“Guess you couldn’t sleep, either,” he said. “Come on up here and sit with me on the swing. You been thinking about this talk we’re supposed to have, too?”

“Yes, I have, and here we are.” Mitzi took a step toward his voice. The wood on the porch scraped her feet after the cool grass, but it was level and didn’t have gopher holes. With a pounding heart she took a few more steps and then heard him pull the tab on a can of beer. Another step to the door leading into the screened porch, and a little flame from a match lit up the darkness. The glow of a jar candle flickered on the table in front of the swing where he sat. She stepped around a bistro set and almost turned around and ran back home when she realized that her hair was a mess, she didn’t have a drop of makeup on—and she was wearing baggy pajama bottoms and no bra under her oversize T-shirt.

Graham handed the beer to her and patted the other end of the swing. She took it from him, sat down, and then noticed that the candle and a long lighter were sitting on the top of one of those tiny dorm-size refrigerators. “Like you said, here we are. According to the girls, I’ve been hard to live with since you turned me down for a date.”

Mitzi took a long drink from the can and turned to face Graham. “I get the same thing from my family. But that’s the problem, isn’t it?”

“I like you, Mitzi, and I think you like me, too.”

“You’re right, I like you, Graham.” There. She’d said it, and it felt good to get that much out. “Do I hear a but in your voice?”

“But you’ve probably been thinking the same thing. Do we feel this way as a by-product of the love we both have for Dixie and Tabby, or is it something real between us?” He sipped his beer and gazed out at the dark clouds covering the moon for so long that Mitzi figured he was about to say that, yes, he liked her but only as a friend. “I’ve given our relationship a lot of thought these past two weeks. Yes, you are good with the girls, but what I feel for you has nothing to do with my kids. There’s chemistry between us that can’t be denied.”

Relationship.

He’d said that and not friendship. It’s what she wanted, but doubts and fears clouded her still.

“But if we ignore it, it might die.” She wiped the sweat from the can.

“Do you want it to go away?” He set his beer down on the floor and scooted over next to her. The touch of his shoulder to hers raised the temperature several degrees.