Dear Reader,

I’ve always loved the craziness of fashion, where the absurd often hangs right next to the sublime. Hmmm—kind of sounds like romantic comedy, doesn’t it? Well, how could I resist? I just had to create Gillian Caine, a fashion designer from New York City who has just been dumped and swindled by a definite Mr. Wrong. Gillian was a delight to write. She’s strong-willed, creative, independent. She’s a girl who intends to stand on her own two feet—even when they’re stuffed into a pair of pumps with five-inch heels. To add to the fun, I transplanted Gillian to Timber Bay, Michigan—the small town I first introduced in my June, 2004, Flipside, Finding Mr. Perfect. Timber Bay is the kind of place where buying a new flannel shirt every winter is considered keeping up with the latest trends—until Gillian hits town, that is!

Gillian Caine is one of my favorite creations. A real Flipside kind of girl! I hope you have fun getting to know her as she commits Random Acts of Fashion on the eccentric citizens of Timber Bay.

May the fashion be with you,

Nikki Rivers

“I want you to decorate the tree with these,” Gillian ordered

Lukas nudged the box beside him, then looked at the suspended branches in the shop window. Opening the carton, he sputtered, “These are…um—”

“Lingerie, McCoy. Now get to work!”

“Yes, warden,” he grumbled, picking up a violet camisole. He continued arranging the garments as Gillian came over to inspect his work. Not used to her closeness, Lukas tripped over the stool, lunging toward her, crashing through the tree. Bras and panties took flight like a colorful flock of frightened birds.

“Lukas?” Gillian tossed underwear aside until she found a nose sticking out of the leg of a French-cut panty.

“Are you all right?” she asked as she lifted the lingerie. “Not exactly the way it’s worn, McCoy,” she said, grinning down at him.

“Maybe you’d like to demonstrate the right way to wear it then, warden,” he replied, his mouth holding back a wicked grin.

Random Acts of Fashion
Nikki Rivers

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MILLS & BOON

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Nikki Rivers loves writing romantic comedy because she believes that laughter is just as necessary to life as love is. She also gets a kick out of creating quirky characters, having come from a long line of them, herself. Nikki lives in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, with her very own Mr. Right. She loves to hear from readers. E-mail her at RiversWrites@aol.com.

Books by Nikki Rivers

HARLEQUIN FLIPSIDE

17—FINDING MR. PERFECT

HARLEQUIN DUETS

66—A SNOWBALL’S CHANCE

HARLEQUIN AMERICAN ROMANCE

550—SEDUCING SPENCER

592—DADDY’S LITTLE MATCHMAKER

664—ROMANCING ANNIE

723—HER PRINCE CHARMING

764—FOR BETTER, FOR BACHELOR

To my sisters, Bobbi, Pat, and Judy. Thanks for the laughter, the strength, and the love—and for all those bizarre weekends at the bazaar. Yes! An ant can move a rubber tree plant!

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

1

THE BLACK PICKUP TRUCK with Timber Bay Building and Restoration painted on its side in old-fashioned gold script pulled up to the curb in front of the Sheridan Hotel. Lukas McCoy got out of the driver’s seat and slammed the door behind him.

“I should have known,” he grumbled, scowling at the workmen installing a sign on one of the storefronts across the street. “Tigers never change their stripes.”

His partner and best friend, Danny Walker, got out the passenger side. “Lukas, pal, I never noticed how fond you are of non sequiturs.”

Lukas gave Danny a look. “Hannah teach you a new word this morning over toast and coffee?”

Danny grinned. “We skipped breakfast, pal. We’re still on our honeymoon.”

Danny had married Hannah Ross at the end of the summer. Everyone said it was the most beautiful wedding that Timber Bay had ever seen. And they were thrilled that Hannah, a research sociologist who’d come to Timber Bay on a misguided mission to find the perfect American family for an ad campaign, had stayed to become one of them. But it was still a little weird for Lukas to think of Danny as being married. He’d always figured that Danny would be a lifetime Lothario. Lukas had been the one most likely of the two to settle down with a wife. Danny had been his best friend since grade school and Lukas begrudged him nothing. But damned if he wasn’t just a little jealous of Danny’s happiness. Facing that satisfied grin of his partner’s every morning was starting to get mighty old.

And now this, Lukas thought sourly as he watched the neon sign being put into place in the window of the long-empty shop that used to be known as Clemintine’s Frocks.

“The big-city princess should have known to hire a local company, at least. Haven’t they ever heard of such a thing as goodwill in New York City? Don’t they know that it’s important to do business with somebody local? And just look at that. Neon.” Lukas spat out the word in disgust. “There isn’t one other neon sign on Sheridan Road.”

It wasn’t as if Timber Bay, Michigan, didn’t have its share of neon. Ludington Avenue was dotted with it. But the Avenue had always been faster than the Road. Always. The merchants on Sheridan Road tended to keep things just as they always had been. Simple redbrick storefronts marched alongside an old-fashioned theater marquee, a Greek Revival town library and an old wooden band shell that was perched in the park along the bay.

And then there was the Sheridan Hotel. Reclusive town matriarch Agnes Sheridan had hired Danny and Lukas to renovate it. The old lady wanted it restored as closely as possible to its original glory, right down to the intricate wood carvings that Lukas was duplicating to replace sections that had rotted.

Danny slapped him on the back. “A little neon isn’t exactly going to ruin the town, pal. Why get all worked up about it?”

It was true that Lukas rarely got all worked up about anything. But this was riling him to no end. “The big-city princess finally claims her inheritance and the first thing she does is plaster neon all over Sheridan Road—and brings in outsiders to do it, besides!”

“They’re from Green Bay, Wisconsin, Lukas, not Pluto,” Danny said as he went around to the back of the truck and let down the gate. “It’s sixty miles away.”

“Still, what’s wrong with hiring somebody local? She’s gotta mar the landscape and insult the citizens all in one day? And how come you aren’t upset, Danny? You’re so all-fired excited about preserving stuff. Clemintine’s Frocks is nearly as much a fixture on Sheridan Road as the hotel is. We don’t need some spoiled city girl coming into town and changing everything around.”

“Women have a way of doing that, pal. And it’s usually for the better.”

Lukas watched the neon being fitted into place and shook his head. “Nothing good is going to come from Gillian Caine coming back to Timber Bay.”

GILLIAN SUCKED IN HER TUMMY and eased the side zipper up on her latest creation—a pair of ultraslim cosmic gray satin pants. She sighed with satisfaction. Living on liquid diet shakes for the past week had paid off. She’d lost five of the ten break-up and go broke pounds she’d gained back in New York. She lifted the filmy ruffled shirt laid out on the bed and slithered into it. Looking in the full-length mirror in the tiny bedroom of her tiny apartment above Clemintine’s Frocks, she was almost satisfied with what she saw.

Of course, it wasn’t Clemintine’s Frocks any longer, Gillian reminded herself. Along with the five pounds, she’d also shed the wooden sign that had hung over the door for the forty years her Aunt Clemintine had been sole proprietor of the dress shop on Sheridan Road. Glad Rags. That’s what Gillian’s shop was going to be called. In bright, bold pink neon. There were two workmen out front right at that very moment hanging the sign. Which was why Gillian just had to look her very best today. Her most chic. She intended to be as bright an advertisement for Glad Rags as the neon was.

She’d purposely kept a low profile since she’d arrived in Timber Bay less than two weeks ago. Behind the yellowing newspapers that covered the display window, she’d toiled day and night, wallpapering, painting and staining until even the rubber gloves she wore couldn’t protect her neglected fingernails. She looked at her hands in disgust.

“Hold on, babies,” she cooed to her chipped and ragged nails. “Once we’ve made our debut, we will find the best manicurist in town and make you all shiny and new again.” Nothing wrong that a good nail wrap couldn’t cure. But at least the rest of her was looking good.

