ON MONDAY MORNING, Jill overslept.

She usually had a fairly regular schedule—going to bed by eleven or so on weekdays and getting up promptly at seven. Since she worked just a couple of blocks away from her apartment, she didn’t have to leave until five minutes before eight, so she normally had almost an hour to dress, eat breakfast, and get ready for the day.

But on Sunday evening, she hadn’t been able to go to sleep. She was still in a weird emotional flurry about her one-night stand becoming her roommate, and she stayed awake half the night thinking about Lucas, trying to figure him out and trying not to replay in her mind having sex with him over and over again.

As a result, she’d only had four hours of sleep, and she’d accidentally hit snooze on her alarm. Three times.

It was seven thirty-five when she finally woke up. As soon as she registered the time, she flew out of bed and ran to the bathroom.

She hated being late. As much as it annoyed her when other people were late, she hated it even more when it was her.

She took a three-minute shower, grabbed an outfit that wouldn’t take any effort to pull together—a knee-length A-line dress in a vintage print—and snatched a handful of jewelry that might possibly work with it. She’d barely gotten her shoes on before she was rushing into the kitchen to get some coffee.

Michelle was at the counter with her laptop as she always was, eating cereal and working. But what surprised Jill was finding that Lucas was up too.

He didn’t have to work. He didn’t have a schedule. He could still be in bed.

But there he was, sitting at the counter with a cup of coffee, putzing on his phone. Wearing nothing but a pair of old sweatpants. His hair was mussed, he needed to shave, and he wasn’t wearing a shirt.

So the first thing Jill saw as she came into the kitchen was a whole lot of gorgeous male back and shoulders and arms.

She didn’t need to see that this morning.

She dumped her pile of jewelry on the counter as she poured herself a cup of coffee.

“Morning,” Lucas said, sounding friendly and casual.

What was he even doing up this early?

And why did he have to sound so awake? Awake and masculine. Awake and masculine and sexy.

First thing on a Monday morning.

She did her best to suppress a snarl.

“You’re running late,” Michelle said, without looking up from her laptop. “Did you oversleep?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.” Jill was trying to drink her coffee and put on her earnings, bracelets, necklace, and rings at the same time.

Lucas was watching her with laid-back interest in his green eyes.

She tried not to snarl at him again.

His eyebrows went up slightly, and she realized she must not have done a good job at the suppression.

She turned her back to him, reaching into the cupboard for a breakfast bar. She preferred to eat cereal, but she didn’t have time this morning. She kept her back to Lucas as she gulped down more of her coffee.

“You missed a button.”

She stiffened, glancing over her shoulder to verify that Lucas had been talking to her. “What?”

“You missed a button.” He gestured toward her dress. “You want me to get it?”

“I can get it,” she gritted out, contorting her arms until she could feel which button on the back of her dress was undone. Discovering it, she stretched her shoulders painfully so she could button it.

When she glanced back over at Lucas, she saw that his mouth was tilted up slightly.

He was laughing at her. Silently but definitely laughing.

She didn’t try to hide her snarl this time.

He didn’t have to be up and dressed and at work by eight in the morning. He didn’t have to sit there in her kitchen, looking smug and gorgeous and amused and irresistibly rumpled when she could barely pull it together.

What kind of malicious turn of fate had made him her roommate at all?

When she’d managed her button, she poured more coffee into her cup and took it with her, grabbing her bag on her way out as she left.

She did remember to mumble out a “See you later,” before she closed the door.

It was just the first Monday morning of Lucas living in her apartment.

It was going to be a long six months.

***

ON WEDNESDAY EVENING, Jill was sitting at a table in Tea for Two with Michelle and Chloe when she saw Steve standing outside on the sidewalk, waving to get their attention.

She said, “Michelle,” and pointed toward the glass storefront.

Steve and Michelle had a silent conversation made up of hand gestures and facial expressions while Jill laughed in amusement.

“Why won’t he just come in and talk to her?” Chloe asked.

Chloe was gorgeous in a wild, artistic way with thick, wavy hair and very dark eyes. She was as loud and dramatic as Jill was quiet and contained. Jill had met both her and Michelle at events on campus she’d attended with Ted shortly after they’d moved to Blacksburg, and the three had been friends ever since.

