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began digging through it for her bath products.
    She'd discovered his fatal flaw without even having to look hard, she thought angrily, wondering if that little ploy on the porch had been about payback for her earlier behavior toward him or if he just hadn't been able to resist discovering how strong her resistance to his charms was.
    Nil!
    She was so distracted she'd already stepped into the shower and lined up soap, shampoo, and cream rinse on the shelf at the rear of the shower before she remembered she'd only turned on the hot water. Shoving her hand cautiously under the spray to test it, she discovered it not only wasn't hot, it was freezing cold. Sucking in a sharp breath as the water pelted her, she leapt out of the shower again, nearly busting her ass as her wet feet hit the slick linoleum floor covering.
    Shivering, she stared at the shower in disbelief for several moments and finally reached in to shut the water off. Twisting the other knob, she waited, testing the water every few minutes.
    No hot water. She couldn't believe there was no hot water!
    Grabbing the thongs she'd discarded, she shimmied into them again, snatched the towel she'd unearthed from the bar and stalked out of the bathroom. There was no sign of a hot water heater in the kitchen. Stymied, she stood in the middle of the room, trying to think if she'd noticed a closet where the damned thing might have been stashed.
    She'd searched the entire house before she remembered she'd seen the damned water heater on the back porch. Tucking the towel around herself, she checked the switches on the wall by the back porch until she found the one that lit the porch and stalked outside to examine the thing.
    It wasn't warm to the touch—which was no great surprise. After examining it, she stomped back into the kitchen and found the electrical panel. All of the switches were in the ‘on’ position and, in any case, they were all clearly marked and not one said ‘water heater'. What the hell? It had to have something running to it, right?
    Stalking back to the water heater she examined it more closely and discovered instructions on the front for lighting the pilot light.
    Gas!
    How hard could it be?
    Surely people lit them all the time without blowing themselves up?
    Getting down on her hands and knees, she peered into the dark hole where the pilot light was supposed to be, but the porch light shed little illumination on the project. She got up again, thinking of her flashlight, but it could take a month to discover what box it was in, she realized in disgust. Shaking it off, she looked around for the matches she'd found earlier. She would need a match to light it, anyway.
    When she'd finally found them on the kitchen counter, she headed back to the water heater, got down on her knees and struck a match, leaning down to peer in the hole again. She still wasn't exactly sure she'd identified the pilot light, but she figured gas would come out of it. If she got the match in the right spot, it was bound to light. Shaking that match out, she pulled out another, struck in and shoved it in the hole.
    "Problems, chère ?"
    Abby let out a shriek of pure terror at the abrupt intrusion of a deep male voice and scrambled to her feet, tearing her towel off and throwing matches in every direction in the process. Cameron, she discovered, was standing on the top steps, peering at her through the screen door. She screamed again before recognition dawned.
    A look of alarm flickered across his features, although he seemed far too mesmerized by her to really register the shriek she'd let out. “You scared the pure fuck out of me!” she snarled furiously, grabbing up the now empty match box and hurling it at the screen door.
    It was the sound of running feet that finally penetrated her shock and anger enough for her to recall she'd left her towel on the floor when she leapt up. Snatching it from the floor, she wrestled frantically with the thing, trying to get it around her.