Crazy Stupid Bromance (Bromance Book Club #3) - Lyssa Kay Adams Page 0,26
breathing thing in the car. “Will you come with me?”
“Of course.”
Alexis didn’t respond. With her free hand, she turned on their favorite satellite radio station, and they rode the rest of the way like that.
Music doing the talking. Saying the things he couldn’t.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Beefcake was nowhere to be seen when they walked back into her house. Noah helped her carry leftovers to the kitchen.
A red leash on the counter caught his attention. He picked it up. “What’s this?”
“A cat harness. For Beefcake.”
“A cat harness?”
“The vet said he needs more exercise, but I don’t think I should let him out anymore, so I got him this leash thing to take him for walks.”
“You’re going to take Beefcake for walks?”
“I think he’ll like it.”
She said it with the kind of innocence with which children swear they heard reindeer on the roof on Christmas Eve. Alexis had a mile-wide naive streak about Beefcake. If she only knew the number of dead things that cat had dropped at Noah’s feet over the past year . . .
She didn’t know, though, because Noah always got rid of the evidence before she could find out. “Have you tried to put it on him yet?”
“Not yet. I need to figure it out. Want to help?”
He eyed it skeptically. He had no idea how the contraption was supposed to work, but he knew with one hundred percent certainty if it involved Beefcake, it was going to end badly.
Alexis called out to the cat in her singsongy way. “Here, kitty, kitty, kitty.”
A yowling noise in the hallway behind him made the air catch in Noah’s lungs. He swallowed and turned around. Beefcake stood a few feet away. “Here he is,” he rasped.
Lexa brushed past him. Beefcake glared at Noah through slitted eyes as Lexa cradled him to her chest and walked back to the kitchen.
“How about if I hold him while you put the harness on him?” she said.
It was the worst idea he’d ever heard, but he wasn’t going to disappoint Lexa. He picked up the harness from where she’d left it on the table and approached woman and beast slowly.
A low growly noise was coming from Beefcake’s chest. It was the closest thing he ever got to purring.
“I think we’re supposed to wrap it around him and snap it across his belly before we do the leg part,” Alexis said, turning and turning the cat over in her arms.
Noah gulped and held out the harness. He met Beefcake’s eyes and saw his own murder flash through them. Carefully, Noah draped the harness on Beefcake’s back.
Nothing happened.
Alexis lifted Beefcake higher so Noah could reach under and—he froze as the cat stopped purring. Everyone knew a cat’s belly was the danger zone. But this cat especially. Noah had made the mistake of trying to pet him there exactly once.
“He’s okay,” Alexis said. “Can you snap it closed?”
Noah winced instinctively as he reached beneath Beefcake and located both ends of the straps. Holding his breath again, Noah gingerly connected the two ends with a quiet but firm snap.
Beefcake barely moved.
“Awww, look! He likes it.” Alexis scratched Beefcake’s ears and made lovey-dovey noises at him. “You really are such a good boy.”
A really good boy were words that had never, ever been spoken about Beefcake.
“Now what?” Noah asked.
“Now I think we loop the other part around each leg.”
Noah did the engineering in his head and decided the plans were flawed from the design stage. Because there was no way Beefcake was going to willingly put his legs through the holes of that thing.
As if reading his mind, Beefcake bared his claws.
The rest happened in slow motion.
Beefcake made a noise like a rabid raccoon and went full Crouching Tiger. He lifted his back legs, planted them in the center of Noah’s chest, and dug in. Before Noah could even register the fact that he’d just been impaled, Beefcake shoved off and flew from Lexa’s hands.
Noah clutched his chest and fell backward as Alexis gasped. “Beefcake, no!”
Dear God, he’d been stabbed. Noah collapsed against the wall, hand covering his heart. Or what was left of it. He was afraid to pull his hand away because he’d likely find it covered in blood.
“Oh my God, did he hurt you?” Alexis asked, running toward him.
“I’m fine.” Noah’s voice registered high enough to summon bats.
“Move your hand,” she ordered. And just in case he wasn’t going to obey, she peeled his fingers away.