A vision of Pete naked, with warm water glazing his skin, flashed into her mind.

Mary Rose shook her head hard and sat down on the sofa, sifting through the magazines on Pete’s coffee table, mostly law enforcement publications and racing rags. The summer they were together, she recalled, he’d read all the golf journals…and the racing rags. Some things never changed.

But some things did. Ten years ago—July 7, to be exact—she’d married Pete Mitchell. They’d lived together for a little over a month in the one-room apartment he’d rented, sharing the cheap furniture that came with the place, subsistence groceries and the red Mustang her parents had given her as a graduation present. Not to mention the fantastic sex.

After ten years they were obviously different people, at different points in their lives, not the kids they’d been long ago. Mary Rose didn’t act on impulse anymore. She considered options, made plans, evaluated results. Yet after ten years, here she was again…in Pete Mitchell’s place.

The Third Mrs. Mitchell

Lynnette Kent

www.millsandboon.co.uk

For Kathy, Barbara and Julie, my sisters…in law and so much more.

Dear Reader,

As a navy wife, I appreciated the opportunity to travel across the United States and see firsthand the amazing diversity and beauty of this country. When the time came for my husband to retire, however, the choice of where to go was never in doubt…we couldn’t imagine settling down outside the South. Neighborhoods where all the children play together and treat each other’s houses, and parents, as their own, backyard vegetable gardens and lazy, sun-soaked summers, honeysuckle vines and moss-draped live oak trees—these are our childhood memories, this the lifestyle we wanted our daughters to experience. We’ve come close to our ideal in North Carolina, although the bustle of the modern world now penetrates all but the remotest country retreats. These days, even rural backwaters have their Internet cafés, rush-hour traffic and crime statistics.

Still, I have a deep affection for the real South and the people who live here. And so I’m offering Superromance readers a series of books set in a small Southern town, stories about folks who stayed nearby after high school or who have come back to make a home in the place where they were born. There’s plenty of material to draw from, since life gets complicated when you know everybody and they all know you, when your smallest transgression is the main topic of conversation the next morning over breakfast at the local diner!

Sometimes, though, the place that’s all too familiar is the best place to make a brand-new start. In The Third Mrs. Mitchell, Mary Rose Bowdrey discovers that coming home means dealing with the mistakes and misjudgments of the past…not to mention Pete Mitchell, the man she’s never quite managed to forget. Pete’s got his life all planned out; after two failed marriages, he’s taken himself out of the relationship game permanently. But when these ex-lovers keep running into each other, their best intentions aren’t enough to keep love from having its own way.

I hope you enjoy the first book in my AT THE CAROLINA DINER series. I love to hear from readers—feel free to write me at my new address: PMB 304, Westwood Shopping Center, Fayetteville, NC 28314.

All the best,

Lynnette Kent

Books by Lynnette Kent

HARLEQUIN SUPERROMANCE

765—ONE MORE RODEO

793—WHEN SPARKS FLY

824—WHAT A MAN’S GOT TO DO

868—EXPECTING THE BEST

901—LUKE’S DAUGHTERS

938—MATT’S FAMILY

988—NOW THAT YOU’RE HERE

1002—MARRIED IN MONTANA

1024—SHENANDOAH CHRISTMAS

1080—THE THIRD MRS. MITCHELL

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER ONE

THE RED PORSCHE flashed by at an impressive 84.7 miles per hour.

Parked within the deep shade of the pine trees in the median, Pete Mitchell sighed, pushed his shades up on his nose, then flipped the switch for the siren and the lights and eased his patrol car into the northbound lane of Interstate 95. Another day, another speeder, another hundred dollars for the county.

Traffic was light at 3:00 p.m. on a Thursday and he caught up with the Porsche before five miles had passed, noting the South Carolina license plate. The driver glanced in the rearview mirror as he moved over behind her in the right lane. Her fist hit the steering wheel in frustration.

“Gotcha,” Pete told her with a grin, staying close as she slowed to a stop on the shoulder of the highway. After checking for oncoming traffic, he eased out of the car and set his hat straight on his head, then took his time getting to the driver’s window.

The windowpane slid down as he came close. A long slender arm stretched out with a driver’s license and registration sheet clipped between two pink-frosted fingertips. The diamond tennis bracelet weighing down that elegant left hand could easily have doubled as a handcuff.

“Trying out for a NASCAR berth, ma’am?” Pete slid the papers free. “I think you’ve confused Interstate 95 with Darlington Speedway.” He turned on his toe to head back to the cruiser, but one glance at the license stopped him cold. Taking off his shades, he checked out the name again. Looked at the face in the picture. Swore under his breath.

Mary Rose Bowdrey. Born May 1, 1974. Height, five-eight; weight, one-thirty. That hadn’t changed in ten years. Eyes, blue—the color, as he remembered, of the Atlantic Ocean at noon on a sunny day. Hair, blond—a rich gold shot through with streaks of silver which didn’t show up in the lousy license photo. Pete hadn’t known her long enough or well enough to be sure whether all that color was natural or not.

After all, they’d only been married thirty-six days.

He pivoted back to the window, automatically taking off his hat. “Mary Rose?”

The red door swung open. The best legs on Hilton Head Island during the summer of 1992—and probably every year since—unfolded into the sunlight. In one smooth move, Ms. Bowdrey stood up out of the car and faced him, pushing up the sleeves of her navy-blue sweater, tucking strands of shiny, shoulder-length hair behind her ears. “I don’t believe this. Pete?”

“That’s right.” He needed a second to remember the next line. “Uh…how are you?” His mama always said good manners could salvage even the most bizarre situations. “It’s been a long time.” Not that he could tell by looking at the woman in front of him. Still sleek as a cat, this Mary Rose could be the eighteen-year-old girl he’d spent that summer with. Married.

Worked so damn hard to forget.

His first ex-wife gave him a beauty-queen smile. “That it has. I’m fine. How about you?” With a faint clink of diamonds and gold, her hands slipped into the pockets of her short white skirt, heading off any impulse he might have felt to give her a hug. She kept her dark sunglasses on, so he couldn’t read the expression in those marine-blue eyes.

Pete didn’t need an interpreter for this message: Keep your distance was as clear as the nearby billboard for fast food and gas. “I’m good. Where’re you headed?”

“New Skye. I’ll be visiting my sister for a little while.”

“That so?” He’d have felt better if she’d said the sky was falling. The possibility of Mary Rose spending more than an afternoon in the same county he lived in, let alone the same town, was big-time bad news.

Why couldn’t he have been asleep when the Porsche passed through?

Pete shook off the feeling of dread creeping up his spine. “Well, it looks to me like you’re in kind of a hurry to get there. Speed limit’s sixty on this stretch of road, you know.”

Mary Rose bit her bottom lip, which was frosted with the same pink as her fingernails. “I guess I wasn’t watching the speedometer. I’ll slow down from now on. I promise.”

“I hope so.” Pete turned toward the cruiser again. “You get back in the car. I’ll be with you in a couple of minutes.”

Standard procedure didn’t use up much brain space, which was good because Pete registered a definite lack of available cells at the moment. Working on autopilot, he wrote up the ticket, logged in the information and ran a check on Mary Rose’s license. There were no outstanding violations on her record, which probably meant she’d talked the other suckers who pulled her over out of writing her up. Maybe she took off her sunglasses for them.

When he handed the citation through the Porsche’s window, Mary Rose gazed up at him, her mouth open in surprise. “You’re giving me a ticket?”

“You can contest the charge in court. There’s a trial date on the sheet. If you fail to appear, your plea of guilty will be assumed and you’ll be expected to pay the full fine.”

“But…” She pressed her lips together for a second, then relaxed them into a sweet, coaxing curve he remembered all too well. “Come on, Pete. There’s no traffic. I wasn’t hurting anybody. Can’t you let this one go?”

He wasn’t even tempted. “Sorry. You keep it under the speed limit from now on, all right?” Tipping his hat, he stepped back, needing to get away. Fast. “Good seeing you again, Mary Rose. Take care.”

Mary Rose watched through the rearview mirror as Pete Mitchell returned to his car. The man was still seriously gorgeous, being possessed of wide shoulders, narrow hips and a tight butt, plus those light gray, dark lashed eyes gleaming like polished pewter in his tanned face. When they were together all those years ago, he’d worn his black hair pulled back in a short ponytail, but the regulation highway-patrol buzz cut wasn’t bad at all. A little austere, maybe, but Pete had always been a straight-arrow kind of guy at heart.

That was why he’d married her in the first place, right? You got a girl in trouble, you took responsibility. If you were lucky, she lost the baby and set you free.

Her ex-husband had been nothing but lucky.

Blowing an irritated breath off her lower lip, Mary Rose put the car in gear, checked for traffic and eased into the sparse flow. Pete followed in his cruiser; while she kept the needle carefully set at sixty, he breezed past her with a wave.

“Oh, of course.” She hit the heel of her hand on the steering wheel. “Mr. Big Shot doesn’t have to obey the speed limit.” She threw him a furious glance as he took the next exit, once again vanishing from her life.

Or maybe not. He had grown up in New Skye, graduated in the same class with her older sister, Kate. Did he still live there? What were the chances she might see him again while she was in town?

Mary Rose shuddered at the thought, tempted to turn around and head straight back to Charleston, damn the speed limit.

But running away was not an option. Kate was in deep trouble. She sounded more desperate with every phone call.

And not even the possibility of another encounter with the man she’d never quite managed to forget was going to keep Mary Rose from standing by her sister during the worst days of her life.

Fifteen minutes after leaving her ex-husband behind, Mary Rose took the interstate exit for the town of New Skye, North Carolina. She hadn’t been home for at least six years; her final Christmas in college had been her last visit, despite her parents’ repeated invitations. Nobody climbed the ladder of success in the business world by indulging themselves with extended vacations. This was the first time since graduate school she’d taken off more than five business days in a row.

Anyway, it wasn’t as if she never saw her family. They all spent a week together in the condo at the beach every summer and a week skiing in Colorado every January. She talked to her parents once a week and chatted with Kate and her kids whenever either of them had a spare hour or so. That was as much family togetherness as Mary Rose, personally, could stand.

So now she studied her hometown with interest as she drove through. The outskirts of New Skye—with its service stations and fast-food restaurants, the water-treatment plant, the police academy, the firefighters’ training tower—could have been any small town in the Southeast. Plenty of asphalt, few trees and the flat Sand-hills landscape did little to invite a traveler to linger longer than it took to get a tank of gas.

But then she turned off the commercial strip to drive slowly along Main Street, toward Courthouse Circle. This wasn’t the dead downtown scene she remembered from her high-school years. On each side of the newly bricked street, antique shops, coffee bars and cafés inhabited what had once been empty storefronts, or worse, bars and pickup joints. The old movie house had been renovated and was showing an art film she’d seen advertised recently in New York. Huge pots of pansies and daffodils punctuated the sidewalks underneath newly-leafing pear trees.

Mary Rose clicked her tongue in amazement. New Skye had certainly changed for the better in her absence.

She was glad to see that some things remained the same, like the Victorian elegance of the county courthouse, standing tall on its island of bright green grass. Traffic circled around the red brick, white-columned building, one of the oldest in town—the fire of 1876 had destroyed all of the business district except the Presbyterian and Methodist churches, the courthouse and the Velvet Rose Tavern. Thankfully, the Velvet Rose had succumbed to its own fire only a couple of decades later. The downtown branch of the public library—still functioning, still imposing with its white marble—had been built in its place.

On the far side of Courthouse Circle, Main Street followed a single hill rising up out of the flat terrain. On top were some of New Skye’s finest residences, built mostly in the early 1900s, though a few dated back to before “The War.” Mary Rose doubted that the folks in Charleston, where an old building might claim construction in 1725, would be terribly impressed with New Skye’s “historic district.” Looking at the area with a fresh perspective, though, she thought the wide porches, fancy columns and wrought-iron fences were charming.

