As Lila double-checked the address and pulled up to a tiny brick house, she realized she couldn’t have been further from the truth. All the houses on this street were boxy and small—less than a thousand square feet apiece—and almost every yard had some variation of a snowman built in it, with discarded carrots and scarves littering the scene. Christmas decorations were already up in abundance, many of the SUVs and family cars bearing fuzzy antlers and red-felt noses on their front bumpers—including Ford’s.

“A minivan?” she said as she pulled open her car door and stepped out. “He drives a reindeer minivan?”

“He has to, unfortunately. He’s in charge of car pool one week every month.”

Lila held back a small shriek of surprise.

Ford appeared next to the large snow pile that must have been hiding him. “For a while there, I tried cramming the lot of them in my two-door sedan, but it didn’t work. For some reason, kids get mad when you make them ride in the trunk.” He grinned and drew closer. “Well, that’s not true. The kids loved it. Their mothers, however…”

Lila remembered, almost too late, to breathe. The mortification of having been caught disparaging Ford’s car was paltry compared to the sensation she felt at seeing him in nothing but a pair of red-and-black buffalo-check pajama pants. He had on boots and a coat thrown hastily over the top, not to mention a small puppy clutched to his bare chest, but he had to be freezing. It was all of twenty-five degrees out here, the windows on every parked car frosted over and clouds of her breath coming out in short, panting puffs.

“We don’t have a fenced yard,” he apologized as he curled the puppy more protectively against his chest. “And it takes at least half an hour to get Emily layered up to go outside, so that makes me the king of potty breaks. Come on in. Have you had coffee?”

Lila strove to find her tongue, but it was cleaved to the top of her mouth. She’d known that Ford in a tuxedo was attractive, all those folds of dark cloth molded to a body that knew what it was about. Even yesterday at the kennel, in jeans and a sweater, he’d looked a fine figure of a man, his shoulders broad and his stance powerful.

But this? Bare-chested? In the cold? All those firmly etched lines flexing with his every breath?

“I haven’t had any either,” he said. “Although I have fed and watered this little beast, so I figure I’m not doing too bad overall. Oh, h-e-l-l. Quick. Let’s get inside before—”

“Ford! Ford, you’ve got to be kidding. You’re going to catch your death of cold like that.”