CARROLLTON, NEW ORLEANS

It was Sunday. The Sunday. Aka the day Danvers was meant to help Jade put together her new furniture.

For the umpteenth time that afternoon, she checked her cell phone. One text message from Sammie. A missed call from her mother. Jade sighed. No calls or texts from Nathan Danvers.

Honestly, it was probably for the best that he’d forgotten. Sure, Jade didn’t know a single soul in New Orleans yet, aside from the Cartwell family. Sure, she’d been strangely looking forward to hanging out with him today. Really, it didn’t matter that Danvers had found something better to do—she was not bummed, and she certainly wasn’t moping.

She dropped her gaze to the boxes littering her bedroom. She’d been at it since six a.m. this morning. From the looks of it, she’d still be unpacking her life when nighttime rolled around this evening.

Shifting to her knees, she pushed her phone aside and surveyed the room, debating on her next move.

A sharp knock came on the front door. And then another.

Jade flew into action.

She lunged over an empty box, grabbed pairs of underwear and bras from the floor with one fist, and tossed them all into the cardboard box. The box was shoved into her bedroom closet just as another rap came at the door.

He was here and—Jade’s feet ground to a halt. She’d been so busy organizing and unpacking that she’d completely forgotten about the food she’d promised him. Crap.

“Jade?” Danvers called out from the other side of the heavy fire door. “You okay in there?”

It was too late to turn back now.

Smoothing down her hair with the flat of her palms, Jade tromped over to the entranceway and swung open the door.

Her breath whooshed out of her lungs as her gaze came level with his chest.

He wore an old T-shirt with sliced off sleeves, leaving his muscular arms bare to her perusal. And oh, did she look. No female on the planet could have stood opposite him like Jade was now and still managed to ignore the masculine perfection that was Nathan Danvers. Basketball shorts hugged a narrow waist and black sneakers completed the look. Her gaze went to his arms again. He looked like he could pick her up with just one hand and throw her over his shoulder without breaking a sweat.

She told herself that the thought wasn’t incredibly appealing.

Lucia Harper would be disappointed to learn that her middle daughter was a liar.

When Jade finally managed to bring her gaze to his face, it was only to find him grinning wolfishly.

“Don’t say it,” she warned with a finger-thrust at his chest. Which was hard as a rock because, well, of course it was—Danvers had the appearance of a Greek statue, all lean and sinewy muscles. She barely refrained from dropping her gaze to his crotch—based off his overall size, she doubted that the classic “leaf” would do the job of covering up the goods.

“Don’t say what?” His voice curled like smoke around her. He still stood on the welcome mat she’d put down just that morning, and, for whatever reason, it seemed momentous that he was her first guest. A bit like that fate. Not that Jade believed in fate. She was more of a make-it-happen kind of girl.

Danvers lowered his head. “Don’t say that you just ogled me? Don’t worry, I’m not easily embarrassed.”

No, but she was embarrassed. As heat climbed her face, Jade wondered if she’d stepped off the deep end. She’d never experienced such an immediate reaction to a man. She wanted his muscular arms wrapped around her waist. She wanted to feel his lips on hers . . . . But she wasn’t looking for a relationship.

Don’t forget about your mother.

Lucia was the perfect example of what happened when you let a man get in the way of your dreams. Jade loved her dad, she did, but there was something to be said about how Kevin Harper had married and continued on with his career while Lucia’s dream of becoming a pediatrician faded during the years of skinned knees, birthday parties, and childhood crushes.

Jade didn’t want that for herself. She had so many plans, so many goals, and the truth of the matter was . . . she’d come to New Orleans looking for a fresh start. Danvers didn’t fit into that equation.

Stepping back into her apartment, she steeled herself against his sexy charm and made a sweeping motion with her arm. “Welcome.” Her voice was a little too high-pitched to be considered normal. “It’s not big but it’s home.”

Like a lion stalking its prey, Danvers circled the small living room. Two bare windows on the far side let in some natural light, but the windows were too small to be deemed anything other than quaint.

“Do you mind if I ask how much your rent is here?”

Jade planted her hands on her hips. “Thinking about moving in?”

“Me?” A husky, masculine chuckle left his lips. “Jade, I’m not even sure I could lay down on the floor without my limbs touching the walls.”

“You’re exaggerating.”

“Am I?” When he made as though he planned to toe off his shoes and put his theory to the test, Jade stilled him with a hand to his shoulder. The muscles in his arm tightened under her touch, and she wondered if he, too, felt a shock hit his body.

Jade yanked her hand back. “The apartment’s small, I know, but it was all I could find on short notice.” She paused, eyes skimming the living space she hoped to make into a home. “You’re right, though. My landlord is probably getting a lot more money out of me than the place is worth.”

