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“David.”

“What? There’s a difference.”

Sara shook her head. “I love how you only develop a sense of humor when you want to be a smartass.”

“This from the woman who won’t give anything a rest until she hears she’s right. I feel more pity for Ryan every time we have one of these...fun conversations of ours.”

Sara smirked. “I promise he has ways of shutting me up.”

“Oh, God.”

And if the devilish look on his sister’s face was any warning, he knew exactly where this conversation was heading.

David held his finger out in warning. “Do not.”

Sara, predictably, ignored him. “So, my dear, sweet little brother, whatever happened to that love life you were supposedly getting ready to have?”

David groaned, giving up all pretense of dignity and flopping his head back to cover his face. He’d made the mistake last time they’d spoken of telling his sister he had a date. His complete silence afterward must have caught her interest, and he should have known it would eventually come up.

“Things did not work out,” David muttered.

“And what was wrong with this one?” Sara asked.

“Nothing, it just...didn’t work out. There doesn’t have to be a reason every time. Some things just don’t work.”

“Right, because the woman before that one was too much of a hermit.”

“As a man who’s expected to go to cocktail parties, galas, charity functions, and the like, having someone social by my side isn’t an unfair expectation,” David told her.

“And the guy before that wasn’t serious enough.”

“Anyone who thinks it’s perfectly acceptable to drink themselves stupid on a work night, more than once a week, is not someone I need in my life, Sara.”

“Okay, fair point. You made it sound like it was only once.”

“He and I talked for a couple of weeks, and he informed me it had happened four times.”

“Wasn’t he my age?”

“Yes.”

Sara wrinkled her nose. “Alright, you win that one.”

“Nice to know I can win something with you,” he said dryly.

“But that doesn’t change the fact that itisabout time you stopped being so damn difficult and tried a little romance in your life.”

It wasn’t a new argument. Along with his sister’s zest for life and insistence on tackling every problem head-on, her passion for romance and love had not been diminished. That wasn’t to say David didn’t have aspirations for a companion.

“You and I both know I’ve made several attempts to date in the past two and a half decades, Sara,” David reminded her.

“For someone with a larger dating pool than most, you have a harder time finding someone than anyone I know.”

David frowned. “That’s not fair. And my pool is not bigger.”

“Right, being interested in men and women doesn’t open things up more.”

“A heterosexual woman does not exactly suffer from a dearth of choice,” David said dryly.