LITMIR.BIZ

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      For Dan, the bookends of my love life.

      Eternal thanks to…

      My amazing editors: Sam Bell, for your kindness, calmness and can-do-ness (I’ll miss you terribly!), and Farrin Jacobs, for your thoughtful, artful guidance in shaping this story. My devoted agent, Marcy Posner, for all your wisdom and patience. Superdesigners Margie Miller and Tara Kelly for another wonderful cover. Margaret Marbury and the rest of the brilliant group at Red Dress Ink for making it all happen so beautifully yet again.

      A truly stellar team of baby-sitters—Sandy, Bubba, Rachel, Nelu and Allison Ouimet—for loving my kid as if she were your own. Galit, for letting me adopt and abuse your laptop (I hope it’s still under warranty). Shoel, Issie, Rose, Ted, Dan, Darline, Selena, Dino, Keenan, Jordy and Sarah, and all the girls, near and far, for asking, caring and sharing.

      Dan, most of all, for being my live-in motivational speaker. Your passionate sincerity, sympathetic soul and boundless enthusiasm for all things me remind me daily why I married you. And, of course, Abigail—the littlest, loveliest person I know.

      Contents

      Prologue

      Part One

      Chapter 1

      Chapter 2

      Chapter 3

      Chapter 4

      Chapter 5

      Chapter 6

      Chapter 7

      Part Two

      Chapter 8

      Chapter 9

      Chapter 10

      Chapter 11

      Part Three

      Chapter 12

      Chapter 13

      Chapter 14

      Chapter 15

      Chapter 16

      Chapter 17

      Chapter 18

      Chapter 19

      Chapter 20

      Chapter 21

      Chapter 22

      Epilogue

      prologue

      The Last First Day of the Rest of My Life

      BUZZ BUZZ! “Looks like another scorcher today folks! Eighty-eight degrees and—” BUZZ BUZZ! “—rising fast! But we’ve got twelve uninterrupted minutes of cool tunes coming up—” BUZZ BUZZ! “—so stick around for some Culture Club, Metallica and Phil Collins—” BUZZ BUZZ! “—right after these—”

      My first conscious thought is that I want very much to stab myself in the eardrums to make it stop. But I smack Snooze instead, the blessed silence returns, and I bury my aching head beneath the pillow.

      Soon, instead of cursing Buffalo’s Number One Home of the Eighties, Nineties and Beyond with all the fire and venom I can muster, I’m dreaming fitfully about Phil Collins. He’s holding a crisp white bouquet of stephanotis and riding naked on a unicycle down the aisle at my brother’s wedding….

      BUZZ BUZZ! “—and the seventeenth K-HIT caller who can tell me Axl Rose’s real name—” BUZZ BUZZ! “—will win a pair of tickets for tomorrow night to see November Rain—” BUZZ BUZZ! “—the rockingest tribute band Buffalo has ever—” BUZZ BUZZ!

      Oh, for God’s sake!

      (SMACK!)

      I lift the pillow and squint, one-eyed, at the glowing green numbers…. 8:10. Crap. But everything gets fuzzy and warm again and I drift off… Ahhh…there’s Phil again, and he looks lovely—

      BUZZ BUZZ!

      Grrrr…

      (SMACK!)

      I squint again… 8:23? Damn. I squint harder… 8:28! Shit!

      Painfully, excruciatingly, I open the other eye. A pack of Canadian cigarettes next to the alarm clock comes slowly into focus….

      No. Please no. Oh God, NO! NOT AGAIN!!!

      I wipe the sleep from my face, panicking now. On the floor, ripped spandex shorts, a bicycle seat and a muddy tire….

      Maybe it’s a dream. A bad, bad dream.

      I pinch myself—hard—just in case, and wait.

      Nothing.

      Hoping against hope, I turn over….

      Ugh. There he is—Jean-Jean. On my formerly very white Egyptian polished-cotton sateen jacquard sheets by Ralph Lauren. Still wearing that dirty baseball hat. Still sleeping. Snoring, even. The audacity.

      Maybe he’s just a hallucination.

      Yes, that’s it! A hallucination induced by alcohol poisoning!

      But as last night’s events bleed through my slowly waking mind like a spreading stain, I recall that I only drank two and a half martinis over a four-hour period. Barely enough to give me a hangover, let alone mental delusions or visual disturbances of any kind.

      But wait… Hold on a second… I did have several olives, come to think of it, and hadn’t I once read somewhere that gin-soaked olives have been known to cause, in some suggestible individuals, effects not unlike those of the storied tequila worm?

      Perhaps not. But surely there was an explanation other than the obvious: That I’d slept with the idiotic French-Canadian bicycle messenger from work.

      Again.

      And yet here he is, all wrapped up in my fine 400-thread-count bedding like a birthday present from hell. Happy 29th, Holly! Here you go—humiliation incarnate. Hope you like it! What, pray tell, could I look forward to next year? A tumor?

      But it isn’t my birthday. Thank God at least for that. Nope, it’s just a plain old Friday morning. Which means that last night’s senseless debauchery was both desperate and stupid, completely devoid of any excuse—rational, alcoholic, depressive or otherwise. Understandable for a Saturday night maybe, when the symptoms of singlehood flare up and otherwise disgraceful hookups might be forgiven, but on a Thursday?

      I should be ashamed of myself. Beyond ashamed, really. Why hadn’t I just stayed home alone and watched an E.R. repeat with a cheap bottle of wine like all the other normal, hopeless, single women in Buffalo?

      “Excuse me,” I say, and nudge him with my heel. Hard.

      He turns over, grunts and smiles.

      “Ahem!” I say loudly, covering myself.

      “Heh?”

      “Please, Jean-Jean, wake up! Allez vous!” I don’t know much French,

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