Fulfilling his promise to Ed shouldn’t require dinners with Finley. He was a fool because he’d somehow let a cream puff of a woman rope him into this.

He knocked. Immediately, he heard answering footsteps within. As the door swung open, he tried to brace himself for the sight of her.

It didn’t do any good. The power of her appearance hit him hard in the chest. She was color and life and warmth.

“Welcome,” she said. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

He figured remaining silent was better than saying, “I’m not glad I came.”

“Come in.”

He entered her house just as a pug came to a stop at her feet.

Great. More pugs.

“Right this way.” Her clogs thumped against the hardwood floor as she walked past an office, stairs, and a bathroom tucked under the staircase.

She wore a loose white tank top and leggings beneath a silky robe-thing in a blue print. The robe-thing was open down the middle and ended near her knees. He guessed it wasn’t a robe since she was wearing it for dinner over clothes. Still, it seemed weird. She had on two necklaces—a short one and a long one that dangled a metal feather. Her black hair was down tonight and slightly wavy. She and her house smelled like orange blossoms.

He followed her to the living room, dining room, kitchen space at the back of the house that overlooked a rectangular deck.

She picked up a spoon and stirred one of the pots on the stove. “This is Sally.” She motioned with her elbow toward the dog. “And there’s my cat, Rufus.” A scraggly cat with one ripped ear curled on a living room chair. He eyed Luke suspiciously. “He’s anti-social. I have a hedgehog named Dudley, who’s currently napping in his cage in the office. And I have Gloria here.” She indicated the fishbowl on the half-wall separating the dining room from the kitchen. “She’s a Siamese fighting fish.”

“I’m not easily scandalized,” she’d said to him on Friday. She had no idea what she was talking about, living out here in her little house in the woods with her pets, listening to soundtracks of wind chimes, eating tofu, and viewing herself as worldly.

“Are your pets all rescues?” he asked.