No, that had nothing to do with it. It was the power struggle. But there was another way. He changed direction abruptly, heading toward the Catalog House as quickly as he could, determination making each step hit the ground harder than was strictly necessary.

He took the steps up the porch two at a time and then knocked on the door.

* * *

Sadie checked the reheating quiche in the oven and smiled. She’d put it in just before getting in the shower. It was looking perfect. And it had taken her only a few tries over the past few mornings.

She’d done it before, but she usually used a premade crust and she’d decided that wasn’t going to cut it at Chez Sadie once she had guests. She took her oven mitts off the cabinet door and opened the oven, pulling the quiche out and putting it on the stove top.

Yes, it looked like heaven. And she was self-satisfied to a ridiculous degree. There was something she liked about all this. Building a business from scratch. Building...quiche from scratch. It was awesome any way.

There was a sudden, impatient pounding on the door that nearly made her jump out of her skin. But almost immediately, she knew who it had to be, without even looking. Because no one else seemed to have emotions strong enough to merit knocks that were quite that intense.

Unless someone had been involved in a terrible wood-chopping accident and was knocking on her door with what remained of their arm. In which case, she should hurry and answer it.

She felt bad for hoping it was someone with a bloody stump, but it seemed oh so infinitely preferable to Eli.

“Coming!” she shouted, pinning her damp hair back and reaching for the door handle, feeling her expression contort to one of horror when she saw who was behind it. “Oh, it’s you.”

“Who did you think it was?” he asked, his dark eyes intense and far too interesting for her own good.

“I was sort of hoping it was someone who’d been gravely injured and was in need of help.”

“Sorry to tell you, it’s just me.”

“Are you in grave danger? Missing any appendages?”

“All body parts present, accounted for and attached,” he said, his tone dry.

And now all she could think of was the body part that had most certainly been present and accounted for during their kiss. And she needed to think of anything else. “Well, damn.”

He leaned in and for one moment, she had the fleeting thought that he was going to burst through that door, throw her onto the table and finish what they’d started earlier in the garden.

Which was ridiculous because she didn’t want him to do that. And because she was not the kind of person who had crazy, throw-down-on-the-table sex. Because that required a certain amount of insanity that was just not a part of her physical relationships.

She was into relationships where you kept your head on straight and had sex at the end of a nice meal. She was well-adjusted about things. She wasn’t an animal.

“I have to work for the next few days, so I don’t have time to entertain you, or help you plan your little barbecue. But the minute that I’m off for the week? You and I have some talking to do.”

So, he was not here to ravish her. Which was good. It really was. She was relieved. Almost as relieved as she would have been to see someone with a severe wound at the door.

“You make it sound like I’m in big trouble,” she said, the words sounding a little softer and a whole lot more flirtatious than she intended.

Her body, it seemed, hadn’t realized what her mind had—which was that the ravishment was off the table, so to speak—and had gone into Mae West mode accordingly.

She tried to tell her inner hussy that he could not come up and see her sometime, but her heart was still beating at hyperspeed.

“That all depends on your definition of trouble, Miss Miller,” he said.

Oh, Lord, why did the way he said those words make a shiver of something rattle through her bones? Why? Why did she sort of wish she could go back to being in trouble with him?

She needed another shower. A colder one this time.

“Not really,” she said, her words terse. “It kind of depends on yours since you have legal backing.”

“I just want to give you a tour of the place. And discuss what is reasonable for the barbecue, and what isn’t.”

“Okay,” she said, feeling a little blindsided by his darn reasonableness. “But I’m not really sure what inspired you to play nice.”

“Must have been the azalea. And if you’ll excuse me, it’s my time off, and I’m going to go unwind.”

She really wished she could stop herself from imagining what all him unwinding might entail. She remembered the presumptively thick erection from earlier and imagined him settling down and unzipping his pants...

No. Bad Sadie!

“Well, you go...do that,” she said, forcing herself not to look down. Forcing herself to look only at his eyes and nowhere else, which, frankly, she felt she deserved a freaking medal for. His hardness had been pressed right up against her today and never—not once—had she given in to the urge to visually explore it.

“I will. And I’ll be here on Thursday morning. Very early. Be ready.”

“Bring coffee.”

He arched a brow. “All right. I will.”

And for some reason, that easy agreement before he walked down off the porch and into the fading light made her more nervous than any fight ever could have.

CHAPTER SEVEN

THE LAST TIME someone knocked on her door this emphatically, it wasn’t because of an ax wound, and she had a terrible feeling it wasn’t this morning, either.

Sadie wiped her hands on her apron and then untied it, draping it over a chair as she walked to the door. “Coming!”

She smoothed her hair, then jerked the door open with a smile pasted onto her face.

And there was the man himself, the cause of the past four sleepless nights, looking awake and far too sexy for a man in a simple pair of jeans and a black T-shirt. And far too tempting.

She looked down at the mug of coffee in his hand. “So thoughtful of you,” she said, reaching out and snagging the bright blue-and-white-spotted tin mug and lifting it to her lips. “Mmm.”

“That was mine,” he said, pushing past her, “and are you going to invite me in?”

“You’re in,” she said, feeling warmed both by the coffee and by the implication that his lips had been on it. Which was juvenile in the extreme. She’d kissed him. What was the point of getting warm and sweaty over her lips touching a mug his lips had touched?

“So I am.”

She took another sip of coffee, fully aware of the awkwardness that was building as they stood in the doorway, making eye contact and with her drinking his drink. Her nipples prickled and she shifted, the motion seeming to draw his eye right down to the place that was currently feeling quite perky and obvious.

“Do you want to come sit at the table?” she asked. “I actually have more coffee. Lucky thing, since you didn’t bring any extra as instructed. And happily for you, my quiche of the day is ready.”

“You have coffee and you took mine?”