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finished weakly.
    “Then why do it?”
    “Oh, I dunno . . . line of least resistance, I suppose,” she admitted.
    His eyes pierced the lambent moonlight to explore her profile. “You’re a strange person, Willy Silverthorne,” he said finally, halting to turn her in the opposite direction. “Hasn’t any man ever got beneath your decorative armor to see what sort of heart beats under all those freckles?”
    She shook her head negatively. “No man’s tried very hard.” She laughed unconvincingly. “I didn’t think men were particularly interested in hearts, as such, these days.”
    “Cynic,” he murmured, but his tone was gentle and he urged her into an easy jog, telling her when she protested that unless she ran off about five hundred calories, she couldn’t have any dessert.
    She loped along beside him, keeping up with him easily in spite of his peak condition, for her long, free-swinging limbs were the equal of his more muscular ones; and when he caught at her arm and swung her around to confront him at the edge of the surf opposite their own street, she was scarcely breathing hard.
    “And they told me you were bone-lazy,” he teased. “You’re like a kitten who sleeps all day long and still manages to outperform any other animal.”
    And you’re like a tiger who sleeps in the sun all day . . . and moves in for the kill when you least expect it, she said silently. Aloud, she asked, “Who told you?”
    A cloud passed in front of the moon, obscuring his expression for a moment. “Oh, you’ve quite a reputation around the mushroom patch, didn’t you know?” He was joking. Or, at least, she hoped he was joking.
    “That doesn’t sound too promising,” she said doubtfully.
    “It sounded awfully promising to me. Let’s see . . . moves like a gazelle, or walks as if she’s treading eggshells barefoot, depending on who’s doing the talking; always a friendly word for everybody, or nobody gets to first base in spite of all her come-hithering, again depending on who’s doing the talking. Shall I continue?”
    “I don’t think I want to hear any more,” she said uncomfortably.
    “Why not? I did. I admit freely to being avid, once I heard about this paragon of pulchritude who had every man in three office buildings falling over their own feet for a glimpse of her wondrous attributes. I thought I’d better check it out, see what I’d been missing.”
    Suppressing an odd shaft of pain, Willy moved away from his side and headed for the saddle-backed dune that gave onto Wimble Court. “And were you satisfied or disappointed?” she asked in a small, tight voice without looking to see if he were behind her.
    He caught at her hand and laced his fingers through her own. “Neither,” he told her deeply. “Neither, Willy . . . yet. Now, come on. I promised you dessert.”
    “I think I’ve had enough to last me a week. I’ll pass it up if you don’t mind,” she told him in a flat tone, swooping down to collect her shoes, her stole and her bag.
    He held her hand firmly while he collected his own things, and then, instead of walking her to her door, he paused outside his garage and opened it, passing his car to lead her over to the stairs in the corner. “We’ll sample it, nevertheless,” he told her, and she hadn’t the heart to argue. She could find no excuse for her own weakness and so she ruthlessly smothered the small warning voice inside her.
    On the counter, a board of cheeses sat softening, and after tossing aside his jacket, Kiel took down a bottle of a heavy, sweet Greek wine and handed down two glasses while Willy stared helplessly at the hard muscles of his arms and shoulders, brought into play by the simple action.
    “Open the porch door. We’ll have it outside if the dew isn’t too heavy on the furniture,” he suggested, pouring a generous portion into the two glasses and laying a knife on the cheese board. He followed her out, and when she would have taken a chair, he swung her