PRING CAME EARLY TO WEST END. A COLD, RAINY winter set the stage for riotous color. When the sun finally dared to peek through the gray layer of clouds, the landscape changed before your very eyes. Bright purple crocuses came first, popping up through the bleak, hard earth. Then the hillsides turned green, and trees unfurled the splendor of baby leaves. Daffodils bloomed along every roadside, created spots of color amid the runaway salal.

Lauren bloomed as well. She'd gained almost fifteen pounds already. Any day now she expected her obstetrician to start frowning at the weighing-in debacle. She moved more slowly, too. Sometimes at the restaurant she had to pause outside the kitchen door and catch her breath. Walking from table to table had become an Olympic caliber event.

And that wasn't the worst of it. Her feet hurt. She went to the bathroom more often than a beer-drinking alcoholic, and gas seemed to be burning a permanent hole through the middle of her chest. She burped constantly.

By April she'd begun to face the question: What next?

She'd been bumping along for the last few months, looking only as far ahead as her next shift at the restaurant or her next date with David. But now--again-- he'd asked her the Big Question, and she knew it was time to stop avoiding the obvious.

"Well?" David said, nudging her.

They were cuddled close on the sofa, their arms entwined. A fire crackled in the hearth.

"I don't know," she said softly. The three words were beginning to wear out their welcome.

"My mom said she talked to the lawyer again last week. He has several couples who are dying to raise it."

"Not it, David. Our baby."

He made a heavy sound. "I know, Lo. Believe me, I know."

She lifted her face toward his. "Could you really do it? Just walk away from our baby, I mean?"

He untangled himself from her and got to his feet. "I don't know what you want from me, Lauren." His voice cracked. She realized suddenly that he was near tears.

She went to him, stood behind him, and put her arms around his waist. She couldn't get close enough; her belly was so big. The baby kicked her, a featherlight flutter.

"What kind of parents would we be?" David asked, not turning to look at her. "If we give up college, what will we do? How will we afford--"

She slipped around to face him. This was one answer she had. "You're going to Stanford. No matter what."

"I'm supposed to just leave," he said dully.

Lauren looked up into his watery eyes. She wanted to tell him it would all work out, that their love would always see them through, but she felt too small right now to reach for the words, and the tiny tap-tap-tap in her stomach reminded her of how different this moment was for each of them.

She would lose him if she kept their child.

Hard choices, Angie had said to her once. How was it that Lauren hadn't truly understood that until this moment?

She was going to say something--she wasn't sure what--when the doorbell rang.

She sighed heavily, extricating herself from his embrace. "Coming."

She opened the door and saw Ernie, the mailman. He held several small packages and a bunch of letters.

"Here you go."

"Thanks." She put the packages on the table by the door and flipped through the letters. One was addressed to her.

"It's from USC," she said, feeling her heart lurch. She'd forgotten about her applications in all the craziness of the past few weeks.

David moved toward her. He looked as scared and nervous as she felt. "You know you got in," he said, and she loved him for that confidence.

She opened the letter and read the words she'd dreamed of. "I did it," she whispered. "I didn't think--"

He pulled her into his arms and held her. "Remember our first date? After the Aberdeen game. We sat down at the beach, by the huge bonfire. While everyone else was running around and dancing and drinking, we talked. You told me you were going to win a Pulitzer someday, and I believed you. You're the only one who doesn't see how great you are."

The Pulitzer. She couldn't help touching her swollen belly. Give yourself a chance, her mother had said. Don't end up like me.

"What should I do?" she whispered, looking up into David's blue eyes.

"Take the scholarship," he said, and though his words were harsh, there was a softness to his voice.

It was the right thing to do; she knew that. At least, she knew it in her head. Her heart was a different matter. How could she raise a baby if she had no education, no prospects? Once again she thought of her mother, on her feet, cutting hair all day and drinking all night, looking for love in dark places. She sighed heavily. The truth poked through her defenses, sharp as a tack. She wanted to go to college. It was her chance to be different from her mother. Slowly, she looked up at David again. "The lawyer found good people to take the baby?"

"The very best."

"Can we meet them? Choose for ourselves?"

Joy transformed his face, turned him back into the boy she'd fallen in love with. He held her so tightly she couldn't breathe, and kissed her until she was dizzy. When he drew back, he was grinning. "I love you, Lauren."

