Winning her over means winning everything

Sophie Callahan is PI Brad Harrington’s best lead to tracking down the man he’s been hired to bring to justice: Sophie’s own thieving father. But when Brad arrives at The Pampered Pooch, just behind a litter of stray kittens, the pet-store owner is the big surprise. This scrappy, huge-hearted woman with charm to spare gets to Brad in a way no one has ever been able to before. She spends her life finding—and making—homes for others: abandoned pets, her young niece. He’ll have to tell her why he’s really here. Which means he’ll have to choose between his sail-away dreams and the chance to build a forever home—with her.

“What do you want from me?”

“I don’t want anything.” Brad pointed to the stairs. “But there’s a little girl down there who thinks of you as her world. As her everything. As her—”

“Don’t say it.” Sophie lunged forward and pressed her palm over his mouth. “I’m better as Ella’s aunt.”

Brad pulled her hand off his mouth, anchoring her with their linked fingers. She searched his face, watched the emotions in his gaze and the words backing up against his closed lips. Maybe he finally understood.

“I lied.” His voice was low. “I do want something from you.”

Sophie waited. The attic seemed to be closing in on her. She shivered. “What?”

Brad tugged her close. “This.”

Sophie stopped fighting, stopped running and stopped hiding. There was so much she couldn’t be. Couldn’t have. But this moment, she’d take this.

Dear Reader,

As a child, our family hopscotched across the US for my father’s job. Living in Pittsburgh meant begging to be allowed into my brother’s backyard snow huts and cheering on the Steelers. Houston brought rodeos and the largest flying cockroaches I’ve ever seen. Northern California introduced us to towering redwood trees and Lake Tahoe. And Hawaii gave us Christmas Day at the beach and a sense of aloha that remains with me today. My parents’ relocations continued after my brothers and I moved out and I’ve been fortunate to experience even more new cities on my trips to visit them.

But one place has been a longtime favorite: San Francisco. I loved to visit the city as a child and I still cherish the time I lived there after college—ever grateful for the lasting friendships I made. Friends who today I consider family. I fell in love in the city and seventeen years later, my husband and I still talk about our first date to the Orpheum Theatre followed by a toast at The Fairmont Hotel.

I’m so thrilled to be able to write a series set in San Francisco with characters who discover all they’ve ever needed can be found in the City by the Bay, if they only open their hearts.

I love to connect with readers. Check my website to learn more about my upcoming books and sign up for email book announcements, or chat with me on Facebook (carilynnwebb) or Twitter (@carilynnwebb). Let me know what your favorite city is and I’ll add it to my ever-expanding places-to-visit list.

Happy reading!

Cari Lynn Webb

www.CariLynnWebb.com

The Charm Offensive

Cari Lynn Webb

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CARI LYNN WEBB lives in South Carolina with her husband, daughters and assorted four-legged family members. She’s been blessed to see the power of true love in her grandparents’ seventy-year marriage and her parents’ marriage of over fifty years. She knows love isn’t always sweet and perfect—it can be challenging, complicated and risky. But she believes happily-ever-afters are worth fighting for.

To my daughter, Emma, whose laughter brightens every day. I love you more than you know. Don’t ever stop laughing.

Special thanks to Melinda Curtis and Anna J. Stewart for answering every plotting SOS whether it was a late-night text, early morning email or last-minute Skype session. And thanks to my husband and family for their continuous encouragement and inspiration.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Dear Reader

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

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

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

EPILOGUE

Extract

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

“THE WIRE TRANSFER was completed yesterday at the request of George Callahan.” The financial advisor for Pacific Bank and Trust in San Francisco watched Sophie Callahan over a bland manila file folder. “The account is empty.”

Empty. Sophie shifted sideways in the leather chair and crossed her legs as if that might minimize the impact of the woman’s firm yet unapologetic voice. An ache wrapped around Sophie’s throat and squeezed. “You’re certain?”

“Yes. The funds have been withdrawn.” She slid a floral tissue box closer to Sophie as if on cue. As if the efficient financial advisor had played out this scenario many times before and the tissues were standard procedure.

Sophie straightened her shoulders, refusing to slide back into the supple leather chair. The leather was pliant, not because it was expensive but rather from all the customers who’d collapsed after Beth Perkins, senior financial advisor, personally delivered their nightmares. “George Callahan is my father.”

“According to our paperwork, he’s joint owner of the savings account.” Beth opened the manila folder and spun the documents to face Sophie.

Sophie recognized the flourish of her grandmother’s signature in black ink on the bottom of the top page. Sophie’s grandmother had added Sophie to her savings account seven years ago, the very same day her grandmother had told Sophie about her terminal cancer. Her grandmother had never mentioned that her son, George Callahan, was also listed on the savings account. And Sophie had been too busy, first caring for her grandmother those final months, then building her pet-store business and watching her three-year-old niece, to worry about who had access to the bank account.

She struggled now to make herself heard. “All of the money has been moved, then?”

And by all of the money, Sophie referred to the funds her grandmother’s trust had released into the savings account at the first of the year with specific instructions to use for the purchase of the property where Sophie and her niece, Ella, lived. Sophie also referred to the additional money from the Pampered Pooch that she’d deposited at the end of every week so that one day, one day exactly twenty-nine days from now, Sophie would hold the title to the building in her own hands. And Ella would never again have to worry about losing the only home she’d ever known.

Sophie couldn’t let Ella down. She couldn’t fail her only niece. She couldn’t become another rotted branch on the careless Callahan family tree.

“Yes, all of the funds have been transferred from the account.” Beth put on a pair of trendy violet-framed glasses.

Ella would’ve loved the smooth lightweight glasses. But the oval shape only sharpened the woman’s gaze, as if that alone would force Sophie to focus.

Sophie was focused. On her empty bank account.

“There’s a balance due for the wire-transfer fee.” Beth closed the folder and pulled out her keyboard. “Usually that’s deducted from the funds, but for some reason that didn’t happen yesterday. Do you intend to clear that now?”

Sophie jerked back against the chair. “A fee?”

Her father had drained their joint savings account and left Sophie to pay the fee. Her back seemed to be pinned against the leather chair like the large Post-it note tacked to Beth’s bulletin board with “I love you mommy” written in blue marker and stamped with a greasy fingerprint. Sophie had never written notes like that to her parents. Notes like that refused to stick to vodka and gin bottles. As for fingerprints—well, generations of Callahan fingerprints were well documented at police stations across the nation.

Perhaps Sophie should’ve written notes like that to her father. Perhaps if she’d been a better daughter, George Callahan might’ve been a better father. A better father would not have drained the savings account without telling anyone. A better daughter would’ve been more diligent in anticipating such a disaster.

Beth stopped typing and looked across the desk at Sophie. “Would you like me to deduct the fee from your checking account?”

Sophie nodded, her head going up and down like one of those bobblehead dogs stuck to a vinyl dashboard. Because ready agreement was expected from people in stunned stupors. Shock scratched at her throat, stealing her voice and sucking every molecule of fresh air in the cubicle.

Beth’s smile was more of a flat grin, a quick twitch of acknowledgment that neither upset her glasses nor loosened her hair-sprayed updo.

Sophie’s account could not be empty. Not after all the sleepless nights, tears and hard work. That money had ensured Ella a home. That money had ensured that Ella would be safe.

Sophie slipped her fingers under her legs to keep herself still. To keep herself from wringing her hands or running her palms over her jeans in some falsely soothing gesture. She peeled her shoulders off the chair, leaned forward, then lied through a grin that revealed all of her teeth. “My father is always looking for the best return on our money.”

Beth offered another quick twitch of a grin. The twitch of a person who recognized a lie.

Sophie continued, “It was certainly thoughtful of him to move the money to a higher-yield bond.”

The only bond Sophie’s father knew was a jail bond. Had he taken the money to avoid prison? He’d never mentioned jail when he’d called for his weekly catch-up with Ella two nights ago. He’d mentioned a plan to Sophie.

But her father always had a plan. Always some new scheme in the works. That was nothing new. He’d told Sophie not to worry. But she always worried. And he’d told Sophie not to panic. Too late for that.

If only Sophie hadn’t been distracted by an eighty-pound poodle petrified by bathwater, she might’ve asked more questions about her father’s latest scheme. Then she might’ve been able to squelch the fear curdling up through her now. Sophie squeezed her leg. “Who doesn’t want more money these days, right?”

Beth kept up her rapid typing. The hard strike of each finger against the key seemed to punctuate every lie Sophie uttered. “We offer some of the best rates in the city.” Beth pushed a receipt across the desk. “It’s unfortunate your father didn’t meet with me. I could’ve helped him.”

It was unfortunate her father hadn’t spoken to anyone, mainly Sophie. It was unfortunate that Sophie had believed her money had been secure. It was unfortunate her father excelled at finding loopholes and using them to his advantage. He’d just never used Sophie as his advantage before.

Until now.

Beth removed her glasses and considered Sophie. “I certainly hope your father didn’t lock up the funds for a certain period of time given your balloon payment is due in less than four weeks.”

Sophie stretched her dry lips. “There’s one thing my father knows and that’s money.”

Her father knew how to invest in business ventures that stretched the legal limits, use small loans to place bets at racetracks and make timely deposits into slot machines in Reno.

But Sophie would not lose their home or her business. She’d been homeless at Ella’s age. No child should experience that depth of fear, especially her niece, who faced every day with courage and a smile. Without Ella’s smile, Sophie just might forget to smile herself. And if that happened, Sophie feared she might lose more than their home. She just might lose herself.

Sophie pushed out of the chair. She had to get outside. She needed to find more air. She needed to find something to stop the buzzing in her head. She needed to find her father. “I’ll have the money for the loan payment by the end of the month.”

“I’ll be here when you’re ready to make that payment.” Beth smiled and swiveled her chair toward her computer. “Enjoy the rest of your day, Ms. Callahan.”

Outside, Sophie leaned against the stone wall of Pacific Bank and Trust. Damp, cold air stuck to her cheeks like blistering hand slaps. Stoplights flashed in the thick fog, dull yellow flares of criticism and condemnation and failure. Even the pigeons nesting up inside the Pacific Bank and Trust sign never cooed, as if already aware she couldn’t afford to waste even one crumb.

Sophie searched the silver mist that had spilled into the city after yesterday’s winter storm, seeking the silent romance of the fog she usually loved. But only a dull grayness blanketed the streets. In front of her, a bus hissed to a stop. Its electric lines sparked and its brakes wheezed an acrid, bitter scent as its occupants spewed onto the sidewalk and scattered like bees from a harassed hive.

Cell phones chimed, coffee splattered the cement, paper bags with morning breakfast muffins crumbled as late workers rushed to their high-rise cubicles and corner offices. Inside the fog, the city pulsed, reminding Sophie that she was an adult and no longer ten years old, shivering and hungry in a one-room apartment with only her sister, who was just a year older than she was. Two little girls confused and scared and all because of George and Cindy Callahan.

How dare her father try to thrust her back into her past. She’d overcome her childhood with persistence and will and guts. He’d not put her back there.

She pushed away from the wall and strode along the sidewalk, stretching her legs into a run. Each smack of her running shoe on the concrete dislodged her panic and organized her thoughts, enough to quiet the frantic little girl that screamed inside her.

Her father had to be in some kind of trouble to take that much money. He knew what the funds were for. If he’d only told Sophie, she’d have helped him. He was her father. That’s what good daughters did, even when their fathers weren’t always good.

