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as long as I keep my end of the bargain, the Prescotts keep theirs and stay the hell away from me.”
    He held her gaze in silence and then ran a hand across his face as if to clear away the unpleasantness she’d piled on him. “I could use that coffee right about now,” he muttered.
    “You want it laced with Kentucky?”
    “Don’t tempt me.”
    She made the coffee strong, and slid it across the counter towards him, a spoon and a sachet of sugar right behind it. “You want to keep talking about it?”
    “I really don’t. You?”
    “I’d much rather look forward. Good things can come of bad beginnings.” She looked to Claire. “There’s my proof, right there.”
    “Mumumum,” said Claire.
    “Hey, Claire. This is Jett.” Now would be a good time for her little girl to step up and be super cute and chatty, maybe even say his name. Dig her mother out of the hole of seriousness that pervaded the kitchen.
    But Claire just stared at him.
    Right then, moving on. “You want to see the to-do list?”
    He nodded.
    She gave him the list, and he reached for his mug and sipped while he scanned it and then glanced up.
    “You got another list?”
    “What are you? Speedy Gonzales?”
    “I like to think so, yes.” The faint stirrings of a smile lit his eyes and she was glad of it. “Mind if I take the coffee through to the front room with me?”
    “You just want to get out of my kitchen.”
    He headed for the door with a grin, but he paused and turned back towards her when he reached the door and his expression morphed into something a whole lot more complicated. “I liked watching you work the bar the other night. You looked confident and you handled the rowdy groups with finesse. I like the way you handled the conversation we just had. And maybe you don’t like that I saw you at your lowest – and it’s not as if it’s something I can forget – but you stood back up and here you are, whole and unbroken, and I can sure as hell admire you for that. I like this life you’re building, Mardie Griffin. I’m glad you’re standing tall again.” He nodded. “It’s kinda beautiful.”
    “You always know what to say to a girl.”
    “I’ve heard that before.”
    “I’m sure you have.”
    Mardie kept smiling until he left the room, and then, for the first time in a long time, she felt silent tears track down her cheeks.
    He, of all people, had known how low she’d been and he’d looked at her this morning and seen beauty and accomplishment, not brokenness and despair.
    She’d needed that acknowledgement, and not just from anyone.
    She’d needed to hear it from him.

Chapter Four
    ‡
    I t took Jett twenty minutes to rip up the carpet in the front room and throw it out the door. The boards beneath were turn-of-the-century maple, by the look of them, more than a hand-span wide and solid through.
    As for the porch… yes it swayed, but it too was in better overall condition than he’d been led to expect. The circular area at the corner end would make a perfect outdoor space for a small child to play in while her mama sat in a rocker and took a well-earned rest.
    He could see it in his mind’s eye and he wanted to make it happen.
    Jett examined the railings and the decking more carefully and thought of the little girl inside. Some of it could do with replacing. There was going to be expense.
    He found her in one of the bedrooms, changing Claire’s diaper, and retreated to the hall with a haste that would have made his slalom coach proud.
    “I’m, ah, just going to stay out here and talk, while you do that in there,” he said and she laughed and wasn’t that a sound he could stand to hear some more of, for it danced across his skin like a longed for breeze on a soft summer night.
    “I knew it,” she said. “I knew I’d find something.”
    Yeah, he had no idea what she was talking about, and judging by the smell of that diaper he didn’t want to know. “I’m going to dump the carpet and pick up a