lare moved among various members of her mother’s social clubs and charity organizations, smiling and making small talk. Several decibels below the hum of conversation, Bing Crosby crooned “The First Noel.” For the annual Christmas party, Clare had stuck a sprig of holly berries in the small breast pocket of her fuzzy angora sweater. The sweater closed with pearl buttons down the front, and the bottom hit just below the waistband of her black wool pants. She’d strapped red high-heeled sandals on her feet and pulled her hair back in a simple covered ponytail. Her cosmetics were flawless and her red lipstick matched her sweater. She looked good. She knew she did. No use denying it. It was just too bad she was having a harder time denying that she’d dressed with a certain reporter in mind. She could tell herself that she always tried to look her best, which was pretty much the truth. Only she’d never been quite so picky with her coal eyeliner, or applied mascara and separated her lashes quite so perfectly, just to attend one of her mother’s parties.

She didn’t know why she’d gone to so much trouble. She didn’t even like Sebastian. Well, not that much. Certainly not enough to get all anal about her appearance. Too bad she tended to forget that she didn’t really care for him the second his lips touched hers. He had a way of making every rational thought melt. Of heating her up inside and making her want to be absorbed into his big chest.

She told herself that it had little to do with Sebastian himself and more to do with the fact that he was a healthy heterosexual man. Testosterone clung to his skin like an intoxicating drug, while he manufactured enough pheromones to overdose any women within a hundred yards. After Lonnie, she was especially vulnerable to that kind of sexual force.

The last time he’d kissed her, she’d had every intention of just standing there, aloof and uninvolved. The best way to discourage a man was to remain unmoved in his embrace, but of course that hadn’t happened. If Leo hadn’t entered the carriage house, she didn’t know how far she would have let things go before stopping him.

But she would have stopped him because she did not need a man in her life. Then why the red lipstick and fuzzy sweater? an inner voice asked. A few months ago she would not have even paused to ask herself the question, let alone consider an answer. She made small talk with her mother’s friends as she thought about it and decided it was plain old vanity, exacerbated by lingering insecurities from childhood. But it didn’t matter anyway. His rental car was no longer parked in front of the garage. He’d probably returned to Seattle, and she’d gone to all the trouble of looking good for a house full of her mother’s friends.

An hour into the Christmas party Clare had to admit things were progressing surprisingly well. The gossip ranged from the mundane and disapproving to the ultra juicy. From the latest fund-raiser and overall appalling quality of the younger club members, to Lurleen Maddigan’s heart surgeon husband running off with thirty-year-old Mary Fran Randall, the daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Randall. Understandably, both Lurleen and Mrs. Randall had declined the yearly invitation to the Wingate Christmas party.

“Lurleen hasn’t been quite right since her hysterectomy,” Clare heard someone whisper as she carried a silver tray of canapés to the dining room table.

Clare had known Mrs. Maddigan most of her life and figured Lurleen had never been quite right. Anyone who made Joyce Wingate look like a slacker had severe control issues. Still, cheating wasn’t right, and getting dumped for a woman half her age must have been humiliating and hurtful. Perhaps even more humiliating and hurtful than finding your fiancé with the Sears man.

“How is your writing, dear?” asked Evelyn Bruce, one of Joyce’s closest friends. Clare turned her attention to Mrs. Bruce and fought the urge to squint. Evelyn refused to believe she’d actually reached the age of seventy, and still dyed her hair bright red. The color made her look as white as a corpse and clashed horribly with her scarlet St. John suit.

“Good,” Clare replied. “Thank you for asking. My eighth book is out this month.”

“That’s wonderful. I’ve always thought that someone should write a book about my life.”

Didn’t everyone? The problem was, most people thought their lives were more interesting than they actually were.

“Perhaps I could tell you and you could write it for me.”

Clare smiled. “I write fiction, Mrs. Bruce. I’m sure I couldn’t tell your story as well as you. Excuse me.” She escaped into the kitchen, where Leo was preparing a new batch of eggnog. A potpourri of cinnamon and clove simmered on the stove, filling the house with the smells of the season.

“What can I do?” she asked as she came to stand beside the older gentleman.

“Go enjoy yourself.”

That wasn’t likely to happen. The old guard Junior Leaguers weren’t exactly fun gals. She glanced out the back window at her Lexus parked next to Leo’ s Town Car—no sign of the rental.

