It was with some trepidation that Pendleton pulled up behind his big Victorian house in Old Louisville shortly after six that evening. He told himself the only reason he was shivering like a jackhammer was because of the constant rush of icy air that blew in through the tear in the roof of his car that even duct tape wasn’t able to mend effectively, and not because he was terrified of a slim, blond woman who couldn’t even make a sarong burgeon on her best day. Unfortunately, thoughts of Kit McClellan left him shuddering every time they braved entry into his muddled brain.

Just what the hell was he supposed to do with her?

He folded closed the doors on the dilapidated shed his real estate agent had called a garage, then made his way halfheartedly up the crumbling creekstones that bisected his small backyard. Once the weather turned warm, he had plans to rip out the stepping stones and replace them with a cobbled walkway that led from the back porch to the new garage he planned to build. Of course, that was going to necessitate building a back porch, too, one to replace the boxy wooden thing with a screen that was currently affixed to his house. For now, however, his yard, porch, and garage were much like his house. In need of major renovation. Kind of like his life, he thought further as he approached both.

He heard her long before he saw her and knew that Kit McClellan was still very much resident in his home. As he carefully negotiated the slick, mossy steps of his alleged back porch, a sound assaulted his ears unlike anything he had ever heard before. Only when he opened the back door and stepped inside did he finally realize what was causing the din.

To say she sang badly would have been like saying Josef Stalin lacked people skills. And the song…

“Oh, don’t you remember sweet Betsy from Pike,” was what it sounded like she was attacking. Then something about green mountains and a brother named Ike. Then egg yolks? He couldn’t really say. But the big yeller dog part was fairly clear, as was the spotted hog part. The rest… Well, he supposed he should be grateful he didn’t understand it all. Because that would mean he had some working knowledge of Kit McClellan’s repertoire. And the thought of such a possibility really didn’t set well with him at all.

“Hi, honey, I’m home,” he muttered as he entered his kitchen.

Immediately, he sensed that something was wrong. Well, something besides the fact that his house was currently the migratory receptacle for the rare, but unfortunately not quite extinct, yellow-headed, gravel-voiced hobnobber. And it wasn’t just because of the tasteful arrangement of table and chairs situated at the center of the room that hadn’t been there this morning when he left for work. It was also because of the smell emanating from one of the numerous copper pots cooking…stuff…on the stove. A smell that was quite extraordinary. Not unpleasant, mind you… Well, not too unpleasant. Just, um…

“Kit?” he called out to the house at large.

“Pendleton! Darling! You’re home!”

Darling?

“I’ll be right there! As soon as I fix your martini!”

Martini?

He told himself it was simple curiosity—and not crippling fear—that kept him rooted in place, gripping his briefcase as if it were the only thing that linked him to reality. Which was good, because when Kit entered the kitchen less than a minute later, he was certain reality was fast slipping away. In fact, he had to close his eyes for a moment, then open them again, to be sure he wasn’t hallucinating.

Nope. He wasn’t. Dammit.

That was definitely Kit McClellan gliding through the swinging door that connected kitchen to dining room, and she really was dressed like June Cleaver, right down to the high heels, the poufy skirt, the matching sweater set, and the pearl necklace. She strode toward him with a sweet smile, kissed his cheek, and extended a glass toward him.

Then she asked, “How was your day, dear?”

Okay, now this was just plain bizarre. It was one thing to have your house overrun, but when the woman overrunning it starting acting like this, well… In a word, ew. A shudder wound through him, and he snatched the martini out of her hand, downing it in one quick swallow.

Kit patted his arm. “I’m glad to see you, too, honey. Here, let me take your coat and briefcase. Your slippers and the newspaper are in your chair by the fireplace.”

Before he even realized what she was doing, Kit had his briefcase on the kitchen table, his coat draped over her arm, and she was refilling his glass from the cocktail shaker she was carrying in her other hand. It occurred to him then that not only did he not own a pair of slippers, but there was also no chair by his fireplace. Of course, until a moment ago, he would have sworn there was no table and chairs in his kitchen, either, and look how that turned out.

