His Second-Chance Family

And you, she added silently. She thought of the loneliness in Anna’s eyes, the tiny shadow of sadness she was certain Anna never guessed showed on her expression.

Their neighbor wasn’t the only one who deserved to be happy, but she decided she—and Abigail—could only focus on one thing at a time. “Will has had so much pain in his life. Wouldn’t you love to see him smile again?”

“Of course. But Julia herself said she hadn’t seen him in years and they barely recognized each other. And we don’t even know the woman. She could be married.”

“Widowed. She told me that on the phone. Two years, the same as Will.”

Compassion flickered in Anna’s brown eyes. “Those poor children, to lose their father at such a young age.” She paused. “That doesn’t mean whatever scheme you’re hatching has any chance of working.”

“I know. But it’s worth a shot. Anyway, Conan likes them and that’s the important thing, isn’t it, bud?”

The dog barked, giving his uncanny grin. As far as Sage was concerned, references or not, that settled the matter.

Chapter Three

Sage and Anna apparently had a new tenant.

Will slowed his pickup down as he passed Brambleberry House coming from the south. He couldn’t miss the U-Haul trailer hulking in the driveway and he could see Sage heading into the house, her arms stacked high with boxes. Anna was loading her arms with a few more while Julia’s children played on the grass not far away with Conan. Even from here he could see the dog’s glee at having new playmates.

Damn. This is the price he paid for his inaction. He should have stopped by a day or two earlier and at least tried to dissuade Anna and Sage from taking her on as a tenant.

It probably wouldn’t have done any good, he acknowledged. Both of Abigail’s heirs could be as stubborn as crooked nails when they had their minds made up about something. Still, he should have at least made the attempt.

But what could he have said, really, that wouldn’t have made him sound like a raving lunatic?

Yeah, she seems nice enough and I sure was crazyabout her when I was sixteen. But I don’t want heraround anymore because I don’t like being remindedI’m still alive.

He sighed and turned off his truck. He wanted nothing more than to drive past the house and hide out at his place down the beach until she moved on but there was no way on earth his blasted conscience would let him leave three women and two kids to do all that heavy lifting on their own.

He climbed out of his pickup and headed to the trailer. He reached it just as the top box on Anna’s stack started to slide.

He lunged for it and plucked the wobbly top box just before it would have hit the ground, earning a surprised look from Anna over the next-highest box.

“Wow! Good catch,” she said, a smile lifting her studious features. “Lucky you were here.”

“Rule of thumb—your stack of boxes probably shouldn’t exceed your own height.”

She smiled. “Good advice. I’m afraid I can get a little impatient sometimes.”

“Is that it? I thought you just like to bite off more than you can chew.”

She made a wry face at him. “That, too. How did you know we needed help?”

He shrugged. “I was driving past and saw your leaning tower and thought you might be able to use another set of arms.”

“We’ve got plenty of arms. We just need some arms with muscle. Thanks for stopping.”

“Glad to help.” It was a blatant lie but he decided she didn’t need to know that.

She turned and headed up the stairs and he grabbed several boxes from inside the truck and followed her, trying to ignore the curious mingle of dread and anticipation in his gut.

He didn’t want to see Julia again. He had already dreamed about her the last two nights in a row. More contact would only wedge her more firmly into his head.

At the same time, part of him—maybe the part that was still sixteen years old somewhere deep inside—couldn’t help wondering how the years might have changed her.

Anna was breathing hard by the time they reached the middle floor of the house, where the door to the apartment had been propped open with a small stack of books.

“I could have taken another one of your boxes,” he said to Anna.

She made a face. “Show-off. Are you even working up a sweat?”

“I’m sweating on the inside,” he answered, which was nothing less than the truth.

The source of his trepidation spoke to Anna an instant later.

“Thanks so much,” Julia Blair said in her low, sexy voice. “Those go in Simon’s bedroom.”

Will lowered his boxes so he could see over them and found her standing in the middle of the living room directing traffic. She wore capris and a stretchy yellow T-shirt. With her hair pulled back into a ponytail, she looked fresh and beautiful and not much older than she’d been that last summer together.

He didn’t miss the shock in her eyes when she spied him behind the boxes. “Will! What are you doing here?”

He shrugged, uncomfortable at her obvious shock. Why shouldn’t he be here helping? It was the neighborly thing to do. Had he really been such a complete jerk the other day that she find his small gesture of assistance now so stunning?

“Do these go into the same room?”

She looked flustered, her cheeks slightly pink. “Um, no. Those are my things. They go in my bedroom, the big one overlooking the ocean.”

He headed in the direction she pointed, noting again no sign of a Mr. Blair. On some instinctive level, he had subconsciously picked up the fact that she wore no wedding ring when he had seen her the other day and she had spoken only of herself and her children needing an apartment. Was she widowed, divorced, or never married?

He only wondered out of mild curiosity about the road she might have traveled in the years since he had seen her. Or at least that’s what he told himself.

In her bedroom, he found stacks of boxes, some of them open and overflowing with books. The queen-size bed was already made up with a cozy-looking comforter in soft blue tones, with piles of pillows against the headboard.

An image flashed in his head of her tousled and welcoming, her auburn hair spread out on those pillows and a soft, aroused smile teasing the edges of those lovely features.

He dropped the boxes so abruptly he barely missed his toe.

Whoa. Where the hell did that come from?

He had no business thinking about her at all, forget about in some kind of sultry, welcoming pose.

When he returned to the living room, her cheeks were still flushed and she didn’t meet his gaze, as if she were embarrassed about something. It was a damn good thing she couldn’t know the inappropriate direction of his thoughts.

“I’m sorry.” She fidgeted with a stack of books in her hand. “I probably sounded terribly ungracious when you first came in. I just didn’t expect you to show up and start hauling my boxes inside.”

“No problem.”

He started to head toward the door, but she apparently wasn’t content with his short response. “Why, again, are you helping me move in?”