“Did Sebastian go home?” she asked, and reached for a corkscrew.

“No. We returned the car. There’s no use in having it when Sebastian can drive the Lincoln while he’s here.” Leo folded beaten egg whites into the eggnog mixture. “He’s over at the carriage house by himself. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind if you went over there to say hello.”

The news that Sebastian was still in town sent a zap along her nerves, and she tightened her grasp on the bottle. “Oh…ah, I couldn’t leave you to do everything.”

“There isn’t that much to do.”

Which was absolutely true, but the last thing she needed was to be alone with Sebastian. Sebastian made her forget she was on a man hiatus.

She grabbed a bottle of chardonnay and stuck the corkscrew into the top. “The ladies can always use more wine,” she said.

“Did something happen yesterday between you and Sebastian?” Leo asked as he placed one bowl of eggnog in the refrigerator and took out another bowl he’d prepared earlier. “When I walked in the house, you looked a little rattled.”

“Ahh, no.” She shook her head and felt her cheeks get warm as she recalled the kiss the day before. One moment she’d been enjoying cocoa, and the next, she’d been enjoying Sebastian.

“Are you sure? I remember how he’d get you all riled up when you were a girl.” Leo set the bowl on the counter and sprinkled nutmeg on top. “I think he liked to pull your pigtails just to hear you scream.”

Clare pulled the cork out and let a pleasant smile curve her lips. These days he had a whole new way of riling her. “Nothing happened. He didn’t pull my hair or swindle me out of my money.” No, he’d just kissed her and made her want more.

Leo looked closely at her, then nodded. “If you’re sure.”

Lord, she was a good liar. “I am.” She grabbed the wine and moved to the pantry.

Leo chuckled and called after her, “He can be a rascal.”

“Yes,” Clare said, although there were other words that fit him better than rascal. She opened the pantry door inward and moved inside, turned on the light and walked past a stepladder and rows of canned goods. On a back shelf, she grabbed a box of Wheat Thins and Rye Crisps.

Returning to the dining room, Clare set the wine beside the other bottles. She replenished a red wicker tray with crackers and plucked a green grape from its vine. From the parlor, she heard her mother’s laugh above the group of voices in the foyer next to the Christmas tree.

“They let anyone in the club these days,” someone said. “Before she married into that family, she was working at Wal-Mart.”

Clare frowned and popped the grape into her mouth. She didn’t see anything wrong with working at Wal-Mart, only the people who thought there was something wrong with it.

“How’s your love life?” Berni Lang asked from across the narcissus centerpiece.

“Nonexistent at the moment,” Clare answered.

“Weren’t you engaged? Or was that Prue Williams’s daughter?”

Clare was tempted to lie, but she knew Berni wasn’t confused. She was just using her false naiveté like a crowbar to do a little stealth prying. “I had a short engagement but it didn’t work out.”

“That’s too bad. You’re an attractive girl, I just don’t understand why you’re still single.” Bernice Lang was in her mid-to late seventies, had a slight case of osteoporosis and a severe case of old ladyitis. An affliction that hit some women after the age of seventy with the belief they could be as rude as they pleased. “How old are you? If you don’t mind my asking?”

Of course she minded, because she knew where this conversation was headed. “Not at all. I’ll be thirty-four in a few months.”

“Oh.” She raised a glass of wine to her lips but paused as if a thought had just occurred to her. “You’d better hurry, then, hadn’t you? You don’t want your eggs to wither. That happened to Patricia Beideman’s daughter Linda. By the time she found a man, she couldn’t conceive outside a petri dish.” She took a drink, then added, “I have a grandson you might be interested in.”

And have Berni for a grandmother? Hell, no. “I’m not dating right now,” Clare said, and grabbed a tray of canapés. “Excuse me.” She left the dining room before she gave into the urge to tell Berni that her eggs were none of the older lady’s damn business.

Clare didn’t believe the biological clock started counting down until a woman was over the age of thirty-five. She was safe for a year, but her stomach twisted into a knot anyway. She figured it was from the stress of forcing herself to be polite Not withering eggs. But…the twisting knot was kind of low for a stomachache. Maybe…? Damn that Berni. As if she didn’t have enough pressure in her life. She had a book deadline looming over her head, and instead of working, she was passing out hors d’oeuvres to her mother’s friends.