“He won’t ever come into Tea for Two,” Jill explained, surprised that Chloe wasn’t already familiar with this particular running joke. “Says it’s too girly.”

“Seriously?” Chloe’s eyes were wide.

“Yeah. He’s mostly just joking, but he never comes in here.”

Michelle had finished her wordless conversation, and Steve disappeared from the sidewalk outside.

“What was that all about?” Chloe asked her.

“He’s going to the bookstore. Doesn’t know how long he’ll be.”

“How are things going with you two this week?” Chloe asked in a different tone.

Michelle made a face. “Pretty good, I’d say. We’ve only argued six or seven times.”

Despite the light words, there was an edge to Michelle’s tone that worried Jill. Her friend had sounded almost resigned, as if she were so tired she was on the verge of giving up. “You want to talk about it?” she asked.

Michelle shook her head. “Don’t have the energy tonight. Let’s talk about something easier.”

“Let’s talk about Lucas!” Chloe exclaimed. “Tell me all about him.”

“You met him,” Jill said carefully, praying with everything in her soul that Chloe wouldn’t have a thing for Lucas. She wasn’t sure how she would deal with that.

“Only once and just for a few minutes. I want to know more about him.”

“There’s not much to know. He doesn’t have a job. He just hangs around all day and does not much of anything.” Jill was trying to sound uninterested, but she ended up sounding a little bitter.

“He’s not bad,” Michelle said, shooting Jill a quick look. “He cleans up after himself, and he’ll do any favor you ask him. He’s a nice guy. I like him.”

“But you don’t like him, Jill?” Chloe asked, her eyes very sharp, very knowing.

Jill shrugged. “He’s okay. I don’t know him very well.”

“She won’t even stay in the same room as him,” Michelle put in.

“That’s not true!”

“Yes, it is,” Michelle said, sipping the last of her Earl Grey. “You don’t hang out in the living room anymore. You come home from work and hide in your room.”

“It’s just been a couple of days.” Jill felt defensive because Michelle was absolutely right. She’d been avoiding Lucas as much as possible. It just felt awkward around him, and she didn’t know what to do about it.

“Yeah, but you live up there. It’s your home. You can’t always be on guard just because you don’t know him very well.”

“I know. I’ll get used to it. It’s just been a couple of days.”

She hadn’t told her friends about what had happened with Lucas. She didn’t normally keep secrets from them, but it felt like so much, so deep. It was too big for her to talk about, so she’d tried to pack all the feelings up and stuff them into a safe little corner of her mind.

“He’s really a nice guy,” Michelle said. “Just try to get to know him. I’m sure you’ll get comfortable around him soon. As it is, he thinks you don’t like him.”

Jill’s eyes widened. “Did he say something?”

“No, but he notices every time you leave the room. I see him watching you. I guarantee he thinks you don’t like him.”

“Ooh,” Chloe said with a little smile. “That’s interesting. He watches her. Is there potential there, do you think?”

“No!” Jill’s response was too quick, too sharp. She saw the surprise on her friends’ faces. “Sorry. I didn’t mean it to sound like that. It’s just that there’s definitely no potential. He doesn’t have a job. He doesn’t take life seriously. He just kind of... drifts around. There’s no way we could ever be in a relationship.”

“No,” Michelle agreed. “It doesn’t seem like you two would be a good fit.”

“Oh well,” Chloe said with an exaggerated sigh. “He sure is good-looking though. At least he’s a little eye candy.”

Despite her mixed feelings for Lucas, Jill immediately bristled at the term. “He’s not eye candy. He’s not just a hot body. He’s a person. A human being.”

“I know,” Chloe said, her eyebrows arching again. “I didn’t mean he wasn’t.”

Jill groaned and slouched back in her chair. “I’m sorry. I know you didn’t mean that. I wasn’t intending to attack you. I’m just trying to explain why it feels awkward. He’s a man, a real live human being. And he’s always there, living in my home.”

“Yeah. So that means you need to get to know him. That’s the only way you’re going to feel comfortable with him.”

Michelle was right. Jill knew she was.

But that wasn’t the only problem.

The problem was that it felt like Jill already knew Lucas.

She knew him and she really liked him.

