She couldn’t help it. She laughed again. “While you’re cooking, I’m going to call Jeremy O’Bannion. He teaches a class at the med school.” Marcus O’Bannion’s father had been a skilled surgeon before burns from a car accident had scarred his hands. Now he taught others. “He might remember an LJM.”

Diesel hesitated. “I might have already asked him.”

Her brows shot up. “Oh, really? Might have?”

He looked sheepish. “You slept really late, Dani.”

She hadn’t slept all that late. “Did you sleep at all?”

“As much as I normally do. Jeremy is checking and said he’d call if he found the name we’re looking for.”

As much as I normally do was not a real answer, but she let it go when another thought occurred to her, one that really should have occurred to them both the night before. “We should check missing-person reports and newspaper articles for the death of a med school student. It wasn’t that long ago.” She frowned. “We should have heard about it in the news, actually.”

She was reaching for her phone to check when Diesel put a cup of tea on the table in front of her. “I looked,” he said. “There was nothing in the news. No mention of any missing med students with the initials LJM. No missing med students period.”

Well, shoot. She’d been so sure last night. It had made so much sense.

“Is . . . Is it okay?” Diesel asked from where he stood at the stove, pointing his spatula at the tea.

She took a sip of the tea. It was the same blend she’d made for him the night before. “Oh, yes,” she said sourly. “It’s made perfectly, too.”

Of course it was.

He looked confused and she realized that she was glaring at him. “I’m sorry. I’m not irritated with you. Exactly.”

“Sounds like it,” he muttered, but because he’d insisted she wear her processor, she heard him.

“It’s not you,” she repeated. “It’s just that you’ve been so damn productive while I’ve been lazy and sleeping.”

He flipped a pancake. “Is this a competition?” he asked mildly.

She blew out a breath, sending her hair flying back from her face. “Of course it isn’t. Except when it is, but that’s just me and not your fault,” she said firmly.

He plated two pancakes and set them in front of her. “Except when it is my fault,” he said. “I haven’t been in a relationship before, but I know how this thing works. When in doubt, it’s always the guy’s fault.”

She should have been distressed that he’d called this odd thing between them a relationship, but she found herself chuckling. “Adages exist for a reason.” She tasted the pancakes and couldn’t stop the low moan that hummed from her throat. “You’re a good cook, too?”