Best Man for Hire (Entangled Lovestruck) (Front and Center) by Tawna Fenske Page B

whichever salesman or religious fanatic hovered out there on the damn porch. Grant sat up, blinking a little like a man coming out of a trance. He took a breath.
    “I’m sure whoever it is will give up and go away,” he whispered. “If it’s important, they’d call.”
    “Right.” Anna licked her lips. “Maybe we could sneak to the bedroom and—”
    “Grant?” From the front of the house came a voice. A woman’s voice. It was shrill and choked with something that sounded like tears, and Anna felt her blood run cold.
    “Grant, are you home?” the woman cried again. “Oh, please—there’s an emergency! I need you.”

Chapter Five
    Grant closed his eyes and counted to ten.
    Okay, it was more like two. The panicked voice of the little old lady who lived next door was enough to send him sprinting into the house before the chime of the doorbell stopped echoing.
    He grabbed the doorknob and hesitated, turning back to see Anna right behind him, buttoning up her dress. She was flushed and tousled and so goddamn beautiful he wanted to burn the house down to make the damn doorbell stop ringing.
    Instead, he turned the doorknob.
    “Oh, Grant—thank goodness it’s you!” On the front steps, his plump, elderly neighbor stood blinking in the dusty sunlight on his porch. She wore an oversize pink chambray shirt that billowed around her like a big pink tent, and her chubby cheeks were flushed with terror. “Oh, dear, I just knew you were home, I heard voices a minute ago. I’m terribly sorry, dear, but—”
    “Mrs. Stein,” Grant said, throwing the door open all the way and pasting on his best Boy Scout smile. “What seems to be the problem?”
    His gut tightened at the sight of the old woman’s tear-streaked face. He scanned her from head to toe, looking for injuries before he turned his gaze to the street for potential assailants. He wasn’t sure whether to reach for a pistol or a tissue. Behind him, he could feel the heat of Anna’s body, and part of him still ached to grab her again.
    Mrs. Stein began sobbing in earnest, which was enough to send all the blood rushing back to Grant’s brain where it belonged. “Mrs. Stein,” he tried again. “What is it, what’s wrong?”
    “It’s Rumpymuffle. He’s gone up a tree, and I don’t know what to do. Oh dear, he’s never been outside before, and the sun is going down soon. Help me!”
    The woman wailed again and launched herself at the front of Grant’s shirt. Given her considerable bulk, he had to brace himself to keep from toppling backward. He patted her shoulders, feeling faintly guilty about where his fingers had been just seconds before. He glanced at Anna, who had regained her composure and was looking on with an expression of intense concern.
    Rumpymuffle? she mouthed.
    “Her cat,” Grant supplied. “Mrs. Stein, this is Anna Keebler. She’s my sister’s wedding planner. Anna, Mrs. Stein lives next door with a great big Maine coon who’s never set foot outdoors.”
    Mrs. Stein drew back and sniffled. “I went to take the trash out and must have left the door ajar. I wasn’t gone more than a minute, but something must have scared him and—well, look.”
    The old woman pointed to the large coconut palm that separated Grant’s house from hers. Grant followed the direction of her finger, his gaze landing on the quivering form of Rumpymuffle gripping the tree for dear life.
    “Shit,” he muttered, then felt bad about it. “I mean shoot . He’s at least twenty feet up there.”
    “I saw you had a ladder when you were painting your house, so I thought maybe—”
    “No, that won’t work,” Grant said, eyeing the tree. “My tallest one is an extension ladder, but I can’t brace that against a trunk that narrow. A rental shop might have an A-frame ladder that could work, but they’re all closed at this hour.”
    The old woman began sobbing again, and Grant patted her back, thinking hard. He had a buddy with a small crane, but that was