Bad News Cowboy Read Online Free Page B

the end of the night Kate had earned several profane nicknames and the contents of everyone’s wallets. She leaned back in her chair, pulling the coins toward her. “Listen to that. I’m going back home, dumping all this on the floor and swimming in it like Scrooge McDuck.”
    â€œNo diving in headfirst. That’s a sure way to spinal trauma. It isn’t that deep of a pool,” Connor said.
    â€œDeeper than what you have. I have all your monies.” She added a fake cackle for a little bit of dramatics.
    â€œThen I will keep all the pie,” Liss said.
    â€œThat’s my pie,” Jack said.
    â€œYou have to stay in fighting form, Monaghan. Your bar hookups won’t be so easy if you lose your six-pack,” Liss said cheerfully.
    â€œI do enough work on the ranch every day to live on pies and still keep my six-pack, thank you very much.”
    â€œYou aren’t getting any younger,” Sadie said.
    The conversation was going into uncomfortable territory as far as Kate was concerned. Really, on all fronts it was getting to an awkward place. Jack and sex. Jack’s abs. Yikes.
    â€œI would return volley,” Jack said, “but I’m too much of a gentleman to comment on a lady’s age.”
    â€œGentleman, huh?” Eli asked. “Of all the things you’ve been accused of being, I doubt that’s one of them.”
    Jack squinted and held up his hand, pretending to count on his fingers. “Yeah, no. There have been a lot of things, but not that one.”
    â€œAnyway,” she said, unable to help herself, “you comment on my age all the time.”
    â€œI said I never commented on a lady’s age, Katie.”
    She snorted. “I am a lady, asswipe.”
    â€œI don’t know how I missed it,” he said, leaning back in his chair, his grin turning wicked.
    For some reason that comment was the last straw. “Okay, hate to cut this short, but I have an early morning tomorrow.” That was not strictly true. It was an optional early morning since she intended to get up and spend some time with Roo. “And I will be stopping by The Grind to buy a very expensive coffee with the money I won from you.”
    Jack stood, putting his hands behind his head and stretching. “I’ll walk you out. I have an early morning, too, so I better get going.”
    Dammit. He didn’t seem to understand that she was beating a hasty retreat in part to get away from him. Because the Weird Jack Stuff was a little more elevated today than normal. It had something to do with overexposure to him. She needed to go home, be by herself, scrub him off her skin in a hot shower so she could hit the reset button on her interactions with him.
    She felt as if she had to do that more often lately than she had ever had to do in the past.
    The thing was, she liked Jack. In that way you could like a guy who was basically an extra obnoxious older brother who didn’t share genetic material with you. She liked it when he came to poker night. She liked it when he came into the store. But at the end of it she was always left feeling...agitated.
    And it had created this very strange cycle. Hoping she would see Jack, seeing Jack, being pissed that she had seen Jack. And on and on it went.
    â€œBye,” she said.
    She picked up her newly filled change bag and started to edge out of the room. She heard heavy footsteps behind her, and without looking she knew it was Jack. Well, she knew it was Jack partly because he had said he would walk her out.
    And partly because the hair on the back of her neck was standing on end. That was another weird Jack thing.
    She opened the front door and shut it behind her, not waiting for Jack. Which was petty and weird. She heard the door open behind her and shut again.
    â€œDid I do something?”
    She turned around, trying to erase the scowl from her face. Trying to think of one thing he had actually done that was