Loving You (The Bridesmaids Club Book 2) (25 page)

She was in trouble. Big, in-your-face trouble that involved three cheeky kittens and a man who was far too easy to be around.

The next few days would be interesting.

***

Dylan pulled the box of kittens out of his truck. They’d meowed all the way over to Annie’s apartment, letting him know they weren’t impressed with being moved again. After looking after them for three days, he knew that once they had full tummies they wouldn’t care where they were.

Annie opened her front door and smiled at the box. “They sound like they’re ready for my garage. Do you want me to bring anything in?”

“There’s a whole pile of things on the back seat. If you want to take the kittens, I’ll get everything out of the truck.”

Annie smiled as she lifted the box out of his hands. She rubbed the top of one of the kitten’s paws when it appeared through an air hole in the top of the box. “This is going to be fun. I’ve never looked after kittens before.”

“What about when you were a kid?” Dylan didn’t think there’d be many people who hadn’t had a kitten in their home.

The smile on Annie’s face disappeared. “My parents weren’t very good at looking after anything. I’ll put the kittens in the garage, then give you a hand with the other stuff.”

Dylan watched her walk down the hallway. “Make sure you close the garage door. They’re good at escaping.”

Annie looked over her shoulder and smiled. “Does that mean they escaped from you?”

“Maybe,” Dylan muttered. “I’ll be back soon.” He left Annie’s front door open and headed across to his truck. It didn’t sound as though Annie’s childhood had been all that great. She was such a kind person that he couldn’t imagine how she’d lived with parents who didn’t seem to care about much in life except themselves.

He grabbed the bag of kitty litter, a tray, a soft blanket and a bag of cat toys. The kittens wouldn’t be bored. Hopefully they wouldn’t play hide and seek in the depths of Annie’s garage.

“Wow. You’ve come prepared.” Annie stared at the pile of things in his hands.

“There’s still the cat food on the seat with their food bowls and some bottled water.”

“Bottled water?”

Dylan didn’t think there was anything wrong with giving the kittens pure spring water. “They’re only little.”

“They’re cats,” Annie said. “Cats drink water out of puddles and buckets. Tap water is fine.”

“I thought you’d never had a pet cat?”

“I haven’t.” Annie lifted the bag of kitten food out of his truck. “I used to feed the stray cats around our house. They weren’t too fussy about what they ate and drank. I’ll show you where the door to the garage is.”

Dylan followed Annie inside. As they passed the kitchen, he sniffed the air and smiled. “What have you made?”

“I didn’t know what you’d be eating this close to the Half Ironman, so I looked online at different recipes. The website I found said to make a high-carb meal with a little bit of protein. I hope you like spaghetti with turkey meatballs and broccoli.”

“I’m impressed.”

Annie slowly opened the garage door and pulled him inside. “Don’t be. I did it for totally selfish reasons. I didn’t want to be the person who fed you the wrong food before your competition.” She looked across the room and smiled. “They’re making themselves at home already.”

Dylan watched Boxer swipe a ball hanging from a long cord attached to the rafters. Boots and Blinky were watching their brother, ready to pounce when the ball came close. Annie had put a box on the side of the room and filled it with a pink blanket. She took the kitten’s food bowl out of his hands and left it beside the box.

Before Annie had torn the bag of kitten food completely open, Boxer tumbled toward her. His plaintive meow bought his sisters scurrying across the room. All three kittens waited patiently beside the food bowl, their pink mouths open and wailing their impatience.

“It must be noisy at meal times in your house?” Annie patted each of the kittens as they dived into the bowl of food.

“You can say that again. I thought they meowed a lot because my house was new to them, but I don’t think so. They just like talking to each other.” He unscrewed the cap on the bottle of water and poured some into another bowl. “I brought some of their toys.”

Annie grinned. “I can see that. Why don’t you scatter them on the floor? I won’t be using the garage while the kittens are here.”

