“So the cats are really okay here?” she asked.
“Of course.”
Eddie was up on the couch now, sniffing and looking around. Mitch moved, grabbing the blanket that was draped over the back of the couch and spreading it out over half of the cushions. Eddie immediately walked onto the blanket, kneaded it a few times with his paws, then plopped down.
“You’re going to have cat hair all over your stuff.”
Mitch took the three steps that separated them and looked down at her. “As long as I have your stuff all over my house, I don’t mind a little cat hair.”
“My stuff?”
“Your bras in my dryer. Your shampoo in my shower. Your hummus in my fridge.” He gave her a grin and moved in closer, his voice dropping. “Your sweet ass—and the rest of you—in my bed every night.”
Her breath caught in her chest. Dammit.
“Your roommate doesn’t hate cats, does he? He’s not allergic?”
She’d almost forgotten that Mitch had a guy living with him, but the fact came back to her suddenly.
“Griff—Griffin Foster. He’s a veterinarian.”
“What? Really?”
“Yep. Joined Tori in her practice and is taking care of the otters and the rest of the petting zoo.”
“So he won’t mind the cats.”
“Well…” Mitch grinned. “He’s a grumpy ass. Kind of pissy about being here in Autre taking care of goats when a few months ago he was the head vet at the National Zoo, leading their propagation program.”
Paige’s eyes got wide. “What happened?”
“He yelled at a donor at a fundraiser and got fired. So Tori gave him a job.”
“Wow. I’ll tread carefully.”
“No.” Mitch shook his head. “I want you comfortable here. He’ll be nice and tolerate the cats. Or he can go live with Ellie and Leo. And he does not want that.”
“You’d kick your roommate out to make room for my cats?” she asked.
Mitch tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “Yes. Without question.”
“Griffin is a jerk?”
“Griffin is great. I like him a lot. His attitude about goats and pot-bellied pigs… which love him, by the way… is hilarious.”
“But you’d pick my cats?”
“I pick you.”
Yeah, reason number seven this was a bad idea… Mitch Landry was pretty damned irresistible.
3
Mitch wanted to take her straight to bed.
And not let her out for two weeks. Or until she promised that she was going to stay in Autre. For six months. He’d say six months anyway. He wanted a hell of a lot more than that, but even six months would be a huge promise for his gorgeous commitment-phobe. He knew this about her. She hadn’t kept her allergy to romantic relationships a secret.
It hadn’t kept him from falling for her and wanting more though.
And now she was here.
He couldn’t believe it. Well, believing that another guy had proposed and that it had freaked her out enough that she’d gotten in her car and out of town wasn’t that hard to believe.
What the fuck was with the guys in Appleby, Iowa? You didn’t just propose to a woman because you found her attractive, you’d known her forever, and you were both single.
Fine, she’d told him that she’d dated the others who had proposed. Not seriously. Not for long. But at least they had a small reason to think that she might say yes. What was with this last guy at her sister’s wedding? He hadn’t even taken her out to dinner?
Mitch worked on taking a deep breath. There was no need to get riled up about the dumbasses back in Iowa who Paige had turned down. She was here now. With him. In Autre. In his house. And she wasn’t leaving at least until after Tori and Josh’s wedding. That was three weeks. Three weeks of having her here, with him, showing her what this could be.
Three weeks of having her in his life.
His life that consisted of a huge number of loud, no-filter, nosy-as-hell family members.
They were going to scare her off.
The thought hit him as he stared into her huge blue eyes. The eyes he’d already seen light up with humor and excitement, love—even if it was love for her cats—and passion.
He couldn’t let his family spook her. They were exactly like the people she’d traveled a thousand miles to escape. They were involved in everything, around all the time, full of advice and admonishment. They were also, he had to admit, crazier than hers.
Her family was meddlesome.
The Landrys were that… and so much more. They laughed and yelled and couldn’t define the word “privacy”. But more, they had Cajun customs and traditions and a blue-collar bayou lifestyle that might be a lot for a yoga-practicing, cat-crazy vegetarian from Iowa.
They believed in ghosts, they believed in bayou magic—to varying extents, but they all agreed the bayou was a special place that people didn’t fully understand—and they loved fiercely. Which meant taking care of each other and protecting each other, even when the other person didn’t want taking care of or protecting.
They also fought like crazy and could hold grudges that sometimes spanned lifetimes.
Paige really couldn’t be with him, even temporarily, without being with them all.
That was going to give this woman hives.
He was going to have to work this out somehow. Because he couldn’t let her go.
He heard a truck coming down the street and instantly snapped into action.
“We need to go,” he told her. “Come on.” He grabbed her hand and started for the front door.
The chance that the truck didn’t belong to a relative was about point two percent. This wasn’t a through street. It dead-ended three houses down from his. The only people driving by were his neighbors. And all three of his neighbors were cousins.
Sure, the truck could be one of those cousins going home with no idea that Paige was here and no intention of stopping at Mitch’s.
But the chances that it was a relative coming over to meet Paige were about ninety-nine percent.
They crossed the porch as the truck pulled up behind Paige’s car.
Yep, that was Owen. And Maddie. And Kennedy. And Ellie.
He was going to have to have a word with Owen later. He should know better than to enable this.
Then again, Owen would do anything for Maddie.
And then there was Kennedy, who had dirt and secrets on all of them. The brattiest of his Autre cousins, and one of the only girls, Kennedy had always been around. They learned when they’d gotten older, and it was too late, that she’d always been paying attention and keeping track of the things they hadn’t wanted their parents to find out about.
Maybe the worst of all, though, was Ellie. Their grandmother. The feisty matriarch of the family. She could get them all to do just about anything. In part, because they all loved her dearly. And in part, because they were all just a little bit scared of her.
Plus, she cooked for them all every day. You never wanted to piss off the woman who could keep the best gumbo in the state away from you.
“Paige?”
She was staring at the truck full of Landrys. “Yeah?”
“Run.”