She couldn't seem to smile. His enthusiasm chilled her somehow, made her angry. "You always get what you want, don't you?"

His smile fell. "What do you mean?"

She didn't even know. All she knew was that she wanted two things and couldn't have them both. "I don't know."

"Damn it, Lauren. What the hell is wrong with you? How am I supposed to say the right thing when you change your mind every ten seconds?"

"Like you've ever said the right thing. All you've ever wanted is for me to get rid of it."

"Am I supposed to lie? Do you think I want to blow off my whole future and be a dad?"

"And I do? You asshole." She pushed him away.

He seemed to fade at that; it was almost as if he were losing weight before her eyes. "This whole thing blows."

"Big time."

They stood there, staring at each other. Finally, David moved toward her. "I'm sorry. Really."

"This is ruining us," she said.

He took her hand and led her back to the couch. They sat side by side. Still, it felt as if they were miles apart. "Let's quit fighting and talk about it," he said quietly. "All of it."

ANGIE GOT OUT OF HER CAR AND CLOSED THE DOOR.

The storage compartment was in front of her.

C-22.

Other people's compartments were on either side. The long, low building was one of dozens. A-1 Storage, the sign at the front gate read. Keep it safe. Keep it locked.

Angie swallowed hard. The key felt cold and foreign in her hand. She almost turned around then, almost decided she wasn't strong enough to do this after all.

It was that, the fear that she hadn't come far enough to be here, that finally made her move. She put one foot in front of the other, and the next thing she knew she was at the lock. She fit her key in place and clicked it open. The garage-style door clattered up and snaked into place along the ceiling.

She flicked on the light switch.

A lone bulb in the ceiling came on, illuminating a stack of boxes and furniture wrapped in blankets and bedding.

The leftovers from her marriage were all here. The bed she and Conlan had purchased in Pioneer Square and slept on for so many years. The desk he'd used in graduate school and finally given up on. The sectional sofa that had been bought because a whole family could lie on it and watch television.

But she hadn't come here for those things, the reminders of who she'd been.

She'd come for Lauren.

She worked through the boxes, moving first one and then another as she made her way deeper into the storage unit. Finally, she found what she was looking for; it was tucked in the back corner. A trio of boxes marked Nursery.

She should simply take the boxes and put them in her car, but she couldn't. Instead, she knelt on the cold cement floor and opened the box. The Winnie-the-Pooh lamp lay on a stack of pink flannel bedding.

She'd known how it would feel to look at these items, each so carefully chosen, none of them ever used. They were like bits and pieces of her heart, lost along the way but never forgotten.

She picked up a tiny white onesie that was rolled into a ball and held it to her nose. There was no smell except that of cardboard. No baby powder or Johnson's shampoo.

Of course there wasn't. No baby had ever worn this, or wakened to the light that shone from Winnie-thePooh's honey bucket.

She closed her eyes, remembering every nuance of her nursery. Remembering the night she'd packed it all away.

In her mind, she saw a tiny dark-haired girl with her daddy's flashing blue eyes.

"Take care of our Sophia, Papa," she whispered, getting to her feet again.

It was time for all these things to come out of the bleak darkness of this storage unit. They were meant to be used, held, played with. They were meant for a baby's room.

One by one, she carried the boxes to her car. By the time she locked up the storage unit again, it was raining.

ANGIE COULDN'T BELIEVE HOW GOOD SHE FELT. THIS day had shadowed her horizon for years, blocking out the light.

The nursery. The baby clothes and toys. She'd known that as long as she kept those things, she was somehow stuck.

Now, finally, she was free.

She wished Conlan were here to see her now, after all the times he'd found her sitting on the nursery floor, holding some rattle or blanket or knickknack and crying. There wasn't an item in all those boxes that hadn't been watered by her tears.

In fact...

She hit the speed dial on her mounted cell phone.

"News desk."

"Hey, Kathy," Angie said into the speaker on her visor. "It's Angie. Is Conlan in?"

"Sure."

A minute later Conlan answered. "Hey, there. Are you in town?"

"No. I'm on my way back to West End."

"You're going the wrong direction."

She laughed. "Guess what's in my trunk."

"That's a new line."

She felt like an alcoholic who'd finally admitted to having a problem. Her AA meeting was in cardboard boxes in the trunk of her car. "The baby stuff."

