Her smile faded. “Thank you again for all your help today. I’m sure you had better things to do.”
“No problem. But I’m holding you to that cake you promised.”
“You’ll have it.”
He couldn’t seem to think of a reason to linger any longer—and neither could she. But still neither of them moved.
Riley cleared his throat. “Well…”
She tucked her fingertips into the pockets of her jeans. “Good night, Riley.”
He startled her by reaching out to tuck a stray strand of hair behind her ear. His fingers grazed her cheek as he did so—and there was that annoying and decidedly inconvenient quivering inside her again. “Good night, Teresa. Sleep well.”
He was standing entirely too close to her. Smiling at her entirely too warmly. She moistened her lips, deciding she’d better make something clear right from the start—just in case there were any misunderstandings. “Riley, I want this rental arrangement to work out. And there’s no reason it shouldn’t if we set a few ground rules from the beginning.”
Even in the shadowy evening light she could see his left eyebrow shoot up in response to her wording. “Ground rules?”
She nodded firmly. “I intend to make it clear to my children that we’re friendly neighbors, nothing more. They won’t be allowed to pester you or pop in on you without permission, and I’ll try to keep them from making too much noise when they’re playing outside.”
“They’re kids. Let them have fun.”
“I didn’t say they couldn’t have fun. I just won’t let them get carried away with it.”
“Any other rules you want to spell out while we’re at it?”
He was making fun of her, but she didn’t let him get to her. She kept her chin high as she replied, “One or two.”
“Such as?”
“I know you were teasing me at the diner—you know, when you flirted with me and asked me out—but…”
“What makes you think I was teasing?”
She wouldn’t let him see how his question—and the tone in which he asked it—flustered her. “I’m quite sure you were. But even if you weren’t, you must see now that it would be entirely inappropriate. You are, after all, my landlord.”
He crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against one of the posts that supported the awning over her little stoop. “Going to charge me with harassment if I wink at you?”
There was the slightest edge beneath his
lazy drawl—just enough to warn her that he didn’t find this as amusing as he pretended. “Look, I’m not trying to be difficult,” she said. “I just—”
“You just want to warn me to keep my hands to myself, is that it? Making it quite clear that my nefarious plan to get you under my roof where I have you at my mercy won’t work?”
She felt her cheeks flame in the cool night air. “There’s no need to mock me,” she said stiffly.
“Did anyone ever tell you that you have a tendency to sound a bit melodramatic at times?”
Now the edge was in her voice. “All I’m trying to say—”
He straightened away from the post as he spoke. “I know what you were trying to say. And now I think we’d better say good-night.”
Great. She’d ended her first day in her new apartment by offending her landlord—and after he’d been so nice about helping her move in. “Listen, Riley, all I was trying to say is—”
“Don’t worry about it. I’m sure we’ll have a very pleasant landlord-tenant relationship. Let me know if you have any problems.”
He was inside his apartment with the door closed between them before she could come up with a reply.
Shaking her head in self-disgust, she entered her apartment, locking the door behind her. She really was terrible at that sort of thing. All she’d wanted to do was let Riley know, as politely as possible, that she wasn’t available for any sort of personal relationship.