“What did I say?” Lila asked as soon as Emily had slammed the bedroom door behind her. The house was so small that the action caused the pictures to rattle on the walls, but Ford wouldn’t punish her for it. A slammed door was preferable to the withdrawn silence that so often took over. “Do you guys have a rule about guests that I should know about?”

Ford sighed and scrubbed a hand over his jaw, momentarily forgetting that he had a tendency to get ink all over his fingers while he sketched. “No, there’s no rule. In fact, teaching Jeeves to recognize a knock on the door should probably go to the top of the list. In case you didn’t notice, neighbors around here have a tendency to drop by at all hours and on the flimsiest of excuses.”

At the mention of Helen and those empty coffee cups waiting to be returned, Lila’s entire body stilled. “I’m sure it’s none of my business,” she said.

“Are you?” He sighed. “I’m not. Not after I let Helen walk away without setting the record straight.”

Color mounted in her cheeks, but not by so much as a flutter of an eyelash did she show any other signs of discomposure. Which was probably for the best, now that he thought about it. At least one of them needed to have some dignity around here, and it obviously wasn’t going to be him.

It never was. For as long as Ford could remember, he’d been lacking all those skills that would set him apart as a man of the world. He wasn’t particularly driven. He had few ambitions outside of Emily’s well-being. And he hadn’t had a relationship—not a real one, anyway—in years.

It was why he was so good at the Helens of the world. The women in his life looked at him and saw not the shitty ex-husbands who’d left them to raise their children on their own, and not a man who had the potential to break their hearts, but someone who made them laugh. Someone safe. A game.

In other words, he was Ford Ford: charming and fun, flirtatious and harmless, great to have at parties.

And never, under any circumstances, to be taken seriously.

“I was hoping it would be a few weeks before we got to this point, but we might as well have the truth out now.” He held out a hand to help Lila to her feet, but she only stared at his palm as though it might bite her. Since there seemed nothing else to do, he settled on the floor next to her instead.