At the fourth block, she pulled out her cell phone and left her father a lengthy voice mail, pleading with him to call her. By the sixth block, she’d slowed to a fast walk and sent him four texts: two pleas, one appeal and one demand.

Eleven blocks later, standing outside the Pampered Pooch, Sophie wiped her forehead with the sleeve of her sweatshirt and checked her phone. No response.

Silence was nothing new from George Callahan. Her father had always drifted in and out of Sophie’s life. The length of his stays had increased the last few years and he always surfaced eventually. Yet this time, Sophie couldn’t wait. She had to find him and her money and soon.

For now though she had a business to run and a niece to get to school.

The bells chimed on the door. Sophie stepped inside, leaving that frightened little girl from years past outside on the sidewalk. Inside these walls, Sophie Callahan was a confident small-business owner and capable caretaker. There was simply no room for anything else, like doubt or nerves.

Sophie flipped the sign in the window to Open and greeted April, one of her three employees, the one who managed to be both her most reliable and most scattered employee in the same week. Sophie never quite knew which April would show up on any given workday. But even April not at her best was better than no one at all. “Did you get some sleep last night?”

April waddled over to settle on the stool behind the counter. A bandanna corralled her unruly burst of wild burnt-copper curls, and a tie-dyed sweatshirt almost contained her protruding belly. “Barely. The babies kicked all night and my maternity clothes barely fit anymore.”

“You’re seven-and-a-half months pregnant with twins—I imagine that’s typical.” Sophie used the rolling cart to prop open the swinging door to the back room.

“So is bed rest,” April muttered.

“Bed rest?” Sophie gripped, in a bear hug, the fifty-pound bag of dog food she was hefting, needing to squash the kernels of panic popping through her core. “As in ‘you have to stay in bed and can only get out to use the bathroom’ bed rest?”

“Yes, that kind exactly.” April rolled a paw-print pencil between her fingers, but wasn’t able to hide the misery in her voice.

Sophie adjusted the bag in her arms and walked down the center aisle, feeling uneasy. Selfishly, she needed April in the store, not in bed. Reliable April was good with customers and calming for the pets, and lately she’d been helping Sophie organize the Paws and Bark Bash. The gala would raise funds for service dog organizations and rescue groups that helped with homeless animals in the Bay Area. Now Sophie had her father to locate. Who’d run the store while Sophie chased down George?

She dropped the heavy bag on the bent shelf. She’d known April would go on maternity leave; she’d just assumed she’d have more time to prepare. Things were supposed to be different in four weeks when Sophie had paid her debts in full. Instead, all Sophie had was an empty bank account, a missing father and surging panic that’d consume her if she wasn’t careful.

Sophie glanced over the top shelf at April. Tears filled April’s eyes and slipped down her full cheeks. Sophie rushed to the younger woman, swiping the box of tissues from the far end of the counter. “You have to do what’s best for your babies. It’s going to be fine.”

Everything had to be fine. Sophie had no other choice.

“I can’t stay in bed all day.” April pressed a tissue to her eyes. “It’s best for my babies if I stay here during the day. With you and Troy and Erin doing the legwork, I could sit on this stool. Bed or stool, what does it matter?”

“Being in bed won’t be that bad.” Sophie handed April another tissue. “Besides, you have to follow the doctor’s orders for the babies’ safety.”

“I can’t do this.” More tears dampened April’s cheeks.

“We’ll get through it.” Sophie rubbed April’s shoulders. “Everything will work out.” Maybe if Sophie repeated it often enough and shouted it loud enough, she’d start to believe her own words.

Troy, full-time college student, part-time pet-shop worker, called out from the back room before he leaned around the cart in the doorway. “Soph, can you help with the morning arrivals?”

Sophie drew a deep breath. Her cell phone hadn’t vibrated in her back pocket. Her father hadn’t responded. She’d lost her entire savings and an employee in the same morning. That little panicked girl from her past tapped on the front window, wanting to be let in. Sophie turned her back on the store entrance. “I’ll help you get the dogs settled, then call Erin to see if she can come in earlier.”

The bell chimed on the front door behind Sophie, signaling the arrival of their first morning customer. Sophie ignored whoever it was. “April, do not move from this stool. If that customer needs assistance, I’ll be right back.” At April’s nod, Sophie rushed through the back to the two outdoor play yards.

Doggy day care was almost full. Her rescued Lab-mix and two senior cats had finally been adopted into their forever homes yesterday. Sophie ran some calculations, hoping that would be enough to cover Erin’s and Troy’s overtime. One day she wouldn’t have to budget by the hour. At least that had been the plan. In a notebook upstairs in her third-floor apartment, she’d designed an area for more kennels to offer long-term boarding services and allow her to take in more animal rescues. She’d mentally renovated the empty second-floor apartment for a vet’s office. She’d drawn the layout for her modern storefront. She’d visualized the growth of her business, visualized making the Pampered Pooch a full-service one-stop that catered to a pet’s every need, both house pets and service animals. Unfortunately, she’d never visualized the disappearance of all her money that’d ensure her future vision.

And, worse, she’d never visualized not living and working here, in this space. Their home. That rapping on the glass increased, the terrified tempo tripping through her. No, she wasn’t that forgotten little girl. She’d find her money and save everything.

Stepping around a crate of dog treats in the storage room, she texted an SOS to Ruthie Cain, her best friend since freshman year in high school. They’d bonded while waiting to be picked joint last for the volleyball team in PE. She strode through the cramped kennel area and pulled up short to avoid slamming into the male back filling the doorway. The man’s broad shoulders looked as if he could hold the weight of the world without stumbling.

But physical appearance wasn’t an indication of the size of one’s heart. She’d witnessed more strength of character in a thirty-pound toddler than in most grown men. That same toddler now stood just over four feet—a compact package of bravery, kindness and a pure heart who reminded Sophie every day that good still existed.

Her cell phone vibrated and she opened a new text from Ruthie. Help was less than ten minutes away.

“Excuse me.” Sophie stuffed her phone into her back pocket and squeezed around the man in the archway, but she didn’t manage to avoid contact. She popped out into the storefront and caught her running shoe on the wheel of the rolling cart. What was happening? She confronted the stranger, the rolling cart the only barrier between them. “This area has to remain clear.” And it wasn’t just for fire-code reasons.

“I’m attempting to clear the area now.” The man grinned at Sophie.

There was nothing symmetrical in the small smile that lifted only one side of his mouth, backed up into a sculpted cheekbone and sparked into his more green than brown eyes. She’d never quite understood that centuries-old fluttery feeling women described until now. She’d never liked being too warm or too queasy or too aware of those complicated emotional spots deep inside her. She blamed the single dimple denting his left cheek and wished he’d step behind the storage-room door. Instead, he studied Sophie as if she might be his next task on his own private to-do list. And made her wonder if she ranked first. Sophie told herself to focus and cleared her throat. “You need to move.”

“If you step aside, the cart and I can clear the doorway.”

Even his smooth voice appealed to her. But good-looking men were like designer shoes in the department store. She’d notice, acknowledge and keep moving. Designer shoes busted her budget; good-looking men busted more than her bank account, like her heart.

April slid a dented, damp cardboard box across the counter where she perched. “He offered to shelve the dog food in exchange for these little guys.”

Sophie held the man’s gaze and willed April not to open the box. Prayed April wouldn’t open the box. Sophie didn’t want to know what little helpless guys shivered inside. She couldn’t accept any more rescues. “Our kennels are full.”

“But there’re five wet and dirty babies in here.” April spread a lavender Pampered Pooch towel across the counter. “Five teeny, tiny kittens that can’t be more than four weeks old.”

Sophie gripped the metal handle on the rolling cart. She didn’t want to know. Didn’t want to look. It was a school day. She was losing her employee. And she had to find her father. Wasn’t that enough for a Friday?

Mewling and scratching sounds drifted from inside the cardboard and stuttered against her heart. She didn’t have time to call Dr. Bradshaw to examine the kittens or search for the heat lamp in the basement or reorganize an already too-crowded kennel. She had to save her home, not add more dependents to it. “We don’t have room for your kittens.”

“They aren’t my kittens.” He pointed over her shoulder. “I found them outside on your doorstep when I arrived.”

“I’m sure your vet will take them in.” Sophie tore off a corner of the waterlogged box flap and crushed it in her fist. That was the closest she’d get without risking her resolve. Neglectful pet owners, even the good-looking ones, made her tired and angry. “And while you’re there, pay to have your adult cat spayed to prevent this from happening again.”

“I’m not a cat person. I prefer dogs.” He shoved his fingers through his chestnut hair, creating spikes on top of his head. “Those baby kittens would be invisible next to the size of dog I prefer.”

“You’re doing the right thing,” she said. He was more appealing with his disheveled hair and earnest tone and tense dark eyebrows over his hazel eyes. He didn’t like to be doubted. Sophie didn’t like mistreated animals. Even more, she didn’t like that this stranger made her want to check her teeth for spinach from last night’s salad, pinch her cheeks for color and take off her baseball cap to fix her hair. Notice, acknowledge and move on. She’d noticed his charm. She’d acknowledged his good looks. Now she needed to move on. “I’m not accusing you of neglect or being a bad pet owner.”

“Suggesting is almost the same.” He rubbed his cheek, erasing his dimple. “In fact, suggestion is often confused with accusation.”

Tension sharpened his voice and narrowed his eyes. Being accused of lying did not sit well with him. Sophie didn’t care about preserving his pride. She was the voice for the abandoned and mistreated and neglected. “And we’re thankful you’re willing to surrender this litter.”

Her placating tone hit another mark. He thrust his arm out and pointed at the corner behind the counter. “If your security camera was installed and not lying on the floor like a forgotten doorstop, you’d have the footage to show that I picked up the box outside your door.” He leaned across the rolling cart toward her. “You’d also have the footage of the actual cat owner and you could harass that individual, instead.”

Sophie leaned toward him, dropping her voice to a low menace. “I haven’t even begun to harass you.” That might be laying it on a bit thick, but she wanted him as unsettled as he made her.

“I don’t suppose you’d consider it harassment.” His voice softened, the edge receding from his words. “You’re the self-appointed guardian of helpless animals.”

Sophie stretched into every inch of her five-foot-five-inch frame. “Seven years ago, I opened the doors to this pet store and doggy day care to give working pet owners affordable and safe options for their apartment pets. I offer training and socialization classes. I foster and meticulously match every pet to each family. I’ve never denied a return or surrender. If there’s a rescue organization in northern California, I’ve partnered with them. There’s no ‘self-appointed’ about any of it. This is my business. My life.”

“And my life is not animal neglect.” He crossed his arms over his chest and tipped his head, his gaze fastened on Sophie.

“There’s an all-white one in here.” April interrupted their stand-off.

Sophie held her breath. Don’t let it have blue eyes. Please, no blue eyes. Sophie needed the cart moved. Needed this man and his kittens gone. She couldn’t afford another rescue. She held the man’s gaze, refusing to even peek in April’s direction.

A squeak, and then April’s words, softer than a sigh. “Both eyes are blue.”

“Are blue eyes bad?” Concern filtered through her cat rescuer’s voice.

“Over seventy-five percent of pure white cats born with blue eyes are deaf.” She rambled off feline statistics as if it mattered. The kitten’s second fragile mewl splintered through Sophie, mocking her resolve to ignore it. Sophie took the white kitten from April and wrapped it in the lavender towel.