“Kit?”

“Yes, dear?”

“What have you done?”

She arched her eyebrows in a way that, judging by the golden age of television still broadcast regularly on cable, was endemic to all Eisenhower-era women. “What do you mean, dear?”

He opened his mouth to put voice to the thoughts jelling—more or less—in his head, but all that came out was, “Ummm…”

Then he was crossing the kitchen toward the door that connected with the dining room, shoving it open with far more intensity than was necessary. He knew that, because it immediately banged into something on the other side and came hurling back again, smashing right against his nose.

“Ouch.” The commentary came not from Pendleton, but from Kit, who stood behind him. “That had to hurt,” she added.

Without comment, he carefully pushed open the door, peeking around it into the other room to see what had caused its halt the first time. Imagine his surprise to discover a lovely dining room suite on the other side, complete with table, chairs, buffet, and china cabinet. A china cabinet that was half-stocked with what appeared, even to Pendleton’s untrained eye, to be pretty primo china.

“Wedgwood,” Kit clarified from behind him when she saw where his gaze had settled. “I got Louisville Stoneware for our everyday. Natch. I hope you don’t mind me picking out our patterns without consulting you. But the fact is you men simply do not have an eye for that kind of thing.”

He turned to look at her. “My, but haven’t you been a busy little bee today.”

She grinned. “Yes, I have, haven’t I?”

He said nothing in response, only gazed at the new furnishings that were nothing at all like what he’d planned to buy for himself. Kit’s tastes obviously ran along the lines of English antiques, where his own were more contemporary and less excessive. Maybe, he thought, if he was really nice to her, she’d let him pick the interior paint colors when the time came.

“I wasn’t sure who to call about the renovation work,” she added, almost as if she were reading his mind. She swept her hand toward one of numerous spots of crumbling plaster near the ceiling. “Call me old-fashioned, but I think that’s more a job for someone who has at least one Y chromosome, so I thought you could handle it.”

“I’ll handle it,” he said, feeling just so damned grateful that she allowed him some small say in the destiny of his own home.

Pushing past him, she strode alongside a half-dozen empty cartons filled with bubble-wrapped items Pendleton felt certain he was better off not knowing about. Then she made her way into the living room, where—would you look at that?—there was an oxblood leather chair sitting by the fireplace, where, incidentally, burned a lovely little fire, complete with a pair of plaid wool slippers and a copy of The Courier-Journal, all folded nice and neat for his enjoyment.

“What? No golden retriever?” he asked.

“It’s being delivered tomorrow,” she told him as she spun around to face him.

He nodded.

“As is the sofa-loveseat combination, the club chair, and the chaise.”

“I see.”

“Unfortunately, our new bedroom suite won’t be here until the day after.”

He sighed heavily. “Does this mean you’re planning to stay for some length of time?”

She waggled her head back and forth, then wrinkled her nose in thought. “Yeah.”

“And, may I ask what I did to deserve such a distinction?”

She shrugged. “You were nice to me, Pendleton.”

He hesitated before saying anything more, wondering just how serious she was about this. Then, when he realized she was, more than likely, pretty dead set on it, he asked, “Will your father really fire me if I throw you out?”

He could have sworn that, for just the briefest of moments, she looked as if he’d hurt her feelings by asking what he did. Then he decided he must have been mistaken, because she immediately appeared to be as cool, calm, and collected as always.

“Yeah, he probably would,” she said. “He’s done some pretty wacky things since Mama passed away. He used to only have four vice-presidents besides Holt, but he created all those new positions with huge, obscene salaries just so he could hire more potential life mates for me. And even at that, he’s fired and hired a whole mess of people over the last two years. He always has what sounds like legitimate reasons for letting people go, but he’s fired an awful lot of them when they didn’t, oh, hit it off with the boss’s daughter.”

“So everyone there now is a fairly recent hire?” Pendleton asked.

