He squints at the photo on my phone’s screen. A close-up of a canvas still mounted to an easel in my studio at home. Carefully reaching past me, Jamie slips on his glasses so he can see it better. His eyes scour the painting, his face drawn tight with emotion. “Bea.”

I slip off his lap and nestle in beside him as he wraps an arm around me. “I’ve been working on it for weeks. It’s based on Grace’s photo at Paint to Your Heart’s Content, but I exerted some creative license. Instead of standing, we’re sitting over a chessboard, which is for—”

“Our first date, of course,” he says.

“In the background, beside the storefront of Paint to Your Heart’s Content, the karaoke bar, the tattoo parlor, and the Alley for the most embarrassing night of my life.”

Jamie laughs. “I just remember kneeling at your feet before we left, lacing up your boots.” His eyes meet mine. “I didn’t want to get up.”

I blush spectacularly and press my thighs together, remembering how talented Jamie is with his tongue, his hands, his everything. “Stop tempting me. I’m being romantic.”

“I love it,” he says, sneaking a kiss before he studies the image again. His smile returns. “I’ll finally have my own Beatrice Wilmot original.”

“The first of many.”

His grin is so deliriously wide it makes my heart sing. “What’s it called?” he asks.

“Two Wrongs Make a Right.”

Jamie slowly lowers my phone. He blinks. Then blinks again, before he dabs the corner of his eye. That’s when I realize what’s happening.

My heart drops to the floor.

“Jamie? I made you cry. I’m so sorry—”

“Come here, you,” he says, curling me tight in his grasp, setting my phone on the nightstand next to him. “Don’t be sorry,” he murmurs as he nuzzles me. “It’s just those pesky fall allergies again.”

Relief washes through me. “So mine isn’t the only place with an astronomical indoor pollen count.”

He laughs softly, then clears his throat, dabs his nose. I reach past him, looking for tissues, but don’t see any on the nightstand or when I visually search the room.

“Be right back,” I tell him, running toward the small storage closet in his hallway. I throw open the door and reach on tiptoe for the shelf that has tissue boxes, lined up in color-coded order, of course. That’s when I feel him—that warm, tall body close behind mine, the glorious scent of cool, foggy mornings. Just like that first night in another closet, close and dark, our breaths echoing in the small space.

“You can’t honestly run off in nothing but my shirt that barely covers this”—he says it in rich, soft French—“beau cul of yours and not expect me to follow.”