“I’m so glad you were able to stop by and help Paige,” Linda commented after he’d worked for a few minutes.

He didn’t miss how his heart gave an extra thunk when Linda said Paige’s name. Damn, that wasn’t good. “Happy to,” he said, trying to sound casual about the first woman he’d felt very un-casual about in a very long time. “She’s a friend of Tori’s. That makes her a friend of mine.”

That was true enough. He was very fond of his cousin’s fiancée. Everyone who knew Tori was fond of her. She was sweet and funny and had a huge heart and the way she loved Josh made her automatically a Landry family favorite. She’d made Josh happier than Mitch had ever seen him. And Josh was generally a pretty happy guy, actually, so that was saying something.

“Well, Paige is… a little difficult but she’s wonderful,” Linda said.

Mitch glanced at her before he could stop himself. “Difficult?”

Linda nodded. “I teach with her sister, Amanda, and Paige worries her.”

“Her sister?”

“She has two older sisters. Amanda is the oldest.”

The one with the kids, likely. So Linda was on Paige’s family’s side. Wanting Paige to settle down and have a family and be happy. “Paige seems to be doing okay.”

She was young. He was aware they were five years apart in age and that at her age the idea of settling down and getting married had been completely laughable to him. It still was, really. His life was good. He had everything he needed. He was happy. Was he a little addicted to a woman who lived too far away to scratch his itch as often as he’d like? Well, yeah, apparently. But if that was the worst thing that ever happened to him, he’d be just fine.

“Oh yes, of course, she’s doing okay. Her sister just worries about Paige’s decisions.”

“What decisions?” he asked. Was it okay to be talking about his fiancée’s friend? Well, Linda had brought it up.

“She runs a yoga studio. It’s not really an… essential business, you know? And she has cats. Lots of cats. Especially for such a young woman… that’s different. Every time someone asks her when she’s going to settle down or if she wants to have kids, she gets another one,” Linda said. “And she’s a vegetarian.”

Mitch hid his smile but ducking his head to study the furnace. She got another cat anytime someone asked her about settling down. That was funny.

“I thought the cat thing was an adoption center,” he commented, his face in the furnace. Tori had actually filled him in on that when she’d explained how she knew Paige. Tori had been the vet to all of Paige’s foster cats.

“It’s that,” Linda said. “Kind of.”

“Kind of?”

“Well, she calls it that, but the process to adopt a cat is crazy,” Linda said. “There’s a ton of paperwork and she does a home visit and then does follow-up visits after the cat’s been adopted for the first six months. Very few people make it past her process.”

“Has she ever taken a cat back after letting someone adopt one?”

“She has, actually. Twice.”

He couldn’t fight his grin this time. That was awesome. “So she’s protective of the cats.”

“Oh, I think she always intends to keep most of them. That’s just her way of pretending to her family that she’s not a crazy cat lady.”

Linda seemed like a nice enough lady. She really did. And he liked her decorating. But he was liking her attitude about Paige less and less all the time.

“Is it a bad thing that she likes cats?” he asked, turning the screw he was tightening a little harder than necessary.

“I suppose not. Her family just worries about some of the things she likes.”

“Why?”

“They just worry,” Linda said again. “Her business isn’t very stable, and she clearly wants to nurture something, but she’s choosing cats instead of having a family and she’s a vegetarian.”

Yeah, she’d mentioned that before too. “So her family worries because they think she’s financially vulnerable and that she actually wants children but is filling that need with cats and they’re worried she’ll…” He shook his head. “I’m not sure why they’re worried about the vegetarian thing.”

He wasn’t sure why they were worried about any of it, frankly.

“Nutrition, of course,” Linda said. “They worry about her health.”

Right. Well, he knew people who wouldn’t understand someone choosing not to eat meat too, but Paige was twenty-two. And clearly in good health. Smart, sassy, confident. She didn’t really need people telling her what to do and questioning her decisions.

And suddenly it made sense why she’d gotten annoyed when he’d pointed out that she might have needed to learn a lesson about interacting with her family.

She clearly had a lot of people questioning how she lived her life. She didn’t need a guy—especially one she barely knew—telling her that he thought she needed to give her family a break.

He pushed back from the furnace. “All done.”

Linda gave a little gasp. “Really? That’s it?”

“Yep. Good to go.” Mitch stretched to his feet.

“Oh my goodness!” Linda threw her arms around him, nearly knocking him back into the furnace. “Mitch! Thank you so much!”

He patted her back. “Happy to do it.”

She pulled back and smiled up at him. “You’re a great guy. Tori’s really lucky to have you.”

For a second he really regretted the lie. It didn’t matter in the overall scheme of things, of course. None of these people needed to know what his relationship was to Paige. Or to Tori, for that matter. But he kind of wanted them to.

Except that he and Paige didn’t really have a relationship.

But he kind of wanted them to.

At least enough that it would make sense for him to tell all of Appleby to mind their own damned business and let Paige do what she wanted however she wanted to do it.

Of course, one of those things she wanted to do was to let everyone think he was Tori’s fiancé so that they didn’t hound her about what was going on between them. So he would keep playing along.

He smiled at Linda. “Thanks.’”

Linda led him out, chatting more about the festival and how he should invite Tori and how he should be sure to stop by the booth where she and her best friends would be selling caramel apples. He, apparently, gave the correct responses because she smiled and kept talking. But the whole time he was wondering what the chances were of him talking Paige into going to the festival with him and if he’d be able to keep from holding her hand or hugging her or stealing a kiss if they did go together. That would be inappropriate for a guy engaged to her friend.

The alternative was, of course, to just stay at her apartment. In bed.

But for some reason, as amazing as that would be, he suddenly wanted to go to the festival with her. Too. He definitely wanted the bed time. But he was going to be here for a couple of days. And yeah, he wanted to make her pancakes. And he wanted to walk through a winter wonderland festival and drink hot cider with her too.

Maybe showing up early had been a bad idea.