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chair as she was going over the accounts for the first week of the B&B. She had just stormed out, intent on slicing into him with the sharp edge of her tongue. “I haven’t called them.”
    “Oh, Miss Carter, you do care!” he crows.
    “I don’t. I just don’t think it’s fair for an obviously bright young man to get nicked for something that is – and I am really giving you the benefit of the doubt, here – a harmless misunderstanding. Now don’t get it into your head that I condone stalking, because pestering and street harassment are very real crimes. But you seem to be under the illusion that this is allowable, and it’s absolutely, one hundred percent not . So. You’ve been told. I’ve made it perfectly clear. Do not wander around my woods alone, staring through my windows again. Shove off.”
    “I don’t mean to be making you uncomfortable, Jennet,” he says, and his regret does seem genuine. “I’m not stalking . I just like looking at you.”
    Jennet throws up her hands and sighs loud and long. “Which is the exact definition of stalking. So, here it is, my last mercy.” She reaches out and flicks his forehead hard with her fingertip, leaving behind a small red mark. “Are you listening? Next time I will call the police.”

    Next time she does call the police, but they never find Liam. Not even any footprints, they say, none that are recent enough to have been imprinted on the ground less than an hour prior.
    The fourth time, he walks up to her in the supermarket, while she’s trying to decide between two brands of butter, and slips a bottle of red wine into her hand-cart.
    “There now,” he says softly, a dark purr beside her ear, “Is this a more appropriate way to chat up a woman?”
    “Much,” Jennet says, but doesn’t give him the satisfaction of turning to face him. She continues to contemplate her butter.
    Silence. Liam rocks on his heels and Jen reads labels.
    “Well, what happens next?” Liam asks, and his voice held a note of a petulant whine.
    “Oh, you really are bad at this,” Jennet says, and puts one of the tubs back onto the chilled shelf. She places the butter in her basket, pats his shoulder consolingly, and wanders down the aisle. “Thanks for the wine. Good choice.”
    She leaves him standing there, mouth hanging open.
    “Jennet!” he calls, scrambling across the slick tiles after her. “Really. Please. What do I have to do to catch your attention?”
    “You could ask for it,” Jennet suggests, now deeply engrossed in picking a brand of yogurt.
    “I … you …” Liam gawps for a few minutes, and Jennet is happy to realize it is the first time she has giggled since her father died. The realization dampens the glee immediately, but she forces the smile to remain. “Jen … Jennet Carter!”
    She can’t be miserable forever, and despite the rocky, slightly illegal start, Liam is endearing. Cute, perhaps too young, but earnest and right now, Jen needs to feel beautiful. Feel wanted. And it is very easy to call the police if he continues to overstep.
    “Yes Liam?” she asks, choosing a low-fat Greek yogurt and popping it in beside the red wine.
    “Would you like to go on a date with me?” he mutters.
    “Yes, Liam,” she says. Now Jennet turns her full attention to him, and graces him with one of her warmest smiles. He seems to grow taller, to unfurl under her gaze, his own puckish grin sliding back across his mouth. “I think I would like that. Let me pay for these, and then why don’t we go to the café down the main road?”
    “I would like that very much, Miss Carter,” Liam replies with another endearingly formal head-tip, and this time when he holds out a crooked elbow, Jen takes it.

    Months pass. Nearly a year since her father died, and Jennet wouldn’t have thought this time last year that she would be smiling by now. Laughing. Flirting.
    Happy.
    And Liam does make her happy.
    The thing is, Jennet knows this is all silly, and doesn’t much