LITMIR.BIZ

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outside of the house continued inside. The hardwood floors gleamed beneath a new coat of stain and faintly striped wallpaper brought out the floral patterns in the chintz sofa and armchairs. But the focal point of the room, a family portrait hanging above the red brick fireplace mantel, remained.

      Taken several years ago, the portrait showed her three brothers in back. Nick, the oldest, was in the middle, flanked on either side by Drew, who shared Nick’s dark coloring, and by Sam, the only blond-haired one in the bunch. Her parents were seated in front of the boys—her father, an older, leaner version of his sons, his thick dark hair sprinkled with gray and laugh lines around his dark-brown eyes, and her mother, as petite as her husband and sons were tall, her chestnut hair cut in a sleek bob to frame her round face and green eyes. Sophia sat front and center, her dark hair longer back then, smiling at the camera with all the confidence of an eighteen-year-old kid ready to conquer the world.

      Sophia sighed. Little had she known.

      Walking toward the back of the house, she expected to find some member of her family—her parents would never dream of eating out on a Sunday night. But the comfortable kitchen, with its oak cabinets, matching table and chairs and green gingham accents, was empty.

      Sophia turned in a circle, feeling somewhat lost in her childhood home, until the sound of laughter rang in the distance. With a glance at the back door, she smiled despite the churning in her stomach. Of course. The weather was perfect for a barbecue, and grilling outdoors was the one chance her mother had in getting someone else to cook a meal.

      Plastering on a smile, Sophia opened the back door and stepped out onto the porch. “Hey, everybody, I’m home,” she announced, preparing for the usual enthusiastic greetings that never failed to disguise the worry and question in her family’s eyes.

      Shouts of “Sweetheart!” “Squirt!” and “Fifi!” rang out, the last despised nickname coming from Sam, who called her that only to annoy her.

      But one voice she never expected to hear spoke quietly in her ear. “Hello, Sophia.”

      Speechless, she turned and gazed into Jake Cameron’s amber eyes.

      Chapter Two

      Jake Cameron. Here. At her parents’ house. With her family. Wearing—was that her mother’s apron? Sophia blinked hard, twice, but when she opened her eyes, Jake still stood mere inches away, his expression serious despite the frilly white apron covered by pink potbellied pigs.

      She was dreaming. Her foolish, foolish wish of having Jake accompany her to her parents’ house had slipped into her subconscious, where she was too vulnerable to keep the ridiculous hope at bay. That was the only possible explanation. She was still asleep at some by-the-highway hotel, her face smashed into a cheap pillow, having a doozy of a nightmare. The breeze carried the scent of charcoal and the sounds of her family’s greetings, but none of it was real.

      Jake even looked as he always did in her dreams—too tempting for her peace of mind and too good to be true, she thought, her hungry gaze taking in rugged features that had become breathtakingly familiar in such a short time. The setting sun burnished his brown hair, bringing out the highlights in the slightly shaggy strands, and turning his skin to gold. Faint lines fanned out from his whiskey-colored eyes, hinting at a smile that could flash lightning quick or start her body on a slow burn with sexy, seductive deliberation.

      If she closed her eyes, she could still feel the heated promise of his lips against hers in intoxicating kisses that made her forget the harsh lessons of the past. But she didn’t need to close her eyes because she was already asleep. Sophia was sure of it …

      Until Jake reached out, trailed his fingers down the all-too-sensitive inside of her arm and took her hand. Her heart slammed in her chest, hard enough to stop its beat and steal her breath, and Sophia knew this was happening, this was real. Because nothing—not a dream, not a nightmare, not a figment of her imagination—could affect her like this.

      Nothing but living, breathing, flesh-and-blood Jake Cameron could make her feel this way.

      Sophia jerked her hand from his as she choked out in a whisper, “What—what are you doing here?”

      Before Jake had the chance to answer, Sam bounded up the back steps to the small landing. “We didn’t know you’d be bringing company, but hey! More the merrier!” Sam slapped Jake on the back hard enough to knock a smaller man aside, but Jake absorbed the blow with little reaction. Her brother dropped a kiss on her cheek as he brushed by. “Good to see you, Fifi. And about time, too.”

      Sophia could barely manage a response to her brother’s greeting. She’d imagined dozens of scenarios where she had a chance to confront Jake Cameron and let him have it for lying to her. In those somewhat vengeful daydreams, she was sharp, clever and cutting enough to bring him to his knees. Never, though, in any of those scenes had she pictured a moment like this.

      “Let me guess,” she said, a hint of hysteria creeping into her voice, “the apron was Sam’s idea.”

      Jake glanced down at the parade of pigs. “He said it was the only one.” His knowing look told Sophia he hadn’t believed it for a second, but then again—

      “Takes one to know one,” she muttered beneath her breath, but not so quietly that Jake didn’t still hear, judging by the muscle tightening in his jaw.

      As the screen door slammed shut behind Sam, Sophia gradually became aware of the rest of her family. Nick and Drew had apparently been in the middle of a supposedly touch football game, judging by the grass stains on Drew’s jeans and the ball tucked beneath Nick’s arm. Her father stood at the grill Jake had abandoned and her mother and Nick’s daughter, Maddie, had been sitting beneath the gazebo off to the side of the yard.

      At Sophia’s arrival, though, everyone charged en masse, giving Jake little time to reply and Sophia less time to prepare. She’d barely made it down the back steps when her mother and niece reached her, Vanessa hugging her shoulders while seven-year-old Maddie wrapped her skinny arms around her waist. “Sophia! It’s so good to see you. I’ve missed you.”

      Wrapped in a cloud of cinnamon-scented warmth, Sophia swallowed hard. “Missed you too, Mom.”

      Vanessa Pirelli pulled back, her green eyes taking quick inventory of her only daughter. Sophia instinctively stiffened as she waited for the questions to cloud her mother’s expression with worry. Was she okay? Was she in trouble? Had she fallen in with the wrong crowd again?

      To Sophia’s surprise, and for the first time in years, disappointment failed to dim the light in her mother’s eyes. Not until her mother included Jake in her happy gaze did Sophia fully understand why. “Wasn’t it sweet of Jake to surprise you like this?”

      “It’s a surprise,” she agreed, avoiding the “sweet” description when it came to Jake Cameron.

      Her fault, of course, for letting the deception go on as long as she had. Was there some ugly, painful stone in her dismal love life he’d somehow left unturned? He was headed for disappointment. She’d spilled her heart to him already.

      She’d foolishly felt she owed him the truth—that she was being unfair to start any kind of relationship without telling Jake about the child she carried. Turned out she didn’t owe him at all. He was already getting paid, and how unfair was that?

      She felt Jake’s intense gaze on the side of her face, as if his golden eyes gave off as much heat as the man himself, but she refused to glance his way. Struggling for normalcy in front of her family, Sophia focused on her niece. She cupped the girl’s dimpled chin in her hand and exclaimed, “Maddie, I think you’ve grown a foot since I saw you last!”

      “I’m starting third grade soon! I’ll be in Mrs. Dawson’s class,” the tiny, girlish version of her big brother said, her whole body practically vibrating with excitement. In Clearville’s small elementary school, first and second grades were housed together in the same classroom. Entering third grade was an enormous step.

      “You’re

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