“What?” Maya paused in her rummaging, her brow furrowing. “He who shall what?”

Oh, crap. Had she said that out loud?

Maya looked over her shoulder, confused, until Sawyer stepped into the store. “Sawyer?” She turned back to Eve. “Were you talking about Sawyer?”

She was speaking in that super-loud way drunk people do when they lose control of the volume button, and Eve wanted to die. To just curl up and slowly freeze to death in the refrigerator.

“Hey, Maya.”

He stepped into the circle of light cast by a lamp on the cash desk—Maya hadn’t turned on the overhead light, so it and the light inside the refrigerator were the shop’s only sources of illumination.

“Burning the midnight oil? I was passing by and saw the light on and wanted to make sure everything was…”—his eyes found Eve’s—“okay.”

Well, at least if he was just realizing she was here, he probably hadn’t heard her using his pseudonym.

“I’m so glad you’re here!” Maya exclaimed. “Eve’s locked in the refrigerator!”

“I can see that.” His eyes did not leave Eve’s as he stepped forward and tried the handle. “You don’t have a key?”

Eve held up the key in question.

Sawyer rolled his eyes and tried—unsuccessfully—to open the door.

“My parents have another key,” Maya said. “You want to keep Eve company while I go get it?”

Eve had hugged herself when Sawyer came into the shop. It had been an instinctive, protective gesture, but now that the coldness had sunk in, she was shivering. She ran her hands up and down her bare arms.

The movement drew Sawyer’s attention. Wrinkles appeared on his forehead as he raked his gaze down her body and back up. She told herself his attention was assessing, clinical. He was trying to figure out how to get her out of here. That was a professional gaze.

It just…didn’t feel that way.

He came right up to the glass, and for a minute it looked like he was just going to…what? Smash through it? She wasn’t sure, but there was such determination on his face. She was tempted to take a step back, but why? He was merely taking stock of the situation. He was doing his job. She stood her ground.

Suddenly he dropped to his knees to look at the lock. But because she hadn’t stepped back, that put his face…in a certain region.

Not really, though. Because, hello, there was a pane of glass between them!

It was just that the picture they made, him kneeling with his face level with the juncture between her thighs, was bringing actual, physical heat to…that juncture, despite the chilled air around her. She ordered herself to stay still, not to squirm. Your juncture is immune!

He extracted something from his belt.