Her face was already glowing. “I thought you were going to work.”

“I can always work.” Even as her lips curved, he was lowering his to them.

Shannon waited a beat, then another before clearing her throat. “Maybe I should wait outside, in the car. With my eyes closed.”

“Stop it, Grayson, you’re embarrassing Shannon.”

“No, I’m not. She’s just jealous.” And he winked at the woman he already considered his sister-in-law. “Come on, pal, we’ll find a guy for you.”

“No, thanks, I just got rid of one.”

“Yeah?” Always interested, Gray handed the baby to his wife so that he could circle Shannon’s waist. “Tell us all about it. We live for gossip around here.”

“Leave her be,” Brianna said with an exasperated laugh. “Don’t tell him anything you don’t want to find in a book.”

“This wouldn’t make very interesting reading,” Shannon decided and stepped outside into the damp air. It had rained, and was raining still, just as predicted.

“I can make anything interesting.” Gray opened the car door for his wife with some gallantry, then grinned. “So, why’d you dump him?”

“I didn’t dump him.” It was all just absurd enough to brighten her mood. Shannon slid into the backseat and shook back her hair. “We parted on mutually amenable terms.”

“Yeah, yeah, she dumped him.” Gray tapped his fingers on the back of the seat as he eased into the road. “Women always talk prissy when they break a guy’s heart.”

“Okay, I’ll make it up.” Shannon flashed Gray a smile in the rearview mirror. “He crawled, he begged, he pleaded. I believe he even wept. But I was unmoved and crushed his still-bleeding heart under my heel. Now he’s shaved his head, given away all his worldly goods, and joined a small religious cult in Mozambique.”

“Not too shabby.”

“More entertaining than the truth. Which was we didn’t really share any more than a taste for Thai food and office space, but you’re welcome to use either version in a book.”

“You’re happier without him then,” Brianna said complacently. “And that’s what’s important.”

A little surprised at how simple it was, Shannon raised a brow. “Yes, you’re right.” Just as it was a great deal more simple than she had supposed to sit back and enjoy the evening.

O’Malley’s pub. It was, Shannon decided as she stepped inside, an old black-and-white movie starring Pat O’Brien. The air faintly hazed from cigarettes, the murky colors, the smoke-smudged wood, the men hunkered at the bar over big glasses of dark beer, the laughter of women, the murmuring voices, the piping tune in the background.

There was a television hung behind the bar, the picture on some sort of sporting event, the sound off. A man wearing a white apron over his wide girth glanced up and grinned broadly as he continued to draw another brew.

“So, you’ve brought the little one at last.” He set the pint down to let it settle. “Bring her by, Brie, let us have a look at her.”