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“What do you mean?” He slung the computer bag over his shoulder. “I'm staying as long as you need me.”

“With that much luggage, I hope the B&B gave you a monthly rate.”

He closed the trunk. “Two of those are clothes.”

“And the others?”

“Other necessities.”

“I’m afraid to ask.”

“You should be.”

She led him inside, where Edith was waiting to meet him. He immediately charmed her by presenting her with the chocolates he’d picked up during his trip. Within ten minutes, he was sitting in the living room listening to Edith recount her niece’s arrest with considerably more enthusiasm than Amanda thought necessary.

She’d expected Edith to like Fen, but she hadn’t anticipated how quickly they’d take to each other. By the time her aunt got to the part about Amanda landing in jail, Fen was hanging on every word and peppering her with far too many questions.

After her embarrassment wore off, Amanda and Fen spent most of the afternoon catching up while he worked through the list of things that had piled up in her absence. He complained about the cellular service until she showed him the signal booster, grumbled that all of this would be easier from Los Angeles, and somehow made himself completely at home in Edith’s living room.

Once they were all caught up with work, Amanda carried glasses of iced tea onto the porch with Fen following behind her. A familiar Rockland County Sheriff’s Department SUV pulled into the driveway just as she set them down, sending an annoyingly eager jump through her pulse. Fen's raised eyebrows told her he hadn't missed her reaction.

Of course he hadn’t.

He lowered himself into one of the porch chairs and put on his sunglasses. “Who’s that?”

“Grady.”

The driver’s door opened, and Grady climbed out wearing jeans and a T-shirt. Instead of heading straight to the house, he walked around to the back of the SUV, opened the hatch, and started pulling out tools.

Beside her, Fen repeated Grady’s name with enough interest to put her on guard.

“The sheriff,” she clarified.

His mouth rounded. “Ohhhhh. The sheriff. Interesting.”

Fen knew about the traffic stop and her arrest, but she hadn’t mentioned how drastically her relationship with Grady had changed since. Edith hadn't said anything either. Judging by her assistant's expression, he was already putting the pieces together.

“Behave.”

Fen placed an offended hand against his chest. “I haven’t done anything.”

“Yet.”

He giggled. “You know me too well.”

Leaving him on the porch, Amanda headed toward Grady. By the time she reached him, he'd pulled out several pieces of lumber and an assortment of tools that made his intentions pretty clear.

“Fixing the steps?” she asked.

“Yep.”

Of course he was. She should have known the man wouldn't forget about the crooked porch steps after noticing them the first time he'd come by. Apparently, identifying a problem and leaving it for someone else to handle wasn't in his genetic makeup.

“I was going to hire someone.”

“Now you don’t have to.”

She was touched that he remembered the steps needed to be repaired, let alone took it upon himself to fix them. “You know you don’t have to do this.”