When she’d arrived in Timber Bay she had still been a mess from the crisis in New York. A girl’s world tumbling to pieces around her tended to make for dull hair and muddy-looking skin. So while she’d subsisted on diet shakes, she’d moisturized, exfoliated, mud-packed and conditioned. She leaned in closer to the mirror, scanning her complexion with a critical eye. “Progress,” she pronounced with a smile. There were still five pounds to lose but she was looking a whole lot better than when she’d slunk out of NYC on a one-way ticket on Amtrak.

Gillian slipped an ankle-length duster that matched the pants off its hanger and put it on, drawing the deeply ruffled cuffs of the pink georgette shirt out to flounce over her hands. She struggled into the pink crocodile boots filched from what was until only recently her very own—okay, her co-owned—boutique in lower Manhattan. They were expensive enough to give Ryan, ex-partner, ex-boyfriend, and ex-decent human being, acid reflux when he realized they were missing. But Gillian had no qualms. In fact, she hoped he’d just downed a double espresso when he discovered the boots were gone and that there wasn’t an ant-acid to be had in all of Manhattan. After what that pseudo-designer and society wannabe had done to her, he was lucky she hadn’t taken him to court.

“Enough about him,” she said, turning to check out her completed look in the mirror. She smiled hugely at what she saw. There wasn’t a woman in Timber Bay under thirty-five who wouldn’t be drooling to get inside Glad Rags by the time the grand opening rolled around.

Suddenly her smile faltered, then fell into an outright frown. She had been wrong about Timber Bay in the past. What if—?

Gillian determinedly shook off the thought and the frown. Frowns turned into wrinkles. Besides, she wasn’t going to be wrong this time. This time the town was going to want what she had to offer.

They had to. Didn’t they? she silently asked her reflection. She’d win them over this time. Wouldn’t she?

“Oh, why are you starting with this old insecurity stuff now?” she impatiently asked her reflection. “It is time to exude confidence, Gillian! You are no longer a little girl needing acceptance but a businesswoman who will be fulfilling a need in the community.” And boy, if they were anything like they used to be, the women of Timber Bay had a really big need for what she had to offer. How could she miss?

Her reflection seemed to be listening to her self-inflicted pep talk. Her shoulders straightened, her chin lifted, and her mouth curved into a smile. “That’s more like it.” She tucked the large silver clutch bag she’d designed to go with the outfit under her arm and headed down the stairs and out the door.

LUKAS AND DANNY WERE getting ready to unload stacks of lumber for the hotel from the back of the pickup when Danny paused. “Well, look at that,” he said under his breath. “A princess from outer space. And I thought Halloween was almost a month away, yet.”

Lukas’s gaze followed Danny’s across the street.

The woman who had just come out the door of the dress shop was wearing something silver. As sleek and shiny as a brand-new saw blade. And she was walking on pink boots with heels as thin and long as a railroad spike. It was some walk she had, too. Lukas knew for sure that there wasn’t a woman in town who walked quite that way. She wasn’t tall, maybe five foot four, but she had a confident stride for such a shrimp of a girl. And she moved from her hips, causing the fabric of the coat she was wearing to swish back and forth when she walked. Watching her stride over to the workmen was like a compulsion. She said something to them and one of them laughed. For some reason, the sound made Lukas’s scowl deepen.

“She still looks like a spoiled big city-princess to me,” he muttered.

Danny shrugged. “I guess that must be how they dress in New York City.”

“Yeah, but this isn’t New York City,” Lukas muttered. “No one around here is going to buy that kind of stuff. Now let’s get this truck unloaded.”

ACROSS THE STREET, Gillian tipped the workmen generously, trying not to calculate how much closer she was going to be to broke because of it. One of the lessons she’d learned from Ryan—besides the need to watch her back—was that you had to look successful to be successful. Money attracted money like lint to black cashmere. Nobody liked to associate with failure. Ryan had always said that looking needy was worse than looking nerdy.

She waved as the workmen drove off, feeling suddenly and absurdly alone. As the truck turned the corner at the Town Square and disappeared down Ludington Avenue, it felt like her last contact with the outside world had been broken. In a way, she supposed, she was like the pioneer women who helped settle the west. Instead of trails forged over mountains or through deserts, she was going to be forging a trail through the closets of Timber Bay, bringing style instead of civilization.

Yes! That was it! A pioneer woman of fashion. She suddenly felt a whole lot better. She also felt hungry—for some real food for a change.

“Time for this pioneer woman to go on a little scouting trip,” she murmured to herself as she scanned the street for a sign of someplace to eat. Maybe a nice juicy—

“Mmm, yum,” she said under her breath when she looked across the street. Two very juicy guys with a truck. Not exactly what she had in mind, but—

“Oh, swell,” she groaned when she got a better look at them.

She hadn’t seen either one since they were boys, but she recognized them all the same. Maybe because they were together, just like they’d always been all those summers so long ago. That was Lukas McCoy squatting in the back of the pickup truck. And the other one, the one grinning at her, was Danny Walker. Walker used to tease her mercilessly about wearing the same outfit as the doll she’d always carried around with her. McCoy, who’d been a big, quiet kid, would just sort of scowl at her. Just like he was scowling at her right now.

There had been plenty of kids in Timber Bay who hadn’t liked her. But of all of them, McCoy had been the worst. Not that he’d ever said anything. In all the years she’d come to Timber Bay as a child to visit Aunt Clemintine, she’d probably only heard his voice once or twice. But it seemed to her back then that he smiled at everybody else almost all the time. He had these big dimples and they flashed all over the place like the lights in Times Square. Unless, that is, he was looking at her. She seemed to be in some weird no-smile zone as far as he was concerned.

Apparently, from the look on his face, she still dwelled in it.

As a shy little girl her defense had been to stick up her nose and pretend he wasn’t there, but she wasn’t that girl anymore. Recent events had toughened her up even more. This time, she decided to meet his disapproval head-on. She decided to cross the street.

When she was halfway across, McCoy started to stand up. And up. Gillian’s step faltered and slowed as he unfolded and jumped down off the back of the truck.

He was nearly as tall as the dress shop and almost as wide. The scowl hovered on his still boyish face but there was no mistaking the shadow of the dimples on either side of his mouth. With that huge, grown-up body, those blond cherub curls falling over his forehead and that smooth boyish face, a smile would have been enough to make her trip and fall flat on her face. Gillian decided for once that maybe she was glad to be in the no-smile zone.

It occurred to her that she still had time to sort of swerve in her crossing and avoid his orbit altogether, but what the heck. If she could take on Manhattan, she could take on this block of disapproval, as well.

Briefly the thought intruded that she’d lost miserably at taking on Manhattan, but she squashed it down again with the ring of her spiked heel on the cracked pavement of Sheridan Road. She hadn’t lost anything—she’d been robbed. Manhattan had been stolen from her, along with her share of the boutique, by her conniving ex and a boney-bottomed lingerie model turned scanty-panty designer. But this small-town giant didn’t know that—and neither did anyone else in Timber Bay. And as long as she dripped confidence, style and flare, they never would.

As she neared the other side of the street, Gillian decided it wouldn’t hurt to take advantage of the three extra inches the curb offered by stepping onto it. She might as well have dug herself a hole to stand in for all the good those three inches did her. Not to worry, she was used to making up for her shortcomings with bravado.

“I see you’ve still got your sidekick with you, huh, McCoy?” she asked, with a cocky New-York-City-girl tilt of the head as she looked up at him.

The giant just scowled down at her.

“I don’t get kicked that often anymore, though,” the other one, Danny Walker, said as he held out his hand. “Welcome back to Timber Bay.”

“Well, it’s nice to know that one of you has learned some manners, at least,” she said, taking his hand.

“Some of us grew up okay,” Danny said.

“And some of you just grew, I see.”

Lukas knew he was coming across as an oaf. He knew he should be smiling at the lady and making nice. After all, hadn’t he just been going on to Danny about “goodwill”? But the big-city princess had always managed to tie his tongue just by looking at him when he was a kid and it looked like nothing much had changed in that department.