There was a pause. Then, "What do you mean?"

"The crib. The clothes. Everything. I cleaned out the storage unit."

A pause crackled through the tiny black speaker. "For Lauren?"

"She'll need it."

Angie knew Conlan heard the distant echo of the other side of those words. And we don't.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"That's the amazing thing, Con. I feel better than okay. Remember that time we went helicopter skiing in Whistler?"

"And you didn't sleep for three nights before?"

"Exactly. I worried myself sick, but once that chopper dropped us off, I flew down the mountain and couldn't wait to go again. That's how this feels. I'm flying down the mountain again."

"Wow."

"I know. I can't wait to give her this stuff. She's going to be so excited."

"I'm proud of you, Ange."

There it was: the reason she'd called him, though she hadn't realized it until just this second.

"We'll celebrate tomorrow night."

"I'll hold you to that."

She was smiling when she hung up. An old Billy Joel song came on the radio. "It's Still Rock & Roll to Me." She cranked up the volume and sang along. By the time she drove into West End and turned onto the beach road, she was singing as loud as she could and thumping the steering wheel in time to the music.

She felt like a kid again, driving home from a football game after a home team win.

She parked close to the house, grabbed her purse, and ran inside.

"Lauren!"

The house was quiet. A fire crackled in the hearth.

There was a pause that seemed to last forever, then a rustle of sound. "We're here."

Lauren sat up on the sofa. Her pale cheeks glistened with tears. Her eyes were swollen and red. David was beside her, holding her hand. He looked as if he'd been crying, too.

Angie felt a stab of fear. She knew about crying in the middle of a pregnancy. "What is it?"

"David and I have been talking."

"The baby is okay?"

"Fine. Perfect."

Angie felt a flood of relief. She'd overreacted, as usual. "Oh. Well, I'll let you two keep talking." She started toward the stairs.

"Wait," Lauren called out, getting awkwardly to her feet. She grabbed a piece of paper from the coffee table and handed it to Angie.

David immediately moved in close to Lauren, put an arm around her.

Angie looked down at the letter in her hands.

Dear Ms. Ribido: We are pleased to offer you admission to the University of Southern California... undergraduate... full scholarship for tuition and housing... respond by June 1...

"I knew you could do it," Angie said gently. She wanted to throw her arms around Lauren and twirl her around, laughing, but that kind of enthusiasm was for ordinary girls in ordinary times. This was anything but.

"I didn't think I'd get in."

Angie had never heard that sad edge in Lauren's voice before. It was heartbreaking. Of all the trials Lauren had faced this year, this--the attainment of her dream--had perhaps hurt the most of all. Now a decision would have to be made, and all of them knew it. "I'm proud of you."

"This changes things," Lauren said so softly that Angie found herself leaning forward to hear.

Angie ached to hug her, but David was there, holding Lauren's hand. "It's not impossible to go to college with a baby."

"A two-month-old?" Lauren's voice sounded old and far away. It echoed and faded, as if she were throwing the ugly words down a well.

Angie closed her eyes. Any answer to that would be a lie. Angie knew already what Lauren was sure to discover: day cares that took two-month-olds were rare. And certainly expensive. She rubbed the bridge of her nose, sighing softly. This was like being on a sinking ship. She could feel the water rising. "That's a problem," she said at last. There was no point lying. "But you're a strong, smart girl--"

"A smart girl would have done things differently," Lauren said. Her eyes filled with tears again, though she was trying to smile. She looked up at David, who nodded down at her encouragingly. Then she looked expectantly at Angie.

For a moment no one spoke.

Angie felt a chill slide down her spine. All at once she was afraid.

Lauren let go of David's hand and took a step forward. "Take our baby, Angie."

The air rushed out of her. She felt her lungs shake with the force of it. "Don't," she whispered, using her hands to ward off the words.

Lauren took another step. Closer. She looked so young. So desperate. Tears swam in her eyes. "Please. We want you to adopt our baby. We've been talking about it all day. It's the only way."

Angie closed her eyes, barely hearing the tiny, mouselike sound that escaped her lips. She couldn't go back down that dream road. It had almost killed her last time. She couldn't think about filling her empty, empty arms again with...

a baby.

She couldn't. She wasn't strong enough.

