It wasn’t that she thought Danny was a bad guy. No, he was one of the good ones. But well, it was Danny. The bane of her existence. And a man who honestly deserved a lover far more emotionally balanced than Catie. He was so wholesome and normal, and she wasn’t.

Forget her parents, losing her legs hadn’t exactly helped with her sunny disposition either. She was moody and grumpy, and yeah, she’d scare Danny off in five minutes flat if they actually tried to get together for real.

Nope. Nope. Nope.

Even if they hadn’t been so wrong for each other, she loved his family too much to mess things up by making it uncomfortable between them. That would be an absolute horror show. The two of them avoiding each other at barbeques and pretending everything was normal when it so obviously wasn’t.

No, thank you.

“The call went better than I thought it would,” Danny said, switching to do raised-knee crunches, his breathing even despite his pace. “I was worried Dad might not approve, but even he got in on the bets.”

“You have a wonderful family, Danny,” Catie found herself saying, her mind continuing along its earlier train. “Don’t ever take them for granted.”

A pause, Danny glancing up at her with a slight flush on his cheekbones before he looked away and continued on. “I know they’re amazing,” he said. “I lucked out.” Sincerity in every word, and yet…

She frowned, sure she was missing something. That was when her phone, which she’d brought in so she could stream her music, pinged with an incoming text. Picking it up, she found a message from Laveni: I’m sneaking a break while Suz covers for me. Only have five minutes. Call now or I shall fly over there with my thumbscrews. Are you two really a thing?

Catie had no secrets from her best friend, so she stopped what she was doing to step out. “Going to talk to Veni.”

“Tell her that ice water gave me a head cold. I hope she feels guilty.”

Grinning, she wandered into the living room as she made the call.

“I knew it!” Veni crowed when Catie confessed that the hookup rumors weren’t true. “So why did you sneak off with him?”

Catie found herself in a quandary. She and Veni told each other everything… but Danny had been so vulnerable last night and this morning, his hand tight on hers. She wanted—needed—to protect him. “I had a good reason, Veni, but I can’t tell you what,” she said, deciding on another kind of honesty.