Kate’s home was one of the largest and grandest on The Hill. A semicircular porch graced the front of the three-story white house; the magnolias flanking either side of the brick walk must have been fifty feet tall and a hundred years old. Thankful to be done with driving, Mary Rose parked at the curb and got out, stretching her arms above her head.

As she started across the grass, the front door opened and her sister stepped onto the porch, looking for all the world like a Southern belle from the distant past. A cloud of soft dark curls framed her oval face and graceful neck. She was tall and slender…alarmingly so.

“Have you forgotten how to fry chicken and cook gravy?” Mary Rose took hold of her sister with a tight hug. “You’re skinny as a rail.”

Kate pulled back to laugh at her. “Says the woman who weighs all of a hundred pounds.”

“One thirty-five, as a matter of fact. I’ve developed a passion for frappuccino with my morning bagel.”

“Then it’s a good thing we’ve got a café here on The Hill that makes them perfectly. Come into the house.” They stepped out of warm spring sunlight into the cool, gleaming perfection of Kate’s home.

“This is beautiful.” Mary Rose surveyed the parlor’s rich combination of purple and gold fabric with mahogany antiques. “You do know how to dress a room.”

Kate waved her into a chair on one side of the fireplace. “How was your drive? You must have left early to be here so soon.”

“I drive fast,” Mary Rose said, and then frowned as she remembered.

“What’s wrong?”

“I, um, got stopped by a state trooper just a little ways south of town.”

“Did he give you a ticket?” Mary Rose nodded soberly, but her sister just smiled. “Don’t worry, honey. The D.A.’s wife is a member of my Sunday-school class at church. I’ll get her to talk to him about dismissing the fine.”

“That’s not the worst part.” She took a deep breath. “The trooper was Pete Mitchell.”

Kate gave her a blank stare. “Mitchell? Who…? Oh.” She pressed her fingertips against her lips. “That Pete Mitchell? Did he remember you?”

“He definitely remembered.” And the distance in those cool gray eyes had warned her that the memory wasn’t a pleasant one. “It’s kind of hard to forget being married, even for only a month.”

Kate shook her head. “I haven’t seen him in years. I guess I thought he’d moved away.” She faced the mantel and made unnecessary adjustments to the perfect placement of the Wedgwood teacups arranged there. “Do you suppose you’ll run into him again? I’d hate to have you uncomfortable while you’re here, worrying about meeting up with your ex-husband. That’s so…difficult.” The last word trembled with despair.

Mary Rose came up behind her sister, putting her arms around the thin shoulders. “I’m not worried about it one way or the other. It’s not like I’ve been moping over him for ten years.”

Kate’s head rested heavily on her shoulder. “And then there’s your job. I can’t believe you just up and left, during tax season, no less. Are you sure they’ll let you go back? What about all your clients?”

“All my clients got their taxes filed before the first of April because I pushed and prodded and nagged them to. I filed mine in February. And if the bank doesn’t want me back…well, too bad. I’ve accrued enough leave that I’d have to be here a couple of months before they could legitimately fire me. And they won’t. I make them too much money. So stop worrying about that.” She turned Kate around to face her. “What I’m worried about is you. You look so tired.”

Kate’s smile failed to dispel her very real air of exhaustion. “There’s a lot of yard work to be done, now that it’s spring. Plus the auction at the children’s school, which we just finished up, and the Azalea Festival, not to mention all the usual driving to lessons and practices and such. I’ve been…busy.”

She obviously didn’t want to go into any more detail right this minute, or explain why her husband, even after moving out of the house, couldn’t assume some responsibility for his children.

Mary Rose tapped the pads of her fingers gently on her sister’s pale cheeks. “That’s why I’m here, to take over some of the routine stuff. I can handle the driving, and help you with the garden, and do some cooking, too, though you might be sorry you let me in the kitchen. Just tell me what’s on the list.”

“Well…” Kate bit her lip, hesitating.

“Seriously. What can I do for you right this minute?”

With a sigh, her sister gave in. “If you brought Kelsey and Trace home from the soccer game at school, I could get the laundry caught up. Mama and Daddy are coming for dinner for your first night here and I need to put the roast in—”

“Consider it done. Just give me your keys. I can’t fit two other people in the Porsche.” Jingling Kate’s key chain, Mary Rose headed for the front door. “New Skye High, right? They haven’t moved it or anything?”

“You could drive there blindfolded,” Kate called across the front lawn. “Nothing has changed out that way in the last twenty years!”

“MY TURN.” Kelsey held out her hand for the soda can. Beside her, Lisa took a quick slurp before passing the drink.

“No fair! I bought it, didn’t I? You didn’t even leave me half.” Tipping her head back, Kelsey chugged the rest of the contents, feeling the whiskey burn as it slid down her throat.

“You got the first drink. Anyway, there’s more soda in the machine.” Her friend leaned close, lowered her voice. “And half a bottle of Jack Black in the car.”

“True.” The smoky liquor swirled in her head, and Kelsey smiled. “What’s the score now, anyway?” Out on the soccer field, red and gold New Skye jerseys chased across the grass, blurred into green Clinton High uniforms, separated out again. She couldn’t see clearly enough to make out the numbers.

Lisa squinted into the distance. “Score’s tied one to one.” She hiccuped loudly and then started to laugh. Helplessly, Kelsey laughed with her, leaning against Lisa’s shoulder until they both tilted back on the bleacher bench into the knees of the girls behind them.

“Kelsey? Is that you?”

Oh shit. A teacher. Kelsey straightened up and tried to stop giggling as she turned toward the person standing on the ground, staring up. She blinked hard, bringing the face into focus. It wasn’t a teacher. For a second, she didn’t recognize the woman at all. Blond and thin and tan and…

“Aunt M!” She never knew how she made it to the ground, just that she was there with her arms thrown around her favorite relative in the world. “I didn’t realize you were coming today.”

“Obviously.” Pulling back, Mary Rose looked her sternly in the eye. “Are you all right?”

“Sure. Of course.” Kelsey smoothed her hair back, wished she’d had time to pop a piece of gum. “What are you doing here?”

“Your mother asked me to pick you and Trace up after the game. It looks like that will be a while yet.”

“Um…” Gazing toward the scoreboard, Kelsey couldn’t read the numbers. The ground tilted under her feet and she put a hand on the nearby bleacher support to stay steady. “A few minutes, anyway.”

When she looked at Mary Rose, her aunt’s soft, pretty mouth had tightened and her eyes had narrowed. In that second, Kelsey knew she was doomed.

“What are you—”

“Mary Rose Bowdrey!” Mrs. Gates, the chemistry teacher, sailed toward them. “I don’t believe my eyes. When did you get into town?” Very tall and very pregnant, Mrs. Gates took Mary Rose in a hug that all but swallowed her whole.

Kelsey closed her eyes. Shit. Mrs. Gates had graduated in the same class with Aunt Mary Rose. Judging by their enthusiasm, they must still be pretty good friends. As soon as they came up for air, they’d be sniffing her breath and treating her like a delinquent.

“Uh…Aunt Mary Rose?” She tugged at the sleeve of a gorgeous navy sweater that had to have come from New York. “I promised my friend Lisa we’d go to the diner for a few minutes. The team always gets a milk shake after a home game.” Like she didn’t know that, like the kids at this school hadn’t been doing the same thing for nearly forever. “Can you pick me and Trace up there?” She tried on a suck-up smile. “Would that be okay?”

Mary Rose looked as if she wanted to say no, but then she glanced at Mrs. Gates, still holding her arm. “Sure, Kelsey. That’ll be fine. I’ll meet you at the diner about thirty minutes after the game ends.” Her expression promised there would be hell to pay afterward.

But for the time being, Kelsey was free. “Thanks!” She didn’t lean in for another hug. “See ya!” Grabbing Lisa by the hand, she scurried and stumbled to the other side of the bleachers, out of the line of sight of any nosy adults.

“Here.” She dug in her purse, brought up a dollar and thrust it at Lisa. “Go get two more ginger ales and meet me by your car.”

But Lisa shook her head. “Game’s almost over, Kelse, and I can’t go home smelling like whiskey. One whiff and my mom would take away the car and the license and ground me for the rest of my life. We need to sober up.”

“Screw sober.” Kelsey started for the drink machine.

“I’m leaving,” her friend called. “See you tomorrow.”

With Lisa went the whiskey. Kelsey stopped in her tracks, shoulders slumped. She could buy her own booze—she had the fake ID Trace had made in her wallet. But she couldn’t get to the liquor store without a car.

So she drifted back to the soccer field, to watch without enthusiasm as New Skye won the game. Wearily, Kelsey followed the crowd to the diner, listened to the same stories she’d heard all day at school, ordering a cup of coffee to mask the smell of liquor on her breath.

And wondered how her life had come to be such a mess.

AS FAR BACK AS Pete could remember, Charlie’s Carolina Diner had been the place for New Skye High kids to hang out after ball games, and tonight was no exception. Judging by the noise pouring out when he opened the door, the home team had won. Teenagers crowded into the green vinyl-covered booths along the walls, shared chairs at the tables, rotated and rocked on the silver pedestal stools at the counter that usually marked adult territory. Working his way through the chaos, Pete took the one empty stool in the back corner, under a framed poster of Elvis.

“Hey, Trooper Pete.” A thick-wristed hand with a Semper Fi tattoo on the back slid a white mug of coffee his way.

“Hey yourself, Mr. B. Standing room only tonight.”

Charlie Brannon nodded. “Soccer game went into double overtime, had to finish with a kickoff. NSH beat ’em three-two. What’ll you have?”

After fifteen years of eating at Charlie’s, Pete didn’t need a menu. “Meat loaf sounds good.”

“You got it.” A broad man with iron-gray hair and a permanent tan, Charlie headed toward the kitchen door, his stiff-legged stride the result of an encounter with a land mine in Southeast Asia in the sixties. He still wore his hair Marine Corps short and held his shoulders as straight as if he were standing at attention. He could bark orders with the best drill sergeants, which was why incidents of actual trouble occurred less frequently at the diner than at the public library.

Pete sipped his coffee, one ear tuned to the talk around him while his brain replayed the sight of Mary Rose standing out there on the interstate in the afternoon sunshine, close enough to touch. With a single smile, the woman had cast a spell over him ten years ago.

And damned if she hadn’t gone and done it again today. He’d been a basket case all afternoon, thinking about Mary Rose Bowdrey. What was his problem that he couldn’t get her out of his mind?

“Hey, Pete. How’s it going?”

He looked up to see Abby Brannon standing on the other side of the counter with his dinner plate in her hands. “Good enough. How about you?”

“Just fine.” She slid his plate in front of him, put out a ketchup bottle and moved the salt and pepper shakers closer. “You want something to drink besides coffee?”

“Tea would be great. Your dad’s looking good today. Is he sticking to his diet?”

Abby didn’t ask if he wanted his iced tea sweet or unsweet. She’d been pouring for customers in this town since she was twelve, and she knew everybody’s preference. “As long as I stand over him like a hawk and watch every bite he puts in his mouth.” Setting down his glass, she blew out a frustrated breath that lifted her light brown bangs off her forehead. “I haven’t been able to bake coconut pies for a month now. He steals a piece—or two or three!—in the middle of the night when I’m asleep.”

Pete grinned. “Too bad. I could go for a piece of coconut cream pie.”

She nodded. “You and me both. But the doctor said he needs to lose at least twenty pounds. So until he does, I guess we’re out of luck. With coconut, anyway. How about lemon meringue? Dad doesn’t like lemon meringue.”