And yet. How could she possibly walk away from this?

A baby.

She opened her eyes.

Lauren was staring at her. The girl's pale, full cheeks were streaked with tears. Her dark eyes were bloodshot and swollen. The letter from USC was right there, a piece of paper that could change lives...

"Please," Lauren whispered, starting to cry again.

Angie's heart seemed to cave in on itself, leaving her feeling empty inside. Lost. There was no doubt in her mind that she had to say no to this baby. And no way on God's green earth she could do it.

She couldn't say no. Not to Lauren, and not to herself. But she knew, deep in her slowly crumbling heart, that she was doing the wrong thing, even as she said softly, "Yes."

"THERE IS SOMETHING WRONG WITH YOU TODAY," Mama said, pushing the glasses higher on her nose.

Angie looked away. "Nonsense. I'm fine."

"You are not fine. Jerrie Carl had to ask you for a table three times before you answered her."

"And when Mr. Costanza asked for red wine, you handed him the bottle," Mira said, wiping her hands on her apron.

Angie shouldn't have come into the kitchen. Like a pair of hyenas, Mira and Mama sensed distress, and once alerted, they tended to move together, following, waiting.

"I'm fine." She turned and left the kitchen.

Back in the busy dining room, she felt less obvious. She did her best to function. She moved slowly, perhaps, but given her state of mind, any movement at all was a triumph. She smiled blankly and tried to pretend that everything was okay.

The truth was, she couldn't feel much of anything at all. For the past twenty-four hours, she'd kept her emotions in a locked box into which she dared not peek.

It was better not to see. She didn't want to look too closely at this Faustian bargain that she and Lauren had struck. It would take them on a terrible journey, this deal; at the end of it there would be broken hearts on the side of the road. Angie felt as if she'd sealed herself into a small, dark room.

She went over to the window and stared out at the night. The bustling sounds of the busy restaurant faded behind her until she couldn't hear anything beyond the beating of her heart.

What now?

It was the query that had kept her up all last night; the first thing on her mind this morning.

Her emotions were a tangle of hope and despair. She couldn't find a place from which to begin the unraveling. A part of her kept thinking, A baby, and with it came a swelling in her heart that was almost unbearably sweet, but on the heels of that thought was always the other one, the darker, Lauren won't be able to do it.

Either way, there would be heartbreak. At the end of this road lay a terrible choice: Lauren or the baby. Angie could, at best, have one or the other. At worst, she could lose them both.

"Ange?"

She gasped and spun around. Conlan stood behind her, holding a dozen pink roses.

She'd forgotten about their date. She tried to smile, but it was weak and desperate and she saw a frown dart across his forehead. "You're early," she said, laughing a little too sharply, praying it was true. It usually was.

He was still frowning. "Only a minute or two. Are you okay?"

"Of course. Let me just get my coat and say good night." She edged past him and headed for the kitchen. She was at the swinging door when she realized she hadn't taken the flowers from him.

Damn.

"Conlan's here," she said to Mama and Mira. "Can you guys close up tonight?"

Mama and Mira exchanged knowing looks. "So that was it," Mama said. "You were thinking of him."

"I'll give Lauren a ride home," Mira said. "Have fun."

Fun.

Angie forgot to laugh or say good-bye. Instead, she headed back to the dining room. "So, where are we going?" She took the flowers from him, pretended she could smell their scent.

"You'll see." Conlan led her out to his car and helped her into the passenger seat. Within minutes they were driving south.

Angie stared out the window. In the tarnished glass, her reflection stared back at her. Her face looked long and thin, drawn out.

"Is it the baby stuff?"

She blinked, turned. "What?"

"Yesterday you cleaned out the storage room, right? Is that why you're quiet?"

There it was again, the hesitancy in Conlan's voice, the treating her with kid gloves. She hated the familiarity of it. "I was okay yesterday."

Had it really only been a day ago that she'd been there, squatting in front of the relics of her ancient hope, believing she'd moved on?

"Really?"

"I boxed everything up and brought it to the cottage for Lauren." Her voice snagged on the name and it all came rushing back.

Take our baby, Angie.

"You sounded good," he said cautiously.

"I was so happy about it." She hoped her voice didn't sound wistful. So much had happened since then.

"We're here." Conlan turned into a gravel parking lot.

Angie craned her neck and peered through the windshield.