And she wanted to have sex with him again.

But she’d meant what she told her friends. There was no real potential for Lucas to become her forever man.

He didn’t want to be anyone’s forever.

He was her roommate, and that was all he could ever be to her now.

***

LUCAS WAS SURPRISED to discover that he liked having roommates.

He’d accepted Steve’s invitation to move in because he’d wanted to move somewhere else—anywhere else—and he always went wherever the tide took him. Steve’s was the first offer, so he accepted it. He’d had roommates in college, but since then he’d always lived alone or briefly with Carly, his former fiancée. Having roommates was different. It felt like a step backward in some way.

But at the end of his first week in the apartment, Lucas was realizing that he really liked it.

The apartment itself was big and airy and comfortable. He liked the older features and the updated kitchen and bathrooms. He also liked how fixed up it was—with little touches like prints on the walls, throw blankets on the sofas, a vase that Jill always kept filled with fresh flowers. It wasn’t fussy or uncomfortable. It was warm. Soft. He liked to look at it, and he knew Jill was the one who kept it that way.

She liked having a home, and she worked to make the place feel so nice.

Lucas appreciated it—since most of the time now he lived in generic hotels or half-empty studio apartments.

In his first week in Blacksburg, he did the normal things. He bought a few pieces he needed for his bedroom. He found a good gym to join so he could work out every day. And he explored the town and surrounding areas. Blacksburg wasn’t a city, but it was a decent-sized town, and because of the university, there were plenty of things to do. The rural mountain counties surrounding it were scenic and offered a lot of hiking and fishing and activities on the New River.

Lucas liked it. He wasn’t surprised Jill had decided to settle here after wandering for so much of her life.

But Lucas didn’t just like the apartment and the area. He also liked having people around.

It was different to wake up and have people to say hello to and to return to. To have people to chat with at all hours. Steve had been a good friend in college, and he was a still a great guy. He worked really hard but had a fairly relaxed attitude about everything else. And Michelle was smart and serious and the least judgmental person he’d ever met.

And Jill...

Jill didn’t seem to want to hang out with him much, and it was bothering him more than it should.

He understood feeling awkward about the fact that they’d had sex and then become roommates. But he’d been going out of his way to make her comfortable, and she still barely said ten words to him at any one time.

They’d had a good time together.

They’d really gotten along on that one night they’d shared.

He was sure they could get along again if she would just give him the chance.

Sure, he spent about half the time imagining her in bed with him, but he hadn’t acted on it. He could be a decent guy when he needed to be. He could respect the boundaries she’d set.

She could at least give him the opportunity to prove that.

It bothered him that she was so standoffish.

A lot.

On Friday, he’d wandered around town until he’d found a farmers’ market, and he’d bought some good fruits and vegetables. He’d had the urge to cook something—he did like to play around in the kitchen when he wasn’t feeling too lazy—so he’d started to experiment with vegetables, pasta, and sausage. He thought he might go out later and try to find a bar that wasn’t filled with college students, but it was early yet. Not even seven in the evening.

Jill wasn’t home yet.

She usually got home by five thirty or six, so he wondered what was keeping her.

Maybe she had a date.

He didn’t like that idea.

At all.

Just because he was resolved to be a decent guy with her didn’t mean he wanted her to hook up with some other guy while he was standing here in the kitchen, wondering when she was going to get home.

Michelle and Steve were home and in their bedroom. Probably either arguing or having sex. That was what they seemed to do whenever one or both of them weren’t working.

At least they weren’t loud about it.

Okay, sometimes they were loud about arguing, but they kept it quiet in bed.

He figured they’d probably come out again in time to have some dinner. They liked when he fixed something. He was a pretty good cook.

Jill would probably like his food too if she bothered to come home.

He realized he was being petty and unreasonable, so he tried to talk himself out of it as he added more cream to the gorgonzola sauce he was making.

He had no claim on Jill. None whatsoever.

And if it felt like he did, that was his problem. Not hers.

She could date or screw or marry any guy she wanted, and he had absolutely no reason to complain.

He almost jumped when he heard a key turning in the lock.

She was home.

