With that, she gives me a tight smile and climbs out of the truck.

So… she hates me, but she’s too nice to make me sleep on the couch.

Fine. I can deal with that. It’s for the best, really. Neither of us has roots anywhere. Not a good time to get involved. It may be frustrating to lie in bed mere feet from her without getting to touch her, but at least I won’t have to listen to other people have sex.

She knocks on the driver’s side window, startling me. “You coming or what?”

Letting Gomer out, I grab my backpack but don’t get far before Gomer blocks my path. His head lowered, he barks once.

“Oh, you’re right. Phone.” Reaching back into the cab, I grab it from the console and head for the house.

Diane trots to catch up with us. “What the heck was that?”

“What?”

“That little routine with the dog?”

“Oh.” I scratch my head, trying to decide whether I should admit how much I depend on my dog to get through the day. “Remember when we met?”

She smirks. “Hard to forget.”

Dousing the ember of hope her comment ignites, I remind myself that she’s very clearly said she doesn’t want to sleep with me. “And I forgot stuff? Like my… uh, what was it I forgot that night?”

She taps pursed lips as she considers my question. I may have a mind like a sieve half the time, but I’ll never forget the glide of that plush mouth over mine.

“Your colleague brought your portfolio, and then I brought you your phone.”

Her words bring me back to the here and now, where she and I will not be sharing anything more than air. “Ahh, right. You have a good memory. I do not. Lucky for me, Gomer here was trained as a support dog. Long story short, he flunked out, so I adopted him. Turns out he has skills I need. Mainly preventing me from leaving my crap all over New York state.”

Before we mount the steps to the porch, I bring a finger to my lips. “Quiet now, Gomes. Bedtime.”

Opening the side door to usher Diane inside, I whisper, “Going to pretend I’m sleeping on the couch so Gran doesn’t get mad. At me or the dog.” After grabbing a blanket and pillow from the linen closet, I settle Gomer on the couch. “Wake me up in the morning, buddy.”

Diane follows me up the back stairs. “He can tell time too?”

“He wakes me up when he needs to go out, which is basically sunup.” At the landing, I gesture to the bathroom. “You want to wash up first?”

“Um. Yeah, okay. Let me just grab something to sleep in.”

A few minutes later, we trade places and I do my own bedtime routine. When I return, the reading lamp is off. Desire throbs low in my pelvis. I’d love nothing more than to remind her of how compatible we were all those months ago, but I crawl under the covers and sink into the familiar, if lumpy, mattress of my childhood instead.

“Night, Sam.”

“See you in the”—a yawn interrupts my thought—“morning.”

But when I wake at dawn to the cold nose of my dog, he and I are alone in the room.

She is awfully good at leaving me, that Diane.

CHAPTER 14DIANE

I’m not sure if he’s doing it on purpose too, but Sam and I manage to avoid each other for the next few days. It hasn’t been easy to share a room with a guy with the face and body of Henry Cavill and the brains of Neil deGrasse Tyson, but I keep telling myself that it’s for the best. After all, if he found out who I really am, I’d lose what I have here: a seemingly endless supply of content subjects and, even more, the feeling of being a part of the kind of family I’ve always wanted.

In any case, after the first morning, he’s up and out before me. For three nights straight, he’s either asleep when I return to the room or gets in long after I’m dreaming about him. Some mornings it’s hard to tell if he’s been there at all.

It doesn’t stop me from wishing he’d kiss me again. Wondering if we could make love quietly enough to avoid waking the rest of the household.

Without things getting messy between us.

But instead of acting on those fantasies, I keep busy with shooting and editing content. When I do see him again, he walks in on Ethel and me. I’ve been helping her with a secret project, which is just adorable.

“What is that?” Sam asks from the doorway of the parlor.

Ethel slams the laptop shut. “None of your business.”

He narrows his eyes at her, then aims that suspicious glare of his at me. “Are you two doing anything illegal?”

I have to suppress a giggle because Ethel’s videos are about as far from illegal as you can get. “No, we are not.”

“Of course not, Sam. Don’t be ridiculous,” Ethel says with a sniff, even as she shoots a conspiratorial grin my way. “Diane is just teaching me computer things.”

“Then why did you hide it from me?”

She lets that hang in the air for a moment before answering. “Because it’s private, female business.”

Sam may keep most of his emotions under lock and key, but when he’s caught off guard, his face reveals all. Ethel’s fib works. He does not want anything to do with anything in the realm of female business when it comes to his grandmother. “Fine. Well, I’m just heading to bed then.”

“On the couch?” Ethel asks. Something in her tone makes me wonder if she knows exactly where Sam and his dog have been sleeping.

“Yep,” Sam says, shooting me a tight smile. “On the couch. Goodnight.”

I hate to admit it, but I’m eager to be in the bedroom when we’re both awake, so I fake a few yawns and rush Ethel through saving and backing up her work. Sam is indeed on the couch when I pass by on the way upstairs, but by the time I return from the bathroom, he’s in bed. The bed that’s far, far away from mine, eyes closed.

When I set a glass on the bedside table, he says, “See you got your ice water.”

A shiver runs through me at the flood of memories the word ice triggers, but I make myself get in my own bed rather than get on top of him. Like I want to.

“Even though the nights are getting chillier,” he adds, his voice low and inviting.

“You know,” I begin, testing the waters. Having sex with Sam, in a houseful of people that includes his grandmother and his sister, is definitely inadvisable. But also irresistible. “It’d be warmer if we shared a bed.”

Next thing I know, he’s hovering over me in a forearm plank, only a hair’s breadth separating our torsos.

A giggle escapes past my lips. “Well, that wasn’t very hard.”

“I beg to differ,” he says, shifting so that the hard length that seems to have imprinted on my vagina presses closer. “Should I leave?”