The Man Next Door

She released a long, slightly wistful sigh, then pushed herself to her feet. She had a small steak in the fridge. She’d bought it on sale yesterday, and she had planned a special dinner for herself tonight. The steak, a baked potato and a crisp salad—a real treat considering her limited food budget. A feast for one, of which she intended to savor every bite. Without once thinking about Teague.

Okay, so maybe the latter was improbable, she thought ruefully, opening the refrigerator door. But she’d try to enjoy her meal anyway.

* * *

“Great party, huh?”

Looking up from the single can of beer he’d been nursing for the past half hour, Teague nodded in response to Mike’s shouted question. Then he leaned closer to his friend to ask, “Does it mean I’m getting old if I say that I wish they’d turn the music down a little?”

“Yeah. That’s exactly what it means,” Mike said with a laugh, leaning against the arched doorway that separated the living room from the formal dining room of the home in which the party was being held. The house was owned by Pete Schram, a lawyer who did some work for the FBI, and Pete’s girlfriend, an up-and-coming fashion designer who answered only to the name of “Z.” Z liked to entertain, and Pete indulged her by cohosting parties at least once a month. Teague had dropped in on a few, finding them always loud, frenetic, cheerful, exhausting. More so the latter tonight, since he was already tired, anyway.

He shouldn’t have come, really. Not after the week he’d put in on the job. But he’d found himself contemplating an evening alone in front of the TV, followed by turning in early, and that had made him feel even older than his wish that someone would turn the music down. Besides, if he’d sat at home, he’d find himself thinking too much about Dani, which was a bad habit he’d gotten into lately. He really needed to spend some time with another woman.

“Hey, isn’t that Kelly Something-or-other over there? The one you went out with a couple of times last spring?”

Looking in the direction of Mike’s nod, Teague spotted the curvy blonde smiling back at him from the other side of the room. “Callie, not Kelly. And yeah, she and I have been out a few times.”

Memorable times, he added silently. Callie’s one goal in life was to have a good time, making sure everyone around her did, as well. He’d always had fun with Callie, but that had been the extent of their relationship. She had a well-known aversion to permanent commitments, and he hadn’t been looking for anything more than someone to relax with between assignments. They had served each other’s purposes quite well while they’d been together.

Maybe tonight was the time for them to reconnect. He had a couple days off, and she looked amenable. Callie would keep him too occupied for a few days to think about…well, anyone else.

Or would she? Sending her a smile in return, he turned slightly away, breaking the eye contact. No need to rush into anything this evening. Especially since he wasn’t at all sure he wouldn’t be thinking about someone else even if he was with Callie.

“So, aren’t you going over there?” Mike prodded.

“I don’t think so tonight. I’m just back from that mess in Texarkana. I’m thinking about going home and crashing.”

“Oh, man.” His friend studied his face with a frown. “You’re thinking about her, aren’t you? The princess.”

It wasn’t the first time Mike had brought Dani up since Teague had carelessly mentioned her that afternoon at the office. Mike seemed to think Teague was developing a thing for Dani, despite Teague’s assurances that he wasn’t that masochistic.

“I’m just tired,” Teague argued. “Didn’t you just agree that I’m getting older?”

“Not that old. And you haven’t been acting quite right since that day I caught you grinning to yourself about something the princess said.”

“Stop calling her that, okay?”

“You were the one who described her that way,” Mike reminded him. “Hot, but high maintenance, I think you said. Have you changed your mind?”

After a momentary pause, Teague shrugged. “Well no, not exactly. But she’s not so bad, really.”

“Oh, yeah?”

Teague gave his friend a repressive frown. “This isn’t junior high, Ferguson.”

“And yet you’re still standing here mooning over the hot girl. So the difference would be…?”

Teague made a suggestion that would have gotten his mouth washed out with soap, had his stepmother heard it. Mike merely laughed.

“Hey there, sexy. It’s been a while.”

Both men turned in response to the throaty drawl. Callie had strolled to their side of the room, accompanied by a tall, slender brunette who was eyeing Mike in blatant approval. Cleavage prominently displayed, Callie touched Teague’s shoulder with a perfectly manicured hand. “So where have you been?”

“Oh. You know. Around.”

She laughed huskily, and he remembered just how that laugh sounded in a dark, steamy room. “Yeah. Me, too. So, maybe we’ll end up in the same place again sometime soon?”

“Yeah, maybe we will.” He knew it would only take a word from him for that “sometime soon” to be that very night. If he’d had any sense at all, he’d have said that word right then, before she found someone else to have fun with that evening. But instead he made a lame excuse about wanting something to drink, and he wandered off to the bar, leaving Mike to entertain the women on his own.

* * *

Dani had just finished an assignment for a Monday-morning class when someone rapped on her door Sunday afternoon. Closing her notebook, she crossed the room and looked through the peephole, thinking her caller might be Mrs. Parsons.

Seeing Teague in the hallway instead elicited her usual reaction; she ran a quick hand through her hair and glanced down to check that her chocolate-colored top and khaki pants were reasonably neat. For some reason Teague always made her conscious of her appearance, though she’d tried to put less emphasis on that during the past year.

She opened the door. “Are you hungry again?”

He chuckled. “No. Bored.”

“And what am I supposed to do about that?”

He gave her an enticing look similar to the one that had earned him a cup of hot chocolate and a sandwich just over a week earlier. “I thought maybe you’d like to go see a movie with me.”

“Oh. I—”

“It’s not a date,” he assured her. “I won’t be making any moves on you during the movie or afterward. I won’t even buy you popcorn, if that makes you feel any better. I just hate going to movies by myself and all my other friends already have plans.”

It was hardly the most flattering invitation she had ever received—and yet it had the result of making her feel relatively comfortable about accepting. If Teague really didn’t see this as a date, or a preliminary to anything of the sort, then there was no real reason she should turn him down, right? If her own imagination got away with her during the evening—well, that was a problem she would deal with at the time.

“Okay,” she said, because she could use a couple of hours of relaxation herself. “What movie do you want to see?”

He looked both pleased and a bit surprised that she’d accepted so easily.

“Just as friends,” she reminded him.

Holding up a hand in an I-swear gesture, he nodded. “I hope you like action movies. I don’t do tear-jerkers.”

“Neither do I. Give me an action movie any day.”

His smile widened. “My kind of friend. How does the latest superhero film sound to you?”

“From what I’ve heard, it’s got enough eye candy to keep us both entertained. Let me get my bag.”

She heard him chuckle as she turned away, and if there was a hint of smugness in the sound, she chose to ignore it.

Chapter Four

“Wow. I hope I never do anything to annoy you.”