He glanced back as she entered, catching her shoulders slumping and her head lowering as she put her bag on the floor where she always kept it. She was wearing a short plaid skirt, her tall boots, and a soft sweater that was very thin and very tight. If her legs weren’t enough of a temptation in that skirt, the sweater pushed it over the top. Her rounded breasts were very clearly outlined by the fitted material.

They looked big and firm and irresistibly soft in that sweater.

Lucas found himself imagining what he would do with those breasts before he realized what he was visualizing. He pushed the thought out of his mind and said, “Hey there. You okay?”

She was still standing there, looking tired and strangely defeated.

He saw what happened. He saw her make herself straighten up. He saw her force a smile on her face. He saw her put on a pose for him rather than acting the way she really felt.

“Yeah,” she said in an almost convincing tone. “I’m fine.” She walked over to the kitchen area, her eyes taking in his jeans, T-shirt, and bare feet and then the herbs on the cutting board and sauce in the pan. “That looks good.”

“Hopefully. Are you hungry?” He saw she was about to decline his offer, so he continued, “I made way too much, and I don’t know if Steve and Michelle are going to ever come out of their room again.”

Jill’s blue eyes strayed over to the hallway. “Are they fighting again?”

“They were earlier. Not sure if they still are or not.”

“Ah.” Jill’s cheeks grew slightly pink, and Lucas knew she was thinking about sex.

That knowledge wasn’t good for his own attempt to keep his mind on the straight and narrow.

He stirred his sauce and reminded himself he was going to be a nice guy. He wasn’t going to be pushy and try to get her into bed again when that wasn’t what she wanted.

He was capable of controlling himself. He had sex all the time.

One hot night with her wasn’t going to change everything.

When she hefted herself up onto a stool at the counter, he was ridiculously pleased. It seemed like she was actually going to hang out with him tonight.

“Bad day at work?” he asked lightly, noticing again that when she thought he wasn’t looking, her eyes were heavy and her expression was tired.

“Eh.”

“What does eh mean?”

“It means... eh.”

“Does that mean work was eh or your desire to talk to me about it is eh?” He’d bought a bottle of red wine from a local vineyard at the farmers’ market, and he picked it up, starting to hunt for a corkscrew in the drawers.

“It’s in the one by the refrigerator,” Jill told him.

He turned around, opened the drawer, and found the corkscrew. Jill reached beneath her for two wineglasses that were hanging on hooks above the wine rack built into the island.

As he poured the wine out, he prompted, “You never answered my question.”

Jill was silent for a minute until she accepted the glass of wine he offered her. After taking a sip, she said, “I guess both. Work was eh. Telling you about it is eh.”

“I thought we got along pretty well. Before, I mean.” He spoke as lightly as he could, although he was seriously invested in her response.

Far too invested. It triggered little alarm bells in the back of his mind.

Being invested meant he was vulnerable.

Being vulnerable meant he was weak.

Being weak meant he got hurt.

“I know,” Jill said softly. “We did get along.”

“But?”

She opened her mouth. Closed again. Then said, slightly hoarse, “I keep thinking about you and sex.”

He was briefly surprised she was so direct, so honest. Then he realized he shouldn’t be surprised. That was her nature. Hiding from him the way she’d been this week wasn’t.

“What’s wrong with that?” he asked, trying to keep the edge of heat out of his voice but not entirely succeeding.

Her cheeks flushed again, more deeply this time, and she dropped her eyes as she sipped her wine. “You know what’s wrong with that. We don’t... we don’t want the same things.”

She was right. She was entirely right.

She wanted a forever man. She wanted a long-term relationship, and he didn’t.

He really didn’t.

He could never be a forever man.

He felt an intense kick of disappointment at that acknowledgment, and his voice reflected it as he replied, “No. I guess we don’t.”

“So it wouldn’t be smart for us to have sex again, but it’s hard for me to... to not think about it.”

He was glad he wasn’t the only one whose thoughts kept going astray. “Yeah. I know the feeling.”

Her eyes darted up and then back down, and she blushed even more.

He took a deep breath, pushing past the sudden urge to grab her, kiss her, take her hard and fast right there against the counter. “We had a lot to say to each other before we got into bed. So maybe we could still... talk to each other.”

This time when her eyes lifted, she held his gaze. “I’d like to.”

