woman bouncing one of the matching babies on one hip while she chatted with some other guests, they softened in a way that moved Tricia deeply and unexpectedly.
Had Hunter ever looked at her that way? If he had, she hadn’t noticed.
“Looks like Melissa is caught up in conversation,” Steven mused, smiling. “Don’t take off before I get a chance to introduce you two.”
“Sure,” Tricia answered, blushing. “I’d like that.”
Steven nodded, excused himself and walked away. Sasha had wandered off to play with some of the other kids, but Tricia wasn’t alone for long. She followed him with her gaze, and when she looked back at the space he’d occupied before, Conner was there.
“Hi,” he said.
She smiled up at him, even though she felt incredibly nervous. The dancing-to-a-jukebox fantasy from the day before, when she’d had to turn off Kenny Chesney, filled her mind.
“Hi,” she replied. Oh, she was a sparkling conversationalist, all right.
“I’m glad you’re here,” Conner said. She wouldn’t have known that by his expression; he wasn’t smiling. In fact, he looked as though he were trying to work out some complex equation in his head. “How’s the dog?”
“Valentino’s fine,” she answered. She’d thought she was over her childhood shyness, but here it was, back again. “He’s at home, with Natty’s cat.”
Could she sound any more inane?
Conner finally grinned, a spare, slanted motion of his mouth. “He’s going to be big when he’s full grown, you know,” he remarked.
Was it possible that Conner Creed was shy, too? Nah, she decided.
“That’s why I’m hoping to find him a home in the country someplace,” she said. “Where he can run.”
Conner merely nodded at that.
Tricia blushed, wishing the tension would subside. It didn’t, of course, and she couldn’t stand the brief silence that had settled between them, at once a bond and a barrier, so she burst out with, “He was supposed to live here, in the office, but he wouldn’t stay put. He managed to escape somehow, and showed up on my doorstep in the middle of that last big rainstorm—”
Stop babbling, she ordered herself silently.
Conner frowned. “How could he have gotten out?” he asked, and when he walked over to examine the office door, Tricia followed right along. The rest of the world seemed to fall away, forgotten. “You locked up, right?”
“I forget sometimes,” Tricia said, enjoying his apparent concern for her personal security more than she probably should have. “And the lock is old, like the rest of this place, and it doesn’t always catch. A gust of wind could have blown it open.”
“Or somebody could have broken in,” Conner said, taking the dark view evidently. “Did you call Jim Young and report what happened?”
“No,” Tricia said. “I drove over here and checked things out myself, after I got Valentino dried off and settled at the apartment. Nothing was missing, or anything like that.”
Just then, Steven’s attractive wife joined them, baby tugging happily at a lock of her bright hair.
“I’m Melissa Creed,” she said, smiling at Tricia, putting out her free hand.
Tricia took the other woman’s hand and smiled back. “Tricia McCall,” she said.
Melissa slanted a mischievous glance at Conner, who was just standing there, contributing nothing at all. “Of course I might have expected you to introduce me,” she told him.
He shoved a hand through his hair, sighed. He looked mildly uncomfortable now, as though he might bolt. “Clearly,” he said, “that wasn’t necessary.”
Melissa laughed at that, and her eyes shone as she turned her attention back to Tricia. “The food is almost ready,” she said. “Women and children get to be first in line.”
By tacit agreement, they started toward the picnic area, where the huge grill was emitting delicious aromas, savory-sweet.
Tricia called to Sasha, who came reluctantly. She’d already made friends with some of the other kids, though they’d only been there a few minutes.
Melissa stayed at Tricia’s side while they waited their turns.
“What’s the occasion?” Tricia asked, taking in the crowds of people. She recognized most of them, but there were some strangers, too. “For the party, I mean?”
Melissa smiled. “My husband likes to bring people together,” she said. “The more, the merrier, as far as Steven’s concerned.”
“Oh,” Tricia said, at a loss again.
Just then, Melissa spotted some new arrival and waved, smiling. “Excuse me,” she said. “I might have to referee.”
With that, she hurried away.
Tricia turned her head, and there was Brody Creed in the distance, looking so much like his brother that it made her breath catch.
BRODY.
Conner couldn’t have claimed he was surprised to see his brother; he’d been warned well ahead of time, after all. But he still felt as though he’d stepped through an upstairs doorway and found himself with no floor to stand on, falling fast.
Careful as Conner was to keep a low profile, Brody’s gaze swept over the crowd and found him with the inevitability of a heat-seeking missile. It was, Conner supposed, the twin thing. He’d nearly forgotten that weird connection between him and Brody, they’d been apart for so long. As kids, they’d been a little spooked by the phenomenon sometimes, though mostly it was fun, like scaring the hell out of each other with stories about escaped convicts with hooks for hands, or swapping identities and maintaining the deception for days before anyone caught on.
Brody narrowed his eyes. His hair was longer than Conner’s, he hadn’t shaved in a day or two, and his clothes were scruffy, but for all that, seeing him was, for Conner, disturbingly like looking into a mirror.
Where was Joleen? Conner wondered, subtly scanning Brody’s immediate orbit. There was no sign of her—which didn’t mean she wasn’t around somewhere, of course. Like Brody, Joleen had a talent for turning up unexpectedly, in his thoughts if not in the flesh; she probably enjoyed the drama of it all. Joleen had always been big on drama.
Now Brody made his way through the clusters of people, smiling and speaking a word of greeting here and there, but he was headed straight for Conner. Pride made Conner dig in his boot heels and stay put, though he didn’t feel ready to deal with Brody just then. He folded his arms, tilted his head to one side, and waited. If he bolted, Brody and whoever else was looking might think Conner was afraid of his brother—and he wasn’t. It was just that there was so damn much going on under the surface of things, and Conner had trouble maintaining
