So, of course I wouldn’t call him.

He’d just been mean to me!

And I was a grown-ass woman, and I might just be coming into my own with that, like, that very day.

But I was entitled to do whatever I wanted or call whoever I wanted when I found myself with a possible-which-turned-into-a-probable crisis.

Or anytime at all.

And Axl might know that if he let me speak.

He was always interrupting me.

So, when I hit his doorbell, all of that was on my mind.

Yes, I got the kind of man he was and what he was to me (even if he actually wasn’t) would make it seem like he should be my first call.

But if this was going to work, he’d have to listen to me so he’d understand why he wasn’t.

So this was on my mind when he opened the door.

Then nothing was on my mind because he opened the door in a pair of gray cotton jersey sleep pants with a wide navy elastic band that rode low on his hips.

And nothing else.

He had dark chest hair, not much, just enough, that trailed down to a dense line low on his flat stomach that led into the waistband of his pants.

His chest was magnificent.

His chest deserved sonnets.

The sight of his chest might make me pass out.

I couldn’t even think of that line of hair that led into his pants or I might lapse into a coma.

I looked up into his semi-sleepy, ice-blue eyes.

Nope.

Not pass out.

Orgasm.

“Hattie? Is everything okay?” his semi-sleep-roughened voice asked.

What was I doing here again?

His gaze went beyond me to the curb.

His stubbled jaw hardened.

Oh, right.

That was what I was doing.

“We’re going to talk,” I declared, turned to give Brett a low wave, a signal I was heading in and a moment for me to pull it together because I could do this.

And I was going to do this.

Brett was being Brett, thus he told me he’d wait at the curb for me to text all was well and Axl was on duty, or for me to come back out so he could take me home.

Yes, at 3:00 at night.

Totally a nice guy.

Seeing as I could do this, and I was going to, I pushed through Axl to get into his house.

I only took a few steps in because there was a light coming from the back, through a door to a room on the right, but the space I was in was dark, the shades were closed, and I didn’t want to mess up before I started by running into furniture or breaking a lamp.