Her heart skipped a beat and picked up speed when she saw him standing on her sidewalk. “I hate this,” she said in the privacy of her house. “I really hate this.” She was infatuated with David Dodd, and she was being sucked into a romance she absolutely didn’t want. Despite all her good intentions, she had no control over the rhythm of her heart. It made her furious.

Dave didn’t have to read lips to know her mood. Though his smile was hopeful, he gave her a wide berth when she stomped down the porch stairs. “So, how’d your morning go?”

“Unh!”

“That bad, huh?”

“I did nothing all morning. You know why? Because of you. You and Mark and Shania and Elsie and that dumb bird who just flew away.”

“Mark and Shania?”

“Mark Beaman and Shania Twain. They’re not here anymore, and I keep listening for them.”

What a relief. For a minute there he thought he was going to have to duke it out with Mark and Shania. “I could help you out. I have some CDs—”

“I don’t want CDs. I don’t want Shania. I want to go back to being the person I used to be. I was happy. I was comfortable.” She snatched the football from Dave. “You know, footballs are ugly. You ever take a good look at this thing? It’s brown and bumpy. Why don’t they make them in prettier colors? And it’s shaped funny. It doesn’t fit in my hand.”

“Maybe we should do this some other day.”

She glared at him. “You trying to weasel out of this?”

“Nope. Not me.” He adjusted her hand around the football. “See, actually it fits okay if you hold it properly.” He stepped back a few paces. “Go ahead. Toss it to me.”

The ball went three feet over Dave’s head and hit a lamppost. Kate pressed her lips together. “You could have caught that one.”

Dave retrieved the football and tried not to grin. Kate couldn’t help herself. Bingo fever was mutating. She was a perfectionist, a competitor, a performer. It didn’t matter if she was playing the cello, icing a cake, or flipping a football—she played to win. He threw the ball back to her and moved into the road. “This time don’t look at the ball. Look at me.”

She felt it slide off her fingertips and sail through the air in a graceful arc.

Dave caught it effortlessly. “That’s great. You’re a natural.”

She could throw a football! But she couldn’t catch it. He threw it back to her, and it bounced off her head. “You did that on purpose!”

“Pitch it to me and watch the way I catch it. And remember when you throw you look at me, but when you catch your eyes never leave the ball.”