“Me? I’m a matchmaker.” He said it without a hint of hesitation or pride, just a simple matter of fact.

Annie gasped out loud, covering her mouth with her hands in shock. “Oh, you’re kidding!”

“Nope.”

“Oh my god. Just my luck to be under the table with a matchmaker at a matchmaking party. Did my sister hire you?” she asked suspiciously.

“No. Which one is your sister?”

“I have two. Chloe and Rebecca. In that order.”

“And you’re the pretty one. Where do you fall?”

“At the end, the baby. And I’m really not that pretty.”

“Don’t lie. How’s your head?” There was that genuine concern again. In her playfulness, she had nudged herself quite close to him in the dark, and she was enjoying the warmth of his thigh, hip and arm touching hers.

“It hurts,” she admitted. “I think I need an aspirin.”

“I bet I can help. Do you want me to rub it?”

Annie hesitated. That was a fairly intimate thing to be doing anywhere, let alone in a dark kitchen under a table. Remembering how good his hands had felt when he’d checked to see if she was bleeding and then had continued to rub the growing knot, she relented. “Sure.” She suddenly didn’t care if it was sending him the wrong message. Then again, maybe it wasn’t the wrong message at all.

“Come here, then. Just put your head in my lap.”

Annie lay down on the tile, resting her cheek against his denim-clad thigh.

His fingers slid through her hair, first finding then caressing the throbbing knot.

The sensation seemed to lift and change as he touched her.

“This is cozy,” she murmured.