“So why don’t we try?” He took a deep breath and forced himself past another wave of resistance. He was here for six months, and this tension was going to get old if they didn’t take care of it. “I promise not to touch to you again... unless you want me to.”

He couldn’t help but add the last part since something inside him howled in outrage at the finality of his promise.

He wanted to touch her again. Of course he did.

But he also really liked her.

He might be able to seduce her back into bed—he was pretty sure he could—but that wasn’t what she really wanted. And it definitely wasn’t worth the angst that would follow if they fell into bed with different goals in mind.

“So you want to... to be friends?” Her expression was genuine, almost hopeful.

He nodded. He wanted a lot more than that, but life didn’t offer what you really wanted. He’d learned that a long time ago. Better to just go with the flow, ride the tide, let things happen to you. This was happening now, so he let it. “Yeah. If that’s okay with you.”

“I’d like that.” She smiled at him. “I’m sure eventually I’ll stop thinking about having sex with you.”

He almost choked in his effort to hold back the loaded comment he wanted to make in response. Then he remembered his sauce, so he turned back to the cooktop, glad for the distraction.

He’d gotten himself together with a firm, mental lecture about controlling his ridiculous lust when he turned back to pick up his glass of wine and smile at her. “Friends it is. No touching. No talk about sex.”

His heart gave a silly little skip when she smiled back at him, and he felt a low rumble of that down-deep anxiety.

Why was he feeling this way?

Why was he acting this way?

He’d turned a corner in his life two years ago, and now he was on a different road.

He didn’t act... earnest. Not anymore.

He cleared his throat, sipped his wine, and turned back to his sauce. “So what was happening with work today?”

“It wasn’t anything terrible. We’re just on this big rush project, and I’m not sure how we’ll get it done in time. Everyone’s all stressed out and snipping at each other, and my boss...” She sighed.

“Your boss what?”

“He doesn’t seem... happy with me. Because I can’t keep up with these deadlines. I’ve only worked there a few months, and I don’t want him to have a bad impression of me so soon.”

Lucas frowned. “I can’t believe you’re slacking or anything.”

“I’m not! I’m working my ass off.”

“Then if you can’t meet the deadlines, then they must not be realistic deadlines.”

“They’re not,” she admitted. “They’re crazy. I don’t think anyone could meet them.”

“Then it’s his problem. Not yours. Is he really an asshole like that?”

“No, he’s not an asshole. He’s usually a pretty nice guy. But he’s just... I don’t know... driven. He gets focused on something, and that’s the only thing that matters. His sister—she manages the office—she’s been telling him to back off and be more realistic about what we’re capable of doing. But I don’t want to disappoint him. If he wants me to meet these deadlines, then that’s what I want to do.”

Lucas shook his head, checking to make sure the pasta was done before draining it. “You can’t work yourself into a heart attack to please an unreasonable boss.”

“He’s not—”

“If his expectations are impossible, then he needs to change his expectations. He needs to change. Not you.”

She gave him a tired smile. “Yeah. That makes perfectly good sense logically.”

“But...”

“But it’s not always that easy to make yourself do it. Not when you want to do a good job.”

“You are doing a good job. Aren’t you?”

“I don’t know.”

“Yes, you do.”

She made a face at him, as if she were briefly annoyed by his pushing. Then she admitted, “Yeah. I’m doing a good job.”

“So what’s your problem?”

“My problem is I don’t like people to be disappointed in me. Especially people I like and respect as much as my boss.”

“I told you it was his prob—”

“I know what you said,” she interrupted, a kind of fierceness to her tone that he liked. “And I get that you don’t give a crap about people’s expectations for you. But I do. Even if those expectations are unreasonable, I care about them.”

He stared at her for a moment, their gaze strangely deep. It felt like he understood her in a profound way and that she understood him too.

Then he broke the gaze. “You’re going to have some of this, aren’t you?” he asked, gesturing to the cooktop.

Her lips wobbled irrepressibly. “I’m not sure how I can say no now, after I’ve been sitting here smelling it for the past ten minutes. I didn’t know you were such a good cook.”

He felt a foolish swell of pleasure at her words. But his voice was dry when he said, “You better taste it before you start handing out compliments.”

