Chapter 1
The Worst Type of Man
Katelyn
“So, Missy, what’s it going to be? The blue or the brown?” Missy, Katelyn Anderson’s seventeen year old seal point Siamese blinked her crystal blue eyes dispassionately. She stared at Katelyn, unblinking. “I know. Boring, boring, boring. All anyone wants here in their houses is boring stuff. Boring colors. Boring furniture. The same old. Why even hire a designer if you’re just going to put the same old carpet in?”
Missy closed her eyes. She shifted on the dark blue leather couch, curling into a tight ball. Katelyn heaved a long sigh. “That’s okay. Just tune me out then.” She stared hard at the carpet samples. “I guess I’ll go with the brown. Matches their wall color and it’s the safer choice. Hides dirt well.”
Her cat didn’t move. Missy was a rescue from a non-kill Miami rescue group. If she’d come into any other shelter, she probably would have been put down to her age and the fact that she currently was in early stages of kidney disease.
Always an animal lover, Katelyn stated following some of the rescues on social media when she’d made the move to Miami the year before. When she had time, she volunteered for fundraisers with the rescues, steak nights and art nights, that sort of thing. When she’d seen Missy, it was love at first sight.
Katelyn turned her attention away from the carpet samples she’d laid out on the coffee table. She reached out and ran a hand gently down Missy’s back. The fur wasn’t supple or youthful. Neither the dark chocolate brown points or the creamy beige had any luster. No matter how much brushing that coat received, it was always lank and oily, almost shaggy. Missy had once been a beautiful cat, in her prime. She still was, to Katelyn, even though her back was a little saggy, her hip bones too prominent, her dark nose dotted liberally with gray. She needed special food and kidney medication administered orally twice a night, but the two hundred dollars a month was a small price to pay for companionship.
Siamese cats were known to be talkers. Missy was no exception. She usually held up her end of the conversation.
A deep rumble started under Katelyn’s fingers. Missy’s body heat warmed her hand and her lonely soul. Though she worked with people all day, she often felt alone. She’d never been that way before John Robertson. She hated to admit her sister, Dinah, had been right. A whirlwind courtship, a fast marriage and a move across the Atlantic hadn’t been the best decision. Katelyn was married and divorced after two years. She’d always said she’d never turn into her mother. Old enough to know better, but unable to help herself. Bouncing from man to man. Divorced three times.
She closed her eyes and let Missy’s soft purr take her away. Back to London, back to the small house she shared with her sister and her brand new niece. It was incredible that Isabella was now three. She’d been just a newborn when Katelyn left. How her sister managed to do it on her own was beyond her. She had all she could do to take care of Missy and her cat was pretty damn independent.
“So, Missy. Do you want your tuna now or in an hour when it’s time?”
Missy’s head perked up at the word. Katelyn smiled. She couldn’t even get the can opener out of the drawer without Missy running into the kitchen and rubbing all over her legs. Her feline best friend was often mighty disappointed to find it wasn’t tuna at all being opened, but a can of soup, or worse, vegetables.
The old Siamese let out a meow that anyone else would classify as a horrible noise. It sounded like a deep squeal with a squawk at the end. She blinked her large blue eyes, her interest fully tuned into Katelyn.
“I’ll take that as a yes. Wish you’d been that helpful with the carpet choice.”
Katelyn stood and headed towards the kitchen. Her condo wasn’t large, but it was nice. It was a fairly new construction, the building only five years old.
Missy stood on the blue leather couch. It was sleek and hard, completely uncomfortable. It had wooden legs, mid-century style even though it was new. Katelyn found it on a classifieds site when she moved. She didn’t see the point of spending a fortune on new furniture when she could find things that were still in good shape at a bargain. She knew from experience what a throw-away society it was. She’d designed enough places to understand that perfectly good things were often donated or worse, pitched in the dumpster. She’d always had a flare for design and after years of schooling and even more experience, it was easy for her to put together a classy space, even on a budget with second hand items.