Sophie hadn’t really stood a chance. She couldn’t have denied shelter to this abandoned litter, deaf kitten or not. Apparently, she hadn’t yet reached her maximum capacity for helping those in need.

“Someone just abandoned a litter of kittens, and one or more might be deaf?” Outrage and confusion collided, deepening her cat rescuer’s voice like a slow roll of thunder before the lightning strike. He glanced between the kitten in Sophie’s arms and the one climbing over April. Finally, he looked at April, as if he didn’t believe Sophie. When April nodded, he cursed under his breath.

Whether it was his outrage on the kittens’ behalf, or that she’d insulted him and he’d refused to back down, Sophie believed him. He’d found the box outside. He wasn’t the cat’s owner.

“It happens more than we’d like.” April kissed her gray kitten on its head and returned it to its siblings. “Sophie rescues anything in need. She’ll fatten these little guys up and care for them like she cares for everything—the right way. Her DNA won’t let her turn anyone away. Ever.”

“Speaking of taking care, April, you need to get your feet up.” Sophie placed the white kitten in the box with the others. None of them looked similar. It was as if each had been picked from assorted purebred litters, then tumbled together like mismatched socks. But they curled up as one, paws and tails entwined for warmth, security and survival, like a family. And now they’d be part of her family. “We can’t ignore your doctor’s orders. It sets a bad precedent.”

“Back on the stool now.” April frowned. “Resting.”

“And you’re swelling.” Sophie pointed at April’s ankles, which were swollen above her slip-on canvas shoes.

The man cleared his throat and pointed to the cart. “I’ll just shelve all this and get that dog food I came in for.”

Sophie dropped her hand on the cart and stopped the man from rolling it away.

“I ordered most of the dog food we carry and can tell you the best kind for your particular dog’s needs,” April offered in her excellent customer-service voice.

Of course, April had chosen today to contend for employee of the month, when unfortunately, these moments had become more and more rare. Still, Sophie frowned at the hope April injected into her voice. “You’ll help by going home to bed.”

“But we have customers, and you have meetings later this morning and only Troy here until this afternoon. And now kittens to clean up and create space for.” April never budged from the stool. “Besides, I’m better here.”

Sophie wrapped an arm around April’s shoulders, nudging her off the stool. “I’ll bring the laptop over this afternoon, and we can go over the table arrangements for the gala. While you wait, you can catch up on some daytime talk shows.”

“I don’t like those shows. They’re always about bad relationships or weight loss.” April yanked her sweatshirt down.

“Then watch reruns or read that mom-to-be book I gave you.” Sophie grabbed April’s purse from under the counter. “Just get into bed. The store will be fine today.”

“What about tomorrow?” April refused to take her purse.

“One day at a time.” Or, Sophie corrected, one crisis at a time. The cart rolled forward—or one customer at a time. She tossed April’s purse on the counter and spun, gripping the cart handle and stopping the cart from moving another inch. “I won’t let you shelve this dog food.”

“You can’t exactly stop me.” He tipped his head toward April. The woman scooted her pregnant belly back behind the counter like the good employee she wanted to be.

Sophie frowned.

“She can’t do any heavy lifting,” her helpful customer continued, his voice all patient logic and reason. “And you obviously have a busy morning.”

She’d already had too much busy in her morning. She wanted her normal routine. The one where everyone listened to her and followed her rules. “If you fracture your back on my property, you can sue for damages,” she said. “I can’t have a lawsuit.” She most definitely couldn’t have a lawsuit, not with everything else.

“I’m well trained in heavy lifting.” He pushed on the cart.

Sophie shoved back, stalling the cart in the doorway and her customer, with his warm smile and easy banter, in the storage room. But she’d never trusted charm and understood all too well the power of false advertising. She’d purchased those trendy boots that had guaranteed flexibility and pillow-like cushioning and all-day comfort and only ended up with raw, open blisters on both heels after one day. Shoes and men were not mistakes she intended to repeat.

The sleigh-style bells chimed on the front door. April stashed her purse, settled on the stool and slid the kitten box closer.

Sophie never loosened her grip as she twisted around and exhaled. Everything was about to return to normal. She gave a quick prayer of thanks for the arrival of her practical, steady and composed best friend.

Ruthie stepped inside, threw her hands wide and grinned at Sophie. “Okay. Duke and Lady are out back running with their doggy friends. I’ve rescheduled my morning conference to this afternoon. I’m all yours until one o’clock.”

The bells chimed again. Matt, Ruthie’s fiancé since their Thanksgiving engagement, strode in. “Sophie, please tell me that Ruthie won’t have to work the cash register.”

“April is still here to train me.” Ruthie waved at April before jamming her elbow into Matt’s side. “Besides, I can run that little credit-card machine without crashing it.”

“Sophie, maybe I should stay here.” Matt dropped his arm around Ruthie’s waist and tugged her into his side.

There was nothing possessive or overpowering about Matt’s embrace. It was as if he simply needed Ruthie closer to him in order to breathe. A sigh shifted through Sophie. Love suited her friends.

Matt grinned at Sophie. “We can send Ruthie to my job site. She’d be safer using power tools.”

“I lecture to halls with over four hundred college freshmen.” Ruthie pushed on Matt’s chest, but he never loosened his hold. “I can handle this.”

Sophie discovered her first smile of the morning. Her grip on the cart eased. She’d needed her friends. The ones that understood why doggy day care clients dropped their dogs off in the back, but entered the store from the front. The ones that followed the protocol and never wavered. Never altered Sophie’s rules. Never commandeered rolling carts. If it had simply been important to Sophie, they’d have done it to appease her. But Sophie’s priority was Ella’s safety and her friends recognized that, too.

She spun around and faced her kitten rescuer. “You can get your dog food now. I’ve got this.”

“Sophie, let Matt deal with that loaded cart,” Ruthie said.

“Out of the way.” Matt’s strong hands landed on Sophie’s shoulders and stilled. “Brad?”

Sophie’s customer leaned across the cart and reached for Matt’s hand. “I didn’t want to interrupt. This must be Dr. Ruthie Cain, the fiancée you can’t stop bragging about?”

Ruthie’s voice echoed the happiness in her wide smile. “Still getting used to that.”

“Ladies, this is Brad Harrington,” Matt said. “I’ve been a consultant for Brad going back several years now.”

Matt wore stained jeans, a plaid button-down shirt and steel-toed boots for his part-time job renovating historic buildings in the city. He also spoke more than half-a-dozen languages fluently and primarily worked as a translator contracted to the United States government for secret missions that Sophie believed saved the world, but Matt never confirmed nor denied. He was quite simply a brilliant mind wrapped in a handsome package. Sophie shifted her attention to Brad in his jeans, pullover and dimpled smile.

He was Matt’s friend. But she didn’t trust him and definitely didn’t want to know anything more about him. She was better off cataloguing Brad as that random kitten finder. “Do you work with Matt on his renovations or on his translation jobs?”

“Matt has the gift with languages. I’m in security.” Brad edged around the cart, stepped behind the counter and picked up the security camera from the floor. “I make these work correctly.”

Matt frowned at her. “Sophie, I could’ve introduced you to Brad a while ago. I thought you got that taken care of.”

“The manual to install it made it sound easier than it is.” Sophie took the camera from Brad and set it on the counter. “I’ll get to it.”

“I bet you haven’t fixed that front lower window yet, either.” Ruthie eyed the kitten box.

“Some things came up.” Like the trip to Chicago for a second opinion on Ella’s eye surgery. There weren’t any extra funds for window repair. And now she was out of funds, thanks to her father. “It’s fine. The glass is taped and I added a piece of plywood on the inside.”

“Anyone can kick that in,” Brad said.

“That’s what I told her when she did it,” April added. The extra tablespoon of gracious, obliging customer service saturated any condescending dips in her tone.

“Anyone can bust through the glass door if they really wanted to steal catnip.” Sophie scowled at Brad and willed him to be stiff and cold and abrasive like those expensive red heels she’d seen in the window display on Union Street. An alarm was quite low on her list of things to deal with. If she didn’t have a store, she wouldn’t need an alarm. She wanted to pull out her phone and see if her dad had replied. Or, better yet, keep calling him until he answered.

“That’s why you need that installed.” Brad gripped the cart handle and pulled, rolling past her. His tone patient, his voice calm, his words all too reasonable.

Sophie crammed her hands into the wide front pocket of her sweatshirt and tipped her chin up, defiance tumbling through her words. “Show me someone who will install it for free and I’ll get it done today.”

“I’ll do it.” Brad smiled at her, distracting her with his dimple.

Sophie paused. Hadn’t he heard her? “I can’t pay you.”

“We’ll work out a trade.”

“Other than dog food, I don’t have much to bargain with,” Sophie told him.

“The only Harrington in need of dog food is Brad’s mother.” Matt guided the front of the cart down the dog-food aisle, then glanced at Brad. “Unless you broke your own vow and adopted a pet, following in your mother’s footsteps, after all.”

Sophie watched Brad’s shoulders stiffen as if he’d been poked with a thick needle. He hadn’t liked Matt’s comment. Brad pressed his lips together as if to keep his response from flying free. And Sophie wanted to know what he refused to say. Sophie wanted to know about his family. Sophie wanted to know about this man.

But that wasn’t right. She wasn’t interested in Brad. She’d given up on relationships and all that ten years ago when she’d climbed into the ambulance with her unconscious sister and her three-pound niece born with a drug addiction eight weeks too early. Love stories belonged to people like Ruthie and Matt. Sophie might dream about her own fairy tale in the darkest, quietest, loneliest hour of the night, but dawn always returned her to reality.

Ruthie nudged Sophie. “Brad’s mother is the newly elected mayor of Pacific Hills. If you traveled down the coast at all last fall, you would’ve seen her campaign posters with the two greyhounds in shop windows and on the residents’ lawns throughout the entire town.”

“Your mother is Mayor Harrington?” Sophie had vowed never to follow in her own mother’s shallow footsteps. But Brad’s mother was mayor of the coastal town south of the city. Surely being like Mrs. Harrington wasn’t a bad thing.

“She is,” Brad admitted. “And I’m definitely not following in her footsteps.”

His voice was tight and drew her in even more. “You don’t want to be mayor?”

“I’ll leave the politics to my brother.” Brad lifted a bag off the cart and passed it to Matt. “And stick with what I know.”

Sophie needed to stick with what she knew, too. And that wasn’t Brad Harrington. Both Brad and Matt towered over the squat shelves that she swore groaned and pleaded for retirement every time she restocked. But the place was stuck in its current unpampered state, much like Sophie was stuck in baseball caps and budget lockdown. This was her life.

She pulled her baseball cap lower on her forehead. “You must have other clients or business to attend to. Something more important than installing a security system in a pet store for free.”

“I’m crashing at our friend’s place until my boat is ready,” Brad said. “Zack can use the food for the dog he rescued on his last trip to the mountains.”

“You’re still setting sail, then?” Matt asked.

“Just waiting for the guys at Delta Craft to let me know the restoration is complete.” Brad tossed the last bag to Matt. “Hopefully before the end of the month, I’ll sail out of the bay.”

“What about your job?” Sophie asked. “What about your family?”

“My partner is handling things in my absence,” Brad said.

