LITMIR.BIZ

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      ABOUT THE AUTHOR

      As a child, Kaitlyn Rice loved to lie on the floor of her bedroom and draw pencil sketches of characters. She remembers assigning each one a name and personality, and imagining what their lives might be like. This study of people and relationships—both real and made up—has always fascinated her. By her midteens she was drawn into the world of romance fiction.

      Through the years, Kaitlyn’s most enduring pastime has been to curl up with a good romance novel, and her fondest dream has been to create full-fledged versions of those character sketches—in book form. She’s thrilled to have finally realized that goal. Kaitlyn lives in Kansas with her husband and two daughters.

      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

      EPILOGUE

      CHAPTER ONE

      ABIGAIL BRIGGS had outgrown temper tantrums well over twenty years ago, when she still wore bandages on her knees and thought marshmallows were a satisfactory lunch entrée.

      Still, if someone didn’t answer her questions soon, she was considering lying on the floor, screaming like a forgotten tea-kettle and thrashing around as wildly as the most precocious of toddlers.

      Even in her brand-new business suit.

      After she’d announced her arrival to the receptionist, she had sat on the edge of the sofa to begin her wait. She must have glanced at her wristwatch at least a hundred times. The second hand kept whirling around its perpetual circle with easy fluidity, but the minute and hour hands seemed sluggish. Twenty-eight minutes she’d waited. It may as well have been twenty-eight hours.

      Abby’s mother had always said she was intense, while her father called her spirited. They were apt descriptions, she knew, since she’d spent her adolescence diving blindly and defiantly into a sea of mistakes.

      Over the years, however, she had developed patience for most things. Anyone who made her living as a gardener learned to wait.

      She could scatter a few handfuls of seeds, and in a season orchestrate the blooms of enough bouquets to please every bride, mother, wife and lover in Topeka, Kansas, and the surrounding county. She could plunk the rooted end of a twig into the ground and nurture it for years, until it became a robust tree capable of bearing bushels of fruit so tender their flesh melted in your mouth.

      But some things were too hard to wait for, and this appointment must rate at the top of the charts in importance. Whatever that slick lawyer was doing right now, it could hardly compare to the weighty deliberation about the future of two precious babies.

      Abby’s indignation had risen with every minute, and now she tapped her foot forcefully on the cushioned carpet, trying to achieve a loud enough sound to catch the notice of the delinquent receptionist. But the woman tapped away at her keyboard, apparently unaware of the hateful thoughts being directed toward her pencil-punctured bun.

      The painting on the wall above the receptionist’s head caught Abby’s eye, if only because it was unimaginative. She wondered if any client had ever been distracted by the watery scene. She wanted to slash it with her pen, paint vivid, deep purple figures across it to express a hurt so deep no lawyer’s meeting could ever truly mend it.

      Paige and Brian were dead, which was reason enough for her impatience, and for the relentless ache in Abby’s gut. The fact that her sister and brother-in-law had died a quick death did little to lessen the agony.

      Each of them had been only twenty-two years old, and they had left behind much. A wide network of friends and acquaintances. A couple of broken-hearted families. And a pair of adorable twins, not yet six months old.

      The sound of footsteps drew Abby’s attention to the conference room door. It swung open, and a tall man stepped out. His eyes bore the dazed look of a person in shock. His jaw was clenched, his face chalky. His appearance was worlds apart from the tanned and relaxed man Abby had met at her sister’s wedding, but she couldn’t fail to recognize him—Jack Kimball was Brian’s older brother.

      He hesitated midstep when he saw her, as if he was once again struggling to place her in their out-of-the-ordinary surroundings. At the funeral, they’d traded arm-patting hugs and the expected words of comfort, but it had hardly been a time for renewing their acquaintance. Now, Abby sat up straighter and smoothed a long wisp of hair behind her ear. Then she balled her fist and dropped it in her lap, perturbed with herself for caring about her appearance.

      She knew the exact instant he recognized her by the renewed hint of life in his expression. He gave a curt nod as he walked past her toward the exit, offering only one word in greeting. “Abby.”

      She had scarcely enough time to question his presence in the law office before the conference room door opened again. Sheila Jeffries, upstart attorney and daughter of the firm’s founder, poked her head through. “Miss Briggs,” she said. “I’m ready for you.”

      Abby picked up a briefcase containing every pertinent document she’d been able to find among her sister’s things, and went inside. The attorney smoothed her hands down the lines of her red linen suit as Abby stepped in, then motioned toward a chair at a corner of the table.

      “Coffee?” she asked. Without hesitating, she walked over to a setup on the far end of the room to pour herself a cup.

      Abby swallowed. Her throat had been so dry lately. She wondered how much bodily fluid a person could actually lose by crying. “I’d love a glass of water.”

      “Certainly.” The attorney pushed a button on the wall, and the hum of an intercom pervaded the room.

      “Yes, Ms. Jeffries,” said a crackling voice.

      “Please bring Miss Briggs some ice water.”

      The hum faded, and the lawyer took a seat across from Abby and started thumbing through the papers stacked in front of her. The only movement on her face was the occasional blink of her perfectly made-up eyes, beneath a pair of perfectly arched eyebrows.

      She looked refined. Disinterested. Detached.

      As an attorney,

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