Carolina Moon

the kitchen. “I had a late night, and I’m surly, so watch your step.”
    Saying nothing, he slid the knife back into its slot in the block. While she measured out coffee and water, he set the plate he carried on the counter.
    “What’s that?”
    “Lilah sent it over, she knew I was coming this way this morning.” Cade peeled up a corner of the foil. “Coffee cake. She said you had a taste for her sour cream coffee cake.”
    Tory merely stared at it, shocking them both when her eyes filled. Before he could move, she held up a hand, kept it aloft like a shield as she turned away.
    Unable to resist, he ran a hand over her hair, then let it drop when she stepped quickly, deliberately out of reach.
    “You tell her I appreciate it very much. She’s well, is she?”
    “Why don’t you come by and see for yourself?”
    “No, not for a while yet. I don’t think for a little while yet.” Steadier, she opened a cupboard and took down a cup.
    “You gonna share?”
    She glanced back over her shoulder. Her eyes were dry now, and clear. He didn’t look like a damn farmer, she thought. Oh, he was tanned and lean, and his hair streaked from the sun. His jeans were old and his shirt faded blue. There were sunglasses hooked carelessly by one earpiece in the breast pocket.
    What he looked like, she decided, was some Hollywood director’s image of a young, prosperous southern farmer who could ooze charm and sex appeal with one easy smile.
    She didn’t trust images.
    “I suppose I have to be polite.”
    “You could be rude and greedy,” he said, “but you’d feel terrible about it later.”
    She had four cups, he noted, four saucers, all in solid, sensible white. She had an automatic coffeemaker, and no bed. Her shelves were already tidily lined, again in white. There wasn’t a single chair in the house.
    Just what, he wondered, did such matters say about Tory Bodeen?
    She took out another knife, then lifted her eyebrows at him as she measured a slice. He wagged his fingers until she widened it. “Got an appetite this morning?” she asked as she cut through.
    “I’ve been smelling that all the way over here.” He picked up the plates. “Why don’t we have this out on the front porch? I take my coffee black,” he added, then walked out.
    Tory only sighed and poured two cups.
    He was sitting on the steps when she came out, resting his back against the top riser. She sat beside him, sipping her coffee and looking out over his fields.
    She’d missed this. The realization came in a backward slap of surprise that was more shock than pain. She’d missed mornings here, when the heat of the day had yet to smother the air, when the birds sang like miracles, and the fields lay green and growing.
    She’d had precious mornings like that even as a child, when she had sat on what had been a cracked concrete stoop, studied the coming day, and dreamed foolish dreams.
    “It’s a nice smile,” he commented. “Is it the cake or the company that tugged it out of you?”
    It vanished like a ghost. “Why were you coming this way this morning, Cade?”
    “I got fields to look after, crews to check.” He broke off a corner of coffee cake. “And I wanted another look at you.”
    “Why?”
    “To see if you were as pretty as I thought you were yesterday.”
    She shook her head, took a bite of cake, and went straight back to Miss Lilah’s wonderful kitchen. It cheered her so much she smiled again, took another bite. “Why, really?”
    “You did look a sight better yesterday,” he said conversationally. “But I have to take into account you didn’t get much sleep on that floor. You make a fine cup of coffee, Miz Bodeen.”
    “There’s no reason you have to feel you need to check up on me. I’m fine here. I just need a couple of days to settle in. I’m not going to be here half the time anyway. Setting up the store’s going to take most of my time.”
    “I imagine so. Have dinner with me tonight.”
    “What for?” When he didn’t answer, she turned her head. His eyes were amused, his lips faintly curved. And in that mild and friendly expression she saw something she’d successfully avoided for years. Frank male interest.
    “No, no. Oh no.” She lifted her cup, gulped down coffee.
    “That was pretty definite. Let’s make it tomorrow night.”
    “No. Cade, I’m sure that’s very flattering, but I don’t have the time or the inclination for any sort of a … of a thing.”
    He stretched out his long