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years ago. She'd take it, you see, from all of us, from the family, but she wouldn't have taken it from any single one of us. If you see the difference."

"Yes, I do. And what about Jake? What happened to him?"

"He does the contracting, when I pick up a place. His father went into construction after he got out of the ring, a few years before my own fateful day with them. Jake went into the business. He's good at it."

"I bet he is." Obligingly, she plopped another slice of pizza on his plate. "You have a way of picking them."

"I do." He laid a hand over hers. "With a few disappointing exceptions, I have a hell of a way of picking them."

Chapter 16

The air was full of sounds, the peeps, the clicks, the whirls of night, when Duncan walked her to her car. "So... what do you think about taking a sail some evening?"

"I think that would be very nice-some evening. It's a little hard for me to miss too many evenings at home. Added to that, you've been lucky so far that I haven't gotten called in before or during one of the evenings."

She turned, leaned back against the car. "You're complicating things for yourself, dating not only a cop but a single parent."

"Complications are interesting, especially when you figure out how to work them around the simple." He leaned down to kiss her. "Some evening."

"All right." She reached for the car door, turned back to follow impulse. "Why don't you come over for dinner this week? It wouldn't be without its complications, but my mother's already fallen for you."

"Yeah? Well, if I didn't get anywhere with you, I figured to hit on her next." He tucked Phoebe's hair behind her ear, gave the little gold hoop she wore a tap. "She makes a hell of a cookie."

"She certainly does. Thursday work? It would give them enough time to fuss appropriately for company, and not give them quite enough time to drive me crazy with the details of it."

"I can do Thursday."

She angled her head. "You don't have a book to check? Appointments to consider?"

"I can do Thursday," he repeated, and this time when he kissed her, he turned up the dial until heat balled in her belly.

"Well." She rubbed her lips together. "Well, I'd better go before I decide staying's an option. Because it isn't," she said, nudging him back when he started to speak. "Thursday. Six o'clock." She laughed as she slid into the car. "It's a school night."

"As long as I don't have to do any homework. You drive safe,

Phoebe. And you should wait until you're home before you think about me. Otherwise you'll get all stirred up, maybe drive off the road."

She drove away laughing-just, she imagined-as he'd intended. Still, she'd just have to risk getting herself stirred up, because he'd given her plenty to think about.

He was fun, interesting and easy on the eyes. He was good in bedor against the door. It occurred to her that while she couldn't claim a wide swath of sexual experience, hers wasn't narrow either. And she'd been married for a few years in there.

But she'd never had an experience to match the one Duncan had greeted her with that night.

He had an easygoing way, but he wasn't careless. Roy had been her experience with careless, and it was one she was determined never to repeat.

He hadn't flipped off his friends when he made his fortune. Phin was his lawyer, Jake his contractor. He remembered his friends. Loyalty was a vital element to her.

Easygoing and loyal he might be, but he wasn't what she thought of as a golden retriever kind of man. Too many layers, too much direction. One of the layers was old hurts. How had he managed to bury that? She knew a lot about old hurts, and just how hard they were to keep down in the cellar of things. He didn't wear his wounds as a point of pride, and many did. He might brood over them from time to time, and she appreciated a good brood herself. But he didn't appear to let those old wounds, those old scars run his life.

On that score, he was probably doing better than she was.

Did the money help? Of course it did. Let's be serious. But she had a feeling he'd have gotten on well enough without it. She suspected the money had opened him to ambition. Or at least had made him