She carried the tray into the parlor. “Canapés?”

“Thank you, dear,” her mother said as she looked over the tray. “These are lovely.” She straightened the holly berries in Clare’s pocket, then said, “You remember Mrs. Hillard, don’t you?”

“Of course.” Clare held the tray to one side and kissed the air above Ava Hillard’s cheek. “How are you?”

“I’m well.” Ava reached for a canapé. “Your mother tells me you have a new book out this month.” She took a bite, then washed it down with chardonnay.

“Yes.”

“I think that’s wonderful. I can’t imagine writing a whole book.” She looked at Clare through a pair of thin tortoiseshell glasses. “You must be very creative.”

“I try.”

“Clare always was a very creative child,” her mother said as she rearranged the canapés as if they hadn’t been placed at exactly the right angles. The old passive-aggressive Clare would have accidently tilted the tray so they slid to one side. The new Clare simply smiled and let her mother do her thing. Canapé placement wasn’t something to get upset about.

“I love to read.” Ava was the latest wife of Norris Hillard, the richest man in the state and the third richest in the country. “Your mother suggested that I ask you for a copy of your latest book.”

But her mother promising free giveaways was a little irksome. “I don’t give away copies of my books, but you can buy them at any area bookstore.” She looked at her mother and smiled. “I’m going to warm these up,” she said, holding up the tray. “Excuse me.”

She wove her way through her mother’s friends, dispensed a few canapés, and made it to the kitchen without losing her cool or her smile. She expected to see Leo puttering about. Instead, Sebastian stood at the counter, his back to the room as he looked out into the backyard. He wore a white T-shirt beneath a bulky gray sweater and his usual cargo pants. His hair appeared wet against the back of his head and bare neck. At the sound of her shoes on the tile floor, he turned and looked at her. His green gaze caught and held hers, and she came to an abrupt halt.

“Where’s Leo?” she asked as several hors d’oeuvres shifted precariously close to the edge of the tray.

Sebastian, being Sebastian, had made himself at home with Joyce’s red wine and held a glass near his hip. “He said he’s taking a break.”

“At the carriage house?”

“Yeah.” Sebastian’s gaze lowered from her eyes to her mouth, then slid slowly to her holly berries. He pointed at her with his glass. “You look good in red.”

“Thank you.” She took a few steps forward and set the tray on the island in the middle of the room. He looked good too, in a totally edible way, and she purposely kept her distance. Her stomach felt light and heavy all at the same time, and she made an attempt at polite conversation. “What have you been doing since yesterday?”

“I was up all night reading.” He took a drink of his wine.

The distance between them allowed her stomach to settle, and she took a relieved breath. “What about this time?”

He looked at her over his glass, then said, “Pirates.”

“Internet pirates?”

“Internet?” He shook his head and one corner of his mouth slid up into a smile. “No. High seas. The real swashbuckling kind.”

Her first two books had been about pirates. The first featured Captain Jonathan Blackwell, bastard son of the Duke of Stanhope, while the second had starred William Dewhurst, whose love of plundering the South Pacific was second only to his love of plundering Lady Lydia. During her research for those books, she’d learned that piracy was still a problem. It certainly wasn’t as prevalent as it had been several hundred years ago, but was as brutal as ever. “Are you writing an article about piracy?”

“No. No article.” He walked toward her and set his glass next to the silver tray, effectively removing the nice safe distance between them. “How’s the party going?”

Clare shrugged a shoulder. “Berni Lang told me that my eggs are withering.”

He simply looked at her through his deep green eyes, clueless as to what she was talking about. But of course he was. Men didn’t have to worry about ticking clocks or aging eggs.

“She’s concerned that if I don’t get to it, I won’t be able to conceive outside of a petri dish.”

“Ah.” He tilted his head back and lowered his gaze to her abdomen. “Are you worried about that?”

“No.” She placed a hand on her stomach as if to shield herself from his sexually potent gaze. If there was one man who could impregnate with just a look, it was Sebastian Vaughan. “Or at least I wasn’t until today. Now, I’m a little freaked.”

“I wouldn’t worry about it if I were you.” He glanced into her face. “You’re still young and beautiful, and you’ll find someone to make a baby with you.”

