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

The cat yowled in protest, but didn’t struggle. Thank God for small miracles.
    “Here we go,” Grant cooed, shoving the cat behind him into the bag. He couldn’t see what he was doing, but he felt one set of claws snag in the fabric. He glanced over his shoulder, relieved to see Rumpymuffle’s head had cleared the top of the bag. He let go of the cat and yanked the drawstring, cinching the bag shut.
    Mrwow!
    Twenty feet below, Anna and Mrs. Stein stretched the sheet out between them, holding it open like a net.
    A net he probably hadn’t washed for a couple weeks. God, if he made it down alive, he needed to seriously reevaluate how often he washed his sheets.
    Don’t think about that now.
    Behind him in the bag, Rumpymuffle squirmed and hissed and sank a set of claws through the fabric. They connected with the back of his thigh, and Grant gave a yelp of pain.
    “Dammit, cat. I’m trying to help you here!”
    Slowly, cautiously, trying not to think about rabies shots, he began his descent down the tree. He slid both hands around the backside of the tree, hugging it tight as he released the pressure on his lower legs. He slid downward, letting his hands move with him. The cat was wriggling in the bag, making it tougher to balance.
    He kept going, dropping faster than he probably ought to, but too damn eager to be back on solid ground.
    Mrwow! the cat screamed again, sinking its fangs through the bag and into his right butt cheek.
    “Shit!” Grant snapped, fighting the urge to unclip the carabineer from his belt and just let the cantankerous creature drop. “I mean shoot .”
    “You’re almost to the ground,” Anna cheered, her voice closer now than it had seemed minutes before. “Great work.”
    Grant inched his hands down again, leaning back a little as he slid his feet down the trunk again. The instant his feet touched the grass, Mrs. Stein was on him.
    “Oh, baby! Oh, sweetie, Oh, honey, my precious little muffin.”
    Grant let go of the trunk and unclipped the bag from his belt, hoping like hell she was talking to the cat and not him. Mrs. Stein grabbed the bag and hugged it to her chest, tears streaming down her face as she began to loosen the knot at the top.
    “You might want to wait till you’re safely inside to let the cat out of the bag,” Anna said. “I don’t think Grant’s going back up that tree if Rumpymuffle gets loose again.”
    “How can I ever repay you?” Mrs. Stein sobbed. “You saved my baby.”
    Grant smiled in spite of himself and tried to subtly rub the bite mark on his butt cheek. “Just doing my part to help out,” he said. “I’m glad he’s okay.”
    “Just let me get my checkbook. I owe you—”
    “You don’t owe me anything,” Grant insisted, his voice a little harsher than he meant it to be. “Just get that cat inside and give him a can of tuna. And a rabies shot.”
    “If you like, I can have my friend Kelli come take a look at him when she’s free,” Anna offered. “She makes house calls for friends.”
    “What would I do without the two of you?” Mrs. Stein sniffed again, while Rumpymuffle yowled from inside the bag. “Thank you. I mean it.”
    She turned and waddled back to her house, leaving Grant standing there in her pink shirt with a throbbing bite mark on his rear. When he turned back to Anna, she was studying him with an expression he couldn’t read. It was either admiration or dismay, or some bizarre mix of the two.
    She shook her head. “Unbelievable.”
    “What?”
    “You’re amazing. A true fucking Boy Scout.”
    He grinned and peeled off the pink shirt. He’d wash it later, fold it neatly, and return it to his neighbor. For now though, he had other things on his mind. He leaned close to Anna, his lips brushing her ear.
    “In that case,” he murmured. “Don’t you think I deserve a merit badge?”
    The flash of heat in her eyes made Grant forget all about the scratches on his wrists, the pain in his feet, the throbbing bite mark