Not much of a greeting. Yeah, she so wasn't interested in him. She held her hands out for her pet, and Ian turned the cat over.
"She was in my car . . . it was the weirdest thing. I drove all the way through town and looked over, and suddenly she was just sitting on the passenger seat." He still couldn't imagine how it had happened, but there it was.
Bree's eyebrows rose. "You can't be serious."
"Totally. I have no idea how it could have happened, but I swear to God, she was suddenly just there with me."
"Yeah, because cats just open car doors and jump in." Bree rolled her eyes.
Ian frowned back. "I know it's insane," he said in irritation. "But she was in my car, and I didn't put her there."
"Whatever."
There was no single word more designed to incite Ian's anger. He couldn't stand it when people said that to him. It catapulted him back to childhood, when his older sister would toss "whatever" at him a hundre
d times a day. It made him feel dismissed, humiliated. So he immediately reacted. "What, you think I swiped your damn cat or something?"
"That certainly seems more plausible than my cat somehow opening my front door and your car door—and closing both again, I might add—in the five minutes you and I sat in my kitchen. It's ridiculous."
"So is the idea that I would steal your cat, and then bring her right back. What kind of moronic theft is that?" Ian's indignation rose. What, like he'd steal a freakin' cat? "And why would I want your cat anyway?"
"I have no idea. Nor do I know why your client wants my house. But neither of you can have either."
She started to close the door on him yet again, but Ian stuck his palm out and held it open. Bree tried to push harder, but he was stronger. He was not a cat thief. "I didn't take your cat. I don't want your cat." Really. He didn't.
"What do you want?" she asked acidly.
"You," Ian said. Hell, he figured he hadn't risen to success from poverty based on being passive. He had always been aggressive in going after what he wanted, and Bree shouldn't be any different.
"Excuse me?" She blinked, looking more shocked than outraged.
Ian met her gaze. "I am attracted to you, and I'm hoping you'll agree to go to dinner with me."
There was a long pause, during which Ian was aware that he was still standing on the front porch and his nuts were going numb while she stared at him, and he was just about resigned to rejection when Bree nodded.
"Okay."
"Okay?" Ian was shocked into parroting her, but he rallied. "Okay, great. Fabulous. I'm only in town for a few more days, so are you busy tonight?"
"Tonight would work."
Said she with zero enthusiasm. Very ego-boosting. But she had agreed to dinner, so he was going to roll with it. "Let me have your number . . . I'll make some reservations and call you." Ian pulled out his cell phone.
Bree gave a smile. "You don't really need reservations in Cuttersville."
But she gave him her number anyway, reciting it quickly, testing the speed of Ian's typing.
"I'd take your number, but my phone is upstairs."
"I'll call it," he said. "So it's in your phone." He hit send for the number she had just given him and let it ring until the voice mail picked up. He smiled at her as he spoke into his phone. "Hi, this is Ian Carrington calling for Bree Murphy to see if we can change our dinner plans to a late lunch. I'd rather not wait to see you."
It was a risk, throwing his interest so clearly out there, and he watched her reaction closely, but Bree didn't balk. She just raised an eyebrow. He continued, "So let me know what you think, and I look forward to hearing from you." He hung up his phone.
"You don't have a lot of patience, do you?" she asked, still holding her cat. It didn't sound like a censure, just curiosity.
"No, I suppose not. I want what I want."
And he wanted her. The unspoken words hung in the air between them.