Free Whiskey Island by Emilie Richards

there was no other choice. He had been out walking alone. He had come back to Whiskey Island later in the evening without a wife in tow.
    Now, as Megan tried to adjust her thinking, the door opened and a head of dark hair preceded a bare arm groping for a rolled up newspaper. The head lifted, and she saw that it belonged to Niccolo, who, in spite of a temperature near freezing, was wearing cutoffs and a white T-shirt.
    She’d known the morning was still young. What she hadn’t known were Niccolo’s habits. Now she wished she’d thought this through. He looked like a man who was just pulling himself together after a good night’s sleep, a man who probably didn’t want company until after his first cup of coffee.
    And what about the wife that surely went with a house this size? What about the kids?
    She sat very still, hoping that Niccolo wouldn’t notice her. When he disappeared back inside, she would drive away. She would come back later, when she wouldn’t find a Mrs. in a bathrobe or a gaggle of toddlers in last night’s diapers.
    She was too late. Niccolo, newspaper clutched to his chest, was squinting at the Chevy. On the night of the carjacking it had been parked right next to Casey’s Mazda, and Megan had no illusions he wouldn’t recognize it. “Charity,” with her rust-patched doors and four shades of blue, was unmistakable.
    Niccolo was probably barefoot, or she imagined he would have marched right out to the street. She sighed and opened her door to make sure that didn’t happen. She took a few steps, then stopped, shielded by Charity’s long hood.
    “I can come back.” She didn’t have to shout. The front yards here were shallow, and his house sat close to the street.
    “Why?”
    For a moment she thought he was asking why she wanted to. It seemed surprisingly unwelcoming.
    He grimaced. She imagined the cold was beginning to take a toll on his bare legs and arms. “Megan, I meant why come back later? You’re here now. Come on in.”
    “You’re sure? I’m not going to surprise anyone?”
    He frowned, and she could tell he was having trouble putting that together pre-coffee. “You mean, like a wife or a live-in girlfriend?” he asked at last.
    “That was on the menu,” she admitted.
    “I live alone except for a mouse or two. And they’ve been served with eviction notices.”
    The specter of the wife in floor-length chenille vanished. “I could wait until you’ve had coffee,” she offered.
    “Come have some with me instead.”
    That sounded like a bonus, and she started up the walk. “I suppose you recognized the car.” She joined him on the porch. “Charity’s one of a kind.”
    “Charity?”
    “Peggy named her.”
    He held the door wide. “Why?”
    “Half the time, when I get more than a mile from my apartment and turn off the engine, she won’t start again. She’s always been that way. She starts fine when she’s parked in front of my apartment building or the saloon.”
    “I’m moving slow this morning. Subtlety escapes me.”
    She moved past him into the hallway, then turned and grinned. “Charity begins at home.”
    He groaned.
    She couldn’t blame him. In her family, there were a thousand corny jokes just like that one. The Donaghue psyche was glued together by humor. Without it, all of them would become hopelessly despondent.
    Niccolo didn’t move past her. His eyes were friendly, but they were also examining her. Not with the calculating, barely restrained leer with which men often examined women, but with a keen-eyed, intelligent interest. “Don’t wander off the beaten path on the way to the kitchen. You might never be heard from again.”
    “It’s a magnificent house.”
    “You can tell?”
    “Absolutely. Gothic Revival, right? Front gabled. Probably the original verge board trim, which I hope you’ll repair. Flattened Gothic arches holding up the porch.” She realized she was showing off. “I’m sorry, I like architecture, and I love old