Page 66 of Can't Help Falling

She dealt with the journals first. Once they were neatly back on the shelf, she quickly did the dishes and surveyed her kitchen. The indoor herb garden she grew on her kitchen table was healthy-looking and smelled delicious. The series of crystals on her windowsill were sparkling in the sun. The herbs that were hanging on racks to dry looked a little unusual, but she wasn’t about to disturb them now.

She was just going back to her room to change out of her pajamas when a knock came on her door.

She froze midstep, almost comically. He was here already. And she was wearing bunchy pajama pants, no socks, a sports bra and an oversized bright teal zip-up sweatshirt. At least she’d brushed her teeth and washed her face. Her hair, however, was in a nest piled on top of her head that she hoped would pass for a bun. She wished that she was wearing at least some of her rings and bracelets and necklaces. But nope. She didn’t sleep in them. So here she was, feeling as naked as a jaybird, pulling open the door for a grinning, lazy-faced Tyler leaning one shoulder on her doorjamb.

“Morning!”

“How’d you know which apartment was mine?”

“Ky told me. Can I come in?”

She stepped aside and swept her arm out like a game-show hostess.

He grinned down at her bare feet. “I take it this is a shoes-off apartment?” He was already sliding his loafers off and setting them neatly next to Kylie’s sneakers.

How could this have happened? How could Fin have a crush on a man who wore loafers?

“Yup,” she said.

“That’s good, because I brought you something.” He reached into the pocket of his coat and fished out a brand-new pair of purple Smartwool socks. Fin gaped down at them as he held them out to her, but his eyes were already across the room, landing on Kylie. “Hey, kid. How’d you sleep?”

“Like a rock. Fin’s guest bed is the most comfortable thing ever.”

“What kind of mattress is it?” he asked Fin, waggling the socks at her when he realized that she still hadn’t taken them.

“What? Oh, it’s just an old futon.” She finally took the socks and felt the jolt of warm energy that coursed off them. It went all the way up to her elbow and back down to her fingertips. Not every gift that someone gave her made her feel this way, just the really thoughtful ones, the ones where the buyer had held her in their heart when they’d purchased it. And right now, her fingers were tingling as she clutched the socks.

It was just a pair of stupid socks. Nothing to get twisted up over. Socks were the kind of gift that women normally complained about getting. They shouldn’t be making her heart do this weird half-step thing in the cavity of her chest.

“I brought bagels, and then we’ll get out of your hair, okay?” Tyler strode toward the kitchen, stopped in the doorway of it, looked and then turned back around to Fin. “There’s no kitchen in your kitchen.”

She couldn’t help but laugh. “Your sister said almost the exact same thing. I usually eat in here.”

She got them plates, poured Tyler a cup of coffee and arranged everything on her coffee table.

“So,” Tyler probed as he set out bagels and cream cheese and a few other spreads. “You don’t cook, like, at all?”

“She microwaves popcorn,” Kylie put in helpfully, her mouth already full with the bagel she’d added a borderline disgusting amount of cream cheese to.

“Kid. The mouth, the food, the words, for the love of God, swallow that trough of cheese before you speak to me again.”

Kylie crossed her eyes at Tyler but did as he asked.

“No wonder you think I’m such a good cook,” Tyler said to Fin. “If the only thing you use your kitchen for is herbs and popcorn, the standard isn’t very high.”

“You are a good cook,” Kylie said, reaching for her juice. “Better than my mom at least. All she ever did was heat up frozen meals. Or if she was having people over, she’d order from a fancy restaurant and put it on plates like she made it.”

There was a momentary lull in the conversation and Fin knew they were in dangerous territory of making Kylie feel funny about what she had just shared.

“I did that once. Pretended I cooked a meal that I’d bought.”

Tyler swung his head over to Fin. “Really? You?”

She shrugged. “It was for this big date, and I was really nervous. I wanted to impress the guy.”

“Really?”Tyler said again, this time incredulously. “You?”

Fin laughed and shrugged again. “What? I was young. He was hot.”

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