As a boy, he used to think she looked like she belonged on top of a fancy birthday cake. She was always dressed in something as light, fluffy and sweet as frosting. She’d been so small with a mass of ash-colored hair hanging down her back and a pair of eyes that looked like they were seeing the world a whole lot differently than anybody else saw it. She still had those eyes. Big. Pale gray irises with dark rings around them. Like the eyes on greeting-card kittens. He’d gone tongue-tied the first time she’d fastened them on him. All he could do was stare. She turned out to be no kitten, though, that little girl from the city. The cat had turned out to be a brat. A snooty, spoiled little girl who didn’t like to get dirty and never went anywhere without her doll.

A sudden breeze off the bay lifted her hair and blew it across her face. It was the same ash color he remembered but cut just above her shoulders now, straight and slick as the skeins of silk yarn his mom embroidered with. She whipped it out of her face with a toss of her head and asked, “Can either of you boys point me in the direction of a decent sandwich?”

This was it, thought Lukas. An opening. Sweet Buns, his sister’s coffee shop, was right next to the Sheridan Hotel. Who better to give her the scoop on the place? He opened his mouth, but it felt like he’d walked through a dust storm without a bandanna and nothing came out. As the seconds ticked by, Danny kind of cleared his throat as if to nudge Lukas on. When Lukas tried to lick the dryness from his lips he discovered that his tongue had gone missing.

Finally, Danny started to tell Gillian about Sweet Buns himself. And he was doing it entertainingly enough to get a little giggle out of the girl from New York City. Danny never had any trouble being clever with the ladies. Lukas wished he could think of something clever to say but the longer he stood there, stoically silent, the harder it was to say anything at all—never mind clever.

“I’ll move these boards,” was all he could finally come up with. He cringed at the lameness of it. And maybe that was why, when he grabbed the small stack of one-by-fours, his grip didn’t quite close around them and they went clattering to the sidewalk, grazing the toe of one of Gillian Caine’s pink, spike-heeled boots in the process.

She squealed and jumped back, then fixed him with those gray eyes while she stuck her nose into the air. “Is that how you welcome all the new girls to town, McCoy, by nearly crippling them and skinning their shoe leather?”

When he said nothing—and how could he with his mouth full of a brand-new load of sand—Danny swooped in to soothe her and make sure she was okay. Lukas knew he should apologize, but if he couldn’t get a word out before he had almost buried her feet in lumber, he sure couldn’t spit out any words now.

“You sure you’re okay?” he heard Danny ask once again. “I’m fine, thanks. You’ve been sweet. But your friend here could obviously use some help in that area. Do the town a favor and don’t let him volunteer for the welcoming committee,” she said before turning in a swirl of glittering silver and heading down Sheridan Road toward Sweet Buns.

The compulsion still with him, Lukas watched her walk away.

GILLIAN MARCHED INTO Sweet Buns and stopped dead.

“I think I’ve just found civilization.” She closed her eyes and took a deep, long breath in through her nostrils. The aroma nearly made her swoon.

The young woman behind the counter laughed. “Sounds like we have a new coffee addict in town.”

“If it tastes as good as it smells, you’ve got yourself a customer for life.”

“Regular or decaf?”

“I’m from New York City.” Gillian slid onto a stool at the counter. “What do you think?”

The woman laughed again and poured her a cup of regular. Gillian lifted it to her mouth and took a sip. “Mmm. This is heaven. I never dreamed I’d find a cup of coffee this fantastic so far from Manhattan.” She took another swallow, then held out her hand. “I’m Gillian Caine, by the way.”

“Yes, I know,” the woman behind the counter said as she shook Gillian’s hand. “You used to visit your aunt. I’m Molly. Molly Jones.”

Gillian shook her head. “I’m sorry, but I don’t think I remember you.”

“Oh, we weren’t friends,” Molly quickly added.

Gillian rolled her eyes. “Big surprise. I wasn’t exactly the most popular girl to come to town. Hopefully,” she added with a nervous little laugh, “that will change, considering I’m reopening my aunt’s dress shop.”

“Is what you’re wearing an example of what you’ll be selling?”

“Yes, it is. I designed it myself.” Gillian stood up and gave a little twirl. “What do you think?”

“It’s incredible. But—”

“Ma-ma!”

“Oops. Sorry. My little girl is paging me. Be right back.”

Molly disappeared into the kitchen and Gillian picked up her coffee cup and strolled around the restaurant. The place was kind of cute with its green gingham curtains and tiny oak tables. Quaint. And the coffee was excellent. When she saw that the beans were sold by the pound, she resolved to buy some to take back to the shop. She was going to be up half the night again, working. On nights like this one was going to be, coffee was a girl’s best friend.

In fact, she could use another cup right now. After a few minutes of waiting for a refill, Gillian followed the sounds through the kitchen, out the open back door and into a small fenced-in yard. Molly was bending over a little girl with blond curls and the face of a little angel.

“She’s gorgeous!” Gillian exclaimed. “What’s her name?”

“This is Chloe. Chloe, say hi to Gillian.”

Chloe babbled something incoherently adorable. “Oh, she’s so sweet!” said Gillian. “How old is she?”

“Fifteen months. Be careful where you walk, it’s a little muddy out here from the rain yesterday.”

“Oh, I hope you don’t mind that I came out here. I could hear the two of you just babbling away and I thought that since I’m going to be practically a neighbor it’d be okay for me to join in on the girl talk.”

Molly lifted Chloe out of the playpen. “No, of course I don’t mind. I apologize for abandoning you like that. This is a slow time of day for Sweet Buns. I’ve got a few high school girls who help out when it’s busy. Now that Chloe is walking, she gets a little restless penned up sometimes.”

She put her down on the grass. Chloe immediately went toddling off toward the fence at the back of the yard. The child had excellent taste, Gillian thought. Beyond the fence and across a small sand beach, the bay glittered in the late September sun like the two-carat tanzanite Gillian had seen in the window at Tiffany’s.

“It’s beautiful out here,” Gillian said. “You should offer al fresco dining.”

“Someday, maybe,” Molly said. “When Chloe’s older and I have more time to devote to the business.”

Gillian had a million questions to ask about how business was and what the peak hours were at the department store down the street, but the sound of Chloe squealing in delight grabbed her attention. The little girl was toddling with rather alarming speed toward her, gurgling happily about something and waving her little fists up and down.

“She’s absolutely, seriously adorable,” Gillian gushed, truthfully. Not that Gillian wasn’t capable of gushing untruthfully if it might be good for business. But she really did think Chloe was cute.

As Chloe tottered closer, Gillian squatted down and held out her arms to welcome the little cherub. “Come on, Chloe,” she cooed. “Come to—”

Chloe squealed, drew back her fisted hands, and let them fly. It turned out that Chloe’s little fists hadn’t been empty.

Splat!

Gillian’s mouth dropped open as mud spattered all over her trousers.

“Chloe!” Molly yelled. “Oh, my gosh! I can’t believe she did that! I’m so sorry!”

Chloe giggled and ran back for more mud.

Before she could reach the puddle again, Molly scooped her up and deposited her back into the playpen.

“Gosh! I can’t tell you how sorry I am, Gillian. Is it washable?”

Gillian looked at Molly like she’d just spoken a foreign language. “Washable? Of course it’s not washable!”

“Oh. Well, then, I’ll pay for the dry cleaning. I’m just so sorry.”

Gillian could see that Molly really was upset, and besides, Chloe was seriously adorable. And it wasn’t like Molly had actually invited her into the backyard. Gillian was really sort of trespassing. “Don’t worry about it, Molly,” she finally said. “It’s not your fault. I’m like a walking disaster area today. This is my second accident. See that scuff on my boot? This big blond giant working at the hotel dropped a load of lumber on me.”

“Um—blond giant?” Molly asked.

Something about the way Molly sounded made Gillian look at her. That’s when she noticed the resemblance. Molly was tall and large-boned with blond hair and warm brown eyes.

“Don’t tell me—Lukas McCoy is your brother.”

Molly nodded. “Jones is my married name. Gosh, now I feel even worse. The McCoy family hasn’t exactly given you a warm welcome, have they?”