Dylan had seen Annie’s car parked outside when he’d arrived. “Where’s your bike?”

“In my office. I didn’t want to risk letting the kittens outside when I take it to work each morning.”

“Wise move.” He stared at the kittens. “Thanks for looking after them.”

Annie walked toward the door leading into the hallway. “I’m happy to help. Now come and have dinner before everything burns.”

Dylan knew the chances of that happening were slim to nothing. The closer they got to her kitchen, the hungrier he felt. Meatballs and broccoli had never smelled so good.

“What are you eating for the next two nights?” Annie took a colander out of a cupboard and poured the spaghetti into it.

“Rice and chicken.” He smiled at her nod. “We must have read the same book.”

“Will you be okay during the race on your own?”

Dylan stood a little taller. “What do you mean?”

Annie glanced at him quickly as she stirred the meatballs in the tomato sauce. “Don’t be prickly. I meant as far as energy drinks and getting changed after each part of the race.”

Dylan sat on a kitchen stool. It had to be better than putting his foot in his mouth. “The officials have drink stations set up along the route. Changing isn’t too hard. I’ll pull my wetsuit off after the swim and throw my bike shorts on.”

Annie put their meal together and handed the plates to him. “You take these. I’ll get some water for us.”

He left the plates on the dining room table and watched Annie move around the kitchen. She had a calmness about her that intrigued him. “You like working in a kitchen, don’t you?”

“Am I that obvious?”

He shrugged his shoulders. “Sometimes. We’re keeping to schedule with the warehouse. The painter’s arriving next week. The kitchen should be looking brand new by the end of the following week.” Dylan had left the color of the kitchen walls entirely in Annie’s hands. She’d be the person having to see them every day, so it seemed fair that she choose.

“That’s good. I’m meeting Molly, Tess and Sally on Friday night. We’re going to taste test the final six menu choices I’ve selected.”

Dylan bit into a meatball and sighed. “If turkey meatballs are one of your options, you can feed me those every night of the week.”

“You’re easy to please.”

He wished he was. “Only in some things,” he muttered.

Annie concentrated on her meal, ignoring the blush on her cheeks as much as he was ignoring the thoughts going through his head. “How’s your website looking?”

Annie stopped chewing and looked up at him.

The laughter in her eyes made him smile. “I’m trying to be on my best behavior. Your website seemed like a safe option.”

She swallowed what was in her mouth. “The website is looking great. Once I’ve decided what meals I’m going to offer we can finish off the last details. It was a good safe question.”

Dylan smiled. For the next forty minutes, they kept asking each other lots of good safe questions. By the end of the meal he needed to go for a run. He’d never worried about what he said to a woman. He didn’t have enough conversations with females to worry about what he said.

Being Annie’s friend without anything else happening was going to be hard work, harder than figuring out how to live a normal life.

He was hoping that one day she’d want to be more than friends. That maybe, without knowing how it had happened, she’d fallen in love with him. He almost laughed out loud. The chance of that happening was less than the odds of three kittens living permanently in his home.

Chapter Ten

“This one’s a winner.” Molly waved her dessert spoon in the air. “You can’t leave tiramisu off the menu. Even if your customers have no teeth they’ll be able to eat it.”

Sally laughed so hard that tears rolled down her face. Tess passed her some tissues. It had been one of the funniest business meetings Annie had ever been to. They’d started the evening by going through her “to do” list, crossing things off with a flourish. The fun had started when Annie pulled the main dish options out of the oven and microwave.

Tess had been hysterical as she’d compared the virtues of smoked salmon over baked ribs. Molly had devoured most of the chicken casserole before anyone else had eaten more than a mouthful, and Sally had eaten nearly half a loaf of bread with the butternut squash soup.

Tess moved fast, whipping what was left of the tiramisu out from under Molly’s nose. She dipped her spoon into the sweet dessert and smiled. “I agree with Molly. This one’s a keeper.”