“That’s a close second.”

“I’ll bring you a piece when you’re done.” Pete watched as she moved down the counter, checking on drink refills, laughing with the kids as she handed over checks written out on an old-fashioned notepad. Abby wore the same uniform every day from March through October—a white T-shirt, khaki slacks and running shoes. In the cooler months she wore a white button-down shirt and a dark blue sweater.

Year-round, though, she had nice, full curves that fired a guy’s imagination and got him thinking about something besides frozen pizza dinners eaten in front of the TV, or even the great food she served up at her dad’s diner. Assuming the guy had options in the relationship department, of course. Some did, some didn’t. After striking out at marriage—not once, but twice—Pete put himself very definitely into the second category. And so he and Abby stayed just friends.

She came back with the lemon pie. “Did you hear that Rhonda Harding has moved home from Raleigh?”

“Yeah? I thought she had a good job with one of the research companies up there.”

“She used to, but she and her husband got divorced and her mother’s sick.” Abby glanced at him, her green eyes crinkled in a smile. “Y’all were hot and heavy senior year.”

He shrugged and looked down at the soft peak of lemon filling on his fork. “I had to take somebody to the prom.”

“Maybe you can pick up where you left off. You’ve been living like a monk for a couple of years now, Pete. Time to explore the possibilities.”

“I am not a monk.” His cheeks had gotten warm. “I go out now and then.”

“With women like me—the ones you’ve known since kindergarten and think of as sisters. Not exactly high romantic adventure.”

“I do not think of you as a sister. And anyway, when was your last date, dear Abby?”

She took his teasing with a grin. “I just dish it out. You have to take it.”

“Yeah, right.” As he rolled his eyes, Pete caught sight of the clock over the counter. “Besides which, I don’t have time for—what was it?— ‘high romantic adventure.’ I race on the weekends and weeknights I’m at school with the REWARDS program. Can you put this pie in a box for me? I need to get set up before the kids start coming in at seven.”

“No problem.”

He was on his feet and thumbing through the bills in his wallet when the bell on the front door jingled. A single glance at the new arrival set him to swearing under his breath.

Her again. How bad could his luck get?

She’d pushed the sunglasses up on top of her head. Now he could see the deep blue of her eyes as she surveyed the crowded room, obviously searching for somebody. Not him, of course. Pete gave a second’s thought to the idea that he might escape out the back of the diner before he got caught.

Not a chance. Before he could move, she looked his way. And frowned. Mary Rose wasn’t any happier to see him than he was to see her.

That made him mad…and made him determined to talk to her. He put the cash for dinner down on the counter, stowed his wallet in his back pocket and headed across the room.

“Hello, there.” He had to stand fairly close to her to be heard over the noise, close enough to note the softness of her skin, the cute curves of her eyebrows. “Taking a tour of the old stomping grounds?”

The frown smoothed out into a tolerant smile. “Looking for my niece and nephew, actually. They were at the soccer game and said they were coming here afterward. I was talking to Lydia Gates and didn’t realize how much time had passed. But I’m supposed to get Kelsey and Trace home for dinner.”

“Hard to find anybody in this mob.” Was it his imagination that she smelled like honeysuckle?

“Especially with you standing right in front of me.” Mary Rose kept her smile steady, but she fully intended the insult. Having Pete Mitchell this close was interfering with breath and thought, with sanity itself. Damn the man, anyway. Why hadn’t he eaten at home tonight? Seeing him twice in one day was simply two times too many.

His dark eyebrows lowered as he stepped to the side. “Sorry. I’ll leave you to your search.”

“Thanks.” The tension eased a little as he moved toward the door. She turned around, pretending to look for the kids, but all she could really see was Pete’s face in her mind’s eye—the strongly set jaw, the well-shaped mouth, those serious silver eyes.

“Pete!” Abby Brannon held out a box from behind the counter. “You forgot your pie!” Her voice carried easily over all the noise.

Without seeing him at all, Mary Rose felt Pete hesitate, felt him appraise the necessity of brushing past her to get the box, then having to turn around to face her where she stood in front of the door.

“Keep it for me,” he shouted, his voice deep, a little rough. “I’ll pick it up tomorrow morning.” The bell on the handle jingled harshly as the glass door was opened, then swung closed.

Mary Rose drew a deep breath. Score one for our side. She’d managed to drive Pete Mitchell completely off the premises…a trick she’d never quite managed when it came to her heart.

AS USUAL, Pete got home late. Running the REWARDS program meant that he spent four nights a week at the high school. He rarely had a chance to relax before 10:00 or 11:00 p.m.

Even on a bad day, though, he didn’t begrudge the effort. Respect, Education, Work, Ambition, Responsibility, Dedication and Success—REWARDS—were the watchwords of his rehabilitation classes for juvenile offenders. He’d realized a long time ago that these at-risk kids needed somebody to draw the line between them and the life that would destroy them. A good group of volunteers in the police, sheriff and highway patrol offices joined him in standing that line.

He hadn’t exaggerated when he told Abby he didn’t have time for romance. Besides, he did have female companionship—Miss Dixie was sitting on the back of the couch, staring out the window with her tongue dangling, when he pulled up in front of the house. She disappeared when he hopped out of the Jeep and started down the walk, but as he reached the front steps he could hear the frantic squeals and pants and barks she used as a greeting.

As soon as he had the door open, the little beagle was leaping at his legs, almost as high as his waist. Grinning, he caught her up against his chest.

“Yeah, yeah, I hear you, Dixie, darlin’.” She licked his face up one side and down the other, with a couple of swipes at his mouth for good measure. “Yeah, I know it’s been a long time. I got off work late, couldn’t get home before class. But I’m here now, so you get yourself outside while I make you a little snack.”

At the back door, she wiggled out of his hold and headed with obvious relief for the far corner of the yard. In just minutes she was back inside, though, licking up the small scoop of food that was her reward for a day spent all alone, slurping at her refilled water bowl. Business taken care of, Pete pulled a bottle of beer from the fridge and went out onto the back deck, leaving the door open so Dixie could join him when she finished.

Slouching down on the forty-year-old glider that was the only thing he’d asked for from his grandmother’s house when she passed away a few years back, he twisted the top off the beer and took a generous swig.

Man, what an afternoon. Seeing Mary Rose twice in the space of four hours had done a number on his brain. What if it happened again? Was he going to have to sneak around town like a burglar for fear of running into his first ex-wife?

Most of the time, Pete tended not to worry too much about the future. With his job, the future could come to a screeching halt at any minute; that was the reason his second marriage bit the dust. His second wife hadn’t wanted to open the door one day to the news that her husband had died in the line of duty. Pete had accepted Sherrill’s need to escape that uncertainty in the same way he accepted the uncertainty itself. Que sera, sera.

But tonight, the idea of turning a corner in the grocery store and facing down Mary Rose Bowdrey had him breaking out in a cold sweat.

“Really dumb,” he told Miss Dixie when she hopped up beside him on the glider. “She’s just a girl I knew a long time ago.”

Dixie stretched out beside him, inviting a rub on her very full stomach.

“Okay, so I knew her really well.” Pete stroked his knuckles along the beagle’s midline. “I couldn’t get enough of her. She was like royalty—I never expected to be with somebody so…so perfect. Totally blew my mind when she walked up that day on the golf course and asked me for a lesson.” He chuckled as he thought about it. “We both knew she didn’t mean golf.”

But then he sighed. “Major mistake, Dixie, darlin’, getting involved with somebody that different.” He finished the last of the beer, set the bottle on the deck and stretched out on the glider with Dixie on his chest. “Major mistake getting involved at all. I’m sticking with you, girl.”

The dog closed her eyes in bliss as Pete wrinkled her ears, massaged the special spot under her chin, scratched along her back. “You’re just glad to see me when I get here, aren’t you, Dix? You don’t spend your time worrying about me, and your only requirements are a full tummy and a soft place to sleep.” He let her settle against his shoulder and propped his chin on the top of her head. “No expectations, no regrets. You’re the only kind of female a man like me needs, Miss Dixie.”

Pete closed his eyes and got a vision of Mary Rose’s pink lips and blue gaze, the defiant lift of her chin as she stared him down in the diner.

He sighed again. “Let’s just hope I can remember that little piece of wisdom when the time comes.”

CHAPTER TWO

AS FAR AS Mary Rose was concerned, dinner with her parents was an exercise in holding her tongue. And her temper. And her breath.

“The roast is delicious,” she told Kate after a bite.

“A bit rare, I think,” their mother commented. “Your father likes his meat well-done.”

Judging from his focused assault with knife and fork, Mary Rose thought John Bowdrey probably liked his roast just as he’d found it. Time for a change of subject. “The game looked pretty intense, Trace. Were you playing a particularly good team?”

Without taking his eyes off his plate, Kate’s son shrugged one shoulder. “I guess.” He was a handsome boy, tall and rangy, with his father’s blond hair cropped close. When Mary Rose had seen him last winter, he’d been the bright, enthusiastic kid she’d always known.

Then, the week after the annual family ski trip in January, Trace’s dad had moved out of the house and announced his intention to divorce Kate. Mary Rose would never have guessed, witnessing L. T. LaRue’s behavior in Colorado, that he had desertion on his mind.

In the months since, Trace had become sullen and uncooperative. His grades had plummeted from high A’s to barely passing. Worry over him, and over Kelsey’s rebellious attitude, had worn Kate to the bone. Mary Rose wasn’t sure her sister even realized the full extent of the problem. There had been a distinct tang of alcohol in the air around Kelsey at the soccer game this afternoon. The girl hadn’t been obviously drunk, and Mary Rose hoped that whiff of liquor had drifted from the friend trailing Kelsey. That would be the easy way out.

But she’d learned long ago that the easy way out rarely was. “It must be getting close to prom time. Are you going this year, Kelsey?”

Across the table, her niece shook her head, her blond hair gleaming with gold under the soft light of the chandelier. “It’s just a stupid dance.”

“It’s the most important dance of the year.” Frances Bowdrey pressed her napkin carefully to her lips, then gave her granddaughter a bright smile. “I can’t imagine why you wouldn’t want to go.”

When Kelsey didn’t answer, Kate did. “She’s only a sophomore, Mama. She’ll go next year.”

Their mother rarely took no for an answer. “Oh, I’m sure some nice junior boy would be happy to take such a pretty girl to the prom.”

Kelsey stared at her grandmother for a moment, her brown eyes wide and wild, her cheeks flushing deep red. Then she pushed sharply away from the table and, without a word, stalked out of the dining room. Her footsteps pounded up the staircase and along the upstairs hall, ending with the slam of her bedroom door.

Eyes round, eyebrows arched high, Frances looked at her older daughter. “What was that all about? Are you going to allow her to leave the table without being excused?”

“Mama…” Kate pressed her fingers to her lips for a second. “Surely you remember…Kelsey’s boyfriend Ryan broke up with her last week. He’s a junior. They would have gone to the prom together.”

Frances pursed her lips. “That’s no reason to be rude.”

“Of course it is.” Ice clanked on crystal as Mary Rose set her glass down a little too hard. “Being dumped is the world’s greatest tragedy for a fifteen-year-old.” She hadn’t liked the experience as an eighteen-year-old, with Pete Mitchell, either. And then there was Kate’s situation. “I should never have brought the subject up. I’m sorry, Katie.”

Her sister shook her head. “You didn’t know. I think I’d better try to talk to her. Please go on with your meal.”

Neither Trace nor his grandfather needed those instructions—judging from their unswerving attention to their plates, they hadn’t even heard the conversation. Mary Rose played with her mashed potatoes and listened as Kate climbed the stairs and walked down the hall. She heard a knock, but there was no sound of Kelsey’s door opening.