“Don’t be silly. You’ve been great. Your brother, however. Well—he was a bit churlish.”

“Lukas? Wow, that’s not like him.”

Gillian already knew that but she saw no point in trying to explain the no-smile zone to Molly.

“Now that I know Lukas ruined your boot, you really have to let me pay for the suit.”

“Don’t be silly. When the mud dries, it’ll probably brush right off.”

Molly bit her bottom lip. “You really think so?”

Gillian grimaced. “Uh—no. Probably not. But I don’t want you to feel bad about it, okay? Really.”

“Well, let’s get you something to eat on the house, at least.”

She followed Molly inside and sat on a stool at the counter while Molly made her the most delicious chicken salad sandwich she’d ever tasted.

“Why is this so fabulous?” she asked as she took another bite.

“It’s the apricot chutney,” Molly answered.

“This sandwich almost makes it worth the mud pie appetizer.”

Molly laughed. “I’m glad you think so. But wait until you have a sweet bun.”

“Oh—no. I couldn’t.”

“Sure you can! I’ll get you another cup of coffee, too.”

Despite her protests, when Molly set the frosted cinnamon bun in front of her, Gillian just had to taste it.

As soon as she took the first bite, she knew that a scuffed boot and a mud-spattered suit weren’t her only problems. Losing the next five pounds was going to be next to impossible—unless she stayed away from Sweet Buns.

“I’M TELLING YOU, Mother, it’s like the McCoy clan has set out to destroy me. This morning that big lug Lukas McCoy nearly dropped a truckload of lumber on my feet. He absolutely ruined those crocodile boots. Then his niece, who is seriously adorable I might add, threw mud all over one of my best designs. And then his sister, Molly, introduces me to the most incredible cinnamon buns I have ever tasted.” Gillian paused to swipe her finger over the frosting on the bun Molly had insisted on sending home with her along with a pound of coffee. With the best intentions, she was planning on saving the bun for breakfast. The temptation was killing her.

On the other end of the phone line, her mother laughed. “Don’t be so dramatic, Gilly. That last one doesn’t exactly sound like an act of destruction.”

Gillian finished licking the frosting off her finger before answering, “That last one could prove very destructive to my waistline.”

“You worry too much about your weight, Gilly.”

Gillian sighed and swirled her finger into the frosting again. She had long resigned herself to the fact that her girl-hood dream of being a model would never come true. She was too short—by model standards, anyway. Five foot four. And both her bottom and her top were far too curvy to ever strut her stuff on the runway. But she had certain standards to maintain. “When you’re a housewife in New Jersey, Mother, a couple of pounds isn’t going to make a difference. Like the PTA is going to care? But in the fashion industry—”

“In the fashion industry there should be someone who designs for women with fannies and breasts, Gilly. I bet there are a lot of women with fannies and breasts in Timber Bay who would be willing to buy—”

“Mother, if you say cute little housedresses or caftans I swear I will scream.”

Bonnie Caine laughed. “I doubt even the women in Timber Bay still wear housedresses, Gilly. I just think that instead of starving yourself so you can wear what you design, you should design stuff for women who eat more than fruit and carrot sticks.”

Gillian looked longingly at the cinnamon bun as her finger hovered above what was left of its thick white frosting. If this kept up, the poor thing was going to be naked come morning.

“Mother, my mission is to influence the fashion sense of women who think Chanel is something you get on your television set. How can I possibly do that if I become one of them?”

“My darling daughter,” her mother said in a dryly amused tone, “I don’t think there is any danger of that ever happening.”

Gillian decided not to rise to the bait of her mother’s teasing. “How’s Binky?” she asked instead.

Her mother filled her in on the health and welfare of Binky, the family’s twelve-year-old golden retriever, and then on her brothers—all four of them. Then her father butted in on the basement extension and told her, yet again, how he was glad that Ryan was finally out of her life but how he still wished she would have dragged that SOB into court and taken him for everything he had. After he filled her in on the latest skirmish at the boilermakers’ union, everyone said goodbye.

As soon as Gillian hung up the phone she felt a stab of homesickness. Yet when she’d gone back to the little blue-collar New Jersey town where she’d grown up after being jilted and swindled, she’d felt less like she belonged there than ever before. She no longer belonged in Manhattan, either. But Timber Bay?

She wandered over to the window in Aunt Clemintine’s living room and looked down onto Sheridan Road. It was late afternoon and the setting sun had streaked the clouds with pink and gold. The Road was bustling with people heading home for the day. Across the street at Sweet Buns, Molly was turning the sign hanging in the door around to read Closed—probably getting ready to go upstairs with little Chloe for the evening.

“Chloe,” Gillian groaned out loud. Mud pies! Served all over the outfit that was supposed to be the centerpiece of her Pastel-Metallic collection. The duster was salvageable. But the pants were a mess. Which meant that Gillian had better get back to work.

As soon as she ran down the stairs and through the door that led to the workroom behind the shop, she felt at home. As much of a misfit as she’d been as a kid, she’d always felt completely comfortable in the back room of her aunt’s dress shop. Aunt Clemintine had taught her all she knew about garment construction. They’d spent wonderful, happy hours together, making clothes for Gillian and her doll. Her family was blue collar and money hadn’t exactly been growing on trees, but Gillian, thanks to Aunt Clemintine, had dressed like a million bucks.

But it wasn’t only the clothes, it was the attention that made her love to visit Aunt Clemintine so much. Back at home, she was the middle child, crowded on both sides by two younger and two older brothers. So around their house it was jock central. Her parents were loving and wonderful, but a little girl who didn’t like sports pretty much got overlooked and out-voiced. Aunt Clemintine, a childless spinster, gave Gillian a place to be safe while she discovered who she was and what she wanted to be. And what she wanted to be was as different as she could possibly be from anything like home.

Unfortunately, as Gillian grew older, Aunt Clemintine and the dress shop got lumped in with everything that Gillian wanted to leave behind. When Aunt Clemintine had died a few years ago and left Gillian the shop, Gillian was touched. But she could just never see herself claiming her inheritance and taking up residence in Timber Bay.

Now she didn’t know how she could have stayed away as long as she had.

The workroom welcomed her warmly, just as it always did. The little puffy calico pincushions scattered about the workspaces. The smell of new cloth, not yet handled or wrinkled. She ran her hand over a bolt of ivory silk and closed her eyes at the feel of it. By the time she opened them, she was smiling again.

The workroom was exactly where she needed to be right now. And not just because she still had clothing to finish before the opening, but because hitting the streets of Timber Bay for the first time hadn’t turned out as she’d hoped and talking to her mother and father had left her a little lonely.

“Come here, you gorgeous piece of goods, you,” she purred to the bolt of silk as she picked it up. “I think tonight is your night to become Cinderella.”

Several hours later, the ivory silk was sliding over her head and floating down her body. Gillian ran out to the dark shop, switched on the light, then closed her eyes as she made her way to the triple mirror near the dressing room, her arms out straight, palms extended. She’d played this scene over and over again as a little girl. She used to be able to find that mirror walking blind. Her outstretched palms hit the cool glass and she smiled. She’d gone right to it.

When she opened her eyes, she was still smiling. The dress looked spectacular. The front neckline draped low enough to show just a hint of décolletage. The back dipped even lower—nearly to her waist—and ended in a flirty bow. The bodice was fitted and the calf-length skirt was full and fluttery. Grace Kelly meets the twenty-first century. Exactly the effect she had been going for.

Gillian stood on tiptoes to try to envision how the skirt would fall if she was wearing high heels, then remembered that she’d brought down a pair of silver strappy sandals the night before. She scampered around the shop till she found them in a corner, then went back to the mirror.

Perfect.

“You are going to look so terrific in the window,” she told the dress. “With that vintage faux pearl jewelry. And maybe a soft pink wool stole to go with the neon sign. Or a cloak. Pink cashmere.”

She pursed her lips wryly and shook her head at her reflection. Talk about dreaming big.