A beautiful stone mansion stood flanked by Douglas fir trees and rimmed in rhododendrons. The Sheldrake Inn welcomes you, read the sign.

She looked at Conlan, giving him her first real smile of the evening. "This is more than a date."

He grinned. "You're living with a teenager now. I have to plan ahead."

She followed him out of the car and into the cozy interior of the inn.

A woman dressed in full Victorian garb greeted them at the door and showed them to the front desk.

"Mr. and Mrs. Malone," said the man behind the reservation desk. "Right on time."

Conlan filled out the paperwork, offered his credit card, then whisked her upstairs. Their room was a beautiful two-room suite with a huge four-poster bed, a river rock fireplace, a bathtub big enough for two, and a magical view of the moonlit coast.

"Ange?"

Slowly she turned around to face him.

How can I tell him?

"Come here."

She was helpless to resist the sound of his voice. She moved toward him. He pulled her into his arms, held her so tightly she felt dizzy.

She had to tell him.

Now.

If they were to have any kind of future, she had to tell him. "Conlan--"

He kissed her then, so gently. When he drew back, he looked down at her.

She felt as if she were drowning in the blue of his eyes.

"I couldn't believe you gave the baby stuff away. I'm so proud of you, Ange. I look at you now and I can breathe again. I don't think I realized until yesterday how long I'd been holding it all inside."

"Oh, Con. We need--"

Very slowly he bent on one knee. Smiling, he held out her wedding ring. "I figured out what to do with it. Marry me again."

The way Angie dropped to her knees was more like folding. "I love you, okay? Don't forget it. As Papa used to say, I love you more than all the drops of rain that fall."

He frowned. "I expected a simple yes. Then a rush to the bed."

"My yes couldn't be any simpler, but I need to tell you something first. You might change your mind."

"About wanting to marry you?"

"Yeah."

He looked at her for a long time, a slight frown creasing his brow. "Okay. Hit me."

She drew in a deep breath. "Yesterday, when I called you about the nursery, I was so excited. I couldn't wait to get home and tell Lauren." She stood up and moved away from him. She went to the window, looked out at the crashing surf. "When I got home, she'd been crying. And David was there."

Conlan stood up. She heard the creaking of the old floorboards. He probably wanted to come stand behind her but he didn't move.

"She got a full ride to USC. Her dream school."

"And?"

"It changed everything," she said softly, echoing Lauren's exact words. "Maybe if she had a toddler, she could swing it, but a two-month-old? There's no way she could handle USC, working, and raising a newborn."

It was a long time before Conlan spoke. When he did, his voice was ragged; not his voice at all. "And?"

Angie squeezed her eyes shut. "She wants to give the baby up for adoption. She thinks it will be the best thing for the baby."

"It probably will be. She's so young." He came up behind Angie, but didn't touch her.

"She said, Take my baby. Just like that." She sighed, felt him stiffen. "It was like being in a car wreck. That's how hard and fast it hit me."

"You said yes."

She heard the dullness in his voice. She turned to face him, thankful at least that he hadn't pulled away. "What choice did I have? I love Lauren. Maybe I never should have let her into my heart--no. No, I won't say that. I'm glad I did. She's how I came back to myself. And to you." She put her arms around his neck, held him close so that he had to look at her. "What if Sophia had asked this of us?"

"She's not Sophia," he said, and she saw how much it hurt him to say that.

"She's somebody's Sophia. She's a scared seventeenyear-old who needs someone to love her, to take care of her. How can I say no to her? Do I tell her to give her baby to strangers when I'm right here? When we're right here?"

"Damn you, Angie." He pushed past her, went into the other room.

She knew she shouldn't go to him, should give him time, but the thought of losing him again made her desperate. "How can we say no to this?" She crossed the room, came up beside him. "You could be his Little League coach--"

"Don't." His voice was barely recognizable.

"How can we say no?" she said again, softer this time, forcing him to face her. As she asked the question, she couldn't help thinking about the day she'd gone to his workplace, when Diane had said: Twice I came into his office and found him crying.

He ran a hand through his hair and sighed. "I don't think I can go through this again. I'm sorry."

She closed her eyes; those two words hurt all the way to the bone. "I know," she said, bowing her head forward. He was right. How could they--she--risk everything again? Tears burned her eyes. There was no good answer. She couldn't lose Conlan again... but how could she say no to Lauren? "I love you so much, Con," she whispered.

