7

MICAH HAD SENT his responses to her questions yesterday, but Kelsey had been in no mood to look at his answers. His email sat in her in-box, contributing to her pile of electronic guilt. In fairness, her Should Be Working On pile was massive, and she was adept at ignoring it. Why should the brewery work be treated any differently? She’d get around to it when her irritation with Ian simmered down.

Because eventually that would have to happen. It had to. It just couldn’t while the memory of him looking so damn smug played through her mind. Smug and sexy and insufferable and insolent. No, wait. Her list of words for him was expanding, but sexy was not supposed to be on it. Damn it.

Procrastination via running errands, rather than working on the brewery piece, was also supposed to have prevented Ian-related thoughts from intruding on her time. So much for that.

Kelsey paused on the steps outside the post office to zip her fleece higher. It wasn’t raining yet, but she swore she could smell rain in the air, and she hoped she could get a good walk in before it actually started. Maybe a walk would clear Ian from her mind.

A mail truck pulled down the narrow, alley-like street, and Kelsey waited for it to pass before crossing. She’d just stepped onto the sidewalk when the library door opened in front of her and out popped the last person she wanted to run into.

Kelsey pursed her lips and prayed Ian wouldn’t notice her. Smug. She focused on the word to keep from focusing on the man, but there was truly nothing smug about the way Ian walked down the path toward her.

She told herself there was nothing sexy about it either. He was wearing jeans and a green jacket, and it was a totally workmanlike combination. It was the sort of thing any guy in this weather, in this town, might wear. Same with his hair. It was a boring color, a common one. There was nothing special about it. Nor about his face. Perfect cheekbones were overrated.

“Kelsey.” Ian gave a slight wave.

She startled and her heart landed somewhere around her throat. Shit. Had she been staring?

She’d definitely been staring. Here was hoping the stare was more of a glare. “Hi.”

“Hi.” Ian’s brow, which really was just another forehead and also not exciting, furrowed. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

What kind of stare had she been giving him if it wasn’t a glare? And why hadn’t she brought her dogs with her? Maybe Ian would have snubbed her then. “Like what?”

His brow lines deepened. “I don’t know. Like you’re suspicious of me or something.”

Suspicion was totally not what had been running through her head, but she wasn’t about to let the excuse Ian handed her go to waste. “You’re walking out of the library.”

“So?”

“That suggests you might read. Seemed suspect.” Ouch. That was meaner than she’d intended, but it was the first relatively logical bit of snark that came to mind.

Ian seemed to take it in stride, or perhaps he’d learned what to expect from her. “I’m actually a man of many talents, reading among them. In fact, I was finally getting my library card. I hope that’s okay with you.”

Anyone who got a library card was more than okay with her, but it wasn’t like she was going to admit that. Once again, though, Kelsey had to appreciate that Ian would return her snark volley for volley. “You don’t need my permission to read a book, although I reserve the right to judge your choices.”

“That doesn’t surprise me. Do I lose points for fiction versus nonfiction? Are certain genres worth more or less? What about length—does it count?”

She couldn’t repress a smirk. “Length always counts.”

“Spoken like a woman.”

Sure, he looked physically pained saying the words, but she was currently the one imagining the length of his “book.” Unfair.

“Length is not as important as quality though,” Kelsey added hastily, trying to purge the image of a naked Ian from her brain.

“I’m sure Hemingway is relieved.”

Whoa. Ian could make literature jokes? She was impressed despite herself, and that did nothing to banish those images, which had morphed into a naked Ian reading in bed. “Don’t worry. I’m not going to ask to see your books.”

His lip quirked. “Believe me, I have no reason to worry if you did.”

“Spoken like every overconfident man.”

Ian’s lips twitched a second time, and he stuffed his hands into his pockets as though attempting to become physically and emotionally more standoffish. “Anyway, glad I have your permission to use the library. Seeing as everyone around here wants to make me jump through a million hoops to do anything, I was expecting a blood sacrifice would be required to get my card.”

Kelsey almost laughed at that. “Don’t you think you’re being a little dramatic?”

“Dramatic? No, not me.” He pointed toward the town hall, which was next to the post office. “How about the town changing the guidelines for what is and isn’t permitted on signage after we had our sign designed to meet them but before approving it, all apparently done at the behest of the SHS.”

Surprised, Kelsey chewed that over for a second. “That does seem—”

“Dramatically directed at us?”

“I was going to say unfair and possibly shady.” Of course, the town was run by Lipins. The mayor was a Lipin, and Lipins dominated the town committees. Shady could be expected. Ian’s problem was that he didn’t know he shouldn’t expect better of the family.

