Let Me Be the One (29 page)

“Big yard.”

“We loved it when we bought the house, but we never got around to working on it. Our neighbor has a beautiful lawn. I have moss. Feel free to look around.” She hurried inside and perched on what remained of the stairs.

Not long ago, these two steps had led to a landing and another nine steps to the upstairs. Now they led to a wall. On the other side was her front door, amputating her new home from what she’d always considered its heart. The symbolism was ironic. Katherine leaned back, trying not to think of Jack Conley, who she could hear walking around the kitchen and dining room.

It would be nice to have a tenant by the first of the month and to have a guy with a dog living downstairs for security purposes. That the potential tenant was gorgeous and that she’d been alone too long had nothing to do with the choice. This was business.

“Mrs. Pelham?”

Katherine looked up. He was admiring her legs. A giggle gathered in her throat. She stood, commanding those legs to hold her. “Ms.”

His eyes swept up her body again. Low heat developed in her belly. “Ms. Pelham, then. It’s a great place. Do you have an application?”

“Oh yes. Give me a minute, and I’ll get it.” She spun around to dart upstairs, checking herself before she ran into the wall. This chopped-up house would take getting used to. “I’ll be back.”

Katherine slowed to a walk as she stepped off the porch steps. Why was she running? It was business. Just because he looked at her like a woman and not like a teacher, or a friend, or a conquest didn’t mean anything. She walked to her door and opened it. The applications lay on the steps. Without the wall, she could have handed him one through the banister. She heard Jack walking around, but knew she wouldn’t be able to hear him upstairs. If she wanted to spy, she’d to have to sit at the bottom of the stairs. Or position herself at one of the heat vents.

Katherine shook her head. Why was she thinking of spying on her tenant? She didn’t even have a tenant yet. She picked up one application, took a deep breath and went back around the house to the first floor. He waited in the foyer studying the cracks in the ceiling.

“Here you are,” she said. “Drop it off in my mail box anytime.”

“Thanks.” Jack folded the paper and slipped it into his coat pocket. “You live upstairs?”

“Yes.”

He nodded. “I’ll have this back today.”

“In a big hurry to move?” Katherine tensed.

“It’s Archer. I just got him, and I can’t have pets at my apartment. My landlord wants him out by the end of the month.”

“I see. Well, you can drop the application off in the mailbox whenever.”

“Thanks.” He held out his hand. “Nice meeting you.”

“Nice meeting you, too.” She kept her composure when his hand enveloped hers, but it wasn’t easy. “Good-bye.”

He grinned. “See ya.”

Katherine locked the front door as he backed his truck out of the drive. She’d forgotten to tell him about the garage and the basement, but it hadn’t gone too badly. Chances were excellent he wouldn’t bring the application back, and if he did, that he wouldn’t be a good tenant. The book specifically discussed researching prospective tenants. Once they moved in, getting them out was impossible. She suspected evicting Mr. Conley would be the least of her troubles.

Living in half the house felt strange. Back in her own apartment, she turned toward her kitchen at the top of the stairs. This had been a four-bedroom house. Now, one was her bedroom, another her living room and the third room was her kitchen. Only her office stayed the same in the fourth bedroom. Her office didn’t have bad memories attached to it, so she hadn’t changed it.

She wandered back into the hall and studied the pictures on the wall. She didn’t know why she hadn’t taken them down. Photos of her ‘happy’ life with a hero. Getting engaged, college graduation, buying a home on a police force mortgage assistance program. All quite dandy until Gary was killed, leaving her with a mortgage she couldn’t afford on her teacher’s salary. And all Gary’s cop buddies lost interest in his not-quite-widow. Four years later, she only rated an occasional drive by.

That mistake she wouldn’t make again. The next time she married, if she married, she refused to marry a hero.