Because a Husband Is Forever by Marie Ferrarella

walked into the kitchen, went straight to the wall phone and picked up the receiver. Her stomach rumbled a protest. “Want some breakfast?” she asked as she pulled the number of a restaurant off the refrigerator.
    He stared at her in disbelief. “Are you ordering takeout?”
    Her finger poised over the keypad, she glanced at him. “Sure.”
    He strode past her to the refrigerator. “What do you have in your refrigerator?”
    She thought a moment. “Last I checked, a lightbulb and some shelves.”
    He opened it and looked for himself. She was right. Empty. Not even what he’d come to expect. “No bottled water?” he scoffed.
    She’d never picked up the habit of carrying around overpriced water that came from heaven only knewwhere. “I like New York water,” she informed him. “It’s got character.” She watched as he closed the refrigerator and walked toward the front door. “Have I scared you off already?”
    He paused only long enough to issue instructions. “Stay here and have some coffee.” He nodded at the coffeemaker she must have preprogrammed the night before. “I’m going to the grocery store.”
    Sliding off the stool, she accompanied him to the door. “Sure I’ll be safe?”
    He ignored her sarcastic tone. Thirteen days after today, he told himself. Just thirteen more days. “Just don’t throw open your door without asking who it is again.”
    He saw her salute, then suddenly disappear from the doorway. But as he turned away he heard her call after him. “Wait.”
    Now what? Stifling impatience, he turned from the elevator. “What?”
    â€œHere.” Striding toward him, her door hanging open in the background, she placed the spare key that had once belonged to John in the palm of his hand, then closed his fingers around it. She was very aware that his fingers felt strong, manly, and that she couldn’t help wondering if they’d be that strong gliding along her body. “This way we won’t have to play twenty questions through the door and you won’t have to lecture me again.” She looked at him significantly. “The first lecture’s okay. The second one I might bite.”
    He nodded, pocketing the key. “I’ll try to remember that,” he told her as he went to the elevator.
    â€œYou do that, Ian,” she murmured under her breath just before returning to her apartment. “You be sure to do that.”

Chapter Seven
    I an returned less than half an hour later, carrying two large grocery bags filled to the brim with everything he needed to make breakfast. Rather than use the key she’d given him, he rang the doorbell.
    â€œWho is it?”
    He allowed himself a small grin of triumph. At least she was learning. “It’s Ian.”
    â€œIan who?” came the melodious question through the door.
    â€œRussell,” he replied evenly. Holding the bags was awkward to say the least. He shifted them for a better hold.
    â€œHow do I know you’re who you say you are?”
    Okay, no triumph, he thought. She was being deliberately difficult. “Look through the peephole,” he growled.
    He heard some movement going on behind the door. The next moment she opened it to admit him. “Never can be too careful,” she told him innocently. Dakota eyed the bags as he shouldered his way in past her. “Boy, what have you got there?”
    â€œBreakfast,” he informed her tersely.
    She’d changed, he noticed as he carried the bags into the kitchen. But she obviously wasn’t in work attire. Despite the weather, she was wearing shorts and an old sweatshirt. From her body language, he gathered that he’d caught her on the way out. Had he come in five minutes later, he had no doubt that he would have missed her.
    Ian rested the bags on the counter and looked at her. “Where are you