The pasta turned out really well. They ate together at the island, having a second glass of wine. After a while, Steven and Michelle emerged, and they had some pasta too.

They hung out there in the kitchen for a long time, and Lucas forgot that he’d been planning to go out and find a bar that evening.

He didn’t end up going out at all.

***

BY SUNDAY AFTERNOON, Jill stopped putting on an act and keeping her distance just because Lucas was living with her.

For the whole first week, that was how she’d felt. Like she was putting on an act. Like she had to think about what she was doing, how she looked, how she sounded, because he was watching her.

But it was too hard. It wasn’t her nature. And it made her stressed out in her own home. Her friends had been right. She needed to get to know him as her roommate. After their dinner on Friday, she felt better about him, about everything.

And by Sunday she let down her defenses.

This was her real life. Her home. She had to live in it, with or without Lucas Bradford.

She worked most of the day on Saturday, trying to catch up on some of her deadlines, but she knew she couldn’t work on Sunday or she’d be exhausted and bleary-eyed at the beginning of the new week.

So she slept in late, had breakfast, then asked Lucas if she could use the tub in the hall bathroom so she could take a bath.

He was on his way to work out—the man was some kind of machine, going to the gym almost every day—so he didn’t care if she used the tub. She had a long, leisurely soak, and then went to do some errands and have lunch with Michelle and Chloe.

She was feeling good when she came home. She wanted to hang out in the living room and watch TV, but Lucas was already there. Her first instinct was to go hide in her room, but she fought against it. Instead, she got her nail file and polish and brought them into the living room.

Lucas was stretched out on one of the couches. He’d showered after working out and was now wearing sweats and a worn Hawkeyes T-shirt. He had a sports channel on the television, but he didn’t appear to be watching it.

He appeared to be asleep.

She sat down in the big chair and realized he wasn’t asleep when he glanced over at her.

“Are you watching this?” she asked, gesturing at the TV.

“Nah. Change it to whatever you want.”

Relieved that he was easygoing about the television, she switched over to a cooking channel.

She liked to watch cooking shows on Sunday afternoons.

He appeared perfectly amenable to that, and his eyes focused on the celebrity chef who was making some sort of towering sandwich on the screen.

Jill started working on her nails.

Lucas was still stretched out on the couch—his body lean and hard and undeniably gorgeous, even in his sloppy clothes—and his eyes moved between the television and her work on her nails.

“Do you do your fingernails every Sunday?” he asked. He didn’t appear to be teasing. He seemed genuinely curious.

“Usually.”

“Don’t a lot of women go to have them done somewhere?”

He’d been engaged, she remembered. She wondered what that woman had been like. She thought it was cute he was still pretty clueless about things like manicures. “Some women do. I like to do mine myself. I like to make them pretty.” She glanced over at him, wondering if he thought she was silly. “I like to make... things pretty.”

“You fixed up the apartment real nice.”

She flushed slightly since Lucas appeared to really mean it. “It wasn’t all me.”

“You’ll never convince me that Michelle and Steve did much to fix this place up.”

“No. Certainly not Steve. But Michelle, Chloe, and I fixed it up together when we first moved in here. We got all the main furniture and stuff.”

“You’re the one who keeps it looking so nice though. I’ve been here a week, and I do have eyes in my head, you know.”

She smiled at him. “I like things to look pretty. Homey. You know?”

“Yeah. I know you do.”

There was a strange resonance in his tone, and she couldn’t quite understand it. He wasn’t judging her though, so she didn’t let it bother her.

They sat in silence for a while, watching the cooking show. In a commercial break, Lucas said, “I haven’t seen Steve all day.”

“He and Michelle got into another fight this morning, and he left. I think he’s just hanging out on campus.”

Lucas gave his head a little shake. “Have they always fought this much?”

“No. They were all lovey-dovey at first. It’s just been the past couple of months.”

“Are they going to make it, do you think?”

Jill felt a little twist in her chest, the way she always did when she thought about the possibility of Michelle and Steve breaking up.

She hadn’t really wanted Steve to move in when he had, but she loved him now. He felt like family. Michelle was one of her best friends though, so Jill’s loyalty would always be first with her.

It was going to be so hard—if Michelle and Steve broke up.