Sophie noted he never volunteered anything about his family. And again she wanted to know more. But he was leaving. What else mattered?

“Brad is the H in J & H Associates.” Matt straightened the food bags on the weary shelf. “Always helps when you own the company.”

Sophie nodded. She was a business owner herself, but leaving had never been a consideration. Never. Not even for a long weekend. She had to be here to maintain the business and provide for her niece. An indefinite hold had been put on vacations. Last fall, she’d taken a day trip with Ella to Chicago for a second opinion on Ella’s eye surgery. Less than a twenty-four-hour turnaround, with most of their time spent in airports and waiting rooms. Definitely not Sophie’s idea of a vacation.

“So, do we have a deal?” Brad wiped his hands on his jeans and smiled. “Security system for dog food.”

“What kind of dog did your friend rescue?” Sophie was curious. “A Chihuahua hardly eats enough to pay for the cost of the security system.”

“A forty-five-pound mutt with one blue eye and one green eye,” Brad said. “I can be done installing this unit within the day.”

A day. She could handle one day with Brad Harrington. Brad’s presence was fleeting, like that wistful glance at the designer shoes in the department-store window—noticed and forgotten. “You have a deal.”

“That gives you about eight more hours to harass me,” Brad said.

The grin in his voice and the laughter in his gaze pulled her own smile to the surface.

“I’ll be back after I pick up a few things.” Brad looked at Matt. “Do you have a tape measure in your truck?”

“I’m parked out front.” Matt hugged Ruthie and moved to the front door.

Sophie watched Brad head toward the broken window. “I’ll replace that,” she said.

Brad faced her and shook his head. “This one is on me. Can’t put in a new security system when there’s a broken window.”

There was a stubborn set to his mouth, but something in his manner, how his head tilted just slightly, made her think he welcomed her argument. He wanted her to spar. Sophie stuffed her hands in her back pockets and held his stare, once again aware of that fluttery feeling in her core and her too-warm skin. His one-sided grin twitched into place as if he was aware of her feelings.

“Auntie!” Ella’s panicked shout steamrollered over all those soft, romantic notions inside Sophie.

Nice smiles, belly flutters—but Brad Harrington didn’t belong in Sophie’s world. Her reality was a ten-year-old girl, eye doctors and abandoned things.

Sophie swung around as Ella stepped into the doorway, a neon-pink brush stuck in her knotted hair, her fingers gripped around her white cane. “Auntie, I told Charlotte I’d have braids today. She has braids today. And I promised we’d match for the field trip. We have to match. It’s pairs day. You have to match your partner on pairs day.”

Sophie hurried over to her niece and started working the hairbrush loose. “Well, it’s a good thing Ruthie is here then, because there’s no one better at braids than her.”

Ella pushed her eyeglasses up her nose. “I thought I heard her. And Matt, too?”

“Good morning, Ella-Bell,” Matt called from the entrance. “Need a lift to school today?”

“I don’t want to wrinkle my dress,” Ella said. “Auntie ironed it last night.”

“Then we’ll plan another date.” Matt walked outside, letting the door swing shut behind him.

Ella smoothed her hands over her dress and whispered to Sophie. “I haven’t wrinkled it yet, have I?”

“You look perfect.” Sophie leaned in and kissed Ella’s porcelain cheek.

“But am I wrinkled?” Ella stretched out the last word, unable to contain her concern.

“Not one wrinkle.” Ruthie adjusted the bow at Ella’s waist. “Now do you want one braid or two?”

Ella’s shoulders lowered and the corner of her bottom lip disappeared between her teeth. “Charlotte says she has less hair than me. She says her hair is flat and mine is puffy.”

“That’s your curls, Ella.” Sophie freed the brush and untangled the worst snarl. “Charlotte’s mother texted me last night. She can’t do French braids, so Charlotte will have two ponytail braids.”

“Ruthie, can you do a French braid?” Hope pushed out Ella’s words in a rush.

Ruthie squeezed Ella’s shoulders. “How about two French braids? That will still look like two ponytails.”

“You can do that?” Ella asked.

“Anything for you,” Ruthie said.

“Careful, Ruthie, or Ella will call you over every morning to style her hair before school.” Sophie handed Ruthie the hairbrush.

Ella shook her head. “Only on special occasions. I don’t want to inconvenience her.”

The sincerity in Ella’s tone and seriousness in the firm set of her mouth ripped through Sophie’s heart. Ella had feared being an inconvenience ever since she’d overheard a conversation between Sophie and her older sister, who was also Ella’s mother. The little girl hadn’t needed supersensitive hearing skills during that particular morning. Sophie had dragged Tessa into the shower, fully clothed, after her sister’s two-day-long binge of drinking and drugs. Even through the hair pulling, kicking and continued resistance, Tessa had never ceased ranting about the inconvenience of family. The inconvenience of parenting. The inconvenience of children.

Sophie rubbed behind her ear. Her hair had grown back, yet the memory still lingered in vivid color. But the imprint on a young, innocent child was the deepest wound, and that unseen scar remained. No matter how often Sophie tried to prove to Ella she wasn’t an inconvenience or encourage her to leave out that word from her vocabulary, she hadn’t succeeded. But she’d never stop trying.

Sophie hugged Ella. “Okay. Ruthie, while you braid, April can give you tips on how to use the cash register.”

Ruthie groaned. “But you told me I wouldn’t need to run that ancient thing.”

“It’ll be fine.” Sophie pushed confidence into her voice. Her friend was a brilliant PhD, but far from tech savvy. “The cash register is vintage, that’s all.”

“And temperamental and finicky,” April added.

Sophie plowed on. “We might not have any customers this morning. So this is just in case.”

“It’s Friday. The bell chimes at least eighteen times on Friday mornings,” Ella said, and nodded, authority lacing her matter-of-fact tone. “I counted when I was home sick a few weeks ago.”

“That was a rare day,” Sophie lied.

“Auntie, you told me it was slower than usual that day.” Ella frowned.

Sophie kissed her niece’s cheek to distract her. “You stand still and get braided. I’m putting a load of laundry into the washing machine and checking on Troy. Then we’ll walk to school. April, you have twenty minutes to talk Ruthie through things and then you’re off, too.”

“Are the babies coming?” Excitement lifted Ella’s voice into a breathless pitch.

“Not today.” Relief poured into Sophie’s words as she rushed through the back door. Delivering twins couldn’t be on today’s to-do list.

“I’ll be here later this morning if Ruthie has any trouble,” Brad called from the front of the store.

Sophie shook the smile off her face. That she liked the idea of Brad being here poked at her conscience; she’d buried these kinds of feelings so deeply inside her, so long ago, she’d assumed they’d be lost forever.

Sophie returned to the group and touched Ella’s shoulder. “Brad rescued a litter of kittens this morning and he’s agreed to put in the security system today.”

“How many kittens?” Ella clasped her hands together. “Can we keep them?”

“Only until we find them their forever homes,” Sophie answered.

“This could be their forever home,” Ella said. “With us.”

Sophie rubbed her forehead. First, she had to ensure Ella had a forever home. “You know the deal. We can’t keep them forever, only for now.”

“Can I hold one?” Ella asked.

“After Ruthie finishes your hair and only for a minute. You don’t want to miss the bus for your field trip.”

“Ask for the white one,” Brad said. “She’s a puffball and soft like a cloud.”

Ella laughed. “She sounds perfect.”

Sophie watched Brad walk outside. Something about him made her want to pull up a chair and ask questions. But Sophie didn’t have time for idle conversations over coffee and cake. She’d never had time for the frivolous. Thankfully, she had less than twenty-four hours to spend with Brad because there were some things Sophie could never have. Brad Harrington was one of them.

CHAPTER TWO

BRAD NOTICED SOPHIE push the empty cart into the back room. For such a petite package, the woman remained a study in motion. She hadn’t stopped moving since she’d wedged herself between him and the cart and demanded he stop shelving her dog food.

He wouldn’t be surprised if she’d already found families for those kittens he’d brought inside.

She was efficient, competent and obviously guilty—like her father. There had to be a dark side to balance all that good, and he’d always been fascinated with exposing that shady inner core. And Sophie Callahan was too fascinating.

Matt leaned against his truck and tossed the tape measure at Brad. “Got a case you’re investigating?”

“No.” Brad caught the tape measure and avoided his friend’s stare. He wasn’t working a case. He was doing a favor. A favor for the widow whose late husband should be seated behind the Pacific Hills mayor’s desk, instead of his mother. “Would it matter?”

“If it involved Sophie Callahan, then yes, it’d matter.” Matt came over to stand beside Brad. “It’d matter a lot.”

Despite his experience, and what it had taken to build his company into a high-end forensic accounting and surveillance specialist firm, Brad hadn’t anticipated his friend’s reaction. Brad tapped the toe of his boot against the corner of the plywood-covered window. If he rammed his foot into the adjoining window, he’d shatter the glass. Nothing unexpected about that. Whereas everything was unexpected about Sophie.

His grandmother had dragged him to the symphony when he was thirteen. He’d been struggling to fit into his height, cursing his pimples and praying Sarah Quincy wouldn’t spot his braces. He’d lodged a series of complaints longer than any kid’s Christmas wish list from the back seat of his grandfather’s pickup, and still they’d arrived early to the performance. He’d slouched in his chair, dug his chin into his chest, convinced the evening would be torture.

But the music—the drive of the woodwinds, beat of the percussion and harmony of the strings—collided inside him and shoved out everything until only the sound remained. He’d never confessed to his grandparents, and even now his family didn’t know his contributions put him in the VIP seats of the San Francisco Philharmonic’s Stradivarian Circle, where he escaped to as often as possible.

Sophie Callahan was the first person to pull at him in places he thought only the music could reach. But, unlike the symphony, he wasn’t interested in becoming a patron of Sophie Callahan’s.

“Look, I carried in a box of kittens to her store this morning.” Brad pointed at the counter. Ruthie held a gray kitten while Ella hugged the white runt. Brad’s mother would approve of Sophie’s dedication to animals. That wasn’t Sophie’s first rescue litter and she acted as if she knew it wouldn’t be her last. Still, she remained committed.

Brad’s commitment to his own one-man cause seemed slightly more selfish in the face of Sophie’s passion for animal rescue. But he was doing what was best for him and his family: leaving. “Some jerk just dumped the box outside her place,” he explained.

“Hold on.” Matt yanked open the door and called to Ruthie, who laughed at his admonition to not get too attached to the kittens and lifted one of the kitty’s paws in a tiny wave.

Matt let the door close. “Ruthie’s sister has not one but two Great Danes that split their time between our house and Sophie’s day care. They’ll accidentally step on a kitten without ever noticing.”

Exasperation was thick in Matt’s tone, but he never masked the tenderness in his gaze when Ruthie was in his sights. Brad’s friend would bring that kitten home in an instant if Ruthie asked, and he’d protect it with everything he had. Love suited his friend. But Brad doubted he could ever love like that. He carried too much Harrington DNA. His family put on the show of being loyal, but at their core it was every Harrington for himself.

Brad measured the window and glanced over his shoulder at his friend. “I’ve been told big dogs can be extremely gentle.”

Matt watched Ruthie through the glass and grinned. “Don’t pass that information along to the doctor.”

“I’m sure Sophie already told Ruthie.” Brad typed the measurements into the notepad app on his phone, straightened and handed the tape measure to Matt.

