She had her head down, searching in her purse for her key, when she approached her house. She gasped when she realized there was a large dark form on her porch steps. She pressed her lips tight together when she saw it was Streeter in an unbuttoned shearling jacket with the collar turned up.

He stood and held her paper out to her. “I thought I should give this to you personally.”

“Why?”

He followed her up the stairs and slouched against her door, hands in pockets, feet crossed at the ankle. “You seemed unusually bent out of shape this morning. I thought maybe there was some special significance to this particular paper. Like, maybe you’re a spy and there was a microdot in the Style section.”

She stuffed the paper under her arm and continued fishing in her handbag. “I’m not a spy. I’m press secretary to Senator Nolan Bishop. I was unusually bent out of shape because I was tired, and because I hate you.”

“How could you hate me? You don’t even know me.”

She paused in her search for the key and looked up at him. “I know you well enough to thoroughly dislike you. I’d give you specific reasons, but it’d take all night, and I don’t want to spend that much time in your presence.”

“This is about the phone calls to your mother, isn’t it? You’re embarrassed because I know you aren’t sleeping with the guy you’ve been dating for the past four months.”

“Get a life.”

Streeter’s grin flashed white in the darkness. “Why aren’t you sleeping with him?”

“He doesn’t appeal to me. We’re just friends.”

“So, who are you sleeping with?”