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At least she hadn’t been imagining things. “Because we made love.” She wasn’t asking a question.

He nodded. “We both agreed that it was a onetime thing and that nothing else would change, but it’s not that simple.” He grimaced. “I can’t stop thinking about what happened. I want to be with you again. But I know that would screw everything up and our relationship is too important to me. I want you in my life. I want us to be friends, and yet I don’t want to hurt you. Until I could figure out how to make it work, it somehow seemed easier to avoid you.” He reached out and touched her hand. “That was selfish and shortsighted. I’m sorry.”

She didn’t answer him right away, mostly because she couldn’t decide what issue to address first. He couldn’t stop thinking about their being together? Her heart fluttered in her chest. She had the same problem. Memories were keeping her up nights and she couldn’t afford to lose the sleep. She was also wrestling with the issue of maintaining their friendship.

She wanted to move close to him and hug him. She wanted to beg him to make love with her. She wanted to make him promise that, no matter what, he would never again disappear from her life.

“Thank you for being honest,” she said at last. “I was afraid you didn’t want to be friends with me anymore. I was afraid you wanted me out of your life.”

“Never.” His fingers curled around her wrist. “But I don’t want to hurt you.”

It was one of those rare statements that rang with sincerity. She sensed he was being completely honest. He genuinely was more concerned with her feelings than his own. She felt a flood of warm contentment flow through her.

“You couldn’t,” she assured him.

His gaze narrowed. “You’re wrong, Heather. I could hurt you very much, even though I don’t want to. Please remember that. Whatever happens, I’ll never hurt you on purpose.”

She shivered involuntarily. “What does that mean?”

“Just what I said.”

But before she could pursue that line of questioning, Diane began fussing in her playpen. Jim rose and gathered her to him.

“How’s my best little girl?” he asked as he cradled her in his arms. Her restlessness quieted instantly. “Feeling better?”

Diane had spent the past several days battling an ear infection.

“The doctor says she’s doing great,” Heather said. “Apparently, a lot of kids get this, but she doesn’t seem prone, thank goodness. But all the medicine and sleeplessness has messed up her schedule just after we’d gotten back on track.”

“That’s all right. You’ll start another schedule, won’t you, sweet cheeks?”

His voice was low, soft, and to Heather at least, very seductive. Or maybe it was just the sight of this tall, strong man holding a small baby in his arms. Jim gazed at Diane with all the love and devotion of a father, and in many ways, that’s what he was whether he realized it or not.

“Pretty, pretty girl,” he said to Diane as he carried her around the room. “You are so lucky. You’re going to have a wonderful life. When you’re six or seven, you’ll have a bike and suddenly you’ll be able to go places. Having your own wheels is a very cool thing. When you’re ten, you can have a horse, and by the time you’re thirteen, you’ll be a beauty just like your mother.”

Heather opened her mouth to say she hoped her daughter would be much more attractive, then closed it. There was no point in sharing her insecurities about her own appearance with a man who would never, by virtue of his gender, understand.

“All the boys will have crushes on you,” he went on. “I can tell. You’re going to be a heartbreaker.”

“Did you have a crush on a girl when you were thirteen?” she asked.

He looked at her and shrugged. “No. I didn’t discover girls until a couple of years later, although most of my friends had by that age.”

“You don’t strike me as a late bloomer.”

“I wasn’t, but at thirteen I didn’t have time to be a kid. I was too busy taking care of my mother.”

He continued to croon to Diane, then said he would put her to bed for the night.

Heather nodded weakly. She couldn’t speak. She’d heard the truth before and thought she’d understood what he was saying, but now she realized that, until this exact minute, she hadn’t absorbed the reality of all that Jim had been through.

There were no secrets to Jim Dyer. She’d seen through to his soul. She knew his demons and how they preyed upon him and he was still the best man she’d ever known. He was everything that he appeared to be—warm, loving, caring…and terrified that it was never going to be enough. He lived in fear that he wouldn’t be able to fix whatever problems life gave him in his personal relationships, so he avoided them rather than fail again. Because to him, failure meant death. First the death of his mother, then the death of his child.

She walked into her bedroom and turned on the lamp. After pulling back the covers, she took off her clothes, then waited.

It only took a few minutes for Jim to settle Diane. He walked out into the hall and glanced into her room. She stood naked in the soft lamplight. He stopped as suddenly as if he’d run into a wall and just stared. She might have been scared…okay, she was scared, but the bulge in his trousers told her that she hadn’t completely misjudged the situation.

“I need you,” she said quietly. “Please make love with me.”