“Well, pink something,” she told herself, refusing to let the price of cashmere ruin the moment. Pink like the Glad Rags logo and sign.

And that reminded her. She hadn’t yet seen the new sign after dark. Gillian threaded her way through unpacked cartons, naked mannequins and hatless hat stands, to the front door. She unlocked it and went outside.

There it was, glowing across the display window in lovely pink neon. Glad Rags. The sight of it put a huge grin on her face and made her twirl around in delight. Quickly, she looked around to make sure there were no witnesses to her less-than-sophisticated display of girlish goofiness.

Not a soul in sight. Different from Manhattan as silk from corduroy. Yet she felt hopeful for the first time in months. Gillian was nearly giddy as she ran across the street to see what the sign looked like from farther away. Maybe it was the air. It was crisp and pure with a tang of water in the wind. The hotel blocked the bay from sight, but she could still hear the waves faintly. Still feel the presence of it on her skin. She started back across the street but paused midway to look up at the sky. So many stars. Even when she was a kid in New Jersey, there hadn’t been so many stars in the sky. She picked out the brightest one and closed her eyes.

“I wish,” she whispered….

That’s when she heard the noise—quickly followed by the feel of the ground beneath her feet shifting jerkily.

And the next thing she knew, she was flying through the air.

She put out her arm to break her fall and felt the jar of the impact all the way up to her shoulder. She grimaced as her palm scraped against the concrete. For a minute, everything went out of focus and then her sight cleared and she saw the dark bulk of a man emerging from the concrete.

“I promised to make you a Cinderella,” she murmured to the silk that seemed to have turned into a cloud around her. “But that doesn’t look at all like Prince Charming.”

He looked more like some sort of beast who made his home in the bowels of the earth. He kept rising and rising and rising, and it was making Gillian dizzy as hell to have to look up so high. Or was it the pain that suddenly shot through her arm when she tried to move? Either way, Gillian did something she’d never done before.

She fainted.

2

ABOVE THE NOISE of the manhole cover clattering to the street, Lukas heard another sound. High-pitched. Like a woman’s squeal.

“Did you hear that?” he asked the big orange tabby cat that was tucked under his arm. The cat flattened its ears and growled. Lukas let go of it and it shot off into the darkness. He hoisted himself out of the manhole and looked around.

The night was clear and crisp, the sky thick with stars. He turned slowly around, trying to remember what he’d learned as a kid about astronomy. All he remembered was that nothing looked like it was supposed to. The names made no sense to him at all. Except maybe the Big Dipper. He could always find that. Tonight it seemed full of stardust.

“You’re getting fanciful, Lukas. You better watch that,” he muttered to himself as he dragged the manhole cover back into place. He straightened up and that’s when he saw it. Something lying in the street. Something as bright and shimmery as a heap of stardust fallen from the sky.

When the heap of stardust moaned and shifted slightly Lukas went closer and found himself looking down at the body of Gillian Caine.

He sucked in his breath, then hunkered down next to her. “Gillian,” he said softly, touching her on the shoulder. She didn’t move. He found the pulse in her neck with his fingers. Oh man, was she soft. And her heart felt like it was beating pretty good, too. She moaned again and he snatched his fingers back. Her eyes stayed closed so he touched her hair for no good reason at all except that, there, just outside of the circle of light from a street lamp, it looked like it was shot with silver. She moaned again and her lashes fluttered.

“Gillian?” he repeated.

She smiled a little this time. A small, sweet smile. In fact, the princess looked altogether sweeter when she was passed out cold than she had when he’d seen her that afternoon.

She was wearing a pale dress made of something silky. It floated around her, settling in the swells and hollows of her body, and fluttered out around the curves of her calves. Her shoes were worthy of a princess, too. Glittery silver with tiny straps and skinny heels that were made out of something as transparent as glass.

“Gillian?” Still no response. He frowned. Shouldn’t she be coming to by now? He looked around the street. All the buildings were dark. Even the windows above Sweet Buns where his sister lived were dark. Molly must have already gone to bed. Timber Bay Memorial was only a mile or so down Ludington Avenue. Lukas figured he could get Gillian to the hospital himself in less time than it would take him to rouse Molly, use her phone, then wait for an ambulance to come.

Carefully he started to gather Gillian up in his arms. She felt so small. A wounded helpless creature. As he started to lift her, his nose brushed her neck. The scent of her shot through him like a craving. The urge was strong to bury his face in the soft crook of her neck. Just for a moment, he told himself.

“Who are you and why are you sniffing my neck?”

Lukas pulled his head back quick enough to give himself whiplash. He knew his face must be flaming.

“Lukas McCoy,” Gillian mumbled fuzzily. “I should have known.” She looked around, still obviously in a daze. “What am I doing in the middle of the road?”

Before he could answer, she started to get up and moaned loudly.

“Ohh—my arm. What happened?”

“Near as I can tell, you must have been standing on that manhole cover over there when I—”

Gillian gasped. “Now I remember! You were that beast who came up out of the concrete and sent me sailing into the air, aren’t you? What is it with you McCoys, anyway?”

“What does that mean?”

She shook her head. “Oh, never mind. Just help me up.”

Lukas helped her struggle to her feet.

“What were you doing, anyway?” she asked. “Lying in wait, hoping to get a second chance after your earlier attempt at crippling me failed?”

“Hey—that was an accident,” Lukas said a little bluntly—more bluntly than he should have. The bright idea of Gillian Caine being wounded and helpless was definitely losing its shine.

“Tell that to the thousand-dollar pair of boots you ruined. And I suppose this was an accident, too. Just you crawling out of the sewer after a day of Dungeons and Dragons?”

“I was down in the tunnel of love to—”

Gillian shot him a sharp look with those huge gray eyes. “The tunnel of what?” she asked him, scrunching up her nose. “Did you say the tunnel of love?”

Lukas hadn’t meant to say that. He felt foolish enough for knocking her flying and the knowledge that he’d wrecked a thousand bucks’ worth of leather wasn’t sitting too well, either. He didn’t relish the idea of trying to explain the legend of Timber Bay’s tunnel of love to the princess when she was acting more like the wicked queen. “Look, maybe we better see about getting you to a doctor,” he said as he took her gently by the other arm.

“I don’t need a doctor,” she said, pulling away from him and jostling her wounded arm in the process. “Ow!” She grimaced. “Okay, maybe I do need a doctor.”

“My truck is right across the street. I’ll take you.” Lukas didn’t know much about body language, but Gillian made it clear she didn’t want his help getting across the street. It was kind of amazing, really, he thought as he followed her to the truck, that she could walk like she did on a pair of heels like that after she’d just been out cold. She made it look as if balancing on three inches of acrylic was the most natural thing in the world.

He opened the door for her and tried to help her in, bumping her shoulder in the process.

“Ow!” she said again, as she shot an angry wounded look at him with those big gray eyes.

“Sorry,” he said as he dipped his head. “I guess I can be kind of a bull in a drugstore.”

“China shop,” she said.

“Huh?”

“Bull in a china shop. You said drugstore.”

“Oh—that’s because when I was twelve I was kind of big for my age and there was this sort of pyramid of perfume bottles stacked up on the counter at Ludington Drugs and one day I went charging right into them, breaking every last one. The whole town square smelled like lavender water for a week. Ever since then—” He gulped, wishing he’d stayed tongue-tied. She was looking at him like he’d gone around the bend. Which he must have because here he was standing in front of the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen and rattling on about his damn clumsiness after he’d just given her a demonstration of it by busting up her arm.

“Look,” she said. “I’m sure this folksy charm works on all the local girls, but I’ve got the disadvantage here of being in pain. Let’s save your life story for after I’m medicated, okay?”

Lukas clamped his mouth shut and managed to help her up into the truck and shut the door without jostling her again. When he went around to the other side and got in, the cab was already full of the scent of her skin. It tied his tongue up all over again. Good thing, too. Otherwise, the big-city princess might have managed to bite it the rest of the way off.

