Identity

“Oh yeah.”

“That’s why yours is so organized. I skipped kitchen training. My mother cooked. When my father was deployed, we ordered in or went out about half the time. Otherwise, dinner at seven sharp, and there would be green veg.”

“Strict.”

“You bet. Looking back, I realize she’d get nervous when she started dinner. I’d set the table, but she’d check that. Everything lined up just so. Military precision. After the divorce, she kept that up awhile, then she’d toss something together or we’d order in.”

She lifted a shoulder, sipped more wine. “Anyway, that might be where my kitchen phobia comes from. Now she and Gram cook together, talk, laugh. Mom bakes bread.”

“From flour?”

“I know, right?” With a laugh, she tossed back her hair. “She says it relaxes her, and it really seems to. So far, I’ve managed to escape her attempts to teach me.

“What does Howl patrol against?”

“Uncertain. The occasional squirrel gets by him, but I’ve yet to see a bear or deer get through the perimeter. Let’s sit outside.”

He took the bottle.

Howl deserted his duties to prance to the patio table and lay his head on Morgan’s lap.

“It’s so quiet,” she murmured. “You must love it.”

“I do. See much of your father?”

“Hmm? Oh, no. None. I lack the desired chromosomes. For which I’m grateful,” she added, “or I’d probably be saluting or being saluted right now.”

“Plenty of women go into the military.”

She rolled her eyes with another laugh. “The Colonel believes, firmly, women have their place. This is not in uniform unless assigned to office work or nursing.”

“Strict,” Miles said again.

“Oh hell, he’s a down-to-the-marrow misogynist. I didn’t know there was a name for it when I was a kid, but I knew what it was. Anyway, he married again right after the divorce, which made it pretty clear that was the reason he wanted out. I’d say we’re all better off this way.”

Maybe through her filter, Miles thought, but he couldn’t see cutting a child out of his life that way.

“Does Howl patrol while you’re at work?”

“What he does when I’m not here is his business.”

“But when it rains? Then there’s the winters.”

“He’s the one who decided to live here.” Then he shrugged. “He’s got a dog hut in the side yard.”

As if he knew the discussion centered on him, Howl grumbled.

“Is that right? All those late nights, shivering in your hut.”

“It’s heated.” He didn’t like admitting it, but both the dog and the woman stared at him. “And the mudroom has a dog door.”

“All right then. That’s a good deal,” she said to Howl. “You take care of your pet.”

“He’s not a pet. He’s more of a tenant.”

“A tenant.” Her eyes laughed over the rim of her wineglass. Those eyes of sizzling green. “What’s the rent?”

“He keeps bear out of the bird feeders and deer out of the gardens.”

“Fair enough. I’m going to keep all that in mind if I ever get a dog. I wanted one when I got my own place, but it didn’t seem right. Two jobs, hardly ever there. Right now, Gram’s not ready, not when she lost Pa and their Lab within weeks of each other.”

“Same with my father. Not ready, so he spoils this one every chance he gets.”

“Who could help it? Look at that face.” She crooned it while she took that furry face in her hands.

“Timer!”

She dashed to the kitchen.

“I can help it,” he told Howl, then got up to turn on the grill.

When she announced she liked her steak medium rare, she edged closer yet to the perfect woman.

And the potatoes she’d obsessed over hit the right accompanying note. While they ate, Howl—fed and knowing the rules—settled down several feet away.

“So we’re square,” Miles announced as the sun began its western dip.

“If making half a meal qualifies, I’ll take it. And I’m about to feed your ego again.”

“I can make room.”

“I’m so relaxed. I don’t think I’ve been this relaxed in—probably never. Thanks.”

“I’ll say you’re welcome, though it’s been pretty obviously my pleasure.”

“And all I had to do was bake cookies. I’ll add to that by doing the dishes before I go. It’s one of my top skills.”

When they’d put the kitchen to rights, he gripped her hips, boosted her up.

“Let’s finish where we started,” he said, and took her back to the couch.

When they’d finished where they’d started, she got dressed again. “Do I really look like I’ve spent the afternoon and most of the evening having sex?”

“Yes. I did my job.”

She pushed a hand through her hair. “Then the reaction when I get home is on you. You be a good boy,” she told Howl while she rubbed and stroked him into delirium.

“You’ve got tomorrow off.”

“Monday’s fun day.”

“Not for me, but I should work it to get home by seven. Come back.”

She looked up from the dog, met those fascinating eyes. “I could stop in town, pick up a pizza.”

“That’ll work. Get a large. Pepperoni, and anything but mushrooms.”

“All right.”

Back in his boxers, he walked her to the door. “See you tomorrow.” Then he backed her against the door and kissed her until her bones melted and poured out of her body.

“Good night. ’Night, Howl.”

He waited in the doorway while she got in her car, waited until she’d driven away before he closed the door.

When he did, the dog let out a mourning howl.



* * *



“You’re a grown woman.” Morgan lectured herself as she walked from her car to the front door. “A grown, single woman. You’re allowed to have sex.”

Besides, they couldn’t ground her.

She went in, dealt with the alarm. And seriously considered the cowardly route of going straight up to her room. There, she could shut the door and do a crazed happy dance.

Because she hadn’t just had sex. She’d had lots and lots of great sex and felt, simultaneously, as if she could sleep for the next three days and scale a mountain.

Cowardly and rude, she told herself, because she heard their voices from the kitchen. She strolled back, casually, she thought, to find them sitting at the counter over tea and cake.

Audrey smiled at her, blinked, then ratcheted up the smile.

“Just in time for some of Gram’s famous pound cake. Did you have dinner?”

“Yes. Sorry I was gone so long.”

“You should have fun on your day off. Sit, have some tea. We’re thinking of adding the pound cake to the café menu. Have a slice and see what you think. We’re toying with serving it with raspberries and cream.”

Since they’d brewed a pot of tea, Morgan got out a cup.

“So, you and Miles went out to dinner?”

She felt her back itch as Olivia asked it.

“No, he grilled a couple of steaks. I made those potatoes I know how to make.”

“Isn’t that nice?”

The itch turned into a burn as she grabbed a dessert plate.

“And yes, we had sex. Lots of sex. And I’m going back for more tomorrow.”

Silence rang for a beat, then a second while she lifted the dome off the cake plate.