She really hoped they wouldn’t.

“Is it that bad?” Lucas asked, evidently reading something in her face.

“I don’t know. They’re fighting a lot. Michelle seems to be getting really... tired. I don’t know.” She swallowed hard, focusing her anxiety on making her pinkie nail perfect. “I hope they’ll figure things out.”

“What’s the main problem with them? Do you know?”

“There’s not one main thing, at least as far as I can tell. Steve is really stressed out at work, and he doesn’t want to do anything else when he’s not working. But I don’t think that would be enough to... I don’t know. It was different last year, before Steve got his PhD. When they were both grad students, it was different. They had more flexible schedules and—I don’t know—they seemed more in sync.” She finished her hand and waved it around to dry the polish. “They fell really fast. They met and were practically living together in less than a month. So maybe it’s just normal life stuff—catching up to them.”

Lucas was looking at her from the couch.

She added softly, “I don’t want them to break up.”

“I guess that would blow a hole into your nice settled life here.”

She sucked in a breath but then saw that his eyes were gentle. He wasn’t mocking her.

“I wasn’t just thinking about myself.”

“I know you weren’t. But they’re your friends. It would affect you. Obviously.”

“Yeah.” She pulled off her thick socks and started on her toes.

She worked for a while, and when she glanced up, she saw Lucas was still watching her. Her hair was in braids, and she was wearing purple leggings with books on them and an oversized T-shirt. He wasn’t likely to be leering at her when she looked like this, so it was unnerving that he was still watching her.

“What?” she asked, meeting his eyes.

“Nothing. Just watching the toenail progress.” He gave her a lazy smile.

“Don’t you get bored?”

“What? On a Sunday afternoon? Nah.”

“Not just right now. Overall. Since you’re not really working. Don’t you get bored?” She was genuinely curious and made sure her tone didn’t come across as judgmental.

“No,” he said with another smile, turning onto his side so his whole body was facing her. “I got bored when I worked. I don’t get bored now. If something gets old, I stop doing it. I move on.”

“You ride the tide. I know.” She made a face. “I would get bored. Hanging around and doing nothing.”

“I do things.”

“You work out. You occasionally cook something. What else do you do?”’

“I do what I want when I want to do it. Anything I want.” His eyelids were heavy, his expression warm and relaxed. “You should try it.”

“No thanks. It’s great that you’re doing what you want to do, but I wouldn’t want to do that myself. I like work. I like having a real home. I like... life. I’m not living for vacation.”

His expression flickered slightly.

“I didn’t mean to insult you,” she said quickly.

“I know you didn’t. I wasn’t insulted. I get what you’re saying.”

She sighed as she inspected her toenails. “My mom was kind of like you. Always moving. Never wanting to get into what she called a rut. But because of that, it always felt like we were drifting, like I didn’t have any... any ties to ground me in the world. She never had roots. She still doesn’t understand them.”

“Is she not happy with your choices?”

“She’s happy that I’m happy. At least that’s what she says. But I think she’s kind of disappointed in me. She thinks I’ve become part of the establishment and won’t ever be free. But I don’t want that kind of freedom. It doesn’t feel free to me.” Jill sighed, wondering how she’d rambled on into this kind of intimate confession on a Sunday afternoon. “She doesn’t understand roots.”

“I do understand,” Lucas said softly.

She met his gaze and held it for a minute.

“I understand roots,” he said, almost like he was taking to himself. “I just don’t want them.”

For no good reason the last words felt like a kick in the heart.

She had to keep reminding herself about who he was and who he wanted to be.

He wasn’t like her. He wasn’t looking for the same things.

If he had been, he would have been exactly what she wanted in a forever man.

But he wasn’t.

And he never would be a forever man.

There was a guy who worked in the office suite below her that she’d been chatting with in the mornings and evenings. He seemed like a nice, stable, fairly cute guy, and he definitely appeared interested in her.

He was the kind of guy she needed to focus on.

Not Lucas.

Never Lucas.

She wasn’t foolish enough to believe Lucas was likely to change, and she wasn’t needy enough anymore to simply take what was offered when it wasn’t what she really wanted.

If things had been different, she would already be crazy about Lucas.

But things weren’t different.

And she wasn’t.