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She made sure her door was locked, then turned to Joan. They both leaned in to share a brief but lovely kiss. “Hi,” Sadie murmured.

“Hi.” Joan pulled her into her arms and squeezed tight.

“Aww.” Sadie nestled against Joan’s warm chest, taking in her citrusy scent, the feel of her hard body. “This is nice and unexpected.”

“I’m just glad to see you.”

“I’m glad to see you, too.”

They drew back slowly. Sadie dragged her fingers along one long sleeve of Joan’s thin black button-down shirt. Her vivid red pants and white sneakers were much more Joan Malone, and complementary to Sadie’s hot-pink shell top, lilac-colored capris and rainbow sneakers.

Joan kissed her on the cheek and grinned. She seemed awfully chipper for someone who’d gotten home late. Though itwasa little after noon.

“What kind of coffee are we having today?” Joan asked, glancing at her mug.

“I made you a little something with ground ginger steamed into the milk.”

“Ginger?” She took a sip, thenMmm-ed in delight. “Sadie. You are spoiling me rotten.”

The way Joan said her name caused a thrill to zigzag up Sadie’s spine. “I believe I told you I’m more than happy to fuss over you.”

Joan took another sip. HerMmmwas lower, throatier. Speaking to what else Sadie could do to fuss over her.

Sadie twined their fingers as they moved toward the elevators. A sweet kiss, a big hug, holding hands as they drank coffee… A girl could definitely get used to this every day.

She opened her mouth to ask how things went last night, but Joan spoke first. “So you enjoyed the steak?”

“It was really good.” Sadie glanced up with a little smile. “I got hungry and ate the whole thing. Sorry.”

Joan laughed and squeezed her hand. “That’s okay.”

“I didn’t want it to go to waste.”

“Hey, I deserve that for leaving. When can we have our rain check dinner?”

“Not ’til Saturday,” Sadie sighed. “I have to work every night until then.”

“We could make it breakfast or brunch. I can scare that pooping pigeon off your balcony.”

“You literally just missed it.”

“Darn. I’ll get it next time.”

Joan was smiling, and had her hair pulled back in a tiny bun, and she just looked so damn adorable and snuggly, and she genuinely wanted to make up for…

Whywasshe so chipper? Was it simply a good mood from fighting crime or whatever she’d done last night? There had been no news about major Super activity, but that didn’t mean she hadn’t been doing something important. It’d been significant enough for her to step away from a very promising date.

“I make a really good frittata,” Joan said.

Sadie blinked and stirred out of her reverie. “I’m sure you do,” she said. “Did everything go all right last night? It sounded pretty important.”

Joan drank some coffee. “Nothing ended up happening. At least not with me and Mark. We have to have a serious discussion with Perry about something today.”

“So this was a found family thing? Not a work thing?”

“My found family is usually a bit of a work thing.”

“I’m only asking because you’re not as tired as I figured you’d be, and if it was related to your job…” Sadie trailed off, biting her bottom lip.