She nodded. “I don’t think any of the VPs have worked for Hensley’s for more than a year. That’s about how long Daddy gives them to make me marriage-minded. If you throw me out now, he’ll probably decide pretty quickly that you’re not vying for my affection and replace you with someone who will.”

“What about Carmichael?” Pendleton asked as a new thought struck him. “If your father only hires potential husbands for you, then why did he hire Carmichael, who is quite obviously a woman?”

“He hired Carmichael in one of his more desperate periods, when he thought maybe I just wasn’t, shall we say, interested in men.”

“Ah.”

“Carmichael has since met a very nice orthopedic surgeon named Debbie, and the two of them are very happy together.”

Pendleton felt triumphant. “Then there’s a good chance your father won’t fire me if I throw you out, if he’s kept Carmichael on in spite of her not being a potential life mate for you.”

“Oh, please, Pendleton. Carmichael is positively incredible heading up advertising. Daddy would have to be crazy—in the medical sense, I mean—to let her go. You, on the other hand, are a new hire who hasn’t even proven himself,” she pointed out. “You are by no means irreplaceable.”

Pendleton naturally took exception to that, but he supposed Kit had a point. Certainly he could fight his dismissal, but such a battle would be time-consuming. He absolutely, positively, without question had to hang onto his job. At least until the last week of April. He had something very important to prove, after all.

“How long are you staying?” he asked halfheartedly.

She smiled brightly, but once again, he got the impression that she was forcing all this cheerfulness. “I haven’t decided yet. It’ll be fun, Pendleton. You’ll see. Just wait. Someday, we’ll look back on this, and we’ll laugh and laugh and laugh.”

He bit his lip as he gazed at her, telling himself to hold back the maniacal laughter he felt threatening until that day dawned. And he wondered for a moment if she really was crazy, or if she just had a very sophisticated sense of humor that people from South Jersey couldn’t understand.

Ultimately, what he decided on was, “You’re sick, Kit. You realize that, don’t you?”

Slowly, she retraced her steps, her high heels skimming softly across the hardwood floor, her smile thinning as she approached. In one fluid gesture, she plucked from his hand the martini refill he had yet to taste, then lifted it to her lips for a dainty sip. “Now, now,” she said after she swallowed. “Anyone will tell you that when you have as much money as my family has, my condition is what’s known as ‘eccentric.’”

He shook his head. “‘Eccentric’ suggests a certain, oh… disorganization. And you don’t strike me as being particularly disorganized.”

She held his gaze for a long time, and he detected something in her eyes that was almost yearning. “Then think of me as someone who has nowhere else to go,” she said softly. “Because in a lot of ways, Pendleton, that’s exactly what I am.”

He inhaled deeply and released the breath slowly as he pondered his choices. Either he could toss Kit out on her keester and risk losing his job and any potential chance he had to show a certain someone exactly what kind of stuff he was made of, or he could let her stay and allow his employer to think that the two of them were shacking up. For some reason, he discovered he rather liked that latter option. It would serve the bastard right.

“What’s your real reason for doing this?” he asked.

She sipped casually from the martini again, her gaze never leaving his. “If my father thinks the two of us are romantically involved, he’ll leave me alone and stop flinging undesirable men at me.”

Sidestepping the matter of his being undesirable—for now, at least—Pendleton asked, “And?”

“And I’ll have bought myself a little time to decide what I want to do.”

He eyed her thoughtfully for a moment. “I thought you said you had to be married within two months or your family would forfeit everything.”

“That’s true.”

“Then it sounds to me like you don’t have a lot of time left to buy.”

“Two months is more than enough time,” she assured him, though he detected something in her voice that told him she was in no way sure.

“So if you, wise as Solomon as you are,” he said, “conclude that your family should go broke for paying your fiancé to dump you, then you’ll just string them along for a couple of months, letting them think the two of us will be married before the deadline. Then you’ll back out at the last minute, thereby causing them to lose their inheritance.”