“Well.” Her mother buttered a small piece of biscuit and put it delicately in her mouth. After a sip of tea, she looked at Mary Rose. “Wouldn’t you rather come home with your father and me? I’m sure our house is more restful.”

Mary Rose had lost her appetite completely; she pushed her plate away and laid her napkin beside it. “I didn’t come to rest, Mother. I came to give Kate some help. That will be easier if I stay here.”

Trace put his fork down. “I’m going up to my room.”

Beside him, his grandmother put her hand on his arm. “The appropriate way to leave the table is to ask if you can be excused.”

The boy rolled his eyes. “Yeah. Whatever.”

But when he tried to stand, Frances kept hold of his wrist. “Trace LaRue. You will ask politely to be excused.” Watching resentment and temper flood into Trace’s brown gaze, Mary Rose wondered if her mother had pushed too far.

Then John Bowdrey looked up from his dinner. “Do as your grandmother says, Trace.” His stern tone would not be argued with.

Trace’s shoulders slumped. “Can I be excused? Please?”

Frances smiled and patted the back of his hand. “Of course, dear. Run and do your homework.”

Mary Rose wondered if her mother heard the boy’s snort as he left the dining room. “This might not be the best time for etiquette lessons, Mother. Trace and Kelsey have enough problems just handling their lives these days.”

“Etiquette makes even the worst situation easier.” Frances got to her feet. “Shall we clear the table?”

“Sure.” Mary Rose wasn’t surprised when her father simply got to his feet and left the dining room without offering to help. Her mother had him well trained—domestic responsibilities were strictly female territory.

Kate had used her fine china for dinner, which meant hand washing all the plates and the sterling silverware that went with them. Trapped at the sink in Kate’s ivy-and-white kitchen, up to her wrists in suds, Mary Rose was held hostage to her mother’s commentary on the state of Kate’s life.

“I can’t imagine what she was thinking, letting L.T. leave like that.”

“He didn’t give her a choice, Mother. From what Kate says, I gather he announced he was moving out, picked up his bags and did just that.”

“She should have stopped him, for the children’s sake.”

Mary Rose blew her bangs off her forehead and scrubbed at a spot of gravy. “How would she have stopped him? Thrown herself in front of his car? Grabbed hold of his knees, weeping and pleading? Kate has some pride, for heaven’s sake.”

“There are ways to hold on to a man who wants to stray.” Frances Bowdrey’s voice was tight, low.

When Mary Rose turned to stare, all she could see was her mother’s straight back. “Mother? What—?”

Trace came into the kitchen. “Didn’t Mom say there was cake?”

His grandmother turned. “I believe she made a German chocolate cake. Have a seat in the dining room and we’ll bring in dessert and coffee.”

He shook his head. “I’ll just take a piece to my room.” Despite her repeated protests, he got a plate, cut a two-inch-thick slice and poured a glass of milk, then disappeared again.

Mary Rose followed her nephew down the hall. “Trace, is your mom still talking to Kelsey?”

“Never did. Kelse wouldn’t open the door. Kate’s in her own room.” Taking the stairs two at a time, he left her standing at the bottom.

“What a mess this is.” Frances spoke from just behind Mary Rose. “I think I’d better talk to Kate. She’s got to do something.”

“Mother…” Mary Rose put a hand on Frances’s arm to keep her from climbing the steps. “Dad’s waiting on his cake. Why don’t you fix his coffee and the two of you have dessert? I’ll talk to Kate.”

Obviously torn, the older woman glanced upstairs and then toward the living room, where her husband sat with the newspaper, his foot crossed over his knee, jiggling in a way they all knew well. “You’re right. But be sure to tell Kate I’ll call her tomorrow. There are things she needs to hear.”

I doubt that. But Mary Rose kept her skepticism to herself as she climbed the stairs.

WITH RELIEF, Kelsey heard Kate’s door open and shut, and the murmur of voices behind it. She’d been afraid Aunt Mary Rose was coming up to talk to her about this afternoon. About booze and teenagers and the evils thereof.

And she would really hate to have to tell her favorite aunt to go to hell, especially on her first night in the house.

She glanced at her backpack on the floor at the foot of her bed. She had two tests tomorrow, and a boatload of homework waited for her attention.

Tough shit. Rolling off the bed, Kelsey grabbed a pack of cigarettes from the bottom of her sweater drawer and stuck her head out into the hallway to be sure the coast was clear. A second later, she was closing Trace’s door quietly behind her.

“Ooh, cake.” She tossed him the cigarettes and snatched up the remains of his dessert. “You ate all the icing, jerk.”

“That’s the best part.” He lit a cigarette for each of them, passing hers over as he went to open the windows. “Was that Auntie M coming upstairs?”

Kelsey drew in a deep lungful of smoke. “Had to be. Grandmother wouldn’t be so quiet.”

“I wish she’d stay out of our business.”

“M?”

“Gran. Drives me crazy, the way she’s always giving me orders. How’d we get such a witch for a grandmother, anyway?”

“I take great comfort from the fact that she’s not really ours.” Kate had married their dad when Trace was a baby, after their real mother had disappeared. So the Bowdreys weren’t actually their grandparents at all, not by blood anyway.

“That’s right. We turn eighteen, we never have to see her again.”

“Hell of a long time to wait.”

“Tell me about it.”

They smoked together in peace for a few minutes. Trace’s room was at the back corner of the house above the screened porch, with windows on two walls and big trees blocking the outside view. Kate had let him paint the walls and ceiling black and put up wildly colored posters—not rock groups, but totally weird computer-generated artwork. Some of the posters glowed in the dark; Trace’s room was an eerie place to be with the lights out.

“I got Janine’s ID finished,” he said, rummaging through the papers piled deep beside his computer desk. “Looks good to me.”

He handed over a North Carolina driver’s license with a picture of her friend Janine Belks, currently a sophomore in high school, but recorded on the license as age twenty-two. Kelsey nodded. “You’ve got those holograms down cold. I don’t think the guys at the license bureau could tell the difference.”

“Just be sure you get the money before you give it to her, okay? I don’t like getting ripped off.”

“No problem.” Another long silence flowed past. “There’s a party Saturday night. Gray Hamilton’s folks are going up to Chapel Hill for the soccer game. He’s got the house to himself.” She blew a smoke ring, then grinned. “And a hundred of his closest friends.”

Trace shook his head. “Boring.”

“I suppose you can do better? Like playing computer games with Ren and Stimpy?”

He gave her the finger for calling his best friends by the names of cartoon freaks. “Beats getting trashed and passing out on the floor with a bunch of drunks tripping over you.”

“Gray’s house has twelve bedrooms. I plan on passing out on a bed in one of those.” Taking one last, long drag, Kelsey dropped the butt of her cigarette into a soda can on the windowsill. A tiny sizzle and a wisp of smoke proclaimed its demise. “Dad’s supposed to pick us up Saturday morning for breakfast.”

Her brother’s response was vulgar and totally appropriate.

“He’ll be pissed if you don’t show up again.”

“Am I supposed to care?”

“No.” Kelsey sighed. “But I have no intention of enduring another meal with him and the Bimbo by myself. And if neither of us goes, he’ll stand downstairs and yell at Kate for an hour. She doesn’t deserve that.”

Trace stared at the poster plastered on the ceiling above his bed, the landscape on some planet out of a heroin addict’s nightmare. “I hate her.” Kelsey knew he meant the Bimbo, the secretary their dad would bring to breakfast. Not Kate. Kate was all the mother he’d ever had.

She gave him the only reason that might work. “If we cooperate, maybe he’ll think about coming home.”

He cocked an eye in her direction. “Bullshit.”

“Maybe not.”

“I’ll think about it.”

That would have to do. “’Night.” She crossed to the door, listening for sounds of someone out in the hallway.

“Kelse?”

“Yeah?”

“What’s wrong with us? What else does he want?”

Kelsey rested her head against the panel and closed her eyes. “God only knows.” With a deep breath, she opened the door, stepped out and closed it behind her. “And She’s not telling.”

ON FRIDAY AFTERNOON, Mary Rose nosed Kate’s Volvo into a long line of equally sensible, passenger-safe vehicles and waited her turn to pick up Kelsey and Trace from school. She had to smile, thinking of herself as a car-pool driver. If she and Pete had stayed married—if their baby had been born—this might have been a daily routine in her life. That little boy would have been ten this year. There might have been brothers and sisters…

She shook her head, squeezing her eyes shut against the futile, irrational urge to cry. What in the world was she thinking? Why had that long-ago tragedy suddenly reared its head?

Because of Pete, of course. Seeing him again had undone ten years’ worth of forgetting and resurrected a pain she really couldn’t afford to relive. Except for Trace and Kelsey, children played no part in her present and future plans. There were real advantages to a life without kids, and she enjoyed as many as came her way.

The car behind her beeped its horn, and she realized the line had moved up. Easing closer to the van ahead of her, she scanned the groups of kids hanging around outside the school building, hoping to spot Trace and Kelsey among them. Even after she reached the head of the queue, though, the LaRue kids were nowhere to be seen. When minutes passed and her passengers didn’t show, the security guard told her to move on. Mary Rose tried to protest, but the woman in the bright orange vest simply shook her head and waved with both arms in a gesture that said, clearly, “Get out of the way.”

Two additional trips through the line later, Trace and Kelsey still hadn’t appeared. Muttering a few choice words, Mary Rose drove to the student parking lot—nearly empty now—and left the Volvo there. She had no idea where in the building Trace and Kelsey might be. But when she found them…

The nearest entrance was one of the doors on the back of the gymnasium. Rounding the corner, Mary Rose stopped short at the sight of what looked to be battle lines drawn up in the narrow asphalt alley between the high gym walls and the chain-link fence marking the edge of school property. Seven or eight Hispanic boys on one side taunted the three white kids who stood backed up against that fence. The gibes were in English, but there were extra comments in Spanish, with mocking laughter and lewd gestures. After a moment, she realized that one of the outnumbered boys wore the brilliant yellow, long-sleeved T-shirt she’d seen just this morning in the car on the way to school. Trace.

She started to call out, just as the fight exploded. One of Trace’s friends charged the other group and was sent sprawling on his back on the asphalt. When Trace bent to give him a hand up, he got a kick in the backside that sent him down on his face. And then there was a jumble of bodies, the sick sound of fists pounding against flesh, curses in English and Spanish.

Mary Rose headed back the way she had come, intending to summon help, but found the principal already running toward her, with Kelsey and another girl behind him. The sound of a siren in the distance heralded the approach of more assistance. For a dreadful second, she wondered if Pete would respond to the call, then decided with relief that the highway patrol would let the local police handle this kind of incident.

“Break it up! You hear me? Get back!” A big, heavy man, Mr. Floyd waded into the fight without any apparent concern for his own safety, jerking kids apart by the shirt collars. In another minute the police car arrived; between them, the three men separated the combatants and ended the fight.

“What’s this all about?” Mr. Floyd stared down at Trace and each of the other boys. “Who started it?”

But no matter how many times he asked the question, none of the kids would give an answer. Even after they were marched like a string of prisoners to the principal’s office and written up for violence on school grounds, no one offered an explanation.

“It wasn’t Trace’s fault,” Kelsey told Kate and Mary Rose later, after they got home. “Eric Hasty made a comment in class about a wrong answer Johnny Vasques gave. They’ve been sniping at each other all year long. And when Trace and Bo and Eric went outside at the end of gym class, Johnny and his friends were waiting for them. Trace was trapped. He didn’t have a choice.”

“You could have walked away,” Kate told her son as he sat at the kitchen table with an ice pack on the side of his face. “You didn’t have to fight.”