He’d said she was beautiful, and for some stupid reason, that left her light-headed and feeling a little warm and fuzzy. It touched the little girl in her that used to follow him around. She tore her gaze from his and looked down at the hors d’oeuvres. She’d come into the kitchen to do something. What?

“If not, then you can adopt or find a sperm donor.”

She grabbed the silver tray and moved toward the sink. “No. That may be fine for some women, but I want a father for my child. A full-time dad.” Talk of sperm and donors made her think of making babies the old-fashioned way. And that made her think of Sebastian standing before her in just a towel. “I want more than one child, and I want a husband to help me raise them.” She pulled out the garbage from beneath the sink. “I’m sure you know the importance of a father in a boy’s life.”

“I do, but you know that life isn’t perfect. You know that even with the best of intentions, fifty percent of all marriages end in divorce.”

Thinking of him in that towel made her think of him without the towel. “But fifty percent don’t,” she uttered, not thinking about what she was doing as she dumped the hors d’oeuvres. As she watched them slide into the trash, she remembered that she’d come into the kitchen to warm them up, not dump them out.

“You want the fairy tale.”

“I want a chance at it.” Damn. She’d spent hours making those mushroom rolls. For a split second she thought about picking them out of the trash. This was Sebastian’s fault. He just seemed to suck the air from the room and leave her brain deprived of oxygen. She shoved the garbage back beneath the sink and shut the door. Now what?

“Do you really believe in the happily ever after?”

Clare turned and looked at him. He didn’t appear mocking, just curious. Did she still believe? Despite everything? “Yes,” she answered truthfully. Perhaps she no longer believed in a perfect love, or love at first sight, but did she still believe in lasting love? “I do believe that two people can be happy and make a great life together.” She set the tray on the counter next to a plate of butter mints pressed into the shape of little Christmas trees. She popped one into her mouth and leaned her behind against the counter. She’d cooked all the hors d’oeuvres and set them out already. She looked down at her red toenails as she recalled some frozen fish in her mother’s freezer, but there wasn’t anything she could do with that.

“Our parents never did.”

She glanced up at Sebastian. He’d turned toward her and his arms were folded across the chest of his bulky sweater. “That’s true, but my mother and your father jumped into marriage for the wrong reasons. Mine because she thought she could change a charming womanizer, and yours because…well, because…”

“My mother was pregnant,” he finished for her. “And we know how that turned out. It was a disaster. They made each other miserable.”

“It doesn’t have to be like that.”

“What’s to stop it? Hearts and flowers and grandiose declarations of undying love? Don’t tell me you actually believe in that?”

She shrugged. “I just want someone who loves me as honestly and as passionately as I love him.” She pushed away from the counter and moved toward the refrigerator. She pulled open the freezer and looked in at an old gallon of ice cream, packages of chicken, and the trout Leo had given Joyce the last time he and Sebastian had gone fishing. She closed the freezer and asked, “How about you?” She was tired of talking about herself. “Do you want children?”

“Lately I’ve been thinking that I’d like to have a kid someday.” Clare glanced back at him as she opened the refrigerator. He took a drink of his wine, then added, “But the wife is a different matter. I can’t see myself married.”

She couldn’t see him married either. She bent forward and placed her hands on her knees to peer into the refrigerator. “You’re one of those guys.”

“One of what guys?”

Milk. Grapefruit juice. Jars of salsa. “Those guys who can’t see themselves tied down with one woman for the rest of their lives, because there are so many woman out there just waiting to be conquered. The ‘why have oatmeal every day for the rest of our lives when we can eat Cap’n Crunch, Lucky Charms, and Tasty O’s kind of guys.” Cottage cheese. A piece of something shaped like a pizza slice. “Do you know what happens to those guys?”

“Tell me.”

“Those guys turn fifty and are alone and suddenly decide it’s time to settle down. So they get some Viagra and find a twenty-year-old to marry and pop out a few children.” Cheese. Pickles. Eggs. “Only they’re too old to enjoy the kids, and when they’re sixty, the twenty-year-old leaves them for someone her own age and cleans out the bank account. They’re sad and broke and can’t understand why they’re alone.” She reached for a jar of Kalamata olives. “The kids don’t want them to come to school programs because they’re nearing retirement and all the other fourth graders think their dad is their grandpa.”