She dropped her gaze to the floor, nodding slowly. Her voice was a quiet monotone that revealed nothing of her thoughts when she replied, “Yes, that’s right.”

“And if, at the end of this two months, you decide they—and you—should keep the money?” he asked. “What will you do then?”

She snapped her head back up, her eyes clouded with confusion when she looked at him. “What do you mean?”

“Well, if you want to keep the money, then you’ll need to be married,” he pointed out. “And what will you do then?”

Her eyebrows arrowed downward in consideration, as if she hadn’t quite thought that far ahead. “Well,” she began slowly, “I suppose… I mean if I do decide to do get married—which I’m not saying I will,” she hastened to qualify, “I guess…” She sighed fitfully. “Well, I guess Novak would do in a pinch.”

“Novak?” Pendleton exclaimed. She had to be kidding.

She shrugged. “Well, he’s made it clear more than once that he’d do anything for me.”

This time Pendleton was the one whose eyebrows arrowed downward in consideration. Then, immediately, he stopped himself. The last thing he wanted to do was consider Novak doing anything for—or with—Kit.

“Besides,” she continued, crossing her arms anxiously over her midsection, injecting a bit more vigor into her voice than he suspected she felt, “I might still decide to stay single. It would serve my family right.”

“And you?” he asked. “You’ll gladly surrender your share of the millions?”

Her shoulders rose and fell so quickly, Pendleton wasn’t sure the gesture qualified for a shrug. “Of course I would,” she said hastily. “It would be going to a good cause.”

She responded too quickly, he thought. She really hadn’t given much consideration to the prospect of being broke herself. He wondered for a moment if he should try to nudge her toward thinking along those lines. Ultimately, he decided it was none of his business. The McClellans dug this pit for themselves a long time before he entered the picture, and there was no reason for him to involve himself in the mess any more than he already was. Still, that didn’t answer his question about what to do with Kit, did it? Should he let her stay or make her go?

“You know,” he said, “I don’t think I’d be talking out of turn here if I said that I really don’t think much your father.”

She smiled sadly. “Yeah, well, you wouldn’t be talking alone, either. Not many people do think much of my father.”

Pendleton studied her for a long time, noting the slump of her shoulders, the downward tilt of her head, and the way she seemed to be holding herself up—as if no one else would do it for her. And little by little, the cool feelings he’d harbored for her began to warm.

“Kit, what you do about your family fortune is between you and your family,” he said. “I really wish you wouldn’t involve me.”

She met his gaze levelly, beseechingly, for a long time without speaking. Then finally, timidly, she said, “Dinner will be ready in about fifteen minutes. It’s something special. I know you’re going to like it.”

Kit held her breath as she waited to see what Pendleton would say about her continued presence in his home. Any other man would have been dialing the police—or Our Lady of Peace Hospital—by now.

But Pendleton was looking at her as if he might honestly allow her to stay. She moved a hand behind her back and crossed her fingers hopefully. Please, she thought, oh, pretty please…

For a long moment, he said nothing, and with every passing moment of his prolonged silence, her heart sank, her limbs grew heavy, and she resolved herself to being dumped. Oh, well, she thought. It wasn’t like such a thing came as any surprise. What man in his right mind would allow his house, his very life, to be overrun by some crazy—or rather, eccentric—woman, just because she asked pretty please?

She was about to open her mouth and concede defeat, to return Pendleton’s house—and his life—to his own capable hands, when he opened his own mouth and cut her off.

“All right, you can stay,” he said, hurrying on before she could comment, “and I’m probably going to be sorry I asked, but…define ‘special’ with regard to dinner.”

Kit smiled as a bubble of relief burst in her belly, even allowed herself to surrender to a ripple of laughter as she crossed the room to link her arm with his. “Fried catfish,” she told him. “Two words, Pendleton. Yum-mee.”

She sensed immediately by the look on his face that he wasn’t nearly as excited about the menu as she was. “Oh, boy,” he said blandly. “Bottom-feeders soaked in fat and served up for dinner. I don’t guess life gets any better than that.”

