She headed straight back to the kitchen as she spoke, and setting the hamper on the counter, shrugged out of her coat, then began to unpack. “Can you open the wine, or will your hand give you trouble?”

“I can handle it.” He took the coat—it smelled of her—and hung it on one of the kitchen pegs. It didn’t belong there, he thought, looking all female and smooth next to his ancient work jacket.

She didn’t belong there, he decided, looking amazing in some little blue number that looked like it might have been painted on by some creative artist who’d been delightfully minimalist and stingy with the brush.

“Look, Kate—”

“Here.”

He took the bottle, the corkscrew she held out. “Kate. Why? Why are you doing this?”

“Because I like you.” She took two enormous potatoes to the sink to scrub. “And because you looked like you could use a steak dinner.”

“How many men fall on their face in love with you?”

She smiled over her shoulder. “All of them. Open the wine, O’Connell.”

“Yeah.”

He put on music, fiddling with the radio dial until he found the classical he thought she’d like. He dug out the good dishes he hadn’t seen in months and set them on the trestle table in the formal dining room where he and Jack had their celebratory meals.

He had candles—for emergency power outages. But nothing fancy and slick. He debated just plunking them down on the table anyway, then decided they’d just look pitiful.

When he came back in the kitchen, she was putting a salad together—and there were two white tapers in simple glass holders on the counter.

She didn’t miss a trick, he decided.

“You know you have a severe deficiency of fresh vegetables in your crisper.”

“I buy those salad things that are all made up and in a bag. Then you just, you know, dump it in a bowl.”

“Lazy,” she said and made him smile.

“Efficient.” Because her hands were full, he picked up her wine, lifted it to her lips.

“Thanks.” She sipped, watching him. “Very nice.”

He set the glass down, and after a moment’s hesitation, lowered his head to touch his lips to hers.

“Mmm.” She touched her tongue to her top lip. “Even better. And, since you’re injured, you’re allowed to sit down and relax while I finish this. You’ll have time to call and check on Jack one more time before dinner.”

He winced. “Shows, huh.”

“It looks good on you. Tell him I said hi, and I’ll see him tomorrow.”

“You really want to do that? The movie thing?”

“I do things I don’t want, but I never volunteer to do them. Go call your boy. You’re getting your steak medium rare in fifteen minutes.”

She liked fussing with the meal. Liked fussing over him. Maybe it was because he so clearly didn’t expect it, and was so appreciative of the little things other people tended to take for granted.