Like Never Before by Melissa Tagg Page B

brain? Not to mention the ache that came along with her.
    Maybe he needed a break more than he realized. “Do you want me to leave?”
    â€œNo, but let me go change. I just ran down here to turn on the teakettle after taking a bubble bath. Not that you need to know that—or that I was taking a bubble bath.”
    He couldn’t help a grin at her rambling, peeking through the crack in his fingers as she bent to pick up her towel and cinched the belt at her waist. She might’ve laughed at him, but he obviously wasn’t the only one uncomfortable at the moment.
    Still, he didn’t drop his hand until she’d started up the boxy steps that led to an open loft.
    â€œSo what are you doing here, Logan?” she called down.
    â€œJust wanted to talk for a few minutes. If that’s okay.” Her living room, with simple beige furniture and an antique trunk in place of a coffee table, spilled into a narrow dining room. “Charming house, by the way.”
    The ceiling overhead creaked as Amelia walked around the second floor.
    â€œCool dining-room table.” Someone—probably Lenny—had crafted it from an old door. Two long benches sat on eitherside. A spread of papers covered one end of the table. Old newspaper clippings, scribbled notes. Logan picked up the top papers, ignoring the voice in his brain reminding him he’d already barged in on Amelia. Probably shouldn’t go through her things, too.
    But curiosity got the better of him. Why was she reading so many articles about Kendall Wilkins?
    â€œWhat did you want to talk—”
    The screech of the teakettle interrupted Amelia’s question from above, so he dropped her papers and walked the rest of the way past her dining room into the kitchen. Steam hissed from the kettle as he pulled it off the burner. A canister of Nestlé hot chocolate mix sat next to the stove.
    She was going to make hot chocolate with that? Instead of placing the kettle back on the stove, he moved to the sink and poured out the water.
    By the time he turned around, Amelia stood behind him. She’d traded the robe in for jeans and an emerald sweater that made her eyes seem more green than hazel. Her hair still hung damp around her face, the scent of vanilla clinging to her.
    â€œWhat are you doing with my water?”
    â€œYou can’t make hot chocolate with this.”
    The freckles on her nose scrunched together. “Yes, I can. I do every night.”
    He moved past her toward the fridge. “You’ve got milk, don’t you?” He pulled it open and found a half gallon of two percent behind a pile of Chinese takeout containers. “Good.”
    Amelia stood with her hands on her waist now. “Make yourself at home, why don’t you?”
    He opened a cupboard. “Spices?”
    â€œNext one over.”
    Cinnamon and nutmeg. Perfect. He turned away from the cupboard. Couldn’t tell if that was amusement or annoyanceflickering in Amelia’s smirk. Probably both. “My mom was very particular about hot chocolate.”
    â€œClearly she passed on the trait.” She brushed her fingers through her damp hair.
    He ignored her wry tone. “Mom, however, used cocoa extract and sweetened condensed milk. We’re going to do our best to re-create it, but it won’t be exactly the same.”
    He found a pan under her oven and poured in a couple cups’ worth of milk, then set it on the still-warm burner.
    â€œYou’re awfully comfortable in my kitchen, Logan. Much more so than you were in my living room.”
    She stood beside him now, hands in her back pockets while she watched him work, and that vanilla smell—her hair, maybe—grew stronger as she moved close.
    â€œWell, you know, you’re wearing clothes now. That helps.”
    She had a nice laugh, low and lilting.
    â€œSo what’s with all the reading material about Kendall Wilkins?”
    She leaned over the