“I’m a big boy.” He put enough butter in the skillet to make her wince. “I don’t expect everything to be fair. And the fact is, there’s already something between us. You pretending otherwise doesn’t change it.” He turned around as the butter melted. “The fact that we haven’t slept together doesn’t change it either. We would have yesterday, if I hadn’t gotten that call.”

“It would’ve been a mistake.”

“If life wasn’t full of mistakes, it’d be a mighty tedious process. If all I wanted was a roll in the sheets, I’d’ve gotten you there.”

“You’re probably right—that’s my point.”

“Right about the mistakes or the sex?” he asked and began slathering jelly on bread.

She decided that even if she had the answer, it wouldn’t matter. Kind, decent, he was. And also stubborn as a mule. “I’ll make coffee.”

“Don’t do coffee with this. Calls for tea. And I’ll make it.”

He filled the kettle, set it on the stove. Poured the eggs into the heated skillet in a sizzling rush.

“Now you’re angry.”

“I walked in half angry, and one look at you took care of part two. Funny thing, though, I can be pissed off at a woman and hold myself back from knocking her around. That’s the kind of amazing self-control I have.”

Nell drew a calming breath, folded her hands on the table. “I’m well aware that not every man deals with temper with physical violence. That’s the kind of amazing intelligence I have.”

“Good for us.” He rooted around until he found teabags, an herbal blend he felt more suited to fancy china cups than the solid stoneware mugs she had available.

He scooped eggs onto plates, found forks, and tore off paper towels in lieu of napkins.

He’d said he wasn’t much in the kitchen, Nell thought as he set a plate in front of her and went back to dunk the teabags in the mugs. But even here he had an appeal. He never wasted a move, she noted, and wondered if it came from grace or practicality.

Either way, it worked.

He sat across from her, let Diego climb adventurously up the leg of his jeans and knead his thigh. “Eat.”

She forked up a bite, sampled. “They’re better than they should be, considering you used a pound of salt per egg.”

“I like salt.”

“Don’t feed the cat at the table.” She sighed, ate. It was so blessedly normal, sitting like this, eating oversalted eggs and strawberry jelly squished in a piece of folded bread.

“I’m not the mess I used to be,” she said. “But I still have moments. Until I don’t, I’m not prepared to complicate my life, or anyone else’s.”

“That’s sensible.”

“I’m going to concentrate on my work.”