Matt never reached for it and instead stared at Brad. “I meant what I said. It would matter if Sophie were involved.”

“Understood.” Brad tossed the tape measure from one hand to the other. He’d already lied to his friend about not being on a case. Fishing for information couldn’t be a worse offense than that. “Anything else I should know?”

“Sophie and Ruthie have been best friends since high school.” There was a warning in Matt’s tone and caution in his silence.

Brad waited.

Matt added, “Sophie Callahan is what I like to call good people.”

He’d witnessed the darkness that festered inside good people enough times in his career as an investigator that he wondered if true goodness was more myth than reality. Only time would reveal if Sophie’s goodness came from her soul—something he’d yet to witness—or simply camouflaged a more corrupt nature. Something that had become his norm. “And I’m not good people?”

“You’re the bubble buster.” Matt laughed and punched Brad’s shoulder, breaking the tension and putting them back on familiar ground. “The harbinger of truth.”

“Truth sets people free.” Brad punched back. He was certainly free now that he’d learned the truth about his parents. Free from the manipulation. Free to pursue his own life on his own terms. He’d gained way more than he’d lost. And if he exposed Sophie’s father, George Callahan, for the low-life thief that he was, then he’d set Sophie free as well, if she was innocent.

“And I don’t always expose the full truth.” He knew when to hold back, like now, with his friend. Brad rubbed at his neck. Surely that wasn’t guilt knotting his muscles. Guilt wasn’t standard procedure. “The Nikkos kids will learn the truth about their arms-dealing father when he goes to trial. And that wife of the fraudulent banker hadn’t wanted to accept the facts. But the truth always comes out eventually, whether a person is prepared or not.”

“Your brand of truth alters lives. And you know I agree with you, or I wouldn’t have joined you on those cases or any of the others.” Matt opened the lid on his toolbox. “But there’s an aftermath.”

Brad tossed the tape measure inside and closed the lid. If only that pinch of guilt was as easy to discard.

Matt studied him. “But she isn’t your case.”

“No.” Sophie Callahan was part of the aftermath. He’d skipped breakfast that morning and assumed the gnawing in his stomach was from hunger, not unease about Sophie. He’d never stayed long enough to witness the ramifications or the consequences. He’d always presented his findings, ensured justice was done and moved on.

Except for his last FBI investigation that had resulted in a counterattack explosion, an innocent woman’s death and his resignation. Yet, according to Dr. Florence, he’d resolved his feelings of regret and blame in his yearlong biweekly therapy sessions. Though, now, he wasn’t so sure, and despite leaving the Bureau, there was still always a next case. Still never time to review his emotions or stick around for the aftermath.

Matt squeezed his shoulder. “Besides, in a few weeks you’ll be leaving the corporate embezzlers, cyber criminals and money launderers behind and seeking your own truth with the sharks, stars and open waters.”

“Maybe when I return, I’ll be good people, too.” Brad feared if he stayed in the city, he’d become more like his mother. Matt would never consider Harringtons good people if he knew the full truth about Brad’s family.

“You should at least have a good tan.” Matt laughed before climbing into his truck.

Brad watched Sophie return to the storefront and help Ella into a fuzzy jacket that made her look like a baby polar bear: warm and bundled up and adorable. Sophie slipped into a similar fleece jacket that she zipped up to her chin. Brad decided Sophie looked entirely too huggable and tempting. For that alone, he needed to expose her secrets.

He shoved his hands into his jacket pockets and strode down the sidewalk. Within twenty-four hours, he’d have Sophie’s security system installed; before the end of the long weekend, he’d locate her wayward father and deliver the truth to his client. As for Sophie, she was either innocent or guilty. Right now, he’d bet on the latter. No woman had ever gotten under his skin, or rather sneaked under, until today. Either she practiced witchcraft or had perfected a legitimate cover that only made him all the more suspicious. No one would ever imagine the adorable pet-shop owner who rescued strays to be a master con artist. No one except him.

A forgotten section of the Times tumbled out of the mist as if the fog had printed its own dire headlines. He stomped on the newspaper, stopping its escape, and bent down, crumpling it in his fist. Somewhere he’d lost his ability to believe in good. To see hope. To imagine something better. He smashed the newspaper into an overflowing trash can, wanting to punch through his own cynicism. But he feared no matter how far he dug, he might never discover that missing part of himself. It was like searching for a rare penny in the city dump. An impossible task.

For now, he just needed to finish this case quickly. Then he’d do what he always did—move on. Or in this case, set sail.

CHAPTER THREE

“WE NEED TO HURRY.” Ella pulled her hood over her braids and gripped Sophie’s elbow. “I don’t want to miss the bus.”

“It’s five blocks and the fog delayed the bus’s departure.” Sophie dipped her chin inside her jacket. The unusual chill never cut into Ella’s enthusiasm. But the drizzle edged under Sophie’s collar, and a shiver ran through her. “I remember when it took you over one thousand steps to walk to school.”

“There’s no time for counting today, Auntie.” Ella squeezed Sophie’s arm, the pressure matching the urgency in her tone. “We have to talk about keeping Stormy Cloud.”

“Stormy Cloud,” Sophie repeated.

“The tiny kitten that April told me is most likely deaf,” Ella said. “She’s soft like a summer cloud, but her purr makes her sound like a storm cloud. No one likes storm clouds, Auntie.”

“I do,” Sophie said. The same way she liked the city fog and its changing weather moods, except today, when she needed sun—bright, bold and encouraging.

“That’s why we need to keep her,” Ella said. “She’ll just be an inconvenience to another family.”

There was that word again. The chill settled deep into her bones as if it intended to become permanent. Sophie tugged Ella closer.

Ella plowed on. “Is Brad an animal rescuer?”

“No, he stumbled upon those kittens accidentally.”

“That’s too bad.” Ella frowned. “I wanted him to rescue another litter so he’d have to come back to the store.”

“You liked him?” Sophie asked. Ella’s answer mattered. She didn’t want it to matter. Brad Harrington had a temporary place in their lives. Still, the mention of Brad brought a welcome warmth inside her.

Ella nodded. “His voice is good like an extra glass of hot chocolate, but sticky, like the laughter is trapped in his throat and he just needs someone to free it.”

“What’s my voice like?” Sophie asked.

“You sound like a mom.”

Before Sophie could ask if that was good or bad, Ella moved on, her conversation covering more ground in the five blocks to the school bus than most people covered in an eight-hour shift. “Papa George promised to take me to a concert.”

Sophie winced. Papa George needed to call his daughter back. Papa George needed to return Sophie’s money. Papa George needed to stop making promises he couldn’t keep.

Giggles and the stomping of boots disrupted Sophie’s irritation. Ella’s friends crowded around, peppering her with questions about her gorgeous braids. Four schools in four years and finally they’d discovered a place where Ella could flourish. Sophie had never considered that the public school less than a mile from their home would be the best fit for her legally blind niece. But the proof embraced Ella on the cement sidewalk in a diverse circle of acceptance and friendship and trust. Moving Ella to yet another school was not an option.

Sophie hugged Ella. “Have fun today.”

Ella gripped Charlotte’s elbow and the group of girls headed toward the buses, a flurry of excited chatter. Sophie waved to Ella’s teacher and Ella’s aide before she rushed down the sidewalk, heading toward her morning appointment. She had to find her money and save their home. And soon.

Her father had to be in serious trouble. She’d always believed she was free from his shady tactics. That she was somehow different to him, and darn it if she didn’t need to feel special, even for a moment, to someone. One time in her life.

No, she didn’t need to feel special anymore. She’d craved that when she was a child. But she’d outgrown the feeling the same way she had outgrown her craving for cereals with marshmallows and stars and good-luck charms.

Sophie stepped inside the law offices of Evans, Hampton, and King, leaving the pigeons on the sidewalk to peck away at her impractical childhood wishes.

Kay Olson waved at Sophie from behind the reception desk and slid off her headset. Kay tweaked her gray hair back into place. She’d been Sophie’s first customer for her dog-walking business a decade earlier. Kay’s hair had been gray even before cancer took Sophie’s grandmother and Kay’s childhood best friend, and before her daughter, April, became pregnant with twins.

Kay’s silver pixie cut was like battle armor, a spiked shield she wore to deflect the mess life seemed content to keep throwing at her. Her shield allowed her to believe in something better. Kay wasn’t expecting a pot of gold at the end of her rainbow—she was more of a realist than that. Sophie wanted some of that same inner-battle armor, though, to forge through her latest roadblock.

“Before you ask, I sent April home to bed.” Sophie unzipped her coat. “If you have the sponsorship check for the gala, I can take it and let you get back to work.”

“Let’s talk in here.” Kay pointed across the hall. “You can sample the pastries from Whisk and Whip Pastry Shop. Everyone agreed last week the Whisk is the city’s best.”

Sophie followed Kay into a small conference room that might have been bright if not for the fog crowding against the wall of windows. “I promised April I’d head over with the laptop and we’d work on the gala table seating so she still feels included.”

“April didn’t want to listen to the doctor.” Kay thrust her fingers through her hair, tightening the spikes. “She never wants to listen to any opinion that differs from her own, including her mother’s.”

“She’ll do what’s right for her babies.” Sophie walked to the windows that looked out over a park, but the gray mist had swallowed the swing set and slides. Mothers had a duty to do what was right for their children. Yet Sophie’s own mother had failed, and her sister struggled to put Ella first. Motherhood for the Callahan women was like standing inside the fog and never seeing the children’s little hands reaching for them. Sophie feared if she became a mother, she’d get lost in the fog, too. And that would be unforgivable.

“Well, the father needs to be told. That’s what’s right.” Kay smacked her palm against the table and released a sigh tinged with frustration. “But we don’t need to have this conversation again.”

“I’ve tried to ask April about the identity of the father, but she refuses to talk about what happened.” Sophie searched the fog for the metal curve of the swing set. She’d wanted to help April, seeing so much of her sister in the lost woman. Even more, she’d wanted to help Kay, to give back to the woman who’d given Sophie direction and purpose so many years ago. “I’m not sure I’ve been much of a good influence on her.”

“Nonsense,” Kay said. “April wants to keep working at your place. This is the longest she has stuck with anything. She claims she needs the Pampered Pooch and the four-legged customers to keep her calm.”

“She’s wonderful with the animals, especially the injured and newborns.” Sophie turned her back on the park and leaned against the window ledge. “She’ll be a great mother.”

Kay remained quiet and eyed the silver pastry platter in the center of the table. She began transferring the pastries back into a medium sized bakery box. “She isn’t you.”

“I’m not that special. I do what needs to be done. April will, too.” Sophie remembered feeling desperate and unsure, but she’d found her way, with the help of Kay and Ruthie. “You raised her right.”

“I raised her.” Kay set a croissant in the center of a napkin. “Did my best. Questioned everything. Second-guessed every decision.”

“Now you can second-guess your decision to be called Gigi or Nana or Grandma.”

Kay smiled. “My grandbabies are coming.”

“They are,” Sophie said. “There’s no second-guessing that.”

April Olson was having twins, ready or not. The pregnancy might have been unexpected, but everything since that test stick turned pink had been expected, even April’s reticence to reveal the father’s name. No one stole away in the middle of the night against the advice of family and friends only to return a year later and reveal all of their secrets. Sophie and Kay had eventually discovered that April had been in LA pursuing her music career. The prescription stuffed inside April’s jacket pocket for rest and hydration for severely bruised vocal cords was from a physician with an East Hollywood address. This was the only clue as to April’s whereabouts during her eleven-month disappearance. Other than that, April had offered few details.