“Well, there’s no reason to be sarcastic.”

“No?”

She enjoyed another sip from the martini she had taken from him, then extended it toward him again. Some Stepford Wife she was turning out to be. She wasn’t even making sure her man had his nightly cocktail refill after a long, hard day at work. Surprisingly, Pendleton took the drink from her, but instead of tasting it, he continued to study her face. And damn him for that. It was just too friggin’ cold in this house to wear skimpy little outfits orchestrated to keep his eyes elsewhere on her body. But he’d only given her June Cleaver get-up a perfunctory glance before settling his attention back on her face. Now she was going to have to try something else. Maybe if she dressed up as a nun. Or a dominatrix. Or both at the same time. Hmmm…

“What else are we having?” he asked suddenly, dragging her mind back to the matters at hand. “For dinner, I mean.”

She lifted her nose indignantly into the air. “Well, after your joyous outburst over the catfish, I think maybe I shouldn’t tell you about the side dishes. Or dessert, either, for that matter.”

“Oh, I think maybe you should.”

She shook her head. “Nah. It’ll be more fun to watch your expression when you sample genuine Kentucky cuisine for the first time. Especially the—”

She halted when she saw his eyebrows shoot up expectantly. “Well, you’ll find out,” she concluded easily.

Pendleton nodded slowly, fatalistically. “That’s what I’m afraid of.”

Kit had little trouble keeping herself busy in Pendleton’s house during the week that followed. She furnished his home from top to bottom with furniture that she, at least, adored—how fortunate that his arrival in Louisville coincided perfectly with a sale at Bittners (and that twelve-months-no-interest plan was just too irresistible to pass up). She cleared his fridge and cupboards of all that trendy bachelor fare and replaced it with the basic four of her home state—cholesterol, cholesterol, cholesterol, and greens. She played her Earl Scruggs CDs over and over and over again, only to learn that Pendleton—go figure—did not like bluegrass music. Oh, yes. And she named their new golden retriever puppy Maury.

All in all, it was time well spent. Not just because she was so successful in organizing her new life with Pendleton, but because while she was redoing his home, hearth, and life, she also learned some very interesting things about him. Like the fact that he had every book ever written by F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway. Like the fact that he owned not one, not two, but three pairs of Levi’s 501s that had definitely seen better days. Like the fact that he preferred boxers over briefs. And like the fact that R&B and blues ruled in his CD collection. Funny, but he wasn’t turning out to be anything at all like she expected.

Now her second Saturday with him was upon them, a full day with just her and Pendleton, and she was looking forward to learning even more. Especially since he’d steadfastly avoided her last weekend by driving to Paducah, claiming that visiting Paducah, Kentucky had been a lifelong goal, and no, if Kit didn’t mind, he’d just as soon go alone. So it was obvious why she intended to take advantage of his presence at home for a change to try and figure the man out.

Not surprisingly, upon opening her eyes that morning, Kit found herself alone in the bed. She’d awakened alone every morning since that first one, now that Pendleton was sleeping downstairs on their new sofa every night. At any rate, a metallic rapping from the backyard was what woke her. She moved to the bedroom window to find the door open on the shed-thing outside, and Pendleton’s Porsche—its roof now mended—parked in the alley. Even after she made her way downstairs to pour herself a cup of coffee and let Maury out for his morning uproar, the pounding continued.

Gazing out the kitchen window, Kit saw Maury yapping happily about the backyard, but Pendleton was nowhere to be seen. Heard, certainly, but not seen. Much as he’d been for the entire length of her invasion. She heard him come in from work every night, heard him shaving and showering every morning. But she hadn’t seen much of him at all. Nor had he spoken to her. Although, all things reconsidered, she couldn’t exactly blame him. After all, the only reason he tolerated her occupation of his home was that it meant he kept his job. As reasons went, Kit supposed his was as good as any that men had used over the years to hang around with her. She sighed as the clink-clink-clink started up again, and she wondered what on earth he was up to out there.