GILLIAN FUMED as the truck turned onto Ludington Avenue. Her arm was killing her and the big lug wasn’t even going to bother saying he was sorry. She looked at him out of the corner of her eye. Make that big adorable lug. That tousled hair the color of pale honey that fell over his fore-head in loose curls. That snub nose and small, sensual mouth. On another man it all might have looked wimpy. But on top of that big body, it just made him look like a small-town Tarzan. No—make that lumberjack. He worked with wood. She knew that much. She could smell it on him and there was sawdust on the plaid shirt he wore tucked into jeans that hugged his massive thighs and made his—

Gillian blinked. What in the name of Vogue magazine was she thinking? Well, she was thinking about what big, hard-looking thighs he had and about what they might feel like if she just reached out and…

This time she blinked and bit her lip at the same time. She deliberately jarred her arm just so she could feel the pain and remember that she had no business whatsoever ogling Paul Bunyan’s thighs.

“Are you all right?” he asked when she gasped in pain.

“No, I am not all right. Thanks to you,” she added testily, reminding herself that he still hadn’t said he was sorry for what he’d done. “I just hope you’ve got your checkbook with you.”

He glanced her way. “My checkbook?”

“This,” she indicated her arm, “is all your fault and you’re paying for the emergency room.”

“Of course I’ll pay. And I’ll give you the money for those overpriced boots, too. But no way am I taking the complete blame this time.”

“Um—reality check. You are completely to blame.”

“You were the one standing out in the middle of the street. They teach you to do that out there in New York City? Cause we don’t teach kids in Timber Bay to stand out in the street much.”

“It’s the middle of the night. Who knew it wouldn’t be safe to cross the street?”

“You weren’t crossing, you were standing.”

“I mean—” she went on as if he hadn’t spoken “—who knew that a giant prowled under the streets of Timber Bay at night and that there was always the danger of him just breaking through the damn concrete whenever he felt like it—no matter who was standing there?”

As far as Lukas was concerned, she was being totally unreasonable. “You were standing on a manhole. I’m a man. You gotta expect these things sometimes.”

“That is totally insane. I was safer in the streets of New York than I am here. First you throw a pile of wood at me—”

“That was an accident!”

“Then your niece ruins a few hundred dollars’ worth of cosmic gray metallic satin—”

“Chloe? Chloe ruined that silver thing you were wearing?”

“Cosmic gray,” she repeated through clenched jaws. “And yes. She ruined it when she decided to serve me mud pies.”

“Hey, Chloe is a sweet kid but she’s not even a year-and-a-half old yet.”

“So what’s your excuse?”

“Listen, princess, I said I was sorry—”

“What did you call me?”

“Princess.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Ha. Did I strike a nerve, princess?”

“I told you not to call me that. And no, you did not.”

“No, I did not what?”

“You did not say you were sorry. Not even once.”

Hadn’t he? Lukas ran over the past minutes in his mind. He must have said he was sorry. But as he pulled into the hospital parking lot and drove around back to the emergency entrance, he honestly could not remember apologizing.

He parked, got out of the truck, and went around to the passenger side to open the door for Gillian. He helped her out as carefully as possible. He could see it cost her some to let him. He had the feeling that at this point she’d rather kick him in the shins with her silver slipper than take his arm.

As soon as the electronic doors swooshed open and let them inside the hospital, Gillian was swept away. He paced while he waited for her to fill out forms and answer questions. He thought he’d get to talk to her when she was sent to the waiting area, but she’d no sooner sat down than a nurse came out and got her. Slow night, apparently, in the E.R. Lukas had never wished for other people to have bad fortune in order that he might get something he wanted, but he sure could have used a little laceration, or a broken toe maybe, so he’d have enough time to apologize to Gillian. Because she’d been right about that, at least. He hadn’t apologized.

What was the matter with him? Lukas never, ever argued with women. Oh, he and his sister Molly tussled like all brothers and sisters, but as far as other women went, Lukas was pretty easygoing. So what had gotten into him tonight? Gillian could have a broken arm and it was all because of him. He remembered how her face had grimaced in pain, and felt ashamed for arguing with her when she was hurt. His mom would skin him alive if she knew.

As he always did when he was bothered by something, Lukas pulled out the piece of wood he kept in one pocket and the knife he kept in the other and sat down in the waiting room to whittle. He knew from the night Chloe was born that the hospital staff wasn’t crazy about having shavings all over the waiting-room floor so he mostly just worked on smoothing out the lines of the chess piece he was carving. When he heard the click of high heels on tile, he looked up to see Gillian coming down the short corridor between the treatment cubicles and the waiting room. Her left arm was in a sling. Oh, man. His heart swelled when he saw it. It must be serious. And it was his fault. And he hadn’t even said he was sorry.

He got up and started toward her. “I—” he began.

“You,” she said, sticking out her good arm, palm up like a traffic cop, “don’t come one step closer.”

She sailed past him and was nearly to the exit doors before he got his wits about him.

“Wait! What did the doctor say?”

She turned around. “It’s sprained, McCoy, that’s what he says. My arm is sprained. I have to keep it in this—this sling. And he says it’ll be a couple of weeks before I can fully use it again. A couple of weeks, McCoy. I don’t have a couple of weeks. I’ve got a boutique to get ready to open. Now how do you suppose I’m going to be able to do that with only one arm?”

She started for the door again. He couldn’t let her get away without apologizing.

“But—wait! I’ll drive you home. I want to—”

“I called a cab. There is no way I’m getting that close to you—or any other member of your family—ever again,” she called over her shoulder just as the doors slid closed.

Lukas ran to catch up to her, but by the time the doors opened again and he hurried outside, the cab was already pulling away.

“OW!” Gillian exclaimed when she stuck herself in the hand with a seam ripper for the fourth time. “This is impossible,” she grumbled, throwing down the cosmic gray satin pants. She’d been hoping that she could salvage the pants because there was just enough of the fabric left to replace the front where Chloe had served her the mud pies, but with one arm in a sling, the seams had ended up looking like the sewing machine needle was going for Olympic gold in the slalom race. She’d assumed that it would be easier to rip out a seam than sew one. But despite the fact that she was right-handed and it was her left arm in the sling, it was still remarkably hard to do anything one-handed.

Gillian finally gave up on the pants and started to unpack the ready-to-wear lingerie she’d ordered. Some of the items needed steaming. She was able to do this pretty well with one hand, but it did nothing to lighten her mood. The silky slips, the gossamer gowns and robes, the lacy bra and panty sets, just made her more aware of the fact that there was going to be more lingerie in the shop than there was going to be Glad Rags by Gillian. She could have wept with frustration. Glad Rags was supposed to showcase her own designs, not those of already established lingerie designers who didn’t even need the measly sales they’d get in Timber Bay, anyway.

After what Ryan had done to her, Gillian had only been able to put one foot in front of the other by chanting living well is the best revenge like a mantra every time the blues threatened. For weeks she’d sustained herself on the image of women flocking to the door of Glad Rags as soon as she unlocked it on the opening day of the Harvest Festival and Sale. She had even done the heretofore unheard-of and toned down her styles for Midwestern tastes. But that hadn’t been sacrifice enough to appease the gods of failure because now her dreams of success—her meager dreams of revenge—were disappearing faster than tickets to a hit Broadway musical. And all because of Lukas McCoy.

A stream of too-hot mist hissed out of the steamer, nearly hot enough to melt the fine lace edging on the camisole she was working on. “Easy, Gilly,” she said, “it’s Lukas McCoy you want to melt, not this exquisite lace.”

Abruptly, she stopped moving the steamer up and down. Had she said melt? Nonsense. Gillian started steaming again. Stopped again. Had she? Well, if she had, she told herself, what she’d meant to say was fry. No, that was the electric chair. Burn? Hmm. Well, certainly not melt. Melting implied all sorts of gooey feelings. And she wasn’t feeling gooey at all towards McCoy. She had no intention of getting all gooey over any man ever again.

Nor did she have any intention of steaming one more garment that she hadn’t designed herself.

