clothes and practically everything a girl could ever want—even if she wasn’t a member of the Donovan family, biologically speaking.
“And the prodigal daughter returns.”
Lyra heard his voice and felt warmth spiral through her spine, sliding downward like a warm waterfall. She needed another moment, another couple of minutes or an hour to gather herself before seeing him. Unfortunately, it didn’t look like she was going to get it.
“She’s all grown up now, man. Doesn’t she look good?” Parker asked, and Lyra wanted to kick him as she had so many times in the past. He always did have a knack for saying what others wanted kept quiet. His playfulness was a big part of his adorable personality, but right now was a pain in her behind. She slowly turned, having decided it was time to face the inevitable.
“Hey, Dion,” she said with all the casual aloofness she could muster.
He walked toward her. He still had the tall muscular body she remembered as if it were yesterday. He didn’t smile. His look was much more intense. Dion Donovan stood at least six feet six inches tall, with a honey complexion, short-cropped black hair and a swagger that said he looked good even if you didn’t want to admit it. He wore jeans and a T-shirt that hugged every inch of his eight-pack and wrapped around his thick biceps like candy coating.
“Hey, Lyra. It’s good to see you,” he said as he came closer.
He was going to hug her, Lyra knew. Not as eagerly as Parker had, but he would wrap his arms around her, because that’s how the Donovans were with family. And she was family, she reminded herself. She’d grown up in this house, had been taken in because her own mother couldn’t seem to get her act together. Janean and Bruce Donovan had raised her as one of their own, giving her every advantage and expecting just as much from her as they did their own children. She owed them everything.
She especially owed them the respect of not pining after their eldest son as if he were the only man on earth that could make her body hum with arousal. Even though, the fact still remained, he was.
“It’s good to see you, too,” she managed as soon as his hands brushed her shoulders and he pulled her up close. He smelled wonderful—some expensive and insanely sexy cologne that she knew would stay with her for days to come.
“I missed you,” he whispered in her ear and Lyra remained silent.
She wouldn’t say the same, couldn’t tell him how much she’d missed him. It was pointless, and she’d made a promise not to move backward. Her new life was her future. Reviving feelings from the past was a futile and emotionally self-destructive exercise, and that was something she refused to engage in. But she’d missed the hell out of him, too.
Chapter 2
Food was everywhere, on fine china platters and crystal and silver condiment bowls and trays along the length of the eight-foot mahogany table covered in an antique-lace tablecloth. Candied yams, homemade macaroni and cheese, corn bread, a huge baked turkey, glazed pineapple ham, mashed potatoes, corn bread stuffing, green beans and corn was more than Lyra could take in in one glance. The dining room hadn’t changed much since she’d left. The massive table was still in the center of the room with chairs all around it, the large china cabinet that spread across the expanse of champagne-colored walls was filled with expensive china patterns, even though several of the pieces were being used on the table and the sideboard, which held even more food.
The atmosphere felt homely, warm and welcoming, and the people sitting and standing around the table greeted her in a way that echoed those feelings.
“You’re back!” Regan Donovan was across the room in seconds, her long arms wrapping around Lyra before she could do anything but smile.
Lyra stumbled back a step as Regan embraced her. “Hey, Regan. It’s good to see you, too.”
“Oh, my God! When I got your email I was ecstatic. You know we need to get together so we can catch up. We can’t do that here with everybody around, but I want to hear everything that’s happened in L.A. And I mean everything,” she said, her large expressive eyes indicating that she wanted to hear things Lyra couldn’t talk about around the rest of the Donovans.
“Let her go, Regan. The rest of us would like to say hello, too.” Savian, Regan Donovan’s older brother, pushed her aside.
“Hi, Savian,” Lyra said, welcoming a hug from the quiet and reserved Donovan cousin, who rarely ever smiled. But there was still a warmth and sincerity evident in his hazel eyes.
“Hey, kiddo. I see you survived it out there in la-la land.”
“I did.” She smiled, pulling away from him. “It wasn’t so bad,” she said biting her inner cheek to keep from blurting out how bad those years away had really been. It wasn’t anybody’s business she’d told herself. She’d left to pursue her goals to become a photographer. And in that regard, she’d done pretty damned well for herself. It was everything else that had fallen apart.
“Well, you look fabulous,” said Carolyn Donovan, a tall, slim woman with a warm chocolate complexion and hair that had a silvery glow. She was beautiful and looked elegant in her cream-colored linen slacks and pale pink blouse. Her hair was flawless as usual and just barely grazed her shoulders. Her eyes smiled as she reached out to hug Lyra.
“Aunt Carolyn, it’s good to see you.”
“Yes,” Carolyn said when she released Lyra from her grip, putting her hands on Lyra’s shoulders as she continued looking her up and down. “Just fabulous. The sun’s kissed your skin so you look even more Native American then you did when you were a little girl. And you’ve blossomed.”
Lyra didn’t know she could still blush, but the heat in her cheeks said she hadn’t grown out of that habit. The Donovans had always told her of her Native American heritage, to which Lyra simply smiled and nodded. She’d never known her father, and her mother, Paula Anderson, certainly wasn’t Native American. She was an African-American, and had grown up in the Lemon City area of Miami, which was known for its large community of Haitian immigrants. But that’s where Mama Nell, Lyra’s grandmother, had lived, so that’s where Paula grew up until she felt like she was old enough to make it on her own. But Lyra’s mother thought she was grown the minute she learned to talk, and at age thirteen Paula took to the streets because Mama Nell’s restrictions were too strict for her.
Lyra didn’t really grow up in one place in Miami, seeing as how Paula dragged her to whatever dirty couch or boarded-up row house she could find in her search for her next high or next john, whichever she was fiendin’ for at the time.
The brothers, Bruce and Reginald, had been standing near one of the windows in the airy room, but with all the commotion they turned to look at her. Reginald with his round face and dark eyes smiled a toothy grin, and she walked to him quickly, falling into his thick arms. “Hi, Uncle Reggie.”
“Hey, Peanut. Carolyn’s right, you’re prettier than you were when you left.”
Being the smallest of the Donovans’ children when they were growing up had earned Lyra the nickname Peanut. The cousins had come up with their own nicknames for her.
“Thanks,” she replied before letting her gaze settle on Bruce Donovan. Tall and broad-shouldered, his medium-brown complexion blended handsomely with the graying mustache and beard.
He reached for