“And left Bo and Eric there by themselves? I don’t think so.” Dropping the ice pack in the sink, he stalked out of the kitchen, then pounded up the stairs to the refuge of his room.

“Men and their honor code.” Mary Rose shook her head. “Not a tradition I understand very well.”

“It’s like something out of the Middle Ages.” Kelsey folded her arms on the table. “Eric’s sister is a year younger than him, and when he caught her talking to Johnny at lunch last fall, he threw a fit. His family doesn’t think Mexicans and Americans should mix. So there’s been this running feud going all year, and today I guess it just erupted.”

Kate took her coffee cup to the sink. “I guess I’ll have to put Trace on restriction. Honor code or not, I can’t have him fighting in school.”

“Oh, come on, Kate. It’s not his fault.” Kelsey got to her feet. “He was just backing up a friend. It’s not like he started the fight.”

“The two of you should have been out front, waiting for Mary Rose to pick you up.”

“I told you, this thing started before school got out. I went to find Trace and they were already fighting. Please, Kate. Don’t punish him like that. I know he’ll stay out of trouble from now on. I promise.”

“How can you make a promise like that for your brother?”

“I’ll talk to him. Make him see he has to behave. You know he listens to me.”

“Does that include getting him to be polite when you go out with your dad tomorrow morning?”

Kelsey swallowed hard. “Sure. We’ll be good as gold. Cross my heart.” She suited action to words.

With a deep breath, Kate gave in. “Okay. No restriction this time. But if it happens again…”

“No more fighting. Guaranteed.” She gave her stepmother a quick hug and started out of the kitchen. At the doorway, though, she turned. “Does that mean he can come to Gray Hamilton’s party with me tomorrow night?”

Mary Rose’s first impulse would have been to say no. Kate hesitated. “They just live around the block, right?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“And you’ll be back by eleven-thirty?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I suppose that will be all right, then.”

“Thanks!”

Alone with her sister in the kitchen, Mary Rose shook her head. “They’re a real handful, aren’t they?”

Kate nodded. “Since they got out of elementary school, I haven’t had much practice at discipline. L.T. was always the one in control, and he made the decisions pretty much by himself. Maybe I took the easy way out, but fighting with him was just more than I could bear.” She sighed. “Now I’m making the decisions. I’m not sure things are going very well.”

“You know what’s good for them and what’s right.” Mary Rose placed her empty cup in the dishwasher. “Trace and Kelsey will settle down as you get more practice and they get used to listening to what you have to say. Give yourself, and them, some time. Everything will work out just fine.”

She hoped.

SWEAT DRIPPED into Pete’s eyes as he swayed from side to side, breathing fast, dribbling the ball and looking for a way around the opponent crowding him. He feinted left; Tommy Crawford moved with him, arms spread wide, ready to steal. “Screw that,” Pete muttered, pivoting on his right foot to turn his back to Tommy.

“Mitchell!” Twenty feet farther away from the basket, Adam DeVries held up his hands. Pete sent the ball like a bullet straight toward his teammate’s face, watched in satisfaction as Adam caught and immediately redirected it in a soaring arch over the length of the court. Swish…the ball dropped straight through the net. Two points, and the game.

Adam came across the court. “G-good pass, Pete.”

“No thanks to Tommy, here.” He punched Crawford in the shoulder. “I thought you were coming down my throat.”

“Us short guys gotta be aggressive.” Tommy shook his head as Rob Warren joined them. “Sorry, man. The guy must be wearing Super Glue. I couldn’t shake the ball loose.”

Rob gave them all his slow grin. “We have to let them win sometimes, right? Anybody else ready for breakfast?”

Without debate they jogged off the outdoor basketball court of New Skye High School and headed across the street to the Carolina Diner. When he wasn’t working, Pete’s Saturday morning schedule never changed—two-on-two b-ball with DeVries, Crawford and Warren from 7:00 to 9:00 a.m., followed by the biggest breakfast Charlie and Abby could dish up.

“Three scrambled, double bacon, grits, biscuits and stewed apples,” he ordered a few minutes later. “And tea.”

“That’s a no-brainer.” Abby grinned at him. “You ever consider trying something different? Oatmeal’s good for your heart.”

Pete let his jaw hang loose as he stared at her. “My heart is doing just fine, thanks all the same.”

“Oh, really?” She raised an eyebrow. “Is that why you ran out of here the other night like the place was on fire? Without taking your pie?”

He snapped his mouth closed, feeling his cheeks heat up. “I had to get to the school.”

“It looked to me like you had to get away from Mary Rose Bowdrey. Fast.”

Three pairs of eyes lifted from the menus to his face. “M-Mary Rose B-Bowdrey is in town?” Adam sat back in his chair and linked his hands behind his head. “Isn’t she…?”

“Yeah, yeah.” Pete rearranged the salt and pepper shakers, started in on the sugar packets. “No big deal.”

Rob took a swallow of coffee. “You were married…what? A month?” Having done her worst, Abby sashayed back to the kitchen.

Pete shrugged. “Something like that.”

“Her sister’s in the middle of a divorce.” Like the Bowdreys and Adam, Tommy was part of the Old Town crowd—the families who traced their names back for a century or more in New Skye history, who mostly lived in big, elegant houses on The Hill, and who pretty much ran the town. “I hear the kids are really messed up over it.”

“If he ran his family the way he runs LaRue Construction, I’m not surprised the family got b-busted up. And speak of the d-devil.” Adam sat facing the door. “Here they are now.”

Pete heard the bell jingle, but he had his back to the entrance. There was no way he could ask who had just come in, so he sat there with a rock in his stomach, certain that Mary Rose had arrived with her family for breakfast. Certain that he could not eat a single bite with her on the premises.

But then the newcomers moved to a booth in his line of sight. He let his shoulders slump in relief. It wasn’t Mary Rose—just the kids, Kelsey and Trace, with their dad and his girlfriend.

Rob shook his head. “That is one unhappy bunch. Does L.T. really think his kids are going to warm up to the woman he left their mother for?”

“L. T. LaRue th-th-th-thinks he can g-g-get a-away with any damn thing he p-p-pleases.” Although usually barely noticeable, Adam’s stutter worsened when his temper flared. “I’m f-f-f-fixing one of his m-m-m-messes right now. He underbid me on the Whispering Pines n-n-nursing home job a few years ago, but the…the s-s-s-s-second-rate air-conditioning s-system already needs replacing, there’s n-no adequate insulation anywhere in the complex, and the ‘new’ stove and refrigerator in the k-k-kitchen were seconds bought at a scratch-and-dent sale.” He shook his head and muttered a word under his breath—without stuttering—that described L. T. LaRue perfectly.

Pete kept an eye on the LaRue kids while he ate. The epitome of sulky teenagers, they avoided looking at their dad when they spoke to him, which wasn’t often and only in response to a question. They appeared to be pretending that the woman sitting beside L.T. didn’t exist at all. Melanie Stewart, LaRue’s office receptionist and the focus of his midlife crisis, was barely a half a decade older than the man’s daughter. She wore her honey-blond hair piled high, put on her makeup with gusto and wore her clothes tight, displaying a set of curves that explained LaRue’s infatuation to any man with eyes in his head.

A hand fell on his shoulder. “Hi, guys. Who won?”

Another Saturday-morning ritual—Jacquie Archer came in for breakfast before starting her workday as a farrier. Thanks to mild weather and good terrain, the counties around New Skye were known as prime horse country, and Jacquie had a full-time job visiting stables and farms to shoe their horses.

Pete looked up at the woman beside him. “Hey, Jacquie. The best team, of course.”

She rolled her eyes. “There’s no ‘of course’ about it, Mitchell. You’ve been running this little tournament since tenth grade and I’ve decided the outcome just depends on who got to bed later on Friday night.” Arms crossed, she stared at them with one eyebrow raised. “Considering the four of you are bachelors with the social lives of slugs, that makes the odds practically even.” While they were still protesting, she turned on one booted heel and went to join her daughter, Erin, in the booth next to L. T. LaRue and his kids.

“‘The social lives of slugs.’ Man, I’d call her bluff on that one.” Tommy finished his toast, then shook his head. “If it weren’t the truth.”

“I’ve got a construction b-b-business to run. This is all the time I can s-spare.” Adam poured syrup on his pancakes. “Besides, who’s she to talk? When’s the last time we s-saw Jacquie with a d-d-d-date?”

Pete gave it some thought. “That would be the senior prom. Remember, she left right after graduation to go up north so she could train with that Olympic rider. When she came back a couple of years later, she’d been married and widowed and had Erin.” The girl must have heard her name amidst the din, because she looked at Pete and grinned. Even wearing jeans and a T-shirt, she made him think of an elf, with her pointed chin, dark eyes and short dark curls, so different from her mother’s corn-silk blond braid.

And so different from Kelsey LaRue in the seat behind her, who was dressed like some jailbait rock singer all the kids idolized—tight jeans, belly-baring tank top and too much makeup. As Pete let his gaze wander, he noticed L.T. pointing a finger at his kids, talking hard and getting red in the face. Before he finished, Kelsey jerked herself out of the booth.

“I don’t give a damn about what you planned or how much money you spent.” Her voice shut down all the other noises in the diner. “If you wanted to be with me and Trace, you should’ve stayed at home. I’ll go to hell before I go anywhere with you and your…your…concubine!”

She stomped through absolute silence to the door, flung it open with a hysterical jingle of the bell and stormed outside. Before the door could close again, Trace caught the handle and followed his sister.

Another mute moment passed, then folks at the tables and the counter started up their conversations again, throwing a few sidelong glances at L.T. and Melanie in the process. Pete looked at his basketball buddies. “Do you suppose those kids are walking home?”

Rob sat facing the streetside window. “Looks like it. They’re at the corner, waiting for the light.”

“That’s no good. It’s a five-mile walk through some of the worst parts of town.” And the girl was dressed like a hooker ready for work. In those neighborhoods, there would be guys ready to take the offer, even at ten on a Saturday morning. Pete put cash for his share of the breakfast bill on the table and got to his feet. “Thanks for the game, guys. See you next week.”

Just as he reached the door, he felt a tug on his sleeve. Abby stood behind him, holding the box with his lemon meringue pie slice. “You’re always rushing out these days. Take it easy, okay?”

He took the box and gave her a one-armed hug. “I’ll do my best. You keep Charlie on his diet.”

Then he went out to make sure Mary Rose Bowdrey’s niece and nephew got home safe and sound.

CHAPTER THREE

KELSEY DISCOVERED almost immediately that two-inch platform sandals were not designed for walking. The kind of walking she was doing, anyway—jogging across the four-lane highway outside the diner, or striding uphill on the shoulder of the road with pieces of gravel slipping underneath her arch, her toes, her heel.

The third time her ankle turned on a rock, she kicked the damn shoe as far as it would go…across the road and into the ditch on the opposite side.

“That was stupid.” Trace finally caught up with her. “How are you gonna walk home with one shoe?”

She couldn’t answer, because that would mean loosening her jaw and taking her teeth out of her upper lip, which was the only thing keeping her from breaking into tears at this point. And she wouldn’t cry over him. She wouldn’t.

Heaving a sigh, Trace crossed the road and sidled down into the ditch. As he bent to pick up her shoe, a car roared up the hill in their direction. Instead of passing by, though, the dusty red Jeep stopped right beside her, blocking Trace on the other side.

Was she about to be abducted? In broad daylight at ten o’clock on a Saturday morning?

She braced herself as the door opened. The guy who got out didn’t look like a pervert—he was actually pretty cute, for being so old. His hair was too short, but he had great shoulders, visible under a sleeveless navy sweatshirt, and fantastic legs. He looked familiar, but she couldn’t quite place him.

Then he flashed a badge. “Pete Mitchell, with the highway patrol.”

