Page 3 of Second First Kiss

“Let’s see how she talks her way out of this one,” Kat said to Tiny Dancer.

Neigh.

Kat rested her head back on the seat and closed her eyes. She wasn’t lying about the headache. It was the equivalent of the thumping bass in a Snoop Dogg song.

Boom. Boom. Boom, it went. Right behind her eyes.

As if sensing her discomfort, Tiny Dancer wiggled himself out from his seat belt and stuck his head between the front seats, giving her ear a little nibble.

“If you want a nibble, you’d better buy me dinner first.”

“I get off at eleven.”

Kat didn’t bother opening her eyes. She’d recognize that voice anywhere.

Nolan Carmichael. Her neighbor, nemesis, and everyone’s favorite federal officer. Everyone, that was, except Kat. He might be the sexiest man in Sierra Vista, but when it came to her, he was inflexible, closed off, and straitlaced. To the rest of the world, he was this easy to trust, larger than life, gregarious golden boy with a sunny smile. A big teddy bear hiding in grizzly clothing. She’d dated one of those guys before, but it turned out that beneath the playful exterior he really was a grizzly with claws and big paws.

Another thing she needed to remember: That when it came to rules, Nolan was so rigid he made the mountains look smooth. Guys like him never messed with chaos, and Kat’s life was chaos personified.

Not that she wanted him to. Unlike the rest of the female population in their small mountain town, she had zero interest in Ranger Tight-ass.

Then why did you kiss him? her inner bad girl asked.

Because it was a dare and I never turn down a dare.

Her inner bad girl called bullshit. And it was a bullshit excuse, and she knew it. The dare had been a fun game of Buckle Up, where the dare-ee had to take off the belt of the next man who walked through the door—with her teeth. To her dismay, Nolan happened to walk through that door. Wanting to see him squirm, she’d challenged him, and just like her, Nolan couldn’t pass up a challenge. Kat had whipped that belt off in under twenty seconds, then—in a moment of sheer insanity—planted one on him.

They’d been circling each other ever since. For months she had given herself permission to admire from afar, but she’d never allowed herself to act on it. Until that damn belt and one awkward kiss—well, she couldn’t really call it a kiss. It was more of an impromptu brush of the lips with zero warning and zero time to rally. A ludicrous, lashing, lip-smashing kind of deal. Even though it had been the worst kiss in history, he’d still managed to create a spark brighter than fireworks on the Fourth of July. Which was why Kat had been avoiding him.

But she couldn’t forget that spark. Maybe it was the way he’d cupped her cheek or the way he’d gazed down at her gently, but something had flickered between them and it wouldn’t go away.

She didn’t have the time or the bandwidth to do anything more than casual. In fact, ever since she’d come home from Boston, she’d sworn off relationships. She’d had exactly one and discovered that she wasn’t really the “bring home to dad type”—or so her ex’s mom had said. Being romantically challenged was something she’d accepted over the years—so she’d become a one-night-stand champion. And she was okay with that title. It worked for her.

Most of the time.

But that title had become a hindrance in her attempt to gain custody of her sister. She needed to show that, unlike her parents, she had sticking power. Even before their divorce, her parents had missed birthdays, Christmas, even showing up for Tessa’s parent-teacher conferences. Tessa was falling through the cracks, and Kat was determined to catch her—but Abe refused to sign over custody. He thought it made him look like a bad father.

And since the loss of their grandpa, that meant Tessa only had Kat as a role model. The irony wasn’t lost on her—or the rest of the town.

Things got really bad when Abe got injured on the job and fell behind on, well, everything. It took him two years of physical therapy to heal, but he had to find another career. To this day, Kat never understood how, out of all the possible career choices, a father could pick a job that put thousands of miles between him and his family. Maybe if he’d had a partner who stayed at home it wouldn’t have been so traumatic.

Then again, he did. Kat. He’d asked Kat to walk away from the future possibilities Boston represented. That help eventually became a full-time job, until Kat found that her dream of finishing college was no longer an option.

Still standing at her window, Nolan cleared his throat, as if expecting a real answer to his ridiculous offer.

“You’ll have to get off on your own. I don’t accept nibbles from men who kiss like corpses,” she said to Nolan, referring to that kiss three months ago.

“Is that your way of asking for a second round? Because I promise you, one kiss and you’ll be begging me to use my tongue—and not just on your mouth.”

A tiny trill of anticipation flickered in her belly. A demoralizing feeling.

She finally turned her head to acknowledge Nolan’s presence and her tongue turned to dust. Instead of his department-issued uniform, he was in faded jeans that were soft in all the right places, a red and black flannel that was waging war with his biceps, and a black ball cap turned backward. He looked like Thor and Paul Bunyan had a love child.

He was bending over slightly, his hands resting on the roof of her car, his face so close she could make out every dark hair of his scruff.

“What are you even doing here?” she asked, working hard to keep her gaze from landing on his lips. Either he could read minds, or she had a very bad poker face, because he smiled this annoying, You’re totally thinking about round two smile.

“I should ask you the same.”

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