“Nope.”
“Yeah, you do. Try rolling it around on your tongue. Get used to it. Ree-jec-tee-onnn.” She exaggerated her mouth’s movements, and then clamped it shut when she noticed he was watching her lips with something other than detached interest. Okay, that wasn’t the reaction she wanted, but now that she got it, she couldn’t stop thinking about anything else. She remembered his mouth on hers, firm and decisive, and she wanted to kiss him again.
Stupid Bianca and her stupid rules about not kissing.
“So what is this?” he asked. “I’d say you were playing hard to get, but the cat on your lap tells me otherwise.”
She jerked, startling the cat in her arms. It was like he knew what Bianca had been saying to her. Edie’s eyes narrowed. “I told you I was volunteering.”
“Which is great. I can keep you company.” He scanned the busy festival. The only people even remotely near their booth were children sticking their fingers in the kitten cages. No one was approaching her end of the table with the elderly cats, even though she had a sign that said Adoption Fees Waived Today. Magnus leaned in closer to her. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but your scowl is keeping people away.”
Edie gave him a startled look. “What? It’s not me. It’s the fact that they’re elderly cats with issues.”
“No?” He nodded at the white Persian in her arms. “That one looks fine.”
“It’s eleven years old and it’s blind.”
“Oh.” His mouth lifted in one of those huge grins. “Well that explains why it’s not intimidated by your scowl.”
She bared her teeth at him.
“Or that.”
“People don’t want an old blind cat,” Edie said, ignoring his teasing. She pointed at the other two in cages. “That one has diabetes. And the other one only has three legs.”
“So what happens if no one adopts them?”
“They go back to the shelter and wait some more.” She stroked the sweet cat in her lap. “This one’s coming home with me, though. She gets too scared at the shelter.”
“Don’t you already have a lot of cats?”
“A few,” she said defensively. “There’s always room for one more.” There wasn’t, really, but she’d figure it out somehow.
“You have a soft heart, don’t you?”
She ignored his gentle, teasing words, focusing on the cat in her lap. “This cat was loved and cared for by someone for eleven years. Then, because of one small defect, she’s suddenly abandoned by those she loved as not good enough? Thrust into a new scary world where no one loves her and that’s full of frightening noises, and she can’t understand what’s going on because she can’t see? I’m not sending her back to that.”
His gaze focused on her face. “Something tells me it all isn’t about the cat, is it?”
Psychoanalysis? From him? Please. She gave him an irritated look.
He ignored her withering expression and put his arms out. “Can I hold it?”
“Do you even know how?”
“It’s a cat, not a porcupine. I’m sure I can figure out the basics.”
“You’ll let her get away.” She leveled him an unhappy look. “I can’t chase her down if you let her get away.”
“She won’t go anywhere. And I’ve been practicing my cat mojo with Lady Cujo.” He winked at her. “Got her purring at the touch of my fingers.”
“It’s a cat, not a hooker,” she sniped at him. “Don’t make it sound so lewd.”
He clutched his chest with a mock-shocked look. “You’re just jealous that I’m talking about her and not you.”
Edie rolled her eyes at him. “I’m not jealous of a cat.”
“Then let me hold that one.”
And because she couldn’t think of a good reason to deny him, and because Peggy was watching her closely, she lifted the cat toward him so he could take it.
Magnus took the cat from her with gentle hands and cradled it against his chest, scratching its back idly. He gave her a triumphant look as if to say See? Which made her just shake her head, biting back a smile. Then he nodded at her. “Looks like you only gave me half the cat.”
She looked down at her black sweater and groaned. White long-haired cat plus black sweater meant tons of cat hair. “It’s a look I’m used to,” she admitted, plucking at a few of the worst tufts. “And it’s a look you’d better get used to if you’re going to keep holding Purrletta.”
“Purrletta?”
“That’s what I’m going to name her.”
“That’s a terrible damn name.” He leaned in to the cat. “She’s going to torture you with that name, isn’t she?”
The cat simply lifted her chin and he obligingly scratched it as the cat settled into his lap as if she were born there.
Traitor. Edie crossed her arms over her chest, half out of annoyance, and half to hide the cat hair on her sweater. “So what would you call her, then?”
He thought for a moment. “You know who was a blind badass? Daredevil.”
“It’s a girl cat.”
“Lady Daredevil, then.”
“It’s a white, fluffy girl cat,” she felt the need to point out.
He just kept petting the cat’s head, and the cat seemed to be eating it up, the little minx. “Which is why they’ll never see her badassery coming.” He scratched the side of the cat’s face. “She’ll be like a ninja.”