Kay leaned back in her chair and looked at Sophie. “What will you do without April?”

Sophie let April keep her secrets and April never pried into Sophie’s secrets. There was a trust between the women. Now Sophie didn’t have April. She couldn’t hire and train another person fast enough to take her place. Not to mention, a full-time employee would expect health benefits. Employee health care was supposed to be part of Sophie’s plans after she’d paid off the loan. And after the gala happened, which was supposed to help raise awareness for the rescues and fosters at the Pampered Pooch that desperately needed homes. Sophie smiled, but the tension throbbing in her head was hard to ignore. “Make it work.”

“You’ve got the gala to organize.” Kay pulled the end off the croissant. “And Ella to care for.”

“I’ll shift things around. I knew this was coming. It’s my fault for not planning better. Sooner.” But she had planned. Except she’d never planned on her father betraying her and ruining everything. “I didn’t come here to whine. We can do that over Sunday dinner.”

“I didn’t bring you in here to stall, either. It’s not like me.” Kay crumbled the pastry into tiny flaky crumbs.

Kay had never been a stress eater; rather, she destroyed food when she was worried. Sophie eyed the mangled croissant. “Okay. Now I’m nervous.”

“I don’t have the sponsorship check.”

“That’s fine.” And it was fine. Perfect, actually. Kay hadn’t announced something that Sophie couldn’t handle, like she had cancer or was moving out of state. Sophie would need to call her vendors and adjust the payment schedule, but she’d sort it out. She dropped into the high-backed leather chair across from Kay. “I can get it Monday.”

Kay leaned forward and squeezed Sophie’s arm. “I won’t have a check.”

“Won’t. That’s different.” Sophie set her elbows on the table, refusing to wilt into the chair. She was starting to hate expensive soft leather chairs. First the bank. And now here. “What happened?”

“I’m not entirely certain.” Kay crushed another bit of croissant into the napkin.

Sophie struggled to remain positive, but her hope deflated quicker than the crumbs beneath Kay’s fist.

“Pete Hampton called this morning to rescind the sponsorship,” Kay said. “But he wants you to keep the firm on the sponsorship list for next year, so it isn’t a total loss.”

“I have to get through this year before I can even consider next year.” And getting through this year was in jeopardy without one of her largest sponsors. “I appreciate that he’s the senior partner and busy, but can I talk to him directly?”

“Pete’s on the road, heading to Phoenix, then Dallas, and won’t return until the end of next week.”

That’d be too late. Sophie needed to pay the caterer and the audio-visual guy on Tuesday after the holiday weekend. Kay avoided looking at Sophie, and her shoulders dipped forward as if she’d lost her only dog in a blizzard. Sophie asked, “There’s no way to change his mind, is there?”

“That man is a mule—brilliant, but a mule all the same.” Kay tossed the napkin into the trash. “I can bring it up with him when he checks in this afternoon.”

Sophie shook her head. She didn’t want Kay to jeopardize her own position within the company. Kay needed the health insurance that covered her pregnant daughter.

“Pete mentioned that the insurance company and the wellness center have also withdrawn their sponsorship. Is that true?”

Sophie pressed into the hard cherrywood table to keep from swaying backward. She felt pummeled like Kay’s croissant: ruined and unrecognizable. The loss of two more sponsors threatened the gala’s success. She had a vision for this gala. “They are my next two stops.”

“It’ll be fine. I’m sure Pete was mistaken.” But Kay’s voice lacked conviction.

“I don’t understand. When we’d met not long ago, they were excited and willing to help with the event. Everyone believed they’d help the animals first and foremost, and also boost their brands or businesses in the process. It’s a win for everyone.” For the Pampered Pooch, Sophie was hoping the event advertising would lead to more sales and subsequently allow her to venture into service-dog training.

“Pete claimed he’d made another commitment that he couldn’t break. And he mentioned something about the first-quarter budget.”

“But he could break his word to me.” Sophie cleared her throat. “Sorry, this isn’t your fault. I wanted this to work.” She’d wanted the Paws and Bark Bash to become the premier nonprofit event in the city. She’d wanted to make a difference beyond her small store. She’d wanted to do something that mattered. Ensuring forever homes for rescues and service dogs mattered.

“And it will.” Kay pushed her chair away from the table. “You just need to find new sponsors. More committed sponsors. We’ll think of businesses to approach.”

“I approached most of the city a year ago when I started planning the gala,” Sophie said. “It was hard to get those sponsors to commit ten months ago. Now we’re less than a month before the event.”

And she was broke, aside from Ella’s eye-surgery fund and the little she had in the Pooch business account. Final payments were all due within the next few weeks. She pushed out of the chair, trying to leave her distress in the leather imprint. She still had two more sponsors to visit this morning. And her father could call back or realize his mistake or return her money. She refused to give up—at least, not yet.

“I can help,” Kay said.

“You’re here more than sixty hours a week and you have April to think about.” Sophie pressed the chair to the table’s edge, trying not to panic.

“I want to help,” Kay insisted as they left the conference room.

“I appreciate it.” Sophie walked to the door. “I’ll figure it out.”

“I’ll text you when I get home.” Kay placed her headset back on.

Sophie nodded and hurried outside. She needed to check the contracts she’d signed and reread the section on cancelations and penalties. She couldn’t handle forfeiting the 50 percent deposit she’d given the caterer and the venue. More than the lost money was the damage to her reputation and the Pampered Pooch. She’d forged relationships, given her word to service-dog breeders and foster organizations. She’d vowed to find homes for every rescue she encountered and minimize their costs with affordable vet services and discounted dog supplies.

An hour later, Sophie stood in front of the insurance corporation and stared at her distorted reflection in the silver-plated serving tray. She wanted to bash the platter against the cement wall of the building, but the dish was worth at least a hundred dollars at the silent auction. That money alone could feed a kitten like Stormy Cloud for several months.

Three sponsors lost in one day. A savings account emptied overnight. And her full-time employee on bed rest. The day was turning out to be something for the record books. She squeezed the embellished silver handles, wanting to absorb the steel into her spine, and stepped into the fog that refused to give way to the sun.

Her first encounter with the city had been on a foggy night, when she’d stepped off the passenger bus holding her sister’s hand. Her grandmother had emerged from beneath a dull streetlamp to wrap both girls in her embrace. There’d been comfort in that night such that Sophie had always welcomed the fog. Greeted the fog like a lost friend.

Except today. Today, no one was coming forward from the mist to embrace her and lie to her about everything being all right, like her grandmother had done all those years ago.

CHAPTER FOUR

BRAD TOSSED THE wrapper from his breakfast burrito into the trash and checked the time. He’d planned on returning to the Pampered Pooch after a quick breakfast, but Evelyn Davenport had texted while he was in line at the Gourmet Burrito that she wanted to meet with him as soon as possible. He’d taken his burrito to go and messaged her that he was heading back to his temporary living quarters at his friend Zack’s loft. She hadn’t arrived yet, so he took a spot on the couch and left a voice mail at Delta Craft asking for an update on the Freedom Seeker’s restoration.

Two photos filled the screen of his laptop on the steel-and-chrome coffee table. One picture was of a well-groomed, debonair man in his early fifties. The other was a woman in her late twenties with a baseball cap, ponytail, purple sweatshirt featuring a familiar paw-print logo, and running shoes. Sophie and George Callahan might dress differently, but they shared a similar undeniable charm. Sophie was the girl next door every boy wanted to ask to prom, and George was the one the accounting floor went to happy hour with every Thursday night at Mac’s Tavern—a guy’s guy and a woman’s best confidant.

People were masters at pretense: pretending to listen to their children, pretending to be committed to charity work, pretending to be good, honest citizens.

But there had been nothing fake about Sophie’s interaction with Ella, from the tenderness in the kiss she’d pressed to the girl’s forehead to the patience and understanding in her calm voice.

Brad’s mother had treated her boys like adults from the time they could crawl. The Harrington boys did not need toys—Nancy Harrington’s boys needed calendars to keep them on task, wristwatches to keep them to a schedule and foreign language tutors to keep them civilized. She’d happily listened to their Latin recitation and would never have pandered to such a nonsensical thing as pairs day.

But Sophie had given pairs day the utmost importance because it mattered to Ella. And that had touched Brad on a level he wasn’t entirely comfortable acknowledging. Sophie’s compassion hit somewhere close to that tender spot he still harbored from the morning his mother had summoned him to her sterile office to enlighten him about the truth of Santa.

She’d considered it a favor to her five-year-old son, who considered it a betrayal, a childhood robbery that stole the magic from the season. He’d bet Sophie gave Ella a Christmas full of magic, wonder and fantasy. Good thing he’d long since filed Christmas into one more retail marketing scam, or he might’ve entertained the idea of spending the holiday with Sophie and Ella, just for the experience. Not that it mattered, since he intended to be lounging on some empty beach on some forgotten island this December twenty-fifth.

A new email message from his assistant Lydia flashed on his screen. A very large sum of money had been withdrawn yesterday from the Callahans’ joint account. That wasn’t the update he’d expected on George Callahan. Fortunately, the teller at Pacific Bank and Trust was a former client of Brad’s firm, and even more fortunate was the teller’s penchant to divulge too much information.

He clicked over to Sophie’s picture. Surely she’d given George the funds so that he could pay back the money he’d stolen from Evelyn Davenport. Now Evelyn was on her way over to surely tell him the matter was closed. Brad scrubbed a hand along his jaw, pleased to be done with the case. He could install Sophie’s security system and move on, like he wanted. Like he planned.

It wasn’t as if he wanted to see more of Sophie Callahan. She’d made him lie. To his good friend and then to her. Zack had never rescued a dog, although he’d talked about it on his last trip when he’d come across the stray near a dirt airstrip. Now Brad could stop with all his pretending.

A buzzer pulled Brad away from his indigestion. Opening the front door, he greeted Evelyn.

She thrust several large shopping bags at him and wiped her knee-high plaid rain boots on the welcome mat. “This loft is smaller than I expected, but it’s much more lived in and comfortable than that last boxy, sad condo you referred to as home.”

Brad walked into the kitchen. “It’s like that because it belongs to my friend and not me.”

“I should have known.” She set a stack of three plastic containers on the table.

Brad peeked into the shopping bags and grinned at the cookies inside. “Let me guess. George Callahan returned your money with copious apologies and all is forgiven. Case closed.”

“Bradley Trent Harrington, you cut off the bulbs of all my tulips and roses in my award-winning garden when you were four years old.” Evelyn untied the thick scarf that matched her rain boots and frowned at him. “You of all people know I do not forgive easily.”

“Nor do you forget.” Brad opened the top container. “I just want to stress that I’d turned four the week before the garden incident.”

“You didn’t leave one flower intact.” She ripped a paper towel off the roll and tossed it at Brad.

“I’d discovered the power of scissors.” Brad lifted a still-warm banana muffin from the container. His mother had never baked anything, not even the ready-to-bake cookies that required only several knife cuts to complete. And now he blamed his mother for his insatiable weakness for home-baked goods.

“If only you’d stopped with the flowers.”

“It isn’t my fault Shakespeare liked to sleep away his afternoons in the garden.”

