"Joseph," she said simply. "It seems as if we should have met years ago after all I've heard about you."

"I'll second that. I've heard plenty about you, too, and it appears none of it was quite true."

"Oh?" She cocked her head inquisitively.

"They've been holding out on me." For a moment his eyes flickered down to her mouth, then back up. Winnie suddenly realized how warm, personal and extended the handshake had become. She jerked free and leaped back a step.

"Oh, you're going to stink like gas! I'm sorry! I ran the pump over just a few minutes ago while I was filling my… my car, and I got it all over my hand and on my shoe and my cuff, and I was going straight to the ladies' room to get rid of the stench, but I never got the chance and-" she raked her hair with four fingers "-and the wind practically tore my hair out, roots and all. I have to… to comb it."

"A pity," he teased.

"A pity? Why, I look like a disaster, and I… I didn't-" She stumbled to a halt. Winnifred Gardner, why ever are you prattling, she thought while Joseph Duggan watched a becoming blush inch its way up one of the most charming chins he'd ever seen, then pass an exquisite mouth whose lips had dropped open in surprise. He lifted his eyes to her beguilingly disheveled hair. In the muted amber light it appeared to be the color of peanut butter. Large wide eyes stared at him momentarily before she did the most amazing thing: she blinked… but with only one eye! It was the most unusual nervous reaction he'd ever seen. And it had been a nervous reaction, and it had been a blink, not a wink. For a winking face uses more than an eye to flash its message. This was a blink, pure and simple, but he'd never in his life seen anyone do it so charmingly.

Her eyes flickered down to his Adam's apple, then away from him entirely, and he let his gaze wander downward. Her name doesn't fit. Winnifred Gardner sounds like a supercilious prude with lineage and laureateship. Instead, the woman before him seemed to blend the shyness of Winnie-The-Pooh with the conditioned body of Superwoman, and the whole bundle smelling like gas.