Had her dad sent the cops after them? Typical. “Was I speeding or something?”

The state trooper frowned at her. “I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to be walking home on this road. Get in, I’ll give you a ride.”

Trace came around the front of the Jeep. “Who’s this?”

Another flash of the badge. “I’m taking you and your sister home.”

“Yeah, right.” Kelsey took her shoe back from Trace and braced herself with a hand on his shoulder while she put it on. Thank God the ditch wasn’t filled with water. “Like we haven’t heard the drill since we were babies. ‘Don’t ride with strangers,”’ she mimicked in a falsetto tone.

The man rolled his eyes. “I’m glad to know the message stuck. Too bad you didn’t hear about staying out of the wrong neighborhoods. This road takes you right into the worst part of town.”

“We’ll be okay.”

“Sure you will, ’cause you’re riding with me.”

Kelsey crossed her arms and stared at him, hard. “No way.”

Hands propped on his hips, Pete Mitchell shook his head. “Look, I’m a…a friend of your aunt Mary Rose. We’ve known each other a long time.” He cleared his throat. “She wouldn’t like it if I let you wander around town on foot. It’s an hour’s walk, easy, from here to your house. Just get in the car, and I’ll have you home in ten minutes.”

A friend of Aunt M’s? Oh, yeah…this was the guy who had stopped Mary Rose in the diner Thursday after the game. They’d talked for a second, then he’d left, and Mary Rose had stared around with a dazed look in her eyes and her cheeks blazing bright pink.

Just friends? Sure they were. This might be interesting, after all.

Kelsey let her hands drop to her sides. “I guess maybe we would be smart to get a ride. It’s a long way home.” She gave Pete Mitchell a friendly smile.

Trace’s eyes widened. “Kelsey? What the hell—”

The trooper relaxed and grinned back at her, and suddenly she realized how sexy he was.

“I’m glad to hear you’ve got good sense. Let’s go.”

Kelsey got into the front seat of the Jeep while Trace, muttering under his breath, climbed in back. The engine started with a rumble but Pete Mitchell waited until both she and Trace had buckled their seat belts before shifting into first gear and starting up the hill.

“Manual transmissions are so cool,” Kelsey commented, watching the trooper change smoothly from second to third.

He let the engine noise build to a roar, then flashed another one of those grins before easing into fourth. “Makes the driving a lot more fun. But working a clutch takes practice. You’re not old enough for a license yet, are you?”

“I’ve got my learner’s permit. But all I get to drive is my mom’s Volvo. It’s automatic. Boooorring.”

“I notice your aunt’s Porsche is a six-speed. Maybe you should bug her to let you drive.” His smile looked…wicked?

“Hey, good idea.” She glanced out the window at the neighborhood they were going through, at houses with sagging porches and yards littered with tires and trash. A gang of boys stood on one street corner, smoking and jiving each other over gangsta rap from a boom box on the sidewalk.

Kelsey shivered. Walking past that group would have been scary. No question.

She felt more than saw Pete Mitchell glance across at her. “That was some argument, back at Charlie’s.”

So much for polite conversation. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“No problem.” He nodded and glanced at Trace through the rearview mirror. “I hear you played a good game Thursday. Leading scorer on the JV?”

“Yeah.” Trace was at his most uncommunicative.

“Bet you can’t wait to get on to the varsity squad. You’re in—what?—eighth grade? I guess you’ve got a couple of years yet. Think you’ll play football, too?”

“Don’t know. Maybe.”

Pete gave up on coaxing the boy into saying something on his own. Forcing a kid to talk was the quickest way to kill any chance for communication. The best results came from letting them know the option was there and then backing off until they decided to take it.

Sure looked as though the LaRue kids could use somebody to listen, though. The air around the two of them practically boiled with what they weren’t saying. A divorce in the family was toughest on the kids—all this bad stuff happening around them over which they had no control.

The rest of the drive passed in silence. Without comment, Pete braked for the stop sign at Boundary Street—the unofficial border between the poorest section of town, with its public-housing projects and broken-down rentals, and the historic, luxurious homes on The Hill. On the south side of Boundary, kids lived with a whole different scale of troubles. Troubles that made Kelsey and Trace look as if they’d landed in Oz by comparison.

“Here you go,” he said as he pulled up to the curb in front of a house probably worth more than all the buildings south of Boundary Street put together. The announcement wasn’t necessary—Kelsey and Trace were scrambling out of their seat belts as fast as the latches would release. “Have a good day.”

Trace stalked off without so much as a nod. Kelsey got out, then leaned back into the car with a smile that flirted a little too much for Pete’s comfort. “Thanks.”

He gave her a discouraging lift of his eyebrow; her immediate pout told him he’d made his point. “You’re welcome.”

“Kelsey?” The girl straightened up and looked over her shoulder at the woman coming around the side of the house. Pete followed Kelsey’s gaze and groaned silently. If the blond curls piled on top of her head hadn’t advertised who this was, the honeyed voice would have.

Damn. His plan was to drop the kids off without running into their aunt. Wasn’t it? No ulterior motive here, right?

Fighting a sensation of imminent doom, he eased out of the Jeep and propped his arms on the roof. “Hey, Mary Rose. You’re out early.”

She held up a pair of garden clippers, as if that explained everything. “What’s going on? Kelsey, where’s your dad?”

Kelsey imitated her brother’s indifferent shrug. “Who knows?”

“He was supposed to bring y’all home.”

“Well, he didn’t.” Before her aunt could say another word, Kelsey stomped up the walk and slammed the front door behind her.

That left Pete to face the question in Mary Rose’s blue eyes. “They, uh, had an argument. At the diner.”

“And how did you get involved?” The suspicion in her tone suggested the ulterior purpose he hadn’t acknowledged.

“The kids left on their own, intending to walk home. I didn’t think that was such a good idea, so I caught up and gave them a lift.”

“Oh.” Her cheeks turned a deep pink under her tan. “Thanks. They should know better than to walk here from Charlie’s.”

“Kelsey was too mad to be thinking about much of anything.”

“Did you hear the argument?” She held up a hand before he could answer. “What am I saying? No doubt everybody in the diner heard.”

“Well, yeah. L.T. had some trip planned, but Kelsey told him she wasn’t going and then stomped out.”

Fists propped on her hips, Mary Rose stared down at the sidewalk, shaking her head. She wore a pink knit shirt, which clung close to her breasts, and pale jeans, which hugged her hips and thighs. The sight stirred something hot inside him that Pete knew he had no business paying attention to. After all these years, after two failed marriages, he could leave well enough alone. Right?

“Well, thanks again.” Throwing off her preoccupation, Mary Rose sent him an impersonal smile. “We appreciate your taking care of the kids.”

Wrong answer. Every time she put him at a distance, Pete got an irresistible urge to close the gap. He walked around the front of the Jeep, braced his feet on the curb and leaned back against the passenger door. “Did you come into town to take care of your sister’s garden?”

Mary Rose glanced at the clippers in her hand. “I’ll do whatever Kate needs. She’s pretty overwhelmed right now.”

“Why don’t you let the yard service take care of things?”

Her mouth tightened and her eyes blazed. “Because when L.T. moved out, he stopped sending his landscaping crew to do the work. And the allowance he gives her doesn’t exactly cover a lawn service.”

Pete muttered the word Adam DeVries had used earlier to describe LaRue. “She should sic her lawyer on him.”

“Easier said than done.” She fiddled with the clippers, opening and closing the blades. “Daddy wants to keep the situation low-key, attract as little publicity as possible.”

“Your dad is acting as her lawyer? But he does business with LaRue, doesn’t he?” Pete thought for a second, then shook his head. Her father had, after all, engineered their divorce. “Why am I not surprised?”

“Don’t make it sound so…so selfish. Daddy wants L.T. and Kate back together. He thinks that by making as few demands as possible, L.T. will…will feel less resistance to coming home.”

“Seems to me he’s interfering the same way he did ten years ago. Telling your sister what’s best for her instead of letting her decide for herself.”

“That’s ancient history.”

“More like history repeating itself, I’d say.”

Mary Rose took a breath to protest, but the words wouldn’t come. Not when she was standing here face-to-face with Pete Mitchell, remembering how her parents had badgered her into getting a divorce. She recalled her dad’s calm, rational arguments, delivered nonstop until she couldn’t seem to think on her own.

“I’m sorry for your sister,” Pete said, breaking into her thoughts. “Sounds like she could use at least one person on her side. And not,” he said, with a pointed look at the clippers, “just to do the yard work.”

“I am on her side!”

He tilted his head. “Are you? Better be sure, Mary Rose. Looks like the stakes are pretty high. There are two kids involved.”

“I’m aware of that. Kate and Kelsey and Trace are the only people who matter in this situation.” Who was she trying to convince? Why did it matter what Pete Mitchell thought, anyway? “Have a good Saturday.”

“You, too.” He straightened up away from the Jeep and walked back to the driver’s side, giving her a chance to stare at his tight butt and the long length of tan legs left bare by his gray cotton-knit shorts.

Mary Rose swallowed hard. Falling in lust with a gorgeous guy—this gorgeous guy—had caused her enough trouble for one lifetime. She did not intend to make the same mistake twice. Besides, there were enough people in this family making mistakes already. Somebody needed to think straight. To stay in control.

Over the last ten years, Mary Rose had made staying in control her specialty.

When she stepped into the house through the front door, Kate was coming down the stairs. “What happened? They’ve locked themselves in their rooms and won’t talk to me.”

Mary Rose told her what Pete had said. “L.T. is behaving like an idiot.”

Kate sat on a step, folded her arms on her knees and curled over until her face was hidden. “I don’t know how to make things better.”

“I don’t think that’s your responsibility.” Sitting beside her, Mary Rose put an arm around Kate’s thin shoulders. “You’re not the one who messed them up to begin with.”

“Mama says—” Kate took a deep breath, but didn’t continue.

“I know what she says. But she wasn’t there, Kate, and she doesn’t know everything. You did the best you could, and L.T. left anyway. So now we just have to figure out how to help Trace and Kelsey get past this.”

“How can I, if they won’t talk to me?”

“That’s why I’m here.” Mary Rose got to her feet. “I’m just the aunt, so it doesn’t matter what I think. Let’s see if they’ll talk to me.”

She knocked on Trace’s door first, though it was farther down the hall than his sister’s. The bass vibrations rattling the door panel suggested that any sound short of a major explosion wouldn’t get through to the boy inside. A twist of the knob demonstrated that he had, indeed, locked himself in. Mary Rose went back to Kelsey’s door.

No loud music here, though the floorboards were shaking from Trace’s stereo. “Kelsey, it’s Mary Rose. Can I come in?”

She waited through a long silence.

“I’m not feeling good,” Kelsey said finally. “Later, okay?”

“You think you’ll be feeling better about this later?”

Another extended pause. “Aunt M, I don’t want to talk about it.”

“So we can talk about something else.” Perhaps the smell of whiskey on Kelsey during that hug at the soccer game Thursday.

She caught her breath. Only two days ago? Surely she’d been through at least a week’s worth of upheaval already. First Pete Mitchell, and then the kids, and Pete Mitchell again…

After a minute, the lock clicked and the door swung back. Kelsey stood in the opening, blocking access to her blue-and-white bedroom. “Talk about what?” She looked altogether too tired and stressed for a fifteen-year-old.

Mary Rose winked at her. “Have you seen the new Brad Pitt movie? The man is totally awesome.”

That got a small laugh. “Yeah, last weekend.” The girl backed up and allowed Mary Rose into the room. “Matt Damon didn’t exactly suck, either.”

“And Damon’s still single.” Mary Rose sat on the end of the bed. “A definite advantage.”