Not today, anyway.

Gillian went upstairs to Aunt Clemintine’s apartment to make a pot of coffee. As soon as the aroma drifted up from the coffeemaker, she wished she had one of Molly’s cinnamon buns. Sweet Buns was just across the street. She could hop over there, get a bun, and come back before the coffee was even done brewing. But Molly was a McCoy. And it wasn’t safe for her to go near a McCoy.

She took a cup of coffee into the living room and prepared to chill out by doing some channel surfing. Aunt Clemintine’s taste had run to overstuffed chintz, Italian porcelain flower arrangements, and numerous other girly bric-a-brac that Gillian had loved when she was a little girl. It was so feminine compared to her parents’ house which had been overrun with boy stuff and decorated chiefly with anything that wouldn’t break easily or show dirt.

Gillian opened the doors to the antique armoire that contained a little television set, then got comfortable on the overstuffed sofa. But when she reached for the remote control, it wasn’t on the coffee table. Or the end table. It wasn’t anywhere. It took her five minutes of searching before she realized that the only innovation Aunt Clemintine had embraced after 1952 had been polyester fabric. Her TV didn’t have a remote. It didn’t even have color. Gillian ended up sitting crossed-legged on the floor close enough to the set to reach out and change the channels manually.

The soaps were no fun in black-and-white because you couldn’t really enjoy the clothes. She stopped at a courtroom show—one of those half-hour things where a smart-aleck judge badgered and humiliated the stuffing out of either the defendant or the plaintiff—or sometimes both. Not Gillian’s idea of happy viewing. She reached out to change the channel when something the female plaintiff said caught her attention.

“It’s his fault, Your Honor, how was I supposed to deliver pizzas after he wrecked my car? I got no earnings—he should be made to pay.”

The judge, a feisty-looking middle-aged woman, asked some questions, listened to the answers, and then lashed into the male defendant like her tongue was a cat-o-nine-tails. The defendant tried to defend himself. The judge shut him up. By the time she threw the book at him and made him pay damages and lost wages, Gillian was up on her feet cheering.

“Damn, that felt good,” she said, nearly out of breath with sisters unite blood lust. And then it hit her.

Maybe she should sue Lukas McCoy.

She started to pace the small living room.

Could she?

Should she?

Would she?

Gillian could feel her adrenaline pumping at the thought of having her day in court. Oh, she really wasn’t out for blood. She didn’t want to ruin McCoy or anything. She just wanted enough money to be able to afford to hire someone to be her left arm until it healed. She’d been too big a wimp to do anything about what Ryan had done to her. But that didn’t mean she had to go on being a wimp, did it? She didn’t want to continue allowing men to screw up her life and livelihood, did she?

“Absolutely not!”

She marched over to Aunt Clemintine’s little phone stand and picked up the Timber Bay phone book. “I’ve got more numbers than this in my Rolodex,” she muttered as she flipped through the slim volume until she found the yellow pages. All eight of them. She located the listing for lawyers and picked up the phone.

LUKAS WAS SITTING on the railing that surrounded the marble terrace at the back of the Sheridan Hotel. It was one of those perfect late September days when the leaves on the trees had started to turn but hadn’t yet started to fall. They rustled in the wind off the bay—a last gasp of energy before the colder winds of October put them to rest on the ground. Climbing roses that had been allowed to go wild were still blooming and there were clusters of deep-gold mums, some of them almost as big as shrubs, bordering the low wall that ran down to the water. He could hear the rhythmic lap of the waves against the ramshackle pier.

If things went the way Agnes Sheridan wanted them to, by next summer the small pier would be restored and there’d be boats docked there. The roses would be tamed and there would be people sitting on the terrace. Wealthy, worldly people.

People like Gillian Caine.

“If only I’d said I was sorry,” he mumbled.

“What’s that, pal?”

Lukas started at the sound of Danny’s voice, then quickly collected himself. “About time you got back with my lunch,” Lukas said, figuring a little grousing would make Danny forget that Lukas hadn’t answered him.

“Here ya go.” Danny tossed Lukas a bag from the lunch counter at Ludington Drugs. “Tuna salad on white bread and an order of fried chicken. Interesting combination.”

Lukas easily caught the bag. He rummaged inside and came out with the sandwich. “Did you tell Clara to put cheese on the tuna?”

“Yup.”

Lukas unwrapped the sandwich and started to tear it into little pieces.

Danny groaned. “Don’t tell me you found another stray?”

Lukas set the wrapper down at the top of the steps and called, “Here, Tiger, Tiger.”

A huge clump of mums started to rustle. A moment later a cat emerged—the same one he’d rescued from the tunnel. The big, lazy-moving orange tabby had a scar on his nose and half his tail was missing. He prowled over to sniff the sandwich, gave Lukas a look of appreciation, then delicately started to eat.

Danny laughed. “Cat knows a good thing. Clara uses only albacore down at Ludington’s. By the time you get around to buying cat food, that cat is gonna turn up his nose at it.”

“You can tell just by looking at him that he’s been through a lot. He’s got a little luxury coming,” Lukas said as he bit into a chicken leg.

“Next thing you know, you’ll be going over to Sweet Buns and getting him a slice of cheesecake.”

Lukas laughed. What Danny said wasn’t so far-fetched. Lukas had been rescuing things all his life. As recently as last month he’d coaxed a wounded squirrel with macadamia nuts filched from the larder at Sweet Buns that, Molly never stopped reminding him, weren’t exactly cheap. He regularly climbed trees to fetch cats and helped old ladies cross the street. Heck, he’d even rescued Danny from a bunch of bullies back in grade school. They’d been best buddies ever since. Lukas had a reputation of being an all-around good guy. So how come he’d acted the way he had with Gillian Caine?

“You know, buddy, I did a really stupid thing the other night,” Lukas said to Danny.

“Stupider than feeding a stray cat a three-dollar sandwich?”

“Afraid so. I was down in the hotel’s wine cellar measuring for the new fittings, when I thought I heard a cat yowling in the tunnel. I checked it out and, sure enough, Tiger here was trapped down there. He was kind of spooked—clawing the hell out of me—and I remembered how when you and Hannah were trapped down there you got out through a manhole onto Sheridan Road. So Tiger and I took the same shortcut.”

Danny shrugged. “What’s so stupid about that? Don’t tell me you had trouble pushing that cover aside. If Hannah could do it—”

“Oh, I could push it out of the way all right, no problem. Trouble is, I sort of pushed more than the manhole cover out of the way.”

Danny wrinkled his brow. “What else did you push?”

“Gillian Caine. She was standing on the cover and she sort of went airborne.”

Danny started to laugh.

“It’s not funny, Danny. She sprained her arm. I had to take her to the E.R. and she’s got to wear a sling and I didn’t even say I was sorry.”

“Well, that’s not like you, pal. You’re the polite type. You even manage to be nice to Dragon Lady Sheridan.”

“Danny, I gotta tell you, I feel really lousy about this. She looked so little and helpless laying there in the street—”

“Gillian Caine helpless?”

“Maybe I should send her some flowers or something. What do you think?” Lukas asked earnestly.

Before Danny could answer, Tiger gave a growl worthy of a canine and both Danny and Lukas turned to see what he was tracking with his yellow stare. A man in a suit was standing in the open French doors.

“Which one of you is Lukas McCoy?”

Tiger bolted back into the mums as Lukas wiped his fingers on a paper napkin and stood up. “I’m McCoy,” he said.

“Then this is for you.” The man handed Lukas some papers and rapidly retreated.

“Hey, wait!” Lukas called to his back, but the guy just kept going.

“What’s with the papers?” Danny asked.

Lukas looked down at them. It took him a few moments to comprehend what he was reading. “Unbelieeeeevable!” He thrust a hand into his hair and started to pace the terrace while he read it again just to be sure. “Un-damn-believable.”

“What is it?” Danny asked.

Lukas looked up. “Gillian Caine is suing me.”

Danny whistled, long and low. “I guess it’s a good thing you didn’t order those flowers yet, huh, pal?”

