Kellen could not believe that he’d called Owen’s name while he’d been coming. It was one thing to fantasize while you were getting off, quite another to blurt out your fantasy to your partner. He’d hurt Dawn. He knew he had. He could see it in the way her pretty hazel eyes never quite met his as he consulted the Internet with his phone for the proper treatment of a jellyfish sting. Several red stripes marred her trim ankle. If she hadn’t already tossed that gross sea creature back into the ocean, he would have pulverized it for causing her pain. Just as he was mentally pulverizing himself for the same reason.

He flushed the reddened area of her sting with salt water—which he could have done on the beach had he known what he was doing—and then used the edge of her driver’s license to scrape out stingers the jellyfish had left behind. The harsh lines on her skin were becoming welts, and though she only occasionally sucked breath through her teeth as he worked at his internet-directed first aid, they had to hurt far more than she was letting on.

“I didn’t know you wore glasses,” he said, grinning at how cute she looked in them in her driver’s license photo.

“I don’t anymore,” she said. “I had Lasik done a couple of years ago. That picture is old.”

“That would explain why you look about twelve years old in it.” The braids on either side of her freckled face didn’t make her look any more mature.

She stuck her tongue out at him, and he chuckled.

“You still look twelve when you do that.”

“I feel twelve sitting up here on the counter while you put Band-Aids on my booboos.”

“It says not to bandage it,” he said as he slopped on the baking soda paste he’d mixed.

A relieved sigh escaped her.

“That feels much better,” she said. “I don’t think he got me very good.”

“If I hadn’t upset you, he wouldn’t have gotten you at all.” He looked up from the white, goopy mess on her ankle and held her gaze. “If you don’t want to talk about what happened earlier, we can ignore it. I’m really good at ignoring things that bother me.” At least outwardly. Inwardly, his little slip would continue to eat at him for as long as the situation remained unresolved. He had hoped not to continue to make the mistake of internalizing his troubles while he was with Dawn. He wanted an open, honest relationship with her. He longed for the feelings developing between them to flourish and to last, but he did find it easier not to put all of his thoughts out in the open. “But I don’t think we want this to stand between us.”

“Are . . .” She pulled her gaze from his and stared over his head. “Are you going to do anything about your attraction to him?”

His attraction to Owen was one of those things Kellen had been ignoring—and denying—for a couple of years now. He was certain that Owen was just being Owen and trying to help out his mixed-up, celibate friend with the occasional hand job, and Kellen didn’t want to upset their friendship by putting his attraction—an attraction Owen did not share—out in the open. Kellen thought plenty of women were sexy, but that didn’t mean he had to act on those attractions. So he didn’t have to act on the strange desire he had for Owen either. Wanting someone was not the same as actively pursuing that want.

“No,” he said. “You’re the only person I’m going to do. I’m the most faithful man you’ll ever know.” He’d been faithful to Sara even years after she’d passed. Being faithful to the beautiful, delightful, sexy, and very much alive Dawn O’Reilly would be easy in comparison.

“But you’ll tell him about your feelings, right?” she said. “What if he’s attracted to you too?”

“It doesn’t matter. Nothing of a serious romantic nature will ever progress between Owen and me. Not ever. You have my word.”

She didn’t look convinced.

“But if you’re hung up on him, like you’ve been hung up on Sara, you won’t be able to concentrate your full attention on me. On us. There is an us, isn’t there?”

Her hopeful expression made his throat tighten. He rose from his crouched position at her feet and shifted between her splayed legs, wanting to be closer to her. He couldn’t stand that there was any distance between them, physical or emotional.

“There’s an us,” he said. “There’s definitely an us. And it’s wonderful.”

Her smile was a little hesitant, but she didn’t resist when he leaned in and stole a passionate kiss from her soft lips.

“It’s getting late,” she said. “Do you want to go out for dinner or stay in?”

“Will you make me French toast?”

“I think I can handle that.”

“Then I definitely want to stay in.”

“I figured you’d want a corn dog from the gas station.”

He curled his lip in disgust. “I’d rather eat sand.”

He helped her off the counter, stealing another kiss before he let her go, and then joined her in the kitchen. He secretly wanted her recipe just in case she decided he wasn’t worth the trouble and he was forced to live without her. He imagined he’d spend the rest of his life putting on the pounds as he ate her French toast and reminisced about their time together.

“What are you thinking about?” she asked as she searched her collection of homemade bread for a mold-free loaf. “I’m going to have to make some bread,” she said as she discovered all loaves but one were inedible. “Unless you’re taking me out for breakfast in the morning.”

“I’d like to watch you bake,” he said. That was his stomach talking.

“And I’d like to watch you grill. Do you barbeque?”

“I do at home.”

“Which is next door,” she said. “You have a grill under the deck. I saw it.”

Next door. He’d almost forgotten it existed.

“We can go grocery shopping tomorrow morning. I’ll grill steaks. Do you like steak?”

“I love steak.”

This felt like making future plans, and he had to admit looking forward instead of backward felt good. And maybe they’d dine at Sara’s house—his house—and he wouldn’t feel like he was desecrating a shrine.