“Ah, well, don’t take it too personally. I’m sure it happens to everyone.”

She cut him a swift glance. “Did it happen to you?”

Large shoulders rolled up in a shrug. “Well, no. But I happen to know my landlord, and he cut me a sweet deal on my place.”

“That’s cheating.”

The grin he gave her was a panty-melter, for sure. “It is a day that ends in Y, isn’t it?”

Jade rolled her eyes and motioned for him to follow her into the small, galley-style kitchen. “Do you want something to drink before we get started?”

He paused by the sink, one large hand resting on the countertop. “We?”

“Yes, we.” Withdrawing two glasses from the cupboard, she poured the two of them some cold lemonade from the fridge. “You didn’t think I was going to let you do everything, did you?”

He accepted the glass she offered him, murmured his thanks, and said, “I figured you had more unpacking to do.”

Oh, she had plenty of unpacking left, but she desperately needed a break from organizing. Planting her butt against the counter, she turned to Danvers. Maybe three feet separated them, and she shifted another foot to the right—just to be safe, in case her hormones decided to betray her. She might have moved to New Orleans with the intent of shedding her predictability, but having sex with a guy who was pretty much a stranger didn’t seem like the way to go about doing that.

“I have a confession,” she said, raising her hand.

“You didn’t make chocolate-covered strawberries, did you?” The words were said with such an air of casual disappointment that she felt the insane urge to drive to the grocery store and pick up the necessary ingredients.

“I may have forgotten to make them,” came her awkward admission.

He nodded slowly, sipping his lemonade, watching her. His gray eyes pinned her in place. “And the pasta?”

Jade downed the rest of her glass like it was vodka. “Well . . . ”

“You forgot?”

Sighing, she put the empty glass in the sink. “I got so wrapped up in unpacking this morning. I feel guilty.”

He crossed the three-foot wide kitchen and placed his glass next to hers. She felt his nearness like a caress down her spine.

“You could make it up to me.” His voice came from just over her right shoulder. Her apartment was small enough on its own, but his presence soaked up the extra square footage like it was his right.

Jade sucked in a rough breath. “Why do I feel like you’re up to no good?”

There was a small pause, in which she actually heard him stifle a laugh. “I’m always up to good, Jade. It just depends on what type of good we’re talking about.”

She lifted her gaze to his, not at all surprised to find his slate-gray eyes dancing with mirth. “Didn’t we have this conversation the other day? Except that instead of being good, you were discussing all the ways you could be bad?”

Twin dimples appeared in his cheeks. “Can’t a man be both? Gotta keep you on your toes.”

Grab control of yourself, girl. She mentally shook herself. “You’re one of those people, aren’t you?”

“Which people?” he asked with a tilt of his head. Somehow, as if he’d read her mind and realized that she desperately needed space, he moved back toward the living room.

Which was small, but at least bigger than the kitchen.

They came to a stop in the center of the room, amidst all the boxes and the unassembled furniture. Danvers really was too large for the space. Unlike the few New Orleans buildings she’d visited over the last few days, her apartment’s ceilings were not ten feet tall or more—maybe seven and a half, if that. Since Danvers himself was only a foot or so shorter than the ceiling, he’d assumed a perpetual hunched look in his shoulders as though he were nervous about smacking his head against the whirring ceiling fan.

“Jade?”

“Yes?”

“You were saying?”

Oh, right. “You’re one of those perpetually happy people, aren’t you? The glass half-full types.”

And then it happened again. Even though his mouth curled in a naughty grin that did funny things to her insides, his gaze cooled. Jade struggled to piece together his carefree smile with the bleak emotion swirling in those gray depths. He was a dichotomy, a puzzle, and Jade loved puzzles. It was why she’d wanted to enter the forensics field in the first place. That, and the thought that even if she was a disappointment to her mother, at least she was making her father proud.

She wanted to push Danvers for answers. To push him until those walls he held up buckled and caved—not that it was her right to do so. It was weird, totally unfamiliar, but she had the oddest feeling that if she wanted to . . . she could learn this man’s secrets.

But then Danvers blinked, and it was as though that brief look into his soul hadn’t existed at all. “Have to keep positive,” he said, turning around to face the mess that was her living room with his hands fisted at his hips, “otherwise shit gets too real most days.”

She had a sneaking suspicion that he thought their conversation was getting too real right now. She didn’t want his guard to go up, and she certainly didn’t want to make him feel as though she was digging for information. Even though she’d been doing just that.

So, she did what she had to do to keep the moment light, casual.

“How do you feel about pizza?”