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Megan refused to pry.
    â€œA need-to-know basis.” She nodded, laughing. “I get it. Obviously the witness protection program is using Jamison, New York, as a current venue.”
    Hannah tipped an amused look Megan’s way. “Yup. My real name is a state secret.”
    â€œSince I love the name Hannah, you may keep it a state secret.”
    â€œDoes it bug you, Megan? To have been that close to marriage twice and have it fall apart?”
    Megan weighed her answer as she watched the toffee mixture darken and condense. “If by ‘bug’ you mean have my episodes of public humiliation turned me off members of the opposite sex for the duration of my natural life, I’d have to say that’s understandable, considering the circumstances.”
    â€œMichael was a jerk.”
    â€œI know. And so was Brad. But the turnaround of that is—why do I attract jerks? Am I so needy that I latch on to any Tom, Dick or Harry that comes along?”
    â€œSo if my name was Tom, Dick or Harry, you might give me a chance?”
    Megan stopped stirring the boiling toffee mix, mortified.
    Danny stood at the back door to the kitchen, looking way too amused and sure of himself for anyone’s good, particularly hers.
    â€œEavesdropping is against the lease rules,” she said.
    He waved a careless hand to the open door. “You weren’t exactly quiet. I could hear you in the yard.”
    Hannah tried to mask a laugh, unsuccessfully. She shot him a look as she removed a tray of supersize cookies from the oven, set it down and replaced it with another. “He’s right. I forgot he was out there. Sorry.”
    Danny leaned his elbows against the metal brace separating the upper screen from the window below. “Back to my question…”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œYou’re sure? I could change my name.”
    â€œListen, I’m working right now, and toffee has a mind of its own. As much as I’d love nothing better than to grow old sparring with you, the likelihood of that is zero. So if you’d be so kind as to maintain a proper landlord/tenant relationship at all times, we’ll both be better off.”
    â€œI get it.”
    He might have gotten it, but he didn’t look all that dissuaded. Great. Just her luck to have rented that apartment to someone who liked a challenge. Megan had no intention of challenging anyone, at least not anyone in the near future. Hadn’t Reverend Hannity talked about God’s plan just last week, the road less traveled, the unexpected twists, turns and inevitable forks along the way?
    Megan wasn’t sure where her road forked, but she was pretty certain that Danny Graham’s fork would zag left in about eight weeks, and she was determined to stand stalwart and solid for that time.
    She tested the toffee texture by dropping a tiny bit into a cup of cold water, fingered the texture to assess brittleness, then examined the threads dangling from the spoon.Her practiced eye told her this batch was done. She set it off the burner, maneuvered the handle left, hoisted the pan and gently poured a thin stream into the bar molds.
    â€œYou don’t use a candy thermometer?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œUnreliable.”
    â€œAnd that…maneuver, the thing with the water cup and the spoon, wasn’t?”
    â€œNot if you know what you’re doing.”
    Danny knew what he was doing. Always had. He’d been raised to make candy in a state-of-the-art facility that believed in small batches, but each batch was expertly measured and timed to assure the quality of the mix. Watching her, he had a vision of what his great-grandmother must have done on her porch outside Wellsville, the little house, long since gone, that had been the original home of Mary Sandoval’s Candies.
    Hannah moved along the cooling molds, sifting chopped nuts onto the surface, then using a wooden board to press them into the