“He never left the house after his haircut.” She tightened the lid on the banana muffins.

“Shakespeare lived longer as an indoor cat. I did him a favor.” Brad laughed and lifted the muffin toward her. “If these aren’t celebratory baked goods, what are they?”

“Products of a guilty conscience.” Evelyn unzipped her raincoat and draped the down jacket over a chair. “They’re guilt goods.”

“You made a mistake. Those happen.” Brad finally sampled the muffin.

“I’m not guilty because I chose to date George. I was lonely and vulnerable and stupid. I’m working through all that.” Evelyn pulled out the tall chair at the kitchen bar and sat, her shoulders dipping forward as if she was an inflatable pool with a leak. She was definitely not acting like a woman whose retirement account had been restored in full.

Brad stopped peeling the wrapping off his second muffin and studied Evelyn. “George hasn’t contacted you, then?”

“Not even a text,” she said. “Should he have?”

If he’d intended to pay back her money. If he’d intended to make things right. If he’d intended not to be prosecuted. Apparently George Callahan had other intentions. Brad shook his head. “There are too many desserts here not to be celebrating.”

“It’s quite the opposite,” she said. “I admit I’ve tried to bake away my guilt. It seems I might’ve ruined George’s daughter’s event.”

“I doubt that.” Sophie hadn’t looked defeated this morning. She’d been determined to help the kittens and turn Ella’s day into the best one of the week.

“I’ve caused her stress.” Evelyn straightened the stack of Tupperware, aligning the containers. “If she’s innocent and not involved with her father’s schemes, I need you to fix it. If she’s like her father, then let it go.”

He set the muffin on the paper towel. The first muffin fought for space beside the burrito. Unease oozed through his suddenly full stomach. “What exactly did you do?”

“Mary Kate Hampton was waxing on about her grandkids at yesterday’s breakfast. No one else had a chance to talk. We don’t invite her often because she can occupy the entire conversation. We invited her this time because she’s dear friends with the owner of the new wellness center. The service is impeccable in their café and the manager comps our appetizers and smoothies, which is always helpful as this group prefers to eat out unless your mother is hosting. When Mary Kate finally paused to sip her Bellini, I mentioned that George had left me.”

Brad leaned back in his chair. Evelyn’s daily vocabulary did not include words that would stir up scandal. The Davenports were the only really honest political family Brad had ever encountered. Evelyn would never confess such a gossipy detail now and mar the Davenport reputation. “You told Mary Kate and the others about the money?”

“I told them George went off with a woman in her thirties,” she said. “I left out the part about George emptying my savings account on his way out the door.”

Brad broke his muffin in half. “How does Sophie fit into this?”

“George and I attended the theater league ball last autumn. George always spoke about his daughter with such pride, and he mentioned to Mary Kate and her husband that his daughter was putting on an event that would rival the theater ball and he was certain she’d accept more sponsors. After several martinis, Peter promised to speak to his partners about sponsoring Sophie’s gala.” Evelyn rose and opened cabinet doors until she found a plastic sports cup and filled it with water. Zack’s modern style didn’t yet extend to his kitchenware. “That was the last I’d heard of it until this morning when Mary Kate phoned to tell me she had Peter rescind the firm’s sponsorship. I’ve ruined Sophie’s event because I was tired of listening to Mary Kate prattle about her exceptionally well behaved, musically inclined, ‘ready to take the fashion world by storm and steal Disney acting parts’ grandkids. All of her grandchildren are under the age of four.”

Brad nodded, although he didn’t understand. The law firm could’ve pulled its sponsorship for any number of reasons. “I didn’t think you’d met George’s daughter?”

“I haven’t,” she said. “She’s protective of her niece and her situation.”

“Situation?” Brad repeated.

“The little girl is blind. Can you imagine? George’s daughter watches her while the child’s mother discovers herself. She needs to discover her parenting skills, if you ask me. A mother belongs with her child.”

Brad disagreed. He’d seen the love and affection between Sophie and Ella in the little girl’s clutching of Sophie’s hand to make her point. In Sophie’s gentleness as she’d freed the hairbrush. In the softness in Sophie’s gaze and the relaxing of Ella’s stiff shoulders with the knowledge that her aunt would make her world right again. He couldn’t recall going to his mother as a kid to fix his problems. Perhaps because he’d been too busy just trying to capture her attention. “The little girl might be better off with the current arrangement.”

“You won’t be better off without your mother.” Evelyn tipped her water cup at Brad. “No matter what you’ve convinced yourself.”

“We aren’t talking about my mother.” He pushed the half-eaten muffin aside. “We’re discussing the Callahans.”

“That’s settled.”

“What did I miss?”

“You’ll make it right if George’s daughter isn’t a lowlife like her father.”

“You want me to fund her gala?” he asked.

“I want you to ensure that gala doesn’t fail because of me. I won’t act as low as George. It’s possible he gave my money to his daughter for her event.” She dumped her water in the sink. “Bradley Harrington, stop frowning at me. I know that didn’t happen, but still, I like that thought.”

“Even if he did give the money to Sophie, which he didn’t, George still stole from you.”

“Yes, but at least the money would’ve gone to rescue needy animals and not to rescue George’s own pocketbook.”

“Perhaps the gala should fail. Perhaps you did Sophie a favor.” Brad pressed his fingertips to his forehead. He kept getting stuck on images of dogs in bow ties, drinking from crystal water bowls. Whoever heard of a dog ball anyway? No doubt it was another Callahan con job. Nobody could be this altruistic without exploding.

“No. Sophie has a real purpose for her event, beyond her own needs. With patience and guidance, it could become a premier fund-raiser. But with a few blows, like a lack of sponsors, it’ll be a mere afterthought. A might have been, like my relationship with George. No one deserves to feel like that.”

“You want me to have George Callahan arrested and help his daughter?” Brad asked.

“Exactly.” Evelyn wrapped her scarf around her neck before bussing his cheek and squeezing his shoulders like she’d been doing since he was four. Here there was the affection and trust and encouragement that Sophie and Ella shared. Evelyn continued, “I’ve provided you with ample snacks to fortify you. There’s nothing complicated about this.”

Brad felt irritation pushing away the comfort he usually found in Evelyn’s hugs. This wasn’t how his cases usually went. Not the protocol. Ever. There was an order. Steps to be taken. He’d labeled this a favor, not a case. Maybe he hadn’t been lying after all. Favors were unpredictable and often unwieldy and usually snowballed into something bigger, something more involved.

But he wasn’t getting any more involved with Sophie Callahan. Installing her security system was enough help. She was on her own with her dog ball.

CHAPTER FIVE

SOPHIE YANKED HER hair into a tight braid to keep from throwing her cell phone against the wall. Unfortunately, her older sister wouldn’t feel the impact. Tessa was thousands of miles away in India and only visible on Sophie’s phone screen thanks to modern technology and phone apps.

Sophie stared at her sister’s thin, tan face filling the screen. Tessa looked rested, relaxed, pretty even. Her lips were stained red like their mother’s, her eyes were sky blue like their mother’s and her auburn hair was full of effortless curls like their mother’s. And just like their mother, Tessa was a wanderer.

“My Yogi master suggested I stay for another six weeks to make sure I’ve fully committed to my new path.” Tessa traced her finger over one naturally arched eyebrow.

“You told me the same thing eight weeks ago.” Sophie tugged on her hair.

“No, I needed the last eight weeks to embrace my new path.” Tessa leaned into the camera. Her blue eyes were wide and clear and no longer haunted. “I need the next six weeks to commit.”

“What am I supposed to tell Ella?” Sophie asked. “I told her two months ago that you’d be coming home. It’s time to come home, Tessa.”

“I left so I could become a better mother.” Tessa leaned away, but Sophie caught the white of her teeth biting into her bottom lip. Her sister always did that when she was scared. She’d chewed her lip raw on their fateful bus ride to the city.

Tessa’s voice lowered, her words tumbling out in an urgent rush. “Mom’s voice is still too loud inside me. And you promised me that you wouldn’t let me become like Mom.”

Sophie had made that promise when Tessa had come home high and clutching a pregnancy test. But Sophie had long since stopped believing in empty words and put her faith in actions. Too often people claimed to be pet lovers, then threw away newborn kittens. Too often parents promised to return to their children, then continued moving on, sending an occasional postcard or making a quick phone call. Too often her sister said she’d put her family first and then disappeared.

But Tessa had booked her healing trip to India on her own. She’d made a plan for a new life. She’d asked for Sophie’s support. Now Sophie had to trust her sister would do the right thing.

“I need these last six weeks to become my best,” Tessa said. “You understand, right?”

“Of course.” Sophie wanted her sister to be home. To be healed. To be a parent. For once in Ella’s life, Sophie wanted Ella to have a real mother. Not a stand-in aunt, who covered for her absentee mother with constant assurances of how much Tessa still loved Ella, even after all these years. But her sister feared coming home. She couldn’t blame her. “No more after this, Tessa. You need to be here. There are decisions to be made about Ella’s next surgery. Her parent needs to sign those medical forms.”

“You have all the paperwork I signed before I left, Soph,” Tessa said. “You just have to submit it.”

“We aren’t talking about that paperwork.” That paperwork made Sophie more than Ella’s aunt. That paperwork relinquished Tessa of her parental rights. That paperwork she’d stashed in the bottom drawer of her dresser under keepsakes from Ella’s first year: hair from her first haircut, her pacifier and a milestone book of Ella’s first five years. Sophie hadn’t opened that drawer since Tessa had boarded the plane to India.

“Fine, but we need to talk about it sometime,” Tessa said. “For now, I’ll put the charges for the next six weeks on the credit card.”

Her sister wasn’t coming home and she expected Sophie to fund the extension. Sophie didn’t have the funds for the electric bill. She closed her eyes and saw only the image of her sister after she’d given birth on her supplier’s cold basement floor. Both mother and baby had barely been breathing. Sophie had vowed that night she’d do anything to keep her only family safe. She dropped her hair and let the braid unravel. “You’re supposed to be teaching classes to help cover your room and board.”

“I do teach,” Tessa said. “Just not regularly. I’ll pay you back. We talked about this before I left.”

They’d talked about many things, some irrelevant like the weather and some relevant like missing Ella’s ninth birthday. Sophie watched her sister wrap a silk scarf over her head. Ella’s tenth birthday was next month. Shouldn’t her sister remember her own daughter’s birthday? If her sister had grown as a person from her year of discovery in India, then Ella’s birthday should’ve mattered.

Sophie shook her head and prayed six more weeks was the answer to Tessa’s lack of parental inclination. “Put the charges on the credit card.”

Tessa kissed the phone screen. “I love you, little sister.”

“I love you, too.” Sophie meant those words and believed her sister did, too.

Sophie just wasn’t sure that love mattered. Love was empty without support and commitment and trust. That’s what made love a bond that lasted and endured. Sophie knew that love existed. She’d seen it with Ruthie’s parents who’d recently celebrated forty years of marriage, and now between Ruthie and Matt. It was rare and precious and magical. But only children believed in magic and fairy tales. And a childhood built on abandonment and dysfunction severed any belief in happily-ever-afters. Instead, Sophie strove for happy-for-nows.

“I have to run,” Tessa said. “Class begins in five.”

“Wait.” Sophie grabbed her phone. “Don’t you want to talk to Ella?”