“Probably building a guillotine,” she muttered to herself. Ah, well. Only one way to find out.

It took her almost no time to take a bath and change clothes. She opted for blue jeans and a bright purple turtleneck that fell to mid-thigh. Maury began to bark incessantly the moment she hit the bottom step outside, and the clamor in the shed-thing abruptly halted.

“Pendleton?” she called out as she approached, thinking that, if this were a Wes Craven movie, the spooky ax-murderer music would start kicking in right about now. “Everything okay in there?”

Not much to her surprise, she received no reply. Except for the constant Awr-awr!…Awr-awr-awr! from Maury as he ran in maddening circles around her feet.

“Down, boy,” she instructed the dog, wondering why she bothered. He was about as obedient as Pendleton was. Sure enough, Maury only increased his frenzied movements in response. Kit rolled her eyes and drew cautiously closer to the shed-thing. “Pendleton?” she tried again. “Sweetie? Is that you in there?”

“Go away.”

Yep, it was Pendleton in there, all right. “What are you doing?”

“Go…away.”

Dissuaded by neither a surly attitude nor the potential for becoming a homicide victim, Kit continued valiantly, “When I woke up alone this morning, I was worried about you.”

He still didn’t emerge from the shed-thing, but Kit still wasn’t quite brave enough to chance a look inside.

“Why would you be worried?” his voice came from the other side of the open door. “Unless maybe you thought I might have hanged myself in the stairwell during the night. Which, as we both know, is a definite possibility.”

“Would that be that you were hanged or you were hung?” she asked. “I never did know the difference between the two.”

That, at last, roused him from inside. When he poked his head through the door, Kit had to catch her breath at the sight of him, because he was really… very… quite… well …breathtaking. His dark hair was tousled all over his head, though whether blown there by the cold wind or because he hadn’t bothered to comb it since rising, she had no idea. Nor did it matter. Even tousled, Pendleton was way too handsome. Worse, he had on a chocolate-brown sweater almost the same color as his eyes, one that did absolutely nothing to hide what she knew were a phenomenal chest and spectacular shoulders. Worse still, he was wearing a pair of those faded 501s, and she realized that they were worn and snug in all the right places.

His breath left his mouth in a rush of white steam, as if he were breathing very hard in an effort to contain himself. “Go. Away.”

“I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

He dipped his head in defeat. “No, you didn’t. You wanted to do something to bother me. Admit it.”

She gasped at him. “That’s not true.” Much to her surprise, Kit discovered that it really wasn’t true. What an interesting development. She tucked her hands into her armpits. Man, it was cold out here. And not just because of Pendleton’s reception, either. “What are you doing in there?” she asked him again.

For a moment, she didn’t think he was going to answer. Then, out of nowhere, he smiled, the way a man would smile if he were doing something he really enjoyed. So Kit felt pretty certain the smile wasn’t for her, but for whatever he was doing before she intruded.

“Building the perfect beast,” he told her.

She smiled back. “Oooh, sounds neato. Can I help?”

He glanced over his shoulder, then back at Kit. “There are those who might argue that you’re the design for the perfect beast, you know.”

Her smile fell. How nice of him to remind her.

“You should know, since you’re one of them,” she said, not quite able to keep the hurt from her voice.

He seemed to give the suggestion weighty consideration before replying, “Not necessarily.’

“Look, can I come in or not?”

“Why would you want to?”

She shrugged. “Just to visit. I’ve missed you, Pendleton. You haven’t been home much.” She told herself she did not sound petulant when she said that.

“I’ve been home every night,” he objected.

“Oh, sure, your body has.”

Now his smile turned into something else, something that was decidedly—uh-oh—playful. “Been noticing my body have you?” he asked.

“Only its absence.”

“You just said it was here.”

“You know what I meant.”

“No, I don’t. Enlighten me.”

