feels like an interrogation—or else I’m just primed to go to pieces around single men carved out of pure boulder.
“So, with that education, how the hell did you wind up in North Dakota?” he asks gently.
I hold in a sigh and set my coffee cup on the table, wondering where to start.
“I’ve called Weston, by the way. He’s checking on an alternator now,” Grady says.
Oof. Does he think he needs to guilt me into telling him?
“Thanks,” I say, then add, “I appreciate it. And I wasn’t trying to avoid telling you the dirty details. I was just trying to figure out where to start.”
“How about at the beginning?”