“I do hope,” said a familiar voice from just inside the French doors, “that this doesn’t mean that my grandson was right about the two of you.”

“Mrs. Sheridan,” Lukas said with surprise. “Did we have an appointment? How long have you—um—”

“Been standing here?” the old lady finished for him. “Long enough to know that someone is suing you. Long enough to make me wonder if I’ve made a mistake.”

Danny hopped to his feet. “You know nothing about what’s going on, so if I were you—”

Lukas stepped in front of Danny, cutting him off both literally and figuratively. “What you just heard, Mrs. Sheridan, had nothing to do with Timber Bay Building and Restoration. It’s me getting sued. Not the company.”

Danny poked his head around Lukas. “Not that it’d be any of Gavin’s business either way.”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” Agnes Sheridan said with a haughty thrust of her head. “Gavin is coming back to Timber Bay.”

Behind him, Danny swore and Lukas tried to cover it up with a cough. “That’s—um—swell, Mrs. Sheridan,” he said after he’d cleared the imaginary frog in his throat.

The old lady’s black eyes glittered and her thin, usually stubbornly set mouth, actually smiled. “It’s what I had hoped. That once work started on the hotel, Gavin would take an interest and reclaim his life in Timber Bay.”

“Don’t tell me he’s coming home for good?” Danny asked. “One can hope, Mr. Walker.”

“Yes,” Danny agreed. “One can.”

Lukas was pretty sure that Danny and Agnes Sheridan weren’t hoping the same thing. He’d feel safer if he separated the two of them.

“Mrs. Sheridan, why don’t you let me show you the progress I’m making in the lobby. I think you’ll be pleased with the way the staircase looks.”

“Lead on, young man,” she said. But before she went through the French doors she turned and gave Danny a poke in the leg with her cane. “I suggest you get on with your lunch, Walker. I assure you that Gavin won’t take this sitting about on the job any better than I do.”

Danny opened his mouth but before anything could come out, Lukas took the Dragon Lady by the arm and ushered her into the ballroom, closing the French doors behind them.

Danny and the Dragon Lady had been enemies for years. Things had gotten better since Hannah, who Agnes Sheridan totally approved of, had hit town. But now that Gavin was coming back, Lukas was going to have his hands full as a peacemaker. The last thing he needed right now was to have some big-city brat take him to court.

He’d been right. Nothing good was coming from Gillian Caine being back in Timber Bay.

“THE HEARING IS TOMORROW, Mom,” Gillian said into the phone receiver.

“Justice moves swiftly in the Midwest.”

“They’ve got this judge who takes care of several counties and he’s only in town once a month. How primitive is that? My lawyer—who, by the way, I had to go to the next town to get—said that if we didn’t get on the docket this time, we’d have to wait a whole month.”

“Are you sure you’re doing the right thing, Gilly?”

Gillian sighed. “What are you trying to say, Mom?”

“Well, as I remember it, the McCoys were well liked in Timber Bay. The town might not take too kindly to an outsider taking one of their own to court. Have you thought of what it might do to business?”

“Mom, I’m not planning on taking him to the cleaners. I just want enough to hire someone to help me for the next couple of weeks.”

“But, honey, I already offered to come out and—”

“Forget it, Mom. We’ve been through all this already. I need to do this on my own. I need to be totally independent.”

“You don’t have to prove anything to anyone, Gilly.”

Her mother was wrong. Gillian had to prove something to herself. She had to prove that she could be her own person and not have to count on anyone coming through for her ever again. If she failed, she’d have no one to blame but herself. And if she succeeded, no one could ever take it away from her.

“Can’t you just be supportive, Mom? I mean, Dad keeps saying that he wishes I hadn’t let Ryan off the hook. You should be jumping up and down with joy. I finally think Dad was right about something. I shouldn’t have let Ryan get away with it. I’m not making that mistake again.”

“But, Gilly, it’s not the same thing at all. In fact—”

Gillian was picking at a fingernail and mostly tuning her mother out when she heard a knock on the door downstairs.

“Mom, someone’s at the door,” she said, sending silent gratitude to whoever it was for getting her out of this conversation. She loved her mother, but she had heard it all before. “I’ll call you after court tomorrow. Kisses to everyone,” she added as brightly as possible. “Bye!”

She hurried downstairs and through the workroom to the back door. But when she opened it, no one was there. Sitting on the cement stoop was a wicker basket covered with a green-and-white gingham napkin. She recognized the napkin, but even if she hadn’t, she would have known that Molly had left the basket. Gillian could smell the cinnamon buns that were lurking beneath the gingham.

A bribe.

She snatched the basket up, shut the door and locked it behind her.

The smart thing would be to leave the basket downstairs in the workroom. Or better yet, out in the shop. Less temptation that way.

On the other hand, it was an old building. It wouldn’t do to encourage any rodents that might have designs on the place—make them think they were going to be able to stop in for a midnight snack.

She decided that she better take the basket upstairs with her, after all. That didn’t mean she was accepting the bribe, though, she told herself, climbing the stairs. She was a big girl. She could certainly resist a couple of cinnamon buns.

When she put the basket on the small drop-leaf table in the kitchen, she noticed the note tucked inside. With two fingers she carefully pulled it out, trying not to disturb the napkin and have to actually look the bribe in the eye. Or in this case, in the frosting.

I thought you might feel funny about coming into Sweet Buns so sweet buns are coming to you. Sorry again for the mud pies. Molly.

“Mud pies. Huh—yeah, right,” Gillian muttered. The basket was an obvious attempt to sweeten her up and make her drop the suit. She wondered how many cinnamon buns Molly thought it would take to buy her.

Well, she could just keep wondering because there was no way she was lifting that napkin and looking underneath.

Stoically, she marched into the bedroom. There were several outfits laid out on the canopy bed Aunt Clemintine had gotten for her the summer she’d turned six. Gillian was still trying to decide what to wear to court the next day.

“Something feminine, yet strong,” she murmured.

That left out the pink polka-dot suit with the ruffled hems.

“Something strong, yet sympathetic.”

That left out the black shantung tuxedo with the sheer tailored shirt and her witty take on a men’s club tie (diagonal rows of pink poodles against an aqua background).

“Something—” Well, above all something that would go with her sling. Which, she supposed, would be the black sleeveless sheath with the little turquoise capelet. The only problem was that it was very, very formfitting. But she had just lost five pounds.

When she tried it on, it fit beautifully. She didn’t even have to hold her tummy in—much. And it barely hurt her arm to put it on.

“Perfect,” she pronounced as she looked in the mirror. Whoever invented those diet shakes should get the Nobel or something. She had missed chewing, though. The sensual feel of food actually in her mouth. Hmm. And that reminded her. She hadn’t had any dinner yet. She’d picked up a salad at the supermarket and it was waiting in the fridge. She peeled out of the dress, hung it up and headed for the kitchen.

Was it her imagination or had the basket from Sweet Buns gotten bigger? Gillian ignored it and went to the fridge. She grabbed the salad, wrestled off the plastic cover and dug in.

“Oh, yum,” she muttered with her mouth full. “Iceberg lettuce and hothouse tomatoes.”

She kept forking into the salad but her stomach kept right on growling. Or was it the siren song of the cinnamon buns she kept hearing over the crunch of a woody radish?

Gillian eyed the basket. It would be such a shame to waste those buns. And didn’t carbohydrates help induce sleep? She started to reach for the basket, then drew her hand back. But, if the buns really were a bribe, did that mean that if she ate one she’d be accepting the bribe?

She picked up the note and read it again.

There really was no mention of Lukas, or the court case, at all. And she was, after all, owed some sort of payment for the pants that adorable Chloe ruined. Just a little carbohydrate to soothe the nerves. It’d be the healthy thing to do, wouldn’t it?

She pulled back the napkin. Six large buns, slathered with thick frosting, were nestled oh-so-beautifully in another gingham napkin. It was more than Gillian could stand.

Just one, she thought. One wouldn’t hurt.

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