I bristled at that. “I know Lori. I know she’s sweet. Innocent.”

“Not disagreeing about that.” Rowan showed me his palms. “But why did you stop?”

“Because it wasn’t even a question to me.” I shrugged. “It’s not like I had some big moral dilemma. I saw it. Saw her. Instinct kicked in.”

Rowan continued to eye me with that stare that made my ankles shake under the weight of it. “Jesus,” he muttered.

I wasn’t quite sure what he was trying to communicate with that. His jaw was still locked, posture still rigid, but his eyes were tender. His stare was almost… reverent.

“Why do you like me?” I blurted.

He inclined his head, face impassive. “Excuse me?”

I sighed, knowing it wouldn’t be as easy as just asking the question and getting a straight answer. I’d have to go through the whole song and dance, humiliating myself. But I’d opened up this can of worms, and the tightness in his jaw told me he wasn’t going to let this go.

“You like me,” I said.

“Like is one word to describe how I feel about you,” he murmured.

The murmur was a boom inside my head. My stomach fluttered, my thighs clenched, and I tried really hard not to let out an embarrassing girly sigh. I managed. Barely.

Then I straightened my spine and remembered what I was doing. “Well, it makes no sense. That you like me. You are this tall, muscled, incredibly handsome, enchanting man. You’re a real man. Like cut wood with an ax kind of man. Women absolutely drool over you, and you don’t even notice. You have some kind of… power about you, like if we were both on a plane and it was going down, I wouldn’t be scared. Not at all, because I know you would somehow handle the situation. Now, I don’t know if you’re a pilot or whatever, but I know you’d take care of it. Take care of me.”

His body visibly relaxed at my words, though his dark brows bunched together, listening to me very intently. With an intensity that was nearly impossible to breathe through.

“And I’m a baker,” I added. “A good one, I’ll give you that.”

“A great one,” he corrected, his voice thick and velvety.

I swallowed the embarrassment creeping up my throat. “Yes, well... Some call me a great baker, and I won’t argue about that, but apart from my baking skills, there’s nothing interesting about me.”

I frowned, looking for tidbits about my life that were even worth talking about. Things that would measure up to a man I trusted to save me from a plane crash.

“I have a drawer full of planners, notebooks and journals,” I continued rambling. “Not like a small, narrow, bathroom drawer. No, a big one. A huge dresser drawer full of beautiful, witty, trendy notebooks. To write plans in. Goals. Lists. Some of them have a list or two inside, but most of them are empty. Because I have high hopes for myself and imagine myself as someone who fills up journals and ticks things off lists. Every time I buy one, I promise myself that is the time I will become one of those people.”