LITMIR.BIZ

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watched as Piers settled back down on the floor beside the baby and started talking to him as if he was the cleverest kid in the world. This time when her heart strings pulled, it was a different kind of feeling. One that made her realize all that she’d forsaken in her life with her choice not to have a family. Faye made herself turn away and take the basket back to the laundry room. She couldn’t stay here another second and allow herself to—

      She cut off that train of thought but a persistent voice at the back of her mind asked, Allow yourself to what? To fall in love with them? That would be stupid. Stupid and self-destructive.

      Faye made herself scarce during Casey’s bath time and final feeding, leaving Piers to settle him for the night. Now that she knew she’d be leaving at some stage tomorrow, she didn’t trust herself not to indulge in little Casey’s nearness just that bit too much. It would be all too easy to nuzzle that dark fuzz of hair on his head, to pepper his chubby little cheeks with kisses, to coax just one more smile from him before bedtime, to feel the weight of his solid little body lying so trustingly in her arms. Just thinking about it made her ache to hold him, but she held firm on her decision to keep a safe distance between them. Piers was perfectly capable of seeing to Casey’s immediate needs right now. The baby didn’t need her any more than she wanted to be needed.

      But you do want to be needed, came that insidious inner voice again. The voice that, no matter how resolute she determined to be, continued to wear at her psyche. It had been easy enough for her to keep away from situations where interaction with babies was inevitable, but in this enforced, close atmosphere here at the lodge, all her hard-fought-for internal barricades had begun to crumble.

      She needed some distance. Right now.

      Faye turned on her heel and left the room, checking the laundry to ensure she hadn’t left anything behind before taking the back stairs up to the next floor. She closed the door behind her when she reached her bedroom, leaned against it and let out the pent-up sigh she’d been holding.

      Tomorrow, she told herself. She’d have her life back tomorrow. Just a few more hours. She could do this. How hard could it be to continue to resist one exceptionally adorable baby and a man who made her breath hitch and her heart hammer a rapid beat in her chest? For now, though, she had work to do and she had a whole lot of people to contact on Piers’s behalf to cancel the house party.

      When that task was done, she decided to get the ball rolling with the private investigation firm Piers used on occasion to collate data on a prospective property development. They were discreet and detailed. Everything you needed an investigator to be.

      She explained the situation with Casey and what little information they had about his mother, and asked if they could look into things. After hitting Send on the email, she lay back on her bed and wondered if she could simply hide out there for the rest of the night. But a knock at her bedroom door drew her up on her feet again.

      Piers leaned against the doorjamb with a sardonic smile on his face.

      “It’s safe to come out now,” he said. “Casey’s down for the night.”

      “I wasn’t hiding from Casey.”

      “Oh, you were hiding from me, then?”

      “No, of course not. I was working,” she protested, earning another devastating smile from her boss.

      She detailed what she’d done and he nodded with approval.

      “Thanks for taking care of all that. I’d have gotten onto the investigators myself, but I got busy with Casey.”

      “That’s why you have me, remember.”

      The words tripped glibly off her tongue but her job truly meant the world to her. She actively enjoyed the sense of order she could restore when things went awry and, for her, the skill she’d developed for anticipating Piers’s needs—whether professionally or personally—was something to take pride in. Doing her job well was important to her. Basically, when it came down to it, it was all she had.

      Sure, she had a handful of friends, but they were more acquaintances really. She tended to keep people at arm’s length because it was so much easier that way. She’d even lost touch with Brenda, her best friend from high school. Brenda had tried so hard to be there for Faye after the crash, but no one could truly understand what she’d been through, or how she’d felt, and eventually Brenda, too, had drifted out of her sphere. Now they occasionally exchanged birthday cards, but it was the sum total of their contact with one another.

      “Yes, that’s why I have you,” he answered with a note of solemnity in his voice she couldn’t quite understand. He held out a hand. “Come on downstairs. The fire’s going, the music’s playing and I have a very special bottle of champagne on ice.”

      “Champagne?” she asked, reluctantly giving him her hand and allowing him to tug her along the hallway.

      “Yeah, we’re celebrating, remember?”

      “Ah, yes. Freedom.”

      “Is that all it is to you? A chance to run away?”

      Was it?

      “I had other plans, too, you know,” she said defensively.

      So what if those plans included allowing herself to go into deep mourning for her family the way she did every year. It was how she coped—how she kept herself together for the balance of the year. It was the only time of year she ever allowed herself to look through the old family albums that ended abruptly thirteen years ago. It hurt—oh, how it hurt—but they were snapshots of happier times and that one night was all she’d allow herself—it was all she deserved.

      They reached the bottom of the stairs and Faye noticed he’d put lighted candles around the main room and turned the Christmas tree lights off. Piers spun her to face him, his expression serious.

      “I’m really sorry you ended up stuck here. I mean it. I should have realized you’d have plans of your own. It’s just that you’re always there at the end of the phone or in the office working right next to me. I guess I’m guilty of taking you for granted.”

      “It’s okay. I love my work, Piers. I wouldn’t change it for the world.”

      “But there’s more to life than work, right?”

      She smiled in response and watched as he reached down and pulled a bottle of French champagne from the ice bucket that stood sweating on a place mat on the coffee table.

      “The good stuff tonight, hmm?” she commented as he deftly popped the cork.

      “Only the best. We’ve earned it, don’t you think? Besides, we’re celebrating the road being cleared.”

      Faye accepted a crystal flute filled with the golden, bubbling liquid. “It’s not clear yet,” she reminded him.

      “Always so pedantic,” he teased. “Then let’s just say we’re celebrating the prospect of the road being cleared, and of Casey not needing to use my good linen as diapers.”

      “To both of those things.” Faye smiled and clinked her glass to his.

      She cocked her head and listened to the music playing softly in the background.

      “What? No Christmas carols?” she said over the rim of her glass.

      “I know you don’t like them. I thought tonight I’d cut you some slack,” he said with a wink.

      “Thank you, I appreciate it.”

      She sipped her champagne, enjoying the sensation of the bubbles dancing on her tongue before she swallowed. The sparkling wine was so much better than anything she allowed herself to indulge in at home. Piers turned to put another log on the fire and she found herself swaying gently to the music as she watched him. When he straightened from the fireplace, she realized she’d already drunk half her glass and it was already beginning to mess with her head. She was such a lightweight when it came to drinking, which was part

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