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Then she paused. Should she get in her pajamas? Or should she just sleep in a change of clothes? No, that would be ridiculous. Besides, her pajamas were perfectly fine. Sweats and an oversized sweatshirt. He’d seen her in them already, hadn’t he? The night she’d almost quit.

With a nod of resolve, reminding herself that this situation was only going to be awkward if she made it awkward, she excused herself from the room and walked down the hallway to where the shared bathroom was situated.

She didn’t like the idea of sharing a toilet with all the tenants, but beggars couldn’t be choosers. And tonight, she was a beggar.

Closing the door behind her, she took a quick glance in the mirror, horror rushing over her at the sight of herself. She looked worse than a wet dog tonight. Her hair was slicked back and half-fallen from her bun, her makeup leaked down from her eyes and slid down the sides of her cheeks, and her silk shirt stuck to her shoulders with wrinkles galore.

Swiftly, she tried to fix her appearance, pulling out her bun to reset it, but her wet hair wouldn’t cooperate. With a sigh, she ran a comb through it, instead, fluffed up the strands with her fingertips, wiped off her failed mascara, and changed into her pajamas.

She and Matthew were friends, and if they were friends, it really didn’t matter what she looked like. Maybe tonight, she would be fine with being average.

Actually, that could be her new mantra.

Step aside, ‘Be like Fort Knox.’ Make room for ‘I’m fine with average.’

Her hand paused above the door handle at the thought, and she turned to look at herself in the mirror, surprised at what she saw now.

Instead of a wounded fawn trying to hide exactly who she was, impressing others with a wealth of business knowledge and pencil skirts and pulled-back hair, she saw a simple girl with imperfect locks down to her shoulders, comfortable, oversized clothing, and eyes that reflected the joy she’d felt with the most perfect man and the most perfect two days of her life.

She could get used to seeing this side of her—the real, true version of Winnie Knox.

With confident steps, feeling lighter than the air around her, she made her way back to the room, opening the door with that same smile on her lips.

And there it froze, as did her feet, body, and heart, all of them immobilized by the sight before her—Matthew half-dressed, standing in the middle of the room they would share that night.

With his dark blue sweats fortunately in place, he lowered his shirt, turning toward her as he revealed just a glimpse of his chest and abdomen.

He looked…Well, let’s put it this way. He looked exactly how a person would expect a knight to look putting on his shirt. Except multiply that expectation by three thousand and maybe, maybe, you’d get close to how Matthew looked right now in front of her.

The moment lasted shorter than two blinks of an eye, and yet, the image of the contours of his back, the angles across his abs and chest, the shifting of his many muscles as he put on his shirt would be engrained in her mind for all eternity.

And she wasn’t mad about it.

She wasn’t mad about it at all.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

“You all right?” Matthew asked.

Winnie blinked, shaking herself mentally from her stares. “Sorry, I figured you’d dress in the bathroom. I can come back.”

“No need. I’m finished.”

She nodded, walking in and closing the door behind her.

He straightened his thin, gray t-shirt over his torso, revealing just a sliver of his skin, but Winnie forced herself to look away all the same, hanging her wet clothes near the wall heater, where Matthew’s shirt and pants already rested.

He motioned to the brittle table near the window, cake and teacups now balanced precariously atop the small surface. “It was a good job I was here when Mrs. Kitchingside brought the slices of cake. She might’ve come in and rifled through all our luggage to see what we’re really doing here.”

Winnie smiled, though still frazzled. She took a few steps forward, blinking away the image of him once again and staring at the cake slices, the smell of sugar and strawberries tickling her nose.

There was nothing that could distract a girl more than sugar.

And yet, when she sat gingerly down on one of the toothpick-legged chairs, not even a bite of the delicious, homemade cake could distract her as he took a seat across from her and his knee pressed up against hers.

She looked up at him furtively, wondering if he had touched her on purpose, but when he didn’t move, taking a bite of the cake himself, she had to assume that he thought he was pressed up against the table’s leg instead of hers.

Her flesh burned, heat coursing through her heart, reminding her again of the other night, how close they’d been to each other, how his lips had looked drawing toward her.