“I will soon,” Tessa said. “It’s better if you tell her. You can hug her and make her smile after delivering the news. If I tell her, then we’ll all be in tears. That won’t be good for anyone. She already thinks I’m a huge disappointment.”

Tessa ended the call before Sophie could respond. Sophie stuffed her phone into her back pocket, checked the locks on the front doors of the Pampered Pooch and switched off the lights. She glanced at the boarded-up window. Brad hadn’t made it back to the store. It meant she’d get to see him again. She might’ve warmed to the idea if her sister hadn’t doused her with a cold bucket of broken promises.

The outside fire escape, with its sturdy thick wood stairs and reliable handrail connected the backyard to the third-floor apartment she shared with Ella. Sophie ran up the stairs, bypassing the empty second floor that would one day hopefully house a vet’s office. This staircase meant Ella and she never had to go outside on the front sidewalk to deal with the steel gate at their main apartment entrance and they could avoid the strangers at the bus stop four steps from their front door.

She wiped her shoes on the mat outside the back door and strode through the kitchen down the hallway. She’d planned to cook a marinara pasta dish with Ella, but her appetite had disappeared when Tessa had signed off. Just thinking about adding garlic to her too-sour stomach made her insides cramp even more.

She pressed her palm on her stomach before knocking on Ella’s bedroom door. “Hey, sweetie.”

Ella sat in the middle of a queen-size bed in a room painted pale lavender and decorated with fuzzy pillows, plump stuffed animals and a thick down comforter. It was the room Sophie and Tessa had never had as children. Ella had picked out everything to make her bedroom cozy. Sophie wished Tessa had been there. Sophie wished Tessa could see how accomplished her daughter had become. Sophie wished...

Ella pressed Pause on her CD player, drawing a smile from deep inside Sophie. These days she couldn’t order audiobooks fast enough for her niece.

“Do we have extra cotton balls?” Ella asked.

“In my bathroom.” The colored markers Sophie had found at the craft store last week covered Ella’s bed. Years ago, Sophie had taught Ella her colors through scent. Discovering scented markers had ignited Ella’s other passion besides books: art. “How many do you need?”

Ella pressed her palm against the upper corner of a poster board. “Enough to glue here for my clouds.” Then she frowned. “Or should the rainbow be above the clouds?”

“The rainbow can be anyplace you want it. So can the clouds.” Sophie touched the intricate braids that Ruthie had formed into her niece’s hair. She wanted so much for Ella to see how much she looked like a princess. “It’s your picture. Your art to create.”

“Do you think Mother will like it?” Ella asked.

Sophie’s heart stalled as if clogged by those extra cotton balls. “She’ll love it.”

“After we add the clouds and I finish the rainbow, you’ll help me write ‘welcome home,’ right?” Ella ran her hands over the rainbow arc she’d formed with thin, flexible wax strips.

The joy in Ella’s tone stole Sophie’s heart, and her throat swelled, feeling stuffed by another bunch of cotton balls. “Whenever you’re ready.”

“She’ll be home in nineteen days,” Ella said. “So I need to be ready soon.”

“About that.” Sophie sat on the bed. “I talked to your mother today.”

Ella’s hands stilled on her picture. “Is she excited to come home?”

A guardedness tightened Ella’s voice as if to protect the joy. Sophie swallowed her scream of anger. Her niece didn’t deserve this amount of pain. “She’s excited to see you.” Sophie hugged Ella, wanting the contact to be more comfort than her empty words, but knew it’d never be enough. “But she needs to stay a little while longer.”

“Then she isn’t excited to see me.” Ella dismantled her rainbow and her joy.

“Oh, sweetie, she wants to see you,” Sophie said. “She wants to be home, but she needs to finish her therapy.”

“She could do her therapy here.” Ella twisted the wax strips in her fingers.

Sophie resented that small kernel of hope in Ella’s voice. Sophie had had that same hope bubble when she was Ella’s age. Her grandmother would pop it with the harsh truth. Over the years, Sophie’s hope bubbles had shrunk in size until they were small enough for Sophie to hide in places her grandmother couldn’t poke.

Ella rushed on. “They have yoga here. I heard Taylor’s mom talking to another mom about their afternoon yoga class over on Market.”

She hated that she’d stomp on Ella’s hope now. She’d never wanted that for this precious girl. “It isn’t the same.”

How Sophie wanted it to be the same. To be that simple.

“It’s better.” Ella smashed the purple modeling clay in her fist. “Her family is here. I’m here. You’re here. There’s yoga here.”

And there was nothing else Sophie could say. She couldn’t promise Ella that Tessa would be home soon. Tessa always found a reason to delay. She’d tell Ella that her mother loved her as usual, but Sophie was too mad at her sister to spend the time to convince Ella it was true. Mothers weren’t supposed to break their daughters’ hearts. Her chest ached and her stomach tightened into knots no Yogi master could release. She’d tried to soften the hurt every time, but the pain was always there. “I’ll go get those cotton balls.”

“There’s no rush.” Ella pushed her drawing across the bed and picked up her headphones. “I’m going to finish my book.”

Ella rolled over onto her side, away from Sophie. Sophie ached. Ella ached, too. Yet no tears dampened either of their faces. But Sophie always dried Ella’s tears and teased away the disappointment. The tissues she’d shoved into her pocket before talking to Ella remained untouched. When had they stopped caring? Ella could see the truth better than most people with twenty-twenty vision. She could see better than her own mother. Sophie’s ache spread like a poison vine, strangling every bone, every vein, consuming her.

Sophie tapped Ella’s shoulder. “I’m going to change over the laundry, then we’ll figure out dinner.”

Ella nodded and covered her ears with her headphones.

Sophie carried Ella’s hamper down into the basement. She wasn’t sure if she smelled the lavender-scented detergent first before she splashed into the water. Or if the water ran into her shoes up to her ankles before the lavender coated every breath, failed to calm her and instead encouraged rage.

She did know that the ancient overflowing washing machine with soap bubbles everywhere and a waterfall streaming up and over the lid became the topper to her rotten day.

She sloshed through the water and kicked the appliance. “Clean underwear. That’s all I wanted.” She kicked the machine again. “That can’t be too much to ask.”

It was too much to ask for her father to tell Sophie about needing money. It was too much to ask for the gala sponsors to show professional courtesy and give Sophie more time before backing out. It was too much to ask for her sister to come home when she’d promised.

But clean underwear was not too much to ask.

Except, apparently, it was.

Water squished inside her shoes. The sound made something switch inside Sophie, as if she’d sprung a leak, too. Or more than a leak. A burst pipe. A broken water main. A knocked-over fire hydrant.

Ruthie had given Sophie a wooden baseball bat for protection when the Pooch had first opened. Sophie had bought one for every floor of the building as her tightened security plan met a limited budget. She grabbed the bat from the hook on the wall and descended on the washer.

Sophie had definitely had enough.

How much was one person expected to handle? She lifted the bat over her head like a club.

“Clean underwear. That’s all I requested.” She smacked the bat against the washing-machine lid. The impact vibrated up her arms, jolted through her shoulders, then splintered down each vertebra. But something aligned inside her or maybe some things finally aligned like the rage, despair, disgust and fear she felt. She smashed the lid again.

That pressure valve inside her twisted open another notch. Tears tangled with her eyelashes and splattered against her cheeks. Her attack on the washer continued.

A hit for her family’s betrayal. A crack for her pain. A series of smashes for Ella’s anguish.

Sophie hardly recognized herself, but she didn’t care. The corner of the washer crumpled beneath the bat’s assault.

“Why?” She slammed the bat against the top. Thwack. Thwack. Thwack. Added one more swing, and shouted, “Why?”

Each breath was more ragged and unsteady than the last. She set her stance, readied the bat. One last hit. Sanity threatened, but she had one final shot inside her.

“You piece of crap.” She swung the baseball bat. The front paneling caved in. A control knob flipped through the air, plopped into the water and sank. Sophie’s anger slowed to a drip as if that valve had been twisted shut. Or maybe she’d used up her emotion and was like an empty well. Either way, clarity and reason finally spilled through her: she had to deal with the water. Now.

She tossed the bat aside and dropped to her hands and knees to search for the drain that was somewhere in the middle of the room. She’d replaced the plastic drain cover after it broke several months ago. Soapy water splashed her face. One more hit of cold reality.

How was she going to fix this? She had to fix this so she could have clean underwear on when she found her father. She needed clean underwear on when she walked into Beth Perkins’s corner cubicle at Pacific Bank and Trust and paid off her loan in full in less than four weeks.

She would not be defeated by an ancient washing machine or her father.

She crawled through the suds, skimming her hands over the cement floor, keeping her search for the drain in the forefront of her mind and the panic at bay.

Sophie had been in the fourth grade when her parents had abandoned her sister and Sophie to their one-room apartment. Sophie had returned from school and found a handwritten note taped to the refrigerator where schoolwork and kids’ drawings should have hung: “If you girls are wise and careful, you can make the groceries last two weeks until we return.”

Sophie had managed the two weeks without panicking. She’d panicked on day twenty-one when all of the food was gone and her parents still weren’t home. She’d panicked on the twenty-fourth day when Ms. Dormer, her fourth-grade teacher, had knocked on the apartment door after following the girls home from school. She’d been nervous when Ms. Dormer drove her to the pawn shop to sell her mother’s gold necklace to buy the bus tickets from Tahoe City to San Francisco. And she’d worried during the first hour of the bus ride that the authorities would separate her and her sister before they’d arrived at their grandmother’s house. She’d finally contained every molecule of anxiety when her grandmother had stepped out of that fog surrounding the bus station and wrapped one thin arm around Sophie’s small but stubborn shoulders.

Sophie hadn’t truly panicked since then.

She refused to panic now. A broken washer had nothing on her past.

She’d overcome this, too. She had to for another, more important child.

CHAPTER SIX

BRAD JAMMED HIS finger against the buzzer to Sophie’s upstairs apartment. Everything remained dark inside the Pampered Pooch. The store had been closed for almost an hour. That wasn’t his concern. It was the violent thudding that seemed to be coming from Sophie’s basement. Sophie might be a con artist, but he didn’t want her hurt until after he’d discovered the truth. Even then, the thought of Sophie suffering made his skin feel a little too tight. He really had to get the woman out of his system.

Another bang vibrated the night air. It wasn’t the crack of gunshots or glass shattering. Still, he wanted inside.

This was the only access to her upstairs apartment other than the wooden fire escape at the back of the building that exited to the doggy play yard. There was an entrance to the alley leading to the yard with a back door to the Pampered Pooch and a door to the basement. This he’d learned from a quick text to Matt.

He rang the buzzer again and hit the call button for Sophie’s cell number, also supplied in a text from Matt. Her voice mail picked up. Silence ricocheted between the buildings and that doubled Brad’s urgency to get inside.

Just then a young voice echoed through the intercom. “Yes?”

Brad pressed the button. “Ella, this is Brad. We met this morning in the pet store.”

Static coated Ella’s voice. “Did you find more kittens?”

“Not this time.” Brad inhaled, forcing himself to slow his words. “Ella, where’s your aunt?”

“Hold on, Brad. Ruthie is calling and I have to answer or she’ll worry.”

Brad closed his eyes and rested his head next to the intercom, which Ella hadn’t clicked off. She exchanged a rapid series of nonsensical words that he quickly deduced was a sort of code. He admired their concern for Ella’s safety.

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