Page 32 of When You Got a Good Thing (Misfit Inn 1)

“Yes, ma’am.” Athena pulled back and faced Kennedy. She fidgeted. “Keep the lit

tle one out of trouble, will you?”

It was a task that presupposed she was actually staying. Kennedy decided that counted as progress. She nodded. “We’ll let Ari know you said goodbye.”

Athena scooped up her bags, dashing any vain hope that they might make more of a connection.

“Have a good flight,” Kennedy told her, and led the guys to the back of the house to show them the sitting room.

Xander cornered her in the hall, while Logan was sizing up the furniture. “You okay?”

She tried to work up a smile for him. “Getting there.”

He looked at her with dark brown eyes that always saw too much. She’d never wanted to hide from that compassion before. She didn’t actually want to hide from it now. She wanted to revel in it, take the comfort and closeness she knew he’d offer. Fighting those urges was getting harder every time she saw him.

“Let’s get to work.”

By the time they’d relocated Mom’s favorite chair to Pru’s room and shifted the bookcase to a different wall, Maggie and Athena were pulling out of the driveway. Without the pair of them in the house, it felt like maybe Kennedy could breathe again.

“Now comes the fun part,” she declared.

“Yeah? What’s that?” Xander asked.

“Treasure hunting in the hay loft.”

When the attic had been converted to bedrooms, Joan had taken to storing spare furniture and other assorted junk on the second floor of the barn. It wasn’t the easiest place to haul furniture in and out of, but there were, at least, stairs. Kennedy dragged a reluctant Pru out to see what they could find.

“I’d forgotten how much stuff was up here,” Pru said. “There are probably some pieces we could sell.” She wandered on down one of the haphazard aisles.

“Long as you don’t sell this,” Xander murmured.

“Sell what?” Kennedy asked.

He tugged her behind a stack of boxes and pointed down another aisle to a dusty day bed at the other end. At the sight of it, her cheeks caught on fire.

“I have particularly fond memories of rainy afternoons and that bed.” His voice was a low rumble in her ear, part seduction, part amusement. He wasn’t holding her, but she could feel the heat of his body bare inches from hers.

“Maybe you want to buy it for your place,” she suggested, her tone coming off a lot more flip than she felt. Careful, girl. You’re playing with fire.

“Maybe I do.” Heat flashed in his eyes.

Kennedy felt an answering tug low in her belly. Not a good idea. But her inner voice of protest was getting weaker, lost somewhere behind the part of her that had been drooling watching him use those big muscles to heft furniture. If it had just been her, she wouldn’t have acted on the heat. She wasn’t the kind of woman to throw herself at a man. But the fact that he unquestionably wanted her back made it so much harder to choose the right thing.

“So I’m gonna owe you for moving all this crap. You should probably be thinking about what you want as payment.”

Why was she bringing this up right now? When they both had sex on the brain?

“Oh, I already know what I want.”

The thumb he rubbed down her forearm should not have been arousing. It should have been an easy, affectionate sort of gesture. But it set her on fire.

Maybe…maybe they both needed this. He needed to get her out of his system and she needed…him. She’d always needed him. Maybe this could help grant them both some resolution and clarity.

“Do you now? And what, pray tell, is that?”

“Dinner.”

Not what she’d expected him to say. “What?”

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