Two days after Cole’s family party, on Monday evening, Sierra stretched out on the couch in his apartment, her feet next to his lap as he sat upright on the end near his easy chair. She would’ve had her head in his lap, but they were entrenched in game three of a best-of-three Words with Friends battle, and she didn’t want him to see her letters. God’s truth, he had a big enough advantage with that brain of his as it was, and the stakes were high—loser had to clean out Tito’s litter box.

Cole had slaughtered her in game one, she’d won by two points in game two, and now she was determined to somehow overcome a sixty-point deficit in game three, in spite of having nothing but one-point letters in her hand.

Once she finished her turn, she popped off the couch and picked up their dirty plates from dinner, which they’d set on the coffee table. Cole could hold his own in the kitchen and had made them chicken enchiladas and Mexican rice.

After spending Saturday night and yesterday together at her apartment, they’d arranged to meet here at his today after work—he’d worked the morning with her and her crew for the very last time, as they’d agreed, and spent the afternoon in meetings at North Brothers.

Yesterday, Tito had managed to get the cabinet under the kitchen sink open at some point while Cole was at her place, knocking over the cleaning supplies stored there and then chewing through the bag of cat crunchies—even though his bowls were still half-full—scattering the pellets all over the kitchen floor in the process. A cry for attention, Cole had explained, then called the cranky cat a home wrecker at the same time he rubbed the beast’s jowls.

Tito was stretched out on the easy chair now, taking up far more room than any twelve-pound cat should need, and Sierra had to admit it was hard to resist his fuzzy cuteness.

As she rinsed off their plates and put them in the dishwasher, she couldn’t help thinking about Cole and her, as a couple, and how close they’d become in a short amount of time. Close and domestic, she thought with a private grin. She’d figured out that the less they talked about them, the more Cole let her in. And his frequent traveling made him even more apt to spend the nights he was in town with her.

Playing it cool was okay for now, but it wasn’t a long-term option as far as she was concerned.