Wow, she thought as she straightened, that sounded cynical. She’d obviously been listening to Maddie too much. She read the pull date on the olive jar. “Not that I’m bitter or anything,” she said through a smile as she glanced over her shoulder. “Not all men are immature jerks,” she added, and caught Sebastian staring at her behind. “But I could be wrong about that.”

He raised his gaze up her back. “What?”

“Did you hear one word I said?” She shut the door and set the olives on the counter. She didn’t have a plan for them, but they looked better than anything else in the refrigerator.

“Yeah. You assume I don’t see myself married because I want to ‘conquer’ lots of different women and eat their Lucky Charms and Tasty O’s.” He grinned. “But that’s not the case. I don’t see myself married because I’m gone a lot and, in my experience, distance does not make the heart grow fonder. While I’m gone, either she’s moved on or I’ve moved on. If not, she suddenly sees my work as her competition and wants me to cut my schedule to spend time with her.”

Clare couldn’t fault him for the last. She knew what it was like to have to work while your boyfriend wanted to play. She felt an affinity with Sebastian until he said, “And women just can’t leave anything alone. If everything is going along just fine, they have to pick at it and torture it and talk it to death. They always want to discuss feelings and talk about a relationship and make a commitment. Women can never just lighten up about that shit.”

“My God, you should come with a warning sign.”

“I’ve never lied to any woman I’ve been in any sort of relationship with.”

Maybe not in so many words, but Sebastian had a way of looking at a woman that made her feel as if she were special to him. When in reality she was only special until he moved on. And she herself, who knew Sebastian for a silver-tongued snake, was not immune. Not immune to the way he looked at her and kissed her and touched her and drew her in even as she knew she should run screaming in the opposite direction. “Define relationship.”

“Jesus.” He sighed. “You’re such a girl.” He held up one hand, then dropped it to his side. “A relationship…as in dating and having sex with the same person on a regular basis.”

“And you’re such a guy.” She shook her head and moved to the other side of the kitchen island. “Relationships should be about more than dinner, a movie, and hitting the sack.” She could have said more on the subject but didn’t believe it would do any good. “What’s been your longest relationship?”

He thought a moment, then answered, “About eight months.”

She placed her hands on the white tiles and drummed her fingers as she looked across the safe distance into his eyes. “So, you probably only saw each other half that time.”

“More or less.”

“So in all, total, it was more like four months.” She shook her head again and walked across the room to the pantry, the sound of her high heels making little click-click sounds. “I’m shocked.”

“What? That it didn’t last longer?”

“No,” she answered as she opened the door. “That it lasted that long. Four months is a long time not to bother you with talk of commitment and feelings.” She frowned at him, then walked into the pantry. “That poor woman must have been mentally exhausted.” She moved passed the stepstool and looked for a box of this or a tin of that. Anything to whip up for her mother’s friends.

“Don’t feel too bad for her,” Sebastian said from the doorway. “She was a yoga and Pilates instructor and I let her work out on me in bed. If I recall, her favorite position was dog down.”

Which proved, yet again, woman did all the work in a relationship. “You mean downward-facing dog.”

“Yeah. You know that one?”

Clare ignored the question. “So, the yoga instructor had to bend herself all around to please you. I imagine she had to rock your world in and out of bed, but what did she get out of the relationship? Besides toned abs and buns of steel?”

He grinned like a natural-born sinner. “Out of bed, she got dinner and a movie. In bed she got multiple orgasms.”

Oh. Okay. That was good. She had never had a multiple orgasm. Although she thought she may have come close once.

He shoved one shoulder into the door frame. “What? You don’t have anything to say?”

Really, though, she wasn’t greedy. It had been so long, she wouldn’t mind just having one. “Like?”

“Like a relationship is not just about sex and a woman needs more than multiple orgasms.”

“Yes. They do.” She closed her eyes and shook her head. “We do, yes. And a relationship is more than sex.” She looked back at him standing there like a hunk of the month. She was allowing him to get her sidetracked with thoughts of orgasms. She’d come into the pantry to find crackers or something….

He pushed away from the frame and closed the door with his foot.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

He moved forward a few steps until she had to tilt her head up to look up into his face. “Apparently, I’m stalking you.”

“Why?” He was doing that thing again. The thing where he sucked out all the air in the room and made her feel light-headed. “Are you bored?”

“Bored?” He took several moments to consider the question before he answered, “No. I’m not bored.”