On the other hand, this was the sort of petty shit they’d usually only pull on her family. It was odd that they’d treat Ian and Micah in a similar way. For some reason, Kelsey had expected better of them. More professionalism maybe.

It also reminded her that she was long past due to delve into what the Save Helen Society was about. It really could be just a group of citizens concerned about overdevelopment. That was generally a more Lipin-affiliated attitude, but Kelsey knew she wasn’t the only Porter quietly worried. It could also be something the mayor had cooked up to generate support for his positions, however. Kelsey’s fingers flexed with the urge to remove the SHS pin, but she wasn’t about to do it in front of Ian, especially because the group might truly be benign.

“Nice of you to admit it.” Ian seemed to shrink an inch with exhaustion.

It wasn’t exactly sexy, but it wasn’t insufferable either, and for a painfully long second, Kelsey almost felt bad for him. Somewhere deep inside, her determination to dislike Ian Roth cracked ever so slightly. She knew what petty Lipin BS was like, but more—she knew what that kind of exhaustion with life felt like. She’d been feeling it more and more over the last several months.

This was another reason she tried to avoid humans. As soon as she felt the slightest bit of sympathy for someone, it was so damn hard to keep up her ice queen exterior.

“Honestly, I don’t know much about the SHS or why they might be directing their ire toward you,” Kelsey admitted. “I just don’t want Helen to turn into a glorified strip mall. I like it as it is.”

Ian took a moment to respond, forcing her to wonder what was going through his head. Possibly she’d shocked him by not saying something sarcastic. She’d kind of shocked herself. “I like it as it is too. It’s one of the reasons I moved here.”

“Which makes you part of the problem.”

That brought a faint sardonic smile to his face, which Kelsey took to mean he couldn’t argue the point. “I’m only one person.”

“That’s the thing.” Her restless fingers brushed the SHS pin, and Kelsey curled her hands into fists to keep herself under control. Then, because that looked more confrontational than she was feeling, she shoved her hands into her pockets. “Everyone is only one person. It’s when you add one plus one plus one, et cetera, that you start running into problems.”

The smile on Ian’s face broadened a touch, eliciting a dimple on his left cheek. How had she not noticed it before? Had she never actually seen him smile? She should say something mean to make it go away before the dimple exerted more sympathy from her. That could destroy her determined dislike.

Ian shrugged in defeat. “Fair enough. If you can admit that the sign thing might be shady, I can admit you have a point. In theory, I agree with the SHS’s goals.”

Kelsey’s cheeks twitched, and she caught herself before she could join him in a smile—or, worse, before she let out a victory cry and punched the air. Ian’s admission was nothing to celebrate. She wanted to dislike him on principle, and a reasonable Ian—an Ian who also had a library card, made Hemingway jokes, and had a goddamn dimple—was a hard Ian to dislike. She should leave. Now.

“Well, I’m glad we had this conversation,” Kelsey said. “I’ll be in touch about the website soon.”

“Me too. Actually, Kelsey?” Ian called out to her as she turned away, and Kelsey cringed with her back to him.

“Yeah?” She turned around.

“About the website. I still want to compensate you for your help. The beer was just a token, but I want to pay you whatever your going rate is for projects like this.”

Now he was really messing with her head. Not to mention that she didn’t have a going rate. Also not to mention that her father would probably be upset if she accepted payment when her labor was supposedly his generosity. She should have ignored Ian when he’d acknowledged her existence. That was how puppies got to you. All you had to do was look at them and suddenly you couldn’t dislike them.

Kelsey cleared her throat as a proxy for the brain she couldn’t seem to clear of Ian. “That’s okay, really.”

“Honestly, it’s not. It was nice of your father to suggest you could help, but I don’t want to take advantage of your time.”

Oh, so Ian could see that her father volunteering her was a dick move, but her own father couldn’t? Why did he have to be like this? It was so much harder to dislike him if he insisted on compensating her for her work.

“I don’t need money for it.” Kelsey forced the words out, debating whether it would be too strange if she sprinted toward her car.

Ian frowned as though working through a problem, and he took a step closer. “All right, if you don’t want money, and you don’t want beer, something else? Your father mentioned you’re renovating your house. Anything I can do to help? I’m pretty handy and good at moving heavy objects.”

Handy and good at moving heavy objects—that reminded her of the picture she’d seen of him on his family brewery’s website. The one where his arms and chest made it clear he was, in fact, capable of moving heavy objects.

