QUOTE : For a man who had gone out of his way to avoid her during the first few days of her employment, Darius Thornton had become annoyingly attentive of late. He’d dined with her each of the last three nights, to Mrs. Wellborn’s delight and Nicole’s dismay. He insisted she attend him in the workshop every afternoon, either to talk through his latest investigative hypothesis or to assist with his efforts at salvaging what parts he could from the exploded boilers. And tonight, he’d called her into the study hours after the sun had set to go over the article chronicling the results of the boiler plate experiment she’d been working on for submission to the Franklin Institute’s journal. How in the world was she supposed to maintain a healthy emotional distance from the man if he insisted on constantly thrusting his physical self into her presence day and night?