“Or how about Pete Mitchell?” Kelsey cocked her head and lifted a knowing eyebrow. “I thought he was extremely hot. For such an old guy.”

Mary Rose felt a wave of heat wash over her, starting at the crown of her head and going all the way to the tips of her toes. “P-Pete Mitchell?”

“He said he was a friend of yours. I could stand to have such friends.” She closed her eyes. “Those shoulders!”

“Um, yeah.” Pete did have great shoulders. And the most intense silver eyes… “I knew him a long time ago. We, um, dated for a summer.”

“And you let him go? Dumb, Aunt M. Really dumb.”

At least Kelsey was talking to her, even if the subject was just about the most uncomfortable one imaginable. She managed a casual shrug. “Pete was too old for me back then—he graduated with Kate. You should stick to guys your own age.”

Kelsey slumped onto the other end of the bed. “Like my social life isn’t already a total disaster.”

“Want to tell me what happened?”

“Ryan said he wanted to date other people, that he was bored.” She glanced up, her brown eyes brimming with tears and anguish. “That I was boring. And the next week, he’s going steady with Trisha Reynolds. A cheerleader.”

Mary Rose let a moment pass. “I think this guy sounds like somebody you’re well rid of.”

“Oh, sure, if I enjoy Trisha rubbing my face in it every day during algebra. And if I enjoy going to parties by myself and not having a date for the prom.”

“Being single isn’t a bad thing, Kelsey. It’s nice to run your own life without having to consult some man about what you’re doing every minute.”

Kelsey sat up against the pillows. “But you date, right? You’ve been dating the same guy for a long time.”

“Well, yes.” Mary Rose went to the window and stared down into the tops of the ligustrum bushes she hadn’t finished trimming. “Martin Cooper. Most people call him Marty.”

“Are you in love with him?”

How did this get to be such a difficult conversation? “I care about him, of course. He’s a very nice, dependable guy.”

“Has he asked you to marry him?”

“Um…yes.”

“And are you?”

A reasonable question, one she should be able to answer. “I don’t know.”

“How could you not know? Either you want to or you don’t.”

“When you’re older, it’s not quite that simple. I’ve been on my own for quite a while. I’m used to living alone, and doing what I want when I want to. Being married means having to consider somebody else all the time.” She laughed and turned back to the room. “Maybe I’m too selfish these days to get married.”

“But I want to be your bridesmaid. You have to have a wedding so Kate and I can choose our dresses.”

Mary Rose decided to steer the conversation into safer waters. “What color would you choose?”

Kelsey cuddled a pillow against her chest. “Anything but yellow. I look horrible in yellow. I think everybody does, don’t you? She was wearing a yellow dress this morning, and she looked like a banana. Of course, that might have been because her stupid dress fit her like a banana peel.”

For a second, Mary Rose was honestly puzzled. “She?” Then, just as Kelsey’s face changed, comprehension struck. “Oh. Her.”

Kelsey buried her head in the pillow. “The Bimbo.” In a softer voice, she said, “The bitch.”

Mary Rose put a hand on the girl’s shoulder. “What did you fight with your dad about, Kelsey?”

“He had this dumb idea that we should all go to the beach together after school lets out. Have you ever heard anything so stupid? Like I want to be cooped up with her in the condo for a week.”

“The condo?”

Kelsey peeked out of the pillow. “Sure. Good idea, huh?”

“Lousy idea. I’d have been furious, too. That’s a family place. Your mother did all the painting and decorating.”

“Exactly. So I told him what he could do with his beach trip and got the hell out of there. And I’ll tell you something else.” She sat up, her face red, her mouth firm, her chin in the air. “I am never going anywhere with him again. Whether she comes along or not. If he can’t come live with us and make us a family like we’re supposed to be, then I don’t care if I never see him for the rest of my life.”

At least she’d admitted how she felt. “He’s made a lot of mistakes, Kelsey. But he’s still your dad.”

“Biologically. A real dad stays with his kids. That makes him a total loser. If he doesn’t want me and Trace, we don’t want him.”

Downstairs, the doorbell rang. Looking out the window, Mary Rose saw an SUV parked at the curb. “Who drives a dark blue Yukon?”

Kelsey sat up straight. “That’s Dad. I won’t talk to him. I won’t!”

“Shh. You don’t have to. Your mother will take care of it.”

“Oh, right. She couldn’t keep him here, she can’t get him back, and she can’t get him to give her any money. What makes you think she can handle anything at all?” The contempt in the young voice bit deep. “Next thing I know, he’ll be kicking my door down.” Kelsey stared at the door with a mixture of fear and despair. And, Mary Rose felt sure, even a bit of hope.

“No, he won’t kick your door down. I’ll give your mom some backup. You stay put.”

By the time she got to the top of the staircase, L.T.’s loud voice filled the house. “I’ll see my kids any damn time I please. Like right now.” He stomped out of the living room with Kate following, but stopped when he saw Mary Rose blocking his way up the stairs. He made a visible effort to recover his temper. “Hey, there, Mary Rose. I didn’t know you were here. That your Porsche outside? Nice car.”

A few times in the past, she’d thought he might be trying to flirt with her, but had refused to believe her sister’s husband would be so dishonorable. Now she believed it. “Hello, L.T. Are you on your way out? Don’t let me keep you.”

L.T.’s hulking frame was as intimidating as his loud voice. At Mary Rose’s words, his face, an older version of his son’s, hardened. “I’m going to see Trace and Kelsey, first.”

“Neither of them wants to talk to you, L.T. Why don’t you let things cool off for a couple of days, then give them a call?”

He looked at Kate, then at Mary Rose again. “You can’t keep me away from my kids. They’re not even hers, for God’s sake.”

Kate gasped. Mary Rose tightened her hands into fists. “You’ve got one minute to get out of here, L.T. Then we’re calling the police.”

“This is my house. I make the payments. You can’t kick me out.”

“Watch me.” Mary Rose turned and started back up the steps, to the phone in the upstairs hallway. L.T. stood his ground on the first floor as she picked up the phone and punched 911.

“I’d like to report an intruder,” she said to the operator. “The address is—”

With a snarled curse, L.T. whipped around and headed toward the front door. He slammed it hard behind him; the pictures on either side of the door frame jumped off their hooks and crashed to the floor.

On shaking knees, Mary Rose walked to the stairs and sat down on the top step. “Well, that was interesting.” She took in a deep, shuddering breath. “What else could possibly go wrong today?”

THE PHONE RANG at eleven-fifteen that night. Mary Rose was sitting up with Kate, watching TV reruns and waiting for the kids to arrive home at eleven-thirty, as expected.

But as Kate listened to the voice on the phone, as her eyes widened and her face paled, Mary Rose knew that the quiet night was about to take a turn for the worse.

“What? What’s wrong?” She got to her feet as Kate fumbled to replace the phone onto its cradle.

For an endless moment, Kate sat motionless, staring straight ahead without saying anything at all. Then she looked at Mary Rose, her eyes blank with shock.

“Kelsey and Trace are at the police station,” she said finally. “They’ve been arrested.”

CHAPTER FOUR

IN ALL HER LIFE, Mary Rose had never been inside the New Skye police station. The newness of the building surprised her, until Kate explained that this office had replaced the sixty-year-old municipal center only five years ago. Television dramas had conditioned her to expect small, dark—even dirty—rooms. But this large, open area was flooded with fluorescent light, painted a clean light gray, and could have been any ordinary business reception area.

Something else Mary Rose hadn’t expected was the crowd of people occupying that bright space. Everywhere she looked, teenagers slumped on the chairs and against the walls. At least one adult flanked each child, and everyone seemed to be avoiding meeting everyone else’s eyes. At a counter running the length of the room, police officers on the inside talked to parents on the outside, with a fairly high level of tension evident in all parties. No one was happy with this situation…whatever it was. Kelsey and Trace were nowhere in sight.

Kate gazed helplessly at the chaos, twisting her hands together. “What are we supposed to do?”

“What did the officer who called say?”

“To check in with the sergeant.”

“Which one is that?”

“The one with the longest line,” a short, tanned man standing near them volunteered. He had a firm grasp on the arm of a sleepy-looking girl about Kelsey’s age. “Hey, Kate. I’m gonna give Les Hamilton hell when I get hold of him. What was he thinking, going off and leaving his kid at home to party? Did you know there wouldn’t be any adults there tonight?”

Kate shook her head. Mary Rose thought back to the conversation as Kelsey and Trace left the house early that evening. Had Kate asked if there would be parents at home? Or had she just assumed? Surely she would be smarter than that…unless she didn’t want to know, didn’t want to face the conflict involved in dealing with all the facts.

She took hold of Kate’s arm. “Let’s go stand in the longest line.”

After thirty minutes of watching parents argue with police and scold adolescents, their turn came to speak with the sergeant. Kate took a deep breath. “I—I’m looking for Kelsey and Trace LaRue.”

The sergeant flipped through papers. “Right. Drunk driving—”

“Driving!”

“Vandalism, consuming alcohol while underage and possession of a counterfeit license.” He glared at Kate. “You got a couple of real delinquents on your hands.”

She gripped her hands together on top of the counter. “What kind of vandalism?”

“Mailboxes. Pulled over half a dozen boxes in the Burning Tree subdivision. Lucky one of the neighbors was awake and called the cops.”

“What are you going to do to them?”

“That’s up to the judge.”

“They’re going to have a trial?”

Glancing up from his papers, the sergeant must have seen how close to the breaking point the woman he was talking to had come. “A hearing,” he said more gently. “In a day or two. All I need right now is for you to sign them out, take them home and keep them there. You are the legal guardian, right?”

“Yes, of course.” She had adopted both Trace and Kelsey soon after her marriage to L.T. Kate put her wavering signature on the lines the sergeant indicated. “They won’t get into any more trouble.”

“Right.” Skepticism weighted the one word. With a nod, he dismissed them, handing the papers off to another officer standing at his back.

In a few minutes the heavy door in the rear of the room swung open. Kelsey stumbled out, dazed and blinking. “Kate? Aunt M?”

Kate took hold of the girl’s shoulders, gazing at her in the unforgiving fluorescent light. “Are you okay?”

Kelsey pushed her hair out of her eyes. “Uh…I guess so…”

“Come on, Kelsey.” Mary Rose took the girl’s limp hand. “We’ll go get the car. You and Trace can meet us in front of the station,” she told Kate, who looked nearly as dazed as her intoxicated daughter did.

Outside, the warm April night was scented with new grass and rain…and a hint of whiskey from Kelsey’s direction. Mary Rose didn’t pause to appreciate the atmosphere. Walking fast, she pulled the girl along behind her as she strode down the sidewalk. She didn’t know about Kate, but she was mad enough to spit.

With the doors shut, she twisted around in the driver’s seat of the Volvo to face her niece in the back. “What the hell are you trying to accomplish? Doesn’t your family have its share of problems already?”

Kelsey drew up her knees and curled into a ball. “I’m gonna be sick.”

“I hope so.” Mary Rose turned to the steering wheel and started the engine. “I hope you’re sick as a dog.”

Trace and Kate walked out of the police station as Mary Rose pulled the Volvo to the curb. Mother and son got into the car without a word. The five-minute drive up The Hill and to the LaRue house passed in total silence.

Once inside, the kids started up the stairs to their rooms. Mary Rose opened her mouth to protest but, thankfully, Kate beat her to it.

“Not so fast. We are going to talk about this. Both of you come into the living room.” Kate’s voice was harder than Mary Rose had ever heard it.

And that steely tone achieved the desired effect. Trace and Kelsey retraced their steps down the stairs, then went to sit side by side on the love seat, facing their stepmother as she stood in front of the fireplace. Mary Rose retreated to the kitchen to start a pot of coffee. Against her inclinations, she closed the door to the dining room to give them privacy, so the voices—mostly Kate’s, but sometimes the kids’ as well—came to her as wordless mumbles.