"And I love you." The way he said the words they sounded like a curse.

"This could be our chance," she said.

"We've thought that before," he reminded her dully. "Do you know what it was like for me, always picking you up, drying your tears, listening to you cry? Worrying that it was somehow my fault?"

She touched his face. "You had tears of your own."

"Yes." His voice was harsh.

"I never dried them. How could I when I never saw you cry?"

"Your pain was so big...."

"It's different this time, Con. We're different. We could be a team. Maybe she'll be able to go through with it, and we'll be the parents we always wanted to be. Or maybe she'll back out, and it'll be just us. Either way, we'll be okay. I swear it." She dropped down to one knee, whispered, "Marry me, Conlan."

He stared down at her, his eyes bright. "Damn you," he said, sinking slowly to his knees. "I can't live without you anymore."

"Then don't. Please..." She kissed him. "Trust me, Conlan. This time we'll last forever."

LAUREN HEARD DAVID'S CAR DRIVE UP. SHE RAN TO THE front door and opened it, waiting for him.

For the first time in months, he was smiling.

"Are you ready for this?" he asked, taking her hand in his.

"As ready as I'll ever be."

They walked across the yard and got into his car. All the way to Mountainaire, he talked about the Porsche. Gear ratios and speed off the line and custom paint colors. She could tell how nervous he was, and strangely, his anxiety calmed her. When they reached his house, he parked the car, then let out a deep sigh and looked at her. "You're sure?"

"I am."

"Okay."

They walked up the stone path to the Hayneses' huge front door. David opened the door and led her into the cool, beige elegance of his home. "Mom? Dad?"

"Are you sure they're home?" Lauren whispered, taking his hand.

"They're home. I told them we needed to talk."

Mr. and Mrs. Haynes came into the room fast, as if they'd been waiting just around the corner.

Mrs. Haynes stared at Lauren's rounded belly.

Mr. Haynes studiously avoided looking at her. He led them into the sunken living room, where everything was the color of heavy cream and nothing was out of place.

Unless, of course, you counted the pregnant girl.

"Well," Mr. Haynes said when they'd all sat down.

"How are you feeling?" Mrs. Haynes asked. Her voice sounded strained, and she seemed unable to meet Lauren's gaze.

"Fat but great. My doctor says everything is perfect."

"She got a full ride to USC," David said to his parents.

"That's fabulous," Mrs. Haynes said. She glanced at her husband, who leaned forward in his seat.

Lauren reached for David's hand, held it. She felt surprisingly calm. "We've decided to give the baby up for adoption."

"Thank God," Mr. Haynes said, sighing harshly. For the first time, Lauren noticed the tenseness in his jawline, the worry in his eyes. Relief changed his face. He finally smiled.

Mrs. Haynes moved to sit beside Lauren. "That couldn't have been an easy decision for you."

Lauren was grateful for that. "It wasn't."

Mrs. Haynes started to reach for her, then withdrew her hand at the last second. Lauren had the strange impression that David's mother was afraid to touch her. "I think it's for the best. You two are so young. We'll call the lawyer and--"

"We've already chosen the parents," Lauren said. "My... boss. Angie Malone."

Mrs. Haynes nodded. Even though she was obviously relieved, she looked sad somehow. She bent forward, picked up her purse, and pulled it onto her lap. She pulled out a checkbook, wrote a check, and ripped it out, then stood up. She handed the check to Lauren.

It was for five thousand dollars.

Lauren looked up. "I can't take this."

Mrs. Haynes gazed down at her. Lauren saw the wrinkles through her makeup for the first time. "It's for your college fund. Los Angeles is an expensive city. A scholarship won't handle everything."

"But--"

"Let me do this," she said softly. "You're a good girl, Lauren. On your way to becoming a good woman."

Lauren swallowed hard, surprised by how moved she was by that simple compliment. "Thank you."

Mrs. Haynes started to move away, then stopped and turned back. "Maybe you could give me a photograph of my--of the baby when he's born."

It was the first time Lauren had thought of the baby as their grandchild. "Sure," she said.

Mrs. Haynes looked down at her. "Do you really think you can do this?"

"I have to. It's the right thing to do."

After that, there was nothing left to say.