She knocked and waited impatiently. When there was no answer, she pulled out her spare key and let herself in, fully intending to make herself at home and wait her best friend out. Opening the front door, Audrey was welcomed by the sound of Queen blaring from upstairs.

So he was home. Good. Audrey set her purse on the end table she’d helped him pick out and hung her coat by the front door the way she had hundreds of times over the years.

Clarke’s house was gorgeous, and Audrey gave herself plenty of credit for that. Not for the prewar architecture, obviously. That had been somebody else’s genius. But Audrey had refused to let such a gorgeous space be wasted with Clarke’s barren man cave decorating sensibilities. With the help of one of Manhattan’s top interior designers, Audrey had given the townhome a decidedly masculine, country-club vibe. The floors and staircase were a rich mahogany, the walls deep blues and greens. The furniture was an intentional mismatch of worn leather and offbeat plaids, the walls adorned with pictures of horses and hunting dogs that Clarke liked to fuss about but never bothered to take down. Audrey suspected that had far more to do with his mother hating the artwork than it did Clarke himself liking it.

She followed the sound of “We Will Rock You” up the stairs, already knowing she’d find him in the one room in the house that hadn’t seen her touch—his home gym. She leaned against the side of the open doorway, not wanting to startle Clarke in the middle of bench-pressing. He’d outfitted one of the larger spare bedrooms with a treadmill, squat rack, free weights, and, as evidenced by the fact that he still hadn’t heard her arrival, a top-of-the-line built-in sound system.

Dressed in gray sweatpants and a tight black workout shirt, Clarke pushed through the last of his reps and set the bar back on the rack. Swiping a towel off the ground, he levered up into a sitting position on the bench, freezing for a moment in surprise when he saw her standing there.

Grinning, he held up a finger. Wait. He reached for his phone and, with a swipe of his thumb, turned the music down.

“Hey, Dree!”

Dree. Not her favorite nickname, but he’d been using it since childhood, and there was no teaching this playboy new tricks. She crossed her arms, one shoulder against the doorjamb. “Anything you want to say to me?”

He smiled wider. “Your hair looks great today?”

Audrey lifted her eyebrows and waited.

Clarke wiped the towel over his forehead and merely grinned wider.

“You know that doesn’t work on me.”

“What?”

She waved a hand over him. “That grin. The perfect white teeth, the strategic amount of stubble, the Superman muscles.”