The wind was suddenly drying out her lips, and Kelsey wet them. “Is that from all the time spent lifting kegs of beer?”

“Something like that.” He seemed amused, and she hoped her face wasn’t making questionable expressions again.

Kelsey hesitated. Her hopes of moving furniture this weekend had been dashed yesterday. Josh had to work his ER shift, and Kevin and Peter had appointments to tour a couple of venues for their wedding location. At this rate, she was going to have to move the furniture by herself, unless . . .

No. Asking Ian to drive to Wasilla with her and lift furniture was out of the question. It would take an entire day, and it wouldn’t be easy. It was too much compensation for what she was doing for him. Not to mention that the drive alone would be about five or six hours round trip. That much time in his company was too much temptation.

Ian noticed her hesitation though. “So?”

Damn it. Ian had put the images of him being all manly and lifting stuff for her into her head, and now she was stuck with them. He also seemed to honestly want to compensate her, and that was pushing him ever closer to likable. She was going to suggest this plan.

She was weak.

She also wanted the furniture.

Also, she was weak.

Kelsey kicked a loose stone down the sidewalk. “How do you feel about road trips?”

---

*   *   *

IT WAS IMPOSSIBLE to be stressed while being loved by a puppy. Such was Kelsey’s philosophy, and since she was stressed, and since her own babies were no longer puppies, she’d sought one out specifically for his therapeutic services.

Neptune was her brother Kevin’s dog, and although he was getting bigger, he retained his distinctly puppyish features. And distinctly puppyish attitude. Her dogs had grown weary of Neptune’s shenanigans after a few minutes in his company, so Kelsey sat on the floor of Kevin and Peter’s house and let the relatively small bundle of black-and-white fur pounce all over her, giving her dogs a break from his attention. It took only a minute for her blood pressure to return to normal.

“You didn’t come here to visit me, did you?” her brother asked, strolling into his living room. “Just the puppy.”

“Look at that face! Look at those bright blue eyes.” Kelsey grabbed Neptune before he could get away and rubbed her forehead against his head.

On the couch, Peter chuckled into his laptop. “I think you need a new dog, Kels.”

“I think she needs to get laid,” said Nate through the video chat program Kevin had started. “She’s acting hormonal.”

Kelsey raised a middle finger in her older brother’s direction and hoped he could see it from the computer screen’s angle. Technology was often a poor substitute for face-to-face interaction, but without it, they’d hardly ever see Nate.

To his point, though, she didn’t need anything, despite what the men might think. She was quite capable of taking care of that sort of business on her own. She had her book boyfriends for emotional fulfilment, and Mr. Happy—her vibrator—for those more physical urges. But Nate’s unfortunate comment did bring to mind Ian, and the puppylike way he’d gotten under her skin today. And now she was feeling stressed again. It was bad enough that she’d been forced to acknowledge Ian was good-looking. She did not need to begin equating him with sex, too, although that conversation by the library was making it a challenge.

“Actually, did you know men’s hormones fluctuate more on a daily basis than women’s do?” Peter asked. “If anything, women are calm and steady compared to men.”

“How do you know that?” Kevin asked, plopping down on the couch. “You research fish, not people.”

Peter merely shook his head. “I have three sisters. I made it a point to learn these things in school. It’s called survival.”

“I knew I liked you,” Kelsey said. She tapped the floor, and her dogs ran over to her. “You’re a smart man. Pay attention, brothers. You might learn something.”

Nate scoffed and stuffed a bite of pizza in his mouth.

“I’m a college dropout. Can’t I just continue to be outclassed?” Kevin sat up abruptly. “Neptune, no! Drop it.” The puppy had started chewing one of his shoes. “Still, Kels, how long has it been since you spared a guy a second look?”

If spared a guy a second look was a euphemism for getting laid, six years. Not that she was about to tell her brother that. And not that she cared. As she’d told Maggie, she didn’t have the time, and she didn’t have the interest.

If spared a guy a second look was taken more literally, well, it was more like six hours. Hence the need for puppy therapy. Kelsey wanted Ian out of her brain, but that didn’t seem likely, given he’d agreed to her ridiculous request for help moving furniture.

“Change of topic,” she said as Neptune, having abandoned Kevin’s shoe, jumped on her lap. “What do you know about the Save Helen Society? Who’s behind it?”

Their website had contained scant clues as to the latter question. Based on her conversation with Ian, Kelsey had become convinced it was someone with sympathetic ears at the town hall, and the lack of information on the group’s website only made her more suspicious.