Annie turned to the piece of paper she’d stuck on her wall. She put a big tick beside the tiramisu. “That gives me three entrees, five main course meat dishes, two vegetarian options, and four desserts. Are you sure about the apple and plum crumble?”

Sally threw her tissues in the trash. “You can’t leave it off the menu. It tasted absolutely yummy and you could make the filling ahead of time.”

Tess nodded. “She’s right. You want food that tastes amazing, freezes really well and is easy to reheat or thaw. The crumble beats pancakes hands down.”

“You could always add pancakes to the menu later on?” Sally suggested. “It could be a special limited time offer.”

Annie was having a hard enough time sorting through her basic menu without adding other options. “Okay. I’ll go with the crumble.” Her cell phone beeped and she took it out of her pocket, looking at who’d sent her a text.

“It’s Dylan again, isn’t it?” Sally grinned from the other side of the kitchen counter.

Annie poked her tongue out at her far too romantic friend. It wasn’t only Sally that had suddenly taken an interest in the text. Tess and Molly were waiting for the latest installment in her less than interesting life. She looked down at her cell phone and re-read the message out loud. “He’s arrived back at the hotel from his pre-race briefing. Everything’s going well. Off to have dinner.”

Molly sighed and Sally giggled.

Annie glared at them. “You’ve got it all wrong. Dylan’s my friend.”

“Of course he is.” Sally scooped some chocolate fudge ice cream out of a bowl. “He’s only sent two texts in the last couple of hours.” She nibbled on the ice cream, then looked at Tess. “Why did we reject this? It’s delicious.”

Tess looked down at her notes. “It defrosts too quickly and crystallized ice cream is no one’s favorite dessert.”

Sally nodded as she dipped her spoon into the bowl again. “Dylan seems like the type of man who would appreciate a fine dessert. Maybe homemade chocolate fudge ice cream might change his mind about the friend thing.”

“It’s not Dylan that needs sweetening,” Molly said with a grin.

Annie pushed her kitchen stool out from the counter and stood up. “There’s nothing wrong with being friends.”

“Of course there isn’t,” Molly agreed. “Except when more could be better. And from what I’ve seen of Dylan, more could definitely be better.”

Annie turned the coffee machine on and looked at the three women who’d helped turn her life around. “Dylan and I are friends. If you want to talk about romance, you can’t go wrong with Tess.”

Tess put her pen down and frowned at the plates in front of her. “I’m not so sure about the romance part. Planning a wedding is like living in a war zone. Everyone wants to do things their way.”

“At least you won’t have to worry about bridesmaids’ dresses.” Sally rinsed her dessert bowl under the faucet. “We’ve got so many of those that it wouldn’t matter if another thirty brides descended on us, we’d still have enough dresses to go around.”

Tess smiled at Annie as she left a hot cup of coffee in front of her. “Thanks, Annie. Has everyone chosen the bridesmaid’s dress they want to wear for my wedding?”

“Not yet,” Sally said. “I was waiting for everyone else to choose first.”

“Why don’t we go and choose our dresses now?” Molly looked at everyone with an excited gleam in her eyes. “We’ve got all night, unless someone’s disappearing on a hot date they haven’t told me about?”

“Not me,” Sally groaned. “If I had a man in my life I wouldn’t have eaten so much dessert.”

“And half a gallon of soup,” Molly reminded her. “I can’t figure out where you put all of the food you eat. You’re as skinny as a bean pole.”

Sally grinned. “I was born with a fast metabolism.”

“And it helps that you never sit still for more than five minutes,” Tess added.

Sally shrugged her shoulders. “Maybe. But the sitting still thing has a lot to do with having older brothers. If I sat still for more than five minutes they put gross things down my shirt, like frogs and worms.”

Annie left a mug of coffee in front of Sally and Molly. “Being an only child definitely has its benefits. There were no worms in sight when I was little.”