The quiet click of the front door opening again caught their attention. Someone else was trying to sneak in.

"What is this?" Jesse asked, glancing at the ceiling like he was looking for guidance. "All of a sudden

everyone decides to come in the front?"

Jesse returned to the living room and found a second person tiptoeing toward the back hallway.

"It's about time you got home."

Katie froze, then pivoted to face him. She smiled a big guilty smile. But Jesse knew it was an attempt

to cover nerves.

"All I want to know," he enunciated carefully, "is what the hell has happened to everyone around here?"

Jesse didn't know how to explain the frustration that raced inside him. His concern for Travis that he

didn't know how to show. His feelings for Katie that he didn't know how to deal with.

He watched as every ounce of Katie's nervousness whisked away.

"Nothing has happened," she shot back.

"Nothing? You were talking about foreplay! On TV. Good God Almighty, Katherine, I can't believe you said Find yourself a strapping man with a fine, strong putter and a good set of balls."

Travis gasped. "Oh, man, I can't believe I missed it."

Red flashed up Katie's face and disappeared into her hairline. But a second later, her eyes narrowed

dangerously. "It is none of your business what I was thinking, or what I was doing for that matter. I had a show to do and I did it."

Jesse shook his head. "First you talk about sex on TV, then Travis wants to quit golf."

Katie instantly cocked her head, her own problems forgotten. "You want to quit, T?"

"Well, I was thinking about it," he admitted.

"Nobody's quitting anything," Jesse announced. "Not yet, anyway."

"Well, well," she said with a superior smile that really got his goat. "Haven't you become the arbiter of proper behavior."

"You better believe it. Someone around here has got to have a clear head."

"What are you going to do?" she asked, her voice overly sweet. "Ground us both this time?"

His eyes narrowed. "I'm thinking grounding isn't such a bad idea after all. But no, that isn't my plan.

I have something better in mind. On Sunday the three of us are going to play golf."

"Us?" Travis groaned. "The kind of us that means me playing, too?"

"Golf?" Katie demanded. "Why in the world would I do a thing like that?"

"Because Travis needs to loosen up and remember he's just a kid. And you"-he pointed at Katie-

"need to get your head out of the studio and stop worrying that you're not good enough as you are."

He saw the minute the anger drained out of her and she swallowed hard. But that age-old stubborn

streak in her wasn't as easily squashed.

"And you think a round of golf will solve that?"

"A round of eighteen holes solves a lot of things."

"Golf isn't a cure-all, Jesse."

"Maybe not. But it's the only cure I know."

The sun had set, the big, wide-open West Texas sky dotted with stars, when Kate heard the sound of splashing water as she returned from a walk. A single dive into the pool, followed by silence in the summer night.

She still couldn't believe the Getting Real segment she had done that morning. Despite her denial to Jesse, she had lost her mind. Yet again! She shuddered when she remembered the line about the putter and balls. Though truth to tell, she also had to suppress a smile. Bad Kate.

She came through the back gate and saw Jesse's sharply defined body cutting through the pool, his form smooth and economical, barely causing a ripple on the water's surface while he swam laps. As always, awareness shimmered through her. His arms glistened in the moonlight with each stroke they took. When he came to the end, he flipped easily, then started back across.

She really didn't like this awkward dance they played. Awareness mixed with restraint. Her body itched for his touch. But as much as she had tried to be Ms. Modern Sex and the City, when push came to shove and sanity was in residence, she still couldn't get around the fact that she didn't want to be another in the long line of women who chased after him. She wasn't meant for Parker, but she wasn't meant for Jesse, either.

She would have bypassed the pool and gone into the relative safety of the house, but when she started for the door, he stopped.

He rose up to stand in the shallow end, his hands coming up to clear his eyes, then rake back his hair. Every time he did that, his arms up, his fingers to his head, tangling in the dark strands, she felt that frustrating sizzle of sensuality.

"Couldn't sleep?" he asked.

She shrugged, taking in the faint outline of his body partially lit by the pool lights. She didn't know how to put into words the unrest she felt. The constant careening back and forth between wanting to live freely and the old fears that any sort of wildness would ruin her.

"Neither could I," he said. He walked to the side of the pool, his movements exaggerated by the water's resistance. "The temperature is perfect. You should stick your feet in."

She told herself to go inside. She walked toward him instead.

At the edge of the pool, she kicked off her sandals and stepped on to the top step, leaning her hip against the chrome handrail running down the center, the water rushing around her ankles. She looked at him until she had to look away.

The old cottonwood was visible against the moonlit sky, the sides of the tree house seeming like alternating teeth cut out of a Halloween pumpkin.

"We should finish sometime next week," he said, following her gaze.

"It's going to be great and long lasting, this time. Most regular houses aren't built so well."

He laughed out loud, the sound echoing in the night. "We have some long hours to go before it's secure in the tree. At this point, a bad storm could send it tumbling. Though I know Travis will be happy to be done with it. He's not crazy about the saw, the hammer, or even the nails."

"Then why are you doing it?"

He came up the steps, one at a time, stopping one below her, and he looked down into her face. "He's twelve but acts and talks like he's thirty. Like I said earlier, he needs to have some fun. Regular, kid fun,"

he quickly added. He hesitated. "Besides, I thought that when we were finished, after he saw what he had made, he'd be proud. You know, give him some confidence."

Her heart lurched, and she crossed her arms on her chest. "You have the potential to be a good father."

He laughed again. "No, I don't, and we both know it. But he's a good kid."

"You seem to have adjusted to the reality of fatherhood."

"The thought of it still rattles me." He hesitated, then glanced at the tree house. "And as much as I keep

telling myself life is going to go back to the way it used to be, it's not. Now I have to figure out what to do about it long term."

He turned back to her then, and curled his fingers around her bare arms.

Instinctively, her hands came up, her palms flattening on the hard planes of his chest-intending to push free. His skin was hot and cold, like electrically charged marble, and she couldn't seem to move away.

"What do you want to do?" she asked, her voice unsteady.

"To hold you."

The words were like fingertips grazing down her naked spine. She drew a breath. "I'm talking about

Travis."

He focused on his hand curling around the skin on her arm, running his thumb over her flesh much as he had done in the cooking segment in what seemed like a lifetime ago.

"Truthfully, I don't know," he answered her. "I wish everything wasn't so ..."

His words trailed off, but she understood what he meant. "Complicated," she finished for him. "I know

the feeling."

"Maybe so," he conceded, his voice a gruff whisper. "I want things to be simpler. But there aren't any simple answers." He watched the progress of his fingers as he ran the backs of them against her arm. Then he surprised her when he asked, "Why did you do the love products show?"

She didn't respond at first, because she didn't have a clue how to explain. "It seemed like a good idea at the time." Water glistened on his body, and she watched a single drop run down his torso to the wet swim trunks that molded to his hips and crotch. He brought his finger to her chin, forcing her to meet his gaze. When she did, she could tell that he didn't believe her.

"Okay," she admitted, "I wanted to be sexy." Which was true. But all she had managed to do was feel like a traitor to herself. With every move she made these days, she wasn't getting real, she was getting farther and farther away from anything that had to do with reality.

His strong arm came around her body and pulled her close, her thin cotton shirt absorbing the water on his skin. Instantly, she felt the hardness of him and her breath fluttered.