LITMIR.BIZ

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      Katie sighed. “Yeah.”

      An appreciative smile stole over her face. “If that’s the case, I’d give just about anything to be in your shoes.”

      “It’s not like that.” Katie felt her cheeks heat. “He…he’s just helping me out for a little while.”

      Judy fanned herself as if the mere thought of living with Booker was enough to give her heart palpitations. “Well, I know I’m not the only one who’d love to trade places with you.”

      “I’m not interested in a man.”

      “Are you crazy? Even Booker? I’ve never seen a better pair of bedroom eyes.”

      Booker’s hands weren’t bad, either. Katie knew from experience the havoc they could wreak on a woman’s body. She’d been a bona fide Goody Two-shoes before she met him, yet he’d broken through her reserve. He seemed to know moves the average man, like Andy, didn’t. But at twenty-five she’d already made more than her share of mistakes. If she’d learned anything, she’d learned that life wasn’t about personal gratification. It was about deeper things, lasting things, and it was time for her to grow up and start building the right foundation. “I don’t care about bedroom eyes. I’m going solo for a while.”

      “Then I suggest you move out of Booker’s house immediately,” Judy said. “Because the bedroom’s where you’re going if you stay.”

      CHAPTER FOUR

      KATIE RETURNED TO BOOKER’S around four o’clock. She’d spent the afternoon at Hair and Now, catching up on all the gossip and getting reacquainted with the people she used to work with—Mona, the middle-aged manicurist, Erma, who was selling the shop to Rebecca but still worked part-time, Ashleigh, who’d been there about two years, and Rebecca.

      Rebecca had been a little reserved at first. Considering how close Booker and Rebecca were, Katie could understand why Rebecca might not be thrilled to see her. But then Delaney had walked in to have her little girl’s bangs trimmed, and Rebecca had warmed up considerably while playing “aunt.” They’d all sat around talking and laughing—until LeAnn, Andy’s cousin, arrived for an appointment. At that point, Katie decided it was time to leave. Mona wanted to trade a manicure and pedicure for a haircut and color, which sounded pretty appealing, but Katie felt she should have dinner ready when Booker and Delbert came home. She had to do something to repay Booker’s generosity in letting her stay with him, something to compensate him for the fact that he didn’t really want her around. Her self-respect demanded it.

      Besides, she was so hungry she could almost eat cardboard, and she wasn’t about to help herself to Booker’s food without working to earn it.

      Unfortunately Booker’s cupboards weren’t well-stocked. Salt, cold cereal, a few cans of tuna, the heel of a loaf of bread…Probably he and Delbert ate out a lot.

      What was she going to do?

      She opened the refrigerator. Beer, a cube of butter and some eggs. Not much better.

      Sitting down, because her empty stomach was making her a little light-headed, she considered her options. She could make tuna salad. Or she could go to the store, spend her last twenty dollars on groceries and make a meal of which she could be proud.

      Somehow, after her mother’s poor reception, the rejection she’d experienced while attempting to find a job, and facing one of Andy’s cousins, she needed to be able to contribute—even more than she needed money. Getting up, she grabbed her purse and headed back into town.

      

      GLANCING AT HIS WATCH, Booker realized it was nearly eleven o’clock. Much too late to tear apart the wheels and repack the bearings on Helen Dobbs’s Chevy Suburban, which was next on his list.

      Shoving himself out from beneath the red Mustang he’d just fixed, he dodged the space heater that hummed nearby and crossed to the sink at the corner of the shop. He’d let his full-time mechanic, Chase Gardner, leave hours ago. Delbert had taken Bruiser and wandered over to the Honky Tonk at nine o’clock to play some pool. But Booker had kept working. For once, he wasn’t interested in hanging out at the Honky Tonk. And he sure as hell didn’t feel like going home. Not with Katie there. Word was spreading that she was staying with him. He’d been hearing about it all day.

      “Hey, I hear Katie’s in town…You two back together…? Is she finished with Andy…? Why is she staying with you instead of her parents?”

      In retrospect, Booker wasn’t sure exactly how he’d wound up with Katie under his roof. There was her smoking car, then the rain, then her mother standing at the door looking down her nose at both of them. And suddenly he had a roommate.

      It was just plain bad luck that he’d come across her before anyone else had.

      Peeling off the heavy coveralls he typically wore over his clothes in winter, he pushed up the sleeves of his long-sleeved T-shirt, lathered his hands and arms with laundry detergent and used a brush to scrub off the grease. In the extra hours he’d spent at the shop, he’d worked on Katie’s car, which he’d towed into town first thing this morning, and finished repairing a Mustang and a Nissan truck. He was tempted to keep working through the night. Heaven knew he had enough backlog. But he had to go home sometime, or he knew he wouldn’t be worth anything tomorrow.

      The telephone rang. It had rung at about ten, while he was working under the Mustang, but he hadn’t wanted to talk to anyone badly enough to interrupt what he was doing. Now he thought maybe Delbert hadn’t been able to catch a ride home, as he normally did if Booker wasn’t around, so he headed into the small front office.

      “Hello?” He propped the handset against his shoulder while he finished drying his hands on the paper towel he’d brought with him.

      “Is everything okay?”

      Not Delbert—Katie. Mildly surprised, Booker threw the paper towel in the garbage. “Of course. Why?”

      “I thought maybe there’d been an emergency.”

      “No.”

      “So what’ve you been doing?”

      “Working.”

      “Just working?”

      “Were you expecting something else?”

      “You didn’t think to let me know you wouldn’t be coming home tonight?”

      “Was I supposed to let you know?”

      “Well, I assumed—I mean, I made…” She sighed. “Never mind.”

      “What?”

      “Nothing. Forget it,” she said and hung up.

      Booker blinked at the phone, then called her back, but she didn’t answer.

      Rubbing his temples, he gave a long sigh. One day. She’d been there one day. And it was already one day too many—for a variety of reasons.

      

      BOOKER SHOOK HIS HEAD as he read Katie’s note taped to the refrigerator. There are plenty of leftovers if you’re hungry. K.

      “Smells good in here,” Delbert said, coming in from the mudroom, where he’d just taken off his boots.

      Booker opened the fridge and gazed inside to see a large pan of lasagna, a green salad, a foil-wrapped loaf of garlic bread and a pitcher of lemonade. Judging by the number of pans drying in the drainer next to the sink, Katie had gone to a lot of effort.

      He felt a little guilty for not bothering to let her know he wouldn’t be home. He’d considered calling but refused to feel as though he needed to check in. It wasn’t as though he owed her anything. Two years ago, he’d asked her to marry him. She’d turned him down flat, then she’d left town with another man. That hardly obligated him.

      “There’s food in the fridge

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