“I only know what it says on their website,” Kevin said, after giving Nate a brief rundown of the group. “As to who’s behind it, I’m pretty sure it’s Theresa Lipin.”

“Theresa Lipin?” Kelsey heard herself squeak, and it wasn’t only because Neptune had decided chewing on her arm was an acceptable substitute for her brother’s shoes. “Are you sure? How do you know?”

“I’m not positive, but that’s what I’ve heard. You might learn things, too, if you left your house more often and talked to people.”

“I don’t like people.” Kelsey swore internally. She should have known it was the Lipins from the beginning. Even if it wasn’t the mayor himself using the group to drum up support for his antidevelopment agenda, Theresa Lipin was his mother. She was also the grandmother of Josh’s girlfriend, and that raised a whole new question. “Josh better not have known that when he gave me the pin.”

Kevin’s eyebrows shot up. “He gave you an SHS pin? I don’t know. Can’t picture Josh tricking you into supporting a Lipin cause.”

He hadn’t tricked her, precisely. She did support the cause, and it annoyed the crap out of her that her interests aligned with those of the Lipins in this case. “You’re right. Josh is too much of a cinnamon roll to do that to me on purpose.”

“Too much of a what?” Peter had been pretending to read whatever was on his computer, but he shot Kelsey a bewildered expression.

“Too nice,” she explained, not bothering with a longer definition. “I wonder what the Lipins have against the new brewery.”

“The Lipins are against everything that’s good and pure and true.” Even Kevin couldn’t keep a straight face as he said it. “Who else could be against beer?”

“They do make good beer,” Peter said, abandoning all pretense of working.

“Very good.” Kevin nodded.

“Wait, since when does Helen have a brewery?” Nate asked.

Kelsey stretched out better on the floor. Neptune was exhausting himself, and he was taking her along with him. “You’ve had their beer?” she asked, ignoring Nate’s question. “If I’d known you liked it, I’d have taken the beer the guys offered me for you.”

That might not have prevented Ian from offering to pay her for her work, but who knew? Maybe she could have avoided the day’s awkward conversation and prevented those frustrating cracks in her dislike.

Peter let out a whimper, and Kevin actually bounded off the couch. “You passed up free good beer? How could you?”

“Quite easily.”

“Now I’m never going to help you get that furniture,” Kevin said.

Kelsey snorted. “Good thing I’ve arranged for alternate assistance, then. Ian and possibly Micah are doing it, since I can’t count on family anymore.”

She expected a snarky comment from Kevin in response to her friendly jab, but he gave her a surprised look. “You’re letting them help? Taking them to our grandparents’?”

Taking them to her grandparents’ house was unfortunately unavoidable, but she was desperate for the assistance. That was the lie she was telling herself, anyway. It felt a lot better than saying she was weak.

“They owe me for the work I’m doing for them. Seemed fair.” She kept her voice nonchalant, but her stomach squirmed when she thought about the long drive and longer day ahead of her with Ian for company.

But hopefully not just Ian. He’d said he’d get Micah to help as well, which seemed like way more muscle than necessary, but having the rock star lumberjack around might be best for her sanity.

“Neptune, leave Juliet alone.” Kevin swooped in and picked up the puppy, who’d grown bored of Kelsey and had started using her dog as his chew toy again.

“She’s fine,” Kelsey said. Juliet merely looked exasperated with the little one. Kelsey could relate, although she was thinking of someone significantly larger.

Her brother struggled to hold on to the squirming husky as he paced. “Make sure Dad doesn’t find out about all this time you’re spending with the guys if you don’t want to make his week. I think he’s given up on me or Nate carrying on the family legacy and is counting on you to provide him some heirs.”

Kevin’s tone suggested he thought as much of the family legacy nonsense as she did, but he and her older brother got to laugh at it. Because of course they did. Kevin was right. No one was putting pressure on them. As the girl child, all that shit was dumped on her.

Kelsey closed her eyes and groaned. At least it sounded like her twin wasn’t going to blab about it. The last thing she wanted was for her parents to increase their meddling into her (lack of a) love life.

No, make that the second to last thing. The absolute last thing she wanted was a love life—period.

Again, it wasn’t Ian’s or Micah’s fault her father was acting like a pest, but she had a hard time not resenting them for it. But maybe that resentment wasn’t a bad thing. She could use it to patch some of the cracks Ian had made in her walls today. She could plaster over her brief moment of empathy. Cover it up and bury it. It might make the trip less pleasant, but that seemed like a small price to pay for her ability to keep an eye on the big picture.