“You’re tired of him.”

She opened her mouth, closed it again, then shrugged. “I am, yes. What’s wrong with me?”

“If I tell you, you’ll be after throwing that plate at me.”

“I won’t.” As a sign of truce, she pushed it aside. “This time.”

“All right, then, I’ll tell you what’s the matter. You underestimate yourself, Darcy, then you get annoyed when others do the same. You don’t have any respect for the men who fall at your feet, promising to give you the world on a platter. You’ve filled your own platter all your life and carried it with your own hands. And you know you can keep doing it.”

“I want more.” She said it fiercely, finding herself inexplicably on the verge of tears. “What’s wrong with wanting more?”

“Nothing. Nothing at all.” He reached out to close his hand over hers.

“I want to go places, see things. Have things.” She shoved away from the table, prowling the kitchen as if it were a cage. “I can’t help wanting it. Everything would be easier if I could be a little bit in love with him. Just a little would be enough. But I’m not, and I can’t talk myself into it. So I woke up this morning knowing I’d be breaking it off, and tossing away a lovely trip to Paris.”

“That’s the right thing to do.”

“I’m not doing it because it’s the right thing to do.” Frustrated, she threw up her hands. “I’m doing it because I’m not having my first trip to Paris spoiled by sharing it with a man who’d bore my brains out. Shawn.” She came back to the table, sat again, and leaning forward, spoke seriously. “I’m not a nice person.”

He took her hand again, patted it. “I love you anyway.”

It took her a minute, then her eyes lit with appreciation. “I should have known better than to expect you to list my virtues. But I feel better in any case.” Because she did, she dipped her finger in the bowl again, scooped out another smear of filling. “I wish I could find someone to have a bit of fun and frolic with, like you and Brenna.”

She might not have caught it, the quick change in the eyes before he rose to clear the table. But she knew him as well as, often better than, she knew herself. “Damn it all. I was afraid of this. You’ve gone and fallen for her, haven’t you?”

“It’s not for you to worry about.”

“It is, of course it is, when I love both of you. You great blockhead. Couldn’t you just enjoy yourself, like any other man?”

He thought of that morning, and licked a bit of apple filling himself. “I am enjoying myself.”

“And how long will that last now that you’ve fallen in love with her?”

Interested, he glanced back at her as he began to work. “Does the fun go out of such matters when love walks in?”