Back to the Bedroom (Loveswept Ser., No. 362)

Back To The Bedroom is a pre-Plum novel by popular American author, Janet Evanovich. It is the first book in the Elsie Hawkins series, on whom, Evanovich says, Grandma Mazur was modelled. Dave Dodd has been watching his busy, energetic neighbour come and go for a while: always in a hurry, keeping erratic hours, wearing a long black coat and lugging a large, oddly shaped metal case on wheels. When something really big falls from the sky and crashes through her roof, he jumps to the rescue.

Katie Finn doesn't have time to deal with the hole in her roof, her broken bed and the ruined (brand new!!) feather quilt: she has a matinee to play in, she needs to get to the Kennedy Centre with her cello now! She has no choice but to leave Dave in charge. By the time she returns, in the pouring rain, Dave is on the roof trying to cover the hole. A slight mishap later, he's lying on his back, winded, on her ruined bed. Katie straddles him to check he's not a corpse, and he's smitten.

Elsie Hawkins, an elderly ex-resident of a care facility, turns up to rent Katie's spare room, and Dave continues to make himself useful to Katie, hoping she'll soon realise she's in love with him too. And she soon is, but there's a problem: Dave seems to be unemployed, and there's no way she could even consider a serious relationship with someone whose work ethic is so vastly different from her own. Funny and a little bit sexy, this is an enjoyable read.