What a fool he’d been to misread things between them. From now on, he was here to do a job. Pivoting, he left the kitchen and entered his bedroom. Tossing his wet T-shirt onto the floor, he yanked a clean one from his chest of drawers, and pulled it over his head before he marched back into the lounge and plunked his carcass back on the sofa.

Elise had helped herself to an apple and a wedge of cheese from the fridge during his absence. She joined him on the sofa a few minutes later and placed the lot on the coffee table in front of them.

Elbows on knees, he leaned forward and stared at the telly, hardly acknowledging her presence. The top of his ears burned.

“Want some?” she asked.

He glanced at her, then at the apple. Eve tempting Adam? He snorted. Everything inside him fought to ignore her, but his sense of fair play got the better of him.

“Thanks.” He took a slice of apple and chewed, his eyes back on the telly. If someone asked him the score, he couldn’t have said, nor did he care anymore. Game over, as far as he was concerned. Home team defeated.

The cushion beside him compressed, and Elise touched his arm. He turned his head and stared at her.

“What do you want, Elise?” His voice came out gruffer than he intended.

Her blue eyes searched his, and he sensed a softening in her, an uncertainty. His mind reluctantly whipped back to that eighteen-year-old girl who had literally plowed into his chest after being ejected from one of Nick’s parties.

“I don’t know. How’s that for honesty?”

His heart stuttered. He wasn’t wrong after all? Air whooshed out of his lungs as though she had winded him, and it took him a second to collect himself.

“Are you willing to give this thing between us a try?” He touched her chin, a feather-light brush against her skin. Sparks arced between them. “You feel it too, don’t you?”

She swallowed. “I feel it. I can’t say that I’m not tempted. I am. But there are things about me I can’t tell you. Things no one knows. And if you did, you wouldn’t want anything to do with me.”

“That’s rather cryptic. You’ve always been a straight shooter. Don’t you trust me?”

“I do trust you. More than you know.” Elise looked at her lap, her mouth pulling down at the corners.

“People in our line of work are often asked to do unmentionable things . . .”

“This has nothing to do with work, at least not directly.” She twisted a small peridot ring on her finger.

“All of us have a past.” Was that what was troubling her? He didn’t care what she had done. “Who you are now is far more important than who you used to be.”