The sofa was now dotted with claw marks, thanks to Missy’s desire to use it as a scratching post instead of the two hundred dollar cat tree that sat untouched in the corner, but Katelyn didn’t truly mind. She loved Missy, not the couch.
“Okay. We’ll see what we can find.”
Missy sat attentively on the gray laminate flooring in the kitchen. It ran throughout the whole condo. It wasn’t overly expensive, Katelyn knew just by looking at it, but it was distressed in an attempt at the ever popular rustic look. It was functional and hid scratches and dirt. She liked that. She liked that she didn’t have to sweep and mop six times a day. With Missy’s shedding, dark flooring would have been an impossibility to keep clean. The gray worked well for them.
Katelyn opened up the small pantry cupboard and produced a can of tuna. She used a little tuna to hide Missy’s medicine in. A can generally lasted a few days. The rest of the time, she spoiled Missy with soft food from the vet, specially for cats with kidney disease. It was lucky Missy liked it. She wasn’t a fussy eater except when it came to the stuff she had to eat, then she usually turned her nose up at it.
The roar of a motorcycle split the quiet of the kitchen. Katelyn started, nearly dropping the can.
“Oh, that damn bike,” she swore under her breath. She set the can down on the counter and stalked to the window.
She loved her condo. She was happy with just about everything except for the fact that the attached unit was owned by some guy she was pretty sure was in some kind of gang. She’d never introduced herself, but she’d seen him often enough, in the parking lot, coming or going on that damn loud bike. The thing was so noisy it literally rattled the window panes in her unit when he pulled up. Her neighbor was the kind of human who instantly instilled fear in just about everyone, young and old and all those in between just by his appearance.
From the window she watched the guy park the bike in the stall right next to her small, lime green sedan. He popped off an all-black helmet, revealing long, nearly shoulder length black hair. It was wild and free flowing, the kind of hair that most women would want to bury their fingers in just to feel if it was as soft as it looked. The guy’s black leather jacket, faded jeans covered in leather chaps and black riding boots looked suited to someone who belonged in a bike gang.
Worse of all, the guy’s neck was tattooed. Katelyn hadn’t ever been close enough to figure out what it actually was of, but she could see the dark black ink sprawling all over the man’s throat like a dark stain. She wondered, with a shiver that was half fear, half thrill, how much ink was hidden below that leather jacket.
The man wasn’t young and he wasn’t old. Probably late thirties. He had the broad shoulders, height and muscular build of a man who took care of himself. Either he worked out or he’d been born with an impeccable set of genetics. His face, even at a distance, was quite handsome. He had a strong brow, deep set eyes, straight nose, tough lips and, she imagined, a granite jawline, though it was hard to tell given that a thick black beard, the kind that was long enough to actually braid, obscured the bottom part of his face. Her neighbor had the kind of features that were carved by nature rather than created by two parents. The kind that women drooled all over. He might have been attractive if it wasn’t for the chilling vibe he set off.
As far as she knew, no one in the complex even knew the guy’s name or what he did for a living. No one went near his house. She was unfortunate enough not to have known he lived there when she bought the unit. His bike hadn’t been parked in front when she’d viewed the unit. It was a small wonder it was cheaper than all the rest and had been on the market the longest. She thought she was getting a steal of a deal and hadn’t hesitated.
Behind her, Missy mewed instantly, pulling Katelyn out of her own creepy vigil at the window. She shook herself and turned away. Missy took off in the direction of the kitchen and Katelyn followed, can opener still in hand.
She didn’t want to admit that she was gripping the handle just a little too tightly or that she had a funny feeling in the pit of her stomach or that the shiver that traveled up her spine wasn’t quite all fear when it came to her neighbor.
Then again, she might as well acknowledge the fact she found the guy’s bad boy aura mysterious and that drew her attention which in turn became interest which had morphed into awareness which turned into a reluctant attraction.
It made sense, given that she’d always fallen for the worst type of men.