He’d already survived six months at Hogue. There were just three months left. Once he completed the program, he could live with her. That was the goal. That was the focus. That was her promise to him.

“Where is Troy?” she asked, combing her fingers through her long hair, trying to smooth and untangle it in one quick motion.

“In the living room. It was the warmest room.” Kara gave Taylor a pointed look, her eyebrows arching. “Although maybe that didn’t matter, because he’s so hot.”

“Is he?” Taylor asked, indifferently. She didn’t understand all this fuss made over Troy. Yes, he was handsome. But so what? The world was filled with good looking men.

“Seriously hot,” Kara drawled.

Taylor rolled her eyes. “Is every woman in this town crazy about him?”

“Every woman with a pulse.” Kara winked, and headed back to her bedroom.

Taylor found Troy standing in front of the living room fireplace studying the framed photos on the mantel. She hesitated in the doorway, watching him examine the photos of Kara and her brother growing up.

His dark hair was cropped clean at his nape, showing off his high hard cheekbones and square chin, his strong jaw shadowed with a day old beard. He was wearing a long black wool coat, something you’d probably see in San Francisco’s financial district and the tailored wool coat made his shoulders look even bigger, broader, which just emphasized his height.

But then he was tall—six two at least—and not the skinny kind of tall, but solid. Muscular. He’d made the huge Escalade feel small and it was probably a very roomy SUV.

“Hi,” she said.

He turned to face her. “Sorry to wake everyone up.”

As he turned from the mantel, his long black wool coat fell open, exposing his black cashmere sweater, and how it clung to the hard planes of his broad chest.

She’d tried not to stare at his chest in the car.

She had to remind herself not to stare now.

“I’m sorry you had to drive all the way back to Marietta tonight, at this hour.” Her voice came out soft, breathless.

She told herself she was breathless because she wasn’t accustomed to greeting men in the Jones’ living room. She’d had some double dates with Jane, but none of the men had ever picked her up here. She told herself she was breathless because she was worried about Doug. She couldn’t admit she was breathless because he was so…so…different…from any man she’d ever met before.

Nervously, she jammed her hands deeper into the robe pockets, thinking she must look as pretty as a roll of toilet paper in her fuzzy gray robe dotted with fat pink pigs, the robe a Christmas gift from Doug several years ago.

“I didn’t want you to panic,” he said.

“That was nice of you, because I was, a little bit,” she admitted. “I haven’t backed up my contacts. Need to.” She was babbling. She hated that. But she felt so jumpy. Troy made her self-conscious. And the robe didn’t help. She felt silly in the robe. Why hadn’t she just put on jeans and a sweatshirt? It would have felt so much safer, and she would have been more confident, than she did greeting him in a pig robe.

Because of course he’d still look urban, and sophisticated.

Dashing.

A prince coming to the villager’s house with the glass slipper.

Or in this case, a phone.

“I would have waited until morning,” Troy said, walking towards her, “but the messages seemed urgent.” He handed her the phone. “Hope everything’s okay.”

His fingertips brushed her palm as he placed the phone in her hand. Taylor blushed, feeling a sharp tingle where his fingers had touched her palm.

This was so absurd.