Yeah, she’d enlighten him, all right. She’d enlighten him all the way back to New Jersey if he didn’t knock off the boyish flirtation bit. Like she was dumb enough to fall for that.

“Look, can I come in or not?” she repeated. He actually seemed disappointed that she put a stop to their repartee. Like he was really the type of man to go for repartee. But he jerked his head back toward the interior in silent invitation, then disappeared inside himself. Before he had a chance to rescind the offer, Kit followed, only to find the dirt-packed floor of the shed-thing covered with lots of car part-things. Or rather, she decided upon closer inspection, what appeared to be…bike-part things?

“What on earth are you doing?”

“I’m working on my bike,” he replied, verifying her suspicions.

“Like a Schwinn bike?” she asked.

He shook his head and thrust a thumb over his shoulder. “Like a Harley-Davidson bike.”

She looked in the direction he’d indicated and, sure enough, saw a big ol’ Harley hog—well, most of a big ol’ Harley hog, anyway—leaning against the side of the shed-thing. One wheel was off, and the chain was drooping, but all in all, the big black monstrosity looked very scary.

“Oh,” she said.

He glanced over at her with a curious gaze. “Oh?”

She scrunched up her shoulders. “Well, it’s just that you don’t much seem like the Harley-Davidson type.”

“But I do seem like the Schwinn type?”

“Well, no…”

“Then why the look of disbelief?”

Good question, she thought. Too bad she didn’t have a good answer to go with. “I don’t know. It’s just unexpected, that’s all. Does it run?”

He laughed as he stooped beside the collection of oily, greasy guy things scattered on the dirt floor, and she realized then that his hands were streaked and smudged black in places with the remnants of his labor. For some reason, the sight of his dirty hands skimming so carefully over the odds and ends sent a thrill of heat crashing through her body. With no small effort, she shook the sensation off.

“Usually it runs,” he said as he picked through the assortment of bits and pieces, his mind obviously focused more on those than on the conversation at hand. “But it’s a pretty old bike, so I have to keep it in shape. The weather should be turning warm before long, and I want it to be ready to take out on the first good day.”

“I bet it’s fun,” she said.

He smiled as he retrieved a big, round metal thing from the assortment of parts and began to wind it around a long, cylindrical metal thing. “Yeah. It is.”

She watched the motion of his grease-spattered hands, the gentle back-and-forth of thumb and forefinger as he slowly, leisurely…oh God, so rhythmically…spun the round part down lower and lower over the cylindrical part. For some strange reason, her heart began to pound like mad, sending her blood zinging through her veins with the speed of a locomotive.

She swallowed hard. “So…do you usually ride alone?”

“Uh-huh.”

“You don’t take any passengers?”

“Nuh-uh. Not anymore.”

Not anymore? she wondered. “Who did you used to take?”

He glanced up quickly, his eyes cool and distant. Somehow she got the feeling he wished he hadn’t made his last statement, and that he wanted very badly to change the subject. But when he spoke, it was in fact in answer to her question. Unfortunately.

“Sherry,” he said as he dropped his gaze back to the floor.

Kit wasn’t sure she wanted to know, but asked, “Sherry?”

He sighed heavily and tossed the two pieces he had joined together back down amid the other clutter. Then, restless, he picked up a wrench and moved closer to his motorcycle, where he hunkered down to unscrew a bolt on the wheel that was still attached. For a long time, Kit didn’t think he was going to answer her. Then, in one swift motion, he suddenly hurled the wrench hard enough to send it crashing through the window on the other side of the shed. He must have seen her flinch from the corner of his eye, because he dipped his head in what resembled an apology. When he looked back up at Kit again, his eyes were turbulent and weary.

“Yeah, Sherry,” he finally said, his voice low and gravelly. “Sherry Pendleton.”

Something cold settled in Kit’s midsection, a sensation she’d felt often enough in her life to recognize as profound disappointment. Even though she knew what he was going to say, she asked halfheartedly, “Sherry Pendleton, your sister?”

He shook his head. “No. Sherry Pendleton, my wife.”