More than half an hour passed before footsteps thumped on the staircase once again, announcing that the kids had gone upstairs. A moment later, Kate struggled past the heavy dining-room door and wilted into a chair at the kitchen table.

Mary Rose put a mug of sweet, milky coffee in front of her sister. “Was it very bad?”

“Very.” Kate hid her face in her hands. “I ought to be stern and strong…but they’re so terribly hurt already. How can I punish them when they’re in such pain?”

That question didn’t have an answer. “Did they have reasons? Excuses?”

Straightening her shoulders, Kate dropped her hands to curl her long, slender fingers around the mug. “Something to the effect that Trace’s friends dared him to knock down the mailboxes and Kelsey didn’t think she should let the boys take a car since none of them has a license.”

“And she does?”

“Her learner’s permit.”

“What about the drinking?”

“Kelsey swears that she only had a couple of beers. She didn’t realize how even that would affect her, because she’d never tried it before.”

Damn. “Kate, that’s not true.”

“What do you mean?”

“When I saw her Thursday at the soccer game, Kelsey had been drinking.”

“At school?” Her eyes widened in horror. “How do you know?”

“I could smell whiskey when she hugged me.”

“Whiskey. And you didn’t tell me?”

“I was hoping I was wrong.”

“Oh, dear God.” Kate put down her mug and stared into it blankly. “What am I going to do?”

Mary Rose put a hand on the soft, brown hair. “Katie, honey, I’m not sure. But we’ll figure out something.”

After a couple of minutes, Kate sighed and straightened up. “The reality is that they’re begging for their father to notice what’s going on. To come back home and take care of them. And all that will happen is that he’ll yell at them—and at me—without changing the situation in the least.”

“Would you take him back…if he asked?”

Kate squeezed her eyes shut. “I think I would have to.” Tears crept out from underneath her lashes. “I don’t know what to pray for anymore. Whether to pray that L.T. comes home, for Trace’s and Kelsey’s sakes. Or…or to pray that he stays gone. For mine.”

Mary Rose leaned over to put her arms around her sister. And she wondered whether there was even one man on the entire planet worth the suffering he inevitably caused.

SUNDAY DINNER was a command performance for the Mitchell family. Pete and his brothers were expected to appear in time for the 11:00 a.m. service at Third Baptist Church and then to show up at the front door of the house they’d grown up in not more than thirty minutes after the closing hymn. Fortunately, their mother’s way with oven-fried chicken and angel biscuits made the effort more than worthwhile.

“I took delivery on some engine parts this week shipped by your company.” Pete handed the mashed potatoes to his older brother, a driver for one of the national courier services. “The box was beat up all to pieces. What’s with you guys these days? Playing dropkick with the merchandise in your free time?”

Rick plopped a mound of potatoes next to the chicken on his plate. “What free time? I’m working overtime every night just to get the stuff out there. Talk to the guys at the airport. They’re the ones who mangle the shipments. They put in their scheduled hours, watching the clock instead of their work, then head on home.”

“So few people understand the meaning of responsibility these days.” Denise Mitchell got up to refill her sons’ iced tea glasses. “If the work can’t be done in the time they’re required to be at the job, they just don’t finish. The younger teachers are especially guilty. That bell rings at three o’clock, they’re walking out the door, without even taking papers home to grade.”

Still shaking her head, she went back to her seat at the head of the table. “And the way some parents send their children to school is shameful. I had a boy in just yesterday running a temperature of one hundred and two. He said he’d been sick all night but his mama made him come to school anyway.”

Pete grinned. “Did you call her and give her a piece of your mind?”

“I did. But she couldn’t leave her job, she said.” Denise sniffed in disbelief. “That poor little boy lay on a cot in my clinic until after two o’clock when she finally got there. I’m still thinking about calling Child Protective Services. We’ll be lucky if a flu epidemic doesn’t strike the whole school.”

“She might be a single mom.” Pete’s oldest brother, Jerry, sat across the table. “Maybe she couldn’t stay home because she’d lose her job and that’s the only income the family has. Some women have tough choices like that to make.”

Their mother sat up even straighter in her chair. “I had those choices to make, if you’ll remember. After your dad died, I didn’t have anybody helping me raise you three, with money or anything else. Yet I never sent you to school sick.”

Jerry gave her an apologetic smile. “But not every woman is supermom. You’ve got special powers.”

“Sometimes even two parents aren’t enough to keep kids out of trouble,” Rick said. “I heard at church this morning that the cops raided a big party last night, arrested the whole bunch.”

Pete looked up from his plate. “Were they fighting? I swear, if any of the REWARDS kids were involved, I’m gonna take some skin off their hides.”

“Nah, this was the right side of the tracks, up on The Hill.” As opposed to the “wrong side,” Pete understood, where the kids in his rehabilitation program came from. “The beautiful people’s kids were drinking, getting crazy. Some of them went out cruising, got picked up for driving drunk. There were some private mailboxes knocked down, cars vandalized. The cops found grass in the house. Er…marijuana,” he corrected himself with a glance at their mom’s frown.

Jerry shook his head. “Makes you question what the people with all that money have in their heads for brains, that they can’t raise their kids right, keep ’em out of trouble.”

Pete wondered if Kelsey and Trace had been at the party. He could imagine how upset Mary Rose would be if her niece and nephew were arrested. She’d been worried about them yesterday, obviously caring about the trouble they were having with their parents’ divorce. Years ago, he’d been surprised at how real she was, how easy for a guy from the other side of town to tell his dreams to. To live his dreams with.

Not. Maybe if they’d been left alone, if the baby had lived, if they’d had a chance to work on building a marriage…

Regret stabbed him, stronger than anything he’d felt in a long time. Having Mary Rose in town was beginning to look like a recipe for the kind of remembering he really didn’t like to do.

“Earth to Pete.” A booted toe kicked his foot under the table. “Pass the gravy.”

He looked blankly at Jerry. “What?”

“Gravy, man. You deaf?”

Pete reached for the gravy boat. “Nah.”

Dumb, maybe. He thought about Mary Rose in her pink shirt and tight jeans, and sighed silently.

Really, really dumb.

STARING OUT her window on Sunday afternoon, Kelsey watched her father slam the door to his SUV and stride up the front walk. Seeing him two days in a row had to be a recent record.

She’d begged Kate not to call him, but that had been a waste of breath. At least he’d left the Bimbo at home. And that was the only good thing she could say about the afternoon ahead of them all.

The bell didn’t ring, but she heard the front door slam shut. He must’ve walked in without even knocking.

His voice came up the stairs as loudly as if he stood just outside her bedroom. “Kelsey Ann LaRue, Trace Lawrence LaRue, y’all get yourselves down here right this minute.” He waited five seconds. “Don’t make me come up there. You’re not too old for me to take my belt to you.”

She remembered her last encounter with that belt all too clearly. Ignoring the pitch and twist of her stomach, Kelsey eased off the bed and walked slowly to open the door. Trace looked at her from down the hall, his face white with a combination of hangover and nerves. He hated it when their dad yelled.

“Come on.” She tilted her head toward the stairs. “Let’s get this over with.”

Kate waited for them at the bottom of the steps, trying to smile but looking every bit as nervous as Kelsey felt. She’d never been arrested before, never done anything quite this bad. There was no telling what her dad would do about it.

He was staring out the French doors into the side yard, but as they stepped into the living room, he whipped around to face them. “Have you lost what brains you ever had? Bad enough you were drinking, but to get in a car and go knocking down mailboxes…In one of my neighborhoods, no less. What kind of stupid is that?”

Kelsey shrugged one shoulder. At the time, it had seemed immensely funny to knock over mailboxes that her dad’s company had set up. Now she didn’t have an answer.

“Don’t give me that sullen face, young lady. You’re gonna explain this until I’m satisfied with what I’m hearing.”

Staring at his clenched fists, Kelsey got nervous. “I was drinking. Not thinking straight.”

“No shit. And you dragged your brother along for the ride? I thought you might have more sense, boy.”

Kelsey caught Trace’s glance, knew he was wondering if she would give him away for having been the one to think up the stunt to begin with. “We didn’t start out to—to cause trouble,” she said, trying out her guiltiest look. “It just kinda happened.”

“Yeah, right.” He propped his hands on his hips and shook his head. “I’ll just have to see what I can do to fix it, is all. I’ve got a call in to the D.A. If we’re lucky, he’ll be able to get this whole situation handled before the court system even sees the paperwork.”

Kate stepped forward. “L.T., I really think Kelsey and Trace need to realize there are consequences to behavior like this.”

He gave her a quick, contemptuous glance. “Oh, you can bet there are consequences.” His gaze shifted to Kelsey. “You’re not going anywhere but school for the next six months, you hear me? No ball games, no parties, nothing. You can sit here and twiddle your thumbs and think about how stupid you were last night. Same goes for you,” he told Trace. “Forget the rest of soccer season. You’re off the team.”

“You can’t do that!”

Kelsey watched her dad’s face change and knew the protest was a mistake. Closing the distance between them, he took a handful of Trace’s T-shirt and brought their faces together. “You want to watch me? I’m not having my boy raising hell in this town, ruining the reputation I’ve built these last ten years. You’ll behave, or you won’t leave the house.”

Letting go with a shove that rocked Trace back on his heels, he whipped around to face Kate. “I don’t know what you’re thinking about, either, letting my kids go to a party like that. Anybody with common sense would know that a houseful of teenagers with no supervision means trouble.” He sneered as he looked their stepmother up and down. “But you’re not real strong in the common-sense department, now, are you? So let me make it plain. Keep those kids in the house, except when they go to school. Got it?”

Before she could say anything, he marched to the front door and slammed it one more time on the way out. In the silence, they heard the squeal of tires as he stopped at the corner, then roared away.

The three of them stood for a long minute without moving a muscle.

“I don’t know what he’ll be able to convince the district attorney to do,” Kate said finally, and went to sit in a chair by the fireplace. “I wouldn’t count on getting off without some sort of punishment from the court.”

Aunt Mary Rose came in from the kitchen carrying a tray loaded with a plate of cookies, glasses and a pitcher of lemonade. “I gather the storm has passed. Y’all want something to drink?”

Kelsey looked at the tray, tried to imagine putting a cookie in her mouth or swallowing a sip of lemonade. Tears burned her eyes and her stomach clenched. With a gasp, she turned and bolted up the stairs. She made it to the toilet in the hall bathroom just in time. Since she’d spent half the night throwing up and hadn’t eaten breakfast or lunch, there wasn’t much to lose.

Somebody started up the steps. “Kelsey?” Kate would want to make her feel better. Like that was even possible anymore.

Still retching, Kelsey managed to shut and lock the bathroom door. Then she curled up in a corner, buried her face in one of her stepmother’s soft turquoise towels and cried.

WHEN HE CAME off duty on Monday afternoon, Pete got the message that the assistant chief of police wanted to see him as soon as possible. Without stopping to change his uniform, he signed out and then hopped in the Jeep for the drive across town to the police station. He had to wait about thirty minutes for another meeting to end, but finally got into the big man’s office. “You wanted to see me, sir?”

“Yeah, Pete. Sit down.” The assistant chief shuffled through some papers, tapped the stack on his desk and folded his hands on top. “I told you I’d get back to you as soon as our budget decisions were made.”

“Yes, sir.” This was not going to be good news.

“The city council handed down a fifteen-percent cut in next year’s police department appropriation. We’ve frozen salary levels across the board, denied most new-equipment requisitions. But to meet the budget, we’re gonna have to trim nonessential programs.”

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