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will be too obvious.”
    “Well, then I suggest you stock up on Viagra.”
    I groaned. “You’re no help.”
    “Yes, I am. You just don’t like what I have to say.”
    “Ugh! I have to go.”
    “You might as well go since you won’t be coming—“
    I hung up on her before she could finish. And she was wrong. There was a reason I kept a vibrator in my bedside drawer.
    When I returned to the living room, Dwight had removed his pants and shoes. He leaned back, wearing his white Fruit of the Looms and his unbuttoned shirt.
    Maybe
I
needed to make more of an effort. Maybe he needed more foreplay. One part of me said to send him home and call it a night, but another part of me screamed
Ellie Lancaster is not a quitter. Well, maybe with piano, yoga, and knitting, but I’m not a quitter in this.
    I dropped my dress to the floor and sat on the sofa with renewed determination. This man was going to have sex with me whether he liked it or not. But as soon as Dwight leaned over to kiss me, I realized I couldn’t go through with it. Call me a quitter, but I was done.
    Rolling away, I stood, reaching for his pants and shoes. “You need to go.”
    His eyes widened. “What? Why?”
    I glanced down to his crotch and then back to his face. “This just isn’t going to work out.”
    He climbed to his feet, and I shoved his pants at him. He stepped into the pants and looked up at me. “Ellie, if you would just be reasonable.”
    I grabbed my dress off the floor. “Reasonable? If I were reasonable, I wouldn’t have gone out with you after our second date, when you suggested that I should reconsider ordering dessert.” I wiggled the dress to my waist, struggling to get the straps up my arms.
    He shook his head in confusion. “But you had just mentioned you wanted to go on a diet! If you want dessert, you can get it—”
    I opened the door and pushed him out while handing him is shoes. “You’re damn right I can get dessert!”
    I stood in the doorway, pulling the door shut behind me as I watched as Dwight clomped down the stairs, irritated that I’d put up with him through five dates. I really sucked at dating. Man after man after man had paraded through my life, each one worse than the last. My judgment was not to be trusted.
    Maybe it was time to find my purpose in life. A purpose that didn’t include men. Maybe I’d even try to move away.
No
, I could never move away from Daddy, and Myra needed me to help with the inn. But I could try to take a trip in the fall. I’d always wanted to see the Grand Canyon. I’d learn some breathing exercises to deal with my anxiety of getting too far from Roanoke Island.
    Starting tomorrow morning, I was changing. No more flighty Ellie. I was going to be mature and responsible. I was going to figure out who I was. And I was giving up men. At least until I figured out me a little better.
    As I turned to go back inside, I noticed someone in the shadows, six feet away. My hand froze on the doorknob.
    The figure stepped out of the darkness, and my heart jolted.
    It was
him
.

C HAPTER F OUR
    “What are you doing here? Are you a stalker?”
    A slow smile covered his face, and he moved toward a chair on the corner of my small porch. “If I were a stalker, would I really admit it?”
    Good point. But stalker or not, finding him on my porch freaked me out. “Why are you here? How did you find me?”
    He leaned back and crossed one leg over his thigh, tilting his head with a self-confidence he didn’t have earlier that afternoon. “Ellie, you know why I’m here.”
    He knows my name
. Wait. Of course, he did. He’d read my name tag. But that still didn’t explain how he knew where I lived.
    He grinned, waving toward my chest. “You might want to cover up.” He shrugged with a smirk. “Or not. It’s entirely up to you.”
    I glanced down to see my dress still partially down, exposing my bra. Jerking my dress up, I pressed my back into the door. “What are you doing here?”
    He set